My New Neighbor Kept Bringing Me Papers to Sign (Continued)

It was not a fence agreement. It was a quitclaim deed — a document signing over a third of my property, including the lot my house sits on, to Kyle for the sum of one dollar.

That ‘friendly young man’ hadn’t befriended a lonely widower out of kindness. He’d spent two months softening me up so I’d sign away the land Dorothy and I paid off over thirty years, without ever reading what was in front of me.

I didn’t let on that I knew. The next morning I told Kyle I’d changed my mind about the fence and didn’t sign a thing. Then, the moment his truck pulled away, I called my daughter, and we called a lawyer, and we called the county.

It turned out Kyle had pulled this exact trick on two other elderly folks two towns over. Because I’d kept the unsigned deed, the lawyer had everything he needed. Kyle is now facing charges, and he has moved away from our street for good.

Dorothy saved me from that grave, same as she saved me from a hundred foolish things in fifty years of marriage. If a stranger is very friendly and very eager for your signature, slow down and read every word. The kindest-seeming hand is sometimes the one reaching for your pocket.