I knew Jiaming was the one when she sent me a picture of a dead bird. I asked what else she'd found, and she sent more photos: a constellation of bird footprints preserved in cement, a decomposed car buried in dirt, a pile of leaves crystalized in frost. I was drawn to the way she saw something worth remembering about these dead things. Unlike the stilted exchanges I had with people at home, school, or work, it was startlingly easy to connect with Jiaming.