After my girlfriend died, I kept contacting her. Every night, I wrote “I miss you.” Someday, communications stopped sending. Her number was disconnected. She sent me a Facebook message the next day. My heart nearly stopped. “Hi, honey,” it read.
First, I froze. My eyes examined the message a dozen times to understand it. Felt like a horrible movie. I clicked the profile, and her profile image, prior postings, and last post before the accident were all the same.
I glanced at the screen, clueless. Typing with shaky hands, I asked, “Is this some kind of sick joke?” The message was read. No reply. It seemed like forever to wait.
After several hours, another communication arrived. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare. Mira, her sister. I recently joined her account. I’ve sought her friends.”
I exhaled deeply. Mira. I remembered her—the foreign younger sister. Although they weren’t close, I knew she’d attend the burial. We hadn’t talked. She returned the next day by plane.
“I didn’t know she had a sister using her account,” I wrote. “Why not message sooner?”
Mira replied, “I wasn’t ready. Just opened it today. I also miss her.”
It hit me. Knowing others were grieving was strangely comforting. We talked about her, memories, and tiny things we missed for hours that night. I told her I couldn’t stop texting. She said she sometimes spoke to her photo.
Mira and I messaged frequently for weeks. Natural and healing. She told me childhood stories I’d never heard. I told you how we met, how we drove late at night and talked about dreams we never fulfilled.
Mira wrote one night, “It feels like she’s connecting us.”
Stared at the sentence. Felt like that. Interestingly, grief can build bridges.
Still, guilt existed. Moving on felt like emotionally betraying my girlfriend. Mira never made it seem like that. She wasn’t flirting or crossing lines. Just being present. Being human.
A few months later, she announced her visit. “I want to visit her grave,” she added. “Will you join me?”
Yes, I said. There was no hesitation.
The day she arrived, I picked her up from the airport. Though not identical, she resembled her sister. Just enough to stir. Her eyes had that same depth you could fall into unintentionally.
Early on, the cemetery drive was silent. She added, “I was nervous about this. Seeing you. Not sure why.”
“I get it,” I said. “I was, too.”
We spoke little at the graveside. We stood. Mira placed a little sunflower on the stone and muttered inaudibly. I backed off and let her speak.
Eventually, she looked at me. “You still text her?”
“Not since the number was disconnected,” I said. “But I still talk to her sometimes. In my head.”
She nods. “Me too.”
We enjoyed coffee afterward, which was effortless. Familiar. It felt like we knew each other longer. Maybe grief did that. Maybe it ignored time.
In the following months, our interactions deepened. We discussed our lives, hopes, and failures. She said she’d always been under her sister’s shadow, not resentfully. I told her I never stopped planning a life with a deceased person.
We sat in my flat with a bottle of red wine and years of grief months later.
“I feel guilty,” I murmured, glancing at my glass.
“For what?” she whispered.
“For this. We are becoming… Feels wrong.”
She gazed at me quietly. She added, “I feel that too. But maybe guilt is acceptable to let go. We may not be over her. We may be moving forward with her.”
I remembered that sentence.
Nothing transpired between us. Not romantically. We were two people searching for meaning in the same loss.
Until she vanished.
Not literally. Suddenly stopped responding. Without SMS or messages. Maybe I said something wrong. Maybe the emotions were too much.
A week passed. Then two. I tried not to overthink. Then I checked her Facebook. Her account vanished.
Deleted.
Panicked. Emailed her. Nothing.
I received a message late one night from an unknown number.
“Hi, Mira. I must explain. Can we meet?
Without hesitation, I agreed.
She greeted me in the café we visited after the graveyard. She had shorter hair. She looked drained.
“I lied to you,” she replied, sitting.
My heart pounded. “About what?”
She inhaled deeply. “I’m not her sister.”
My brain couldn’t handle that. “What do you mean?”
“I didn’t mean for it to go so far,” she responded hurriedly. “I started it to process my grief. Your name was in one of her posts. I got your mails. I didn’t try to defraud or catfish you. I felt lonely.”
My mind raced.
She continued. I was her roommate. We were tight, but not like you two. Her parents gave me some of her belongings when she died. My laptop still had her Facebook. One night, I saw your messages and… No idea. I just wanted to talk to someone who knew her like me. Someone who missed her like me.”
“Your name is not Mira?”
“No. It’s Rachel.”
Leaning back. Processing. Angry. Hurt. But primarily bewildered.
“Why not say that from the start?” I requested.
“I worried you wouldn’t talk. I thought saying I was a roommate would invade your grief. Having a sister felt safer. More is permitted.”
No words were spoken. She added, “I deleted everything because I couldn’t live with the lie anymore. However, I couldn’t let you believe something false.”
Not knowing what to say. I felt duped. It was strange, yet I felt understood. Everything she stated in those months was true. Comfort, healing, connection. Even though the information were wrong, the emotions remained.
Finally, “You were there for me when no one else was,” I added. “I guess I was there for you too.”
She nodded, looking hazy. I’m sorry. Truly.”
Yes, I believed her. Not sure why. Maybe because her voice sounded like mine in pain.
My messages to the dead were my only comfort. Until her number disappeared… and she messaged me from beyond the grave.
