Alice's hands shake when she pours Dad's morning coffee.
She tells herself it's just the tremor, the one that started around week two of this. But it's not. It's four months of waking up at 3 AM to the sound of him calling for someone who isn't there. Four months of her body moving before her mind catches up—checking on him, settling him, lying back down knowing she won't sleep again.
She hasn't eaten since dinner yesterday. It's almost 6:00 p.m. now.
Today, James is here.
He arrives on Saturdays, when things are manageable. When Dad is usually lucid. When Mom can pretend everything is under control. James hugs Mom like she's made of glass, and she lights up—actually lights up—in a way Alice hasn't seen in months.
"James! You look thin, are you eating enough?" Mom says, already moving toward the kitchen. "Let me make you something. Your favorite—"
"Mom, I'm fine, really—"
But she's already pulling out ingredients. Alice watches from where she's standing, still in yesterday's clothes because she didn't have time to change. Her stomach feels hollow. Concave.
Mom piles food on James's plate. Real food. The fresh rice. The special cookies she's been rationing. Alice's jaw tightens. She can feel it happening in her face—the muscle working, working—and she has to look away.
James doesn't notice. He's talking about work, about his week, and Mom is hanging on every word like he's been gone for years instead of a week.
This morning, Alice was helping Dad get dressed. His hands were confused, fumbling with buttons. She was patient. She was always patient.
"You're doing it wrong," he snapped. "Where's Alice? Get Alice."
She stood there, his shirt half-buttoned, and something in her chest just... stopped.
"I'm here, Dad. I'm Alice."
He looked at her—through her—and his face went blank. "No. Where's my daughter? Get her."
She finished the buttons. Her fingers moved. Her body kept going. That's what bodies do.
When James arrived, Dad tried. Alice watched him try—reaching for James's name, almost getting there, the effort visible in his face. With James, he was a father. With Alice, he was just confused and irritated. Orders. Complaints. She's the one who knows where things are. She's the one who is supposed to fix it.
She's the one who's still not doing it right.
They end up at Happy Coffee because Alice needs to sit somewhere that isn't home. James comes with her. She feels like she ought to be grateful, but it makes everything harder. They used to talk about everything. Now they sit in the same space and can't find words that don't carry the weight of all the unsaid things.
James stares into his tea. Alice stares at the table.
"We'll get through this," James says.
Alice nods. If she opens her mouth, she'll say something she can't take back. She'll say: You don't know. You come for an hour and you think you know. She'll say: I haven't eaten since yesterday and Mom just gave you all the fresh rice. She'll say things that will break what's left of the fragile connection between them.
So she doesn't speak. She just nods.
Mrs. Tanaka approaches with something wrapped in cloth—a furoshiki printed with an intricate pattern of waves and birds. Inside are delicate Japanese cookies.
"We didn't order this," James says.
"No," Mrs. Tanaka replies, setting it down in front of Alice. "This is for you."
She sits with them, uninvited but somehow exactly needed.
"My parents were in the camps," Mrs. Tanaka says quietly. "When they came back, everything was gone. The shop. The house. Everything. My mother—she took in sewing. Piecework, working late into the night. Her fingers would bleed. She gave up meals so my brother and I could eat. She gave up sleep, gave up her health, gave up everything to keep us going. My father got credit for rebuilding. My brother got praised for doing well in school. She just... kept sewing."
She touches the furoshiki gently. "This pattern was one of the few things we kept through those years. My mother wrapped our lunches in it. My father looked at it when things felt impossible. It reminded them that no matter how hard things got, they had each other. They had strength they didn't know they had."
She looks directly at Alice. "But my mother—she needed to know that her work mattered. That someone saw her. That the invisible things she gave up weren't invisible to everyone."
Mrs. Tanaka stands, smoothing the cloth. "The pattern is called nami-chidori. The birds fly through the waves, through the storms. They don't fly alone. They fly together. And they always make it through. But the birds that fly lowest, closest to the water—they're the ones holding everyone up. Without them, the others would drown."
Something breaks open in Alice's chest. The tears come fast, surprising her—not polite tears, but the kind that come from somewhere so deep she didn't know it was there. Four months of putting aside her needs to take care of her family, but still the one not doing enough. Four months of invisible labor and impossible choices. Four months of her body moving through it all while her hands shake and her stomach stays hollow.
James is quiet for a long moment. Then he reaches across the table and takes her hand.
"I didn't know," he says, and his voice cracks. "I didn't see. Alice, I'm so sorry. I didn't see."
It's not enough to fix everything. But it's a start. Someone finally seeing her. A hand reaching out to keep her from drowning.
