My neighbor kept blaming delivery mistakes whenever my packages vanished. Then one day, I decided to order one final box and watched exactly where it went.
We hurried outside.
Michael stared at his phone as the little blue dot moved across the map.
“She’s in the backyard.”
“How can you tell?”
“It stopped near the back fence.”
I grabbed my cane.
Michael looked at me.
“Grandma, you’re not going over there.”
“I am absolutely going over there.”
“You’re 80.”
“I’m aware.”
“She steals packages.”
“So far, she hasn’t stolen an old woman.”
He sighed. “Please stay behind me.”
I rolled my eyes but let him go first.
My name is Eleanor. I’m 80 years old, and until Linda moved in next door, I had never once considered putting a tracking device inside my own Amazon order.
I also never expected to spend a Thursday afternoon following my grandson toward a neighbor’s backyard like we were conducting the world’s slowest investigation.
But Linda had tested my patience.
It began with vitamins.
Nothing exciting.
Just the same calcium supplements I’d ordered for years.
Amazon marked them delivered.
I opened my door. Nothing.
I checked beside the planter.
Behind the rocking chair.
Near the garage.
Nothing.
Two days later, Linda knocked.
“Oh, Eleanor! This came to my house by mistake.”
She handed me the package.
My name. My address. Clearly printed.
I said, “That’s odd.”
“These delivery drivers are terrible now.”
She laughed like we were sharing a joke.
Linda had moved in three weeks earlier.
She was probably in her mid-50s.
Friendly in that very fast way some people are friendly before you know anything about them.
The first week, she brought banana bread.
The second, she asked whether my house was paid off.
That should have told me something.
I took the vitamins and thanked her.
Then my slippers disappeared.
Soft blue ones with rubber soles, because Michael worried I’d slip on the tile.
The delivery app said they’d arrived at 2:13 p.m.
At 2:25 p.m., my porch was empty.
The next morning, I saw Linda watering flowers.
“Did another package come to you by accident?”
She blinked. “What package?”
“Slippers.”
“Oh!”
She put down the hose. “I think I saw a box by my side door.”
Five minutes later, she brought it over.
Still sealed.
Same excuse. “Drivers.”
I stared at her. “Funny how they keep getting my address wrong.”
She smiled. “You should complain.”
Then came my granddaughter Lily’s birthday gift.
That one bothered me.
Lily was turning 12 and loved drawing.
I ordered her a marker set she’d been talking about for months.
The package disappeared.
Linda claimed she hadn’t seen it.
Two days passed.
I finally told her I’d contacted Amazon.
Suddenly she remembered. “Oh! Wait. There was a package in my garage. My husband must have brought it in.”
Linda didn’t have a husband living there.
She’d told me herself she had been divorced for six years.
I said, “Your husband?”
She froze.
Then laughed. “Ex-husband. He stopped by.”
That was when I ordered the camera.
Michael installed it that weekend.
“Now you’ll get an alert whenever someone comes up.”
“I don’t need an alert every time the mailman breathes.”
“I’ll adjust it.”
The first evening, the camera notified me 12 times because of a large moth.
Technology.
But three days later, it earned its keep.
I had ordered refrigerator filters.
At 3:06 p.m., the driver placed them beside my door.
At 3:10 p.m., Linda crossed my lawn.
She looked toward my windows. Then toward the street.
She walked up my steps, picked up the box, and went home.
No confused driver.
No wrong porch.
Linda.
I watched the recording three times.
Then I marched next door.
Well.
I marched as much as an 80-year-old woman with arthritis marches.
Linda opened the door.
“Hi, Eleanor.”
“I’d like my refrigerator filters.”
She stared at me. “What?”
“The package you took from my porch.”
Her expression barely changed.
“I think you’re confused.”
I held up my phone.
“I have a camera now.”
For half a second, her face went blank.
Then she laughed. “Good for you.”
“Give me my package.”
“I was bringing it over.”
“Why?”
“Because the driver left it at my house.”
“No, he didn’t.”
I showed her the video.
She watched herself walk directly onto my porch.
