ONE.

The lights in the restaurant are dim, and some of the wood of the tables are already chipping. An old clock hangs on the grimy tiles, telling the few patrons in the eatery that midnight is fast approaching. Japanese paintings hang at the oddest places, failing to attain the oriental atmosphere it desperately tries to achieve. A waitress bustles here and there, clearing the dishes and re-filling glasses. There isn’t much to do, really, but this waitress likes to keep busy. She dumps the dirty dishes in the sink, and then turns on the tap, allowing the sink to be filled. She ties her blonde hair back into a ponytail, and then sets about to scrub the dishes clean.

There is a sudden tinkle, and the waitress raises her head. A lady with brown hair so straight it looks like a wig enters, scanning the surroundings, until she spots the blonde waitress.

“Hyo! I’m here, you can go now,” the lady says, offering the blonde a bright smile.

“Hi, Vic. It’s alright, I’ll finish these up, but I think the gentleman over there needs his glass re-filled,” Hyoyeon says, smiling back.

“Gentleman, Hyo?” Victoria laughs, raising an eyebrow.

Hyoyeon shrugs her shoulders, smiling. “Brute, then.”

“That’s more like it,” Victoria says, picking up the water jug and moving swiftly to the needed glass.

Hyoyeon goes back to her dish-washing, and as she finishes up her last plate the clock chimes, announcing the arrival of a new day. Hyoyeon drains the sink, washes her hands, and then gets her bag, a cheap cloth one she had purchased at a road-side stall.

“Bye, Vic, have fun,” she says, and Victoria gives her a two finger salute in reply.

Hyoyeon steps out into the windy San Francisco night, wrapping her jacket around her and zipping it up all the way. Shivering, she stuffs her hands into its pockets, and then starts the long walk back to her house. She could have taken the bus, or the subway, but her boss still hasn’t paid her for this month, and she knows she is down to two loaves of bread and a melting pot of butter back in her one-room, rented apartment.

“Miss, do you have a dime to spare?”

Hyoyeon turns, coming face to face with a haggard soul, with sunken cheeks and blonde hair, shades lighter than hers.

“You had money to dye your hair?” she blurts out, and then realises with a sinking feeling what she has just done.

To her surprise, the guy laughs, his voice low and rough, his cheekbones showing through his parched skin. Hyoyeon offers him a tentative smile, not quite sure what to make out by his laugh. She can only hope she will not be left here in the streets, bruised and broken.

“Do you or do you not have a dime to spare?” he asks again.

Hyoyeon shrugs. “A few dimes won’t get you a meal.”

“So give me more.”

“I’ll give you a meal, how about that?”

The stranger laughs in disbelief, even louder than before, slapping his thighs. “You, pretty lady, giving me a free meal? I must be dreaming.”

Hyoyeon shrugs again. “I just know what it’s like to survive on an empty stomach, that’s all.”

He laughs again, pretending to wipe tears from his eyes, and when he speaks his tone is mocking. “What would you know about that?”

Hyoyeon gives him a wry smile. I know a lot, buster, she thinks. And indeed she does, for she has gone days without a proper meal, sneaking rice and seaweed from the restaurant instead. Before her job as a waitress, she had worked as a bartender, and had to fill her stomach with enough vodka so she would feel full, so she could convince herself she had enough, that she didn’t need to just whip out a knife and end it all.

“Believe what you like. Do you want the free meal or not?” Hyoyeon asks, folding her arms.

The stranger shrugs. “Sure, what’s not to accept?”

“Come on, then,” Hyoyeon says, tossing her blonde hair over her shoulder and re-tracing her steps towards the Japanese restaurant.

Victoria looks up, surprised, when Hyoyeon enters with a shabby beggar in tow, but Hyoyeon motions for Victoria not to say a word. Victoria dishes out glasses of water, cutlery, and the menu, all the while with raised eyebrows. Hyoyeon can only shrug at Victoria, but frankly she doesn’t know what has prompted her to offer the stranger now devouring the menu hungrily a free meal, either. She barely has enough on her to last her the month, and yet here she is now, ready to pay for someone else’s meal.

“God, you don’t know what it’s like to just be looking at all this food,” the stranger groans, rubbing his stomach.

Once again, Hyoyeon has to hide her smile, for she knows exactly what it’s like, when she finally quit her job at the bar and got this waitress job. How she could finally stare at a god-damn menu and know that she had enough to pay for a proper meal, to look at all the mouth-watering pictures and feel like she had been given a fresh start, to feel safe, for once.

“I’ll get the tempura udon, if you please, some sake, and a plate of this cucumber sushi,” the stranger tells Victoria. She nods, and then turns to Hyoyeon.

“I’m fine,” Hyoyeon says, and Victoria gives her a look that demands explanation.

Later, Hyoyeon mouths, and Victoria’s eyes tell her that there is no escaping that silent promise.

The food comes soon enough, and the stranger devours the food like a mad wolf, picking up the entire bowl and draining every single bit of morsel in it. He downs the sake, cup after cup, the plate of sushi long empty, completely wiped clean, every bit of seaweed, every sesame seed safe in his stomach. At the end of it all, he leans back, his lips, and gives a long, deep sigh.

“Here’s the cheque,” Victoria says, and with a sinking feeling in her stomach Hyoyeon takes it.

$21.35, the bill read, and Hyoyeon takes out her wallet, coming up with a crumpled bill and a couple of coins. From far, Victoria knows full well that Hyoyeon has barely enough, and she swiftly walks over, taking the twenty dollar bill and three cents, before Hyoyeon even has enough time to see if she has spare cash in her bag.

“Thank you very much, miss,” Victoria says, and Hyoyeon gives her a grateful smile. Tomorrow, Victoria mouths, and Hyoyeon nods, silently thanking the big man up there for a friend like Victoria.

The pair sits in silence then, the stranger eyeing Hyoyeon, as though expecting a sort of catch. Hyoyeon just stays rooted to the chair, not knowing why she is staying.

“Well then, I guess, I’ll be going,” the stranger says, uncertainly, rising awkwardly from his chair, the horrible scraping sound making Hyoyeon wince.

She rises quickly too, but with a soft lift of her own chair. “Okay.”

They exit the restaurant together, but still the stranger is eyeing Hyoyeon. She gives him a brief smile, and then turns on her heels, anxious to get home, but then there comes a voice, slicing through the quiet morning air.

“Hey, lady!”

Hyoyeon turns.

“How come you had money to dye your own hair?”

Hyoyeon starts to walk again.

“I saw you! You didn’t have enough for the meal, did you? Why did you treat me then?”

Hyoyeon quickens her pace.

“Lady!”

Faster.

“If you come back tomorrow I’ll tell you how I had money to dye my hair!”

Her footsteps slow, and she glances back, curious. She knows how she could have her own hair dyed, back when the owner of the bar insisted blondes would be more attractive than brunettes. He had been drunk, of course, but she and the rest of the girls still got the salon trip. It made her wonder why this stranger had his hair dyed blonde. She smiles lightly to herself, and then continues walking down the street.

“You’ll come back, right?”

Hyoyeon thinks she will.