Another truth: one of the only reasons I told Monica to start looking for you again was to clear my conscience. I thought there was nothing you could do to me that would hurt me anymore, not at my age. But clearly there was, and I see I am now facing the punishment I deserve, a vengeance for what I did to you, the severity of which could only be matched by hurting Monica. I let her leave the hospital with someone who could hurt her worse than any of the scenarios I had ever imagined—car accidents, thieves, bullies. What damage could they do compared to a broken heart, and one I helped facilitate?

I’m afraid there is a world where you and I never understand each other again, where even all the words in the world cannot right what the decades have wrought on us.

Chapter 29

From the diary of Monica Tsai, backed up on three servers spanning two continents

November 24, 2018 (2018-11-24T17:24:29.420083)

loc: Cambridge, Massachusetts. United States of America (42.3721865,71.1117091)

There’s a state of calm I can sometimes enter. Yesterday the calm was nowhere to be found because there were too many unknowns. But when everything is laid out, the panic subsides, replaced by logic. For me it’s the same feeling as coding once all the specifications are in place. The problem is clear. All that is left is to address it.

After we left the hospital, Louise drove me home. She had not driven all the way here out of any sense of love for me. She came to get grandmother’s story. Otherwise, she feared it would be lost forever. She cared more about collecting stories than for the people at the heart of them. In this calm state, I didn’t even feel that bad for myself. I felt worse knowing grandmother’s hopes must have deflated.

We were silent the whole ride, her hands tight on the steering wheel. The cramped brick houses of Cambridge lurched past. We remained silent even after her fourth attempt at parallel parking, when she finally managed it, the car sticking out only a little bit. She turned the engine off, and our silence was amplified.

“Listen,” she said as I continued to stare out the window. “I know I’ve messed up somewhere. And I probably owe both you and your grandmother an apology.”

I told her she didn’t.

“I do. I think.” She shook her head. “But I’m so tired. I’m not thinking properly. I didn’t sleep at all last night. So I’m going to find a hotel or something and get out of your hair.”

I sighed and told her to sleep in the guest room.

“No, that doesn’t feel right—”

“No matter how much you insulted grandmother, she would find it even more insulting if you paid for a hotel.”