The stories were good.
The songs were better.
But neither would put coin in my pocket anytime soon. Stories needed printing. Songs needed instruments, singers, a way to spread.
I needed now money.
That meant one thing: a classic kid hustle.
Feed people.
Or, more accurately — sell them something so sweet it'd make your teeth ache for a week.
Peanut brittle fit the bill. It was cheap, it kept well, and unlike lemonade or cider, I didn't have to worry about hauling a bucket of liquid through the streets in February chill.
---
The first step was supplies.
In an orphanage, "supplies" meant whatever I could get without tripping suspicion. That's where the other kids came in.
Ryo, with his gap-toothed grin, could talk the kitchen staff into giving him the last of the peanuts "before they went stale."
Mika, who could slip through the laundry window like smoke, ferried me scraps of wax paper.
And little Tomi… Tomi just had the eyes. No one could tell him no, so I sent him for the sugar.
In the evenings, we'd gather in the old storage shed. I'd stand on a stool, stirring the pot with the biggest wooden spoon we had, feeling the sugar melt and hiss into molten gold. The scent was a weapon in itself — warm, roasted, a promise.
When the brittle cooled and cracked, I broke it into jagged amber shards, wrapping them in the paper Mika brought.
---
Selling was the easy part.
We didn't waste time on kids — they never had more than lint and pebbles in their pockets. Adults, though? Adults paid to shut kids up, or keep them sweet.
Market street was our hunting ground. The air there always smelled of grilled fish, oil, and too many bodies pressed together. I stationed the others at corners, but I took the main drag myself.
It wasn't long before I spotted my ideal customers: two chunin, uniforms loose and sleeves rolled to the elbows, waiting for skewers at a food stand.
"Fweeeesh pee-nuh bittle!" I piped, holding up the packet so the light caught the glossy brown surface. "Sweet 'nuff make you fo-get!"
One of them snorted, but the other tossed me a coin without a word. I caught it, dropped a brittle shard into his hand, and moved on before he could change his mind.
---
A tailor with a pin-cushion wrist paused outside her shop, bolts of bright cloth stacked in the window behind her. The faint tang of dye followed her like perfume.
"What's this, little one?" she asked.
"Cwunchy suga peanuts!" I announced proudly. "Yummy yum!"
She laughed, bought two packets, and pinched my cheek like I'd just solved world hunger.
---
A middle-aged man with the scowl of someone born angry waved me over.
"How much?"
"One monny, big piece!" I said, stretching my arms wide to demonstrate size.
He grunted, bought one, bit into it… and paused just long enough to give me the smallest nod before walking away. For him, that probably counted as a rave review.
---
Halfway through the day, I stopped to warm my hands on a brazier outside a tea shop. That's when I heard it — two merchants, leaning close over their steaming cups.
"…found him wandering the school yard after dark," one said.
"Drunk?"
"Had to be. Slurring, stumbling. We chased him off, told him not to come back."
The other shook his head. "Some people."
They laughed, and the conversation drifted to weather and shipping.
I kept my head down, eyes on the fire. A drunk drifter didn't sound like my problem — but I filed it away anyway.
---
By sundown, I'd sold every shard. My pockets clinked when I walked back to the orphanage, the coins warm from my body heat.
The brittle plan was only step one. With more supplies, I could branch out. Cookies. Cider. Maybe even a little eggnog if I could sweet-talk the right cook.
And if the stories and songs ever hit the streets?
Then I'd be cooking with gas.