When I open my eyes, there’s still a single flickering candle left. I feel a flash of the old fear coming back to me. Does this mean my wish won’t be granted? I pull as much air as I can into my lungs, and exhale as hard as I can. The final flame goes out. The lights come back on. Poppy cuts the cake into thick slivers. Places them on paper plates and hands them out.
“So, how does it feel?” Lily asks, her arm around me.
“How does what feel?” I ask.
“Being another year older at an age when another year isn’t something to be afraid of.”
Archie approaches Lily. “You, my dear beautiful flower, are a mere thirty-four years old. You should hardly be afraid of another year.”
Lily pats her cheeks. “Everything is starting to sag. There are lines around my eyes. It’s all downhill from here.”
“Your vanity is your most charming flaw,” Archie says, taking her hand in his.
She pulls it away and slaps him in jest. “It’s myonlyflaw!” Everyone laughs. Lily turns to me again. I have a piece of cake in my hand now. A belly full of sweetness. “Ignore my vanity, child. But heed my advice and appreciate your youth. With every year that passes, time speeds up on you. The days, weeks, months, and years go by faster and faster.”
“It’s true,” Azalea says. “Scientists are researching why. They think it’s because the young brain takes in information faster. Learns more. Which makes timeappearlonger. More meaningful.”
“But surely time is time,” Poppy says. “A minute is the same minute whether it passes for an aging woman like me or a young soul like Maud.”
“All time is not equal,” Lily says with certainty. She takes a piece of cake but doesn’t touch it yet. “Think of the most beautiful moments of your life. Archie, think of the moment you broke free from your family. Azalea, think of when we saved up enough money to fly to Casablanca and become the women we knew we were. Oliver, think of that moment in the library, when you first laid eyes on Bram. Surely, these are the minutes we all replay in ourminds millions of times. Which makes that single life-changing minute more valuable than a million dull minutes.”
Azalea nods. “What you’re saying is that all that matters is our perception of unknowable things like time, space, love, pride. These thingsfeelunstable becauseweare unstable creatures.”
“Unstable and vain,” Lily cracks. Everyone laughs. “The sad truth behind my charming vanity...” Lily throws her gaze toward Archie. “...is that I don’tfeelold. My body is aging faster than my soul. Maybe every soul is eternally young.”
“Absolutely not,” Archie blurts out. “I assure you that my parents do not have eternally young souls. Perhaps you do because you’re curious; you’re open to new sounds and ideas and experiences. But people like my parents have decidedly old souls.”
“That makes them sound very wise,” Maud observes.
“Then let me rephrase.” Archie thinks for a moment, then, “My parents have eternally decayed souls.”
“My point is this,” Lily says. “Souls don’t age. They can’t. Perhaps all of us have souls that are fixed at one age. Mine is eternally young. And Archie’s parents are eternally decayed.”
“I think I might be eternally middle-aged,” Azalea blurts out, and everyone laughs.
“I think I’m in an eternal midlife crisis,” Poppy cracks.
“Eternal life would be nice,” Charlie says. He’s still so young. He has no idea what wishing for immortality can lead to.
“No, it would not,” Lily says firmly. “Who wants to be some decrepit one-hundred-year-old anyway?”
“Eternal youth, then,” Poppy suggests.
Lily shrugs. “Doesn’t sound so great either. The only thing worth living for is discovery, isn’t it? Of the world... Of our selves... Once we know everything, once we’ve seen everything, what’s left?”
“This is why I hope to always be a little unsure of myself,” Bram declares, his eyes on me. I realize that Bram and I have not stopped looking at each other since this conversation about time and age began. “Because if I’m not, then life is over. The interesting part of it, at least. And I never want life to end. Not when it’s this beautiful.”
“Can Oliver open the gifts now?” Maud asks. “All this talk of getting old is freaking me out.”
“Gifts!” Bram squeals happily.
I tear open wrapping paper and fling it across the room. After six decades of solitude, it feels so extravagant to accept so many presents. A pair of Levi’s from Archie. A Claude McKay novel from Maud. It’s calledBanana Bottom, which inspires a round of hilariously dirty jokes about what a bottom might do with a banana. A Walkman from Azalea. Unbelievable that you can carry music with you now, in your pocket. You can score your own life like it’s a film. Azalea and Lily must have coordinated their gifts, because Lily gives me cassette tapes as well as records. All classical. Tchaikovsky. Chopin. Rachmaninoff. Schubert. All my favorites. I’ve embraced the new without discarding the old.
“I wanted to make sure we played your favorite music once in a while,” Lily says.
“Thank you. I’m so... touched.” I give Lily a meaningful hug. She’s not Mother. She never can be. But she isamother. And like Mother, she understands what music means to me. Not revolution, but salvation.
“Which one should I play?” Lily asks.
