I kept one of the eggs from our closed restaurant

Dear Delyara, Tonight we closed the family restaurant my parents opened in 1986. Rising rent, electricity, and food costs finally did what bad reviews, recessions, and a kitchen fire could not. We served the last customers, cleaned the grill, emptied the refrigerator, and divided the remaining food among staff. At the bottom of one tray were six eggs. My father took five home. I kept one. It is in my coat pocket now, wrapped in a paper napkin, although I know that is foolish and may end badly. When I was a child, my mother would crack eggs one-handed while taking orders over the phone. She taught me that the sound changed when the shell was old. I learned to cook before I learned multiplication. Tonight, after locking the door, my father kissed the metal shutter and immediately pretended he had only leaned close to check the lock. We walked away separately because none of us wanted to be witnessed crying. The egg is not a symbol to anyone else. It is breakfast, inventory, something perishable. Perhaps that is why I took it. The restaurant is gone, but tomorrow morning I can still break one small thing from that kitchen into a pan and hear the same sound my mother taught me to recognise.