A Deity’s Wish

On my first day as the City Goddess, a half-grown boy came to offer me incense. “Make my father meddle in my life less!” So I kept his father busy with business, leaving him no time to press the boy to study. Then his grandfather arrived, wielding an enormous sandalwood ruler. After the beating, the boy limped back into my City God Temple. I quietly poked my head out and saw him baring his teeth as he complained, “What a lousy deity!” I could not stop myself from muttering, “I am not lousy.”