A Step from Heaven by An Na Page A

face and Joon hurries to brush it off.
    What are you crying for?
    Joon shrugs.
    Wrong answer. Apa slams his hand across Joon’s face.
    Joon’s head jolts back. A howl escapes from his lips.
    Uhmma comes to the doorway and stands behind me. She calls out to Apa over my head, Yuhboh, that is enough.
    Apa turns toward her voice. Shut up, Apa says. Keep out of it. This is my son and he will not grow up weak.
    Yuhboh, Uhmma says again.
    Apa ignores her and focuses back on Joon. Stand up straight, Apa orders.
    Joon straightens up, wiping the tears from his face, looking around for that corner of sky.
    You cry like a girl. You whine like a girl. Have I not taught you anything? Be strong. Be a man.
    Joon’s face grows blank again. He found it.
    Apa continues, In this world, only the strong survive. Only the strong can make their future. If you cry and whine like a girl, who is going to listen to you? Who? If you talk like a man, fight like a man, you will get what you want in this world. Do you understand?
    Yes, Joon whispers.
    What did you say? Apa leans in, ear offered up as though listening for a mouse in the wall.
    Yes, Joon says louder.
    Yes, and what else? Apa asks, straightening up.
    It is important for Joon to get it right. If he says what Apa wants to hear, the lecture will end. If he gets it wrong?
    Joon hardens the muscles of his face. A mask of glass covers his eyes, cheeks, lips, forehead. Joon says clearly, I must talk like a man and fight like a man if I want to make my future.
    Apa leans back on his heels, clasps his hands behind him. Good, Apa says. Good.
    My held-in breath pops out from my chest in relief.
    Joon looks in my direction.
    Apa turns as if to leave and then pivots back around. He balances on one leg and swiftly kicks Joon in the stomach.
    Joon never saw it. Never got to prepare his body. The mask of glass explodes into fine shards of pain, etching his face unrecognizable, old. In Joon’s place stands a prune-faced grandfather, stooped, holding his stomach, unable to walk.
    Uhmma pushes me to the side and rushes out to Joon. Apa grabs her by the shoulder and stops her in one abrupt movement. Joon’s mouth gapes wide open as he fights for air.
    Apa shoves Uhmma in front of him as they turn back to the house. Apa says calmly, He has to learn his lesson.
    Apa stops at the scattered Lego set and tells Joon, Hurry and clean that up before we leave for your Gomo’s. I do not want to be late.
    Joon hobbles over to the Legos.
    I back away as Apa and Uhmma step inside. After they pass, I rush outside and help Joon clean up. We kneel together and disassemble the castle towers.
    â€œI hate him,” Joon says.
    I nod silently and drop the small gray plastic pieces back into the box. As I try to pull apart a red flag from a gray block, the flag breaks in my hand.
    Joon’s eyes follow the sound of the snap. “That’s my flag!” Joon cries and jerks back his hand.
    I stare at the broken flag in my palm. Joon’s slap rings in my ear.

Harry
    We thought nothing would happen the way we wanted. Not ever.
    Not the time Apa, with a distant edge in his eye, took us to see the new houses being built on a nearby hill and said, We shall see. But then we never did see, although Joon and I asked every day and even packed our clothes in brown paper grocery bags in case we had to move fast.
    Not the time a letter addressed to Apa with the words “You Are the Next Ten-Million-Dollar Winner!” and two hazy men’s grins stamped on the front made Joon and me so crazy with heat we had to run up and down the hallway screaming.
    And definitely not the time Harry died. It’s hardest to think of Harry because we tried that time. Really tried. It wasn’t about luck or waiting for Uhmma and Apa to tell us the good news. It was about us. Joon and me trying our best, like the teachers in school tell us to do and we’ll be rewarded. Even then. Nothing.
    Harry was our baby bird,