Telha
I woke up drenched in sweat, feeling drained and uneasy. As I sipped my morning tea, my eyes wandered to the window again. There she was—waving, her tiny hand motioning as if calling to me.
“That’s it!” I said to Sandy, my wife. “I’m done with this. I’m going to talk to her parents. She’s starting to scare me. Last night, she waved at me the same way. What does she want from me?”
Determined, I mapped out how to find their apartment. When I rang the doorbell and the door finally opened, what I saw nearly made me collapse.
When the new family moved into the neighborhood, no one paid them much attention. They were reclusive, the kind of people who seemed to want no interaction with their neighbors. That suited Sandy and me just fine—we valued our privacy too.
But there was something about them that intrigued me. Their daughter, a little girl no older than five, had a strange habit. Every day and night, she would stand at the window and wave at me.
One evening, I mentioned it to Sandy, who was curled up with her usual book. “That little girl is waving at me again,” I said.
“Maybe you should wave back,” she teased, smiling at my growing obsession with the tiny neighbor.
“I don’t know,” I replied. “Something about her feels… off. She doesn’t just wave. She looks at me—deeply, like she’s trying to tell me something. It’s unsettling, like she’s asking for help.”
Sandy laughed and brushed it off. “She’s probably just bored. Don’t let it get to you.”
But I couldn’t shake the feeling. That night, I dreamed of the girl and woke up feeling more unsettled than ever.
The next morning, I told Sandy I was going to pay the family a visit. She shrugged and said, “If it’ll ease your mind, go for it.”
When I saw the girl waving again that day, I couldn’t ignore her any longer. “That’s it, Sandy. I’m going to talk to her parents.”
As I approached their house, I hesitated for a moment before ringing the doorbell. A few seconds later, the door swung open, and I froze.
“Juliette?” I whispered, stunned.
“Long time, no see, Jim,” she replied calmly.
Before I could process what was happening, the little girl ran to the door and shouted, “Daddy!”
I gripped the doorframe, struggling to stay upright.
Juliette, my ex from six years ago, invited me inside and began explaining. When we separated, she discovered she was pregnant, but I had already moved away, and she couldn’t find me. The little girl who had been waving at me all this time—her name was Heidi—was my daughter.
Once I got home, I fell to my knees, tears streaming down my face. I told Sandy everything. She was completely stunned. We had spent years trying to have children, only to accept that it wasn’t in the cards for us.
Sandy urged me to request a DNA test to be sure, and Juliette agreed. After what felt like an eternity of waiting, the results confirmed what I already felt in my heart: Heidi was my daughter.
Juliette apologized, insisting she hadn’t meant to complicate our lives—she just wanted Heidi to know her father. But neither Sandy nor I felt any resentment. Instead, we were overjoyed that Heidi would now be part of our lives.
That evening, Heidi stood at the window again. She waved at me like always, but this time, I waved back. My heart swelled with a happiness I’d never known.
I never imagined becoming a father like this, but life has a way of putting us exactly where we’re meant to be.
