Chapter 3

Mom stood there sobbing, nose running, tears streaming.

If she and I were like any ordinary brother and sister.

If we were like other people's children.

By now I'd probably be crying my eyes out too, wouldn't I?

But there wasn't a shred of pity in me.

I looked at her coldly.

"What does his being paralyzed have to do with me?"

She wailed at me.

"You wretched girl, how can you be so cold-blooded? He's your own brother!"

I gave a faint smile.

"So what if he's my brother?"

"His whole life he's soaked up every bit of love in this house. Did anyone ever think of me?"

"Now that you need to carve out my organs, suddenly you remember I exist?"

"Don't you find that laughable!"

Mom stared at me, unable to believe her ears.

"Prissy, when did you turn into someone like this?"

I shouted back at her.

"From the day you stripped me of my education for his sake!"

"You—" Her eyes went wide.

I laughed coldly.

"I know what you're about to say. That I'm a girl, that I'll marry off sooner or later, so what's the point of school? Right?"

"Well, since that's how you feel."

"Then his needing a new kidney has nothing to do with me either."

"After all, once I marry, I belong to another family."

"Until my future husband gives his permission, you have no right to touch my organs, and no right to order me around!"

"You—" Mom clutched her chest and jabbed a finger at me. "You, you're trying to make me drop dead?"

I shouted.

"That's exactly what I'm trying to do!"

Slap.

A hand cracked hard across my face.

I cupped my cheek and turned to look at my father.

He said icily.

"How dare you talk to your mother like that! Apologize!"

Bearing the burning sting on my face, I looked at him and asked.

"You hit me?"

Dad flared up.

"I didn't just hit you, I'll beat you black and blue!"

"It's my fault for going easy on you all these years, for not disciplining you properly, for spoiling you and indulging you too much."

"That's why you've got no respect left for your own parents!"

What an ironic thing to say.

Was he saying it in anger?

Or was this a joke?

I looked at him.

"How did you treat me all those years?"

"When you bought two drumsticks, you gave them both to my brother and didn't leave me so much as a scrap?"

"Or when my brother and I fought over a toy, and you took a feather duster to me?"

"Or how about cutting off my right to go to school so my brother could have more spending money than anyone else!"

"That's what you call spoiling me? Indulging me?"

"How do you even have the nerve to say it?"

"You, you—" Dad raised his hand again, ready to strike me.

I thrust my face right out at him.

"Hit me, go on, hit me!"

"You've always taken out every bit of your frustration on me anyway, my whole life."

Dad roared.

"That's a lie!"

I said.

"A lie?"

"When I was twelve, your boss chewed you out at the factory, so you came home, and all because I scored a ninety-eight on a test instead of a perfect score—"

"That was your excuse, and you took it out on me and slapped me hard, twice."

"And at that very moment, my brother was standing right there shaking, holding a test he'd scored eighty-nine on. Were you blind? Couldn't you see?"

Dad's eyes wavered for a moment.

"I did that because I wanted you to do better!"

"If you'd just tried a little harder, wouldn't you have gotten a perfect score?"

"You wanted me to do better?" It was as though I'd heard the biggest joke in the world.

"If you really wanted me to do better, if you really cared about my schooling, would you have ignored me? Would you have forced me to give it up?"

"You're a grown man past your prime, saying things like that. Don't you feel any shame?"