Chapter 10 - The Morning Shift List
My phone buzzed at 6:14 in the morning and I knew before I looked that it wasn't good news.
I was sitting at the little table in my apartment with my hair still damp from the shower, wearing a dry T-shirt and sweatpants. The blazer and blue shirt were hanging over the shower rod, stiff and smelling faintly of chlorine despite the rinse I'd given them at the laundromat. The black phone was charging next to my toast. The backup drive was in my bag. When the screen lit up, it said Temp Assignments - Morning Shift List, and then a second text came right under it.
Please call office before 8am re client feedback - M. Delgado
I stared at those words until the toast went cold. Client feedback. That was the phrase they used when a hotel said you were slow or a caterer said you disappeared on break. Not when you'd been pushed into a rooftop pool in front of donors.
I called back at 6:40. My hands were shaking and I hated that.
"Hi, this is Elena Ruiz," I said when a woman picked up. "I got a text from Ms. Delgado?"
"Hold for Marisol," she said.
I listened to hold music and the drip of my shower faucet. Then a new voice came on, brisk but not unkind.
"Elena, thanks for calling. I have a complaint logged from last night's Foundation event," Marisol Delgado said. "They report dress code and conduct issue, guest disruption by the pool area. Client requests removal from future Foundation shifts. I need your side before I update your file."
My throat tightened. "Ms. Delgado, I didn't cause a disruption. I was knocked into the pool while I was carrying a tray. My whole uniform got soaked. I climbed out and stayed at the edge."
There was a pause and keyboard clicking.
"Did you leave your post to use a personal phone on the terrace?" she asked.
"I used my phone after I got out," I said. "I felt unsafe. I documented it."
"Okay," she said. "Come in today at eleven. Bring your ID badge. We need to talk in person about next steps and whether we can keep you eligible for downtown placements."
After she hung up, I sat there with the dial tone gone and the rent notice stuck to my fridge in my peripheral vision. Removal from future Foundation shifts meant losing the best-paying client on the list. Downtown placements were fourteen dollars more per night than the warehouse banquets out by the highway.
My sister Carla called at seven-thirty on her way to drop her kids at school. I told her everything in a rush — the call, the complaint, the photos I'd taken of the wet uniform at the laundromat.
"They're going to cut you loose to keep the contract," she said bluntly. I could hear turn-signal clicking. "That's what they do."
"I know," I said. "I don't know if I should file something formal. Or go to the police. Or just let it go and try to keep the job."
"Don't go to the cops yet," Carla said. "Not unless you want this to turn into something you can't control. HR first. Paper trail. You tell the agency exactly what happened, in writing, with dates. You keep a copy. If they bury it, then you think about police."
"But what if writing it down makes it worse?" I asked. "What if Marisol just files it and the Foundation says I'm lying and I'm blacklisted everywhere?"
"And what if you say nothing and they already wrote you up as the problem?" she said. "Honey, you already took the pictures. You already saved the video. Don't post it. Don't send it to some news page. That feels good for a day and then you have no job and no case. Do it clean."
I looked at my phone on the charger. The night before I'd stared at the upload button for a long time at the laundromat and closed the app. She was right. I didn't want it to go viral. I wanted my shifts back.
"I'll go in at eleven," I said.
"Wear something nice," Carla said. "Take the photos. Don't cry in there if you can help it. Write it down plain."
The staffing office was in a low brick building off the highway access road, between a donut shop and a tax office. Inside it smelled like coffee and copier toner. A dry-erase board listed the week's shifts in blue marker. My name wasn't on the morning shift list anymore. Someone had wiped it and written ON HOLD in its place.
Marisol Delgado was in her forties, dark hair in a bun, a headset around her neck. She waved me to a small conference room with a plastic plant and a folder already on the table with my name on it.
She slid a printed email across to me. It was short. Staff member in gray blazer seen in pool and using phone waterside, unprofessional appearance, client requests no return. No mention of how I got in the water. No mention of the blonde woman laughing.
"That's not complete," I said. My voice sounded smaller than I wanted. I cleared my throat. "Can I show you something?"
I laid out my own prints on the table next to her folder — the time-stamped photos from the laundromat of the soaked blazer and shirt, the badge, my waterlogged shoes. I didn't show the video. Not yet.
"I was carrying a tray near the pool when I was shoved from the side," I said. "I went in fully dressed. I got myself out. I stood by the edge and used my phone to record what had just happened and who was there. I didn't approach guests. I didn't argue. I stayed composed because I needed this job."
Marisol studied the photos for a long time. She picked up one of the badge close-up.
"You kept working after?" she asked.
"I finished until the captain cut my shift," I said. "I turned in my tray. I left quietly."
She leaned back. "Elena, I believe something happened to you. But you need to understand my position. The Foundation is forty percent of our evening business. If I fight them, I risk shifts for thirty other girls."
"I understand," I said, because I did. "I'm not asking you to fight them. I'm asking to file a written incident report. What happened, what time, where, what I was wearing. That I was removed from the list after reporting an unsafe condition. I want it in my file."
She tapped her pen. "You could also sign a conduct acknowledgment and we try to place you at the north hotels next week. No report, no flag. Faster money."
For a second I almost said yes. Rent. Gas. The empty shift board with my name wiped off. Faster money sounded like breathing again.
But then I thought about standing in wet clothes at the pool edge holding that phone with both hands, deciding to press save. If I signed that paper, it would say I agreed I was the problem.
"No," I said. "I want the report. I won't post anything online. I won't talk to the press. I just want a formal record that I was put in that pool and then penalized for it."
Marisol looked at me, then opened her laptop and pulled up a form. She typed while I talked — date, location, rooftop terrace, approximately 9:40 p.m.,527 tower, gray blazer and employee badge, fell/forced into illuminated pool, exited unassisted, used personal phone to document, shift ended early. She printed two copies.
"Read it before you sign," she said.
I read every line twice. My hand was steady when I signed. She stamped both copies and handed one to me. The ink was still wet.
"I'll open an inquiry," she said quietly. "I have to notify Foundation operations that a formal report was filed by assigned staff regarding last night. They won't like it. But it's logged now. Keep your photos and your original files somewhere safe."
May you like
I folded my copy and put it in my bag next to the backup drive. "Thank you," I said.
Outside, the highway hummed and the donut shop neon buzzed. I hadn't gotten my shifts back. I might have lost more. But walking to my car, I felt the weight shift from my chest to my hands — something written, dated, stamped, that couldn't be wiped off a board like my name had been.
