I used to hate it when Umma and Appa would fuss over me, but today I soak it all in, letting Umma refill my water glass and Appa tend to my toe. I watch them the whole time, rememorizing their faces. It really has been so long since I’ve last seen them. Christmas, I guess? But no, wait, we were still on tour over the holidays. I remember FaceTiming them and Leah from my hotel room in Taipei, trying not to cry as I watched them open presents from our old apartment. Looking at them now, I feel like they’ve gotten older. Umma’s face is lined with more wrinkles than I remember, and Appa’s hair is definitely getting grayer. I guess I never stopped to think about how when time was flying for me, it was also passing for them. It hits me how much time I’ve missed with them.

“Ready for the full tour now?” Appa says as I finish my last bite. He’s bouncing with energy and suddenly looks so much like the young pro-boxer Appa of my youth that I almost laugh out loud.

“So ready,” I say.

They show me the living room, the master bedroom, Leah’s room. I see she hasn’t gotten any neater than she was when she was a kid, but her bedroom is no little girl’s room anymore—no NEXT BOYZ posters pasted everywhere, no galaxy pattern on her duvet cover, no stuffed animals lining her bed. Okay, actually, I still spot one rabbit plushie nestled into her pillows.

The hallways are lined with art pieces that Umma and Appa collected throughout their marriage. Vintage New Yorker covers, charcoal sketches of Seoul, and a caricature of the two of them that they had done on the Coney Island boardwalk on their first date—with Umma’s forehead twice as big as the rest of her face. Everything in this house has a story. I can’t imagine my family in a more perfect home.

“This is the guest room,” Appa says, leading me to the final room in the apartment. “But we hope you think of it as your room whenever you come visit.”

He opens the door and steps back to let me enter first, and I stare in awe. A fresh jar of lilacs—my favorite flower—has been placed on the nightstand. I inhale the fresh scent of my favorite Baies candle from Diptyque, and picture Umma rushing to light it as soon as she and Appa hung up the phone with me earlier tonight. There’s a spacious bamboo-top desk under the window and a coffee mug filled with sharpened pencils.