They were too young when she passed to understand it, really. I remember holding them both at the service, one on each hip, while trying not to fall apart myself. I told them she was in the sky, watching us. That she loved them more than cookies and cartoons combined.
Now they’re five. Old enough to ask questions, to hold flowers, to remember things I didn’t think they could.
We go every year on her birthday. Bring yellow daisies—her favorite—and take a photo to “show her we visited,” like I promised them we would.
This time, we dressed up. Ellie insisted on wearing the gray dress because “Nana liked twirly ones.” Drew wore his little button-up, though he unbuttoned half of it before we even got through the gate.
They hugged in front of her stone like they always do. It was supposed to be a quick visit. Just flowers, a photo, and a few quiet minutes.
But then Drew pointed at the base of the headstone and said, “That box wasn’t there last year.”
I looked down.
He was right.
Tucked carefully under the bouquet was a wooden box. Clean. As if it had just been placed there that morning.
There was no name. No writing on the outside.
I opened it.
And what it was—was a bundle of old photographs and a small, folded letter, yellowed around the edges.
Ellie tugged my sleeve. “Is it from Nana?”
“I don’t know, baby,” I said, though my heart had already started racing.
I unfolded the letter with shaky hands. It wasn’t addressed to anyone. Just a short message written in delicate, cursive handwriting.
sat back on my heels. My eyes darted around the cemetery, half-expecting someone to be watching us from behind a tree or a nearby grave. But there was no one.
The kids were too busy counting birds in the sky to notice my mood change.
I thumbed through the photos.
Most were black and white. Some had my mother in them—young, smiling, holding hands with a man I didn’t recognize. A tall man with broad shoulders and kind eyes.
And then I saw the one that made my breath catch.
It was her. My mom. And that man. Standing outside the old