This story was sent to me. I’m not going to do it justice. But I’ll try. 

It happened in Washington, the Evergreen State. It was late. There was a woman about to kill herself. She was young. Standing on the ledge of an overpass. Holding a stuffed animal. Hair blowing in all directions. She was really going to do it.

Traffic whizzed beneath. Roaring engines. Red tail lights. Endless rivers of Detroit engineering. 

The weeping woman gazed at the long chain of speeding cars and said a simple prayer into the din of traffic.

“Jesus, I’m going to kill myself. If you’re real, you’ll stop me. I’m giving you five minutes to prove that you care about me.”

Meantime, across town, Officer Rob Kearney was involved in another call. He heard the radio call for the suicide attempt. He overheard one of the officers speaking over the airwaves, and there was a tone to the Officer’s voice that concerned Rob.

Something made Officer Rob leave his call and divert to assist. On his way to the scene, more calls came in. 

The radio chatter was saying. “She’s on the railing! She’s gonna jump!”

Officer Rob flipped on his lightbar. He stamped on the gas. Hi-Lo sirens blaring. 

By the time he got there, there were other officers on the scene. What they all saw surprised them. A civilian man, a stranger, had wrapped his arms around the young woman. The civilian was bear-hugging her tightly to keep her safe.

She wanted to jump. She was trying to jump. But she couldn’t. The stranger had his arms around her. And he wasn’t letting her go.

In only moments, officers were dragging the woman away from the railing. She was screaming and cussing. “Let me go you [deleted] mother [deleteds]!”

Later, while sitting in Officer Rob’s cruiser, when she had calmed down, she told Officer Rob about the prayer she’d made. About how she had asked Jesus to stop her within five minutes.

“Well,” said Rob, “it worked. He sent us, didn’t he?”

“Yes, but you took SIX minutes to get here.”

They took a brief ride in the ambulance to the hospital. The young woman was placed on a routine mental-health hold. When they were en route, she and Officer Rob had a long talk. They laughed. She cried. They spoke of life, and the many moments of pain and suffering therein.

Later, when Officer Rob was briefing nurses, Rob’s partner asked the young woman about the stuffed animal.

The woman smiled. She held the stuffed animal up. It was a stuffed lamb. “I’m going to name it Jesus,” she said.

His partner’s face turned white. His partner wore one of those looks. It’s a look that originates deep in your chest, then works its way into your eyes.

“What’s wrong with you?” Officer Rob asked.

“Did someone already tell her?” replied his partner.

“Tell her what?”

The officer removed his notepad, just to make sure he was reading his notes correctly. But there it was. Written in ink. 

His partner read aloud. “The civilian who pulled her off the railing told officers his name was Jesús.”