“I’m trying to save you from being used.”
“We also passed through hard times,” Sandra said quietly. “You remember when we could not even afford stock for this place. You remember when we begged suppliers to give us goods on credit.”
Doris’s jaw tightened. “Yes, I remember. But we worked hard. We didn’t sit down outside people’s shops and make suffering a lifestyle.”
Sandra glanced at the man again. His shoulders were bent, his eyes lowered, his whole body carrying shame like a second skin.
“Maybe his life didn’t turn out the way ours did,” she said.
Doris scoffed, but Sandra didn’t answer again. Deep down, she knew Doris was not entirely wrong. The world did use soft-hearted people. But Sandra also knew that if she let her heart become hard, she would lose something no money could ever replace.
Later that morning, a well-dressed man walked into the shop. He stood out immediately. His shirt was crisp, his watch elegant, his shoes too clean for the dusty little town. He introduced himself as Paul Okafor. He had come from the city for work, he explained, but there was something else he was doing while he was there.
He was searching.
When a young man entered briefly to buy something and left, Paul’s eyes followed him with such sharp emotion that Sandra noticed at once.
“Sir, are you okay?”
Paul looked embarrassed. “That young man just reminded me of someone. My brother.”
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