A Kidney For The Golden Boy

On my thirtieth birthday, I received a ghost from my past.

It was a package, wrapped in cheap, crinkly brown paper. Inside sat a vintage handheld GameBoythe exact model I had spent my entire childhood praying for.

Becca, my senior colleague, leaned over my cubicle and let out a soft whistle. Thirty years old and someones sending you vintage toys? she teased, her eyes twinkling. "Thats either the mark of someone who knows your soul... or someone who really, really hates you."

I forced a smile, my fingers tracing the cold plastic buttons. "Youve got a sharp intuition, Becca. You hit the nail on the head."

The person who sent this was the person I had been closest to in this world. And, without a doubt, the person who had carved the deepest scars into my heart.

But it had been years. Hate, lovethey were just different sides of the same exhausting coin. At this point, I didn't want either.

1.

Underneath the console was a handwritten letter. It was thousands of words long, a sprawling manifesto of supposed "sincerity" and "regret." I didn't bother reading past the first paragraph. I tossed the letter and the GameBoy straight into the trash can.

Becca gasped, reaching out as if to catch them. "Sadie! If you don't want it, let me have it. My son is obsessed with these 'relics.' This thing is probably worth fifty bucks on eBay. Ill pay you for it!"

"Fifty bucks?" I let out a dry, hollow laugh. "Is that all it's worth?"

I waved her off, telling her to just take it. She felt guilty, though, and insisted on taking me out to lunch to make up for it.

At the restaurant, I spent five minutes meticulously picking every piece of zucchini out of my pasta. It was a reflex, a twitch I couldn't unlearn. I caught Becca watching me, her expression a mix of pity and confusion.

"You probably think Im ridiculous," I said, my voice dropping. "A grown woman acting like a picky toddler. Dressing in these bright, 'young' colors, trying so hard to look like a girl who hasn't been broken yet."

Becca shook her head vigorously, reaching across the table to squeeze my hand. "Don't you dare go there. Life is too short to eat things you hate or wear things that make you feel invisible. I tell my son all the time: we aren't rich, but we aren't so poor that we have to deprive ourselves of the small joys. You live once. You should be comfortable in your own skin."

Such a simple concept. And yet, it had taken me thirty years to even hear the words.

I thought about that GameBoy, a toy that had never truly belonged to me. A sad, helpless smile pulled at my lips. "Becca, have you ever heard the saying? We spend our entire adult lives haunted by the things we were denied as children."

My list of denials was long. My obsessions ran deep.

Becca opened her mouth to ask more, but she froze. I followed her gaze.

Standing just outside the glass doors of the restaurant was my mother, June. She was clutching a thermal lunch bag, her eyesdull and sunkenlit up the moment she saw me. Within seconds, they were brimming with practiced tears.

"Sadie... oh, thank God. I finally found you."

She rushed inside, ignoring the stares of the other diners. "Youve been gone for so long. Do you have any idea how worried your father and I have been? Were a family, Sadie. Weve missed you so much."

A small crowd began to gather, drawn by the drama. June saw them and leaned into the performance, dabbing at her eyes with a tattered tissue.

"Its okay, its okay," she sobbed softly. "Parents don't hold grudges. Its your birthday, honey. I made your favorite. I brought it all this way. Please, eat it while its hot."

She unzipped the bag and pulled out a container. Inside was a gray, congealed mess of zucchini and eggplant. No seasoning, no sauce, just a watery, slimy mush that looked like something a body had rejected.

I stared at it. My vision blurred with a sudden, violent heat. I tried to swallow the bile rising in my throat, but I couldn't. I stood up and swiped the container off the table. It hit the floor with a wet thud, the gray slime splattering across the tiles.

"June, you know damn well," I hissed, my voice shaking with decades of repressed rage. "I hate zucchini and eggplant more than anything in this world. Almost as much as I hate that GameBoy!"

The restaurant went silent. Junes bottom lip trembled. She looked around at the onlookers, then slowly lowered her head, looking small and defeated.

"Its my fault," she whispered, loud enough for everyone to hear. "I forgot. Youre a 'city girl' now. My cooking isn't good enough for you anymore. But its not dirty... Ill eat it. I won't let it go to waste..."

She actually knelt down. She began to scoop the mush off the floor with her bare fingers, moving it toward her mouth.

"Sadie, thats enough!" a colleague from a nearby table shouted, stepping forward to pull June up. "How can you treat your own mother like this? She traveled all this way just to bring you lunch, and you act like a spoiled brat?"

"Shes a monster," another whispered. "To treat an old woman that way... no wonder people say shes cold."

The judgment hit me like a physical weight. Junes sobbing intensified. She started apologizing for "failing as a mother," telling the strangers how I had always been "difficult," a "liar," and nothing like my "sweet, successful brother."

My eyes stung, but I refused to let the tears fall. I reached into my bag and pulled out the legal documentthe formal estrangement papers Id had drawn up years ago. I slammed them onto the table in front of her.

"You were the one who told me we were done, June! You signed these! Why are you here now, putting on this sick show? Do you want me to tell them? Do you want me to tell everyone exactly what you did?"

2.

Junes mouth twitched. She let out a ragged breath. "What is there to tell, Sadie? The same old story? That we 'favored' your brother?"

She turned to the crowd, her voice gaining strength. "We worked ourselves to the bone to put her through school, and she spent her time skipping class and getting into fights. She barely scraped through a community college. We didn't even blame her! But then, she got herself pregnant at eighteen, brought shame on this family that we had to carry for years. Meanwhile, her brother... hes a saint. Hes the one who told me to come. Hes the one who worried about his big sister being all alone."

She collapsed into a chair, looking like she was about to faint. Becca tugged at my sleeve, her voice a panicked whisper. "Sadie, just apologize. Youre up for a promotion. Don't let her ruin this. Youve worked too hard to let your reputation go up in flames over a bowl of vegetables."

I looked at June. I realized then that her timing wasn't accidental. She hadn't come for my birthday. She had come for my jugular.

Was this "gift" supposed to be a peace offering, or was it a slow-acting poison meant to hollow me out?

I had spent fifteen years being quiet. Fifteen years swallowing the "gray mush" of my life.

Not today.

I looked at the woman who shared my blood, my voice turning ice-cold. "Lets talk about being 'poor,' June. That was your favorite word, wasn't it? 'Were too poor, Sadie.'"

Since I could remember, that word was a cage. June told me I was born sickly, that my medical bills had drained their savings. To "save money," I was fed the cheapest scrapsdiscount zucchini that was practically rotting, bitter eggplant from a neglected garden patch. Boiled together until it was inedible.

But Tyler? Tyler had steak. Tyler had roast beef. I remember the smell of it, how my stomach would cramp with hunger. Once, I reached for a piece of his food. June slammed a hot frying pan down onto my hand.

I lifted my hand, showing the faint, jagged scar on my palm to the room. "You still want to tell them you weren't 'favoring' him?"

June shook her head, tears streaming down her face. "Sadie, thats not how it was! You were allergic to protein! I was trying to save you! I was terrified youd go into shock. I bought you the best ointments afterward..."

"The 'ointment' was toothpaste mixed with lard, June. It gave me an infection that turned into a fever so high I hallucinated for three days. You told me the hospital was too expensive and gave me a bag of frozen peas for my head. I missed my final exams because I fainted during the gym test. Thats why I didn't get into a top-tier university. And then you used those grades as 'proof' that I was lazy and stupid."

June shifted in her seat, her expression flickering between embarrassment and defiance. "That was an accident. And I tried to make it up to you, didn't I?"

"Oh, you made it up to me alright," I said, my laugh sounding like glass breaking. "With another bowl of zucchini."

3.

After I failed to get into the state university, I begged them to let me retake my senior year. I knew I could do it if I was healthy.

But the answer was always the same: No money.

"Sadie, its not that we don't want to," June would say, her voice dripping with fake sympathy. "Were still paying off your childhood medical debts. Just go to the vocational school. Its the same thing. Ill make you a huge feast for your birthday to celebrate."

I was naive enough to believe her. I told myself Id work twice as hard, make them proud. On my birthday, I put on the only nice thing I owneda hand-me-down dress from a cousin that was three years too small.

June did make a feast. There was steak, lobster, a three-tier cake. Shed invited every relative we had. She said it was a "once-in-a-lifetime" day.

But when I walked into the dining room, the banner on the wall didn't have my name.

CONGRATULATIONS TYLER ON GETTING INTO THE ACADEMY!

The lobster, the steak, the cakeit was all for him. His "big day." I was a ghost at my own party.

June had pulled me into the kitchen, away from the guests. She pulled a small bowl out of the microwave. "Youre still recovering, honey. Rich food is bad for your digestion. I made you a special batch of zucchini and eggplant. I even put a little bacon grease in it for flavor. Its all yours."

I watched through the kitchen door as my father sat in the living room, bragging to my aunt.

"Twenty thousand," my father said, patting Tyler on the back. "Thats what the tuition and the 'donation' cost to get him into that school. Worth every penny. A boy like Tyler is going to lead this family. Hes the legacy."

"Twenty thousand?" my aunt gasped. "Thats a down payment on a house!"

"Tylers a star," my father replied, his voice thick with pride. "Not like Sadie. That girl isn't cut out for books. Once shes eighteen, well get her a job at the plant so she can start saving for Tylers wedding fund."

Tyler sat there, stuffing his face with cake, looking at me with a smirk that said he knew exactly what was happening. He was the prince; I was the cattle.

I looked at June now, standing in the middle of the restaurant. "Twenty thousand dollars. You told me we were starving, but you had twenty thousand for Tylers 'donation.' And you wouldn't give me two thousand for a tutor."

My teacher had come to the house back then, begging them to let me continue. They lied to her face, saying they were broke. When she suggested a student loan, June screamed at her, saying it would "ruin the family's reputation" to have a debt-ridden daughter.

The people in the restaurant were starting to look away now, their faces softening into something like shame. June, sensing the shift, tried one last desperate move.

"I didn't want you going away because I was afraid youd get into trouble! I heard the rumors, Sadie! You were hanging around those boys, staying out late. I was trying to protect you!"

I let out a harsh, jagged laugh. "The 'boys' youre talking about were the only reason I didn't starve. They were the ones who shared their sandwiches with me because they saw me fainting in class! If it wasn't for them, I wouldn't have made it to eighteen!"