The world after her father's last breath was a world made of lead. Sounds were muffled, movements were slow and arduous, and the air itself felt thick and difficult to draw into her lungs. The hospital's frantic flurry of activity—the crash team, the hushed, professional urgency, the final, solemn declaration of time of death—passed over Refiloe like a wave over a deeply anchored rock. She remained seated, her hand still resting on the now-cool skin of her father's wrist, the word Joseph a branding iron on her mind.
It was Dineo who finally pried her away, her touch firm but not unkind. "Come, Refi. There's nothing more to do here." Her voice was hollow, all the efficient energy drained out of it, leaving behind a brittle shell.
The arrangements began with a grim, practiced efficiency that spoke of a culture well-acquainted with death. The house in Soweto, which days before had been bursting with celebration, was now a sombre command centre. Uncles and aunts took over the living room, their low voices a constant murmur as they coordinated with the funeral parlour. The vibrant umembeso blankets were folded away, replaced with sombre black fabrics.
Refiloe moved through it all like a ghost. She accepted the plates of food brought by neighbours—samp and beans, stews, loaves of bread—with a numb thank you. She listened as her mother, Grace, spoke on the phone with the pastor, her voice steady and clear, betraying none of the seismic shock that had ruptured Refiloe's world. How can she be so strong? Refiloe wondered. Or was it not strength, but something else? A rehearsed performance?
Two days after the death, she found a moment alone with her mother in the kitchen. Grace was scrubbing a pot that was already clean, her back to the room.
"Mama," Refiloe began, her voice raspy from disuse.
Grace's shoulders tightened almost imperceptibly, but she did not turn around. "Yes, my child?"
"At the hospital… Daddy… he said something to me."
The scrubbing stopped. The silence in the kitchen became profound, broken only by the drip of a tap.
"He was in pain, Refiloe. The medication… people say things they don't mean when the spirit is preparing to leave." Her voice was carefully neutral, a diplomat defusing a bomb.
"It wasn't like that. He was lucid. He was trying to tell me something important." Refiloe took a step closer. "He said a name. Joseph."
The pot clattered into the sink. Grace turned slowly, wiping her hands on her apron. Her face was a mask of weary grief. "Joseph? I don't know any Joseph. It was the morphine talking, my darling. Your father loved you. He was your father. That is the only truth that matters now." She walked over and cupped Refiloe's face, her eyes brimming with genuine tears, but Refiloe saw it—a flicker of something hard and fearful deep within. "Let it go. For me. For us. We need to bury your father in peace."
Later, she cornered Bongane as he was on his way out, his car keys jangling in his hand. "Bongs, I need to ask you something."
He sighed, his handsome face etched with a genuine exhaustion that softened her for a moment. "Refi, not now. I have to go to the parlour with Uncle Themba to choose the casket."
"It's important. Did Daddy ever mention someone named Joseph to you?"
His reaction was swift and sharp. A flash of irritation, quickly masked. "Joseph? Who is Joseph? Another one of your wedding planners?" He attempted a weak smile, but it didn't reach his eyes. "Look, sis, Daddy is gone. He said a lot of things. He was sick. Don't torment yourself with the ramblings of a dying man." He kissed her forehead quickly. "I have to go."
Dineo was the hardest to approach. She was a whirlwind of lists and logistics, a barrier of practicality. When Refiloe finally managed to pull her aside in the hallway, Dineo's response was to straighten the collar of Refiloe's black dress.
"This is not the time for this, Refiloe," she said, her voice low and firm. "Can't you see Mama is barely holding on? We all are. Whatever you think you heard, whatever you think it means, now is not the time. Our duty now is to the family. To honour the man who raised you." Her words were not unkind, but they were final. They were a door being closed and locked.
That night, the silence in the house was a living thing. The murmurs of the extended family had faded, leaving only the four of them—Grace, Dineo, Bongane, and Refiloe—in the overwhelming quiet. The wedding plans, once a source of such excitement, were now a painful pile of brochures and fabric samples on the dining room table, a future indefinitely postponed.
Unable to sleep, her mind screaming with the name Joseph, Refiloe slipped out of her room. The house was dark. She could hear Bongane's soft snoring and see the strip of light under her mother's door. She moved like a thief through her own home, down the hallway, and into the stuffy, single-car garage.
It was a time capsule, filled with the dusty detritus of their lives: old school books, a broken bicycle, Christmas decorations. And in the corner, under a dusty sheet, were several large cardboard boxes labelled in her mother's neat handwriting: PHOTOS.
Her heart hammered against her ribs. This was a violation, she knew. But the need to know, to find some tangible proof of the ghost her father had summoned, was stronger than guilt.
She lifted the lid of the first box. The scent of old paper and fading memories wafted out. She sifted through envelopes of photographs, her fingers trembling. Pictures of birthdays, holidays, school events. Her father was in all of them, smiling, present. The bedrock.
Then, in a older, leather-bound album at the bottom of the second box, she found it. It was a photo of her parents, young and radiant on their wedding day. But as she went to turn the page, a smaller, square photograph, the old-fashioned kind from the 90s, slipped out from behind it and fluttered to the concrete floor.
She picked it up. It was a group shot, faded and slightly blurry. People laughing, holding drinks, celebrating. New Year's Eve, perhaps. Her parents were there, younger than she'd ever known them. And there, on the edge of the group, was a man. But someone had taken a pair of scissors and meticulously cut him out of the picture. All that remained was his shoulder, part of his arm, and a sliver of his profile—a strong jaw, a dark curl of hair.
Refiloe's breath caught in her throat. Her eyes dropped to the back of the photograph. In her mother's youthful handwriting, now faded but still legible, were the words:
"New Year's Day. With Joseph."
The ghost had a face. Or at least, a fragment of one.