When an attempt at suicide fails, what can you do? Maybe part of you sees it as a sign of God interfering, that He wants you to go on, that there will be a better time. But when you wake up not expecting to, and the situation you thought couldn’t get worse is even worse, what can you do? For a person without hope, who decided it was not worth living, what can they do other than try again?

  The woman had the same dilemma. What can I do?

  She sat on the edge of a bridge for a long time, lost in her thoughts, constantly crying, her eyes swollen. She didn’t blink, didn’t move. She just stared at the cold water below, as if searching for something—anything—to give her a reason to keep going.

  And then she jumped.

  When the woman died, nothing changed in the town. No one searched for her, no police case was filed, as if she never existed.

  Growing up in poverty, a child once decided she would never bring another life into the world. Then she grew, got a job, found stability, fell in love—and got pregnant. A parent never wants their child to have the same childhood as themselves. They think I will do better than my parents!

  Then life changes. Suddenly, you are a 25-year-old single mother. You have a four-year-old child. Her needs are growing. You think you can do it. You think you will do better.

  She found out nothing was stable—not even her job at a big company. She realized her parents had been trying their best for the situation they were in.

  When you don’t have income and your savings are exhausted, you start borrowing money from every soul you know. But this can only last so long. They start knocking on the door. You make promises, and this repeats. But then, you have no one left to borrow from. You can’t pay rent. And you lose the door to be knocked.

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  The woman was homeless.

  The child played alone on the side of the river while the mother searched through the trash. The child was dirty, her clothes torn, her nose runny with mucus over her mouth and left hand, dried into a white crust. The mother, even worse. She searched through garbage, collecting anything she hoped could be useful or sold. She was thorough, checking every corner, but she would glance at her daughter every few minutes before continuing.

  Sometimes she sat on the side of the road with a cup, begging for money—hoping she could buy cough syrup for her daughter. Maybe even food. And then she would be taken out of her daydream.

  "You are young, you are well, why are you begging?" they would ask. And she couldn’t reply. She would just stare.

  People don’t understand that when you are homeless—when you haven’t bathed in weeks, when you reek of your child’s piss, when flies roam around you—your options for a job shrink drastically.

  The woman would find various things in the trash. Her daughter’s best friend, Sammy-the-Princess-Teddy, was made from a few discarded toys she found and stitched together. The child always kept Sammy beside her, even when sleeping. She talked with her.

  Sometimes the woman found old clothes. Sometimes she found food. If she found anything useful, she would keep it in a dirty sack.

  And sometimes, she found rat poison.

  She kept it in her pocket on impulse, thinking, Just in case.

  At night, when her child played with her toy, the mother would take out the poison and just stare at it. Sometimes she sobbed. Sometimes she laughed. But she never threw it away.

  As a parent, when you cough for weeks, it’s okay. But when your child also starts coughing, when you lose your night’s sleep, when you place your hand on her chest and it’s cold but you have no blanket—when you know winter hasn’t even started—you start losing hope.

  When you have seen the worst of days and know the future is no better, you start building courage—something you never had.

  And one night, your courage is greater than ever.

  And you open the packet in your pocket.