“And you miss her.” She set aside the banana and finally turned to face him, only to watch tears gathering in his big brown eyes. Tears he wouldn’t appreciate her witnessing. “We have a lot of work to do.” She moved briskly toward the sunroom. “Let’s get to it.”

For the next several hours, Toby helped her carry broken furniture, moth-eaten cushions, and desiccated draperies to a spot at the end of the drive where she’d get someone to haul it away. Panda might not have any respect for this house, but she did, and if he didn’t like it, he could sue her.

Toby tried to make up for his lack of muscle with a seriousness of purpose that touched her to the core. She never got to work one on one with kids anymore, not unless they were related to her.

Together she and Toby struggled to carry out an ancient television that no longer worked. He filled trash bags with the decades-old magazines and tattered paperbacks she handed him from the sunroom bookcases, then wiped the shelves as she rearranged what was left. Although they tried, the awful green kitchen table proved too heavy for them to move, and they both ended up with nasty splinters for their efforts.

When she’d had enough for the day, she carried some money out to the screen porch Toby had just finished helping her scrub down. His eyes widened when he saw what she was paying him. He quickly shoved the bills in his pocket. “I can come back anytime,” he said eagerly. “And I’ll clean the house, too. I know it didn’t look too good before, but I’m a lot better now.”

She regarded him sympathetically. “Panda’s going to need a caretaker who’s a grown-up.” As his face fell, she went on, “But I have some other jobs in mind for you.”

“I’m just as good as a grown-up.”

“He won’t see it that way.”

He stomped across the porch and banged the screen door behind him, but she knew he’d be back, and he was.

Over the next few days, they swept up cobwebs and scrubbed floors. She covered the worst of the outdoor cushions with more beach towels and discovered the metal baker’s rack that looked clunky in the front hallway fit perfectly on the porch. Gradually the ceramic pig, chipped canisters, and other detritus that had cluttered up the counters disappeared. She filled a blue pottery bowl with ripe strawberries and a jelly jar with roses she found growing on an old rambler behind the garage. The arrangement was a far cry from the incredible creations that came out of the White House flower shop, but she liked it just as much.