The Forgetting Curve (Memento Nora)

by Angie Smibert

  “The only doors you’ll be rattling this summer are to the lab and your room.” All trace of humor was gone from his face as he got out of the car. He strode toward the house without waiting for me.

  Dad can’t get away from me fast enough.

  I grabbed my backpack and hurried after him.

  Mr. Yamada looked a little surprised to see us when he opened the door. He acknowledged Dad with the slightest of head bows. I saw Dad stiffen slightly, but not enough for anyone else to catch it.

  “We just got home ourselves,” Mr. Yamada said, more to me than to Dad. Winter’s grandfather waved us into the loft. It was the kind of place I imagined he and Winter would live: wide-open space, minimal furniture, industrial-looking pipes overhead, concrete floors, and artwork everywhere. Oh, and an old motorcycle in the foyer.

  Dad took in the place, too, but I don’t think he was appreciating its aesthetic value. “If you’ll pardon me, Koji, I’ll call Brian to see where they are,” he said.

  Mr. Yamada motioned him toward the leather sofas at the other end of the loft. To me he said, “She’s in the garden.” He nodded toward an enormous Shoji-screen door at the back of the house.

  Winter had told me about her garden. I knew she’d built several moving sculptures within the traditional Japanese garden—bamboo, sand, rocks—that Mr. Yamada had started. But even after seeing pics of one or two of the sculptures, I had trouble visualizing it.

  The Shoji screen door, I realized as I got closer, wasn’t made of rice paper and bamboo. It was made out of Kevlar and had an R39 security system attached to it.

  The door swooshed open, and I couldn’t move for a moment. The gleaming bamboo walkways and white sand were so serene, so cliché-Japanese; but the sculptures were so stark and industrial, all burnished metal, with splashes of plastic, cloth, and paint. The whole thing tore at me, like my own two sides.

  “Wow,” I whispered.

  The sculptures sprung to life as I stood there gawking. Arms started turning. The sail-things tinkled. The metal guy slapped the water. He reminded me of a fountain I’d seen in Zurich or Basel. But I’d never seen anything like that shopping bag crab thing. It pulled itself along with windshield wiper legs. The whole thing worked together like a mad machine.

  Staggering. Genius. Warped—in a good way.

  Of course, buttoned-up engineering and financial types—like our parents—might see craziness in Winter’s creativity. Our family knew how to make money, not art. Then again, a lot of famous artists had mental problems. Van Gogh was bipolar or schizophrenic—I forget which.

  I stumbled around peering at each creature, trying to figure out how she’d done it. Then I got to the pagoda. The mask sculpture in the middle of the table stopped me. Scaffolding held the mask in place, but its façade had eroded in spots, revealing the gear works underneath. The thing unnerved me. It was like someone had tried so hard to keep up a front because they were afraid to let people see beneath the mask, but it fell away, anyway. It was so deep I felt like I was drowning.

  A song began playing from the sail sculpture. And my mobile started vibrating. It was probably Mom calling to see if I got here okay. I fished the mobile out of my pocket, and I was going to answer it, but I caught a glimpse of Winter through an open door off of the pagoda. She was tinkering with a lunch box.

  What if she was sick? What if she was different? I put on my own mask, hoping the holes weren’t revealing too much, and stepped through the doorway.

  8.0

  UNTAKEN

  WINTER

  “Winter?” a voice said from the direction of the garden. The hummingbirds quieted so I could hear. It was a male voice, but not Grandfather’s or anyone else I immediately recognized. “Winter?” the voice said again, this time closer.

  I turned to see a young man standing in the entrance from the garden. It took a second for it to click. I hadn’t seen Aiden in the flesh since my parents left. And he’d grown. About a foot and a half, at least.

  My cousin crossed his arms over his very preppy sweater vest, which he was wearing on top of a snowy white T-shirt and jeans. The sweater had some sort of crest on it. A few years ago, he’d been sent away to a Swiss boarding school near where his mother lived.

  “Nice outfit,” I said. It wasn’t.

  “The shit in this garden is genius,” he said, matching my farthest-thing-from-the-truth tone. He scoped out the workshop with this practiced mask of indifference plastered across his face. That face must have been very useful in boarding school.

  He didn’t fool me. Nothing bored him.

  “Oh, shut up,” I said. “You know it is.”

  His mask cracked, revealing the true Aiden, the one I’d always seen no matter what face he put on for the rest of the world. His hazel eyes looked green under the fluorescents.

  “Damn, girl.” He tucked a strand of black hair behind his ear and grinned. “It’s really good to see you.”

  We hugged. I asked him about school.

  “Oh, let’s not talk about that dreariness.” He was picking through things on my workbench like a hungry dog sniffing out treats. “Tell me about that.” He pointed at my garden. “It really is genius.” He handed me the remote. “Show me.” This was my Aiden, wide-eyed, eager to figure it all out, to tear everything apart and put it back together his own way.

  I couldn’t think of anything I’d rather do than show him my creations. I pushed the button on the remote and the sculptures came to life.

  “I got your message,” Aiden said as he took my arm.

  “What message?”

  “You know, the book, the Mementos.” He whispered this last part as we crossed the threshold into the garden.

  I had no clue what he was talking about.

  Then I saw her.

  My mother—Spring Nomura—stood in the center of the garden, in the pagoda, in the flesh, smiling, teary-eyed, the whole surprise-I’m-home works. I ran into her arms like I was still that kid who’d hidden in the garden so many years ago. My good dreams were all about this.

  “Winter, honey. It’s okay,” she said as she stroked my hair. “I’m here now. We’re home for good.”

  “We?” I looked around. Aiden had melted back into the workshop, where I could see him gingerly shaking my Scooby Doo lunch box. There was no one else in the garden.

  “Of course, silly. Your father’s trying to find a safe place to park. This neighborhood,” Mom said with a shudder in her voice. “I didn’t realize it had gotten so rough. It’s no wonder Father got hurt on his neighborhood patrol.”

  “Hurt?” Not my Sasuke-san. I felt a lump of panic rising in my throat. He’d seemed okay when we both stumbled out of the cab. I turned toward the kitchen.

  “He’s fine now, dear. Don’t you remember?” Mom took my hand. “He was in the hospital, too. Just a concussion, but at his age, you can’t be too careful.” She shook her head sadly. “We should have taken you with us.”

  “Taken me with you?” I was puzzled but not sure why.

  “To Japan, of course.” She looked at me warily. “The schools are so much better there. Everything is so clean.”

  The hummingbird wings fluttered in my ears.

  “Why didn’t you take me?” I backed away.

  “Oh, honey,” she said sadly. “You know why. You didn’t want to go. You didn’t want to leave your friends or your grandfather. And,” she added in a hushed voice, “your doctor didn’t think it was a good idea.”

  Doctor? I didn’t know what doctor she was talking about. Did she mean the shrink? I didn’t start seeing her until after they left. Then again, I didn’t even remember why I’d been in the hospital.

  What was going on? I looked at Mom again, this time with my X-ray vision, as my friends liked to call it. Mom was older, thinner maybe, and as neatly dressed as ever. I knew I hadn’t seen this woman in years.

  “Baby, are you feeling okay?”

  “Fine,” I said. “Just tired, I guess.” It wasn’t the t
ime to grill her.

  “Not too tired to give your dad a hug,” my father said as he walked through the door from the house. He was older, too; his short shock of black hair was sprinkled with more gray than I remembered. He had the same thin black glasses, though.

  Inside my head, the hummingbirds fluttered, but the little voice whispered over them. Yes, they were in Japan working for the company. But they’re home now. Everything is finally okay. You can get on with your life. Forget about art and hummingbirds. Work hard. Go to school. A good school. Work for the company. I don’t know where that came from.

  “Ah, Pooh-bear, I’ve missed you.” Dad wrapped me in a hug, and I was too tired to fight the voices. I was just happy to have my parents home again.

  When I emerged from Dad’s arms, I could see we’d been joined by Grandfather, Aiden, and his father. My uncle looked exactly the same every time I’d seen him, which wasn’t often: all business. Black hair, black tie, black suit. He’s the head of Nomura North America. Only his father, Katsu, the chairman of the Nomura Corporation in Japan, outranked Ichiro Nomura.

  My other grandfather, Koji Yamada, laid out a tea tray on the small table in the pagoda. I flicked off the kinetic sculptures. Grandfather handed me a thick black coffee with—I knew without tasting it—six sugars. He’d made green tea for everyone else.

  They sipped tea politely, not saying anything for a long moment. Aiden finally broke the ice.

  “The garden is spectacular, isn’t it?”

  My mother and father exchanged glances. Mom glared at Grandfather as he stared into his teacup. Uncle Ichiro took a sip of his tea before commenting that I showed “quite a mechanical aptitude.”

  “She could always build anything with her hands.” Aiden nodded in agreement as if his father had been the one to bring up the subject. “You know, Winter should intern with me at the company this summer. Robotics, maybe.”

  His father looked pleased at the idea. I couldn’t tell if Aiden was working his dad or trying to divert attention from the obvious tension between my parents and Grandfather. Were they mad at him for something?

  “That would be a more productive use of her time,” Mom said, a harsh edge creeping into her voice. She kept glaring at Grandfather.

  Aiden nudged me and his father toward the Shopping Bag Crab. “Father, you should see this one.”

  Ichiro raised an eyebrow but followed us. Aiden turned over the crab and examined its workings. My mother’s voice fell into heated whispers directed at my Grandfather. Aiden blathered on about some program he’d hacked at school, but I couldn’t help listening to the other conversation.

  “Didn’t you realize she wasn’t taking her meds?” Mom asked.

  Grandfather froze as if trying to remember some long ago information tucked in his brain. Eventually, he shook his head. I’d never seen him so unsure of himself, so meek. Normally, there was nothing meek or even remotely retired about my grandfather. He runs three tattoo shops, patrols the neighborhood for baddies, and works out on his Sasuke obstacle course.

  “How could you not have known?” Mom gestured to the moving statues around her.

  Grandfather didn’t answer. And I didn’t want to hear any more. They hated my garden. They thought it was some outward manifestation of inner crazy.

  “Mom, stop it.” I strode back to her. “He’s not to blame for anything.” I touched Grandfather’s hand, just above where the snake head emerged from his crisp white sleeve. The dress shirt couldn’t camouflage all of his tats. A tiger’s claw reached out of his other sleeve, and the cherry blossom—the tat that symbolized my mom’s birth—peeked out from his collar. The only tattoo you couldn’t see was the one that celebrated my birth: a snowflake over his heart. “He’s always been here for me.” I gave his hand a squeeze.

  “Dad,” my mother said sounding angrier than before. She tore my hand from his. “You promised.” She held up the back of my hand for everyone to see.

  “Spring, I did not do that.” He turned to me.

  A perfect circle had been tattooed on the fleshy part between my thumb and forefinger. It wasn’t perfect really; it was more like someone had done it with a calligraphy brush in one stroke, not quite closing it. I stared at the circle. Nothing came to me.

  “I don’t remember,” I said slowly. I wanted to say I didn’t remember a lot of things—them leaving, them ever calling or visiting, me going to the hospital, or anything that happened in the last few weeks. The hummingbirds flitted wildly.

  “It’s okay, honey,” she said acting motherly all of a sudden. She took my hand in hers and spoke slowly and calmly, like she was speaking to a five-year-old. “The doctor said you might have some holes in your memory. It’s one of the side effects of treatment.”

  “Ichiro has arranged for you to see an excellent doctor at the compound,” my father said, finally joining the conversation.

  “Compound?” I asked dumbly.

  “Tamarind Bay. Ichiro got us a new house there, near his. And you’re already enrolled in school for the fall.”

  Great, I thought. A compound. And a new school. I had friends here. Finally. Before I moved in with Grandfather, we’d lived in an old-fashioned ’burb on the south side of town. Southern Hills wasn’t a compound, but everyone there was on a waiting list to get into one. Same difference. I had zero in common with those kids.

  “A summer internship wouldn’t be a bad idea,” Dad said.

  His brother nodded. “We have an opening.” It had probably been his idea. Maybe he was the one playing Aiden.

  My life was all arranged, at least for the foreseeable future, by my loving family that was suddenly back in my life. It was almost too much.

  Grandfather looked at me and nodded, as if he knew what I was thinking.

  Aiden helped me pack up my books while my mother picked through my clothes. Eventually, she pronounced most of them unsuitable and left them hanging in the closet.

  “We’ll go shopping,” Mom said running her fingers over my sleek straight black hair. It had been pink and spiky before this so-called hospital. “Tamarind Bay has shops that rival Tokyo.”

  On my way out, I found my Sasuke-san sitting slumped at the table in the garden, staring into his cold cup of tea. The scene looked oddly familiar. The hummingbirds flittered in my brain as I kissed him on the forehead.

  “We got them back,” I whispered.

  1:28 AM. SOMEWHERE IN THE CITY OF HAMILTON…

  Good morning, citizens. Our dear mayor has proclaimed that his ID program will make us all safer, that it could make the whole country—maybe even the whole world—safer. And he’s going to ride that idea—and a boatload of TFC money—right into Congress. His sponsors love him. The press eats up every word. He’s got a slew of other Patriot Party candidates and legislators on his bandwagon.

  However, nobody seems to be asking him the big question. How exactly does an ID in your skull make you safe? The TFC-partiers say it’s unpatriotic to ask.

  But I’m asking.

  Sure, the chip would be a great Lo Jack for missing kids, deadbeat dads, and cheating spouses. The cops already track felons this way. But wouldn’t a smart terrorist (or other criminal) just get the ID? Or a fake one? You know they’re going to pop up on the black market sooner rather than later.

  So ask yourself why this ID chip is suddenly a requirement. Why did TFC insist that Nomura bring out the chip (and their new mobiles) now instead of in the fall as planned? Who gains?

  Next up for your listening pleasure, “Follow the Money” by Political Business. And then we’ve got “Wait until July Comes” by a local band who wishes to remain anonymous.

  9.0

  BAGGED, TAGGED, AND RELEASED

  VELVET

  Somebody did need to do some explaining, but I didn’t know who that somebody was.

  The cops? Hardly. Spike? A fat lot of good that’d do. Dad? I hated to worry him about stuff at home. Mom? Maybe. I live in hope.

  It started to rain. Ho
w cliché.

  Do not run. Book of Velvet. Chapter 3, Verse 12. Not from or toward anything.

  My boots slapped the wet pavement as I walked past boarded-up houses. Spike lives on the nicer end of the West End. Mom and I rent the bottom of a sad-looking triplex on the crappier end. The top floors of our once pretty Victorian were empty. We’d pried off the plywood from the second-floor windows so that people wouldn’t assume the whole place was vacant—and thus up for grabs in the squatting department.

  By the time I hit my front door, I was feeling like a stunned (and drenched) animal who’d been tranq’ed and released back into the wild.

  Bagged, tagged, and released. With no idea who the baggers were.

  “Is that you, Anne Marie?” Mom yelled from the kitchen. A pack of mongrels from Chihuahua up to mastiff-size bounded out to greet me. One of Mom’s causes. “Don’t let the new pups out.”

  I knew the drill. This wasn’t my first dog rodeo. But a new dog, a big black one that kind of looked like the dog on the Black Dog Architectural sign, blocked the door into the kitchen. I stood my ground but didn’t make eye contact.

  “She’s okay, Bridget,” Mom said evenly.

  The dog sniffed me and stepped aside, her tail wagging slowly.

  “That one is very protective.” Mom was busy sorting out the garbage and putting the organic stuff in the composter. “How many times have I told you, Anne Marie, to put your coffee grounds and table scraps into the compost?”

  “Mom, we don’t even have a garden.” We could just use a disposal like everyone else.

  “It’s on my list.”

  Mom has a long list of projects—and causes. She actually takes the compost to the community plot to trade for fresh veggies. She’s the queen of bartering.

  “Mom?” I grabbed a towel from the laundry basket and dried myself off.

  The new black dog nudged Mom for a bit of stinky cheese she was throwing in the compost. “Such a sad story.” Mom tsked. She grabbed the dog a biscuit from the treat jar as she talked. “She was—”