I carried them all home.

When Daniel came downstairs later that evening, moving slower than ever, he found me curled up next to the basket with the kittens. I had Lily’s sweater folded in my lap.

He stared in silence for a few seconds, his eyes widening when he saw the cat and her babies.

“What… what is this?” he asked, his voice dry and unsure.

I looked up at him, and for the first time in three weeks, I didn’t feel like crying from pain. I felt something else — something fragile and hopeful.

I had Lily’s sweater

folded in my lap.

“Lily’s secret,” I said softly. “She was taking care of them. In the old shed.”

Daniel blinked slowly, as if he hadn’t understood the words.

I told him everything — about the sweater, Baxter, the hiding place, and the clothes. I told him how she must’ve been sneaking out to bring warmth and safety to this tiny family of strays.

As I spoke, something changed on his face.

The pain didn’t go away, but the darkness in his eyes lifted just a little.

As I spoke,

something changed

on his face.

With great effort, he knelt beside me, reached out, and stroked one of the kittens with his index finger.

“She really did have the biggest heart,” he whispered.

“She did,” I said, smiling through the tears. “And it’s still here. Somehow.”

We kept them all. The mother cat was calm and affectionate, and her kittens grew stronger every day. Baxter watched over them as if it were his full-time job.

“And it’s still here. Somehow.”

And me? I found a reason to get up every morning. To feed them, clean their space, to hold them, and to cradle them the way Lily used to cradle her dolls, singing lullabies she made up on the spot.

A few nights later, I walked into Lily’s room for the first time without holding my breath. I picked up the half-finished bracelet she had been making for me and tied it around my wrist, even though it barely fit. I sat at her desk. I opened her sunflower sketchbook.

And I smiled.

I sat at her desk.

Every tiny heartbeat in that basket downstairs reminded me of her. It was like a whisper from Lily herself. It was not a goodbye, just a reminder that even in grief, even in the wreckage, love finds a way to stay.

I sat by the window that night with the yellow sweater in my lap and whispered, “I’ll take care of them, baby. Just like you did.”

Every tiny heartbeat

in that basket downstairs

reminded me of her.

Baxter came and rested his head on my feet, and the mother cat purred louder than her babies nestled in close.

That was the first night I slept without nightmares.

And in the morning, when the sun poured through the windows, and the kittens stirred, it felt — for just a moment — like Lily was still here. Not in a ghostly, sorrowful way, but in the quiet kindness she had left behind.

That was the first night

I slept without nightmares.