Hungry

In the poster, Bruce wore a suit and stood among a group of children, his smile so picture-perfect it looked cut out of a charity brochure.

Wayne Foundation: bringing education to every corner of Gotham.

When the homeroom teacher came in, the classroom grew a little quieter.

She was a woman in her forties, her hair pulled back tightly, with heavy dark circles beneath her eyes.

She carried a stack of documents in one arm and held half a cup of cold coffee in her other hand.

From the moment she entered, Chen Mo smelled the miserable blend of chronic sleep deprivation and cheap instant coffee.

The top note was exhaustion.

The middle note was overtime.

The base note was a paycheck.

It broke the hearts of those who smelled it and brought tears to those who saw it, so overpowering it caught in the throat and stung the eyes.

The teacher set her documents on the lectern.

"Quiet."

No one quieted down.

She raised her voice.

"Quiet!"

Someone in the back was still laughing.

The teacher suddenly picked up the chalkboard eraser from the lectern and hurled it at the storage cabinets in the back with a crack.

Dust exploded.

The classroom finally fell silent.

The teacher swept her gaze around the room, her voice as cold as a knife that had never been sharpened properly but had seen plenty of use.

"My name is Helen Morris. You can call me Ms. Morris. This is our first time meeting, and I don't want to call the police or write an incident report, so you'd better not force me to do either before nine in the morning."

Nobody spoke.

She continued, "Our school has joined the Wayne Foundation's pilot program this year. There will be a new lunch system, new vocational courses, and a new counseling program."

A boy in the back raised his hand.

Ms. Morris looked at him. "What is it?"

The boy asked, "Will the new lunch system give us enough to eat?"

A few quiet laughs rose around the classroom.

Ms. Morris paused.

For that instant, a faint trace of weariness flickered across her face.

"The school will do its best."

The boy lowered his hand and muttered, "So that's a no."

Someone beside him chimed in, "Wayne will do his best."

Another said, "They promised us lunch and dinner when they rounded us up and brought us to school."

"You actually believe what gangs say? I'd sooner trust Bruce Wayne."

"At least the young master Wayne is handsome. Such a pretty smile. My mom was watching the news yesterday and said he looked like an angel."

"Your mom's never seen an angel go hungry."

"Bruce Wayne doesn't know shit about going hungry. When he's hungry, his butler asks if he wants truffles. When we're hungry, the cafeteria lady asks if there's any money left on our cards."

The classroom grew rowdy again.

This time, Ms. Morris didn't stop them immediately.

She seemed used to it already.

Or rather, she had heard this sort of thing far too many times.

A blonde girl sitting by the window frowned and finally couldn't hold back.

"Can you stop blaming Mr. Wayne for everything? At least he's helping."

Her tone was sincere when she said it.

And clean.

As clean as a glass of water that had never touched this city's sewers.

A few people on the door side of the classroom turned to look at her.

Their gazes quickly changed.

The change could roughly be described as sewer rats suddenly spotting a swan on a lake, or goblins in a forest suddenly spotting a princess on horseback.

You're not the same species as us!

Get out of our tribe!

Danny laughed.

"Oh, sorry, princess. Did we offend your charity daddy?"

The blonde girl's expression shifted slightly. "I'm just saying he isn't the root of the problem."

The girl in the knit cap looked up.

"Then who is?"

The blonde girl opened her mouth.

"The system, the city government, budget allocation, and-"

"Wow."

Danny clapped his hands.

"She can say 'budget allocation.'"

Someone in the classroom laughed.

Danny stood up and gave her an exaggerated bow.

"Excuse me, Miss Budget. Yesterday, my little sister got kicked out of the school lunch line because she owed money. Which budget kicked her out? Was it the city budget, or that new system with the Wayne Foundation's little blue logo?"

The blonde girl's face flushed red.

"That's not what I meant."

"Of course it's not what you meant," the girl in the knit cap said. "It's never what you mean. You just sit over there with the hot meals and say it isn't one person's fault."

She held up the lunch card in her hand.

Its edges had worn white.

"When this thing won't scan, the system doesn't say, 'Sorry, this is a structural problem.' It just flashes red. Then everyone looks at you. Looks at how you have no money. Looks at you standing there holding your tray. Looks at you getting turned away like a beggar."

The classroom fell quiet.

Her voice wasn't loud.

But every word sounded ground out between her teeth.

"So don't tell me Bruce Wayne isn't the problem. His name hangs at the entrance, his face is on the news, and his money paid for the cafeteria system upgrade. What's wrong with us cursing him out?"

The blonde girl said nothing.

Sitting in the back, Chen Mo first grabbed Barbara, who was about to slam her hands on the desk and stand up, then lightly tapped a finger against his desktop.

He suddenly felt that this school was a fucking perfect fit for Gotham.

The future was written on the blackboard.

Knives were hidden beneath the desks.

Charity was plastered on the walls.

There was no money on the lunch cards.

And a bunch of fifteen- and sixteen-year-olds were already discussing who should be held responsible for their hunger as fluently as veteran stock traders.

A bunch of trolls who needed their fingers to add and subtract numbers under ten were actually using their brains to think. That showed how hungry they really were.

Ms. Morris closed her eyes briefly.

"Enough."

No one spoke again.

She picked up a piece of chalk and wrote the title of today's lesson on the blackboard.

Civic responsibility and the city's future.

The funniest thing about Gotham was that it always managed to put the most correct words on display at the most inappropriate times.

Civic responsibility.

The city's future.

Unpaid lunch bills.

All three gathered in one room.

Very educational.

The morning's classes continued to pass peacefully and naturally.

During the first period, someone slept in the back. When Ms. Morris woke him, he said he had worked at a gas station until three that morning.

During the second period, a fight broke out in the hallway. Two security guards rushed over. One student had a split lip, and a small packet of white powder fell from the other student's hand.

During the third period, halfway through the math teacher's lesson, sirens sounded outside the window. Chen Mo was the only person in the class who looked up.

The others didn't even flick an eyelid.

They were used to it.

Gotham students' ability to tune out distractions was absurdly strong.

By lunchtime, the entire school finally came truly alive.

Not from happiness.

From hunger.

There were three lines outside the cafeteria.

One was for hot meals.

One was for cold meals.

One was for "waiting for the system to come back online."

The hot meal line was noticeably shorter.

They held trays with roasted chicken legs, mashed potatoes, vegetables, and a small carton of fruit.

The cold meal line had far more people.

They received sandwiches in plastic containers, the bread hard around the edges and the ham slices so thin they looked like memorial portraits of some kind of meat.

The "waiting for the system to come back online" line was the longest.

Because it held all the students whose cards had insufficient funds, whose information was incorrect, whose eligibility for assistance was pending review, whose proof of household income was missing, or whom the system had simply deemed "ineligible."

Most of the people here were homeless street kids the gangs had rounded up off the streets just a couple of days earlier.

Chen Mo stood at the end of the line, listening to a boy ahead of him argue with a cafeteria worker.

"I handed in the form."

The worker looked down at her screen. "It's not in the system."

"I gave it to the office."

"It's not in the system."

"Then what am I supposed to eat?"

"You can choose an emergency cold meal."

The boy let out a relieved breath. "Then give me one."

The worker paused. "We've run out of emergency cold meals today."

The boy stared at her.

The cafeteria was noisy.

Yet his silence at that moment was frighteningly clear.

After a few seconds, he gave a little laugh.

"So what am I supposed to do now?"

The worker avoided his eyes.

"You can contact your guardian to add funds."

The boy laughed again.

This time, it was quieter.

"My mom got kicked out by the landlord last night. How about you help me contact her and see which bridge she's under and whether she can answer her phone? I only came to this shitty school because Bruce Wayne promised to feed us! He promised us lunch and dinner!"

Someone behind him swore.

"Fuck."

Another person said, "Have Bruce Wayne call his mom. Isn't he responsible for lighting up every corner?"

"Does under a bridge count as a corner?"

"Of course it does. The most fucking typical corner in Gotham."

"Can the Wayne Foundation install Wi-Fi under bridges? Make it easier to top up lunch cards."

"Throw in a QR code too. Scan to claim your daily serving of dignity."

Laughter rose from the line.

It sounded uglier than it had that morning.

Hunger made people's tongues sharper.

Because their stomachs were empty, their words scraped out of their throats like knives.

The boy in front of Chen Mo suddenly turned around.

He looked thin, with dark circles around his eyes and hair so greasy it reflected light.

"You new?"

Chen Mo nodded.

"Yeah."

The boy looked him up and down.

"Got money for food?"

Chen Mo gave it some honest thought.

He had money in his pocket.

There was still a little left from his writing payments.

But that money had to buy dog food for Bruce, patch up his suit, buy compressed biscuits, and last until his next payment.

In Gotham, having money and being able to spend it were two different things.

So Chen Mo said, "In theory."

The boy understood.

He nodded. "So that's a no."

Chen Mo said, "Your translation skills are impressive."

The boy grinned.

"Welcome to the Wayne Education Equality Pilot Project."

He pointed at the promotional screen on the cafeteria wall.

A video was playing on a loop.

Dressed in a suit, Bruce Wayne stood smiling at the camera in a school auditorium so clean and bright it looked like another universe.

"Education should not be determined by background. Every child in Gotham deserves the chance to choose their future."

The applause in the video was enthusiastic.

In the real cafeteria, someone slammed his tray onto the floor because his lunch card wouldn't scan.

Clack.

The plastic tray bounced twice, splashing mashed potatoes onto a nearby student's pant leg.

The cafeteria staff screamed.

Security guards rushed over.

The boy who had thrown the tray was pinned to the floor, his face pressed against greasy tiles.

He cursed as he struggled:

"Choose our future? I can't even fucking choose my lunch right now!"

A guard twisted his arm behind his back.

The boy sucked in a breath from the pain, but he was still laughing.

"Bruce Wayne! Can you hear me? You bastard in a suit! Can your fucking future spare me a bite to eat first?"

The cafeteria erupted.

Some whistled.

Some pounded the tables.

Some joined in shouting, "Wayne! Buy us lunch!"

"Wayne! Buy us lunch!"

"Wayne! Buy us lunch!"

At first, it was a joke.

Soon, its tone changed.

More and more of the poor students joined in.

Not because they actually expected Bruce Wayne to show up.

But because they had finally found a name they could shout.

City Hall was too far removed.

The system was too abstract.

Budget allocation sounded too much like something from a textbook.

But Bruce Wayne's face was right there on the screen.

His name was right there at the school gates.

His foundation's logo was right there on the lunch system's login page.

So they shouted his name.

Cursed him.

Hurled all their anger with nowhere else to go at that handsome, wealthy man who stood smiling on the news.

"Wayne! Buy us lunch!"

"Wayne! Buy us lunch!"

"Wayne! Buy us lunch!"

Standing in the crowd, Chen Mo suddenly felt that this didn't sound like heckling.

It sounded like hunger itself pounding on the tables.

They were just too hungry.

Bruce Wayne had promised to provide two meals through the education system.

"Sigh."

The main reason ninety-nine percent of the students came to school was those two meals.

Most homeless children had no legal status, and with the two formidable buffs of being undocumented immigrants and child laborers, the work they could find was extremely limited.

Chen Mo knew that all too well.

What kids like them earned from a full day's work outside wasn't even enough to buy two meals, so going to school was a better deal by comparison.

That was all there was to it.

The guards dragged the boy outside.

The boy's face scraped against the floor, leaving a red mark, but he was still smiling.

"Tell Bruce Wayne-"

He took a gasping breath.

"Tell him we're grateful for his bronze plaque!"

The crowd laughed again.

Louder this time.

Ms. Morris rushed in through the doorway, looking as grim as if she had just retreated from a lost war.

"Everyone, shut up!"

Her voice was hoarse.

No one quieted down right away.

Not until she rushed up to the boy being dragged away and blocked the guards.

"Let him go."

A guard frowned. "He's disrupting order."

Ms. Morris looked at him.

"He's hungry."

The guard said, "That's not my problem."

Ms. Morris gave a little smile.

It was the same smile the students wore.

Very Gotham.

"Of course it isn't. Nothing that happens here is ever anyone's problem."

The cafeteria fell silent.

Those words were so light.

As light as a sheet of paper.

But when they fell, everyone heard them.

Standing in line, Chen Mo suddenly felt that the little bit of hunger in his stomach was nothing at all.

He knew this feeling all too well.

Having nothing to eat wasn't the most frightening part.

The most frightening part was that everyone knew you had nothing to eat.

The system knew.

The teachers knew.

The guards knew.

The students knew.

But everyone stood at their own post and said:

That's not my problem.

Only Bruce Wayne had stepped forward and said, "This is my problem."

So he was the only one getting cursed.

Chen Mo suddenly raised his head and looked at the box of hot meals behind the cafeteria counter that hadn't been handed out yet.

That box of hot meals was probably reserved for some education committee visiting that afternoon.

Or for certain people who would take pictures.

In any case, it wasn't for the people in this line.

Chen Mo blinked.

Spider-Man shouldn't steal.

Spider-Man shouldn't snatch school lunches, either.

But a friendly neighbor occasionally helping food fulfill its intended social function probably didn't count as stealing.

That was called resource circulation.

A very sophisticated term.

Chen Mo was just about to move when he suddenly felt someone tug his sleeve.

It was Barbara, who had also been silent for a long while.

She lowered her voice. "Don't do anything rash."

Chen Mo looked at her.

Barbara looked him in the eye.

"You've been staring at that box of hot meals. Don't do anything stupid."

Chen Mo smiled. "Do I look like someone who'd do something stupid?"

Barbara was silent for a second.

"Very much so."

Chen Mo said, "..."

His classmates really had sharp eyes.

Was that what you expected from the police commissioner's daughter?

Barbara withdrew her hand and said quietly, "You grab them today, they'll install cameras tomorrow, and the day after that, the school police will get another stun baton. Everyone ends up suffering. This is a structural problem. You can't change it on your own."

Chen Mo paused slightly.

Barbara continued, "If you want to help people, don't charge out like a hero. Heroes only make them increase the budget to buy more expensive locks."

"Do you think your dad and Batman are heroes?"

"They are. That's why the gangs have now learned to use even more violent methods, and Gotham has even more lunatics."

With that, Barbara blinked at Chen Mo. See? You couldn't refute her, and neither could the facts. She was right.

An individual hero couldn't change a collective wrong.