“The doctor gave me only 3 days to live, and my wife smiled beside my bed: ‘Finally, everything will be ours.’ My stepdaughter took the keys to my classic car, but I pretended to be asleep, pulled out my phone, and called the driver who had been with me for 30 years...
never imagining what I had recorded.” “The doctor gave him three days,” Amber whispered beside the bed. “Finally. As soon as he d:ie:s, the house, the accounts, and the company will be mine.” “And I’m keeping the sports coupe,” Ruby, her daughter, replied.
“I can already picture myself driving it all the way to Miami.” Calvin Buffington remained motionless, his eyes closed and his breathing heavy. The pa:inki:llers allowed him to pretend he was asleep, but he heard every word.
At 66 years old, he had built one of the most successful nurseries and landscaping businesses in Atlanta from nothing. Forty years earlier, he had owned only a rusty pickup truck, a few tools, and Barbara, his first wife, who had sold her jewelry to buy their first trees.
Together, they had also restored a classic sport car, ivory-colored with cream leather seats. Barbara used to say that old cars had souls, as long as someone cared for them with love. When she d: ie:d 9 years earlier, Calvin kept the car covered for almost 2 years.
Sitting behind the wheel felt like hearing her laughter inside the garage all over again. Then he met Amber at a charity dinner. She seemed kind, attentive, and admired hardworking men. They married a year later.
Ruby, already an adult, entered his life asking for help with credit cards, trips, and failed business ventures. Calvin paid, avoided arguments, and convinced himself that this was how he built a family. Until that afternoon in the hospital.
The CT scan showed an unusual mass in his liver, along with a severe infection. Dr. Robert Gable was cautious. “We need a biopsy. It could be serious, but I’m not going to make a diagnosis without the results.” “Speak clearly,” Amber demanded.
“Could he di:e this week?” “In the worst-case scenario, his condition could deteriorate within a few days.” When the doctor left, Amber smiled. Then she adjusted Calvin’s blanket, gently touched his forehead, and said the words that finally broke something inside him.
Later, she and Ruby stood in the hallway discussing selling apartments, throwing away Barbara’s old sofa, and having a cheap funeral. Calvin clenched his teeth until they hurt. That evening, Elias Herrick arrived.
He had been Calvin’s driver for 30 years and was the friend who had slept at the hospital when Barbara d:ie:d. He brought a thermos of atole from his wife.