I found comfort in the fact that David was remembered, even if it was by a ghost I could never catch. That was until yesterday. Yesterday was the seventh. Exactly nine years. One hundred and eight months.

I drove to the cemetery with my usual bouquet of white lilies, expecting to find the familiar worn, oxidized copper coin waiting for me.

The penny was there, but it was wrong. It wasn’t dull or weathered. It caught the mid-morning sun, gleaming brilliantly against the grey stone. I picked it up, expecting it to be a newly minted penny, perhaps a mistake by the visitor. But as I rubbed my thumb across the back of Lincoln’s head, I felt a strange, jagged texture.

I took the penny home and walked straight into David’s old study. I hadn’t changed much in there since he died. I opened his desk drawer and pulled out the heavy brass magnifying glass he used to use when reading the tiny print on legal documents.

I clicked on the harsh, yellow light of the desk lamp and positioned the coin underneath the glass. Someone had defaced the penny. Tiny, incredibly deliberate scratches had been carved into the copper. It must have been done with a needle or an engraver’s tool.

I squinted through the magnifying glass, my breath catching in my throat as the scratches formed distinct shapes. E.R. 1974 I sat back in the leather chair, my mind racing. E.R. Who was E.R.? I mentally scrolled through every friend, family member, and acquaintance David had ever mentioned.

No one matched. And the date—1974. David and I met at a mutual friend’s dinner party in the winter of 1982. In 1974, David would have been twenty-one years old, presumably still in his final year of college in upstate New York.

He never talked much about his college years, dismissing them as boring and uneventful.

A terrible, heavy feeling began to settle in my stomach. The anonymity of the pennies had always felt like a warm embrace, a sign of silent respect. This felt different. This felt like a message. I couldn’t sleep last night. I tossed and turned, staring at the ceiling, trying to convince myself I was overreacting to a piece of pocket change.

But by 6:00 AM this morning, I couldn’t take the anxiety anymore. I threw on a heavy coat over my pajamas, grabbed my keys, and drove back to the cemetery as the sun was just beginning to rise over the treeline. I don’t know what possessed me to do it.

When I reached his grave, I just stood there for a moment, looking at the empty spot where the penny had been. Then, on pure instinct, I reached out and grabbed the heavy marble vase built into the base of the headstone. I twisted it and lifted it out of its bracket.

Underneath, shielded from the rain and wind, was a small square of folded white paper. My hands began to shake violently.