The cemetery sat quiet under a low gray sky, the kind of afternoon that pressed down on your shoulders. I stood at my father Daniel’s freshly turned grave, the oaks behind me shifting in a slow wind. The other mourners had begun drifting toward their cars, their black coats blurring into the hedges.
My cousin Ellie lingered a few steps away, holding her purse against her chest.
“You don’t have to stay out here alone, Sarah,” she said softly.
“I know.”
“He wouldn’t want you catching cold over him.”
I almost laughed. “He wouldn’t want me doing a lot of things.”
She gave me the tired, patient look people give grieving daughters. “He was proud of you. You know that.”