Chapter 1

The summer after my college admissions exams, my parents realized I'd changed.

I'd become a complete egoist.

No more aching over how hard my mother's life was. No more helping my father pay off his gambling debts.

They tore my room apart looking for my savings, so I turned around and put something in their food.

While they were choking and gagging, trying to vomit it up, I brought out my bank card.

"Mom, Dad, the second you take this card, that was your last meal. Go on. Take it."

After that, nobody dared set foot in my room.

They thought they could threaten me with their own lives. They stood on the school roof and ordered me to drop out.

"Drop out, or we'll make you an orphan today!"

While they were still gloating, I stepped forward and knelt down.

"Please, Mom, Dad. Go ahead and die."

Only later did they understand.

My summer break had been spent at a correction center.

And there, I'd cured myself of any feeling for them.

......

The instructor handed me a graduation certificate.

I took it and left without a word.

For the rest of the summer, I went looking for another job to keep earning.

That money was all I had for my repeat year to retake the exams.

I didn't pick up a single one of my parents' calls.

The instructor had told me: anything that disturbs my own mood, I have every right to refuse.

I was an outstanding graduate. I kept that firmly in mind and carried it out without wavering.

I only went home when the summer was nearly over and school was about to start.

The house was the familiar wreck. My father lay on the floor, face bruised and swollen, groaning and moaning.

My mother sat off to the side cracking sunflower seeds and watching TV, not sparing him a single glance.

When he saw me, his eyes lit up.

"Good boy, how much did you make? Why weren't you answering the phone? Those debt collectors nearly beat me to death!"

He lunged at me, grabbing for the bag on my back.

I twisted aside and dodged.

"You gambled again?"

He grinned and rubbed his hands together.

"I was just trying to win it back and take some pressure off you. Luck wasn't on my side, that's all, so I owe a little more."

"Not much. Just ten grand."

At the electronics plant I stood from morning till night, ten hours a day, and made only two hundred a day.

I stood for twenty-eight days. My legs swelled up, and it came to just forty-six hundred.

But my father, breezy as anything, had run up ten thousand more.

I'd expected to break down, to scream at him the way you scream at someone hopeless, "Didn't you say you'd quit? Didn't you say you'd work and take care of this family?"

I touched my heart, beating steady.

Nothing.

I felt nothing at all.

As if the man in front of me wasn't worth one more glance.

In those twenty days and nights at the correction center, every hour the instructor set my parents' photos in front of me, playing sob stories in a synthesized voice.

The moment my heart so much as wavered, the instructor shocked me without hesitation. Even if I wet myself, he kept shocking me until I was immune to it, until I'd make the choice that served me best.

Every time I chose wrong, the instructor would put my exam scores up.

That column for English, the glaring zero. That was what came of choosing my parents.

And now I was home, right when it was time to test what I'd learned.

My father didn't care about my cold stare. His eyes kept darting toward my backpack.

"Dad won't ask for much. Give me five grand and I'll pay off the one that's hounding me hardest. Son, you can't stand to see them break your dad's hands, can you?"

He held out a pitiful, bruised hand.

Before, seeing him this pathetic, I'd never have been able to stop myself from handing over the money I'd worked for to cover his debts.

I was terrified they'd beat him to death, that then I'd have no father at all.

Blood, morality, pity, duty. They all dragged me down and pinned me fast in this swamp called home.

But now I only let out a mechanical sigh and said, in a flat, cold voice,

"The instructor said anyone who harms my interests is an enemy."

The first rule the correction center instructor taught me.

There's no need to go soft on an enemy.

"So how come they didn't break your hands?"

My eyes traveled over my father's hand, looking honestly regretful.

All he could do was gamble anyway. What did he need hands for.

He snatched his hand back fast, watching me, wary and unsure.

He hesitated.

"Trudy Fox, are you just worn out from working?"

My mother stopped cracking seeds and looked over too.

"You know I'm worn out, and you're still blocking my door?"

I shoved him aside and strode into my room.

Two months away, and the room had gathered plenty of dust.

I tossed my bag onto the chair and reported home to the instructor.

"Did you go soft?"

"No. He's just noise to me. If he's in debt, why not just die? Debts die with the man. What could be better."

"Good. Keep it up. Remember, take one step back and they'll take ten forward. You're my best student. Don't wreck my reputation."

The instructor's warning, I kept it in mind.

"Yes, instructor."