Page 24

From the diary of Monica Tsai, backed up on three servers spanning two continents

November 5, 2018 (2018-11-05T21:58:12.

218777)

loc: Cambridge, Massachusetts.

United States of America (42.

3721865,71.

1117091)

There’s been some good news on the work front lately.

Apparently, Prof.

Logan spent fall break presenting EMbrS to potential

investors, the first step in turning it from a research project into something bigger.

I watched his pitch a few times—him onstage with a headset, large banners of the name of the conference in the background.

He wore a T-shirt with the EMbrS logo (a doodle I made of a fire with sparkling eyes and jazz hands) and emphasized his words

in the way startup founders do, all passion and drama.

Behind him were his slides, and suddenly the picture of Louise and

Meng—Louise beaming, Meng squinting at the camera—blown up for thousands to see.

He went on to explain how grandmother was looking for her cousin, how they were separated during the Chinese Civil War, and were now over ninety years old and had lost contact.

His performance was a more elaborate version of what I sent him—and at times, completely made up.

He talked about me, an engineer on his team who journaled about her grandmother’s wish in EMbrS, and how EMbrS connected me via this photo.

Then he showed my visualization of the data, the connections and algorithms that took place to make this happen.

He did not include a conclusion, only the implied reunion.

“This program isn’t just about sparking lost connections,” he said, his voice deep with emotion.

“It’s about sharing enough

of ourselves to form true, real connections. Never in the history of the world has there been as much information freely shared

as there is now. Let us use it to spark connections in every part of our lives.”

He flipped to the last slide.

It was a picture of me and grandmother on her ninetieth birthday next to a tray of roast beef

sandwiches.

I had sent it to Prof.

Logan along with the other EMbrS-related assets.

I had never imagined he would end with

it.

The room erupted in thunderous applause.

Now there were some big-name investors who wanted to pour money into EMbrS.

He called me that night.

“Monica,” he said warmly.

“The one who ignited EMbrS to life.”

“That’s you,” I corrected.

“EMbrS was always your idea.”

“Yes, but you were the one who successfully used it. You were the one who saw what it could do, even when it was a bunch of

bash scripts cobbled together. You made it work, and that story about your grandmother resonated , let me tell you.”

“I didn’t actually use EMbrS as a journal though,” I said, afraid I had somehow misled him.

“I manually looked through its

data.”

“Well, it’s the same thing, right?” he said breezily.

“A proof of concept, with some manual processes, which EMbrS now automates.

If you had journaled and EMbrS had been ready at the time, it would have turned up the same thing.”

I agreed reluctantly and asked about the interested investors.

“They’re all across the spectrum,” he said vaguely.

There was a faint background noise on his end, the sounds of a conference party in full swing.

“But I need to know more. Your grandmother’s story has piqued the interest of these investors. Not only the investors, it’s also just a good story. People want to know what happened afterward.”

“Afterward?”

“After they reconnected. In other words, how does their story end? We’re humans, after all. Our lives are defined by stories,

even if they’re retroactively formed. People are invested in this now and want to hear a happy ending.”

“I want a happy ending for their story, too.”

“Of course. We all do. We’re all involved now. So if there are any updates to their interactions, will you let me know? All

of us would be thrilled, to celebrate this connection born from EMbrS.”

“Sure,” I said, strangely touched.

“And how about that other connection? Have you been in touch with the girl you met through EMbrS? The one in New Jersey?”

I thought about her weekend in Cambridge, the late-night mahjong, our story reframing by the river, how my heart ached as

I watched her train leave.

How she had read grandmother’s all-too-revealing text message and seemed happy, thrilled even.

Except now our messages had gone back to what they used to be—simple updates about our days.

I wanted to see her again but

couldn’t think of a good excuse to ask her.

I must have paused for too long because he suddenly laughed.

“Oh, is it like that?”

“N—no,” I said quickly.

“I mean, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Yes, we’ve kept in touch, but—”

His gentle laugh interrupted.

“Sometimes I forget how young you are. It’s refreshing, it really is. I’m glad you two have connected. Now, there’s something

I need to tell you.” His voice changed from wistful to serious.

“We have gotten more interest than you can imagine. I am probably

going to leave teaching to pursue this full-time.”

“Oh,” I said, too surprised to say anything else.

“Come with me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Come be one of the first engineers of EMbrS the company. I’ll hire more experienced engineers too, of course. But you’ve

got such potential and you already know the problem space so well. And you have a personal connection to it. I’d pay you a

full-time salary with benefits and all of that. Equity, too, and as an early engineer, that could be a huge amount of money

down the line. You can continue working remotely and be with your family, of course.”

“So I would drop out of school?” I asked, the idea nearly unfathomable.

“I know you are a good student. But this is another option. You know those stories about college kids dropping out of school

and becoming billionaires before they’re even thirty? This might be one of those opportunities.”

I could not think of anything to say.

“Think about it,” he said gently.

“You can always return to school. But I don’t know where EMbrS as a product or a company

will be by the time you graduate. And this way you won’t have to pay college tuition. You’d just be making money. Anyway,

I don’t mean to pressure you. Take some time.”

I’ve been seriously considering it.

It’s the logical decision, right?

To ease the burden on my family—no more tuition fees,

and I can stay working from home as grandmother’s illness progresses, and potentially make a lot of money.

The only downside

would be not finishing college, though a lot of computer science students drop out these days, and they are still super successful.

I never pictured myself as that kind of person—I’ve always stuck with the road map.

But I haven’t been on any road for a while

now.

At least that was what I was thinking before I told Louise about it.

I even sent her Prof.

Logan’s pitch.

so you wouldnt go back to school?

I guess not

but dont you like school?

I did.

but this way I can stay with my grandparents and help them out more

I mean, I can’t say much since im still in college too.

but you know how everyone says its the best time of their life?

would

you want to give that up?

Suddenly, I was annoyed.

in an ideal world, no.

but not all of us are so fortunate to be able to spend four years away from family

I thought she would apologize.

She was usually so good about realizing her mistakes and correcting them, always ensuring she

wasn’t hurting anyone.

Instead, she replied:

okay, but working on EMbrS?

is that really what you want to do?

The angle surprised me.

why wouldn’t I?

because its kind of a creepy application, dont you think?

That hurt more than anything else she had said.

She followed up.

I watched your professor’s pitch.

it’s cool, of course, but how much data is it collecting without anyone knowing?

I certainly

didn’t know when I uploaded that picture of me and Meng that it would alert you.

I mean, im glad it did.

but you couldve been

anyone.

it just seems like it can be taken advantage of too easily

I avoided my phone after that.

It was cowardly, yes, but I needed to retreat.

Because, to tell the truth, I had not only been

seriously considering the offer, I had been excited about it.

So much of this year has been out of my control—grandmother’s

health, Louise’s responses—while EMbrS has been a steady presence.

I am proud of my coding work.

My former classmates will

eventually have a degree as proof of how they spent their semester, a shiny bullet point on their résumés.

I had EMbrS, the

various commits to the codebase, a proud log of look: this is what I was able to do even as my world fell apart .

And for it to become an actual product spread to more users, for other people to connect in our increasingly disconnected

world—I had been really excited about that.

Louise’s questions pricked.

It wasn’t my job to understand how the terms of service worked, or who the consumers were, or

how unscrupulous actors might take advantage of EMbrS.

I was an engineer trying to make money to support my grandparents.

Who knows how long grandmother’s illness will last, how long we can hold out with only me and grandfather as her caretakers,

how long until I’m the caretaker for them both?

All of these questions are making me confront a separate, though equally uncomfortable, truth: If I really believe in EMbrS and radical sharing, it can only be a good thing to know more about grandmother, right?

I should be able to tell her what I know, and we should be closer for it.

I should want to learn everything about her in the time we have left.

I should stop cowering and beg her to teach me to Reforge.

Armed with this resolve, I went to find her.

She was writing at the kitchen table.

I sat next to her and peered over her shoulder.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

The paper was lined with her Chinese characters.

The computer makes characters very boxlike, but

her handwriting has always been beautiful to me, flowing and precise, even if I can’t read it.

Her pencil was dark; the wood somehow still shone after all these years.

The tip appeared recently sharpened.

Grandmother

hand-sharpens her pencils, even now, even after I bought her an electric sharpener.

The pencil heart drew my eye.

Maybe there

really was something in me that was organically drawn to it.

Grandmother noticed me staring at the pencil.

She waited for me to answer her question.

She was very aware of herself today.

Those days are getting fewer and fewer.

Grandfather had gone out to meet with a former student.

There would not be many more

opportunities like this one, where it was just me and her and she was fully present.

I took a breath and recited all the facts I knew.

“I know you lived in California and that your house burned down. I know pencils burned with it. I know the house was owned

by a Taiwanese official. I know they were running a large surveillance network at the time.”

The pencil betrayed the trembling of her hand.

I told myself it was due to her age, not from any reaction my words might have

caused.

She would tell me I was misguided, to go to my room and stop with the wild theories.

Instead, she whispered:

“Did I tell you that?”

The words crushed me.

Both because of the implied admission and because she genuinely could not remember.

She did not know

what I knew about her or what she had told me, if anything.

“I found out from EMbrS,” I said, trying to steady my voice.

“My research project.”

“Is it a spying tool?”

“No! No, it’s a journaling tool. It’s what helped us find Meng, remember?”

She shook her head.

I took another breath.

“And I want to learn how to Reforge,” I said.

“Please teach me. I was scared to learn before. But I want to understand you.”

“Even now?” she asked, voice weaker than I had ever heard it.

“Yes,” I said firmly.

“I want to understand you as you understand yourself.”

“Even if you may not like what you learn?”

I did not trust myself to convey certainty, not when I was wondering if I could pretend this conversation had never happened.

I nodded.

I helped her stand.

She took me to her room, to her bedside table.

From the drawer, she retrieved a familiar pencil.

The first

thing Louise had given me.

“I’d like you to Reforge this,” she said.

“Me? But it’s for you. We had a deal.”

“I can’t,” she said simply.

There was no sadness to her voice.

It was a statement of fact.

“But what if I mess up?” I asked.

“I’ll teach you properly first. You seem distraught, maybe even lost. But I think you will find you are very much like your

great-aunt.”

“Really?” I took the pencil from her.

“Yes. And she did what I couldn’t do.”

“What was that?”

“You’ll discover for yourself.”

I couldn’t help but feel she had somehow swindled me yet again.

The interaction left me drained, though also hopeful.

Maybe my questions will soon be answered.

It was enough to make me forget about the argument with Louise.

When I returned to my room, I unsuspectingly picked up my phone, only to find a series of missed calls.

I called her back.

“I’m sorry,” she answered immediately.

“I really shouldn’t have insulted your work like that.”

That was much more like the Louise I knew.

I could not blissfully accept her apology, not without acknowledging the ways she

had been right.

“I’m sorry too,” I said.

“I had a lot to think about. And you made some good points that I didn’t want to consider. Not right

now.”

“I was jealous, to be honest.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I told my parents earlier today that I was changing majors and what I was going to do instead.”

“Did they not take it well?”

“Not at all. They kept asking what I was going to do for money and if stories could pay, which of course I couldn’t say yes

to, and we had a huge spat while my doctor brother watched gleefully from the corner.”

I winced.

“You’re not going to let that change your mind though, right?”

She paused.

“No. Not right now. I’m still hoping I get that grant. It’s kind of a big deal. I think if I had that, they might take me

seriously. Or maybe one day I’ll end up crawling back to them because I really don’t have any money.” She gave a weak laugh.

“It stinks that everything revolves around money. But hey, at least one of us will have it.”

“I don’t know if I’ll actually sign on to the job,” I said.

“I need to think about it.”

“Oh.” She sounded relieved.

“Well, good to know we are both at a crossroads, then.”

I smiled.

“It’s not so bad with the right companion.”

“Will you still say that when your companion is poor and unemployed?”

“Then I’ll protect her even more fiercely.”

She laughed.

“I’m so relieved you called me back. I was really worried. I think—” She cut herself off.

“Hm?”

“Ah, nothing. Look at us. We’ve survived the first fight of our relationship! We should get ice cream.”

What was our relationship even?

What did she think it was?

Did she count the number of fights she got into with all her friends?

Or was that for romantic relationships only?

I was more confused than ever.

“Come visit again, and I’ll buy you ice cream,” I nevertheless agreed.

“And maybe I’ll show you something else too.”

“Oh?” Her tone was impossible to decipher.

“Something you’ll really love.”

“There... are a few things you could show me that I would really love.”

The back of my neck tingled.

The pause was unusual for her.

Normally I was the one stuttering.

Was it possible that I could

have a similar effect on her?

“If my train had been a few minutes later,” she continued, “would you have shown me then?”

“No,” I said.

“It’s not something that I’ve learned yet.” I could not just brush off the suggestion in her question.

“But

I do wish your train had been a bit later.”

“I do too. But tell me what you are learning.”

“Magic,” I said.

“Really?” There was true awe in her voice.

“Your grandmother is going to teach you?”

“Yes, starting tomorrow. I—I don’t know. I’ve been wary of it. But I think you were right. That I would regret not learning. I’m so confused about so many things lately, and grandmother says Meng’s pencil might help me sort my thoughts.”

“Meng is very wise,” she said earnestly.

“I mean, her accent is strong, so I could only understand every other word she said.

But every other word was a banger, so I imagine she’s twice as wise as I think.”

“I am excited to hear from her. But I don’t know how it works. Will I hear her words in her accent and not be able to understand?

Or will I only receive the written words and be able to understand even less?”

“I’m sure that’s what your grandmother will teach you. Damn. Wow. Please tell me all about it. If you’re allowed. I don’t

know what secrets there are around magic and all that.”

“I will,” I promised.

“I’ll tell you everything.”

She had to leave for practice.

I rewatched Prof.

Logan’s EMbrS pitch, the picture of Louise and Meng flashing on his PowerPoint

in front of thousands of people, followed shortly by the one of me and grandmother.

I scrubbed back to the picture of Louise

and Meng, focusing on Meng this time.

She looked old and stern, like grandmother, really.

She would have blended into any crowd in Asia.

I’ve spent so long looking

for her, and even now it feels like I’ve been circling around her.

What did she do that grandmother apparently couldn’t?

What

does grandmother want me to learn from her?

And what will I learn about grandmother in the process?

I’m dreading it all.