At seventy-five, my mother was behaving like a teenager preparing for her first date.
She’d bought a new blue dress, visited the hairdresser twice, and spent an entire afternoon trying to decide which earrings looked best.
All because of a man named Simon.
“Do you think he’ll recognize me, Jolene?” she asked while studying herself in the hallway mirror.
“Mom, you’ve sent him photographs. Of course he’ll recognize you.”
She smiled nervously.
“But he remembers me when I was eighteen.”
I laughed.
“Well, he’s seventy-eight now. I doubt he looks exactly the same either.”
Mom blushed and returned to adjusting her hair.
I’d never seen her like this.
My mother, Beatrice, had been married to my father for thirty years before he passed away. She loved him dearly, and for a long time afterward, she couldn’t imagine becoming close to another man.
But Simon had been part of her life long before Dad.
They’d met when she was eighteen, at a summer dance in their hometown.
Simon was a quiet young man who worked at his father’s repair shop. He had dark hair, an awkward smile, and a habit of bringing Mom flowers whenever they met.
On their first date, he’d given her a single yellow rose.
She’d pressed it between the pages of a book and kept it for fifty-seven years.
They’d planned to marry, but Simon’s family moved away when his father became seriously ill.
At first, they wrote letters.
Then their lives became busy, and the letters slowly stopped.
Mom eventually married my father, while Simon built a family of his own.
Twenty years ago, after both had lost their spouses, a mutual friend brought them together again.
They met for lunch and spent hours talking about the people they’d known and the lives they’d built.
But soon afterward, Simon accepted work overseas.
They exchanged a few emails, then gradually lost touch again.
Mom never talked much about that reunion.
Occasionally, though, she’d take the old yellow rose from its wooden box and smile.
Then, three months ago, she received a message online.
Beatrice, I hope you still remember the boy who nearly dropped a yellow rose on your doorstep.
She called me immediately.
“Jolene, it’s Simon!”
Within days, they were exchanging messages every evening.
Mom showed me photographs of his garden, the small cottage where he lived, and a lake he liked to visit.
Sometimes he sent her pictures of his grandchildren.
She told him about my children, her gardening club, and how much she missed traveling.
I was pleased to see her happy.
Still, one thing bothered me.
They never spoke on the phone.
Whenever I suggested a video call, Mom explained that Simon disliked technology and preferred writing.
“He says he wants to hear my voice properly when we meet again.”
I thought it was a little unusual, but I didn’t want to ruin her excitement.
Then, last week, Simon sent her a flight itinerary.
He was coming to Chicago.
Mom spent the next seven days preparing.
On the morning of his arrival, she carried a fresh yellow rose in her handbag.
As I drove toward the airport, she kept smoothing the fabric of her dress.
“I can’t believe I’m finally going to see him,” she whispered.
I reached across and squeezed her hand.
“I’m happy for you, Mom.”
She smiled.
“I’ve thought about him so many times over the years. Sometimes I wondered what would’ve happened if we’d never lost touch.”
I glanced at her.
“Are you nervous?”
“Terribly.”
We both laughed.
The arrivals hall was crowded when we reached the airport.
Families waited with flowers, children ran excitedly toward arriving relatives, and travelers pushed luggage carts through the doors.
Mom stood beside me, holding her yellow rose carefully.
Every few minutes, she checked her phone.
Then a message appeared.
I’ve landed, sweetheart. Give me ten minutes.
Her face lit up.
“He’s here!”
I smiled and looked toward the doors.
But Simon wasn’t the person who approached us.
A gray-haired man wearing a dark brown coat stopped a few feet away.
He looked to be in his early seventies.
In his hand was another yellow rose.
“Beatrice?” he asked quietly.
Mom turned.
“Yes?”
He offered her the flower.
For a moment, she looked delighted.
“How lovely. Did Simon send you?”
The man hesitated.
“I’m here because of Simon.”
Her smile faded.
“Where is he?”
The stranger glanced toward the arrivals doors, then lowered his voice.
“I’m afraid you need to leave this area.”
Mom gave a confused laugh.
“There must be some mistake. Simon just landed. He sent me a message.”
“No, ma’am. He didn’t.”
I stepped closer.
“Who are you?”
“My name is Edmund. I know Simon, but we shouldn’t discuss this here.”
I took out my phone.
“I checked the flight myself. It landed twelve minutes ago.”
“The plane arrived,” he replied. “Simon wasn’t on it.”
Mom gripped my arm.
“That’s impossible. He even sent me a photograph from his seat.”
The man looked suddenly alarmed.
“Did he ask you to bring anything? Money? Documents?”
“What?” I demanded.
“Please, I need you both to listen.”
Before he could finish, Mom’s phone began ringing.
Simon’s name appeared on the screen.
She stared at it.
“See? He’s calling.”
Edmund’s face changed.
“Beatrice, please don’t answer.”
But Mom had already accepted the call.
“Simon?”
A man’s voice came through the speaker.
“Hello, sweetheart. I’m terribly sorry to keep you waiting.”
Mom’s expression softened immediately.
“Oh, Simon. Is everything all right?”
“Just a little problem with my luggage. I’m sorting it out now.”
She looked toward the arrivals doors.
“Well, take your time. I’m here with Jolene.”
“Good. Stay where you are, darling. I’ll be with you shortly.”
The call ended.
Mom turned toward Edmund.
“That was Simon. I know it was.”
He looked at her gently.
“When did you last hear his voice?”
She hesitated.
“Twenty years ago.”
“And since you started messaging again?”
“Only written messages.”
Edmund closed his eyes briefly.
Then he took a worn photograph from his wallet.
Two young men stood beside an old motorcycle.
Mom leaned closer.
“That’s Simon,” she whispered, pointing toward the taller one.
The stranger nodded.
“I’m his younger brother, Edmund.”
Mom stared at the photograph.
Then she looked carefully at his face.
I could see the resemblance now. He had the same deep-set eyes and narrow nose as the younger man in the picture.
“Where is Simon?” Mom asked.
Edmund took a shaky breath.
“I’m so sorry, Beatrice. My brother passed away six months ago.”
My mother went completely still.
“No.”
“I wish there were an easier way to tell you.”
She shook her head.
“That’s not possible. I’ve been talking to him for three months.”
“I know.”
“He remembers everything. Our first date, the yellow rose, the old dance hall. He even remembers what I wore when we had lunch twenty years ago.”
Edmund looked down.
“Someone has been pretending to be him.”
I felt my stomach turn.
“How do you know?”
“Someone gained access to one of Simon’s old online accounts. We discovered messages being sent after his death.”
Mom stepped back.
“No. You’re mistaken.”
I put my arm around her.
“Mom, let’s slow down and find out what’s happening.”
I turned toward Edmund.
“If what you’re saying is true, we’ll need proof.”
He nodded.
“Of course.”
I asked him to come with us to the airport information desk, where we could speak with staff and verify his identity.
He agreed immediately.
While we walked, Mom’s phone rang again.
This time, I asked her to put the call on speaker.
“Beatrice, sweetheart,” the man said. “I’m terribly embarrassed.”
Mom swallowed.
“What happened?”
“There’s an unexpected charge before they can release my luggage. My bank cards aren’t working, and I don’t have access to my account.”
I looked at Edmund.
He was shaking his head.
The caller continued.
“I hate asking, but could you send me $2,400? I’ll return it as soon as we get to the hotel.”
Mom stared at the yellow roses in her hand.
“Two thousand four hundred dollars?”
“It’s only temporary, darling. I’ll send you the payment details.”
She looked toward me.
For a moment, I was afraid she’d agree.
Then she took a breath.
“Send me the details, Simon. I’ll look at them.”
She ended the call before he could answer.
Edmund looked relieved.
“Please don’t transfer anything.”
Mom handed me her phone.
“I wasn’t going to,” she whispered. “I just wanted him to stop talking.”
Her hands were trembling badly.
We spoke with airport staff, and I asked Edmund to show us his identification.
He also called Simon’s eldest daughter, who confirmed that her father had passed away and that the family was aware someone had been using his accounts.
I watched Mom’s face as she listened.
The last bit of hope seemed to disappear from her eyes.
A little later, we went to a nearby diner so she could sit somewhere quiet.
Mom placed the two yellow roses beside her untouched coffee.
“Please show me everything,” she told Edmund.
He opened a folder containing a printed obituary, several family photographs, and documents from Simon’s memorial service.
There he was.
The man Mom had waited twenty years to see.
He looked older and thinner than in the photographs she’d received online.
Underneath his picture was a date from six months earlier.
Mom touched the paper.
“That’s him.”
Her voice broke.
Edmund nodded.
“He’d been having trouble with his heart. His daughters were with him when he passed.”
Mom covered her mouth.
For several minutes, she couldn’t speak.
I moved my chair closer and put my arm around her shoulders.
Finally, she asked, “How did somebody know all those things about us?”
Edmund explained that Simon had saved many of their letters and emails over the years.
After his death, the family began closing his online accounts.
But one of his older email accounts had recently shown suspicious activity.
When they recovered access, they discovered messages exchanged with my mother.
The person using the account had copied photographs and personal information from Simon’s old correspondence.
“That’s how he knew about the rose,” Edmund explained. “And the restaurant where you met twenty years ago.”
Mom stared at her coffee.
“So every night I thought I was talking to Simon…”
She couldn’t finish.
Edmund looked genuinely miserable.
“I’m sorry. I wish we’d discovered it sooner.”
I asked how he’d known about the airport meeting.
He explained that the messages contained the flight number, arrival time, and Mom’s description of where she’d be waiting.
He’d already reported the account misuse to the authorities.
Since Edmund lived near Chicago, he’d driven to the airport as soon as he realized what was happening.
“I was afraid the person might approach you here,” he admitted. “Or convince you to send money before anyone could warn you.”
Mom looked at the roses.
“That’s why you brought one?”
He nodded.
“Simon told me about the yellow rose when we were young. I thought you’d recognize the meaning.”
She was quiet for a moment.
Then she said, “You frightened me terribly.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“I thought you were bringing me a message from him.”
Edmund looked down.
“I should’ve explained who I was immediately.”
Mom nodded, but I could tell she was struggling to take in everything she’d heard.
On the drive home, she barely spoke.
She kept the roses in her lap, occasionally touching their petals.
That evening, after we’d eaten a little soup, she asked to be alone.
I checked on her an hour later.
She was sitting on the edge of the guest bed, scrolling through the messages she’d exchanged with the man pretending to be Simon.
“He remembered my birthday,” she whispered.
I sat beside her.
“He knew because he had access to Simon’s information, Mom.”
“I know.”
She showed me another message.
I wish we hadn’t wasted so many years apart.
Her eyes filled.
“I told him things I haven’t told anyone in years, Jolene. About your father. About being lonely. About how frightened I sometimes feel getting older.”
I put my arm around her.
“There’s nothing wrong with telling someone how you feel.”
“But it wasn’t Simon.”
“No. And that’s the cruel part. Someone took advantage of what you thought was a real connection.”
She began crying.
“I feel so foolish.”
“Mom, you aren’t foolish. Someone deliberately deceived you.”
She shook her head.
“I should’ve asked him to call me. I should’ve noticed something.”
I stayed beside her until she was ready to sleep.
The following morning, I helped her secure her accounts.
We changed passwords, enabled additional verification, and reviewed her bank statements.
Fortunately, she hadn’t transferred money or shared her banking details.
She had, however, told the impersonator her address, birthday, and information about our family.
An officer advised us to preserve the messages and call records while the investigation continued.
Mom agreed to cooperate.
What troubled her most wasn’t the possibility of losing money.
It was learning that Simon had been gone for six months while she’d spent those same months imagining a future with him.
A week later, Edmund called.
“I have something that belongs to your mother,” he told me.
He explained that Simon had written a letter to Beatrice during the final year of his life.
He’d never mailed it.
After Simon’s passing, his daughter found the letter among his personal papers.
Edmund had brought a copy with him to Chicago, but he hadn’t wanted to show Mom until she’d had time to understand what had happened.
“Would she want to see it?” he asked.
I told him I’d ask.
When I explained, Mom immediately sat up.
“He wrote to me?”
“Apparently.”
“Then yes. I want to read it.”
Edmund visited the following Saturday.
This time, Mom welcomed him into the house herself.
He carried a small envelope.
“Simon’s daughter wanted you to have this,” he said.
Mom took it carefully.
Inside was a handwritten letter.
She recognized the handwriting immediately.
She sat down by the window and began reading.
Dear Beatrice,
I don’t know whether you’ll ever receive this letter. I’ve started writing to you several times over the years, but I always seem to find a reason to put it away.
Sometimes I think about the summer we met. I remember standing outside your parents’ house with a yellow rose, trying to decide whether I should knock or go home before you saw how nervous I was.
You opened the door before I could make up my mind.
Mom smiled through her tears.
She kept reading.
I’ve had a good life, Bea. I loved my wife, and I’m proud of the family we raised. I hope you’ve had a good life too.
But I’ve never forgotten you.
When we met again twenty years ago, I wanted to tell you how much those few hours meant to me. Instead, I accepted another job overseas and convinced myself we’d find time later.
I was wrong.
I’m not writing because I expect anything from you. I just want you to know that whenever I remembered that summer, I remembered it with happiness.
I hope you’re well. I hope you’re surrounded by people who love you. And if you still have that old yellow rose, I hope it makes you smile.
With love, Simon.
Mom finished reading, then returned to the beginning and read it again.
Her tears fell onto the paper.
“Why didn’t he send it?” she whispered.
Edmund sat across from her.
“He’d been unwell for some time. He kept saying he’d write when he felt stronger.”
She looked up.
“Was he afraid I wouldn’t answer?”
“I think he was afraid of disturbing your life. He didn’t know whether you wanted to hear from him again.”
Mom pressed the letter against her chest.
“I would’ve answered.”
Edmund nodded.
“I believe you.”
For the first time since the airport, Mom began talking about Simon without looking ashamed.
She told Edmund stories from their childhood.
She remembered how he’d once borrowed his father’s bicycle to visit her during a rainstorm and arrived completely soaked.
Edmund laughed.
“He got in terrible trouble for that. Dad made him clean the garage for a week.”
Mom smiled.
“I never knew.”
They spent the afternoon looking through photographs and comparing memories.
Before Edmund left, Mom showed him the little wooden box where she’d kept her dried yellow rose for fifty-seven years.
He looked at it for a long time.
“Simon kept a photograph of you,” he said quietly.
Mom looked up.
“He did?”
“From when you were young. He kept it with some of his most important things.”
She touched the dried flower.
For several moments, she couldn’t speak.
Over the following months, Mom slowly returned to her usual routines.
She began attending her gardening club again and visiting friends she’d avoided while waiting for Simon’s arrival.
Sometimes she still became upset when she remembered the messages.
But she stopped blaming herself for believing them.
The authorities hadn’t identified the person responsible, although the investigation remained open.
Mom kept copies of the messages and cooperated whenever investigators contacted her.
She also stayed in touch with Edmund and Simon’s daughters.
They shared old photographs and stories she’d never heard.
One afternoon, Edmund invited her to visit Simon’s grave.
Mom thought about it for several days.
Then she called me.
“Jolene, would you come with me?”
“Of course.”
We arranged the trip for spring.
On the morning we left, Mom wore the same blue dress she’d chosen for the airport.
But this time, she didn’t spend hours worrying about her appearance.
She simply brushed her hair, put on her favorite earrings, and tucked two yellow roses into her bag.
When we reached the cemetery, Edmund was waiting near the entrance.
He led us along a quiet path to a simple headstone.
Simon’s name was engraved beneath a small cross.
Mom stood in front of it for a long time.
Then she asked whether she could have a few minutes alone.
Edmund and I walked toward a bench nearby.
I watched her kneel carefully beside the grave and place the two roses against the stone.
She spoke quietly, too softly for me to hear.
When I returned, she was wiping her cheeks.
“Are you all right, Mom?”
She nodded.
“I told him I was angry.”
“At Simon?”
“At the time we wasted. At how frightened we both were to reach out again.”
She looked down at the roses.
“Then I told him I loved him when I was eighteen, and that I was glad I’d known him.”
I took her hand.
We stayed until she was ready to leave.
On the journey home, Mom rested the envelope containing Simon’s letter on her lap.
“I thought going to the airport would give me another chance with him,” she said quietly.
I glanced at her.
“I know.”
“I wish I’d learned the truth from Simon himself. But I’m glad Edmund came.”
She looked out the window.
“And I’m glad I got his letter.”
A few weeks later, she asked me to help her find a frame for it.
We chose a simple wooden one and placed it beside the photograph of her and Dad in her living room.
Mom stood back and studied them.
Then she smiled.
“Your father would’ve liked Simon,” she said.
I laughed.
“You think so?”
“Oh, yes. They both loved fixing things, and neither of them knew when to stop working.”
She told me another story about the two men, and we ended up talking until dinner.
Later, as I was getting ready to leave, I noticed she’d placed a fresh yellow rose in a vase on the windowsill.
She followed my gaze.
“I thought it would look nice there.”
“It does, Mom.”
She smiled and walked me to the door.
The next morning, she called to ask whether I’d bring my children over for Sunday lunch.
She wanted to make her usual roast chicken and had already invited a neighbor.
I told her we’d be there.
Before hanging up, she reminded me to bring the photograph album we’d found during our trip.
“There are a few more pictures I want to show you,” she said.
And when I arrived that Sunday, Mom was waiting on the porch, waving as my children climbed out of the car.
The yellow rose was still on her windowsill.
Inside, Simon’s letter rested beside the photographs of a long, full life that had included more than one kind of love.