What could have been.

After *24 December*, Grace is the last one left holding the house. Her cousin *Will* is gone. His brother *Tee* is gone. Her father *Ti* is gone. Three graves. One garden that only grows spiderlilies - flowers for the dead. Each petal gets a name: *Will. Tee. Ti. Empty.*

*Empty* is Grace. The one who survived. The one who desired death and it left her behind; the one who is living for them.

She isn't alone. Her cousin *Thabo* is still here. Alive. The two of them fell together. Relapsed together. Now they're learning how to get up together, carrying three ghosts between them.

*WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN* is not about healing. It's about staying. It's about a fireworks lesson that ended too soon, a father who held the house until he couldn't, and a sentence that should have ended with a period on *24 December* but got a *Semi-Colon;* instead.

This is a book about grief that doesn't move in a line. About survivor's guilt that doesn't wash off. About choosing to live when death already took everyone else.

*Three graves. Two cousins. One step. One promise: _We will keep getting up when we fall.*_