Heat burned behind my eyes. “I’ve been working nonstop for you,” I said softly. “For both of you.”
Mom rolled her eyes and brushed past me into the kitchen. When I followed, still trying to reason with her, she grabbed a mug from the counter, half-filled with lukewarm coffee. “I said we’re done,” she yelled, and with a sharp twist of her wrist, she flung the coffee straight at my chest.
The mug shattered in the sink as the liquid soaked into my scrubs, hot and bitter. Mia laughed from the doorway, amused. Mom gestured toward the trash bag on the floor like a judge handing down a sentence.
“Get out, Lauren,” she said. “Tonight.”
I left that evening with a trash bag slung over my shoulder and coffee stiffening on my scrubs. The October air sliced through the thin fabric as Mom slammed the door behind me. Mia stood at my old window, phone raised in her hand. I climbed into my dented Honda, stared at the house for three seconds, then drove to the only place that still felt like mine: the hospital.
My charge nurse, Jessica Moore, was wrapping up charts when I stepped into the night-shift office. “Parker, you look wrecked,” she said. In the break room, I told her everything—how I’d covered the rent and Mia’s tuition, how my room had been cleared out, how Mom threw coffee when I asked why. Jess listened, her jaw tight.
