It might have been Alaska sometimes it was Seoul or Manila. He would be visiting again from some faraway place where the ships on which he worked had taken him. There would be a meeting point somewhere outside a dockyard or in a parking lot near a pier. I remember the salty air coming across San Francisco Bay, the endless cables of the suspension bridges in the heat. Moments later, we would be racing down the highway with the windows rolled down. My mother would put on some makeup and fish out a pair of earrings from a tangle in the basket next to the bathroom sink.

I slept in a twin bed in the living room, and I would start jumping on it, seeing if I could reach the ceiling of our mobile home with my tiny fingers.

She would put down the receiver and look up at me. She would put out her cigarette, grab a sheet of paper and scribble down the address. Her eyes, just starting to show their wrinkles in those days, would fill with the memories that she shared with this man. I remember his voice on the other end of the line, muffled in the receiver against her ear. Somehow it was always my mother who answered the phone when he called. To hear more audio stories from publications like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.