No signal—except a tiny bar. She had dialed her dad’s old number in a panic. That number… had later been reassigned to my daughter before she passed.
And now… to me. But as she cried, something else happened. A second notification appeared on my screen.
A photo. Sent from that same number. My heart nearly stopped.
It was a picture of a dark, empty road. Rain on the asphalt. A broken streetlight flickering in the distance.
The exact kind of road where I lost Helen. My hands started to shake uncontrollably. The girl on the phone choked out, “Please don’t hang up.
I don’t want to be alone.”
I stayed with her until a patrol car finally reached her. I waited until she confirmed she was safe. Only then did I end the call.
When it was over, I sat in my car outside my daughter’s house, staring at that photo on my screen. I cried the way I hadn’t allowed myself to cry since the funeral—loud, broken, heaving. Because for those few minutes…
It felt like Helen was close.
Not haunting me—just reminding me. That love doesn’t vanish. It lingers.
It finds ways to reach you, even through wrong numbers, broken signals, and late-night miracles.
