A young woman gets a chance to meet her supposedly dead husband after taking a job as a housekeeper in the home of a rich old lady.
“This is Carl Jung’s mailbox, I can’t answer right now, but please try again later.”
It was the fifth time that Gloria Jung had called her husband, who worked at a logistics company. He had left in a hurry that morning after being called for a sudden delivery.
Gloria began to worry when her husband didn’t come home.
The couple had returned from their honeymoon two months ago, and her husband, who was the only one of the two working, had returned to work while she took care of their home.
They still felt like newlyweds, but they had been friends before they got together, so they knew each other well enough to know that something was wrong.
“I’ll be back by noon,” Carl had said in the morning as he got dressed.
“You have to, we have the doctor’s appointment to talk about our family planning,” she reminded him.
Gloria knew she shouldn’t worry; her husband always kept his word. But as the afternoon came, she became unsure.
Three hours later, she decided to call him, but only his voicemail came on. She waited another hour and tried again, but a call from an unknown number interrupted her before she could dial.
“Yes? Who is this?” she asked.
It was a policeman with bad news; her husband had been killed in a car accident caused by a truck driver.
“He died at the scene, but his body was taken to the hospital. I’ll give you the address,” he said, “my condolences.” Then Gloria was alone with her thoughts.
“This can’t be,” she whispered to herself repeatedly as she tried to reach his cell phone.
“You can’t be dead!” she screamed and burst into tears.
She remembered the words of the policeman, quickly packed her things, and drove to the hospital he had told her about.
Carl lay in a closed casket at the funeral.
Carl lay in a closed casket at the funeral, and afterward, Gloria began to mourn him. It was hard for her because she had loved her husband very much.
We had so many plans, Carl!, she cried herself to sleep one night as she thought about their shared dreams. How could you leave me all alone?, she asked herself, although she knew her deceased darling could have done nothing to prevent his fate.
The widow mourned for months and lived off her savings. After a while, however, she realized she needed to work to survive.
Finding work was very difficult for Gloria because most of the open positions were for men; but finally, she found a job as a housekeeper in the home of a rich old woman named Judith.
“The tasks are simple,” the old woman said, “I pay decently if you help me keep the house clean and sometimes cook for my son.”
“No problem, good lady, I just need a list of his preferences.”
“He loves chicken, no matter what form,” the woman chuckled amusedly.
“Really? My late husband also loved chicken,” said Gloria, feeling the now bearable sting she always felt when she thought of Carl.
Gloria did not get over the death of her husband.
Gloria got the job and started early the next day. She took the matter seriously and left the house at sunrise.
Had she not done so, she would have missed what was happening in the woman’s driveway. She saw Judith walking through the garden with a young man.
“That must be her son,” Gloria thought as she watched them.
She followed them quietly out of curiosity and was amazed as Judith led the man into another building that had once been a warehouse.
As Judith noticed that Judith was staring at her, she quickly led the man into the building and closed the door – she always did that when she noticed the stares of her employees or other people.
But by then, Gloria had already recognized that the man looked exactly like her late husband. She clapped her hands over her mouth as the door slammed shut.
What kind of game is this?, she whispered as her head raced. Am I just imagining it?
She could not be sure it had been Carl after the brief glance, but his walk, his hair color – it was enough for suspicion.
Gloria would have given anything to find out, but out of respect for her boss and for fear that she had imagined it all, she went back to the main house and started cleaning while her thoughts spun in circles.
Judith quickly locked the door as she led the man into the building.
Did I hallucinate? Oh.. I miss him so much, she thought.
She did her best not to think about the outbuilding where Judith and the man had disappeared while she gathered the courage to ask the old woman about him as soon as she returned.
“Was that your son?”, she asked Judith when she returned a few minutes later.
“Yes. Do you know him?”, Judith replied defensively.
“Oh, I doubt it – he just looks so much like my late husband Carl,” Gloria said, forcing back the tears.
Judith looked sad at the answer and walked away without a backward glance, assuming Gloria would follow her.
They walked through the study, which among other things had a large secretary. In the first drawer was only a wedding ring that looked like the one Gloria had at home.
“I found him next to a burning car a few months ago, he was barely breathing,” Judith confessed. She confessed how lonely she had felt when she found Carl, who had suffered memory loss after the holiday. “I nursed him and when he asked about his identity, I told him I had given birth to him and gave him a new name.”
Gloria wondered if she had imagined it all.
“Please, let me see him!”, Gloria pleaded. “He might be my husband!” Then she left the room because she knew she couldn’t talk further without bursting into tears.
Judith followed her. “I’m sorry, I can’t allow that. Because if he’s your husband, you’ll take him away from me and I’ll be alone again. Sorry, but you’re fired,” Judith said and stormed away.
And so Gloria lost her job. But she had regained something important instead – hope. The love of her life might still be alive and she wouldn’t give up until she knew the truth.
I’m sorry, Judith, but he might belong to me, she said to herself and hatched a plan. If he can’t remember the past, I’ll jog his memory.
The following day she returned to Gloria, but the old lady was home, so she couldn’t gain access to the outbuilding.
Day by day she came back until one afternoon when Judith wasn’t home and Gloria was able to sneak into the house where the man had disappeared.
Gloria had lost her job, so she hatched a plan to win back her husband.
“Who are you?”, he asked as soon as he saw her. “Why am I happy because you’re here?”, he wondered aloud, confused by his feelings.
Gloria’s tongue was paralyzed and she could only cry, now having confirmation that her husband was alive.
“I’m your wife!”, she finally sobbed.
She told Carl what had happened and the story shocked him. He tried to grasp everything and noticed Gloria’s earrings; it was a pair he had given her for an anniversary.
“Gloria…”, he muttered as he remembered her name and the word triggered a whole wave of memories.
On the day of the accident, he had picked up a stranger hitchhiker. They had talked when a drunk truck driver came off the opposite lane and caused chaos on their side of the freeway.
Carl couldn’t avoid it and his car was totaled. He remembered how he had crawled out of the car after the accident and discovered the body of the stranger in the passenger seat. Then he passed out and Judith found him.
Gloria sneaked into the building.
“You must have buried the stranger in my place”, he sadly realized, “if I hadn’t picked him up, he would still be alive.”
“It’s not your fault, darling”, said Gloria.
Then Judith suddenly returned. Before she could say anything, Carl announced the good news to her: “Mom, I found my wife!”
Gloria wanted to tell Carl that Judith was not his mother, but she changed her mind when she saw the tears in Judith’s eyes. Since Carl had originally been an orphan, she played along.
It took a few weeks before Carl’s memory fully returned and he remembered that his mother had died decades ago. But by then the bond between him, his wife, and Judith had already been established.
They and Carl visited the old lady regularly and took care of her. When Judith died, she left them her villa.
Gloria was overjoyed to be back with her husband.
What can we learn from this story?
Grief is no excuse. Gloria lost her husband who had provided for her, so she no longer had a source of income. To survive, she used her savings while planning his funeral and mourning him. When the time came to look for work, she managed to pull herself together and leave the house instead of sitting inside and crying, even though it had only been months since she had lost Carl.
Do not repay evil with evil. Judith had fired Gloria to keep her secret, but in the end it came out. After that, Gloria could have revealed that Judith was not Carl’s real mother, but that would have caused pain to both sides. So she kept it to herself and in the end they were rewarded by the old lady.
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