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<<run Config.passages.nobr = true;>>
<<run Config.ui.stowBarInitially = true;>>
<<set $passages0 = ["tools", "sculpture", "recipes", "jewelry"]>>
<<set $passages = $passages0.shuffle()>><center>@@font-size:xx-large;Remembrance@@<br><br>
[[Start|intro1]]<br>
[[About]]
</center>This story was created by E. Joyce for the Single Choice Jam, in which the goal was to create an interactive story with only one branching point.<br><br>
<<return>><<linkappend "Your mother's ashes are going back to Earth, and you are going with them.">><br><br> It's been about a year since she died; the trip can only be made within a narrow window every 370 days or so, and your mother’s heart attack happened right after the last shuttle left. <<linkappend "Punctuality was never her strong suit.">><br><br>(This is the kind of joke you make in the privacy of your own head and then feel vaguely guilty about. There’s nothing at all funny about this situation, of course. [[But sometimes it helps to pretend that there is.|intro2]])<</linkappend>><</linkappend>><br><br>If you’re honest, the delay was kind of a relief. Handling the logistics of the trip would have been overwhelming when the grief was still raw (rawer, anyway). Even packing—which is what you’re currently doing—is something of a headache. Of course, it doesn’t help that you haven’t packed for a trip since you were six. The station just isn’t that big.<br><br>
The baggage limits for the Earth shuttle are strict, and you've already devoted most of your allotted mass and volume to necessities. But you have room for one small object. Maybe you should bring some sort of token for your mother. [[Something to leave in the niche your uncle has reserved for her urn.|intro3]]<<set _next to $passages.pop()>>
<<if visited() == 1>>Her father's people, you're vaguely aware, would leave pebbles on graves, and her mother's would burn incense—but the station doesn't have graves as such, and you've had little opportunity to spend time with your extended family. The traditions surrounding death are abstract to you. So you might as well make your own, right? Bring something sentimental, perhaps; something that seems to hold the most important parts of your relationship with your mother.<br><br><</if>>
You look around the room. Your eyes land on
<<switch _next>>
<<case "tools">>
[[a set of woodworking tools|tools1]].
<<case "sculpture">>
[[a small sculpture|sculpture1]].
<<case "jewelry">>
[[a box containing a necklace and earrings|jewelry1]].
<<case "recipes">>
[[a box of handwritten recipes|recipes1]].
<</switch>>Your mother gave this jewelry set to you for your sixteenth birthday. The pieces are strung with delicate little silver flowers inlaid with semi-precious stones. (Well, they’re silver in color, anyway. The metal is probably one that’s more abundant out here, but you weren’t really paying attention.) They don’t grow that many gemstones up here, so your mother probably paid a lot for this, or waited a long time, or pulled strings—or some combination of the above. <<link "It’s a shame she didn’t put that effort into getting you something you’d actually //like//." "jewelry2">><</link>>You’ve never been much for jewelry, or for flowers. When you were very young your mother used to dress you in floral prints often, but clothing on the station tends to be a bit more utilitarian—no sense wasting the limited textile production capacity on something a lot of people wouldn’t want to wear. When you look back at pictures from your earlier childhood, you feel kind of grateful for that.<br><br>
Anyway, at sixteen you were in a bit of a rebellious phase (a very tame one, but still), and when you opened the gift, you made no attempt to conceal your disappointment. You said “Thanks,” as flatly as possible; then you put the box on the table and started [[heading for the door|jewelry3]].You remember your mother looking not so much hurt as baffled. (But maybe that’s just you rewriting the past to make teenaged-you more justified.) “I thought you loved flowers,” she said.<br><br>
“No, Mom,” you said, “//you// love flowers.”<br><br>
Your father started to say something, but you didn’t stick around to listen, and instead headed off to your room feeling secure in having gotten the last word.<br><br>
It seemed like a cool one-liner to you at the time (well, you //were// sixteen), but a part of you still feels bad about not having faked a bit of enthusiasm. You don’t think you’ve ever worn the jewelry, but you’ve never been able to bring yourself to get rid of it, either. Maybe it would be fitting for your mother to have it, as a sort of peace offering. <<if $passages.length > 0>>Or maybe you just want an excuse to [[get it out of your quarters|intro3]].
<<else>>
Or maybe you just want an excuse to [[get it out of your quarters|decision]].
<</if>>This was an attempt by your mother to support you in your interests, once it became clear that you weren’t going to get over this art nonsense and take up something more useful, as she spent most of your childhood and early adolescence [[unsubtly hoping you would do|tools2]].(You can’t entirely blame her for taking that attitude to your interests; your lack of practical skills would be bad enough on Earth, but it’s worse on the station, where everyone has to justify their presence somehow. Currently you’re justifying yours by washing dishes in the nearest cafeteria, but you’re aware that you’re eminently replaceable. Sometimes you wonder whether you should leave and free up the resources for someone with a more versatile set of skills, but then what would you do? You don’t even know anyone on Earth besides some relatives you’ve exchanged infrequent messages with.)<br><br>
This set of tools wasn’t a major gift, just something your mother found some print files for and got excited about. You never really found a good way to use them, considering that wood is in short supply around here and they’re not keen on giving it to random would-be artists to tinker with. You got your hands on some scraps now and then, but not enough to ever get good at or comfortable with the process. Mostly you stuck to your digital modeling. Occasionally you tried to use the tools to fix up pieces that didn’t come out of the printer quite right—[[without success, more often than not|tools3]].Nonetheless, you’ve kept the set for years, because the act of giving it to you felt like your mother’s first acknowledgment of //you//, as you actually were, not as she hoped you would turn out to be. It meant a lot to you.
<<if $passages.length > 0>>[[You hope it meant as much to her.|intro3]]
<<else>>
[[You hope it meant as much to her.|decision]]
<</if>>You made—that is, designed and 3D-printed—this little sculpture for an art class when you were seventeen. Thinking back, you’re a little surprised that your school even taught art, but legally speaking the station is part of the United States, and there’s probably some kind of obscure curriculum requirement that they were [[perfunctorily filling|sculpture2]].The sculpture is an abstract piece, a collection of intricately nested geometric shapes. The assignment had been to create a representation of what “home” meant to you. Many of your classmates from later waves turned in homesick paeans to Earth, but you’d been among the first—the original team scouted your mother for her work engineering crops that would grow in nutrient-poor soil. (She was immensely proud of this. When you were younger you were proud of it too.)<br><br>
So you weren’t like your classmates: you hardly remembered planetary life. Your world was plastic and metal and artificial angles; everything a community needs, densely packed into a [[carefully engineered shell|sculpture3]].When you brought the sculpture home, your mother just said it was “nice.” Non-representational art wasn’t really something she understood. But she was thrilled when your teacher (who was singlehandedly covering half the humanities subjects and doing her best) asked to submit your design to a nationwide competition for art by high school students. And she was even more thrilled when you were among the winners.<br><br>
Personally, you’ve never been convinced that this wasn’t due to the novelty value. Great publicity to announce that one of this year’s winning pieces came from the world’s first asteroid mining colony. [[But it made your mother so happy to see you excel.|sculpture4]]After that, this sculpture had pride of place in the family’s quarters for a while, and she was eager to tell anyone who came over all about it, which at the time made you want to sink into the floor, but in retrospect it’s kind of sweet.<br><br>
Of course, technically you don’t have to bring this one with you. You could just print off another copy at your uncle’s house. <<if $passages.length > 0>>But you think it would have meant something to your mother to [[have the original|intro3]].<<else>>
But you think it would have meant something to your mother to [[have the original|decision]].<</if>>You got these family recipes from your mother, who got them from her father, who got them from his mother, who apparently had an already-anachronistic penchant for writing things on paper. They're beautifully laid out in lovely handwriting, a fact you can appreciate even though the ink has gone brown and the paper yellow and brittle. The box itself is wooden and worn smooth from [[decades of handling|recipes2]].Your mother had all these recipes stored digitally long before your family moved here, but clearly she had a sentimental attachment to them. And even though you mostly used the digital copies in the kitchen, these pieces of paper still bring back memories of the times you two spent together there. She was so patient when she was teaching you how to cook—maybe because you were actually eager to learn on this topic, unlike many others.<br><br>
Some of these recipes you've never made, because they require ingredients you can't get here—the lack of honey, for example, puts most of the Rosh Hashanah desserts out of reach. But many of them rely on easily grown crops like potatoes and cabbages (all the more easily grown thanks to your mother's professional efforts), and these you learned [[at her side|recipes3]].By the time you were thirteen or so, you could make most of the recipes that could be made at all without looking at the instructions, and you remember the wave of pride you felt every time your mother complimented the outcome.
She might have preferred for you to keep the box rather than leaving it with her, but she did clearly love these recipes--<<if $passages.length > 0>>[[and they can hardly be handled anymore without disintegrating, anyway.|intro3]]<<else>>[[and they can hardly be touched anymore without disintegrating, anyway.|decision]]<</if>>It’s almost time to go. You’d better make your choice.<br><br>
[[Take the jewelry set.|jewelryend]]<br>
[[Take the woodworking tools.|toolsend]]<br>
[[Take the sculpture.|sculptureend]]<br>
[[Take the recipe box.|recipesend]]''Later, on Earth''<br><br>
The silence in the columbarium weighs heavily on you. Some stupid part of your brain feels like everyone is looking at you and wondering what you’re doing as you place the jewelry set next to the urn. But that’s not true, of course; everyone here is in their own private bubble of mourning.<br><br>
You don’t really believe in any kind of afterlife, but on the off chance that your mother is out there somewhere, you hope this makes her happy. In many ways, you weren’t the person she wanted you to be, but you did try. Some part of you will always be trying. You hope it would give her some satisfaction to know that.<br><br>
You’re crying now, but it’s something bitterer and more complex than the kind of grief you think you should be feeling. Your father clearly has no idea what to say, but he puts a hand on your shoulder, which is something.<br><br>
After some time—you have no idea how much—you manage to pull yourself together. You wipe your face on your sleeve. You, your father, and your uncle look at each other, wordlessly agreeing that you’re ready to go.<br><br>
You turn and walk out into the bright afternoon sun.''Later, on Earth''<br><br>
You feel a bit self-conscious as you place the tools next to the urn—they’re a somewhat odd item for this purpose, out of context. Luckily, neither your father nor your uncle asks any questions; you're not in the mood to explain.<br><br>
You hope your mother would have understood. Was the gesture of giving you the tools that significant to her? Well, it must have taken her some effort, some amount of contemplation, to decide to make it, after all those years of attempting to gently steer you away from your useless interests. And as much as you hated that she did that, maybe what matters is that she came around in the end, because she did love you.<br><br>
At that thought, something gives way inside of you, and before you can do anything to stop it, you’re in tears. Your father clearly has no idea what to say, but he puts a hand on your shoulder, which is something.<br><br>
After some time—you have no idea how much—you manage to pull yourself together. You wipe your face on your sleeve. You, your father, and your uncle look at each other, wordlessly agreeing that you’re ready to go.<br><br>
You turn and walk out into the bright afternoon sun.''Later, on Earth''<br><br>
You place the sculpture in the niche next to the urn and step back to consider it. It looks a bit odd here, but, well, you didn’t select it for aesthetic harmony. You don’t really believe in any kind of afterlife, but if your mother is out there somewhere, you hope it brings her as much joy here as it did in your family’s quarters.<br><br>
You and your mother didn’t always understand each other, and she didn’t always see the value in what you were spending your time on. (To be fair, you weren’t always sure how much value it had either.) But she was proud of you, sometimes. Maybe that’s enough.<br><br>
This thought brings up a tangle of emotions that you can’t quite unpick, and suddenly you find that you’re crying. Your father clearly has no idea what to say, but he puts a hand on your shoulder, which is something.<br><br>
After some time—you have no idea how much—you manage to pull yourself together. You wipe your face on your sleeve. You, your father, and your uncle look at each other, wordlessly agreeing that you’re ready to go.<br><br>
You turn and walk out into the bright afternoon sun.''Later, on Earth''<br><br>
You place the shabby, worn box of recipes next to the urn. It fits a little awkwardly into the niche, but it does fit.<br><br>
You hope your mother wouldn’t be disappointed to learn that you’re leaving these here—but while you might be leaving the physical copies behind, the recipes themselves will stay with you. And this does seem appropriate as a tribute. The two of you were never more connected than when you were together in the kitchen.<br><br>
The two of you didn’t always get along; your choices often surprised and disappointed her. But at least you had this. And at that thought you find yourself in tears.<br><br>
Your father clearly has no idea what to say, but he puts a hand on your shoulder, which is something.<br><br>
After some time—you have no idea how much—you manage to pull yourself together. You wipe your face on your sleeve. You, your father, and your uncle look at each other, wordlessly agreeing that you’re ready to go.<br><br>
You turn and walk out into the bright afternoon sun.