our: What

nzipped her coat, and passed the phone to Kemi. "She knows." Kemi read the message, quiet. "She'll ask me to come back," Esi said. "She'll pray. Cry. Say I've been cursed by the West." Her voice cracked. "And I'll hear it all in her voice. That disappointment. That disbelief. Like she's mourning me while I'm still alive." Kemi knelt in front of her. "You don't owe her your death to prove your loyalty." "She's my mother." "I know." Kemi paused. "But you're also you. And you can't keep burying that just to make her comfortable." Esi looked down. "What if I lose her?" "Then we grieve," Kemi said gently. "But at least this time, it'll be for something real." That night, Esi didn't sleep. The hours passed in fragments-memories of her childhood, her mother's hands scrubbing floors and peeling oranges, the way she used to sing when cooking on Sundays. Esi thought of the little girl who used to cling to her mother's leg in church, and wondered if that girl could have imagined this moment. If she'd be proud. Or terrified. Just after sunrise, she picked up the phone and dialed. Her mother answered on the third ring. "Esi?" "I'm here." A beat of silence. "Where exactly is here?" her mother asked, her voice tight. "I'm in Amsterdam. With Kemi." "You lied to me." "I didn't know how to tell you." Another pause. Then: "And what's this I'm hea