Homeless Man Helped Elderly Lady with Grocery Bags. Next Day, Store Owner Caught Him and Did This

The next day, when the woman noticed something different in her purse, the supermarket security guards were called and dragged the poor man inside the store. What the man revealed then made everyone kneel and ask for forgiveness.

When Hurricane Harvey hit the city of Rockport, Texas, the catastrophic flooding caused by the storm ruined the life of the carpenter, Alfred Tyler, and many others. Alfred wouldn’t mind if he had only lost material possessions. However, on that fateful night, he lost much more than his own home. Alfred lost Sophia, his beloved wife, and the only person he ever called family.

Alfred recounts that on that day, while driving his truck to work, he had a premonition that something bad was about to happen. He was just a simple construction worker, and the chief contractor had called him and other workers to reinforce a beam at a construction site at the last minute, as the news reports indicated that a hurricane was imminent. But until that moment, nobody believed it could be so terrible.

Alfred arrived on time and started repairs with his team. There was a sense of discontent in the air. It was yet another weekend where the workers were forced to abandon their days off and work hard, while the contractor himself rested at home. But what really aggravated the situation was that everyone was apprehensive. An old radio was on all the time, tuned to the news and weather forecast station, while they worked, and the news about the hurricane was becoming increasingly worrying.

That day, the sky darkened much earlier than usual. As soon as everyone saw the dark clouds covering the sky and the winds becoming too violent, Alfred and his friends called the contractor on the radio and asked to be released, as each one there had their own family to take care of. But it was an expensive job, and the man refused the request, even under the threat of having his contract terminated.

Alfred could only think of his wife alone at home in a storm like that. He pushed the security guard who surrounded him at the door and got into his truck, amid shouts that he would be fired. “You’re out of here!” It was the last thing the carpenter heard before stepping hard on the accelerator on the dirt road. The radio station continued to alert everyone to leave their homes and seek shelter, as the city was at the epicenter of the storm, and everything indicated that the hurricane would make landfall.

Alfred sped up until he saw his neighborhood at the end of the road, exactly under a huge black cloud. Suddenly, the storm was already soaking his windshield with violence. When he finally reached his street, the worst sight of his life unfolded before his eyes. Hurricane Harvey was sweeping everything in its path, including the house that Alfred built with his own hands.

He got out of his truck as quickly as he could and ran to try to save his wife, but it was already too late. If Alfred hadn’t been dragged away by neighbors fleeing, he would have been dragged by the hurricane and died with Sophia in a dark and ironic way. A few minutes after passing through the man’s house, Hurricane Harvey simply dissipated, as if by magic.

After the disaster, the city of Rockport was destroyed and desolate. The burial of the victims moved the country, and several tributes were paid to the victims, as well as donations from all over the country arrived for those who had lost everything. Alfred was one of those people, but he didn’t want anything or anyone’s help. Nothing they did would bring his wife back or the baby she carried just a few months in her womb. Suddenly, all of Alfred’s dreams were swept away by the wind.

Since then, the carpenter’s life has become an endless abyss. He had never managed to earn enough to keep a savings account or pay for his home insurance. To make matters worse, his boss followed through on the security guard’s threat and canceled his work contract after he abandoned the beam reinforcement, which also did not withstand the hurricane and caused huge losses to the contractor.

Alfred knew he had no responsibility for that and that he had labor rights, but he didn’t care about anything anymore. Grief had consumed him entirely, and with no place to call home, only the streets of the city remained as his home, becoming a homeless widower. The more the days passed, the less hope Alfred saw in things. He stopped going to church when he thought it no longer made sense, and many times he argued with God out loud, blaming and pointing at the sky for making his life so miserable.

One year and two months passed as if they were days. Noticing his reflection in a shop window and seeing his calloused face and dirty beard, Alfred realized that he had become a typical beggar, the kind he used to see on the streets, sometimes even judging them. Not even in his worst nightmares did he imagine he would sink so low. And it was precisely at that moment that the answer to all his questions came in the most unthinkable way.

On that hot afternoon, Alfred was wandering the streets, looking for something to eat. His mouth was dry from thirst, and his stomach was growling. He reached into the pockets of his tattered pants and took out the only coins he had, collected from begging. The hunger was terrible, but it was wiser to save them for later, buying some bread for dinner.

Exhausted and sweating from so much walking, Alfred arrived at the supermarket parking lot. He always frequented the place, and it was crowded with vehicles. It seemed like a lot of people were shopping at that time. He sat in his usual spot and extended his hand to try to earn a few more coins. Few people passed by and gave him something; most simply ignored him as if Alfred didn’t exist.

When he was almost falling asleep, he heard the noise of something dragging on the ground a little further away. “What’s that noise?” he grumbled and raised his head. And that’s when he saw an elderly woman who had just left the supermarket with a shopping cart. She was trying to take her heavy bags out of the cart, and the effort seemed to be too much for a woman of her age and alone.

Alfred was filled with doubts about whether to get up or not, until at a certain moment, a glass container fell from the bag, shattering on the ground. Alfred couldn’t just wait and watch the scene. He got up, not caring about his own sweat smell, and then approached the woman. The lady had a kind appearance.

“Hello, do you need any help?” he asked. “Please, I accept your help, my son,” she replied. Alfred began to pick up all the heavy bags and put them into a shopping cart that belonged to the woman. When the cart was completely loaded, he pushed it a bit and saw that it was indeed very heavy. Then he looked back at the woman.

“Can I push it for you to your house, that is, if you’re not afraid of me?” he said timidly. The elderly woman was surprised by the stranger’s interest in helping her, especially because no one had done that for her before. She used to shop at that same supermarket, and she always carried her groceries to the car. But that day, the car was in repair.

After a brief thought, she asked Alfred if he was sure and said she didn’t have money to give him. “I can’t pay you, young man. I just spent the money I had with me to make these purchases,” she looked at the homeless man from head to toe, already expecting him to simply walk away, screaming and cursing her for wasting his time. But Alfred’s response made her realize that not all poor people were after money.

“You remind me of my mother, and I wouldn’t charge my mother for help,” Alfred said. “Please, let me push the cart for you,” he insisted. Alfred pushed the heavy cart for about 25 minutes and several blocks, including uphill. “This lady must have miscalculated this because it was evident that she could never carry this cart with so much weight alone,” he thought along the way.

Alfred accompanied her until she was safely home with her groceries. The man was fascinated to see that the woman’s house was large and very beautiful. She offered him a cup of tea, but despite wanting that courtesy more than anything, Alfred didn’t want her to think he had only helped her in exchange for some reward. So he declined the stranger’s kindness.

To the old woman’s heart, she watched him for a while as Alfred waved and disappeared down the path back. It had been a long time since she had met someone with such a good heart. The elderly woman closed the door and began to organize the jars in her cupboard and place the ingredients for that night’s dinner on the table.

She couldn’t forget the gentle yet sad expression of the beggar, and something told her she should have helped the young man in some way. She walked back to the living room and rummaged through her purse to see if there was anything else to be stored or receipts to be thrown away. That was when the old woman was surprised to find something she didn’t remember buying.

She examined the item for a while and felt confused. So she decided she should go after that homeless man immediately. The next day, as dawn broke, the woman grabbed her purse and returned to the supermarket without even having her breakfast. Nervously, she searched for Alfred everywhere in the parking lot and in the awning he had used as shelter the day before, but he wasn’t there.

She entered the store and met with the owner, asking him to make an effort to find the homeless man urgently. “You need to find him, please. He must have come here other times,” she said to the store owner. The supermarket owner said that the security camera footage should help in the surveillance room. The store owner assisted the security guards in rewinding the tape to the beginning of the recording that morning when the market opened.

“Pause, pause,” the store owner said to the surveillance camera technician. The woman pointed to Alfred on the computer screen. “That’s him, yes, that’s the guy. We need to find him,” the old woman said after seeing the homeless man in the store’s CCTV footage. The supermarket owner sent a security guard to look for the beggar with the help of a police system that worked in conjunction with the city’s shopkeepers.

After hours of searching squares, bus stops, and parking lots, the men finally returned, dragging Alfred, grabbing him by the shirt because the man had refused to accompany them. When the older woman saw how they were holding the poor man, she was furious. “What are you doing? Leave him! I asked to bring him, not drag him,” she said.

Alfred was scared. He had no idea what was going on. “What’s going on? I didn’t do anything,” he said, his tears and fear filling his eyes. “These men found me in the bus depot and asked if I was here yesterday. When I told them I was, they grabbed me by the shirt and brought me here. I didn’t do anything wrong,” Alfred continued, pleading for them to let him go.

The elderly woman approached the homeless man and then hugged him, while the others watched in surprise. “Mom, what are you doing?” the store owner asked her. Alfred was startled to find out that the supermarket owner was the son of that lady. The lady smiled and explained that she had been looking for that homeless man to return the chain that had accidentally slipped into her bag.

“I saw this chain, and when I opened the locket, I saw this photo. Is this your wife?” she asked Alfred. The man began to cry and told her that he thought he had lost the only memento he had left of his deceased wife. “I thought I would never see it again,” Alfred cried. Loaded with emotion, memories flooded Alfred’s mind, and he couldn’t contain himself, recounting his story to everyone.

“I met Sophia during the repair of a barn when I arrived in this town. It was the beginning of my career as a carpenter. I was young, and her father gave me the opportunity for that job. Since then, I never took my eyes off her. This chain was our first dating gift. We got married the following year, and we were finally fulfilling our dream of starting a family. Sophia was expecting our child. I was sure I would live forever by her side,” realizing that it was a delicate matter for the man, she said that he didn’t owe anyone an explanation.

But Alfred continued as if he wanted to remove a rock lodged in his throat. “But then came that damn hurricane, and I was forced to work. I should never have let a man like Christian Blake tell me what to do, that unscrupulous contractor. My place today should be underground, dignified, buried next to my family,” by this point, the old woman was already in tears. Alfred and she hugged, and no one said a word.

Everyone remembered the hurricane and how devastating it had been for many families in the city. They could imagine what that man was going through. After a long and respectful silence, the old woman held Alfred’s hands and asked the homeless man to return to her son’s supermarket the next day because she wanted to do something for him.

That same night, the woman talked to her son, and both were amazed by the homeless man’s story. The truth was that they froze when they heard that the name Christian Blake come out of the poor man’s mouth. What were the chances of such a coincidence actually happening? The young man’s anger was so great that he made sure to call his own lawyer to see if they could still do something for him.

The next day, the family’s lawyer brought good news, and then mother and son walked around the neighborhood and approached the homeless man again. When they found him, they quickly introduced the family’s lawyer to Alfred. “Are you Alfred Tyler?” the lawyer asked. Alfred nodded, wondering to hear his last name for the first time in a long time.

“Mr. Tyler, pleasure to meet you. I’m Jacob Johnson. Mrs. Blake’s and her son’s lawyer,” the lawyer continued, pointing to the old woman and the supermarket owner. “We want to make you an offer, but before that, we need to hand you some money,” Alfred thanked him but refused the charity, saying he helped the old lady a few days before because it was something anyone should do.

“But this isn’t charity; it’s your payment for a favor, Mr. Tyler. The money we have is yours by right,” the lawyer explained. Alfred was even more

confused by the situation, and the explanation almost made his heart stop. According to the lawyer, the contractor for whom Alfred had worked in the past was the nephew of that same lady Alfred had helped. The whole family already knew the man’s reputation and was ashamed of the ambitious and unscrupulous man he had become.

Christian Blake was a man involved in bribery schemes and carried some lawsuits on his back, including a tax and labor sentence. So he was on the run because he had fled justice. They activated a resource to freeze his bank accounts and all his assets, which would be used to pay the due compensations to the employees harmed by his management.

According to the lawyer, the homeless man’s name, Alfred Tyler, had been on the list for a long time, but the man was never found or sought his rights. But now, somehow, fate had put Alfred in the path of that lady, and finally, justice was being served. In the ruling, the judge determined that Alfred would receive the sum of $78,000, which wouldn’t make him rich, but it was enough for him to restart his life and get off the streets, either by renting an apartment or making a down payment on a new piece of land.

All he needed to access the money was to get all his documents again and open a bank account, and the family’s lawyer would help him with that. Just when Alfred thought the surprises were over, the young supermarket owner made a proposal. “I think a new job would do you good. What do you think, Alfred?” Alfred couldn’t believe his ears, and it was hard to hold back the tears as he clasped his hands in gratitude and nodded.

In a serious tone, the young man continued, “Great. A man with your experience must have noticed that the market needs a renovation, and I still don’t have a chief contractor. Do you think you can handle it, Mr. Tyler?” Alfred wiped away his tears and replied, “Sorry for being blunt, sir, but your market is falling apart,” said the homeless man, eliciting laughter from everyone, and added, “I’m sure I can help.

The supermarket owner handed him a uniform and said that the work would start the next day at 8:00 a.m. sharp. Alfred could hardly contain his happiness, and before saying goodbye, he looked at the old woman who had changed his life. “Thank you so much. You’re no different from my mother,” he said in tears. “And you’re no different from my son,” she replied, patting Alfred’s shoulder.

He then asked her name. “Maria. My name is Maria Blake,” she said, bringing Alfred to tears once again. His late mother’s name was also Maria. Alfred interpreted it as a divine sign. From that day on, the man who was once homeless reaped the sweet fruits of his compassion. He now had a roof over his head and a good job and started visiting the church occasionally. Alfred never complained about his life again or blamed God. He still didn’t know what the purpose of it all was, but he felt that a spark of optimism was growing inside him again.