I pick up my phone to call Micah, ready to lose my ever-loving mind, when I realize: Dad’s the only father Micah’s ever really had. If I tell him this, he’ll lose that. And Mae: I can’t tell her. She and Dad were crazy close, and this would do nothing but fuck her up as much as I am right now.

I hold Dad’s laptop and go to my door, listening. It sounds like they’re still downstairs, so I creep to Mom and Dad’s room and get Mom’s laptop. Back in my room, I search through her emails, but there’s nothing, no sign that she knew. Ignorance is bliss, right? Maybe Mom had no idea, and she died with the man she loved, end of story.

Because if she knew, if that wave was coming and she knew …

“I can’t do this,” I say out loud.

There’s a long, low breath behind me. The scent of roses.

I turn. My mother is doing a headstand.

I slump to the ground.

“Are you really here?”

I’m not high—yet.

Her hair is matted down with sweat. Or seawater. Her forearms rest on either side of her head, keeping her in balance.

I crawl to her. “Mommy?”

Her eyes stay focused on the mat, her long body in perfect alignment. That breath—ujjayi breath—which sounds like the sea. Like waves sliding to the shore.

I want to touch her, but I don’t want her to fall. She exhales a wave of breath, and I try to catch it with my mouth. How can the person who made you be gone?

I follow the line of her leg, up to her ankle, and I burst into tears: her right. The Om is on her right ankle.

“Did you know?” I whisper. “Mom. Did you know?”

Mom moves her left leg so that it bends at the knee, makes a four. A sort of upside-down tree pose, but with her foot sliding just behind her knee, so that her left shin rests against the back of her right thigh.

“Tell me what to do. I can’t do this, Mom. Please.”

Her muscles begin to strain just a little, and I remember her holding my feet as I wobbled on my hands: I can’t do this!

And almost like she can see that memory playing through me, Mom looks at me, smiles, and lands back on her feet like a cat.

And then she’s gone.

I lunge toward the mat, too late. There is one strand of long black hair—but it could be mine. I don’t know. I don’t know.