Chapter 1 - Twenty-Four Cups of Noodles
After burying my mother alone, my mother-in-law ordered, “Get up and cook dinner for twenty-four guests.”
I didn’t argue.
I placed twenty-four cups of instant noodles on the table, picked up my daughter, and walked away with an old key in my pocket, never imagining that key would unlock my husband’s darkest secret.
“Are you really going to keep up this drama just because you buried your mother? Get up and make dinner for twenty-four people.”
Brenda Adams threw those words at me at nine o’clock in the morning, just as I returned from the crematorium, my clothes still carrying the scent of incense and rain.
For three days, I had mourned my mother, Mary, completely alone because my husband, Kevin, “couldn’t miss work,” and my mother-in-law already had tickets to a concert.
Neither of them had even asked if I had eaten.
I walked into our house in Columbus carrying a bag with the belongings the police had returned to me and a small suitcase.
The kitchen was a disaster, with dirty dishes, beer bottles, chicken bones, and piles of laundry everywhere.
My five-year-old daughter, Hannah, was curled up asleep on the couch, still wearing the same dress she had worn the day before.
I locked myself in the bedroom and had barely begun to cry when Brenda kicked the door open.
“Today’s Pamela’s birthday,” she said, referring to her divorced daughter, who had been living with us for the past eight months. “She’s invited twenty-four friends. I want roast chicken, rice, salad, cake, and set a nice table.”
“I just buried my mother.”
“And is lying in bed going to bring her back? The living still have to live.”
Then I noticed a crushed box of sweet candy in the trash.
My mother had been carrying it when a vehicle struck her in front of a department store. She had gone to buy it because Brenda insisted it was “a special edition.”
The police had returned the stained, broken box along with the rest of my mother’s belongings.
“My mother died trying to buy this for you.”
Brenda barely looked at it.
“No one forced her to go. She was just unlucky. Now get to the market before the prices go up.”
Something inside me stopped hurting.
It simply turned cold.
I kissed Hannah on the forehead, grabbed my purse, and left the house.
Instead of buying meat, mole, and cake, I came back with twenty-four cups of instant noodles.
I placed one at every seat around the white tablecloth and set a large pitcher of hot water in the middle of the table.
Pamela walked in with her freshly straightened hair and screamed.
“What is this garbage?”
“Dinner for your twenty-four guests.”
Brenda began throwing the noodle cups onto the floor.
At that moment, Kevin walked through the door, smelling of alcohol.
“Apologize to my mother,” he ordered. “Then get in the kitchen and start cooking.”
I didn’t answer.
I walked into the bedroom, picked up Hannah, grabbed the suitcase I had quietly packed, and headed for the front door.
Brenda grabbed my arm.
“You’re not taking that little girl anywhere without my son’s permission.”
“Tell your son I’m filing for divorce.”
Kevin burst out laughing.
“And how are you going to survive? You don’t know how to do anything.”
I reached into my pocket and pulled out an old key.
It was the key to the small family diner my mother had run for thirty-five years near the market.
“I know how to do exactly what she taught me.”
I closed the door behind me as insults, shattering glasses, and Kevin’s voice shouting that he would take Hannah away echoed through the house.
That morning, I thought the worst was already behind me.
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I had no idea what was about to happen next.
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