You’re in your childhood home. It’s 2008 and you’re listening to your neighbor’s pot-bellied pug march up and down the wooden deck tiles of Middle America’s newly loaned-out, renovated patio flooring.

It’s Sunday, and your dad’s new work friend Todd is over, so you hear “Bush” at least three times in one sentence and you think it’s funny that dads have to pretend that they don’t love the park as much as kids do.

Your mom calls out from the kitchen and you can tell she’s pissed at your dad again because of the way she says his name fully and how the second syllable of his name comes out breathier and angrier than the first and pitches upward as if she’s about to ask him a question. She’s not going to ask him a question, though.

You stretch your legs really good under the patio table because they’ve been hurting you, mostly at night, and go inside to see what’s happening in the kitchen. You have all sorts of new fears lately.

This time, the fear is that your mom might have a finger lodged in the mouth of the garbage disposal. Or that her heart is seizing because she’s been pan-frying gözleme for hours even though the air conditioning broke yesterday, and now she’s comatose, but your dad won’t be able to save her in time because he’s too busy talking about the park. And you didn’t help her in the kitchen, don’t forget that, so you’re not entirely blameless.

Why did she have to yell his name and not “Help?” Wouldn’t that have been more effective? Why is she so averse to receiving help?

Your mom is actually alive and in the kitchen and she does not acknowledge you. Maybe it is because you are taller now, two whole inches this summer, which is more than last summer, and your mom just wants to keep you scaled down and baby-like, sort of like your Polly Pockets. But you’re only getting bigger and maybe it’s making her sadder. Your mom’s costume jewelry is shimmering like calves of docks, but your attention is on her calloused hands writing, moving in a blur, as ink trails on her yellow legal notepad. It reads: Lasagna.

You might have had that for school lunch once. You sound it out: La. Sag. Nah.

Your mom calls out for your dad again, and this time, both of the syllables in his name are very much aligned with each other on how angry they are, so your dad definitely has to come inside now.

Her English is not bad, but she has a noticeable accent. You wonder if Todd notices her accent. Of course he does. You wonder if he’ll laugh about it with his wife later, if he has one (if so, why isn’t she here?), and then decide not to continue the friendship with your dad because it’s embarrassing or something.

Your mom takes a deep breath, like she’s about to yell again—at first, you’re worried it’s her heart about to seize— and you try to stop her because she’s already yelled twice, so three times will just make Todd go home. Even though you don’t care about Todd, you don’t want your dad to be upset by this because your dad doesn’t have many friends and that must make him sad sometimes.

You try to picture your dad at your height, going down slides at the playground and chasing dogs and learning about multiplication. You think of your mom as a bride, leaving her family behind. You picture the softness of the tip of her nose, her dark brows and red palms pressed to the glass of the cab. She’s staring at the tar steaming after rain, watching as her mom grows further and further, until she is just a dry outline. Then, just light. Then, just a memory pressed behind her eyelids.

Your mom calls out for them again, and it’s nicer this time. It’s less of a yell than a loud-pitched proclamation, but you know she’s shrouding the upset with something fake sweet and inconceivable because Todd is over (there is an unspoken rule about guests), and she will reserve her anger for tonight. Why do you feel tense when guests come over to your house? You’ll make sense of this when you’re older, and you’ll also understand why your mom was so angry back then, and it will make you very sad.

Time for coffee, is what she says.

Your mom has a headache, so she does not join you, your dad, and Todd in the backyard. She tells you to inform them, when they come inside, that there are sweets on the counter. You look at the counter.

There’s a bowl of ripe tiger figs and pistachio baklava and roasted chickpeas and syrupy cakes. You think about following your mom to the bedroom, in case it’s a brain aneurysm and not a headache. How do you know which is which?

If you sit on the foot of her bed, you can monitor her breathing while she’s asleep. But she shouldn’t be sleeping, right? You saw something in a movie once about how you can’t sleep when your head is injured, or else you’ll die.

You decide to stay downstairs and pray to God, or whatever is meandering up in the sky, for your mom to stay alive. Your thoughts are cleaved neatly in half—half of them are with your dad and Todd on the patio, a little more than half are with your mom and her brain.

They’re still talking about the park and saying a lot of names of people you don’t know. You try to make sense of their abstract words and think about how one day, you’ll be big too, and know all kinds of abstract words of your own.

The steam of blackened semolina cakes rises like mirages, waving over their coffee-glossed lips. You’re nine and not really allowed to drink coffee, but your dad gives you some anyway. A spoonful of tarry liquid you always dreamed was sweet like fairy floss tastes like bark and wood-smoke and leaves a grainy film on your tongue.

Their marble eyes around the patio table watch for a reaction, so you pretend it’s nothingness. You’re very cool, even, and shrug with a smile—watching, waiting, making sure that Todd approves. He does. He laughs and pats your dad on the back. You feel good. You know your dad doesn’t have friends; he is lonely and misses his mom and is spiraling deep into human depravity. You’re nine but you’re no stranger to the dark of your dad’s forehead, growing darker when he sinks into evening news, gridlock, or birthday parties.

Your dad usually falls asleep on the couch after de-veining oranges all night. A porcelain plate rests on his belly, piled high with its spongy, porous tissue. You always cover him with a thin blanket and worry that something will happen to him in the silence of the night.

You wonder if Todd will stay late to peel oranges and watch Turkish politics on the TV with your dad tonight, but he finishes his coffee and says he should get home to the wife and kids. You think it’s interesting how adults don’t have names anymore. But your teachers and the school nurse and the principal all have names and they use them every day, so do adults only go nameless when they have kids?

You don’t think you want kids, though you know it’s very early to think about that, but the thought of being pregnant is very scary. Disgusting, even. You still like to swaddle your stuffed lamb in a baby blanket and sway it back and forth, back and forth, to sleep. And that’s technically a baby, so maybe you’ll just grow up and have a lot of lambs.

It’s the end of August, but you’re not entirely sure, because your childhood is a place without clocks, and days are only guided by the sun’s movements.

You’re only nine, but overnight it will explode into thirty, and you will long for a place that does not exist anymore, but you’ll eat oranges and think of your dad.