Auntie Elizabeth and Hilary said few words during dim sum. After the other aunties left to go sightseeing, or to fly back west, back to their homes, Auntie Elizabeth took my arm and walked with Hilary and me to a nearby bubble tea place. She didn’t say anything, but I knew by the droop of her eyes, the tightness of her lips, and her constant physical touch, comforting me, that she was saddened by the news. Not only was Mother her friend, but Auntie Elizabeth also knew, watching me grow up alongside Hilary, what her loss meant to me.

In the months after the red egg and ginger party, Hilary checked in on me regularly and invited me to outings with Abby and her mother. I never tired of hearing Abby call me Auntie and couldn’t wait for Leo to call Hilary Auntie and Abby Jie Jie. I accepted all the invitations and felt more at ease learning how to be a mother, watching my best friend and her mother, and letting them remind me that we were family.

When I told Father, Bea, and Auntie Choo Neo that Leo’s middle and Chinese name would be Vóng Hua, they were perplexed. Their first question was why wasn’t it in Mandarin? I was surprised by their urge to mainstream her name but insisted I wanted it to be in Hakka. It didn’t escape them that part of Mother’s name had crept in there, like a ghost briefly entering the room. I explained to my family that Leo’s name was not just a nod to her lost po po but also an homage to our ancestors, the guest people. The yellow flower honours our Hakka heritage.

心Heart

MAY IN OTTAWA THAT YEAR WAS GLORIOUS. The magnolias in the neighbourhood were in magnificent bloom, the tulips crowded the flower beds at the edge of the Rideau Canal, and the irises pressed their bearded faces towards the sky. The dandelions were unruly, leaving polka-dotted patterns on fields and lawns and in the cracks in the sidewalks. Everywhere, a smattering of lion faces turned into poufy balls of white spring snow.

The pollen irritated my nose, and my whole body shook with the sneezes that erupted. My allergies reminded me of Mother. When I was a child, I hoped that the end of winter, and the life sprouting from the ground, would buoy her, but she always found something wrong with spring. Coming from a land with only two seasons—rainy and dry—she must have felt it was strange to have to go through two extra transitions in the year.

Leo sat on a picnic blanket in the backyard while I hung the laundry. She was wary of the grass, something new she had never encountered before, and did not venture off” the cloth. She was teething again, chewing voraciously on a plastic giraffe. I looked at the bedsheet flapping in the wind and was transported back to when I watched Mother doing the same thing. She was wearing a mustard-coloured dress with an A-line skirt that the breeze brushed along her pale legs. Her hair fell against the back panel of her dress, and her sleeveless arms reached high to secure the clothespins to the line. Although her clothes were plain and simple, Mother had a special way of carrying herself. Even when she had nowhere to go, she wore even the most modest of outfits with importance and pride. She was so elegant it was a shame no one else could see her. Bea and I were hiding behind the large sheets hung on the line. The late morning was hot, and we found some reprieve in the damp, fluttering fabric. We giggled as we poked at each other, like ghosts jerking in the wind. Mother normally would have yelled at us to stop, but that day she was distracted. She didn’t hear our laughter or feel us moving around her. She looked up at the sky, as if a typhoon were upon us. I followed her gaze and saw nothing.