Lonely Old Man Saves Pills after Price Increases, Gets Box of Meds from Man Who Claims To Be His Son – Story of the Day

Somewhere in a forgotten town, an elderly veteran was struggling to afford his medication. But when a younger man followed him to his house, he didn't expect the man to have bought him an entire box of his medicine, let alone carry a link to the old life he left behind…

Chuck was a 50-year-old man with a wife and three kids, but lying to his mother still made him sick to his stomach.

"Yes, Mom. The conference is today. Yeah, I'll call you once it's over. All right, bye, Mom. Love you!"

There was no conference. The truth was that Chuck had come to his mother's old hometown, looking for the man who had broken her heart half a century ago. The man who was his father.

Chuck had always heard the story of his father from Rhonda, his mother.

"Your father and I met at a hospital. I was a 23-year-old nurse, and he was a 28-year-old mechanic who had come in with a bruised arm."

"It was love at first sight. And when we discovered how ambitious we were in life, the love only got stronger."

"I wanted to open a nursing practice, and Chuck wanted to own his own garage someday."

"But three years into our innocent world of dates and movies and dreams, war came calling. And your father, a deeply patriotic man, signed up to be drafted."

A day after Cedric left home, Rhonda fainted. "I was trembling when the doctors told me I was pregnant! I remember thinking that your father was going to be beside himself with joy when he heard about it…" Rhonda would tear up every time she mentioned that moment.

Rhonda wrote letter after letter but never got a response. For a whole year, she kept the porch lights on at night, hoping the love of her life would return to meet their beautiful baby boy.

"I don't take charity from strangers," the elderly man said firmly, turning away.

But even three years after the war was over, Cedric never showed up. With a toddler in her arms, Rhonda tried everything to find her husband.

But when she learned from a friend of a friend that he was "alive and well, living somewhere in Philadelphia," she was devastated.

"I was hurt and abandoned, but I had you to take care of," Rhonda had told Chuck years later. "So I packed a few bags, tried to pick up the pieces of my life, and moved to a whole new town."

Rhonda became a hardened woman, but Chuck, her only son, had seen her cry in bed almost every night, thinking of the only man she ever loved.

50 years passed, and Rhonda lived vicariously through her son and grandchildren but she never married. And she never uttered his name until she found an old diary and a picture of him on their last day together…

Rhonda, now a frail 73-year-old woman, couldn't stop weeping. "I wish I could have my Cedric back!" she cried and cried until she fainted out of weakness.

Thankfully, Rhonda was all right in a couple of hours, but the episode was enough to make Chuck start a hunt for his long-lost father. He had everything planned in his head: how he would confront the man, what words he would use.

But after he had spent an entire week trying to look for the man in the town where he met his mother, Chuck was starting to lose hope.

He was waiting at the counter of an old drugstore when fate decided to surprise him.

The store owner was talking to the elderly man in front of Chuck, who was trying to buy a few items. Their small talk had been going on for quite a few minutes, and Chuck was starting to get annoyed.

"Man, don't skimp on medication. Take it. You can always pay me later!" The store owner was trying to convince the man.

"Thanks, buddy, but you've done enough for me already. I'm not gonna take something I can't afford. And besides, I still have a bunch of pills from my previous prescription..." the older man said, counting the few coins on his palms.

"Hold on, I think there might be a some more in here," the man said and emptied his tattered wallet. Among a few old photos, coins, and crumpled-up bills, the man had a military medal that he now placed on the counter.

"I'm forced to endure pain and save my medication ever since these prices shot up," the old man frowned, turning to Chuck, looking for a stranger's sympathy.

Chuck smiled awkwardly, but he couldn't take his eyes off the medal on the counter.

"This?" the man noticed Chuck's curiosity. "I fought in 'Nam. Left my woman, joined the war, and came back home four years later to a lonely life and a broken leg. Still hurts the same. But leaving my woman hurts me more. You know what I mean, son?"

The old man smiled, said goodbye to the store owner, and turned to leave.

"Take care of yourself, Cedric!" He heard the store owner say to the old man.

Chuck felt chills run down his spine. "This is him! This is him!"

Chuck did something unexpected. He bought a box of the medication the older man couldn't afford and followed him until he stopped in front of a small house.

Chuck wasn't prepared when the man suddenly turned back, looked him straight in the eye, and asked, "Who are you, and why are you following me?"

"I–I got you your medicine," Chuck fumbled.

"I don't take charity from strangers," the elderly man said firmly, turning away.

"Who said I'm a stranger? I'm your son. And I followed you to ask you one question: why did you abandon us?"

The older man chuckled, "You've got the wrong guy, young man…"

"I don't think so. Rhonda. Does that name mean anything to you?"

Cedric's knees buckled when he heard that name. "Rhonda...How could this be? Is this really her son? Is this…my son?" Cedric's thoughts wouldn't stop.

That afternoon, Cedric met his son for the very first time. He answered every angry question Chuck had with grace and calmness.

As it turned out, Cedric was shot in the leg during the war and was sent to Philadelphia to a special rehabilitation facility shortly thereafter. He spent two years in therapy before he could put weight on his foot without screaming in pain.

He never got Rhonda's letters, and he couldn't find a way to send her any, either. Once the man left the rehabilitation center, he immediately flew back to the place he and Rhonda had called home.

"All I wanted to do was see her, hug her, and tell her that everything hurt…"

But the night before, young Rhonda had already left the town with her baby, telling no one where she planned to go…

"I loved her more than anything, son. And my greatest regret is never getting to kiss her sweet face again or telling her I'd come back for her. All these lonely years, I've been talking to her through this…" Cedric cried, pulling out an old black-and-white photo of Rhonda from his tattered wallet.

Chuck couldn't believe he had finally found his father. That evening, the two men drove to the city and knocked on the door of the woman they loved more than life itself.

Rhonda opened the door to the face she never thought she would see again and fell into the arms where she had always belonged.

What can we learn from this story?

• Don't let misunderstandings ruin the love of a lifetime. Rhonda and Cedric gave up looking for each other after a point. Had they managed to reach out to each other, they could have cleared the misunderstanding and shared several years of raising their son together.
• It's never too late to look for closure. Chuck had lived 50 years of his life without knowing much about his father. But he ventured out to find his dad and was thrilled to finally understand the story behind the man's absence.

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If you enjoyed this story, you might like this one about another love story between a young man and woman that ended abruptly, and then the woman finds a forgotten letter 50 years after they parted.

This piece is inspired by stories from the everyday lives of our readers and written by a professional writer. Any resemblance to actual names or locations is purely coincidental. All images are for illustration purposes only. Share your story with us; maybe it will change someone's life. If you would like to share your story, please send it to info@amomama.com.