The Toy Left Behind

The morning light slipped through thin curtains, touching everything with a quiet gold. Abby’s pawprints trailed across the waxed floor, soft echoes following us down the hall. In her mouth, as always, was her little toy rabbit, threadbare, one ear bent, the fabric faintly smelling of cedar and years of love.

Mrs. Patterson had been waiting. Her frail hands trembled when she reached to touch Abby’s fur. Her skin was pale as parchment, but her eyes still shimmered with life. She whispered something I couldn’t quite catch, her voice almost hidden under the hum of oxygen. Abby pressed her head into her palm, and for a moment, the machines, the world, all seemed to hush. When our visit ended, we left in that same quiet way we always did. I didn’t notice the missing toy until we were halfway to the parking lot. Abby turned, looking toward the building, ears tilted, as if she already knew.

Two days later, we returned. The scent of lilies lingered in the hallway, flowers for the recently departed. Mrs. Patterson’s daughter met us with red rimmed eyes and a gentle smile. In her hands was the rabbit.

“She held it all night,” she said softly. “She called it ‘my golden girl.’ Said she was waiting for her by a river, with sunlight in her fur.”

The toy was warm, as though it had soaked in something beyond touch. Abby sniffed it, tail low, then rested her chin on my knee. I could feel her heartbeat through the leash, steady, strong, alive.

I placed the rabbit back in her therapy bag, not as a possession, but as a keepsake of something holy. It had crossed a boundary, carried comfort where words could not.

Outside, the air smelled of rain and blooming earth. Abby looked up at me, eyes soft and knowing, before we walked toward the light that always waits at the edge of goodbye.