Nine moments across five days of the post-loss visit.
November 2029. The McGolrick bench scene in #06. Mom's new card on the side table in #09.
Mom flew in at 6:42 PM on a Tuesday in mid-November.
Same arrivals gate, same wave. Mom — at sixty-one, five months after losing her father — was carrying it in her shoulders. She didn't comment. I didn't comment. She hugged me at the railing. She said I came. I said thank you. She said eat the orange. She handed me a mandarin.
Mom walked into the apartment at 8:14 PM.
Took off her shoes. Set down the carry-on. Took the apartment in. She walked to the wall above the desk. Stood in front of it for a minute. Didn't say anything. She lifted her hand once — almost touching her father's framed photo, then not. Lowered her hand. Turned. She said the wall is right. I said yes. That was the entire conversation about the wall.
Mom and I made the soup together on Wednesday morning.
Same recipe. First the bones. Ginger second. The kitchen was small — two people at the stove is shoulder-to-shoulder. We hadn't cooked together in Brooklyn before. We had in Hangzhou. Now here. Mom said, at minute fourteen of stirring: you do it well. She said it the way she'd said it in Hangzhou. The same compliment. The same kitchen, differently.
August came over Wednesday at 4:14 PM.
He had, by his own quiet preparation, brought a bag of fruit. He shook Mom's hand. He said I am, very much, pleased to meet you. Mom said yes. After an assessing minute, she said sit. August sat. Mom poured him tea. The afternoon was Mom meeting August without performing it. He stayed an hour and a half. Left at 5:42 with I will see you both tomorrow. Mom said, after he'd gone: he is the right shape. I didn't ask what she meant. I knew.
Mom did the two-pat at the kitchen counter at 6:14 PM.
The two-pat — the two pats with the flat of the hand — is what Mom does when she has approved. Not on a shoulder this time. On the counter, beside where August had been sitting. Mom approving August without saying it. She didn't, in any of the remaining four days, mention the two-pat. The two-pat was the entire approval.
Sat on the McGolrick bench for thirty-five minutes Thursday afternoon.
Didn't speak for thirty-two of them. Mom looked at a tree across the path. I looked at the same tree, mostly. The November leaves were half-down, half-still-up. At minute thirty-two Mom said, in slow careful Mandarin: the bench is the same bench. I said yes. Walked home.
Mom inspected Greg on Saturday morning.
Greg had been drooping since August — not dying, just not thriving, the plant equivalent of a bad month. Mom touched a leaf. Mom said 她需要光. She needs light. Mom moved Greg six inches to the right — away from the corner. Mom said now she will recover. I said yes. By Christmas, Greg had recovered.
Sunday evening, the last dinner.
The three of us. Mom in the cream cardigan. The cat on Mom's lap. The lamp on. The soup, the roast, the bread. We didn't talk about the trip ending. We talked about the neighbor in Hangzhou's grandson's bakery, the dumpling shop's son's son, Mim on the lap. Mom said, at minute thirty-two of the dinner, the apartment is the apartment. August said yes. I said yes.
Found the card on the side table on Tuesday morning.
A cream envelope. Three sentences, in English: Take care of yourself. Take care of August. Eat well. Mom had left this one visible — not under the pillow like 2028. She'd trusted I would find a visible card. The card was right for 2029. Taped it on the wall above the desk, beside the framed first card, the Hangzhou photo, the grandfather photo, the grandfather note, the faded yellow sticky note. By 8:42 AM Tuesday the wall had eight things on it.