\nI receive word of my sister on a Wednesday morning in early May. My son Noah is out of school that day for teacher in-services; I\u2019ve taken time off work to be with him at home. I\u2019m making soup and sandwiches for us both when the call comes in\u2013I take it over the kitchen speakers, assuming it to be work-related. \u201cThis is Kim.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cHi there.\u201d The speaker is a woman, with a sunny voice and a hint of a Southern accent. \u201cThis is Judi with Puget Sound Oncology. Would I be speaking with Kimiko Fukada?\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nI pause before replying\u2013a phone call from a strange business entity, without video. Not an email, certainly not text or subvoc. I shift into a more formal register. \u201cThis is Kim speaking; how can I help you?\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cGreat.\u201d A few verification questions follow. \u201cAnd our records show you as the surviving next-of-kin for one Noriko<\/em> Fukada?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI pause over the tomato I\u2019m slicing. I recall a series of letters, dry official notices from the hospital. I started receiving them after our mother died, about eight or nine years back; after the first two or three, I simply threw them away. Now I set down the kitchen knife, slide the kitchen door closed with a gesture. \u201cI\u2019m sorry, what is this regarding?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n<\/p>\n \nMy sister is awake. <\/em> I subvoc my ex-husband Troy, convince him to take our son out to his soccer game. Troy works from home, and so readily agrees. He asks me what\u2019s come up, and I tell him the truth. He doesn\u2019t reply right away. Somewhere in the back of my skull I can feel him composing his reply. Deleting, then recomposing. Do whatever you need to, he says. I hope it goes okay. I expect you two have a lot to talk about.\n<\/p>\n \nMy sister is awake. <\/em>This thought repeats itself on my drive into downtown Seattle. My sister is awake. <\/em> Literally years now gone. Our parents are dead and what will I say? Will she even recognize me? Shock gives way to ragged breathing, to numbness in my cheeks, my hands. Eventually the panic rises up and I have to set the autopilot, let the car drive the rest of the way. I lean back and look out the window as we cross over the Fremont Canal. High-rises crowd in stacks along the water\u2019s edge.\n<\/p>\n \nAt the hospital, after what must be an hour of filling out release forms and nondisclosure agreements, I find myself in a crowded hospital room with a corner view of Puget Sound. Also present are a doctor, a pair of med students recording, and a hatchet-faced femme in a dark gray suit. Meanwhile in bed is my big sister Nori, twenty-five years old and the same as she ever was. She sits upright in bed, her skin waxen, her cheeks gaunt. Her dark hair is thin and brittle, and the right side of her head is buzzed to reveal a gruesome, bright-pink surgical scar. She watches us with the wary eyes of a shelter animal, regards me with caution but doesn\u2019t appear to recognize me. The doctor introduces both himself and the femme, but neither the students nor myself. I have been asked to avoid speaking. The doctor smiles and asks Nori, \u201cHow are you feeling?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhere\u2019s Dr. Cospoole?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nHe smiles. \u201cEnjoying his retirement, as I understand. Lots of sailing, I\u2019m told.\u201d He wears a sweater vest under his coat and has receding brown hair, with playful eyes and a fatherly grin. \u201cHow are you feeling?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNori thinks a moment. Rival emotions play out across her face. \u201cI\u2019m\u2026 okay, I guess. The nausea\u2019s mostly wearing off.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou\u2019ve responded well,\u201d he says. \u201cThere\u2019ll be at least two more rounds of treatment, but if the results we\u2019re seeing hold, we could be fast-tracked for FDA approval inside of two years.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI don\u2019t know what you\u2019re saying.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMs. Fukada, what is the last thing that you remember?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNori thinks a moment. \u201cMy sister\u2019s basketball game.\u201d She would be referring to my sophomore year of high school, junior-varsity. I can remember that day as if I were still there. \u201cI had an aura,\u201d she says. She\u2019s referring to the visual phenomena that came to precede her seizures, after the cancer had spread to her brain. \u201cI had another one. Oh god, I had another one, I\u2019m so sorry.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cEverything\u2019s fine,\u201d says the doctor. \u201cI promise.\u201d He offers to tell her a story.\n<\/p>\n \nHe speaks then of her cancer\u2013his language candid, his tone cuttingly frank. The onset of Nori\u2019s symptoms, the path that the illness took, month-by-month, as it tore through her body like fire through the compartments of a ship. He uses phrases like progression of symptoms and pathology tables by age group <\/em>and suddenly I\u2019m a teenager again, listening to my mother try to explain my sister\u2019s latest round of test results. I still remember those final months, watching my sister sink beneath the waves. Nori meanwhile listens, regards the doctor and the hatchet-faced femme. Several times she glances over at me\u2013she is drawn to something in my features, but cannot yet place me. \u201cGiven your unique case,\u201d says the doctor, \u201cand the time-sensitive nature of your condition, the hospital board elected by emergency vote to intervene in your care and retain you for further study.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIntervene?\u201d she asks. \u201cI don\u2019t understand. I have a living will. I have a DNR\/E.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThe hospital argued superseding medical interest,\u201d says the hatchet-faced femme, \u201cand was awarded an injunction.\u201d They keep their blonde hair slicked back, wear a shade of indigo lipstick that matches their tie. I suppose I should have expected this, that even now the hospital would work first to secure its own interests. When I was a grieving teenage girl, all I could see was the act of corporate charity, the vague hope that my sister might one day have another chance at life. Now I understand a little better.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou\u2019ve been unconscious for a time,\u201d says the doctor, \u201cbut I do need to stress here that a corner\u2019s been turned. Your prognosis going forward is extremely encouraging.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou mean like in a coma?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNot a coma,\u201d says the doctor. \u201cIn stasis. Do you understand what that means?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNori blinks. She regards the backs of her own hands, unlined by age, and frowns. Slowly, I can watch as the picture comes together. \u201cYou froze me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWell, strictly speaking, the term frozen is a bit of an oversimplification\u2013\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat the fuck,\u201d says Nori, \u201cI didn\u2019t give you permission to do that. What the hell kind of doctors are you?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThe same that saved your life,\u201d says the hatchet-faced femme, \u201cAnd who now continue to absorb the costs of your ongoing treatment.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIf I may,\u201d says the doctor. \u201cAt the time of your retention, you were already in cardiac arrest. Had we not intervened, you would have died and simply been reduced to another statistic. But we did intervene, and now here we are. I need you to take a moment and appreciate just how historic all this is\u2013what we\u2019ve learned here will completely change the nature of modern cancer research. Medical textbooks will have whole chapters on you; years from now, your name will come up in the same breath as Henrietta Lacks or Maria Navarro. Heroes, saviors of modern science.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou mean test subjects used without their consent.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe hatchet-faced femme smiles. \u201cA terribly cynical interpretation.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cReturning to the point,\u201d says the doctor. \u201cThere are entire wikis now cataloguing diseases we\u2019ve wiped from the earth\u2013polio, smallpox, ebola. HIV. Now this?\u201d His manner softens. \u201cWhat we\u2019ve achieved here with you will save literally millions of lives. And you are only the beginning. I understand what you must be feeling right now, but please, try to consider the opportunity we have been given here. That you have been given here.\u201d He is very good, I will give him that much. I\u2019m reminded of the old talks given by Silicon Valley venture capitalists, in the early part of the century. The same high-mindedness, the lofty talk of disruption and changing the world. <\/em> I\u2019m sure he even believes it. I can only imagine the hospital advertising brochures that will arise from this.\n<\/p>\n \nWhat do I say?\n<\/p>\n \nMy sister glares back at the doctor and his overseer. When she does at last speak, it is very quiet. \u201cHow long?\u201d she asks.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMs. Fukada, please understand, at the time of your illness, the medical science that we had available was simply not\u2013\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou said I was out,\u201d she says. \u201cAnswer me. For how long?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe doctor\u2019s smile fades. He looks down at the backs of his hands. \u201cNineteen years, six months, and twenty-two days.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nSilence. Behind my sister\u2019s eyes, a set of new and awful realizations are clicking into place. \u201cWhere are my parents?\u201d she asks. \u201cWhere\u2019s my sister?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m here,\u201d I say. A single crack in the porcelain of my resolve, and my vision goes hot and blurry. I am surprised at how small my voice sounds. I cannot stop myself from smiling. \u201cI\u2019m right here.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNori looks at me. Her eyes go wide, and here at last is recognition. Something tenses in her jaw, and I realize then that she is shaking. \u201cAll of you get out.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThis has been a lot to process,\u201d says the doctor. \u201cWe can pick this up later.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI said get out!\u201d<\/em> The room quickly empties after that. I attempt to approach Nori\u2019s bedside, but am intercepted by the hatchet-faced femme. \u201cThank you for coming,\u201d they say. \u201cWe will be in touch to discuss custodial paperwork and conditions for discharge.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nOut in the hallway, I take a moment to compose myself. I can still hear Nori sobbing behind the closed door to her room. I subvoc Troy and tell him that I\u2019m finally leaving, and on the way out, I pass both the doctor and the hatchet-faced femme. They appear to be having some quiet but urgent discussion. The doctor sees me and falls silent mid-sentence. The femme watches me go, with raptorine gaze.\n<\/p>\n \n \nBy the time I leave the hospital and make it through the afternoon traffic, Noah\u2019s soccer game is nearly over. I find Troy amongst the other parents gathered on the sidelines. Try as we might to encrypt the things that we are feeling, a trained eye will always spot the vulnerabilities. He pulls me into a hug as I walk up, and though there have been no feelings between us for years, I am grateful. \u201cHey,\u201d he says. \u201cHey. You\u2019re alright.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe drive home with Noah is mostly quiet. I focus on the road, attempt idle small talk. His answers are brief and addressed to his cleats. Halfway home he asks me, \u201cAre you all right?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI glance back at him in the rearview mirror. \u201cYou never told me how things were at your dad\u2019s.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThey were fine,\u201d he says. \u201cYou\u2019ve been stressed out all day. Because of Aunt Nori.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI see your father has been talking again.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt was what the phone call was about,\u201d he says, \u201cI heard you talking on speakerphone.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat have we have talked about before with you eavesdropping?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou\u2019re not happy,\u201d he says. \u201cI don\u2019t understand. Good news is supposed to make you happy.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nAfter dinner that night, we lay together on the couch and stream Finding Nemo. <\/em> We do not discuss my sister, or indeed speak at all. Eventually he falls asleep on my shoulder, and I carry him, as though he were a baby, back to his own bed. For some time, I linger in his doorway in the dark, listening to him breathe. What no one ever told me about parenting was how such small moments could comfort, and yet hurt so much.\n<\/p>\n \nLater I pour myself a glass of bourbon, nurse it as I stare out the window across the city. The skyscrapers are spaced out like so many candles, and it makes me think of Nori\u2019s vigil. So many years ago now. I put back the rest of my drink, feel it warming as it settles in my chest. In my work I have attended thousands of funerals, across a multitude of traditions. What should one more be amongst so many? I set down my glass, focus on the constellations of the distant skyline. Soon I realize that I am drunk. So be it. I am allowed to be drunk for once.\n<\/p>\n \n \nThe following afternoon I return to the hospital, where I am informed by the desk nurse that Nori has been transferred to another unit. For several moments, I simply stand there at the counter, expectant. When it becomes clear that no further response is forthcoming, I ask and am referred to someone more familiar with her case. What follows is a tense and escalating discussion.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI don\u2019t understand,\u201d I say. \u201cWhat exactly does that mean, transferred? What other unit, specifically?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019ve already explained this, ma\u2019am,\u201d says the nurse. \u201cI can only tell you what I see. The rest of the notes on her file are restricted.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cRestricted, how?\u201d I ask. \u201cThe hospital designated me power of attorney. I\u2019m her sister. I have the right to access that information.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m afraid the law doesn\u2019t work that way in this instance, ma\u2019am.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cGive me your supervisor.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI am the nurse supervisor on duty for this unit.\u201d She is stout and diminutive, with massive black hair lashed back into a bun. She looks perpetually tired, in that way common to nurses and new mothers. \u201cMa\u2019am, with all due respect, I understand how frustrating this is. Believe me, if I could give you more information, I would. But her file is restricted.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMeanwhile\u2013\u201d she points to the screen behind her\u2013\u201cthese names? The patients listed on my board? They\u2019re the ones I\u2019m paid to concern myself with. Now is there anything else I can do for you?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI swallow hard. I will not resort to shouting, will not break down crying here in the reception area, though I am certainly angry enough to do both. \u201cThat\u2019ll be all,\u201d I tell her. \u201cThank you.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhen her status changes,\u201d the nurse supervisor says, \u201cthe hospital will notify you. The elevators are around the corner to your left.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nIn the days that follow, I pace around my condo in a limbo of dread and angst. Where is my sister, I wonder? Why did they take her from me again? It seems that for most of my adult life, I\u2019ve been a state of suspended mourning. She is not truly dead, I have been told, and so I am forever without closure. So it is again.\n<\/p>\n \nI try to keep myself busy with work. I attend two clients\u2019 funerals, one Episcopal and one Jainist. I take on three new commissions to curate clients\u2019 personal archives after their deaths. I receive an invite to speak on a panel at a conference; the subject is said to be population shifts and data-migration over the last half-century. That weekend, Noah goes to his father\u2019s, and I spend as much time at the office as I can. There is always work to do, maintaining the personal records of the dead. For the living there is only anxiety, and dread, and waiting.\n<\/p>\n \nIt is nearly a week before the hospital finally calls back\u2013not Oncology, this time, but rather Behavioral Health. Nori has had a self-harm incident, I am advised, and she is finally well enough to receive visitors. The call comes in the middle of a work consultation\u2013I end the call quickly and reschedule with my client, to some considerable objection. On the way out, I swing through the old piroshky shop just off of Pike Place Market, then hurry the three blocks to my car with purchase in hand.\n<\/p>\n \nI follow the instructions given to me by the information kiosk. Nori is being housed, I am told, in the hospital\u2019s inpatient psychiatric wing. I take the elevators and present my visitor\u2019s badge at the intake desk; I find my sister seated at a table, at the far end of a large common area. She holds a book in her right hand, while the left one is encased in a heavy brace. She looks up from her reading as I enter, holds my gaze as I draw near. I move slowly, as if approaching a wild deer. I realize then that I have never seen a deer outside of photographs. My sister says nothing as I sit down across from her. I point to her wrist, to the cut glued closed above her left eye. \u201cWhat happened there?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cApparently windows have to be shatterproof now.\u201d Her manner is sullen and embarrassed. \u201cTyphoon-resistant, something, I dunno. Stop laughing.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cForgive me,\u201d I say. I can only imagine my sister curled up on the floor, clutching her head and hissing with pain, an attempt at a grand final gesture reduced to mere slapstick. I realize of course that I\u2019m being unkind, so I opt instead to try and smooth things over. I pull out the bag containing our piroshkies, unwrap my own and slide hers across the table. Her eyes go wide.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou didn\u2019t.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI did,\u201d I say. \u201cGrilled tofu and cheese. I hope that was alright.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThey didn\u2019t have the salmon?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNo more salmon.\u201d She looks at me strangely. She takes a bite of her pastry, wipes crumbs off her lower lip.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSo,\u201d I say.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSo.\u201d She studies me for a long moment, searching my face. After a long moment she finally says, \u201cYou don\u2019t look the way I thought you would. That\u2019s not a bad thing, it\u2019s just not what I expected. I don\u2019t know what I expected.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWe rarely do.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThe short hair looks good though.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThank you,\u201d I say. \u201cYou look\u2026\u201d My words trail off, and she waits for me to finish.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cLike what?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cLike you never left us.\u201d I find it suddenly difficult to breathe. I focus instead on our surroundings\u2013a pair of old men playing chess; a few other patients watching a movie. Over in the corner, a few of the younger ones are holding some sort of writing workshop. \u201cIt\u2019s a nice setup they\u2019ve got here, at least.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYeah,\u201d says Nori. \u201cI was expecting straightjackets and drugged-up stares, but the people here are pretty normal. For the most part.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWe expect mental anguish to look a certain way.\u201d I think then of my own years spent in and out of therapy. \u201cWe find ourselves surprised when it turns out to wear a face that we know. Rational people make irrational decisions every day.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI wasn\u2019t being irrational,\u201d she says. \u201cI know what you\u2019re thinking, and I\u2019m not crazy.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt isn\u2019t a matter of being crazy. But you\u2019ve also been through a traumatic event. It\u2019s not unreasonable to assume that you might experience some difficulty coming to terms.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWho said anything about a traumatic event?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt is my job,\u201d I tell her, \u201cto understand traumatic events.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \nThe rest of our visit is spent playing catch-up. I explain what has happened in Nori\u2019s absence, both in our own sphere and in the world at large. This turns out to be not as strange a conversation as one might expect\u2013had it been forty years, rather than twenty, it might be very different, but for the most part, Nori absorbs what I say without visible shock or dismay. Recent elections raise some eyebrows. \u201cAnd what about you?\u201d she asks. \u201cMarried, any kids?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cDivorced,\u201d I say. \u201cWe have a boy, he\u2019s nine now. Noah. He looks a lot like you, I think.\u201d She smiles. I had forgotten what a lovely smile she had.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAnd what do you do now?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m an archivist.\u201d I explain then about the nature of my job, a kind of mortician for the age of social-media. \u201cEveryone leaves behind a life,\u201d I say. \u201cI take that life and shape it into a statement.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNori stares. \u201cAnd, that\u2019s just a thing now, I guess?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cA very lucrative thing, if one is any good at it.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cA touch morbid, don\u2019t you think?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAs a matter of fact, I do not.\u201d The force of my own response surprises me. \u201cForgive me. I\u2019m simply very proud of what I do, the ways in which I help people. I don\u2019t find it to be morbid at all.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cLook, I\u2019m sorry.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s fine,\u201d I say. \u201cThough I do have a question, if I might.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOkay?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI have to ask. About why you did it? I\u2019m sure you understand.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nSilence. She looks around the room, then down at her feet. \u201cIt was stupid,\u201d she says. \u201cAn impulse decision. I realized what had been done to me and I got scared. I wanted out.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIf they let you out of here, will you try to do it again?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNo. Absolutely not.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cGood,\u201d I say. \u201cI spent years wishing to have you back. I don\u2019t want to ever lose you again.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou haven\u2019t already?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThat wasn\u2019t my doing,\u201d I say. \u201cI tried to find you, but they\u2019d restricted your file.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou know what I mean,\u201d she says. \u201cWe might as well be different people now. Strangers.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cDo you want to be?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI don\u2019t think so, no.\u201d She changes the subject. \u201cListen, I need you to do me a favor.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m listening.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m not stupid,\u201d she says. \u201cI could put it together from the way the staff all try to hide things from me. But when they woke me up, and you were the only one who showed? I need to know about Mom and Dad. I need you to tell me the truth.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m sorry,\u201d I say. I\u2019ve been dreading this conversation for over a week now. \u201cYou meant everything to them. To all of us.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNori nods. I can see her trying very her hardest. \u201cI need some time, I think. Just for a little bit.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI understand.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cPromise me you\u2019ll visit. I don\u2019t want to be in this alone. I can\u2019t be in this alone.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI won\u2019t let you be.\u201d When the silence at last becomes too much I get up from my chair, turn and make my way for the exit. It is only as I reach the elevators that I realize we never embraced, or said that we loved each other.\n<\/p>\n \n \nI keep my promise. I visit twice a week over the next several weeks. Nori is eventually taken off watch, transferred out of Behavioral, back to Oncology and then out to Physical Therapy. During one of our visits I\u2019m sent home with a packet\u2013it includes a discharge checklist, timeframes, specific things that Nori will need. Top-to-bottom physical, updated driver\u2019s license and passport, collection of belongings from storage. There are printouts for a series of job fairs, as well as a listing of crisis lines and emergency shelters, but otherwise no mention of housing or employment.\n<\/p>\n \nOne night I\u2019m helping Noah out with his math homework. He has always struggled with fractions. He slouches over his tablet, face buried in his hands, and I remind him, \u201cThat finger could be busy writing things out.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThere\u2019s nothing to write,\u201d he says. \u201cMy brain is a complete blank.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cTabula rasa,\u201d<\/em> I correct him. \u201cReduce it down. Two-fifty over four hundred. What\u2019s a number that goes into both?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI told you, I don\u2019t know. <\/em> I\u2019m not like you. I can\u2019t just magically be good with numbers.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cNo one is ever magically good at anything,\u201d I say. I tell him then how, when I was younger, I had wanted to be an architect. At that age I had loved the idea of building things, of seeing how various pieces came together, but my knowledge was largely cribbed together from what I had learned playing building sims. When I finally did try to test into the AP classes I would actually need, they wouldn\u2019t even let me in. \u201cI only got good at math because I had to learn it for things like STEM Club or AP Calculus,\u201d I tell him. \u201cI had to practice, just like you.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat about Aunt Nori?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThat\u2019s different,\u201d I say. It always seemed to me growing up that Nori was better at everything, but in hindsight I think she only ever cared about her cameras, her photography. She was only perceived as gifted because she was given free rein to indulge her singular focus. I used to hate our parents for that, damning me with faint praise while giving Nori the freedom to explore her gifts. Meanwhile, the problem on Noah\u2019s notebook lingers unsolved.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cDid you and Dad ever think about having more kids?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat now?\u201d I ask. \u201cWhat does that have to do with anything?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cDid you?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI don\u2019t believe that\u2019s any of your business,\u201d I say. \u201cNoah, where is all this coming from? Please talk to me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cJust forget it.\u201d He rolls his eyes, goes back to staring into his tablet. His shoulders slump the way they do when he\u2019s feeling defeated or ignored. My powers of professional empathy feel utterly useless here. \u201cShow your work, how?\u201d <\/em>he asks of no one.\n<\/p>\n \nAt the next soccer game, I bring it up with Troy. \u201cYou don\u2019t think it\u2019s a little strange?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cKids are curious,\u201d he says. Noah\u2019s team dashes past with the ball, and we cheer him on as he runs by. When it quiets down again Troy says, \u201cThis is still new for him. Hell, for everyone.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThey haven\u2019t even been introduced yet,\u201d I say. \u201cIt\u2019s a little early to have the \u2018cool auntie\u2019 thing happening.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cHe\u2019s lonely. He wants someone to identify with.\u201d He smiles in that way of his, whenever he\u2019s planning to rib me for something. \u201cYou know, you\u2019re a pretty tough act to follow, I dunno if you\u2019ve picked up on that.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat the hell is that supposed to mean?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt doesn\u2019t mean anything.\u201d He focuses back on the game. \u201cHave you peeked at his sketches though lately?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYes,\u201d I tell him. \u201cI\u2019ve seen them, and they\u2019re lovely. He\u2019s also working on them in class instead of focusing on the material at hand. Why do you think he\u2019s barely passing half of his courses?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThe point is that he\u2019s passing,\u201d says Troy. \u201cHe needs an outlet to express himself.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAnd I agree. Art classes. Summer workshops. By all means. But he still needs to make some sort of effort in the core subjects.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cTell me again that any of this has anything to do with Noah\u2019s math homework.\u201d Troy shoots me a knowing look, and I fume. His cavalier attitude can be infuriating, but he isn\u2019t without his moments of insight. I shout out encouragement as Noah sends a shot spinning off downfield.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt was an offhand remark,\u201d I say. \u201cKids don\u2019t parse subtext the way we do, but still.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI get it,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd what about you? How\u2019re you holding up?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cJust fine, but obviously you have other opinions.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI forfeited my right to have an opinion years ago. Look, I get that this is bringing a lot of stuff back up for you. It would be for me. But Noah doesn\u2019t deserve to be caught in the fallout.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI know, and I\u2019m sorry.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou\u2019re not little Kimi anymore,\u201d he says, \u201cYou\u2019re a different person now. Stronger. You\u2019ve got people in your life who care. People who want to help.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThat\u2019s certainly very kind of you to say.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI mean it,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m here. Whatever you need.\u201d He still does this sometimes, still leaves small doors open in our conversations, and I refuse to enter through them. A sense of finality is essential to achieving closure. I turn my attention back to the game.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI appreciate you listening,\u201d I say.\n<\/p>\n \n \nDuring visits with my sister, the conversations tend to be relatively anodyne, at least at first. A question about a recent news article, for example, or a discussion about changes in fashion or popular culture. Her inquiries almost always pertain to the larger world, rather than to my own life since her stasis. Occasionally, however, there is some overlap.\n<\/p>\n \nOn one such occasion, I visit during one of Nori\u2019s bi-weekly physical therapy sessions. They have her on a treadmill, hooked up to monitors, running intervals. Stasis can be hard on the human body, and patients often come out lacking the strength or endurance that they possessed before. According to her doctors, these regimens will help boost her mobility and cardiovascular health. Nori and I talk in between bursts of sprinting, indicated by a chime and a sudden increase in speed from the treadmill. When 60 seconds have elapsed, the pace from the machine slackens again. Nori slows to a walk, still breathing heavily. She gestures to her neck, indicating the pattern tattooed behind my right ear and jawbone. \u201cThat your subvoc?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI smile. \u201cYou\u2019re familiar, I take it?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOnly from what I read on the internet. The Star Trek<\/em> stuff was always your thing, not mine.\u201d I bristle a bit. I had forgotten how dismissive she could be, but I refuse to let her condescend. I explain the concept: that what started as a way to interact directly with the internet of things, became a way to enable private comms between people. \u201cLegally gray,\u201d I say, \u201cbut hard to limit the way people use it. Jailbreaking, they call it.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNori looks skeptical. \u201cDoesn\u2019t seem a little bit \u20181984\u2019 to you?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOn the contrary,\u201d I say, \u201cit\u2019s the only secure communication channel most people have now.\u201d Nori looks unimpressed. The treadmill beeps and speeds back up, and this time I raise my voice as her feet resume pounding out their familiar rhythm. \u201cYou know, not all change is bad. Sometimes new tech, new disciplines make our lives better.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe gestures around us. \u201cTell me how any of this<\/em> is better.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou\u2019re here now. What about that? Or my subvoc, letting me talk to people without some program snooping in. Advertisers, law-enforcement agencies. What about that?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cShe says, getting her phone literally tattooed into her skin.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThey\u2019re not even remotely the same thing,\u201d I say. \u201cChrist. You sound exactly like Mom and Dad.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAre you lecturing me?\u201d The treadmill beeps, and she slows her pace. \u201cWhere the hell do you get off?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI am trying to explain to you the way that things work now.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI think I get it, thank you.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNo,\u201d I say, \u201cI don\u2019t think you do. Privacy is a commodity. We live in a very different world now.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSo enlighten me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI glare at her. When I was 22 years old, returning from a post-graduation trip to New Zealand, I found myself detained by customs agents upon my arrival into SeaTac. No doubt they saw the last name Fukada,<\/em> first name Kimiko<\/em>, printed on my passport, and saw an excuse to accuse me of traveling under false cover. It was nearly six hours before a law-student friend could get them to acknowledge that I was in fact an American citizen, and not some spy or sleeper-agent of the Japanese military junta. Meanwhile last week, I read that members of a survivalist militia out east were killed by an airstrike, launched upon their compound by an Air Force drone flying high above the deserts of Kansas. I have heard it said that such end-of-the-world types decry tech like the subvoc as the mark of the beast\u2013<\/em> perhaps they believed that old burner cellphones and ham radios would keep them more secure. \u201cYou read the news,\u201d I say. \u201cYou can draw your own conclusions.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe treadmill beeps a final time, and Nori comes to a stop. She shoots me a withering look.\n<\/p>\n \n \nOn another occasion, Nori and I are sitting on a bench in the hospital\u2019s visitor atrium. A geodesic roof stretches above our heads, gives shelter to a host of once-native flora: cedar, fern, redwood. Moss covers every trunk, while sprinklers rain down mist that pools into droplets, patters down through the branches around us. I close my eyes and breathe in deeply. Nori asks me out of nowhere, \u201cHow did Mom and Dad die?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI take a moment before responding. I think then of the first time my mother sat me down to tell me about Nori\u2019s cancer. I think of having to explain to Noah, at five years old, why his father and I could no longer live together. \u201cThey were quick at least,\u201d I say. \u201cFew years apart. Dad left work with a headache one evening, called Mom up from the bus and halfway into their talk he just started slurring.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cStroke?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m guessing so. Couple of bystanders tried to pull him off the bus, grab him an uber to a hospital, but by the time they got him there, he was already gone.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cJesus. And Mom?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThat was a bit worse,\u201d I say. \u201cHow familiar are you with Parkinson\u2019s?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNot really.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cFair enough.\u201d I explain then about the paranoia, the hallucinations that sometimes accompany the illness. \u201cI didn\u2019t realize at the time just how bad it actually gotten; we weren\u2019t really talking much by that point. Anyway, one day not long after Noah was born, I get a call from the police. You remember the Schindlers next door?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSure.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOf course. Well anyway, I get this message from SPD, who tells me that Mr. Schindler came out to find Mom digging up her tulips with her bare hands, talking to herself. He tried to ask if she was alright, and she just swore at him up and down, stumbled out into traffic.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOh god. And that blind curve.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI nod. \u201cI should have pushed her more to look at assisted-living options, before she really started to go. Maybe she\u2019d still be here if I had.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou can\u2019t think like that,\u201d she says. For a long time then we sit in silence.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou seem to be taking things more in stride,\u201d I say.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cJust trying to come to terms, as you put it. Though I do have another question, if that\u2019s okay?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cGo ahead.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhen I was dying,\u201d she says. \u201cWhen they took me away, what did they do for me? The hospital I mean.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nSilence. I know what she\u2019s hinting at, but I wish that I didn\u2019t. \u201cYou mean a funeral.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI guess.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI close my eyes. \u201cOf a sort,\u201d I say. \u201cA vigil, they called it.\u201d I remember how hasty and thrown-together the entire affair had felt, how the hospital had imposed strict limits on how many could be even invited. As a result, I only saw a few of Nori\u2019s friends from grad school, along with several family acquaintances and colleagues of my parents. I recall the smell of disinfectant and incense that had hung over everything, the hard clonewood pews of the hospital prayer-space. I remember my mother sitting stone-faced on my left, my father on my right. I remember how lost and vaguely guilty he had looked, how he spent most of the time trying to meet my mother\u2019s gaze and being ignored. Up at the front, a woman with short gray hair, clad in full vestments – a minister of some kind, intoning words of solace. On the table beside her sat a framed photograph of my sister, lit by candles. Not even a body to display, I remember thinking. I tried to imagine the girl I grew up with lying in some hospital storage unit somewhere, wrapped in plastic and pumped full of refrigerant. I would have nightmares around that idea for months\u2013the thought of the lid closing above me, the transfusion freezing in my veins, the plastic film sealing off my mouth, my lungs. No longer even a person at that point, but an object. A unit of preserved tissue.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cKimi?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cJust give me a moment please.\u201d To this day, I hardly remember any of what was said by those who took the podium. What I do remember is how at the end, instead of Amen, the minister had proclaimed Until we meet once more.<\/em> It felt like a cruel thing to say, a promise that no one had any reason to expect would be kept. After what felt like an unbearable silence, people at last began to get up quietly and leave. I watched them go, heard their murmurs and sniffles. I remember saying to them No, remember saying You can\u2019t leave, it isn\u2019t over.<\/em> I remember my father\u2019s hand on my shoulder, remember him saying Kimi please.<\/em> I remember shouting that he was letting them take her away, that they didn\u2019t have the right, that it wasn\u2019t fair. My mother finally started to cry, and my father whispered to me Kimi, not now, you\u2019re making a scene.<\/em> I hated him then for not crying the way we all were. I told him as much, to his face.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cHey.\u201d Nori places a hand on my shoulder. \u201cListen, it\u2019s okay, I shouldn\u2019t have asked. Just forget I said anything, I\u2019m sorry.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m the one who\u2019s sorry.\u201d I start to cry, unable to stop myself.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s okay,\u201d she says again. \u201cI\u2019m here and we\u2019re okay.\u201d She pulls me into her arms, and for one very brief moment I\u2019m back to being the younger sister again. The trees and ferns around us say nothing, and for a time we mourn what is lost, in silence, together.\n<\/p>\n \n \nOn the day of her discharge, Nori calls me from one of the hospital courtesy phones. I can grab my own gear,<\/em> she says. Just meet me with the car downstairs.<\/em> We go to pick her up, and on the ride in, Noah can barely contain himself. He bounces in his seat, watches every passing pedestrian. \u201cI don\u2019t even know what she looks like,\u201d he says.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cLike me but younger, I suppose.\u201d It occurs to me that he\u2019s never actually seen a photo of her. \u201cLonger hair. More ink.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cInk?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cTattoos.\u201d We pull up to the main entrance, and above us looms the hospital, all skywalks and gleaming surfaces. Out front are a throng of patients and their families, waiting for pickup. Some are on foot, some in wheelchairs, many laden with bags or heavy suitcases. Nori however stands off to the side, in jeans and a red hoodie. Her luggage is limited to an old black messenger bag and one plastic hospital footlocker. I smile and wave through the window, pop the car\u2019s rear hatch. Nori tosses her things into the trunk and piles in.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cGet me the hell out of here,\u201d she says.\n<\/p>\n \nThe drive home is quieter than I expected. Noah stares at her, grinning, from the backseat. Nori meanwhile presses her face to the window, peers up at all the new construction overhead. She takes in the daytime traffic around us, says \u201cThe cars are all so ugly now.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \nThat night, I make us a fancy dinner\u2013garlic-parmesan chicken with twice-baked potatoes. The ingredients nearly double our grocery bill for the week, but I\u2019ve been wanting so badly to do something nice. After our last conversation in the atrium, I finally feel ready to try again with my sister. That she is even here with us tonight, at this table, is a chance most families never receive.\n<\/p>\n \nShe eats slowly, never seems quite to know what to do with her silverware. Noah plies her with questions, and she tries to answer candidly, but only ends up sounding forced and awkward. At one point he asks, \u201cYou ever read any Marvel?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe looks up. \u201cI\u2019m sorry?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNoah here is a big fan of the Hulk,\u201d I say. \u201cAmadeus Cho is one of his heroes.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou should check out Captain America,\u201d he says. \u201cThe older ones, back when it was still Steve Rogers? He was frozen at one point, I think.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMaybe I should sometime.\u201d Nori smiles. \u201cHow old are you, Noah?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNine, you?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cTwenty-five.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAnd if you hadn\u2019t gotten sick,\u201d he asks, \u201cHow old would you be?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNoah.\u201d I set down my utensils. \u201cEat your dinner, please.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cForty-five.\u201d Nori says this without looking up from her meal. \u201cI\u2019d be forty-five years old.\u201d Noah meanwhile gives me a sideways glance, before going back to his food.\n<\/p>\n \nLater, Noah gets ready for bed, and Nori stakes out the futon in my office. I give a knock on the door after she\u2019s gotten changed, find her with a splay of items across the bedding in front of her: a collection of store-bought toiletries, some old clothing, a few books. In an ancient leather case, her beloved Nikon camera, once a birthday gift from our father. She notices me in the doorway, straightens and feigns nonchalance.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI just wanted to come give you your welcome-home present,\u201d I say.\n<\/p>\n \nHer smile is pained. \u201cListen, I\u2019m fine, I promise. All of this is perfect. Really.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cStop.\u201d I produce from behind my back the box containing her gift\u2013she takes it with some hesitation, opens it to find a brand-new computer, black and chrome. She pulls it out slowly and turns it over, runs a thumb along its edges.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cGod that\u2019s big for a tablet,\u201d she says. \u201cHow do you turn it on?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt actually has a laptop mode. Here.\u201d I press and hold one corner, and the holographic display flickers into being. Nori starts. The startup logo spins onscreen, and she looks at me.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThis really wasn\u2019t necessary.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI just wanted you to have something to work from,\u201d I say. \u201cYou deserve it.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWell thank you.\u201d I watch as she begins to experiment with the new interface. \u201cHey, how do you connect to the internet on this?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cEverything\u2019s public now,\u201d I say. \u201cI pre-loaded with everything you\u2019ll need. VPN, professional-grade imaging software. I even managed to pull most of your old portfolio.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cHow?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cCall it inheritance,\u201d I say. I explain then that after our mother died, executorship passed down to me. \u201cFor the last few years I\u2019ve been the legal custodian for all our family data. Now that you\u2019re back, I don\u2019t have to be.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThis is amazing.\u201d Her words are genuine, but her gaze is clouded. I worry that I\u2019ve somehow offended her.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou don\u2019t like it,\u201d I say.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThat\u2019s not it at all.\u201d She seems so sad. \u201cListen, I\u2019ve just had a long day. I\u2019m probably going to brush my teeth and get ready for bed. Thank you though.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \nThat night, I have trouble sleeping as usual. I get up for a glass of water, come out to find Nori curled up in the reading nook by the window. She glances back at me, framed in silhouette by the lights of the city. A wave of d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu<\/em>\u2013for years after they took her, I used to dream of waking to find her in my bedroom, watching me from the shadows. Perhaps I\u2019m still dreaming now. I ask her, \u201cAm I intruding?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe shrugs, turns her attention back to the skyline.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019ll put on tea. Chamomile, if that\u2019s alright.\u201d I pad barefoot into the kitchen, fill the pot with water and subvoc the burner on. I don\u2019t even bother with the lights anymore. After so many years, I\u2019ve grown accustomed to navigating in the darkness.\n<\/p>\n \nWhen I come back, Nori hasn\u2019t moved at all. She takes her mug, and I crawl into the nook beside her. I take a sip. \u201cWhen I was first looking at places,\u201d I say, \u201cafter Troy and I separated, this spot right here was what sold me. I imagined Noah and I would curl up here and read books together. Now he\u2019s too grown up for all that.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou\u2019re his mom.\u201d She looks out across the city, all neomodern high-rises and prefab housing blocks. Construction cranes and giant industrial printers dot the horizon. \u201cThere\u2019s so much more of it now.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI think there was more of it back then than you remember.\u201d I remember reading somewhere that in the last thirty years, some eighty percent of the American population had relocated to either the west or the upper east coast. Some did so seeking work; others, to escape droughts and deadly heat waves. Hardly anyone lives on the Gulf now, and all across the world countless other places are simply no longer habitable. So many places reduced to either silence or static. \u201cPopulations don\u2019t just grow or shrink, they also migrate.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt doesn\u2019t even look like Seattle,\u201d she says. \u201cMakes me think of like LA, or I dunno, Tokyo.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMm.\u201d I\u2019ve been to Los Angeles; neither of us has ever been to Tokyo. For some moments, we drink our tea in silence. At last I say, \u201cYou\u2019ve barely said a word since we came home. Talk to me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat\u2019s to talk about?\u201d she says. \u201cEveryone just carries on like nothing is any different. Like, to the point that it freaks me out.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cDerealization, they call that.\u201d In truth, I\u2019ve been experiencing something similar\u2013even now, I see her and find myself looking for the seams that will reveal her as some feat of visual-effects trickery. A flaw in the way that light is rendered, some facial expression that seems too flat. I keep expecting her to out herself as an illusion, and when she doesn\u2019t some part of my mind panics, tries to reconcile what shouldn\u2019t be. \u201cThe doctor says it\u2019s just a side-effect. It\u2019ll get easier the longer you\u2019re out.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMeaning it\u2019ll just start to feel normal. None of this is normal.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \nI take the rest of the week off to help Nori with getting reintegrated. The first few days are a blur of appointments: the Social Security office, the bank, the state Department of Licensing. At each location, the staff look at the date of birth on file, then at the young woman standing before them. No one can find her in any systems, because for two decades her data footprint has been completely nonexistent. Tasks like ordering new ID, or opening up a checking account, require at least a supervisor and a retinal scan. There are procedures in place for a case like Nori\u2019s, though no one has ever actually had to look them up.\n<\/p>\n \nCredit lines. Insurance history. Debt. Nearly all evidence that my sister once existed has rolled off. All except the student loans. All except the threat of the hospital bill.\n<\/p>\n \nThere are other hurdles as well. To drive now requires not only a field test, but a written exam\u2013Nori doesn\u2019t even make it past the written. \u201cI don\u2019t ever remember it being that complicated,\u201d she says later.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThankfully there\u2019s actual train service now.\u201d Quite frankly, if asked to take the same exam myself, I\u2019m no longer certain that I would pass it. Suffice to say that I\u2019m thankful for the auto-pilot feature on my Hyundai. \u201cWe\u2019ll study for next time, but for now you should be able to manage without.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nWhen not busy with administrative errands, we spend our time shopping for things Nori still needs, chief among them an updated wardrobe. We find ourselves at the old Macy\u2019s on 3rd and Pine one afternoon. She busies herself in one of the fitting rooms, while I wait with our cart. She emerges after some time, tosses her pile of garments down on the bench. \u201cNo.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNo?\u201d I watch as she begins stuffing items back onto hangars. \u201cYou took at least ten different items in there. No to which ones?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAll of it,\u201d she says. \u201cI get out and everyone dresses like a freak.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat? I don\u2019t.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYeah, but you\u2019re\u2026\u201d She gestures, and I can hear the implication in her tone: old. I look down at my own ensemble: black Armani blazer, white V-neck, blue jeans with vintage Chuck Taylors. I specifically chose the look to be low-key and casual.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m thirty-four.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cExactly. I should have expected this.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s the fashion now.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s hideous.\u201d She holds up a pair of burgundy trousers, the material strangely iridescent. \u201cThese are supposed to be slacks.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThe style is a bit young, I\u2019ll admit.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMaybe we can just hit up a thrift store later,\u201d she says. \u201cThey still have those, right?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cGood luck finding anything more to your liking,\u201d I say. \u201cYou can\u2019t just wear the same five band tee-shirts from twenty years ago.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWatch me.\u201d She piles the collection atop the counter and walks off; I rifle through for the items that I think most closely fit with her aesthetic, then toss them back into the cart.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWe still have to pay,\u201d I call out after her.\n<\/p>\n \nLater, on the way back to the car, we swing by an electronics store and pick her up an inexpensive phone. We make our way downhill to where we parked, and as we walk she busies herself with the new features. \u201cYou\u2019ll be able to take phone calls and access the internet,\u201d I tell her, \u201cbut everything\u2019s monitored now, so try not to say or post anything that you wouldn\u2019t want seen.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNori rolls her eyes. \u201cWouldn\u2019t want to risk getting in trouble with Big Brother.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cTry your employer. Try your health insurer. Try a future lender.\u201d I unlock the car and we climb in. \u201cWe really ought to think about getting you a subvoc.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNori looks at the markings on my neck, as if they were some sort of infection. \u201cAbsolutely not,\u201d she says.\n<\/p>\n \n \nOne afternoon a few days later, while Nori is busy with job applications, I come upon Noah curled up in the reading nook. He has his tablet with him, but instead of schoolwork he has his sketchpad open. He hunches over the paper-white screen, carefully drawing out a line. \u201cWhat are you working on?\u201d I ask.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThe comic.\u201d He flips the stylus over, erases his line and then redraws it. I slide into the nook beside him. Noah has been working on his comic for months now\u2013he speaks little of it, but it consumes nearly all of his free time, at the expense of both homework and chores. He begs me to take him to the library on our days off, spends hours perusing video tutorials, old graphic novels. Last month, when the book fair came through school, he came home with a pair of how-to drawing guides for kids. He knows the names of every illustrator from his childhood picture books. I peer in over his shoulder.\n<\/p>\n \nHe does have a remarkable gift, I will admit. His lines are uneven, his shading too busy, his hand still unsure in the way of youth, but the books and hours of how-tos have been paying off. No talking heads inside of hand-drawn boxes here; Noah\u2019s panels flow and overlap and dominate the page. I\u2019m reminded of an old Calvin and Hobbes<\/em> print my father used to keep in his office. I remember asking him once about it once when I was eleven, and he gave me some reply about the creativity and curiosity of children. On Noah\u2019s current page, a boy in goggles and superhero gear encounters a sealed casket, wipes frost from its glass porthole. Sleeping inside lies a young woman. I ask him, \u201cWhat\u2019s the \u2018A\u2019 on his chest?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nHe replies without looking up. \u201cThe Archivist.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nLater after dinner, Nori and Noah play videogames in the living room. They race over splitscreen, pilot futuristic hovercraft at speeds that threaten to leave me motion-sick. I linger on the balcony with my fingers to my neck, messaging with Troy. He informs me that he\u2019s been thinking about Noah\u2019s soccer league again. I thought maybe once the season was over, I might ask him and see if he wants to stick with it, or try something else.\n<\/p>\n \nWhy? I ask. He\u2019s doing really well.\n<\/p>\n \nHe doesn\u2019t enjoy it,<\/em> he says. It\u2019s something he does because I want him to, not because he wants to.\n<\/p>\n \nYou\u2019ve never been one to pressure him.\n<\/p>\n \nNo, but kids pick up certain messages.<\/em> A pause. From inside Noah shouts, \u201cWho\u2019re you talking to?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYour dad. Grown-up stuff.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cHey, Dad!\u201d He speaks without taking his eyes off the screen. His hands are a blur on the controller, and Nori curses as she tries to match his dexterity. I go back to my conversation. Noah says hey.\n<\/p>\n \nHey, kiddo.<\/em> I can feel the smile in his words, in a way that text never connote. He\u2019s been asking for a longboard for his birthday. Things are almost as big as he is.\n<\/p>\n \nHe made some mention, I say. Tell me we\u2019re not just encouraging him to just abandon a thing, whenever it gets hard.\n<\/p>\n \nIt isn\u2019t hard for him,<\/em> says Troy. He just doesn\u2019t care. If you told him right now that his practice was cancelled tomorrow, he\u2019d go right back to his room with his sketchpad and his handheld. It\u2019s okay for him to have different interests.\n<\/p>\n \nYou guys bond over sports.\n<\/p>\n \nI bond over sports,<\/em> he says. I don\u2019t want to be that dad, pushing his interests onto his kid. You remember my old man\u2013I did JROTC all through school just to make him happy. All it did was make me hate him.\n<\/p>\n \nSo what are you proposing?\n<\/p>\n \nI dunno\u2013maybe we try asking him.<\/em> From the living room, Noah shouts and pumps his fist in the air. Nori shoves him playfully, and Noah shoves back. They have a real connection, one I admittedly envy. Who knows? Maybe we take him out to the skate park over by my place.\n<\/p>\n \nI\u2019m already imagining the doctor\u2019s bills, <\/em> I say. I\u2019m going to head back in for now. We can talk about this more soon.\n<\/p>\n \nSounds good. See you.<\/em> I go back inside, join Nori and Noah on the couch. They\u2019re busy selecting their vehicles prior to the next race; I tousle Noah\u2019s hair and kiss the top of his head. \u201cYour dad says hey kiddo.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \nThat weekend, Noah goes to his father\u2019s house. A week passes, during which time Nori searches for jobs and housing. The results are less than encouraging\u2013housing in Seattle was already expensive, and the years have only seen the problem worsen. Now, more tenants vie for fewer openings. We discuss this one morning, while I check my emails and Nori looks at ads for roommates. \u201cToo creepy,\u201d she says of one. \u201cToo old.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat about cohousing?\u201d I ask. \u201cI saw some nice listings over in West Seattle.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cEw.\u201d She swipes continually left, as if dismissing a procession of suitors. \u201cLet me pay half of my weekly income to rent a fancy bunk bed. In shifts.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWell, considering that right now your income consists entirely of my income, I\u2019d say we\u2019re thinking rather far ahead for all that.\u201d She shoots me a dirty look over the top of her computer, goes back to swiping. From behind, her screen depicts a shimmering illusion of the lower half of her face. \u201cUrban cricket farmer,\u201d she says. \u201cRents from her parents. Ugh, hopelessly basic.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou are entirely too judgmental,\u201d I say. \u201cThe fact is, whatever you find in this market is going to be small, it\u2019s going to have shared services, and yes, you\u2019re probably going to have to lower your expectations surrounding roommates.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe looks around us. \u201cYou managed just fine.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThe difference here is that I can afford it. Who knows though? Maybe you\u2019ll get lucky.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe doesn\u2019t hear me. She appears to have paused on a candidate, cocks an appraising eyebrow. \u201cCute,\u201d she says. \u201cSeems normal enough.\u201d Swipes right.\n<\/p>\n \nThe job market turns out to be even bleaker. I assist Nori with rides to job fairs, call in a few connections for interviews\u2013the Seattle Times, the PI,<\/em> the <\/em>Stranger. <\/em> When those fall flat, we turn to design firms, marketing firms, PR, anywhere that might require a full-time photographer or editor. Perhaps it\u2019s simply a glut of qualified applicants; perhaps the economy has simply changed. Over the week that follows, I watch as leads dry up and Nori\u2019s morale falters.\n<\/p>\n \nOne afternoon, we\u2019re riding home from yet another interview. Nori stews, looking uncomfortable in one of my borrowed blazers. Out of nowhere she undoes her seatbelt, pulls off the blazer, crumples it up and throws it into the back seat. For several moments, the cabin chimes with the sound of the seatbelt alarm.\n<\/p>\n \nI ask, \u201cWere you going to get that?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe sighs and does as asked. \u201cSuch bullshit,\u201d she says. \u201cThe entire thing is bullshit.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt was one interview.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOut of how many?\u201d She looks out the window. \u201cMaybe the articles were right, maybe I need to be looking overseas. China somewhere, or Dubai.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou really don\u2019t want the kinds of jobs you can get in China or Dubai. Did they at least offer you any kind of feedback?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThey didn\u2019t have to. Right out the gate, one guy on the panel said he thought my portfolio work was \u2018dated.\u2019 I won contests for those shots.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cBusiness types don\u2019t always appreciate creative photography,\u201d I say. \u201cJust give it time. You\u2019ve got degrees, you\u2019ve got work published, you\u2019ve got internships.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThey wanted something more recent,\u201d she says. She strains to get a better look as we pass Green Lake on our right. Here a break in the endless high-rises, a place where rows of lakefront houses still crowd against the water\u2019s edge. Residential neighborhoods have increasingly become an affectation of the rich. \u201cAny idea whatever happened to the old house?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI sold it after Mom died.\u201d I brace, expecting her to be angry, but she just looks at her feet. Perhaps she expected this. \u201cWould you like to go see it?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nHer reflection in the window frowns. \u201cCan we?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \nWe lean on the hood of the car, parked just up the street from our old childhood home. The day is hot and bright and perfectly quiet, like a thousand summer afternoons from my youth. I have a memory of being Noah\u2019s age, straddling my bicycle and staring down a world of possibilities. Nori says, \u201cI hate what they\u2019ve done with the color.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI frown. \u201cThe pink is an interesting choice.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThey cut down my tree.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOld oaks like that are hard to keep healthy.\u201d It isn\u2019t just her tree\u2013all up and down the block now, yards are being planted with acacia, jacaranda, eucalyptus. Still other homeowners favor hybrid clones found nowhere in nature, engineered for drought and insect resistance. Xeriscaping is increasingly common, though a few holdouts still maintain green lawns, expensively irrigated. That kind of extravagance with water seems alien to me now.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat did you get for the house?\u201d she asks.\n<\/p>\n \nI shake my head. \u201cThe number would just make you angry.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSo? Tell me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cEnough for the condo, and for Noah\u2019s college fund besides.\u201d The screen door to the house pushes open, and the current resident, a woman in her thirties, emerges with a tablet in hand, wearing a pair of oversized sunglasses. She takes up a spot on the porch swing they\u2019ve installed, settles in and begins to thumb through invisible pages. She looks like the kind of person for whom work has only ever existed as an abstraction. She reminds me of the trees and the flowers here now\u2013a transplant, beautiful and out-of-place. Nori looks on with an expression like longing.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou didn\u2019t have to sell it,\u201d she says. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t have sold it.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou weren\u2019t around to ask.\u201d The house had actually been a sore point between Troy and I. At the time, Noah had just been born, and Troy thought it would be the perfect place to begin our family. He had never owned a house himself, couldn\u2019t understand my eagerness to be rid of it. I couldn\u2019t tell him how I dreaded the thought of living with so many old ghosts within those walls\u2013perhaps I feared I might long to join them. Troy eventually gave up on the matter, but I know some part of him resented me for it. In hindsight, I think that may have marked the beginning of our end. Meanwhile a police gunship passes thumping overhead; its shadow crosses over yards and rooftops and then is gone again. The woman on our porch looks up, notices the gunship receding, then notices us.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWe should probably go,\u201d I say.\n<\/p>\n \n \nThe visit to the house affects Nori more than she is willing to acknowledge. I should have anticipated that it might be hard for her. Part of me longs to say something in my own defense, but what? I sold off our childhood home, because I didn\u2019t want to deal with the grief that it encompassed.\n<\/p>\n \nThat night over dinner, she asks me, somewhat unexpectedly, about my work. I\u2019ll admit that I\u2019m rather taken aback, but at the same time I\u2019m touched by her sudden interest. I try to answer her questions to the best of my abilities.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s not just social media,\u201d I try to explain at one point. \u201cThat\u2019s active data footprint. What I\u2019m talking about is passive footprint, the data you generate just by existing. It\u2019s location check-ins, purchase histories, photos you\u2019re tagged in with other people. It\u2019s about networks you accessed, places you lived, people you connected with. It\u2019s like\u2026 tree-rings or fossil tracks; it reflects the shape and trajectory of one\u2019s lived experience.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe spoons up a bite of polenta. \u201cSo then, you get rid of people\u2019s dirty laundry too? Scrub their search histories?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI am empowered in a limited way to manage the privacy of my client\u2019s digital estates, per their final wishes.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNori seems unconvinced. \u201cSo, do Mom and Dad have an archive then?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI take a sip of water. \u201cSorry, no. Not currently.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhy not?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI smile. I am uncomfortable with this entire line of questioning. \u201cI\u2019ve worked at the idea some, over the years, but I\u2019ve just never really completed anything.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSo what would it take to complete?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cTime,\u201d I say. I\u2019m not sure if I mean in labor-hours or grief expended. \u201cYou know, if you wanted to, we could always go out to my place of employment sometime. Visit their urns.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI don\u2019t know that I\u2019m ready for that,\u201d she says.\n<\/p>\n \n \nThe change in Nori\u2019s mood deepens. Over the following days, she becomes quieter, helps out more with the housework. She responds to questions plainly, without any of her usual snark or pushback. I suppose that I should consider this an improvement, but it feels like a lie to me, a way for my sister to put up walls between herself and the world. I find myself missing her cynical affect. I find it a shame, because I do enjoy her as a person, whatever our differences in age or maturity. I want to know her better, and it saddens me to realize that I don\u2019t.\n<\/p>\n \nI decide to take that Friday for just the two of us. I wake Nori early; we head into town for bagels, then cross the bridge over into West Seattle. We order coffees down at Alki Quay, take a stroll down along the waterfront.\n<\/p>\n \nThe weather that morning is bright and breezy, the waters choppy. I\u2019m told that there used to be a beach where we now stand, though the rising waves have long since claimed it. Now those same waves crash against the pier, while massive hotels block out the sun overhead. I\u2019m reminded of the old paintings by the Spanish Surrealists, black shadows falling across hard bright earth. I mention it to Nori. \u201cRefresh me on the word for that?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cChiaroscuro.\u201d She gives her answer automatically, without looking up. The breeze tugs at her ponytail, her windbreaker, and I\u2019m reminded of the weekend outings we used to take as a family. She is so much more beautiful than I remembered. She notices me staring at her, asks me \u201cWhat?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNothing.\u201d The wind stings at my eyes, and I smile. \u201cWe should find somewhere to eat. Are you hungry?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nWe take lunch outdoors at a nearby bistro, then back over the bridge into downtown. We wander Pike Place, the New Waterfront, the Amazon Gardens. Nori inquires about the Space Needle, but I say, \u201cThe view isn\u2019t what it used to be. All the new development. I took Mom a few years back, you\u2019d just be disappointed.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI guess.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nLater, we visit the Seattle Art Museum. The feature that month is an exhibition titled \u201cHere and Now: Pacific Northwest Art in the 21st Century.\u201d It presents itself as a kind of regional retrospective, spanning from turn-of-the-century Instagram photography, to the mixed-media and sculpture installations currently in vogue. All the artists are local to Oregon, Washington, British Columbia, the Yukon Indigenous Administrative Region, and Alaska.\n<\/p>\n \nWe wander with no particular objective, taking in the featured works. One room is devoted entirely to repurposed Civil-War era relics. Railgun emplacements, troop transports, all graffiti\u2019d and reworked into new shapes by a blacksmith. At the center of the hall, posed upright as if climbing skyward, towers the gutted hulk of an old fighter jet. It is garlanded with cedar boughs, painted to resemble an osprey in the Coastal Salish style. All this, Nori informs me from the placard, is the work of a First Nations artist from Aberdeen, and is titled Reclamation. \u201cThis one here\u2019s No. 9, apparently.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMm,\u201d I say. \u201cSwords to ploughshares, I suppose.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nWe head deeper into the museum, eventually going our separate ways. I end up drawn to a collection of sculptures, built from the 3D-printed bones of extinct animals. Each evokes a classical work in grotesque negative: The Creation of Adam, Judith and Holofernes, Saturn Devouring His Son.<\/em> I find myself drawn to the Goya homage in particular, where the human victim is held aloft, half-eaten, by a monstrous assemblage of every great beast our species has ever slaughtered. Polar bear, giant ground sloth, mountain gorilla. The terror-stricken face of the original has been replaced by the gaping jaws of what the placard states is a Siberian tiger, and I find this fitting somehow. The sins of our past consuming our present, and thus our future.\n<\/p>\n \nFrom across the hall, I suddenly can hear Nori exclaiming, far too loudly, \u201cWhat the fuck. What the fuck.\u201d I look up at the source of the commotion. All around, other patrons are clearly perturbed. I cross the room quickly, seize Nori by the arm before she can embarrass us further.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMay I help you?\u201d I hiss.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cGet off me.\u201d She pulls away, goes back to the feature that has her so riled up: a black-and-white photography series, taking up an entire wall. The featured artist on the placard is a middle-aged woman, with impeccable cheekbones and upswept red hair going gray. Her work tends toward atmospheric shots, stark and heavily-filtered. I don\u2019t recognize her name, though Nori certainly does. \u201cThat\u2019s Bly Maddox,\u201d she tells me. She explains then that they were in art school together. \u201cWe actually dated for a while. Before I got sick.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOh, how lovely.\u201d I turn back to the display, avoiding the gaze of the curator wandering in our direction. \u201cWhat a small world.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cLike hell.\u201d She goes and points to the central work, a panorama depicting carbon-capture towers, anchored off the Olympic coast during a storm. \u201cThis was my piece. My fucking piece.<\/em> I spent months on that shot, I can\u2019t fucking believe her! Where the hell did she even find this?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou are making a scene,\u201d I say. I understand that she has every right to be angry, but the attention we\u2019re drawing has my anxiety in overdrive. Off to our right, the curator is approaching us with a concerned expression. Other patrons are staring at us, and at least one person has pulled out a cellphone. \u201cThere are better ways to seek redress for this sort of thing. Perhaps we can talk about them more quietly, maybe on the way home?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m sorry folks, is something the matter?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI glance over at the curator. She seems eager to avoid a confrontation, to have this quietly brushed aside. \u201cWe were just leaving,\u201d I say. \u201cNori?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhatever.\u201d She looks back at the Maddox exhibit again before we go. Shakes her head. Mouths the word bitch under her breath.\n<\/p>\n \n \nNori fumes the whole way back to the car, and on the way home. I can feel her shaking next to me. Only as we park in my driveway does she finally speak up. \u201cListen, I\u2019m sorry.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s fine,\u201d I say. \u201cPerhaps we should file some sort of complaint with the museum. Maybe get an attorney?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat would be the point?\u201d she asks. \u201cI\u2019m nobody. She\u2019s somebody now. My word against hers. Like with everything else.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNot just your word,\u201d I remind her. \u201cWe still have your portfolios. They\u2019re on your computer. Maybe there\u2019s still something there. Some kind of proof.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAnd do what then, sue her? Go through all of that all over again? Look, it\u2019s over and she won. I don\u2019t have the energy to fight about it.\u201d Outside, great thunderclouds are building overhead. \u201cEveryone\u2019s moved on. Everyone has families, careers. You. Bly.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt isn\u2019t that simple,\u201d I say.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou guys have at least done something. You\u2019ve at least got something to show.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI think you\u2019re forgetting all that you have to be grateful for here.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cLike what?\u201d she says. \u201cSome new scars? Permanent nerve damage? My pictures are hanging in some art gallery under someone else\u2019s name. What the hell do I have to be grateful for?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI say nothing. On the windshield, droplets of rain begin to appear.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cLook, I\u2019m sorry. Just forget it.\u201d She goes for her door handle, then pauses. \u201cWhat else has changed?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \nThat night, it thunderstorms, an unusual phenomenon for July, and the news covers it as a once-in-a-decade occurrence. The rain drums on the window during dinner, where we eat in silence. Nori disappears into the study afterward, closes the door behind her. I set to loading the dishwasher and tidying up.\n<\/p>\n \nAfter perhaps an hour, her door bursts open as I\u2019m pouring myself a drink. She brushes past me in tears, snatches her jacket and bag off the hook. Goes for the door, then stops. \u201cI\u2019m going out.\u201d She manages to keep her voice from shaking. \u201cI need you to reload my card for me. Please.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI watch her. The sound of the rain outside is like steel bearings on hardwood. I set aside the bottle of bourbon, open up my tablet sitting on the counter. \u201cOf course,\u201d I say. \u201cYou have my number? You remember how to get to the train stop?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019ll map it. Thank you.\u201d The sound of the rain gets louder as she opens the door, then goes quiet again. I watch her walk off into the night, head down and hood up. I take a sip of my drink and take my tablet into the living room.\n<\/p>\n \nThe door to her room is open, the screenlight harsh against the lamplit walls. I can\u2019t help but peer inside. There\u2019s something intimate about a space only recently deserted\u2013a sense of trespass, of absence. Like a sleeping face after the life has vacated it, like the data-wakes my clients leave in their passing. That sudden cessation one day of all activity. I have lived inside that sense of absence these last twenty years now. It is the only place I feel safe, the only place I can hear myself think. I slip inside, careful to disturb nothing.\n<\/p>\n \nHer computer screen is still up, left open on her social media. I am surprised to find myself looking at the official profile of the woman from the museum, this Bly Maddox. I search my memories and after some effort I finally recall her: a young woman in her twenties, with green eyes and a nose piercing, some partner that my sister brought around while I was still in high school. For all my effort, however, I can\u2019t remember when we would have met, or at what point she stopped coming around. In any case, there is another woman in the picture beside her now. Their recent photos appear to show a beachfront wedding, the pair resplendent in simple dresses, exchanging vows barefoot in the sand.\n<\/p>\n \nIt is true of course that we only ever know our family members, our parents and siblings, incompletely. It is especially true when we are children, though in the face of illness or family crisis it is also true as well. We speak so much of our loved ones\u2019 perseverance, their courage, though we rarely ask what they battles they must be fighting internally. We rarely ask what it is they have lost. Slowly I sit down upon the futon. Raindrops patter against the window.\n<\/p>\n \n \nI wait up late for Nori\u2019s return, checking messages on the couch. I try to imagine where she might be\u2013out riding the trains perhaps, or out at a club? I seem to recall that she was a fan of dance music, but I have no idea what style or period. I pass out sometime after midnight, wake up late the next morning with the sun in my eyes. I peek into the study and find her safely asleep. When I emerge from the shower, she is awake, already starting the coffee. By the time I\u2019ve gotten dressed she is sitting at the table. I pour myself a cup and join her. \u201cAre you all right?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe looks at me, shrugs.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI think I finally figured out where I met your friend Bly,\u201d I say. \u201cThanksgiving dinner, my freshman year of high school. Mom was talking like you guys thought she might be The One.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNori rolls her eyes.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI couldn\u2019t help but notice you stalking her profile page last night.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe glares at me. \u201cYou went into my room. You looked on my computer.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYour door was open,\u201d I say. \u201cI didn\u2019t touch anything. I was just trying to understand, I\u2019m sorry.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s fine. You\u2019ve been the one telling me that I can\u2019t expect any privacy.\u201d She falls silent, stares into her mug.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat happened between you two?\u201d I ask.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat do you think?\u201d She talks then about being diagnosed, how at the time her doctors were convinced she only had six to nine months. \u201cWe all were pretty sure I was gonna die. She couldn\u2019t take it, so she bailed.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m so sorry.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cHer loss, right?\u201d Nori sniffles and wipes at her eyes. \u201cIt\u2019s good though. She looks good. They both look really happy together.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019m sorry anyway.\u201d These things happened decades ago, but for her I imagine the hurt must be far more recent. \u201cHow do I not remember you two breaking up?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe shrugs. \u201cBigger concerns, I guess.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cA partner leaving after a terminal diagnosis seems like a pretty big concern. Did Mom and Dad know?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThey did. I told Mom I was the one who broke it off. I didn\u2019t want her to be mad at Bly. So stupid of me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s not stupid to still love someone who hurts you,\u201d I say. \u201cWhy didn\u2019t you tell me?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat were we going to do? Pour our hearts out sitting on your bed? Talk about our feelings? What grade were you even in at the time?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNinth. I would have listened.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou were like twelve. Were you even old enough be dating?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cFourteen,\u201d I was. \u201cAnd as a matter of fact, I was.\u201d I think then back to long afternoons after school with my best male friend, sitting shoulder-to-shoulder against our lockers. I remember the away trips with the debate team, the long playlists we made for each other. I wanted so badly to share what I was feeling with someone. \u201cI wanted to be close to you,\u201d I say. \u201cI still want that.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAnd what, you thought this was going to be some sort of second chance?\u201d Her voice takes a mocking tone. \u201cLook, I\u2019m grateful that you\u2019ve been here, I really am. But I never asked for this. I never wanted this. And here I am stuck now in some bullshit future with our parents gone, and you bossing me around, and my ex married to someone else, cashing in on my fucking work.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI don\u2019t say anything. I can feel my mouth move, but the words refuse to come.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cLook, just forget it.\u201d She drains her coffee and pushes back from the table. \u201cI\u2019m gonna go grab a shower. After that I might take my computer, head into town. Maybe hit up the library.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s a Saturday,\u201d I call after her. She ignores me and vanishes into the study. When she emerges again, she has her towel and hygiene bag. \u201cWhat on earth for?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe calls back from the bathroom. \u201cWhat do you think?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \nShe is gone all the rest of that day. By the time I go to pick up Noah from his father\u2019s, she still hasn\u2019t returned. Only after Noah has gone to bed, and I\u2019m sitting down to catch up on work, does she burst through the front door. She drops her bag on the floor in the hallway, in spite of the wall-mounted hook, and disappears into the study. When she comes out, she heads straight for the kitchen, raids the refrigerator. \u201cThis pasta spoken for?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s cacciatore. It has mushrooms in it.\u201d This doesn\u2019t seem to faze her. She reheats the leftovers in the microwave, stares at her feet as she waits for the timer. When her dinner comes up, she doesn\u2019t bother with a bowl, just takes it with her in the container. I ask \u201cHow did your day go?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe shrugs, already heading back to the study. \u201cIt went, I guess.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThis routine continues the next day, and the day after that. Only on Monday does she come home at a reasonable hour. I\u2019m pulling dinner out of the oven, and so I don\u2019t hear the door when she enters. I glance back just in time to see Noah tackle her in the hallway; she glances up at me and smiles painfully. I notice that she\u2019s wearing the blazer I loaned her.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWell this is a surprise,\u201d I say. \u201cYour timing is perfect. You can have a little break from leftovers.\u201d I finish plating up everyone\u2019s tilapia and couscous, look up and realize that I\u2019ve left the TV on. Onscreen, the Pacific Garbage Fire is continuing into its second month. A wall of flame and smoke curtains the horizon, reduces the eastern sun to a pale red orb. Boats of all sizes deploy water cannons, to virtually no effect. Cut to a shot of the fire visible from orbit, a bright smoking crescent like lava flowing into the sea. It must stretch on for hundreds of miles. I swipe the TV off from where I sit and Nori says, unprompted, \u201cI got a job.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOh, that\u2019s wonderful.\u201d I reach for my glass of Riesling. \u201cThat was quick. I told you something would work out. Where at?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cElliott Bay.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI frown a moment. \u201cThe retail chain?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe looks up and studies me a moment. I feel as though I\u2019ve missed something. She rolls her eyes and goes back to her fish. \u201cYeah. The retail chain.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSo what are you doing? Photography? Marketing? Graphic design?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cStocking,\u201d she says. \u201cI start Wednesday.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou mean like bookshelves?\u201d Suddenly it all starts to make sense\u2013the sudden hire, how soon they want her to start. No doubt they\u2019re desperate for people. \u201cYou know what, it\u2019s still a big milestone and you should be proud. This can be a stepping stone to something bigger.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe shakes her head, spears up a bite of tilapia with her fork.\n<\/p>\n \n \nNori quickly launches herself into 12 and 14-hour days. Soon we barely see her at all. She\u2019s gone most morning before I\u2019m even up, doesn\u2019t return again until after I\u2019m asleep. Sometimes she gets home and I start awake at the sound of the door\u2013I can lie there and can listen to her raiding the fridge, bolting her food upright in the kitchen, brushing her teeth in the bathroom sink before bed. I\u2019m reminded of how, after college, some friends and I shared a house for about a year. For roughly two months of that, one of my housemates had a cousin stay with us.\n<\/p>\n \nMost of us never even saw her, and those who had couldn\u2019t accurately describe her. One night I remember getting up to go to the bathroom, only to discover her already in there. I remember lurking in the dark around the corner, dreading the prospect of an introduction and awkward small talk at that hour. I never got another chance to say hello, and I never learned why she left. There comes a point when we don\u2019t have the energy for human interaction, when it simply becomes easier to live with the sound of each other\u2019s presence in the other room. It begins to feel that way with Nori.\n<\/p>\n \nNoah quickly picks up that something is amiss. One afternoon he\u2019s in the nook, working on his sketches. He asks me without looking up, \u201cWhy doesn\u2019t Aunt Nori like us anymore?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cShe\u2019s just working,\u201d I say.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cBecause she doesn\u2019t want to be around us,\u201d he says. \u201cI didn\u2019t mean to bug her so much.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou have never bugged anyone,\u201d I say. I slide into the nook. \u201cLook at me. What\u2019s going on with Aunt Nori has nothing to with us. She\u2019s just going through a lot right now. Do you remember when you were younger, and your dad and I got divorced?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nHe winces, but nods. I suppose it\u2019s my turn now to pick at old scars.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThat was a really rough time, wasn\u2019t it? We almost had to pull you out of kindergarten.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou guys were yelling all the time. I didn\u2019t want to come home either.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNeither did I.\u201d In my work, I have learned how to cultivate a certain professional distance, a poise that helps me stay centered. I imagine it must be the same for doctors, or for social workers. That ability to exist at one remove from other people\u2019s suffering is easy in the context of a working relationship, but I\u2019ve never been able to do the same with my son. I blink to clear my vision. \u201cThat kind of hurt didn\u2019t just go away, did it?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNo.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOf course not. And the same is true here. Your Aunt Nori\u2019s hurting, and it\u2019s still fresh. But it\u2019ll get better, I promise.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI guess.\u201d I suspect most children learn to distrust the promises of adults from an early age. \u201cYou don\u2019t ever seem like you\u2019re hurting though.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019ve been dealing with it for longer.\u201d I smile and kiss the top of his head. \u201cYou should finish your drawing\u2013maybe you could let me see it when you\u2019re done?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \nNori comes home unexpectedly one evening. I\u2019m sitting at the coffee table, busy working on my tablet. She keys in and blows past me into the study. When she emerges in a different outfit, I say, \u201cYou\u2019re home early.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSaturdays I only work an eight-hour shift.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cEight hours would be four hours ago. Like two in the afternoon.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI know.\u201d She slips into the bathroom. \u201cI\u2019m going back out. I just wanted to swing by and change first.\u201d She leans over the sink with the door open, takes a moment to reapply her makeup. Something catches my eye, a series of dark geometric lines on her neck. They frame her right ear and jawbone like pathways, reach down to a contact point just above her clavicle. The borders are still fresh, still raw and angry, still shining with a thin coat of ointment.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat is this?\u201d I say. \u201cWhen did you get this?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou\u2019re going to make me fuck up my mascara.\u201d She ignores my gaze in the mirror.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI thought you hated the idea of a subvoc.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMom and Dad hating the idea of getting their prints registered. They still did it.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThat wasn\u2019t exactly a matter of choice.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cLots of things aren\u2019t a matter of choice.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI would have had to reload your card. With extra, even.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOvertime,\u201d she says. \u201cNice thing about probationary employment.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAnd you weren\u2019t planning on telling me?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI don\u2019t have to inform you about every single aspect of my comings and goings,\u201d she says. \u201cI thought you\u2019d be happy: layabout big sister gets up off your futon and finally gets her act together. This is me getting my damn act together.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cUp off my futon, maybe. I\u2019m not so certain about the rest.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cCould we please just not?\u201d She puts away her things and zips up the bag. \u201cI honestly don\u2019t know what you want from me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cFor you to talk to me. For you to let me in.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThis is really not the time to be doing the whole family-therapy routine.\u201d she says. \u201cI\u2019m going out tonight. On my own money. Don\u2019t worry, I won\u2019t have to ask you to spot me again.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThat isn\u2019t even what this is about. I\u2019m worried about you. I want to help.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI don\u2019t need anyone\u2019s help,\u201d she says. \u201cI\u2019m doing fine. Better than I have since I got out.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou\u2019re killing yourself with work. You\u2019re barely sleeping. Those aren\u2019t the coping habits of someone I\u2019d say is \u2018doing fine.\u2019\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAt least I\u2019m working.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAnd doing what?\u201d I say. \u201cI\u2019ve scored you opportunities with at least a dozen good places. I\u2019ve tried to find you jobs\u2013good jobs within your field, jobs that use your degree. I would think you\u2019d be grateful, and instead you\u2019ve washed out of every single interview I\u2019ve landed you.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWashed out? I got a good job, on my own, and I didn\u2019t need your help. Better than some pity internship that wants to pay me half of basic income.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s menial labor,\u201d I say.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSo? It\u2019s all menial now.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s chain retail.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt didn\u2019t use to be a chain!\u201d she says. Her sudden outburst frightens me. \u201cGood god, are you that dense? Do you remember nothing?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nFor a moment I can only stammer, searching for words. \u201cI\u2019m sorry, I don\u2019t understand.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cElliot Bay,\u201d she says. \u201cDid Dad not ever take you there as a kid?\u201d I wrack my memory. Our father never took me to any such place that I can recall, another reminder that he and Nori always had a different relationship than we did. A stronger relationship. \u201cIt was his favorite,\u201d she says. \u201cAnd they bought it out. God damn it, this town kills everything. They killed it and they took that part of him away from me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nShe\u2019s near tears now. How could I not have known, I wonder? Did our father never choose to share that with me? Was I too selfish, too caught up in my sports and STEM club, my construction sims and my tabletop games? Was Nori just the daughter he cared about more? \u201cI\u2019m sorry,\u201d I say.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou don\u2019t know anything,\u201d she says. \u201cAbout me. About this family. You don\u2019t know anything.\u201d She brushes past me and disappears into her study; the door clicks shut behind her.\n<\/p>\n \nAfter a little time has passed, she comes out to find me on the balcony. I can feel her in the doorway, ask her \u201cWhat?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNow\u2019s as good a time as any,\u201d she says. \u201cI found a place. I\u2019ll be moving out probably Sunday. I\u2019m sorry.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThere\u2019s nothing to be sorry for,\u201d I say. \u201cWe can even take my car to haul things.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI don\u2019t have that much.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI know. Listen, it was wrong of me to downplay your achievements. I\u2019m sorry. You\u2019ve worked really hard. You should be proud.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cPlease don\u2019t,\u201d she says. \u201cAnyway, I should probably get going. I\u2019ll see you tonight.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWait.\u201d I take her hand, clasp it in between mine. With my fingers I can feel the raised welt on her wrist where they\u2019ve injected the probe for the subvoc. The probe opens the channel with touch, and the tattoo transmits the nerve impulses of the throat and larynx. Not so much recorded speech, as a mapping of speech. Once I feel the link, I touch my fingers to the button inked on my collarbone. I love you, I say.\n<\/p>\n \nShe stares, struggles with the feel of another user\u2019s words inside her head for the first time. After a moment she touches her own throat. I love you too. I\u2019m sorry. Then without another word, she\u2019s out the door and gone.\n<\/p>\n \n \nNoah goes back to his father\u2019s for the week. I go back to working at the office again, rather than from home. With Nori gone, a silence settles back over the condo. It remains in the air even after I pick Noah up again on Saturday evening, hangs over our dinner and our weekly movie night. It begins to feel like she was never there at all.\n<\/p>\n \nShe wanders into the kitchen on Sunday morning, already showered and dressed, as I\u2019m loading up the dishwasher. She looks at me, then back at Noah doodling at the table. \u201cYou guys ready?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cJust finishing up,\u201d I say. \u201cYou need help getting your things packer?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAlready loaded. It\u2019s just a footlocker.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cFurniture?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMy roommate has furniture.\u201d That tightening of the muscle in her jaw. \u201cSo, are we doing this?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nHer new place is out in University Park, a small unit located in a high-rise tenement block. Ugly Brutalist constructions, they crowd together like server arrays, dotted with lights. I remember the protests over zoning density that took place when they first went up. Noah peers overhead, jaw slack with wonder.\n<\/p>\n \nWe pull into the visitors parking area. On either side of the entrance stand a pair of tall, carefully-landscaped junipers. The elevators don\u2019t work, so we mount the stairs instead. Nori drags her footlocker, the wheels thumping over each step, while I carry a few bags of assorted groceries. Ramen, canned sliced tofu, eggs, assorted produce. She initially resisted my efforts at charity, but my fretting instinct isn\u2019t so easily deterred. Bringing up the rear is Noah, hauling a set of bedding. Pillows, a quilt set, but no sheets\u2013I couldn\u2019t be sure what sort of bed she\u2019d have at her new place, and Nori didn\u2019t seem to know either. Such housewarming gifts as I have to offer.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cRoommate\u2019s supposed to be working,\u201d Nori says. \u201cWon\u2019t be back until later this evening.\u201d She opens the door into a small, crowded space, with flimsy-looking walls and sliding doors. Dirty laundry is draped over the sofa, over the coat-hooks, the chairs. There are unwashed dishes on the living-room table, which also seems to double as the dining-room table. There are no chairs. Posters advertising various live concerts adorn the walls. Cutouts from various glossy fashion mags are strewn over every surface, some pasted into collages. There seems to be a recurring focus on hair, femme hair specifically, in various punk or androgynous styles.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThis roommate, what\u2019s she like?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSeems alright,\u201d she says. \u201cWorks as a stylist.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMm.\u201d It explains things. I glance out the window\u2013one thing this place affords, if nothing else, is a breathtaking view of the city looking south. Morning sunlight silhouettes the skyline in gold. I ask, \u201cDo you need any help with anything?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019ve got it.\u201d She rolls her foot-locker into a corner, instructs Noah to drop her bedding on the sofa. \u201cSo.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSo.\u201d I take her in. A sense again that I\u2019ve damaged us somehow, in some way that can\u2019t be fixed. Not all things become clearer with hindsight. \u201cYou\u2019ll subvoc me if you need anything?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI should be alright.\u201d For a moment, I think she might become emotional, but the moment passes. \u201cI really appreciate everything you\u2019ve done for me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s nothing,\u201d I say. \u201cNoah, you ready?\u201d He glances back at us, shrugs and heads for the door. Stops to hug Nori as she passes. She smiles. It is the same smile that she gave me, after her diagnosis. It\u2019ll be fine, I remember her saying. I\u2019ve got good doctors, a good treatment plan. Everything\u2019s gonna be just fine, I promise. At what point do we start lying to children and calling it love? Nori and I exchange a look then. \u201cCome on,\u201d I say to Noah.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cOkay.\u201d He heads out the door, and I stand there a moment longer. I know this isn\u2019t goodbye, and yet in some fundamental way it is. \u201cSee you around,\u201d I say.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYeah. See you.\u201d Rather than prolong the moment, I head for the door.\n<\/p>\n \n \nOn the ride home, Noah says, \u201cShe isn\u2019t going to come visit us at all, is she?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI glance back at him in the mirror \u201cI honestly don\u2019t know.\u201d He shrugs, goes back to looking out the window.\n<\/p>\n \nLater that afternoon, while we work on our respective projects at the kitchen table, a knock comes at the door. It\u2019s one of Noah\u2019s friends, asking if he can come ride bikes. Noah is up and out the door the instant I call for him. When I return to the table, I notice he\u2019s left his tablet open. On it, the latest panel from his comic: in it, the sleeping woman from before now wanders through an underground ruin, dwarfed by runic symbols. She arrives at a pedestal, pushes a button to reveal a casket like the one she first emerged from. Without a word she climbs inside, seals the lid over herself, closes her eyes as frost obscures the porthole. For a long time, I just stare over that particular image. I rub the bridge of my nose, then turn and attempt to return to my work.\n<\/p>\n \nThat night, Noah and I visit the Ballard Night Market. The air is alive with music and laughter, with the smell of fried food, dishes from various cultures. We wander among the street trucks, grab pad thai for myself, barbeque-tofu mac and cheese for Noah. We sit on a bench and tuck into our food, listen to the buskers plying their trade, then toss our plates into the nearest incinerator when we\u2019ve finished. Up ahead through the crowds, a familiar face: it\u2019s Troy, out with a woman I don\u2019t recognize, presumably his latest girlfriend. She leans into his shoulder as they walk, and here in the wild I can see how happy they are together. He spies me through the throngs and waves, and though I wave back I resolve not to disturb them. Noah, however, has other ideas. \u201cDad!\u201d he shouts. \u201cCome on.\u201d He tugs at my sleeve, then slips through the sea of bodies like an eel. I try to keep up but am quickly caught up in the throng. I watch him run up ahead, see him tackle Troy in a full-body hug. Together they all beckon me to join them, but something stays my feet. Something always stays my feet.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I receive word of my sister on a Wednesday morning in early May. My son Noah is out of school that day for teacher in-services; I\u2019ve taken time off work to be with him at home. I\u2019m making soup and sandwiches for us both when the call comes in\u2013I take it over the kitchen speakers, …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106414,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,14,19838],"tags":[19839],"class_list":["post-136770","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction","category-publications","category-tcl-31-spring-2019","tag-the-colored-lens-31-spring-2019","entry entry-center"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136770","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/106414"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=136770"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136770\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":136771,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136770\/revisions\/136771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=136770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=136770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=136770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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