I swear I didn’t mean to follow him. It wasn’t premeditated or anything—I just had this gut feeling. One of those strange, unshakeable instincts that grabs you by the ribs and won’t let go.
Mark left that morning without kissing me goodbye. No “have a good day,” no coffee ritual, no half-joking grumble about traffic. Just a mumbled “I’ve got meetings,” and the door closing behind him like a final punctuation mark. That wasn’t like him. He’s predictable in all the ways you grow to love someone for. So the change hit me like cold air in July—wrong, out of place, impossible to ignore.
I tried to shake it off. Really, I did. I told myself he was probably just stressed, probably tired. But by 11:30, I was in the car, driving without really knowing where I was going until I found myself parked across the street from Leona’s Café—the little spot on Sycamore where he used to take our grandson for pancakes.
And there he was.
My sixty-two-year-old husband, in a clean polo I hadn’t seen in weeks, seated at a table on the patio like he was hosting a lunch meeting. Espresso in one hand, planner in the other.
And directly across from him, perched like a furry little gentleman, was Cheddar. Our golden retriever.
I blinked. And blinked again. Cheddar sat upright on the chair, front paws resting on the tablecloth. A tiny ceramic dish was placed in front of him like a formal setting. Mark leaned in, eyes soft, talking to him—animated, expressive, completely focused.
And I’m sitting there in the car, heart doing gymnastics in my chest, thinking: Is this endearing? Or completely bonkers?
But then I saw it.
Tucked beside Cheddar, folded neatly under a napkin, was the green notebook.
That notebook.
The one Mark had started writing in after… well, after we lost Mason.
Cheddar’s “journal,” he called it once, jokingly, when he left it out on the counter by mistake. “Cheddar’s been keeping secrets,” he said, snapping it shut before I could ask questions. I didn’t push. I should’ve. But grief makes you delicate with each other. Like touching old glass—you don’t know what will crack, or when.
I sat frozen. My stomach turned with a strange cocktail of dread and confusion. Because I knew what that notebook held. And I knew—deep down—that it wasn’t about the dog.
It was about Mason.
Our grandson.
The sun felt too bright as I stepped out of the car, shielding my eyes like I was walking into a dream. I crossed the street before I could change my mind.
Mark didn’t see me until I was practically at the table.
“Hey,” I said softly, my voice cracking on the single word.
He flinched like I’d slapped him. “Wendy. What are you—?”
I looked down at Cheddar, who wagged his tail slowly, like he was in on some secret I wasn’t. Then I looked at the notebook.
Mark followed my gaze, and something shifted in his face. The polished surface cracked. He looked… caught. Ashamed.
“I’m sorry,” he said, barely above a whisper.
I slid into the chair next to Cheddar. “You don’t have to be sorry. Just… tell me.”
He looked away, jaw tight. “It started with the therapist,” he said eventually. “You know, Dr. Raines. She said I needed to talk. To write. But I couldn’t. Not to people.”
He glanced at Cheddar. “So I talked to him.”
I stayed quiet. Sometimes silence is the only kindness you can offer.
“I brought him here once, a few months ago,” Mark went on. “I didn’t even mean to. I just… I walked. And ended up here. At the café. Where we used to bring Mason.”
His voice caught.
“He’d always run ahead to see Cheddar. Wouldn’t even say hi to us first. Remember that?”
I nodded. God, I remembered. That little boy with the mismatched socks and a laugh that echoed off walls. He would drop his backpack the moment he saw the dog and fall into him like home.
Mark reached for the notebook, running his hand over the cover like it was fragile.
“I started writing to Mason. Through Cheddar. It sounds crazy, I know. But it helped. Like I could still talk to him, you know? I’d write what I wanted to tell him. Updates. Thoughts. Stories I remembered.”
He paused. “Sometimes I’d ask Cheddar what he thought. It was stupid. But it made me feel… connected.”
Tears burned behind my eyes, but I swallowed them down. “It’s not stupid,” I said.
We sat in silence, just the three of us—me, my husband, and the dog who’d somehow become a bridge between the living and the lost.
“I didn’t tell you,” Mark said, “because I thought it would hurt you. Remind you.”
I touched his hand. “Mark. Everything already reminds me.”
He smiled sadly. “Yeah. Me too.”
He opened the notebook and pushed it gently toward me. “Do you want to read one?”
I hesitated. Then nodded.
The page was dated April 2nd.
“Hey Mase. Cheddar got into the trash again today. Just like that time you dared him to lick the whipped cream can. I swear he remembers that. I can still hear you laughing. I made your favorite pancakes this morning. Didn’t even burn them this time. Mom would’ve been proud. I miss you. Every damn day. But I’m trying. I really am.”
I wiped my cheek with my sleeve.
It wasn’t insane.
It was grief.
It was love wearing strange clothes, showing up in odd places—a sidewalk café, a green notebook, a golden retriever perched like a therapist in fur.
I looked at Mark. “Let’s make copies.”
He blinked. “What?”
“Of the notebook. For us. And for Mason’s parents. Maybe even for his school library. They have that grief support shelf now, remember?”
He stared at me, unsure.
“We’ve both been drowning,” I said. “You found a lifeline. Maybe someone else can too.”
He smiled, watery but real. “You really think people would want to read this?”
I reached over, scratched behind Cheddar’s ear, and laughed through my tears.
“I think people need to. God knows I did.”
Later that week, we scanned the pages, typed some of them up. Added a foreword. We even named it Cheddar’s Table: Letters to Mason. It wasn’t meant to be a book, but people started sharing it. First in our grief group. Then in parent circles. Then online.
And suddenly, something broken had been repurposed into light.
If you’ve ever lost someone and found yourself talking to the wind, or to your dog, or to an empty chair—know this: you’re not crazy. You’re surviving.
One page at a time.
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