I Buried My Son 10 Years Ago – When I Saw My New Neighbors’ Son, I Could Have Sworn He Looked like Mine Would If He Were Alive Today

I inhaled, and it felt like the first breath I’d taken in a while.

There was only one question that mattered.

“How old are you?” I asked.

He tilted his head. “What? Uh, I’m 19.”

Nineteen. The same age Daniel would’ve been.

There was only one question that mattered.

“Tyler? Is everything okay? I heard a crash…” a woman’s voice called out from somewhere inside the house.

The young man turned. “I’m fine, Mom. But there’s a woman here; she dropped something.”

Mom. Hearing him say that word to someone else was the strangest feeling.

He started picking up the broken pieces of the plate. A woman appeared in the doorway behind him.

The initial shock was fading now. I forced a smile.

“I’m so sorry about the mess,” I said. “My son. He… if he’d gotten a chance to grow up, he would’ve looked very much like your boy.”

Hearing him say that word to someone else was the strangest feeling.

Tyler (he was Tyler, not Daniel, unless by some miracle he was Daniel) frowned and straightened up. “Oh, I’m so sorry for your loss. Don’t worry about the mess. It’s no problem.”

But the woman went completely still, like a mouse that’s just realized the cat is watching it. She looked from me to her son… and then to his eyes.

“Sorry for your loss, but you need to leave. We have a lot to do!”

Then she stepped forward, pulled Tyler back into the house, and shut the front door right in front of me.