Chapter 4My Older Sister

The first challenge after leaving the hospital was finding a place to live and figuring out how we'd eat.

With Sarah, I couldn't stay in the college dorm anymore.

I found a tiny basement room near campus, just big enough for one bed. The landlady, Mrs. Peterson, was a kind woman.

When Mrs. Peterson heard our story, she agreed to let us pay the rent later.

We didn't get lucky with some rich benefactor swooping in to save us.

I knew deep down that for poor people like us, the only real chance was to cling tightly to education, to use it as a vine to climb up.

No matter how hard life got, I couldn't let go of my chance to learn.

When I didn't have classes, I took Sarah with me to hand out flyers.

At night, I worked as a server at a fried chicken joint while Sarah rested at home.

One night, coming home late from my shift, I found Sarah waiting up, guarding a steaming bowl of beef noodles. When she saw me, she immediately put down her chopsticks and brought it over.

"Ashley, breakfast!" she said, mixing up night and day.

After paying the rent yesterday, Sarah and I had less than five dollars between us.

An eight-dollar bowl of noodles was a luxury for us, used to surviving on plain bread.

"Sarah, where did you get this?"

Her eyes sparkled brightly. "Mrs. Peterson! She helped me find a job! Washing dishes at the diner down the street. I get free breakfast every day, and five hundred dollars a month!"

Sarah carefully blew on the noodles to cool them for me.

Her clear, bright eyes watched me intently. "Ashley, Mrs. Peterson said I have to help you as much as I can, so I'm not a burden. I'll work hard to earn money so you can stay in school."

Looking into her innocent eyes, tears started streaming down my face again.

How could anyone call her a burden, an idiot? She was my wonderful sister, who loved me and cared for me.

By my sophomore year, thanks to our hard work and careful saving, things weren't quite so tight.

At least I could pay my tuition.

Sarah and I didn't have to eat plain bread every meal; we could afford meat sometimes.

Mrs. Peterson felt sorry for us and cleared out a storage room on the first floor for us to live in, without raising the rent. We finally moved out of the damp, dark basement.

The shop owners and neighbors nearby knew our situation, and many were happy to lend a hand.

Mr. Henderson, the security guard at a nearby building, would keep an eye out when I wasn't home to make sure Sarah didn't wander off.

Ms. Davies at the corner store would give Sarah snacks and toiletries, pretending they were about to expire.

Mrs. Peterson often claimed she'd cooked too much food.

There was Mr. Johnson, old Mrs. Gable…

Our biological family was a wreck, but strangers we'd never met showed us endless warmth.

By my junior year, life got even better.

Sarah and I each bought a cheap smartphone.

Our family thought Sarah was too stupid to bother teaching, she'd never spent a day in school. So, I started from the very beginning, teaching her how to hold a pen, how to write her name, letter by letter. Then I taught her phonics.

It was slow and difficult, but day after day, Sarah finally learned to slowly type out words.

Now, we could communicate even when I wasn't home.

Senior year, I got an internship at a company.

During a work trip, we got caught in a flash flood out in the countryside. Relying on the survival skills I'd learned growing up in a rural area, I managed to grab onto a big tree. I also pulled a colleague who'd been swept away to safety with me.

Later, I found out he was the boss's son, working his way up from the bottom to learn the business.

After that incident, the boss learned about me. He reviewed my performance records since I joined the company and moved me to the Marketing Department, where hard work directly translated into better rewards.

A few years later, I finally established myself in this bustling, glittering city through my own efforts.

I became the Marketing Manager. I moved with Sarah into a nice apartment complex the company rented for me.

Sarah adapted well to city life. She even took some classes at a special needs center, learning new things. She happily became my supportive home-helper.

Just as I was starting to look forward to a brighter future…

My mother showed up at my door with my ailing father and my brother Kevin, who had dropped out of high school.