Dear Diary,
When I was thirteen I learned how to hide both hunger and embarrassment. My family was so strapped that most mornings I walked to school on an empty stomach. During break, while the other kids took out apples, biscuits and sandwiches from their bags, I pretended to be reading, lowered my head, and tried not to let anyone hear the quiet growl of my stomach. Yet the pain I felt was not just from lack of food, but from loneliness.
One day a girl noticed. She said nothing; she simply placed half of her lunch on my desk. I flushed, ready to refuse, but she just smiled. The next day she did the same, and the day after that again. Sometimes it was a slice of cake, sometimes an apple, sometimes a scone. To me it felt like the whole world had been handed over. For the first time I sensed that someone saw me, not just my poverty.
Then she vanished. Her family moved away and she never returned to the school. Every day I stared at the doorway, halfexpecting her to walk in, sit beside me and say, Here, take this. The doorway stayed empty. Her kindness, however, stayed with me. It settled deep inside.
Years passed and I grew into a man. Occasionally I recall her, a reminder of the miracle that once rescued a bleak day. Yesterday time seemed to stand still. My daughter came home from school and asked, Dad, could you make me two sandwiches for tomorrow? I was taken aback. Two? You usually cant even finish one, I said. She looked at me seriously and said, One is for a boy in my class. He didnt eat today. I shared my lunch with him and froze. In her gesture I saw that same girl again the one who once gave me a piece of her bread when the world was silent.
Her kindness never died. It traveled through the years, through me, and now lives in my child. I stepped onto the balcony, gazed at the grey sky, and tears slipped down on their own. In that moment I felt everything hunger, gratitude, hurt and love. Perhaps that girl has long forgotten me, perhaps shell never know how she changed my life, but I will always remember. One good deed can echo across generations. And today I am certain: as long as my daughter shares her bread with another child, kindness endures.
