When You Were Here

freak. So why not just go wild? I don’t have to impress anyone by being a prim and proper schoolgirl. So I dress for myself. I wear the things everyone wants to wear but is afraid to because of what people might think. Besides, it’s pretty hard to be unhappy when you’re carrying a panda purse and wearing a pair of boots that a drag queen would drool over.”
    The other day she wore a white petticoat, orange tights, and a yellow tank top with an illustration of a lollipop on the chest. Another time a red, white, and blue cheerleader outfit with black combat boots. It makes sense now why she dresses so wildly; not for show but for sanity. Fashion makes her happy.
    And, sure, I’m happy in the moment with her friendship. I like her teasing, her hissing, her wise old soul. I like the way I feel as if I’ve known her my whole life and the way I feel steady with her. Most of all, I like that I feel alive, I feel good, I feel that thing my mom was said to have felt— happy —for more than just a few seconds at a time. But is that enough? I can’t take Kana back with me to California; I can’t hold her in front of me like a shield for the rest of my life. I have to find a way to be happy even when she’s not here. I have to keep seeking out the answers, and I know they won’t just be found in language lessons and crepes, much as I enjoy both of those.
    “Kana, will you show me the temple my mom went to when she was here? I need to see more. I need to connect with her,” I say, and I couldn’t feel more exposed than I doright now as I say these words aloud for the first time, as I blatantly, patently, ask for help. Asking for more, even when she has given so much already.
    But this is Kana. She does not take advantage. She does not keep score.
    “It would be a complete honor.”
    We leave the noodle shop and head down the nearest subway steps and onto the next train. The doors close, and we’re whooshing through the tunnels underneath Tokyo. Kana’s hand is right under mine since we’re sharing the same strap. She notices, shrugs playfully, and then shifts her hand deliberately so it’s on top of mine. It’s not a romantic move; we don’t have that sort of chemical attraction. But as she laces her fingers through mine, I make room for them and then squeeze her hand back.
    We let go of each other’s hands when we reach our destination, a working-class district. We walk past several shopping alleys with tented stalls catering to the locals. They’re selling staples, like pots and pans and lotions and towels.
    The temple is at the end of the pedestrian shopping way—it’s clearly a temple, with lanterns and a pagoda-style design, but it’s smaller than the other temples I’ve seen and needs a new coat of paint. I walk in with Kana. Incense burns, and candles flicker. My eyes adjust to the lower light in here. I take a deep breath, expecting to hear a voice, feel a presence, something.
    Instead Kana whispers. “Do you consider yourself religious?”
    I shake my head. “Agnostic Jew.”
    Though cultural Jew would be more like it. I like bagels and lox, I crave matzo brie when I’m sick, I eat noodle kugel on Rosh Hashanah, and I think rabbis are the closest there can be to wise men. I did a year of Hebrew school, but I wasn’t even bar mitzvahed. My parents were Jewish, but they both lost interest in the maintenance of the religion, and I have to say I’m glad neither one of them insisted on sending me to Hebrew school after that one year. I’d rather have been playing sports or reading books, so that’s what they encouraged. I never felt like I was missing anything, to tell the truth.
    But maybe I was missing something. Maybe if I were more religious, I could deal with my parents being gone. I could believe they were in a better place, maybe even back together again. I think they’d both like that. My mom missed my dad a ton, and if there is a heaven, or an afterlife, or something else , I have no doubt he’d have been pining for her the whole time until she arrived a few months ago.
    Then I realize: This is the first time I’ve thought of them together. The first time I’ve imagined them as anything but ash. Maybe all I needed was to go to a temple.
    Or maybe I’m losing my mind.
    “I think your mother was a Buddhist. Or became one,” Kana says.
    I nod. This much I know about her. Not that she became one, because she didn’t convert or anything, because you don’t really convert to