Boy pushes off the blanket and gets up when it’s still dark because it’s too cold to sleep. He loosens the ties at the front of the tent and pops his head out to look at the sky. It’s morning. Ice hangs from everything: the pointy black trees, the rich man’s roof, the poles that hold up his tent. He feels the cold on his face and pulls his head back in.
Last night he tore a hole in his wool jacket, just under the left armpit. He was pretending he was a bird flapping its wings, to make Mother laugh, and he raised his arms too high. He decides he will surprise her by fixing the coat himself. She’s still sleeping. As quietly as he can, he opens her box of sewing things. Boy sees well in the dark, so he’s able to cut off a length of thread with his teeth and carefully push it through the needle’s eye. Sitting cross-legged next to Mother, listening to her breathe, he smooths the coat across his lap, struggling to keep it still as he starts sewing. It takes longer than he thought it would, and he worries that he won’t finish before she wakes up. He works faster, hurting himself with the needle and sucking on his fingers so the blood won’t drip onto the shiny black coat. The stitches aren’t pretty like when Mother sews, but she will still be proud of him.
She is still sleeping when he hears the rich family start their day. Like almost every morning, the girls come out of the house fighting about something. In her high voice, the smaller one tells her older sister that she is a stupid donkey. The stupid donkey answers: You’re so dumb and ugly, you must be adopted. Boy hears the sound of car doors slamming shut. Something is wrong when the driver tries to start the engine. He tries twice. Three times. Boy listens hard as the engine makes growling noises. The car doesn’t start. Curiosity overtakes him, and he runs across the garden toward the house, where he stops and crouches low against a wall. He pretends to be playing with the spool of thread still in his hand, but he is looking toward the driveway out of the corner of his eye. They don’t see him. They never do. The chauffeur gets out and pulls open the hood. Then he starts cursing in a way that sounds both angry and sad.
Boy keeps his back close to the wall but shifts closer to the driveway. The back doors fly open, the sisters jump out and run to the driver’s side as he pulls something out of the engine, shaking his head and saying woy woy woy. The younger girl balls her hands into fists and presses them into her eyes, and when she starts to scream, it is the most terrible sound Boy has ever heard. Her sister comes to her side and hugs her hard. The girls do not see the driver walk quickly toward the front door of the big house, holding in his arms a cat, its white fur matted with blood, its legs limp. The animal shakes so much that Boy wonders how the driver can hold on to it. The rich grown-ups from the house come out, everyone talking over each other, but the howls of the little girl are loudest of all.
Boy knows what death is. He has seen dead rats and donkeys and dogs when he and Mother go walking around to look for work. But he has never seen anything like this, a creature about to die. Not knowing what to do, he walks back to the tent and notices that he’s forgotten to put on his shoes and that the snow is very cold under his feet. By now, Mother will be awake, and he can show her the coat and tell her about how the car wouldn’t start, and how the girl’s cat must have climbed into the engine because it was a warm place to sleep on a cold night. He can still hear the girl’s screams in his head even though it’s quiet now. Back in the tent, Mother is still sleeping, lying on her side with the thick blanket pulled up high, covering her ears. He nudges her. She doesn’t move. He strokes her hair. She is so still.
He calls out for her, pushes the blanket off, and pulls on her arm. She rolls onto her back, limp and heavy, her eyes open very wide and still. The spool of black thread still clutched in his hand, he screams, “Mother!” She doesn’t answer. He screams again and again until he knows she will never wake up. Then he runs from the tent, his heart jumping into his throat, tears choking him. He almost falls as his feet sink into the snow, but he doesn’t stop. He doesn’t stop running until he is outside the garden, past the quiet street with the fancy houses, on the other side of the big road with all the honking cars. Boy knew about death, but he didn’t really know before today.