Page 84 of Butterfly Effect

“Don’t ‘Dad’ me. It’s tradition.”

“We don’t have to.”

“Don’t have to what?” Wade asks, settling down next to me.

Dad mirrors him on my other side and plops open the photo album in my lap. “A trip down memory lane.”

My heart seizes within its cage.

“That’s Bela,” he taps. “Love of my life.” Light brown eyes peek from their corners at the camera, the young image of my mom donning a nauvari sari and embellished with traditional Maharashtrian jewelry: a bejeweled brahmani nath, thushi necklace, heavy jhumka and gold bangles, a giant dhol strapped to her torso. “Gabe’s mother.”

Wade’s eyes narrow in question. “You’re Indian?”

“Half.”

“You look like her,” he deadpans.

“Doesn’t she?” Dad nudges his knee into mine.

“The freckles,” Wade whispers.

Goosebumps rise across my arms.

“She led dhol tasha every chance she got.” Dad’s smile wanes. “Her parents cut contact when she immigrated here to pursue a Master’s against their will. We met at an ISKCON event on campus. She was vibrant, a burst of light in the darkness I was escaping.” His hand sweeps over a series of their wedding pictures. “My relationship with my family was already strained from leaving the church. Swedish Lutherans. They were so tightly wound, and there was so much life I wanted to experience. They completely severed ties when I told them I was going to marry her.”

He pauses over a photo of their joint hands. “We only had each other, but it was enough.” Images of her gardening with others appear. “Our community understood our search for love and acceptance. To belong.”

A few faded snaps of the original greenhouse and farm come up. Rows of potted hibiscus, gardenia bushes, frangipani trees, jasmine, tiger lilies. None of them beam as Aai does.

“She was so naturally nurturing, spent hours caring for her plants. Friends and community, too. Always dropping off meals and herbal remedies to anyone who got sick or needed a little help. Never put herself first.” He turns to another page. “And then…”

Welcome to the world, Gargi Bela Finkannounces my birth on a banner at the top. Scrapbook style, there’s a card with my height and weight next to a pink, swaddled newborn in her arms. Aai’s face glows despite the weariness in her eyes.

Wade lowers his head and squints. “Who’s…Gar-gi Be-la?” The enunciation cracks a smile.

“That’s me.”

“We named her after the great intellectual Sage Gargi and kept her middle name Bela after her mother, but she wanted to change it in high school, right before the prospects of playing university basketball came around.”

I’d had enough of being called Gaggy and Gargle Fink Rat. The name change ultimately worked in my favor professionally and severed cultural roots in one fell swoop.

“Where did Finch come from?”

My father points to himself. “My last name, Fink. It’s the Swedish word for finch.” Dad sighs, melancholy and nostalgic, showing off photos of some of my milestones. First steps, first tricycle, first day of preschool. Aai blows out candles on a cake with me on my fourth birthday.

“We lost her shortly after.” There’s a guilty tremor in his voice as he keeps flipping pages, revealing more and more pictures without her. “She wasn’t taking care of herself. And maybe I didn’t take good enough care of her. It was a tough year.”

Tears trickle down his face, slow and steady. He sniffles and wipes them away with the collar of his shirt.

My heart rate drops, blood retreats from my face, sending a shiver up my spine.

We do it every year, but I don’t want to. Not today, not in front of Wade.

“Dad,” I warn. “Please.”

“It’s okay, bala,” he murmurs. “You never let yourself…it’s okay to miss her. I miss her every day.”

I hate the irrational feeling of missing her. I didn’t even know her. I don’t remember her. How can I miss someone I don’t remember?

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