Chapter 9 - The Work Note I Folded Twice
I got to the urgent care parking lot before the sun was fully up. The asphalt was still dark with overnight damp, and the fluorescent sign buzzed over the glass doors. I sat in my car for a minute with the engine off, my clean uniform folded over the passenger seat, my purse heavy on my lap.
I had changed in the parking lot. I hadn't wanted Marta to see me walk in wearing last night's uniform. The new shirt still smelled like detergent. My hair was pulled back again, damp at the edges where I'd splashed water on my face in the staff bathroom. My hands shook when I tried to smooth the black trim at my sleeves.
That morning I told myself this would be simple. Get proof. Get cleared. Get back before anyone counted my absence.
Inside, the waiting room was empty except for a man coughing into his elbow and a TV playing the local news on mute. The receptionist slid a clipboard toward me without looking up. I filled in my name, my address, the apartment number I shared with two other girls to make rent. Under employer, I wrote Russo Housekeeping, then crossed it out and wrote private housekeeping. Under reason for visit, I wrote dizzy and sick to my stomach.
I paid the intake fee with the cash I'd set aside for groceries. That was the first scene I kept replaying later. The way the bills stuck together. The way I counted them twice.
The nurse called me back twenty minutes later. She was older, maybe fifty, short graying hair under a scrub cap, reading glasses on a chain. Her name tag said Denise.
"Blood pressure's low," she said, after the cuff deflated. She wrote it down. "Ninety over sixty. You've got a fever, honey. A hundred point one. When did this start?"
"Last night," I said. My voice sounded thin in the small exam room. "I got dizzy at work. Then I threw up. Then I just — I went down."
She nodded and made a note. She didn't look alarmed, which made me feel both relieved and stupid for coming in.
"Any fluids since then?" she asked.
"A glass of water," I said. "Someone gave me water."
The doctor came in after that, a young guy who didn't sit down. He listened to my chest, pressed on my stomach, looked in my throat and shined a light in my eyes until I blinked. He asked if I was pregnant. I said no. He asked if I'd eaten that day. I said a granola bar.
"Classic dehydration with a viral thing on top," he said. "Fever, low BP, vomiting. You're run down. Have you been sleeping? Working a lot of hours?"
I nodded. That felt safer than explaining.
He typed while he talked. "I'm documenting dehydration, low blood pressure, fever. Nothing that needs the ER. Rest, fluids, light duty for two days. No heavy lifting, no long standing in heat."
Light duty. The words landed hard. I thought of the laundry carts, the stairs, the marble bathrooms that needed scrubbing on my knees.
Denise came back with the printed papers while I was still sitting on the paper-covered table in my uniform pants, my shoes on the tile floor. She handed me two sheets. One was the visit summary with the diagnosis typed clean. The other was the bill.
"This is your copay balance after intake," she said. "You can set up payments at the front if you need to."
I stared at the number. It wasn't huge to some people. To me it was half a week's pay. My rent share was due Friday. If I took two days off, I wouldn't cover both.
Denise must have seen my face, because her voice softened. She pulled the stool closer.
"Can I ask — where did you collapse?" she said. "At home? At work? We like to note it for the record."
I hesitated. My mouth opened and nothing came out for a second. The exam room suddenly felt too bright, the paper crinkling under my hands.
"At work," I said finally. "In a — in a bedroom I was cleaning. Upstairs."
She waited, pen hovering. "Did someone find you? Did you hit your head?"
I looked down at my hands. I could see the glass of water again, the way I'd held it with both hands. I could hear him saying my name.
"Someone helped me," I said. "I didn't hit my head. I just needed to sit down."
It wasn't a lie, but it wasn't the whole thing either. I couldn't say I'd woken up barefoot in Mr. Russo's bed with white sheets. I couldn't say he'd been reclining there watching me. Denise would have written something else down, or looked at me different, and I needed that paper to stay clean.
She wrote helped by coworker and I didn't correct her. I hated myself a little for letting it stand.
"And this work note," she said, printing a third slip. "Light duty for forty-eight hours. You give this to your supervisor. They have to honor it."
She held it out. I took it and folded it once, then again, until it was small enough to fit in the side pocket of my purse where I kept tips.
I knew in that moment I wasn't going to turn it in yet. Not until I figured out rent. If I handed that note to my supervisor that morning, they'd send me home or stick me on folding rags for half pay. Marta was already on thin ice. If I went light duty, someone else would have to cover my rooms, and they'd ask why. They'd ask where I'd been for that missing hour last night.
I stood up and slung my purse over my shoulder. The visit summary with dehydration, fever, low blood pressure was in there too. That one I would keep. That was proof I hadn't made it up. That was proof I was sick and dizzy, just like I'd said to him.
At the front desk I set up the payment plan. Twenty dollars now, the rest in two weeks. The receptionist stapled the receipt to my bag without looking up.
May you like
Outside, the parking lot was full daylight now. Cars pulling into the diner next door. A bus hissing down the road. I sat back in my car and unfolded the work note once to reread it, then folded it twice again and zipped it shut.
I was cleared to light duty. I had the paper to prove I was sick. But nobody at the house was going to see it until I knew I could still make rent.
