The dress Mrs. Potts bought is too tight in the collar, but Shelly has other things on her mind the day of the funeral. The service is in a little chapel on the grounds of the graveyard, the same one where they met Joseph. One of Grandma’s friends burns sweetgrass and walks around the room, slow and steady, letting them breathe in the smoke.

Shelly sits between Grandma and Mrs. Potts. They’re more comfortable with the ceremony than she is. She tries to follow along as they fan the smoke toward themselves, but she’s never been to a funeral before and it’s all new. Shelly tries to focus on looking like she knows what she’s doing because it’s something else to think about. If she’s thinking about the scent of sweetgrass, she’s not thinking about her mother being dead—she’s not thinking about how the next time she sees her, her mom will be a ghost.

Shelly’s hair is loose. She has to comb ghosts from it with her fingers on the way to the cemetery, but Grandma doesn’t say anything about her hair being down. She understands grief better than most people. Grandma makes her living with the dead, and that means she talks to people who are grieving. That means she’s met ghosts who never wanted to die, who were taken from the living too soon. Grandma has helped other people move on before, and now she and Shelly have lost someone, too.

Shelly winds her hair into a loose bun, ready to pull it free if she sees her mother. Grandma wears her hair in braids, wrapped around her head like a crown. They walk hand in hand to the cemetery, where the urn that holds Shelly’s mother’s remains waits.

Grandma cries as the drummers sing a traveling song to guide Shelly’s mother on to her next destination—even though Shelly knows her mom isn’t going anywhere yet—and she and Shelly lower the urn into the earth.

Grandma and Shelly step away from the grave. Grandma cries and holds tight to Shelly’s hand. They stand and watch until the urn is covered in dirt and the song is done, until the other people at the funeral start coming up to offer their condolences and say how lovely it was—the song, the sweetgrass.

Shelly slips away from all the hugging and touching and walks to the outskirts of the cemetery.

“Little Shell,” Joseph says, looking at her with his black, blank eyes and his mouth that moves while his headphones emit the tinny sound of his voice. “Did you bring me a tape?”

“Do you want to learn French?” she asks, pulling her three stolen tapes from her pockets. “The thrift store had these.”

Joseph looks offended. “No music?”

“My mom died,” Shelly says. “I can’t find her.”