Prologue

I was seated inside the confession room in the campus chapel earlier today.

Dear Saint,

"I am glad I can talk to you every time of the day. But can you actually ask the Lord for me?

Can I just sleep here and you'll just wake me up with the birthmark behind me, gone? I'm sick and tired of being unlucky. I'm sick and tired of being the one blamed for other people's misfortunes. I mean, are there that many people praying right now? Can you put me on priority, this time? I've been praying for this for the last eighteen years. I beg of you, please."

I often got carried away by my prayers. I'd guess you could call it desperation on my end. But then I guessed, someone else in the chapel at that time was even more reasonably desperate than I was.

"Dear God, please give my mother a second chance. Please grant her a longer life," pleaded the student as she knelt near the entrance.

It made me pause.

"You're too unfair," I sighed. "Alright, please hear hers first, then."

Hmp!