The pleasantly familiar scent of the sea wafted forward as your mom opened the door to Kim’s Seafood.

“Good Afternoon, Mr. Kim,” she greeted pleasantly.

Mr. Kim, the small, thin man who owned the store along with his wife, beamed at both you and your mother.  “Good Afternoon!”  He turned to you.  “I haven’t seen you in forever!  Did you go to school?”

“Yes, sir,” you answered.  “I just graduated.”

“Where did you go?”

“Columbia.”

“All the way up there?”  His expression was playfully censorious.  “What’s wrong, our schools weren’t good enough for you?”

“Nope!” 

“That’s right!” Mrs. Kim called, as she came from the back.  “Never settle when it comes to your education, young lady!  What did you study?”

“International Relations, and Diplomacy.” 

Your mother affectionately your hair.  “She wants to be a diplomat,” she said, eyes shining as she looked down at you.  

Flushing, you smiled awkwardly, shy at suddenly being the center of attention.  

“Oh! Look at that smile!” Mr. Kim grinned at your mother.  “She grew up so well!” Turning back to you, he cocked her head.  “International relations…  You must like learning languages.”

“Yes, sir.”

“How many can you speak?”

“Um, just French, but I want to learn maybe Russian, or Arabic, as well.  Maybe Hebrew...”

“Do you learn languages well?” Mrs. Kim asked suddenly.

“I’m okay…”  

“Don’t listen to her,” your mother interrupted.  “She picked up French in two years, has a smattering of Italian and German,” here she looked hard at you, and you did your best to look innocent, “which she would know better if she bothered to actually buckle down and study properly, and she used to speak Swahili with her best friend from Kenya when she was little, before we moved back home.

“Smart and cute…” Mrs. Kim said thoughtfully.  “Have you ever thought about learning Korean?”

“I...can’t say that I have…  I have to admit that it’s probably too hard for me--I know my limits.  There’s no way that I could memorize all those characters.”

“Oh, there are only 24 letters in Hangul,” Mrs. Kim rejoined quickly.

“Really?  I didn’t know that.  I thought…”

She waved a hand.  “You’re thinking of Chinese and Japanese.”

“Oh,” you said quietly, feeling your face heat at your stupidity.  

“So, what are you going to do now that you’ve graduated?” Mr. Kim asked.

“Um, I’m slated to go to grad school this autumn.”

“Where are you going?” Mrs. Kim inquired.

“Georgetown.”

Mrs. Kim looked at you consideringly for a moment, before turning to Mr. Kim, and sharing a look.  They seemingly came to a conclusion, and Mr. Kim turned back to your mother and smiled.  “What can I get for you two, today?”

Your phone rang, and you saw that the call was from the call center where you were trying to get a summer job.  “I’m sorry, I have to take this.”

“No problem!” Mrs. Kim smiled at you.  “You’re home for the summer, right?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Then we’ll see you again.”

***

Later, at home, you and your mother sighed happily as fragrant steam wafted up from the seafood platters that she had ordered, as you both valiantly tried to ignore the large honey-brown eyes of your American pitbull terrier, JT.  

You pretended to cry.  “I missed this so much!”

“I know you did!  That’s why I took you there.”  She leaned over to give you a hug, slowly rocking you from side to side.  “Oh!  I missed you!  My arms were hungry for you!”

“Ma!” you whined, embarrassed by your mother’s intense affection, even though no one else was there.

Seeing the hug fest, JT leapt up between you, nuzzling his snout so that he could both of your faces.

Your mother laughed and let you go, but reached up to ruffle your hair as you straightened, and surreptitiously slid JT a fried oyster.  “My daughter deserves a treat to celebrate her graduation!  Do you want some of my shrimp and scallops?”

“Don’t you want them?”  

“I like to see you eat.  It makes me feel good to know that you’re nourishing your body.”

“Ma!”

“What?!  I can’t help it!  I haven’t seen you in four years!”

“Well, do you want my crab cake, then?”

“You still don’t like crab?”

“Nope.  Still tastes like snot.”

“It does not!” your mother protested, even as she lifted the cake off of your plate.

You both tucked into the food, the reigning silence broken only by the soft, wet, snuffling of the biscuit hound as he occasionally accepted treats from one or the other..  

Halfway through the meal, your mother spoke up.  “So, while you were outside on the phone, Mr. and Mrs. Kim told me that they thought that you’ve grown up very well, and that you look especially well-mannered.”

“That was nice.”

“It was…” she hesitated.  

“What is it?”

“Well, Mr. Kim asked me a question, but I told him that I would have to ask you.”

“Okay?”  You wondered if they needed summer help.

“He has a nephew who’s actually going to med school at Georgetown, and apparently the tuition for non-American students is pretty high.”

Humming quietly to yourself, you nodded as you made a little sandwich out of two fried scallops and a shrimp.  “Considering the difference between in-state, and out-of-state tuition, I can’t imagine what his must be.  So, what, does he need help looking for scholarships?”

“Actually Mr. Kim wanted to know if you’d be willing to marry him for citizenship.  He said that his family would give you $15,000.”

“What did you say?”  Your mother was notorious for her sharp tongue when it came to defending your “honour”.  JT rested his head on your lap, liquid brown eyes looking up at you as if he had never eaten in his entire life.  You slipped him a fry.  

Your mother sighed.  “I told him that I would have to ask you.”

Pausing in mid-chew, one cheek pouched out like a squirrel’s--you stared.  “I’m sorry, what?”

When she looked at you, it was somewhat sadly.  “You’re not a baby, anymore.  I can no longer make these decisions for you.”

“Well, obviously the answer is no!  That’s literally illegal?”

Your mother shrugged.  “Okay.  I just told him that I’d ask you.  I’ll tell him your answer next time I see him.”  Leaning back, she sighed.  “Well, I’m full.”

“Already?”

“Yeah.”  She checked her watch.  “I have to get back on the road, anyway.  My lease is up on Friday, and unless I get a good number of airport trips, I’ll have to hit the ground running to try to make it.  If you’re still hungry after you finish yours, then eat what you want of mine, and put away the rest.”

“Okay.”

You walked her to the door, but before she left, she turned around to give you one last, bone-crushing hug, burying her nose in your hair.  “Mommy missed you.”

“Well, you’ll have me all summer.  I’ll be annoying you in no time.”

She laughed shortly. “Sister-daughter?”

“Sister-mom,” you grinned, giving her a kiss on the cheek.

With one last squeeze she left, walking down the porch steps to head to her cab.  “Don’t wait up--I don’t know when I’ll be able to be back!”

“M’kay!”  You watched her drive off, the familiar pang from your childhood tugging at your heart.  It was hard to see your mother work herself into the ground to pay for what little you had, especially considering that she could have done so much more, if only…  Something warm and soft filled your palm, and you looked to see JT nuzzling the top of his head into your hand.  You it absentmindedly before returning to the kitchen.

Sitting down in silence, you looked over the remains of your dinner.  It was still warm, and you knew that it would be just as delicious, but you still wouldn’t enjoy it as much without your mom.

Carefully, you packed it all up, and put it all away, so that you two could finish whenever she came home to sleep.  Crouching down, you took JT’s face in your hands.  “You want to go for a walk, boy?”

Two minutes of aggressive tail wagging later, you were out walking in the spring twilight.

***

“Could you get the mail?”

“Sure.”  You returned with a small stack of spam mail and a few letters, handing it all to your mother, and sitting beside her as she went through them.

“What’s this?” your mother muttered as she looked at one of the letters.

“I don’t know.”

She gave you an arch look.  “Rhetorical.”

Grinning, you bumped her shoulder with your own as she opened the letter.

“It’s from Mr. Vest.  I wonder what he wants…”  Her lips thinned as she looked over the letter.  

“What is it?”  You could sense sudden tension in every line of her body.

“The City has purchased the trailer park.  They want to tear it down and build single family homes.”

A sick, free-falling feeling set up shop in your stomach.  “Why?”

“Because the taxes on the new homes would be much more than what they’re getting from all of these old trailers.  Besides,” she said flippantly, refolding the letter and replacing it in the envelope, “this is basically beachfront property.  It was only a matter of time until the City took it.  You know that poor people can’t have anything nice.”

“So...what…” you looked at her helplessly, not even knowing how to finish your sentence.  

“I don’t know, baby.  I guess that I’ll have to start looking for somewhere else, although I don’t know how I’m going to save up enough when the cab lease is already $900 a week.”

“Well...the City can’t just take it…  I mean, Mr. Vest may own the land, but everyone here owns their own trailer.  It’s illegal to just take someone's property without paying for it.”

She sighed.  “The letter did mention that, but this trailer is so old that they’re only offering $500 for it.”

“But you paid $2000.”

“Unfortunately irrelevant.”

You both stared straight ahead in silence.

“So...how long?” you asked tentatively.

“Six weeks.”

“Six weeks?!  That’s ridiculous!”

She looked at you sympathetically, reaching out to lightly brush her fingertips over the side of your face before cupping your cheek.  “You’re a sweet girl,” was all she said, before standing.  “I have to go.”

“But you just got here!  You have to sleep!”

“I have to try to make enough above the lease to start saving for an apartment.  I’ve been lucky to live here with such a low lot rent, but I can almost guarantee that I won’t find another place as cheap.”

“What about another trailer park?”

“From what I’ve heard, the city is buying trailer parks all over to do the exact same thing.  There’s no guarantee that this wouldn’t just happen again if I go to another one.  I’ll have to look for an apartment.”

“But you hate apartments!  You hear everything!  And you hate people!”

She laughed.  “I don’t hate people, I love people.  I just hate being around them.”

You gave a small, one-sided grin, against your will.

“Besides, we’ve had a lot of people moving in from bigger cities, and they’ve been outbidding locals for rent, so it has gone up dramatically.  I can’t just rent a house for three or five hundred like I used to when you were a little girl.”

“But...what about JT?”

“I don’t know, baby…  I guess…  If I can’t find anywhere that allows dogs… then I’ll have to find a good family for him.”

The silence was broken only by the sound of JT loudly snoring at the foot of your mom’s bed.  He had been a part of your family since you were 14 years old, and even though you hadn’t seen him in years, he was still a big part of your heart.  And your mother’s heart, you knew.  “I’ll look online for places that accept pets without too much of a fee, while you’re out,” you said quietly, eyes soft as you watched JT’s little feet twitch in his sleep.

“Okay.  And I’ll scout places as I drive around.”

“Okay.”

Leaning down, your mother placed a long, cool kiss to your forehead, before standing back, gently your hair.  “My baby,” she said softly.

And with that, she was gone.

***

Later that night, unable to sleep--even with JT’s warm bulk pressed tightly against your back, which usually never failed--you stared at the ceiling from your narrow sofa bed.  You could postpone grad school, try to get a job.  But unfortunately, an International Relations undergrad wouldn’t get you very far--the real jobs came after grad school, which would come with key internships, so anything you could get would probably only pay a pittance.  But what else could you do?  Your mother was an only child, both parents dead, and your father…

Well, you hadn’t seen him since he left your mother for another woman when you were four.  Oh, sure, he called off and on as you grew up, occasionally promising you visits for Christmas, or your birthday, but every time would come and go, with you looking out the window, and no one pulling into the driveway.

No help, there.

There was always egg-selling.  It had always been a running joke while you were in school, but if someone were willing to buy a few, then you weren’t exactly trying to hold on to what you weren’t using.  

Leaning over to grab your phone, you quickly looked up the criteria for egg donation, before flopping back in disappointment.  You could see the logic of requiring a former pregnancy as a qualification, but it was still irksome, considering the fact that it took you out of the running.

Snorting you turned over, and spooned JT, vaguely wishing you could sell something extra, like a piece of your liver, or a kidney.  After all, you did have two.

If truth be told, your biggest fear was postponing grad school only to never be able to go back, to be stuck with minimum earning capacity for the rest of your life.  It wasn’t that you minded taking care of your mother, you just didn’t want to struggle anymore.  Since your father left, your entire life had been a struggle.  Not for the first time, you wished that your mother had heeded everyone’s advice and just aborted you.  Then, she would still have had a chance for a career, instead of being stuck taking care of you, when all she had ever been trained for, since she was a child, was opera.

Drifting off you dreamed of the sort of life she could have had, if only she hadn’t had you.

***

“...but apparently, one of the qualifications is that you had to have already been pregnant.”

“That’s stupid.”  The disdain on your best friend, Olya’s face made you feel mildly vindicated.

“I know!”  Sniffing in disgust, you looked down at your plate.  “Do you want the rest of my fries?” you asked.

“Only if you’ll eat the rest of my sandwich,” she answered.

“Deal.”

After switching food, you leaned back in your chair, enjoying the soft breeze and sunshine on the restaurant’s outdoor patio on the pier.  “Do you still want to get milk tea after this?”

Olya snorted.  “Do I want…?  Have you ever known me to not have room for sweets?”

“I must have lost my head...”

She looked thoughtful as she sipped her water.  “So, have you found a good place yet?”

“Not yet.  So far, every apartment that I’ve found that even takes dogs wants an additional $200 per month, and I can’t find any houses below $900.  To be honest, apartments really aren’t all that much cheaper than the houses…”

Olya fiddled with her straw.   “My love?”

You looked up in mid bite, eyes narrowing suspiciously.  Pulling the sandwich out of your mouth, you leaned back.  “What?”

“My darling?”

“What do you want?”

“My first?  My best?  My dearest dear?”

“Get on with it.  You’re creeping me.”

Leaning forward, Olya gently pushed your hair behind your ear, before reaching over and viciously plucking you on the forehead.  

“Ow!  What the heck was that?!”

“You know I don’t countenance stupidity.”

“What are you babbling about?  And you’re buying my milk tea, by the way.”

“Worth it.  And what was that for?!  Oh, I don’t know, maybe because you have the solution right in front of you?”

“I keep telling you, I’m not going to be your sugar baby!”  You ducked, holding up an arm, and lowering your head to keep from being too injured by Olya’s mostly harmless blows.  

After she felt that you had been appropriately beaten, Olya leaned back in her chair, readjusted her hair.  “Now, you vicious little idiot--”

“--that’s not what you said last night--” you cringed as she held up a loose fist.

“Say something else.  I swear on my own name, you say one more thing and I really will take you over my knee!”

“I knew it!” you crowed, startling passersby.  “Lover’s spat,” you whisper-shouted at them, earning you nothing but rolled eyes. “So why, other than your blatant ual sadism, am I a vicious little idiot, now?”

“You’re lamenting over the fact that you can’t sell your eggs, when you have access to a cool fifteen thousand!”

“What?!  Are you talking about the marriage proposal?!  I’m not going to let myself be thrown in jail to fulfill your prison wife fantasies!”

Olya leveled a cool look at you.  “You only get sent to jail if you get caught.  So...don’t get caught.”

“Oh!  Is that all?” you said airily.  “Look, I can’t!  It would be wrong!  That’s like...defrauding the government…”

“The government isn’t a person, it’s a lifeless faceless entity, and in case you haven’t been paying attention since the last election, even if it were sentient, it wouldn’t care about you.  Look, I know that you’re too earnest to function, but sometimes you have to be subtle.  In the long run, whom does it really hurt?  You get fifteen thousand dollars--which is a downpayment on a house, by the way--he gets to become a doctor--a person who helps people, by the way, his family doesn’t have to shell out obscene amounts of money just because of the vagaries of a few boundary lines on a piece of paper…  I mean, come on!  We’re all people, and yet there are all these stupid laws arbitrarily keeping us apart when we all should be working together!”  

Crossing your arms, you looked away, unwilling to concede that she had a point.

Olya, seeing you making your wavering face gently pressed on.  “At the end of the day, what’s the harm?  This would take nothing from you--it’s beneficial for everyone involved!  I mean, come on, higher education is valuable, but at the unholy rates that are being charged now?!  It’s obscene!  It’s no longer value for commodity gained, but pure greed--you know that!”

Pouting, you continued to remain silent.

“I know you.  You’re silent because you know I’m right.”

“I didn’t say that!”

“If you didn’t agree, you’d be giving me contentions, historical references, legal precedents, political theories--”

Leaning forward, you challenged her rant. “You make me sound like a nerd--”

“--you are a nerd!”

Grumbling, you leaned back.  “Valid.”

“So, since you obviously don’t have any arguments against what I’ve said, what’s your real problem?”

Sighing, you shook your head, looking away.

Olya gentled her voice, leaned forward.  “Come on… What is it?”

“It’s stupid,” you muttered.

“Despite my teasing, nothing about you is stupid.  I wouldn’t be your friend if you were.”  She tilted her head, her eyes going soft.  “What is it?”

Unable to meet her eyes, you stared down at the wrought iron of the table.  “I just...I just thought...I mean...other than school no major event in my life has ever gone the way I’ve wanted!  I’d watch tv shows, and movies with daddy’s little girls flitting around, while mine would forget to return my calls.  

“I wanted to spend time with my mother--to have her come to school events, and tuck me in at night, and give me attention, but she never had any extra time because she had to work like an insane person to keep us alive and not homeless.

“I dreamed of a nice sweet sixteen--nothing big, you know I’m iffy with parties--just something nice, and what did I get?  A cake in flavours I don't even like which my mom started to eat while complaining about work, before even wishing me a happy birthday.  

“I wanted to have a nice prom, get asked in a cute way, wear a dress that I designed.  I had to ask a friend to go, and later when I confessed to him, he turned me down.  You know why I went to Columbia?  Because I was too afraid to apply to Harvard, even though that’s where I had wanted to go ever since I had ever heard of it.  I just don’t…”

You pressed your lips together in frustration, willing yourself not to become emotional. “I know that it’s whiny, I know that it’s stupid, I know that it’s entitled, but I just...don’t ever get to have anything I want! I just thought...I just...hoped...that at least...when I got married...at least that would go how I wanted.  I don’t even want anything ostentatious, just…  For once, I wanted something to go like how I wanted it to go, and I wanted my marriage--” here your voice involuntarily broke, as slow tears began to slip down your face, “I wanted to marry for love!”  

Your voice was hoarse, and hearing your words, you roughly wiped your face, embarrassed.  “That sounds so childish, I know! I just...if nothing else, I at least wanted my marriage to be something special…”  You stared at your lap, waiting for her judgment.

Olya reached over, grabbing your chair and pulling it close to her own before wrapping her arms around you, laying your head on her shoulder, your hair.  “Oh, baby...I know…  I’m so sorry…  That’s not stupid, or childish…  Your feelings are valid.  But--hey--it’s not the shiny newness that makes a marriage special…  Hm?  It’s the connection between two people.  And I’m not devaluing your words, or belittling your feelings, I just want you to...to maybe try to see this in another light, hm?  In the end…”  she went silent, then squeezed your arm, “In the end, you have to do what’s best and right for your life.  No regrets, hm?”  

You both stayed silent for a long time, just looking out at the water.

Finally, Olya looked down at you, her face soft with worry.  “Hey...whatever you do, whatever you choose...make the choice that will allow you to look back with a clear heart and mind.  Understand?”

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