The Yellow Ribbon
He looked almost lifeless, breath shallow, mouth ajar.
A thin seam of light slipped through the curtains and lay across his pale face. Shadows shifted along the wall beside the bed.
The house was silent.
A key turned in the front door. It opened with a click, and a middle-aged woman in a caregiver’s uniform stepped inside. Her smile gathered among the scatter of cinnamon freckles on her pale face.
She moved through the hallway to the kitchen. A note was pinned to the fridge with a magnet, written in the mistress of the house’s familiar, quick hand. She went straight into the bedroom and eased the curtains apart. Light slid across his face.
She paused, counting his breaths the way she always did. Shallow, uneven, but there. She stepped closer, waiting for his breathing to settle before speaking.
“How are we today, sunshine?” She set a hand on his shoulder, feeling the coolness of his skin.
He stirred. “Joy? Not you again.”
“Come on, Andy-Pandy. Five minutes.”
“Too late for me. I’ve died.”
“Aren’t you tired of dying?” Joy chuckled. “You and your jokes.”
She set the bed brake, raised the head slightly. “Let me get the water going.”
“Better that,” he breathed, “than losing my sense of humour.”
“That tongue of yours might outlive us all,” Joy said with a wry smile before heading to the lounge.
“Quick check-in: with Mr. Miller now,” she murmured into her phone.
On the kitchen table, a note caught her attention. She read it, frowning, then returned to the bedroom.
“Shower time,” Joy said. “Then you’ll be free of me till Monday.”
“Get out!”
“Did you hear the All Blacks beat the Aussies yesterday?”
Andy-Pandy opened his eyes. “Really? Alright, time to resurrect.”
Joy set the bed brake, raised the head a notch, and drew the blanket aside. “Ever hear of the player who scored the most tries?”
“Who was it?”
“You’ll have to make it to the bathroom first.”
“So will I,” he groaned.
He was soft at the middle and balding now, but the old sturdiness still showed in his calves and hands. Joy helped him undress. He shivered in the cool air, frail, exposed, and for a moment she saw the child in his shoulders. She touched his back lightly and nudged him forward.
“Well done! Keep going.”
“Ha! Been doing this all my life,” he quipped.
In the bathroom, Joy turned on the water and laid out the mat.
“I wonder what they'll say at my funeral,” he muttered.
“Wait and see,” she replied. “That kid on the wing. Can you believe it?”
“Who? Isn't he a newbie?”
“Crossed over from the juniors last year. No one believed in him, and last night he proved them wrong.”
“Handsome lad,” he said, smiling faintly. “Bet he’s still got all his teeth.”
“Maybe,” Joy replied with a grin. “But a bad haircut can take years off your game.” She kept up the patter over the hiss, letting his breath set the pace.
Afterward, they sat in the dining room. The radio was tuned to the oldies station Joy always left on for him, a low wash of voices and weather. As she moved about the room, fragments drifted through. Delays. Airports. An incident overseas. She turned the volume down without thinking.
Serving a sandwich and coffee, she paused by the window, the cup warm in her hands. For no clear reason, a small unease tightened in her chest, the kind that comes before bad news. She shook it off and went back to him.
Andy-Pandy looked lighter, more awake.
“You’re in a thoughtful mood today,” Joy said.
“Just lining things up,” he replied. “Words help.”
“Looby Loo?” he asked.
Joy handed him the note from the fridge. “She’ll be on the plane to Christchurch by now.”
He read it slowly, then looked up, bewildered. “She can’t go back there. Too many ghosts. Too many memories.”
Joy’s eyes went to the note. Christchurch was underlined, the pen pressed hard enough to bruise the paper. She folded it once, then again, and pinned it back in place.
“It’s unwise to leave you alone.”
“I’m fine. She's silly to visit them.”
“Why?”
“They sued her. Cut her off entirely.”
“Oh… what happened?”
“Long story.”
She glanced at her watch. “I've got time.”
Andy-Pandy moved to an armchair.
“Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree” came on the radio.
The melody filled the room with the quiet rhythms of the past.
Joy reached to turn it off.
“No! Leave it.”
He sang along softly. His voice was thin, but steady. Then he leaned back, fingers steepled, gazing into the middle distance.
“There’s that line,” he said, “only one happiness in this life: to love and be loved.”
“Yes,” Joy smiled.
“What a strange coincidence. It was to this very 70s hit that we played lovers in our school theatre club. I was older than Looby Loo. We were both from Broad Oak village in England. Her French father gave her this lovely name. And from the TV series we watched as children, she in turn called me Andy-Pandy.”
He nodded, eyes following something only he could see. “I finished school and enlisted in the army. One bad day, I hit an officer and got a couple of years in prison. Afterwards, I worked in America.”
He steadied his fingers on the table’s edge and drew a long breath. A ghost of wet leaves and pipe smoke carried him back to an autumn bench, uniform still crisp.
“Looby Loo got married, had a girl and a boy,” he said, tracing the rim of his cup.
Joy’s brows lifted. “And you?”
“Years later, I learned she’d divorced. I sent a short letter, asked if she still loved me.”
“And?”
He gave a faint smile. “She never replied.”
Joy leaned forward, listening.
“Driving the village road to my parents’ place, I saw yellow ribbons on the old oak. Her sign was for me.”
Joy’s eyes widened. “How romantic!”
He remembered her laughter, soft and sudden, like water over stones, the warmth of her hand in his, and the faint scent of jasmine in her hair.
“We settled in Christchurch,” he said. “However hard I tried, the children never called me Dad.”
Joy’s voice was low. “That must have been hard.”
“Looby Loo spoiled them,” he sighed. “She felt guilty …for denying them their father.”
“Did it help?”
He shook his head. “No. It never does.” He paused. “I chose not to tell her that.”
Joy folded a napkin.
“In the end, we raise ourselves,” she murmured, the thought brushing too close to her own family.
“We bring children into the world just to love them. Perhaps that’s all.”
“Looby Loo told them how wonderful he was, even though it wasn’t like that. She showed him a lot of kindness too. He moved out here to be closer to them, visited them bringing presents. Later, they said he blamed Looby Loo for their divorce, and they took his words to heart.”
“A minute’s enough to fall in love. Divorcing yourself can take a lifetime.” He rubbed his temple.
Joy rested a hand on the table.
His voice dropped. “Once they were old enough, they moved out. Stopped visiting.”
His gaze fell to his hands.
“If you go looking for blame, you’ll always find some.”
A brief touch at his temple.
“After the quake… a court letter came.”
A pause.
“She can’t go back to that city. That broken place… broke us too.”
Joy said, “You both moved to Hawke’s Bay. She wanted to see them again.”
They sat in silence. Joy looked down, then placed a hand gently on his knee. “And now she’s gone to see them. After all these years.”
Andy-Pandy nodded. “Foolish. But it was her choice.”
Joy’s voice was quiet. “She’ll come back. She always does.”
The radio broke in: reports of an attack at Al Noor Mosque in Christchurch. Fear crossed their faces. Joy’s hand tightened around her mug, and Andy-Pandy glanced at the door before their eyes met, wide and searching, as the radio crackled with horror.
“She’ll be at the airport by now,” Joy whispered.
“Cracked city,” Andy-Pandy whispered. “Cracked family.”
They understood each other without another word.
“I’m heading out. Another client soon.”
He inhaled slowly, the faint scent of pine polish rising from the floorboards. “Then I must return to myself. Be ready for her.”
Outside, a breeze rustled the leaves. In the distance, a tui called. Andy-Pandy looked puzzled, sighing heavily. Joy reached across the table and gently touched his hand.
“I’ll get ribbons on my way,” Joy said, rising, soft now, almost reverent. “Yellow ones.” She grabbed her bag.
Andy-Pandy smiled, warm and hopeful, and settled into a chair facing the driveway. A breeze drifted through the open window, a breath of jasmine, as if she’d just passed. Spring returned to Broad Oak: the lit road under oaks, her laughter, the yellow ribbon in her hair.
He waited, listening to the clock. His chest tightened; he felt her nearness before tyres whispered on the gravel. A car slowed. Through the open window he saw her glance toward the reserve oak, its branches bright with yellow ribbons.
For an instant, her tear-streaked face was years younger, eyes lit with a laughter he hadn’t seen in half a lifetime. The ribbons lifted in the wind. Her face loosened; she seemed years younger.
He saw it then — not the years, not the grief — a quiet endurance. He felt it before it took shape. Something like home.
