Sawyer knows he should resist the temptation to go back home while he’s on the mainland, back in 1976; it’s not as if there’s anything he could do to save his family - as Faraday was always saying, whatever happened, happened.

Even as he dials the number, which he still remembers after so many years, part of him feels like he shouldn’t, yet at the same time he knows one phone call won’t change anything, that he just has to hear her voice again for one more time.

Mary Ford picks up the phone, says “Hello?” a few times before hanging up, muttering something about idiots who didn’t say anything when they got the wrong number, and Sawyer holds on to the callbox receiver a long time after she hangs up before whispering “Goodbye, mom.”