I moved to my late dad’s house right after his funeral. While going through his things, I found a photo album. Inside, I saw weird photos of unknown teen girls, all of them looking messy, some even crying. Later, I discovered that all these girls were real.

At first, I thought maybe he worked at a youth center or something. But the photos didn’t look like they were taken in a happy environment. They looked like mugshots—raw, unfiltered, emotional. Something about them felt off.

The album had no names, no dates. Just faces. Some girls had bruises. One had a split lip. Most of them were looking away from the camera, clearly not wanting to be photographed. My dad was a quiet man, a mechanic for most of his life. He never talked much about anything personal. But this… this felt personal.

I spent the next few days cleaning out the house. Every time I passed that album, my stomach turned. Curiosity kept me up at night. So I finally opened one of his locked drawers using a butter knife and a bit of patience. Inside, I found a stack of letters, bound with a rubber band, and a torn envelope marked: “To be opened in case of emergency.”