Good story. In a twist, his perserverance was rewarded! I expected a somber ending with an empty swing. Instead I was pleasantly surprised!

Very romantic, and I definitely didn’t she the happy ending coming. Much nicer than the horrific or tragic twists one usually sees.
One critique point, it’s considered less strong to start sentences with ‘and’ or ‘but’. I know we do it in conversation, but grammatically speaking it’s not ideal. Just something to keep in mind to tighten up the writing from a technical standpoint.

I think of that often when I write, but I also view it as providing a stop and start that I feel may be warranted. Like with the sentence, But then she had stopped coming. I feel it is a little jarring to go from happy and carefree to it all stopping.
Also, I sometimes feel sentences feel too long if it is all strung together. But maybe that’s just me. :)