As floodwaters roared through the Texas Hill Country in the early hours of Friday morning, two young sisters—Blair, 13, and Brooke Harber, 11—held onto one another in the dark, knowing help wouldn’t come in time. Alone in a separate cabin from their parents, they sent one final message. Just three words:
“I love you.”
Then, silence.
Their family would later learn the full story—how RJ and Annie Harber had shattered a window in a frantic effort to reach their daughters. How they ran through the chaos to borrow a neighbor’s kayak, desperate to paddle through the violent current. How they were ultimately rescued, empty-handed, and forced to wait in unbearable agony.
Twelve hours later, and fifteen miles downstream, rescue crews made the discovery that would stop even seasoned first responders in their tracks. Blair and Brooke were found side by side.
Still together. Still holding hands.
The image—two small bodies, linked in love—spread faster than the storm that took them. In a disaster defined by rising waters and rising death tolls, this was something different. This was heartbreak, pure and unfiltered. This was innocence, robbed. And this… was courage.
The sisters had been on a short family trip to Casa Bonita in Hunt, Texas. When torrential rains overwhelmed the region, floodwaters engulfed their cabin in minutes. Blair and Brooke were both students at St. Rita’s Catholic School in Dallas, where their mother teaches. They were described as “believers,” girls who brought their rosary beads on vacation and joy wherever they went.
“[Blair] was brilliant and kind. [Brooke] was light—she just made people feel good,” their father told CNN. “They loved each other. And they weren’t afraid. They stayed together.”
Their final message, “I love you,” was sent to their parents and grandparents around 3:30 a.m.—just minutes before the floodwaters reached the cabin’s ceiling.
Mike and Charlene Harber, the girls’ grandparents, remain missing.
The Harbers were staying in two separate cabins that night. The grandparents had taken the girls into the larger cabin offered by out-of-town neighbors, while RJ and Annie stayed nearby. But distance, in a storm like this, was everything. Too far to reach. Too late to save.
As of today, the flood has claimed at least 80 lives, with dozens still missing. Emergency crews continue their search as more rain threatens the already devastated region.
But in the midst of the destruction, two sisters are being remembered not just for how they died—but for how they lived. With faith. With love. And with each other.
Their hands were locked until the very end.
Because even when the flood came, they didn’t let go.
And because of that… none of us will forget them.
