Lin Jiaying paused before she entered her grandmother’s room in the old wing of the house.  Making herself smile wasn’t easy these days, but she did it, because even though her grandmother couldn’t communicate in words anymore, she still responded to moods, facial expressions, and tones of voice.

“Good morning,” she said, once she fixed a sunny smile on her face, balancing the tray on one arm and pushing the door open with the other.  “It’s Jiaying, Grammie.  Hello, Auntie Hsu.”  She greeted the home healthcare worker who’d worked the night shift.  “How is Grandmother today?”

“Oh, she is very well,” the home nurse replied.  “Clean and dry, and in good spirits, I think.  I gave her all her morning medications and she’s ready for breakfast.” 

Her grandmother had the same needs as a baby these days, and that was breaking Lin Jiaying’s heart.  The woman with a wizened face and shrunken form now dressed in clean blue and white pajamas, was so different from the vibrant, lively person she had been before the strokes began.

“Isn’t the day nurse here yet?” Lin Jiaying glanced around the spacious room.

“No,” the middle-aged woman said, clasping her hands together. She was a quiet, plain woman, both reliable and good at her work. “And like I said yesterday, I have to leave.  I can’t stay any later, not today.  My son—.”

“And you shouldn’t have to.  Who’s on the schedule for today? —never mind.  It’s Fang Xiaoyi, isn’t it?”   Lin Jiaying crossed the room and put the breakfast tray down on the bedside table. 

Auntie Hsu nodded, looking worried.

“Again,” Lin Jiaying sighed.  “Don’t worry. You can go.  She’s never very late. I’ve talked to the agency about her, but they say they’re understaffed.”

“Thank you, Miss.  I’ll see you tonight.” The care worker collected her belongings and left the two alone together.

Lin Jiaying smiled at her grandmother.  “Time for breakfast, Grandma. Open up!”  She scooped up a spoonful of congee from the bowl and held it out to the elderly woman, who opened her mouth obediently. The bones of her face said that she had once been a striking woman, and the same bone structure, translated to the younger generation, said that one day her granddaughter would be, too.   

Right now, though, Lin Jiaying was still a work in progress. At seventeen, she was a little over medium height and had a medium build.  Her legs were nicely shaped, but her chest was smallish.  She had beautiful hair but so-so skin.  She was prone to breaking out in acne when stressed, and at this time in her life, there was plenty of stress. 

“Grandmother, this morning I have an exam, the last one.  They’ll let us go after that, so I and some of my friends are going to the park for a picnic,” she chatted as she gave her grandmother breakfast.  “I’ll make sure to bring back some sweets like you used to get for us.  You’ll like that, won’t you?   I should be home at the regular time, maybe a little early.”

These days, her grandmother often made nodding motions involuntarily, one of the sequelae from the strokes, but…maybe this time the nods were a response?   She felt a literal, physical pang in her chest at the thought.

Lin Jiaying wanted to think her grandmother was responding, hoped that somehow, her grandmother understood.  Then again, what would be worse—being trapped in a failing body, yet aware of what was going on, or being in a state where as long as your physical needs were met, everything else didn’t matter?  Her eyes stung.   Setting aside the empty bowl of congee, she switched to the yoghurt.  “I think Stepmother is going out to brunch with her friends today.  Little sister has beginner’s ballet after preschool…”

She continued her monologue while feeding her grandmother the yoghurt, then went to the bathroom and wetted a washcloth with warm water.  Returning to the bedside, Lin Jiaying washed her grandmother’s face, then carefully applied moisturizer and lip balm. 

“There, now you’re freshened up.” She kissed the withered old cheek she had just washed.  “Let’s get some sunlight in here.” 

Lin Jiaying crossed the room to draw the blinds.  The floor to ceiling windows revealed a deciduous forest in spring, where wildflowers had been allowed to naturalize.  Her grandmother and mother had planted them long before she was born.

“What’s this?” Lin Jiaying spotted something at the corner of the window.  It was a large black and yellow spider, a golden orb-weaver, with a body as long as her own outstretched hand.   It was not the first time one had found its way in, since living in the woods by the lake meant a lot of wildlife was around.  “Come to visit Grandma?”  Her grandmother had been a professional embroiderer, so renowned for her talents that she was considered a living cultural treasure.  She had often joked when she saw a spider, that they were colleagues. 

Another girl might have screamed on encountering such a huge spider, or squashed her, or run for a can of insect-killing chemicals.    Lin Jiaying instead picked up a magazine and coaxed the spider onto the glossy cover.  “I know it’s warm in here, but I don’t think you’ll find much to eat, Madame Weaver.”  She knew that only female golden orb weavers grew that large, and she knew the species was not especially aggressive.  Opening the sliding door, which was part of the window, she gently shook the spider outside.  “I hope you find lots of bugs and pests to eat!”  She closed the door and locked it.

At that moment, someone entered the bedroom.  “Sorry I’m late,” a young woman sang out.  “Traffic was terrible!” 

“Again?” Lin Jiaying couldn’t help it; the word popped out before her mind could stop it.

“Uh—yes,” the home healthcare worker froze in the middle of taking off her jacket.  “Would you rather I didn’t come at all?” Fang Xiaoyi was only a few years older than Lin Jiaying, and she was much brasher in personality than the quiet Auntie Hsu.  Brash also applied to her appearance; she had permed hair and was fond of big, flashy earrings. 

“I didn’t mean it like that. Of course, we want you here,” Lin Jiaying quickly apologized.  “I’m just worried about getting to school.”

“It should be cleared up by the time you leave,” Fang Xiaoyi replied. “Old lady’s had her breakfast already, I see.  Anything else I need to know?”

“She’s had her medications,” Lin Jiaying told her, gathering up the breakfast tray.  “Please take good care of her today.”

“I will, I will,” Fang Xiaoyi waved her out the door. 

The old part of the house, where her grandmother lived, was truly old, although it had been renovated and brought up to date in terms of wiring and plumbing.  The new part was actually about fifteen years old now, but it was such an impressive piece of modern architecture that it still looked cutting edge, all concrete, glass, and metal.  Since Lin Jiaying had grown up there, it was commonplace to her.   The main level was all one huge room, two stories high, except for the pantry kitchen, which was where the auntie cooked.  That was where Lin Jiaying dropped off the tray. 

Auntie Sun, the housekeeper, looked at the tray with its empty bowls, “Ah, Elder Madame always eats everything when you feed her.  You’re such a good granddaughter.”

“Not at all,” Lin Jiaying demurred politely.  There was something smarmy about Auntie Sun, nothing obvious, but enough that Lin Jiaying kept it rather cool between them.  “Did Weiwei eat breakfast yet?”

“No, I think your little sister is still getting dressed.”

Lin Jiaying nodded.  “I’ll hurry her along.”  Weiwei was probably still in her pajamas and playing with her toys.  Heading down the stairs to the bedroom levels (the new part of the house was built into the side of a cliff, so the garage was on top and the bedrooms at the bottom.) she passed the master bedroom suite, where her stepmother was going through the walk-in closet, and then reached the level where the children’s bedrooms were.  

Sure enough, Weiwei was in the playroom, surrounded by her toys, having her ponies rescue a dragon from princesses.   Fortunately, she was already clean and dressed.

“Time for breakfast,” she told her half-sister.   “Your ponies will wait for you until after school.”

“Okay, Sister,” the child agreed happily.  Weiwei was three years old and one of the delights of Lin Jiaying’s life.

The young woman crossed the playroom to her room, where she changed into her school uniform, adding a rose gold and pearl flower pendant on a chain as a nod to the season.  The pendant had been a gift from her grandmother, and she loved it.  As she finished getting ready, she turned to survey the room and frowned in thought.

Of course she had a bedroom and her own bathroom, but just an ordinary closet, nothing like the huge walk-in her stepmother enjoyed.  Theirs was a fairly well-to-do family, and although she was still a teenage girl, Lin Jiaying still had some nice things appropriate to her age.  Cashmere sweaters, silk dresses, trendy shoes, and accessories.  Nothing too high end, but definitely nicer than many girls her age.  The problem was, her closet, unlike her stepmother’s, didn’t have a lock.

Someone—Lin Jiaying didn’t know who—had a habit of going into her room and going through her things when she was in school.  Nothing went missing, at least not permanently, but her belongings were often rearranged.   Sometimes she could have sworn some of her clothes had been worn and put back, like when she found a sleeve that had been turned up in a cuff or a whiff of perfume on a scarf she hadn’t worn in months.

She asked Weiwei if she had borrowed her clothes to play dress-up, but her little sister had said no.  Lin Jiaying believed her.  She also asked the aunties if any of them had rearranged things when they hung up the dry-cleaning or collected her laundry from the hamper.  Neither the regular housekeeper nor the healthcare workers had admitted to it.

She didn’t have proof anyone was messing around.  However, that was going to change.  They had security cameras to monitor the outdoor areas, but nothing inside the house.    She eyed the closet, judged the distance between it, the dressing table, and the mirror, and took out a very small motion activated surveillance camera, one which would capture both sound and picture.  There was a hanging plant in about the right place.  That would do.  After she hid the camera, she opened her laptop and turned it on.  It had a camera built in.  It couldn’t hurt to have two recordings, right? 

Besides, if whoever it was noticed the laptop was recording, they probably would just shut it and not look any further.

Grabbing up her belongings, she went upstairs.  Her stepmother—or, rather, her late father’s widow— stopped her along the way.

Ren Minglan was somewhere between thirty and forty, and she worked extremely hard to keep looking that way.  She had married Lin Xinghe eight years ago, two years after the death of his first wife, Lin Jiaying’s mother.  From the start, the relationship between stepmother and stepdaughter had been…neutral. 

Ren Minglan had been happy to have Lin Jiaying’s grandmother keep on raising the girl, and when she bore her own daughter, happy that her mother-in-law was willing to oversee the care of Weiwei as well.  It was only after Lin Xinghe passed and then Grandmother had her strokes that Ren Minglan had stepped up her game.

“Ah, there you are. How is your grandmother today?” Ren Minglan inquired with a practiced look of concern, picking a bit of lint off her dress sleeve.  Her dress was quite beautiful and fitted her perfectly, but both the color and style were, in Lin Jiaying’s opinion, a little too youthful for her.  She also should not have been wearing pearlescent cosmetics any longer.  Rather than restoring a dewy glow to her skin, they were starting to enhance the signs of aging—and the signs of very discreet surgery.

“Quite well, thank you,” Lin Jiaying answered politely.

“Good.  You have an exam today, don’t you?”

“Yes,” she responded, “the last one.”

“Well, I know you’ll do your best. Your father would be proud.”

“Thank you, Mother.”  Lin Jiaying knew something stinging would come now, it always did.

“If you get in the top five for your grade, how about I take you shopping as a reward for your hard work? Or,” Ren Minglan’s eyes narrowed, “I know! I’ll make an appointment for you with my dermatologist!  Your complexion is looking rather disappointing lately.”

“Thank you, Mother.”  There was going to be more. There always was.  

“What happened to your little friend—the one whose family came back from America?  Mo Mufan.  You were so excited that he was coming back.”

“He’s fine.”  Lin Jiaying never volunteered information.

“I haven’t seen him around or heard you talking about him lately.  What happened?”

“Not much,” Lin Jiaying shrugged.  “It’s just that after five years, we don’t have much in common anymore.  That’s all.”

“What a shame! I suppose it’s only natural.  After all, a girl of seventeen is practically an adult, while a boy the same age is still quite immature.  Oh, well. Now, I’m going out for brunch with friends, so tell the driver to come back right away after dropping you and Weiwei off.”

“I will,” Lin Jiaying said, pretending she was a grey rock.  So grey, so featureless that there was nothing interesting about her.  She was almost an adult, almost a college student, and she could endure Ren Minglan just a few months longer.