The plague has come to our house: the mother-in-law has covid, caught on her trip to Dublin. Ah well. We fumble with masks as we pass each other in the hallway or the kitchen. She's constantly moving, though she shouldn't, coughing and aching on her way to feed the cattle. After 2 years of lecturing us on unnecessary visits and leaving all the windows open even in the winter, us wearing coats inside (there are A LOT of windows in this ridiculous 6-floored house), she will go to the shop if we're not around and sit in the unventilated kitchen for hours in the evening, like one of those zombies in Ling Ma's apocalyptic novel Severance, mindlessly doing the things they did before they were infected.

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Yesterday the sky was so blue, I had to look away at times. In the forensic sunshine, I noticed the things that have accumulated or broken down in the wintry dark. Split ends. Oily streaks on windows. Buttons that have come undone. Dog hairs or tobacco fluff on tabletops. I dusted the bedroom: bedside table, countertops, books, a collection of owl figurines from my travels, and cigar boxes full of mementoes from Berkeley and Oakland.

Picking up a photo frame to wipe, I paused to examine the image behind the grimy glass pane: my parents, Dad in a dark pinstripe suit and wide tie, Mom in a white dress and veil—not Cambodian wedding fashion, most likely the influence of their Baptist missionary sponsors. Yellow rose bouquet in hand and long black hair curling at the ends like mine, my mother's beauty startles me. They both look impossibly young.

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Later a small tortoiseshell butterfly drifted down from where it had been hibernating onto the sitting room carpet. Taking care to not touch its wings, I lifted it onto the windowsill, just as Sam thundered into the room, wild-eyed and panting. Tonight I found it again in the same place, a visitor from warmer times.

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