SUMMER SEVENTEEN XIII

ALL THE WINDOWS in Cuddledown are open when I come down after lunch. Taeyeon is putting music on the ancient CD player. My old crayon art is on the refrigerator with magnets: Dad on top, Gran and the goldens on the bottom. My painting is taped to one of the kitchen’s cupboards. A ladder and a big box of gift wrap stand in the center of the great room.

                Tiffany pushes an armchair across the floor. “I never liked the way my mother kept this place,” she says.

                I help Taeyeon and Minho move the furniture around until Tiffany is happy. We take down Bess’s landscape watercolors and roll up her rugs. We pillage the littles’ bedrooms for fun objects. When we are done, the great room is decorated with piggy banks and patchwork quilts, stacks of children’s books, a lamp shaped like an owl. Thick sparkling ribbon from the gift-wrap box crisscross the ceiling.

                “Wont Bess be mad you’re decorating?” I ask.

                “I promise you she’s not setting foot in Cuddledown for the rest of the summer. She’s been trying to get outta this place for years.”

                “What do you mean?”

                “Oh,” Tiff says, “you know. Natter natter, least favorite daughter, natter natter, the kitchen is such crap. Why won’t Grandad remodel it? Et cetera.”

                “Did she ask him?”

                Minho stares at me oddly. “Don’t you remember?”

                “Her memory is messed up, Minho!” yells Tiffany. “She doesn’t remember like half of our summer fifteen.”

                “She doesn’t?” Minho says. “I thought – ”

                “No, no, shut up right now,” Tiffany barks. “Did you not listen to what I told you?”

                “When?” Minho asks, perplexed.

                “The other night. I told you what Aunt Sara said.”

                “Chill,” says Minho, throwing a pillow at her.

                “This is important! How can you not pay attention to this stuff?” Tiffany looks like she might cry.

                “I’m sorry, all right? Hey Tae, did you know about Jessica not remembering, like, most of the summer fifteen?”

                “I knew.”

                “See?” says Tiffany. “Taeyeon was listening.”

                My face is hot. I am looking at the floor. No one speaks for a minute. “It’s normal to lose some memory when you hit your head really hard,” I finally say. “Did my mother explain?”

                Minho laughs nervously.

                “I’m surprised Mummy told you. She hates talking about it.”

                “She said you’re supposed to take it easy and remember things in your own time. All the aunties know,” Tiffany says gently. “Grandad knows. The littles. The staff. Every single person on the island knows but Minho, apparently.”

                “I knew,” says Minho.  “I just didn’t know the whole picture.”

                “Don’t be feeble,” says Tiff. “Now is really not the time.”

                “It’s okay,” I say to Minho. “You’re not feeble. You merely had a suboptimal moment. I’m sure you’ll be optimal from now on.”

                “I’m always optimal,” says Minho. “Just not the kind of optimal Tiffany wants me to be.”

                Tae smiles when I say the word suboptimal and pats my shoulder.

                We have started over.