Gene Eyster got called to an apartment complex three days before Christmas, 24-years ago.
"That was one of the strangest calls I think I've ever had: 'We have a found baby in a box,'" Eyster, a 47-year veteran of the department. "You always wonder, what happened?"
The baby was named John Doe, but Eyster and his department didn't care too much for the name.
It was Christmas time after all, so Eyster got him a teddy bear, and the guys at the department changed his name.
"We didn't want to degrade him by calling him John Doe. Baby Jesus came up."
Then the kid was put in foster care, and his records were sealed.
After 47 years on the force, Eyster retired without ever really knowing what happened to "Baby Jesus."
At least not until, he got a call from one of his friends still on the force.
He said, "Well, you're not going to believe this."
I said, "What?"
He says, "He's sitting next to me."
I said, "Who is?"
"Baby Jesus. He's sitting next to me. He's my rookie."
That's right!
"Baby Jesus" whose real name is Matthew Hegedus-Stewart, is now a rookie cop in the same department.
And the two got to reunite.
"It was a blessing," Hegedus-Stewart said of meeting Eyster. "I mean, I wondered my whole life, ‘Hey, who found me? What happened?' And more or less, it's a kind of closure for Gene."
"Like he said, for 20-something years, he's wondered what happened to ‘Baby Jesus,' but here we are. We made it."
When Hegedus-Stewart was asked if his rescue led to his chosen line of work, he said,
"I guess subconsciously, yes, that's probably why I ended up where I am now."
For Eyster, the meeting was not just closure in finally finding out what happened to the baby he rescued, but also it felt like a divine appointment.
Eyster's 36-year old son recently passed away unexpectedly.
"So the timing couldn't have been any better, it helped to fill a void that I've had to deal with," Eyster said.
THE BEST.
Here's a video if you aren't shedding tears already:
Shoutout to Not the Bee user @distractedknits for the heads up about this story.
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