Cynda and the City Doctor: 50 Loving States, Missouri

“I know you hear me. Slow down, Rhys. Hold on!”

If anything, my words only make him walk faster. And I have to put more cardio than I’m used to these days into running fast enough to catch up with him.

I’m out of breath by the time I jump in front of him. “Wait, Rhys! Please listen to me. I’ve got two step-siblings depending on me. I need this job. So please don’t do this. Don’t fire me. I’m begging you.”

He looks down at me for a long, hard moment.

Then he hands me back a smile so cold, it chills me to the bone. “Thank you for begging. It makes my revenge that much sweeter. Now out of my way.”

I draw back, nearly choking on outrage.

“So this is about revenge?” I ask him. “Why? Because of that fling we had three years ago? How are you not over that?”

Rhys jerks, like I slapped him instead of asking him some perfectly reasonable questions about his completely insane actions.

Then he pushes past me. Again.

This time I don’t bother to run after him.

Oh, God, what just happened?

The answer to that question whips back into my face along with the cold March wind.

I’ve been fired.

And as for my beloved father’s practice…

My extremely bitter ex owns it now.

After my showdown with Rhys, I immediately head across town to Guadalajara Baptist Hospital to apply for a job. Thank goodness for GuacBap as us Guacamoles call it.

When I decided to stay on in Guadalajara after my father’s death, I made a conscious decision to work for Dr. Haim instead of applying there. The pay was much, much shittier, but it was my father’s practice. Also, Dr. Haim ended his office hours at four unless there was an unexpected emergency, which meant I had more time to spend with the twins after they got home from school. Besides GuacBap was all the way on the opposite side of town, which meant I’d never be able to walk to work. I figured a job at the hospital would always be there if I needed it.

And now I needed it.

Driving over there, I’m a little happy Rhys fired me. I wouldn’t have wanted to work with his crazy behind anyway. And the hospital’s pay scale for RNs was almost double what I made with Dr. Haim. A job with GuacBap would mean I’d be able to save enough money for the apartment in Pittsburgh and pay all our bills for as long as it took for me to sell the house.

Take that Rhys! I thought to myself as I strode through the hospital’s sliding doors.

But as it turns out, I was wrong about how easy it would be to score a job at the only hospital between my house and St. Louis.

“Sorry, girl,” my friend Yolanda told me as soon as I asked her if there was anything available.

Yolanda and I had attended school together all the way from first grade to high school, and we’d even roomed together when we both moved to St. Louis to attend SLU’s School of Nursing.

Technically, she worked in Case Management, not the Emergency Department. But us Black Guacs tended to bypass pesky little obstacles like HR and go straight to our longtime friends for the hook up when it came to jobs. “You know, normally I’d make sure your application went straight to the top of the pile, but with this COVID mess on, there’s been a hiring freeze. So far nobody here has it…”

“That we know of,” I feel obligated to point out.

“That’s for sure right,” Yolanda agrees, raising a church hand. “But everybody’s afraid to come to the hospital because they don’t want to get it. And for all we know, they’ll be calling all our behinds into St. Louis if there’s a huge outbreak there. So right now the administration’s answer to all that uncertainty is not hiring anybody till we get these patient numbers up. But if I hear of something, you know you’ll be my first call.”

I thank her and promise to send her my resume. Then I trudge back out to my car. What am I going to do?

The sound of a horn interrupts my self-pity party, just as I’m reaching for my door handle.

“Hey, Princess Missouri, what you doing on this side of town?”

I look up to find Mavis, an organic farmer who lives about forty miles outside of town, leaning out the window of her old Chevy truck like she can’t wait to hear my answer. Over the years, I’ve become used to seeing the older Black woman at least once a month while assisting Dr. Haim on the Saturday rounds for the farmers who live way outside of town. And I know for a fact that she’s in her late sixties. But she’s wearing a long curly red wig underneath her bandana, and that makes her look decades younger.