Page 12 of Before I Say I Don't
KAMIRA
Ialways forget how quiet a cemetery is until I stand inside one.
The next day was Mama’s birthday—a date that resonated in our bones as much as it did on the calendar. We always brought her flowers. Danica and I decided on white lilies—Mama’s favorite. She swore they smelled like a hymn. I tucked a single pink rose against the ribbon because Mama believed a little color belonged everywhere.
Danica came with a small balloon pressed under her arm, with "Happy Birthday" looping across it in swirly gold letters. In her other hand, she clutched a slice of lemon cake in a plastic container.
“Mama wouldn’t want us to show up empty-handed to her own party,” she said, and I could almost hear Mama’s laughter in the space between her words—warm, knowing, and still ours.
Her plot sat beneath a sprawling oak tree whose gnarled branches reached out like a guardian’s protective arms, casting dappled shadows on the ground below. The headstone was simple, yet elegant, exactly as she had wished:JOYCE ADELE SINCLAIR, etched in a timeless serif font, followed by the birth and death dates, and beneath that, the phrase that resonated sodeeply with all of us—SHE TAUGHT US HOW TO STAY.Every time I read those words, they always hit me the same way. A bittersweet swell of pride and a hollowness seemed to grow deeper, no matter how many verdicts, promotions, or milestones I amassed in my life to fill that void.
Sometimes when I thought about my father, it felt like I was trying to remember a dream I never had. He died when I was one month old—too soon for me to have a single memory of him. Danica got four years with him, but four years doesn’t stretch very far. She could barely remember the sound of his laugh or the way he used to hold her. Mostly, we grew up on stories and photographs, pieces of him passed around like fragile glass we were scared to drop.
He wasn’t originally from Chicago. That was our mother’s city, her neighborhood and world. He came to Chicago because it was a place where drugs moved quick and money moved quicker. But it was also a place where the street life eventually caught up to him. One wrong deal, one wrong night, and he was gone… just like that.
When he died, his mother—our grandmother—had him buried back in New Hampshire, where he was from. Our mother told us many times how his mom never liked her. She called her names, kept her at a distance, treated her like she wasn’t good enough for her son. According to our mother, she was a bitch back then—cold and judgmental. And when our father died, the wall between them grew even higher.
It tookyearsfor that wall to come down—years of awkward phone calls, hesitant visits, and my grandmother realizing that she couldn’t punish us for the choices our father made. Somewhere along the way, she found God, softened her edges, and learned to love us like we were truly hers. By then, me and Danica had already built our own ways of coping, our own ways of missing a man we barely knew.
Every year, on his birthday, me and Danica took a trip to New Hampshire to visit his grave. Sometimes we laughed at how weird it is, honoring a man we only know in fragments. Other times we cry, because even fragments still cut when you realize what you lost.
His death changed everything. Our mother, who once thought the fast money was worth it—the nice car, the good jewelry, the trips she could take—finally admitted it wasn’t. She became more spiritual, anchored herself in faith, and swore she would never date another drug dealer or criminal again. The money was good, but it wasn’t worth the empty side of the bed, the endless worry, or raising two daughters who would only ever know their father through secondhand stories.
And me? I carried all of that with me. His absence shaped me just as much as his blood did. Every choice I made—to go to law school, to work twice as hard, to never settle for a man who thought lies and hustle were love—was built on the memory of a man I never got to meet.
“Hey, Mama.” I set the flowers down and smoothed the ribbon with my thumb. “We brought you your favorites.” My voice snagged on the second word.
Beside me, Danica knelt down, gently brushing away the morning dew that clung to the stone’s surface with a tissue, as if she were delicately wiping away crumbs from Mama’s table after a family meal.
“Happy birthday, Ma,” came from Danica. “Your girls look good, don’t they? I know you see it.” She glanced over her shoulder at me, eyes glinting. “Kam showed out in court last week, Ma!”
I laughed under my breath. “I didokay.”
“She got a four-point-seven!” Danica continued talking to the headstone like it was a person with a gossip subscription. “You know she still overworks like you taught her!”
I chuckled. “That wasnotwhat she taught me.” Though in some ways… it was.
Work, but with intention. Push, but don’t let it push you over.That’s what Mama would always say.
We stood there for a while, not speaking, letting the wind comb through our hair. I took the fork out of the container and set the slice of lemon cake on top of Mama’s stone, balanced over in the left corner where the marble dips. Danica stuck a single candle in it, shielded the flame with her hand, and lit it. For a second, the tiny light looked rebellious, bright against all that gray.
“Make a wish,” Danica said, and because that was always her job—assigning meaning, marking moments, bossing God kindly—I closed my eyes.
I wished for the same thing I always did when it came to Mama—for just a little more time.
One more day in that kitchen. One more car ride with the windows down. One more lecture about not lowering my voice when I knew I was right.
Danica and I leaned over the flickering candle. Together, we blew it out, watching as the remnants of smoke curled upward and then vanish into the open air, much like our fleeting memories.
Danica took the little balloon and tied it to the flower stand, where it bobbed cheerfully above the polished stone like a smile that refused to fade.
“Let's pray,” she announced softly, and I nodded in agreement because at Mama's grave, there was always a prayer—whether we vocalized it or let the quiet thrum of our hearts do the talking.
“Lord, we thank you for Mama’s life,” Danica began, her fingers tightly laced with mine, a comforting anchor. “We thank you for every invaluable lesson she taught us, every time she toldus the unvarnished truth, especially when it was hard to hear, and for every soft place she created for us to land after life’s many falls. She was a good mother, and we are who we are today because of her nurturing spirit. Keep us in your care and guide us in our choices. Amen.”
“Amen,” I whispered. It slid out like relief, mingled with grief.
We stayed a little longer, sharing things with Mama, she already knew from her seat on some heavenly balcony, a watchful guardian over us. Danica filled her in on the kids' latest school projects, including the way Larenz—her husband—had attempted to salvage the overcooked salmon last week by smothering it in lemon, which made us all laugh. I shared my recent experience of a client hugging me so tightly after the verdict that I felt a rib might crack. I talked about the dress fitting that had me excited yet anxious, and about Diane’s offhand comments, how I’m continually striving so hard to be gracious. I reflected on being thirty, still yearning for the days to feel as uncomplicated as they did when I was fifteen, when Mama used to drive us to Sunday service, her scarf wrapped around her hair like a crown.
