A brief encounter on a bus to a cancer appointment "perked up" an anxious woman after a rollercoaster year.
Wallasey woman Wendy Gooley was travelling to and from an appointment at the Clatterbridge Cancer Centre, Wirral when a group of young lads put a smile on her face.
Thinking of her rough year, with cancer scares and a birthday spent in hospital with sepsis, brought tears to Wendy's eyes.
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But the boys' banter on the bus gave her confidence after an awful few weeks.
Mum-of-four Wendy, 50, told the ECHO: "I was just sitting to the back of the bus, and then a couple of stops later, on comes these kids, lads, teenagers.
"And they're all just chatting away to themselves and having banter and laughing.
"I couldn't help but look at them because it was just making me smile, and I was thinking back to when I was a kid.
"They weren't your usual swearing, throwing louts, do you know what I mean?
"These were a group, there was at least five of them, and they were having a laugh.
"It was all just nice to see, and I was just smiling away. They must have caught me smiling, because they did look at me once or twice."
Wendy had cancer when she was younger. She continues to get checked when she has problems.
A couple of years ago, a precancerous tumour appeared in her pancreas, which grew slightly last year.
Her trip on Tuesday afternoon (November 9) was an annual check to see if there were any changes. Now she waits for results.
On her return journey from the Clatterbridge, Wendy crossed paths with the boys once again after spotting them in a field where the bus pulled over.
Wendy told the ECHO: "One gets on, and he sits behind me, so I turn round and he goes, 'It is you, isn't it? You're the woman from before', and I went, 'Oh yeah, I thought that was you'.
"So he taps to the window to his mates and he's saying, 'It is, it is!'
"They were waving and everything, and one of them did a fist bump at me through the window.
"I was waving, and I was smiling like a little kid, because they made my day."
Days later, Wendy is still smiling about the encounter.
She told the ECHO: "I keep smiling. I just keep smiling. Because every day, without fail, you go online and you see all the stuff the other [young people] are up to. Stealing bikes, smashing things up."
She added: "I thought it was lovely, and do you know what? I went to bed that night, and when I got up in the morning, I thought, that really, really did make my day.
"There's so much negative stuff out there all the time, so I'm going to put it out there, because if it's made me smile, it might make others.
"And Jesus Christ, hasn't it?
