My name is Erin. Three weeks ago, my ten-year-old daughter Lily died in a car accident.
That morning, as I sat frozen at the kitchen table, Baxter, our golden retriever, appeared at the back door with something yellow in his mouth—Lily’s sweater. Without hesitation, he led me through the yard to an old, forgotten shed.
Inside, nestled in a pile of clothes, was a mother cat with three tiny kittens—and Lily’s sweater wrapped around them. She had been secretly caring for them, a quiet act of love I had never known.
Overwhelmed, I brought the kittens home and watched them grow, feeling Lily’s presence in every small life she had touched. For the first time since her death, I smiled. Her love, it seemed, had never truly left us.