My mother cried.
She’d been crying every night for four months. And because her tears were my fault, my heart drowned with every salty droplet. The shame wasn’t new. Guilt wasn’t, either. But I hadn’t meant to do what I did. If I could rewind time and fix the catastrophe I caused, I would.
But I accepted my punishment: her disappointment in me, our removal from our home…I bowed beneath the penance because she needed me to suffer. She needed to know I felt the weight of my actions and accepted that I’d been the reason for everything.
And I did.
Crap, how I did.
“Okaasan…please.” Glancing around the dirty alley we’d stumbled upon three nights ago, I ensured we were alone before dropping to my haunches beside her. “I’ll make it right. I promise.”
She tore her body away as I placed my palm on her shoulder. Her rebuttal of my affection cut me but not as much as it had at the beginning.
Our first night on the streets had been the worst in my entire thirteen years. I missed my room, my cello, my comfortable, if not rich life. But it was all gone now. My brother was gone. My father. Our house.
The only thing I’d been able to save besides myself was my mother, who cursed the very ground I walked upon.
“How can you make it right? We have nothing! No one will take us in. We’re alone.” Her sobs crushed me deeper into the dirty concrete where I’d laid a few cabbage-stained cardboard boxes from the dumpster behind us.
“I’ll get a job. Someone will hire me. We’ll have a home again.” I swiped at a piece of torn newspaper as it blew down the wind tunnel that was our accommodation for the night.
New York was not a kind innkeeper to those who found sanctuary on her streets—especially in fall. The leaves had switched from green to rust, and it was only a matter of time before the frigid mornings became frost and snow.
I have to fix this before then.
My mother cried harder into the crook of her elbow. Her black hair glistened in the faint lights of the cheery apartments above us. Craning my neck, I looked up the sides of the buildings we sat between, watching shadows of people cooking dinner and laughing with loved ones.
My stomach growled, tearing through the silence with empty ferocity. We hadn’t found decent food since yesterday morning.
What I’d done…it was unforgivable.
Overwhelming hatred for myself swirled with humiliation, thicker and thicker as my mother sobbed beside me. Her pretty blouse and jeans were now grubby and tattered. Her closet full of patterned kimonos and my father’s freshly ironed suits turned to ash and rubble.
My fingers flew over the newspaper I’d snatched from the wind. Folding it into a square, I tore off the ragged ends and set about transforming the crumpled inked page into something better.
As my mother cried herself into a catatonic coma like she did every night, I sat silently, turning rubbish into origami. My fingers shook as I smoothed the petals of a blooming rose before slipping it gently into my mother’s balled hands.
Wrapping her in a hug, I vowed, “I will fix this. I don’t care that I’m too young to get a job. I’ll find money and a way to fix what I’ve done.”
My mother sucked in a shaky breath, not believing me but accepting my origami rose as a peace token. Her head rested on my shoulder as her tears slowly dried.
She didn’t speak, but she didn’t need to. Her doubt, disappointment, and despondency spoke loudly.
She didn’t believe me.
I didn’t believe me.
What could I do? A stupid boy trained in cello and origami?
As the moon crept over the sky and the temperature plummeted until our breaths became ghosts in the night and cardboard boxes became useless blankets, I stared at the talented hands that’d given me nothing but grief.
I’d been proud of my hands—of the skill they wielded. Now, I wanted nothing more than to cut them off.
But…
Wait.
Holding two palms and ten digits in the New York City gloom, a plan began to form.
I could strum a cord before I could run. I could curl the finest crease of paper before I could write. If I had such agility in my fingers…perhaps they could learn another trade?
A better trade?
One that would ensure our survival and drag us back to where we belonged.
I’d brought badness into our life. It was time to become bad to free ourselves from it. I wouldn’t be a useless brat who only thought of himself.
No.
I’d be a pickpocket.
A thief.
And I’d steal every damn thing from every damn person to ensure my family forgave me.
I shuddered as the memory finally let me go. Cold sweat drenched my spine.
When my life had changed, giving me food instead of starvation and tailored clothes instead of tatty dumpster rags, I’d thought I’d be forgiven. That I’d erase the shame I’d brought on our name and be welcomed back.