Pricilla Jones Campbell has counted the days since her teenage son was shot near Lansdowne High School last month.

For weeks, she lay in bed every night, searching for sleep. In the brief moments she dozed off, she jolted awake soon after, panicked that closing her eyes meant she was no longer thinking of her baby.

Her baby. Kamau Xavier Campbell, age 16, known to his family as “Daddy” because he was his mother’s only boy when born. Her baby, who had such a sense of justice that he won anti-bullying awards in grade school and was later known to break up fights. Her baby, a charming personality who always treated girls as he wanted his mother to be treated.

Her baby was waiting for a ride at a shopping center across from the high school on March 4 when someone jumped out of a car and started shooting at him. Kamau ran toward the high school, where he collapsed, and the gunman shot him multiple times more. He was pronounced dead after being taken to a local hospital.

The weeks since have been a blur for Kamau’s loved ones, who can’t make sense of the unsensible. They believe they know the identity of the shooter, though police have not yet announced an arrest. Surveillance footage circulating online of the killing has only added to their pain.

So they have focused their energy on the Kamau they knew and loved. His mother had his face printed on sweatshirts and posters, and she made jewelry spelling out his name in cursive. His parents recently picked up the urn to hold his ashes, shaped like a flame to represent eternal life.

“People love him so much — they’re going to keep his name alive,” said Kamau’s older brother, Shawn Henry.

Kamau was born Nov. 27, 2008, Thanksgiving Day, to Pricilla and Antonio Xavier Campbell. His arrival was highly anticipated, the first baby born years after his older half-siblings from his parents’ previous relationships. He came prematurely and stayed in the hospital for several weeks. Every day, his parents hoped to bring him home. “Not yet,” the doctors would say.

The last day Kamau was in the hospital, their car was towed, but they finally had their baby. They wanted to give him a ‘K’ name, because his older sisters’ names started with the same sound, and his mom was known by the nickname “Kedi.”

He was a mischievous, curious baby, his parents said. “Anything he see, he wanted to learn it,” Antonio Campbell said.

He loved being in and around water, especially playing in swimming pools. Neighbors sometimes called when they saw Kamau standing on the side of the house turning the hose on.

As the youngest, Kamau was spoiled rotten, his parents said. His three sisters and two brothers spent so much time with him that people sometimes thought Kamau was their child. As he grew older, it seemed that he was given a new pair of shoes every three weeks, his mother said.

Kamau was a skilled athlete and natural leader. He started playing football at about age 5 and quickly became captain. From ages 10 to 13, he led his team to the championship game, his parents said.

“They had him playing so many different positions — he was on offense, defense, running back,” Henry said. “When they was losing, he was the person that they looked up to, that get everybody on the same page, for real, so they can win the games.”

But his friends looked up to him for more than football. Nate Johnson was about three years older than Kamau but still sought his counsel. Kamau wore his heart on his sleeve and was fiercely protective of friends and family. Johnson used to have trouble standing up for himself, he said, but Kamau pushed him to be more assertive.

Kamau was the only male friend Johnson has ever bought a birthday gift for (a pair of Air Forces). They talked of taking trips and starting a business together.

“He was one of them people who was always in my ear telling me to do the right thing,” Johnson said. “The day he passed, he told me he was proud of me. I had started my job.”

Kamau also had an autistic brother nine years his junior whom he defended and supported like no one else. He once shoved a boy making fun of his brother, his mother recalled. When the boy’s mom came over to assess the situation and learn what happened, the boy was scolded.

When his brother graduated from kindergarten and his name was called, it was like Kamau wanted to run up on the stage with him, Pricilla Jones Campbell said.

The boys loved playing video games together, one of Kamau’s many hobbies. He was also an amateur rapper, though his skills were anything but amateurish, family and friends said. He wrote a few songs, too, that his family now listens to just to hear his voice.

He was very close with his parents, often gossiping with his mother. And he broke his phone so often that his father joked he had the local fix-up shop on speed dial.

And, boy, was Kamau funny, his family said. From the time he was a baby, he was always up to some antics, Henry said. One Thanksgiving, Kamau stole his brother’s phone and dropped it in a bucket of water. Henry, a teenager at the time, was fuming and retreated outside to sulk. A little while later, Kamau brought him a phone.

Whose phone? Nobody could figure it out right away. Perhaps, feeling bad, Kamau just took a phone from one of the neighborhood kids playing outside.

A few months back, Pricilla Jones Campbell had some teeth removed. Kamau was always the first to poke fun at her gummy speech and her inability to eat solid foods as she waited for dentures.

The day of Kamau’s funeral, his mother accidentally left her temporary dentures at home, and she thinks it was because her son wanted to laugh with her one last time.

“I wish he was here,” she said. “He would make a rainy day seem sunny. He would make you laugh when you want to cry.”

Kamau’s parents want the world to know that their son was kind and decent — a boy who stood up for what was right, who looked out for others, who walked with confidence and who brought people together. Kamau wanted to follow in his brother’s footsteps and attend pharmacy school, and he’d been saving up for a car. He dreamed of bringing his girlfriend of two years to Miami.

Despite rumors some have spread, Kamau wasn’t involved in gangs, he didn’t play with guns, and he wasn’t disrespectful, his family said.

It’s hard for Kamau’s parents to talk about what happened to their son. The wound is still fresh, and justice hasn’t yet been served. Their 7-year-old son looks at a life-size cutout of Kamau in their home every day, waiting for his best friend to come back.

“He was too good of a kid to get murdered,” his father said through tears. He was their baby.

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