Chapter 3

After the promotion to deputy supervisor, Frieda's paycheck went up a notch, but so did her troubles, twice over.

The thing that gave her the worst headaches was money.

That day she had just paid this month's three-thousand-dollar mortgage when a text came in from the property office demanding the water, electricity, and gas bills. Together it added up to nearly a thousand more. She stared at the balance shrinking fast in her banking app and felt a wave of frustration.

Her husband had fallen ill and died a few years back, and it hadn't just wiped out every cent of the family's savings, it had left them with debts on top of that.

These past two years she had carried it all on her own. Her daughter's living expenses at college, the household costs, and the mortgage every month sat on her like three mountains, and she could barely breathe under them.

That was also why she was so hard on Jeffrey. She'd had her fill of what it meant to have no money, and she didn't want her daughter walking that same road.

That evening Louisa came home, which was rare, but she was in a low mood.

"Mom, can you give me an extra five hundred for next month's living money?" She sat at the table picking at the rice in her bowl, head down.

"More money? You already went through the two thousand from last month?" Frieda's brow knit at once.

"There've been a lot of club activities lately, and classmates' birthdays, and... it's just not enough, okay."

Frieda set down her chopsticks and looked straight at her. "Is it for yourself, or for Jeffrey?"

The color drained from Louisa's face in an instant, and her head shot up. "What's that supposed to mean? You think I'm taking your money to keep a man?"

"I never said that." Frieda's tone was flat. "But let me remind you, a girl needs some self-respect.

"You're not even married. Don't go throwing yourself at him. He got rid of you with one box of oranges, and here you are eagerly handing him money to spend. How do you think that looks if word gets out?"

"Frieda! You've gone too far!" Louisa shot to her feet, chest heaving. "Money, money, money, is there anything in your head besides money? Jeffrey doesn't have money, but he's good to me!

"He'll run across half the town in the middle of the night to buy me the late-night snack I'm craving, he'll stay up the whole night looking after me when I'm sick! And you? Besides measuring him by money, have you ever once cared about anything to do with me?"

"It's because I'm good to you that I don't want you taking the wrong road!"

Frieda's temper flared too. "He buys you late-night snacks in the middle of the night, is he going to do that for a lifetime? When you can't make rent someday, when you can't afford formula for a baby, let's see if he's still buying then!"

"You're impossible!"

Louisa slammed her bowl down and stormed into her room again, shutting the door hard.

In the kitchen only Frieda was left, facing a table of food slowly going cold.

She picked up her phone and, out of habit, opened her feed to see what her daughter had posted.

The latest one was from ten minutes ago. No words, just a single picture.

It was a screenshot of a chat.

On the other side of the message thread was Jeffrey, saved under the name "my sunshine."

Jeffrey: "Louisa, your mom... is she still not okay with it?"

Jeffrey: "Don't fight with your mom, she wants what's best for you too. It's my fault, I couldn't measure up in her eyes."

Jeffrey: "My bonus this month was three thousand, I'll send you two thousand. Get yourself something good to eat, and stop always asking your mom for money, she has it hard enough on her own."

Below it was a screenshot of a two-thousand-dollar transfer.

Frieda looked at that screenshot, and a tangle of feelings rose in her.

This poor boy she had always looked down on had quietly been doing all this for her daughter behind the scenes.

And her own daughter would rather show off her love on her feed than tell her one honest word.

Something pressed down inside her that she couldn't name, like a wad of cotton stuffed in her chest. She switched off the phone, looked at the food on the table, and had no appetite at all.