A Cuban Girl's Guide to Tea and Tomorrow - Laura Taylor Namey Page 0,28

her. I visit about every other day.”

He places the photo into my hands. “This was one of the last shots Dad took of her before her diagnosis.”

I swallow past the lump in my throat. His mother is beautiful in a cream sweater, fairy blond hair dusting over her shoulders. Orion has her eyes and I’m lost at the sight of this woman, his mum, standing under a cherry blossom tree in bloom. “Oh, Orion, she’s…”

“She’s everything.” His voice cracks. “The cherry blossom trees in London were her favorites. Flora’s named for them. But she doesn’t know me or Dad or Flora anymore. She doesn’t know her own name anymore.”

My mouth opens to offer some kind of consolation, drawing from the place where my own loss grows, when the front door squeaks open.

Flora steps in, dragging a chilly gust behind her. Seeing me, her face goes blank with what could be confusion; I’m clearly not Charlotte from Twyfold.

Orion jumps up. “Hey, Pink, you want some amazing flan custard that Lila made?” he asks like we’ve been discussing movies or music or anything but their mother. I note Flora’s nickname, too. Pink for cherry blossoms? Maybe. But Flora’s black and gray getup is the opposite of pink or floral.

Flora’s already a third of the way up the stairs, just ahead of a no, thanks. Orion approaches, whispering over the railing. And then she’s gone.

He turns, cocks his head, then grabs the mass of dark gray wool hanging off the banister. It’s the cardigan I wore the other night in the churchyard. “Here. You’re shivering.”

The patches of forearm visible under my three-quarter-length plum top are goose bump–heavy. I realize I’m not so much cold as overwhelmed. But I trade the photo frame for the soft wool and drape it around my shoulders. “Thanks.”

Orion replaces the picture, this time on the piano. “This was Mum’s. She was an incredible pianist.” He rattles his head. “That’s actually how she suspected something was off at first. Songs she’d memorized for years and played all the time, well, she began losing the notes.”

“Only forty-two, though. It’s hard to think of that happening to someone so young.”

Orion sits, closer this time. “It’s more common than it should be, medically speaking. But you never think it’s going to be you or your family. Especially when you’re twelve.”

“You must’ve had to grow up pretty fast.”

A single nod. “That’s why I latched onto superstitions. As a mental escape, not a code of conduct. Dad and the doctors tried to help and inform me—always forthright about what was happening—but there was so much extra inside. Confusion and bitterness. The collecting gave me something to do. Superstitions explain or give meaning to some things we can’t understand.” Orion grabs the cider, runs his finger around the lip. “Cultures trapped that confusion into relatable objects or notions. It brought people a sense of closure and maybe some control.”

Some things we can’t understand. How Stefanie can share a past with me but not trust me with her future. How Andrés can say he still loves me but can’t be with me. How Abuela went years too soon. “My family tried to help me, too.” And counsel and treat and coddle. “But I wouldn’t have it, so they sent me here.”

Orion leans forward, hands clasped. “Three months, though. All because of your friend?”

“I wish that were it.” I bite my cheek.

“I see. Well, the story of my mum seems a thousand years long. But you got the highly abridged version. The simple one, if we could ever call it that.”

I peek at him with one willful eye. “You mean I could give you the quick and easy version of mine, like when you make a store-bought cake mix instead of baking something from scratch?”

“You could, yeah.” He points at me. “But I’d bet my next paycheck on the fact that you’ve never used a cake mix. Never will, either.”

My mouth springs wide, just for a breath. “All right. I can do highly simplified,” I find myself saying. I’ve been holding all the trauma of last spring so close. But just like earlier with Orion’s friends, no one here will make my personal business the next slice of neighborhood chisme. No one’s judged me or hovered too closely over my every word and move. Orion just shared his mom with me. We’re still inside the small and quiet space of that. One that feels… safe.

So I start. “I call it the trifecta. Stefanie’s only one end point.