It’s been a month since I read the words, “My beautiful friend and sister has passed away.”

The Instagram story was in Arabic, white letters against a black background. But the male version of “passed away” was used instead of the female one, right before my friend’s Instagram handle was tagged.

“This is a mistake,” was my first thought.

Who passed away? Her father? Her brother? Her uncle?

I messaged her to check.

“Engyy,” I typed and sent.

It delivered. Phew. Good.

That’s good.

Everything’s fine.

I went back to Instagram and replied to our mutual friend who had posted the story.

“What?”

I took a screenshot of the words, white on black, and sent it to my sister.

“What does this mean?”

“Where are you?” She replied.

“I’m on my way to you now,” my husband texted at the same time. three red hearts.

Shit, I still haven’t jumped in the shower.

But what did I just read?

My heart sank.

Ignore it. Ignore it. Ignore it.

I called my mum.

I heard her sobbing.

No. No. No. No.

“What did I just read?” I asked.

“Pray for her,” she replied between sobs.

“Who are you talking about?” I asked again.

“My friend called. She heard the news from her daughter. Engy is gone,” she answered.

But I’d read the male word for “passed away,” so my mind clung to the hope that this was a mistake. For the following two days, I kept asking my mum if she was sure. And every time, she would say she was.

Even after the same friend who had posted the typo posted again, this time sharing the funeral information, instructing attendees to wear white, I still had my doubts.

Even after she had replied to my one-word question saying, “She’s dead…”

Even after our other friend messaged me a few hours after I’d read the news: “I’m so sorry to tell you this, but Engy passed away,” her message piercing through my heart all over again.

I couldn’t let go of the alternate reality where the male use of the Arabic word for “passed away” was not a typo. Where it ended with someone’s grandfather; some man who had lived a full life, well past his 90s. Someone whose passing was still sad, but sort of expected.

Not my best friend. Not my 30-year-old best friend. Not my new-mother-of-a-3-month-old, 30-year-old best friend.

It has been a month since I saw that typo, since I messaged my best friend to check. A whole month of two grey ticks, never turning blue.

I thought it had sunk in, nearly four weeks later, but I finally got to go home to Egypt and half of me wanted so badly to message her and tell her I’m here.

I went to her house, saw her mother’s sunken, blood-shot eyes and her husband’s hollow cheeks, and still half-expected her to come out of her bedroom at the end of her childhood home’s corridor and give me the biggest hug.

Her father sat with me briefly and said, “she left us beautiful baby Lara.”

I brought gifts for her daughter and kept them in a bag next to my feet for an hour before her friend noticed it and asked me what was in it. I didn’t want to show them; I was still half-waiting for her to show up so we could all go through the baby outfits and toys together.

For the past month, I’ve felt half-alive. I’m half-here, and half still in that hotel room in London, waiting for my phone screen to light up with her name, telling me everything’s fine.

But it was just a typo.