salted butter                                            white sugar

flour, sifted 2-3 times                               brown sugar
      don’t use pre-made cake flour                                                                  
                  like you don’t know no better                  large eggs, beat in 1 at a time

             whole milk                                            baking powder

           pure vanilla flavoring

           You should realize I left something out. 
     Put that in, and measure it all with your eyes.

You have to remember how to make the caramel cake after I’m gone. You’ll be the last one who knows. I made sure to leave you a little money to bury me with, but I’m sure you know there’s no inheritance for people like us. I’ve given you everything I have, though. My prayers. Your great aunt’s ring that she never took off, even after the man did. All the photos that were left after the fire on Sycamore. My eyes, that can cut better than any blade your uncle carried. My stories. And those hands—even though yours are tender in a way mine never were and don’t show the scars of too-hard work—I gave you my touch for cooking. Don’t be telling people your granny taught you everything she knew in the kitchen and then go and make a dry cake.

And don’t forget the stories, the ones only you and I know. Because when I’m gone, you’ll be the only one to tell them, and you have to keep them alive. Keep us alive. We’ll live as long as your memory, and the people who remember you, so give them to someone who will understand. You’ll know, like I knew when I saw you. Pink blanket. Red skin that was a little yellow with jaundice. Dark, endless eyes that could absorb it all.

Tell the stories while you bake this cake for the young ones every year on their birthday. And after I go, remember to make it for yourself on yours. Sing the songs my sister Sarah and I sang for you, and show them how to keep a garden. Teach them how to set their jaw and shoot like Ruth. Let them cuss and drink when they’re almost old enough like Ann D would. Don’t do anything like Marybelle. Pray like Eva, even when you don’t want to and barely believe. I know you. Jump trains like my brother Wes, just to know what all is out there, and make your own path regardless of what people want you to do. Stop smoking so much reefer like him, it’ll turn your pretty lips black. Say your Psalms and remember I’m with you, no matter how long it’s been. 

Never let anyone forget I kicked Mae Mosely’s ignorant ass for calling your daddy a son of bitch, grown as she was. But tell them I took my steel toe boots from the factory off first cause I always fought fair. That part is important. And since they’re both dead now, you can tell them how Ruth pulled the shotgun on Mae Mosely’s old drunk husband and threatened to clear Sycamore Street when he staggered down with his pistol to see about me after, cause he liked to be the only one to beat on Mae. Tell your nieces about Nessie like I told you when you were small. (Probably too small, I’m sorry. I used to tell your little curious eyes everything. And that day when you saw me looking at old pictures with an angry, wet face, I couldn’t help but let it all spill out.) If you ever see your sisters with a man like Low Down Jones, do what I should’ve done and don’t tell nobody, so you never have to bury your sister young. I heard he died an awful death alone some years later, bleeding out and begging for his mama. But I don’t know that story too well, and there’s no one left to tell it. Some memories, like some men, are better off dead. 

Like I told you about the cake, when you tell my stories, don’t let them be dry. And don’t let nobody else tell them dry. You remember how my cheeks touch my eyes when I get to laughing and my mouth is open wide, teeth showing. A laugh that comes from deep, being a lady be damned. Don’t quiet your laugh or life to be a lady. Be you. 

Now, I told you this is your inheritance, so don’t just give it away. People are going to taste it and fawn over you and ask how you did it, what’s the recipe. I know I didn’t raise you to be the kind of person that tells everything you know to any old body. You smile and rattle off ingredients that could go in any cake, in whatever order, with no measurements or anything else. And if they corner you at a function you don’t even want to be at and ask you to write it down, and you do it without leaving anything out, I will haunt your little green tail and make all your cakes fall when you open the oven until you’re old and gone like me. That goes for your mother too. You bet not let anyone say they’re making Dot’s cakes and they’re flavorless, fallen, or dry. 

When you make this cake for someone you love, use all vanilla flavoring, not imitation, and use the good butter. Remember to let the butter soften. Don’t be rushing and take it right out the ice box. That’s how you get cakes like your cousin, who I don’t even have to mention. I told her to stop telling people I taught her to bake. She couldn’t bake a good cake if Duncan Hines himself came to life and held her hands in the kitchen. 

Cream your butter and your sugar first. That’s your foundation. Then your dry ingredients before your wet ones. How you do it matters. But if you don’t know that by now, you don’t need to be making this cake. While it’s baking at 350, make the caramel. I won’t bother writing that because you should know it by heart. It should be my color, not yours, and not your daddy’s. 

You remember the first time I taught you to make caramel on the stove? I know you’ve heard it a hundred times by now, but remember it like this: You were so little you needed a step stool, and the saucepan was still chest-high. You said you wanted to help stir. And you took to it like you had done it for years. Steady and patient, cautious of the sticky sugar-turned-lava that would take your skin off, but not afraid of it. I had taught you right and you were listening when I talked. You had the fire low, but hot enough, and mixed the sugar in a little at a time while you stirred slowly. Your focused, narrow eyes and sucked in bottom lip reminded me of Mama. 

Your daddy was coming from work to get you about that time, and when he saw you there over the pot you would’ve thought he saw a spirit standing in the middle of the room. His voice and eyes got all wild and nervous—you know how he still gets about you. Couldn’t stand to see something happen. Mama, what are you doing? She’s gonna get hurt! He cleared the length of the kitchen in two steps and went to lift you off the stool. He wanted to keep you safe, but I knew what you were capable of, and I stopped him right in his tracks. I never liked to interfere much with your parents, but I I told him, Look at her, she knows what she’s doing. She’s gotta see things for herself. And you did. 

Everybody said it was the best caramel cake I ever made. They didn’t want to believe me when I said my little grandbaby did it. Four and a half years old, and I knew you had it. You’ll always have it, even after I’m long gone. You know Mama taught me and Ann D the recipe. And in time, she was asking us to make it instead, though she wouldn’t admit it was ‘cause ours was light as a cloud in a way hers never was. Yours will be even sweeter than mine. It’ll be your own, and all of ours too.