I Came Home From Qatar and Found My Mother Locked in a Room—Then I Lifted Her Mattress and Found an Insurance File in My Name Dated Two Days in the Future

“What shirt I would wear.”

Pause.

“Where I’d put a chair if I ever had my own room again.”

She looked around her apartment.

“The chair is wrong, by the way.”

“Mom, you picked it.”

“I was recovering.”

I laughed.