Dad Is Still Typing

March 11 is the day Alexander Graham Bell placed the first successful telephone call to a friend, Thomas Watson.

The phone has since become a feature of our pockets, and a constant Dinner Table battle with the kids.

But some messages stay, regardless of era.

Some voices refuse to log out.

🍚📱💬✨💬📱🍚

It had been years. Somehow, he still scrolled our social media accounts. 

The WhatsApp Chat Dad had started had become defunct after he stopped chatting with this world. 

No one deleted the account after he passed. Somehow, the small green dot next to his name was a firm reminder. Like his hand once was. 

A piece of him.

No one dared to loosen it.

His last message remained pinned to the top of the conversation. The chat had long lost its chattiness. But that message was a sonorous reminder of his presence.

Then, a too-familiar text.

"Everyone, jiak peng te nan chu."  (Dinner at our home).

The words sprang out at us and seemed to hover in front of our eyes for several seconds.

Three little green WhatsApp dots. Then, complete silence.

The whole family bore witness to it. No denials.

The chat window glimmered a little too brightly.

That was a Dad message. Mum never issued dinner reminders - she was always too busy in the kitchen. 

"Jiak peng te nan chu."

It was a line which he had written hundreds of times. The familiarity opened floodgates. 

And there was flooding. 

But the timestamp didn't belong at the dinner table. Or at the empty seat. 

Mom called in Jia Le, her nephew and our cousin. The software engineer did the customary probing. 

WhatsApp had included its new feature in our chat feed - 

AI memory restoration. 

It imitated a person's writing style from memory. 

The tool had restored messages. And dad. 

The system had learned his voice too well; our laptop had found a way to be him.  

Our father had found a way to continue chatting with us. 

Digitally, if not spiritually. 

"Jiak peng te nan chu" appeared again a few weeks after Jia Le eased digital or otherworldly frustrations.

But no one opened the chat. 

Or turned off the feature. 

Dad was still composing replies. His messages -

Digital or spiritual -

Always read. 

🍚📱💬✨💬📱🍚

Original story by Michelle Liew Tsui-Lin. AI tags are coincidental.

For Mikeydred's March prompt.