Chapter 12 Breakdown night

Was this fate or was it coincidence? Mario had no idea but all he knew was that he was standing right in front of the lady that said things that no girl had ever said to him before.

"So it is you." Mario started, taking a few steps towards her. "I thought as much. From the time I saw you at the elevator, I suspected that I had seen you somewhere. Too bad we are meeting at a hospital. It will be rather harsh of me to speak vile words as you did to me that day in a place like this."

"Don't you have respect for people? Can't you see that I am not in a good mood. I just came out of my father's room and here you are trying to make my day worse than it is. Do not speak to me again." Her eyes were already red as she had already cried while in the room with her father and her face was mean, then she walked out on him, again.

Mario didn't know what it was but he felt a stroke of pain hit him in his heart when she spoke to him. Today it was different -- unlike the other day at the event, he was able to feel something while someone spoke to him and considering the fact that she was a total stranger, he wondered why.

...

Peace soon returned to her work place to continue her work but on her counter was a letter. She peeped at the caption which was titled SACK LETTER in capital letters, then she turned to the other side of the paper and saw that it was her name written on it. 

"What's going on?" She muttered to herself before opening the letter to read the contents. After reading the contents of the letter, she discovered that her boss had fired her after she had left. She was still in the process of taking it all in when the staff door opened and another lady came out of there alongside her boss. She wore her apron and then went to stand at her table.

On sighting Peace, her boss greeted, "Oh! You're here. Welcome back or should I not say welcome back? Anyways I'm sure that you have seen the sack letter. I don't know what it was that made you abandon your duties but as you can see you have already been replaced. Your paycheck will be sent to you a few days from now and that is going to be out of my own benevolence. Feel free to come in at anytime to grab a burger or whatever but until then, have a nice day." As he said that, he tapped her on the shoulder and then left through the entrance door. 

Peace could not believe her ears. Was this what humanity was really about? How could he not even give her the chance to explain herself? He didn't even know what happened and what made her leave so urgently and instead of waiting to hear what the problem was, he sacked her instead. She knew the hurdles she went through before she found that job and now that she needed it the most, she lost it. 

She threw a brief glance at the one that her boss had brought to replace her and she wasn't surprised to see that she was all smiles. She only scoffed as she had no words for her at that moment. She just took her letter and left the place immediately.

The sun disappeared from the sky and the clouds drew closer in darkness. Peace walked along the road side frustrated and devastated by her present situation, she even had no will to board a taxi and go home.

Life was beginning to revisit her with pains and difficulties again and she had no idea if she was able to pull through with it this time. She remembered the words of the doctor before coming back to that godforsaken Burger Store.

"Your father's condition is worsening and he needs to undergo a major chemotherapeutic treatment. There is only little that this hospital can do. We will try our best to save his life but you will have to work hard to ensure that it all goes successfully."

Of course they were referring to his bills. As per the foundation that the hospital was built on, The People's Welfare Org took care of one quarter of each patient's bill while the rest of the payment would be handled by the patient's family or guardian if there be any and if there was none, they would be relocated to a low grade hospital which of course she wouldn't want for her father.

Peace knew that she had to do something and she had to do it pretty fast. The kids. The orphanage home. They needed maintenance and with her father down, she didn't know how she would settle up for everything. Even the staff would be expecting their payments and unfortunately... In fact she didn't want to reason towards that area unless she would break down.

As soon as she got home that night, it was then that she felt how hot her body was. She took off her clothes, leaving herself in a bra and panty then she turned on the cold shower and sat under the drizzling water. The cold hit of the water on her skin was still not enough to drench away the hotness that she was feeling inside her body. Tears built up from her insides and soon, it began to flow from her eyes, blending with the downpour of water from the host.

...

A few more hours later when Peace was more settled in on her bed all dried and wrapped up in a towel, she began to scroll through her phone looking for job vacancies. Most of the jobs that were available were mostly motel jobs and she wasn't a fan of such. There were more decent ones like cleaners and salespeople but their pay wasn't so good and the distance from her house to the work place was more outrageous than anything else. But then she saw one that looked to be fair enough -- A bartender job and it was at one of the luxurious nightclubs in Vegas. It wasn't so far from her home and the eye catching part was the pay. It was a whopping four hundred dollars per night. She had never seen such a pay in her entire life and without wasting any time, she clicked on the Apply button. She filled in her necessary details and submitted it to their website and then dropped her phone by her side and stared at the ceiling. 

It hadn't been up to an hour since she submitted her application when she heard her phone buzz. She recognized this buzz because it was only her Gmail notifications that came in with such buzz. From the screen she saw that it was an email from Santana Night Club and she was ecstatic to open though not knowing what she would see there.

It came as a surprise after she had opened the email and saw that she had been employed and she was to resume work the following night by 8pm.