PART 1 — THE JAR THAT NO ONE WAS ALLOWED TO TOUCH
Twenty years.
For twenty summers in a row, every July, I found a jar of strawberry jam sitting on the railing of my veranda.
No name.
No note.
No single clue revealing who had left it there.
Only an old glass jar, covered with a cream-colored cloth and tied with a small piece of string.
At first, I thought it was simply an anonymous gift from someone in the neighborhood.
But the moment I tasted it, I knew.
It was my mother’s strawberry jam.
My mother had died twenty years ago.
And the strangest thing was that she had never written down the recipe.
Once, I asked her while laughing:
“If I want to cook just like you when I grow up, what should I do?”
My mother only shook her head.
“You don’t need a recipe, my dear. I have already passed it on through your hands.”
But I had never learned how to make that jam.
I had left home far too early.
After her death, I inherited my mother’s house. I lived there alone, and every July, the jar of jam appeared again.
I had never seen who brought it.
Until this year.
I decided to place a small camera near the window.
The next morning, I watched the footage.
At first, nothing unusual happened.
Until 5:47 in the morning.
A green pickup truck slowly pulled up in front of my house and stopped.
A woman stepped out.
She was wearing a wide-brimmed hat and an old coat.
In her hands, she carried a glass jar.
I looked at her face, and my entire body froze.
I knew her.
Thirty years ago, she had taken care of my mother.
Her name was Anna de Vries.
The woman I had always believed had moved to Oregon many years ago.
Anna carefully placed the jar on the railing.
But before leaving, she stopped for a moment.
She gently placed her hand on the jar.
Then she lowered her head and whispered something.
I replayed the recording.
This time, I heard it clearly.
“I’m sorry…”
Anna said.
“I kept my promise to your mother.”
I immediately ran outside.
Under the cloth cover was a small piece of paper.
With trembling hands, I opened it.
The first sentence made all the air leave my lungs.
It was my mother’s handwriting.
“If you are reading these words, it means Anna is finally ready to tell you the truth.”
I stood there, completely frozen.
My mother had been dead for twenty years.
So why had she written a letter for me…
and why had Anna kept it all these years?
