Page 4 of Alice Chen's Reality Check

“I’ll, um, pay online.” I hear myself cut her off. “Thank you.” I hang up, my mind reeling. How am I going to pay this new bill next month? Where am I going to get the money? I can take on more shifts at the private tutoring center where I work for extra cash, but there’s only so many hours in the day. Maybe I can sell my eggs. I wonder if I could get away with selling goop in a jar on eBay if I said it was Henry Cavill’s spit.

I’m snapped out of my spiral by a honk behind me. I curse and focus on the road. I’ll take it day by day. Payment by payment. I can make the numbers work. I have to.

Ten minutes later, I’m in the grocery store with a basket in hand. As I pass by the snack aisle, I remember the little paper cylinder of haw flakes my mom used to buy me when I was a kid. I always wanted tosavor the fruity, coin-shaped candies, but I couldn’t seem to make a roll last beyond the car ride home. Part of me wants to take a detour down the aisle and throw some snacks into my basket—haw flakes, lychee jelly cups, sachima cakes, sesame egg rolls, and wasabi peas. But it’s a luxury I can’t indulge in.

Instead, I veer away, picking up fresh noodles and tofu and Chinese broccoli neatly swathed in plastic wrap over white Styrofoam trays. My mom claims that dark leafy greens can cure any illness, and the aunties in her Bible study agree, so it’s my daughterly duty to make sure she gets her fill.

On my list of priorities, getting my mom healthy is at the top. Figuring out how to pay for it all is a distant second.

After checking out, I park down the street from my mom’s place and do a weird sidewalk dance as I juggle the groceries, my coffee thermos, and my purse. I create another list of steps as I go:

Prep the veggies (bok choy, mushrooms)

Get stock going

Make garlic paste

I’m jogging up the stairs to my mom’s apartment when two things strike me at once.

There’s the piercingly shrill alarm blaring, the sound growing louder and louder as I go up.

And there’s the gray haze I can see billowing out of a window.

Mrs. Stewart from down the hall pokes her head out the door and shouts something, but all I can hear is that alarm. I drop everything and sprint up the steps.

“Mom!”

The heavy smell of something burning hits me as I wrench open the door. All I can see is a thick wall of smoke and the faintest outline of furniture, nothing else.

I should call for help.

But there’s no time, and it’s just me here.

I run in. The smoke is everywhere, stinging my eyes.

“Mom!” I scream. That’s a mistake. I immediately start coughing.

I duck my head low and cover my face with my jacket, my mind frantically dredging up the fire safety and first aid classes I took to become a teacher.

It’s a good thing I know my childhood home by heart. I grope my way to the kitchen, where I can smell burnt rice and oil. Flames are leaping up from the stove, and on the floor, beside a cutting board and scattered vegetables, is my mom. She’s lying still, too still.

My heart plummets. My legs feel like lead, and I drop to my knees as I feel the moment spinning out of my control. I can’t move, can’t breathe, can’t think.

Then I hear her cough. I jolt back into what’s happening, like I’ve just grabbed a live wire. I crawl to her side.

I take hold of my mom and manage to get her out, lifting her with a strength I didn’t know I had. I leave her with a crowd of neighbors, all older aunties and uncles, then dash down the hall, grab the fire extinguisher, and blast everything in the kitchen with foam.

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