“Is there anything we can do for you?” he asks, peering at me with concern, perhaps watching my face for signs of an imminent explosion.

Ava, it always comes back to my daughter. If it weren’t for her, I probably would have just nodded at the dismissal. Take it graciously like I try to do with everything life throws my way, like I’d been taught at a young age. Never let them see you cry; never let them see you as anything but perfectly appropriate. Suck it up and carry on, a vision of cool.

But my life at the moment isn’t cool and there isn’t a single appropriate thing about it. My rent at my shitty apartment recently increased. My car needs a part I can’t afford, so it just sits on the curb collecting rust from San Francisco’s eternal mist, and Ava has been increasingly sick lately. Nothing to worry about, the doctor says, just lethargic on some days but I’ve got an endless supply of worry for my kiddo and not always enough money to pay for a doctor’s visit. Not to mention a pretty useless doctor at that. I was counting on that goddamn medical insurance for her, not for me.

And so, like Bruce Banner when he turns into the Hulk – minus the shirt-ripping – I let it all unleash on my unsuspecting ex-boss. For three months I have been prim and proper and yes sir, no sir, running around all the stores like an overworked slave, all while keeping a big smile on my face. Never let them see you sweat. Always keep your cool.

Fuck that.

I’m not even sure what to say. It’s like I go into some deep, black pit of pent-up resentment. I think I even blackout for a moment. All I know is that when I realize what I’m doing, I’m standing up, my finger jabbing in the air towards my ex-boss, and I’m spewing a load of obscenities.

“You know if you had just fucked me over sideways, that would have been fine. But you’re hurting my daughter by doing this. How dare you just toss me aside a week before my health insurance kicked in!” I yell at him. “Don’t you have a damn heart?”

But from the way Ross calmly picks up his phone and asks his assistant, Meredith, to come in the room as if I need to be escorted out, I can see he doesn’t have a heart at all.

Meredith has never liked me and the last thing I need is her gloating, so I hightail it out of his office before she can get a glimpse of my red and distraught face. I quickly gather my purse from my cubby in the staffroom, grateful for once that while I was the company’s visual stylist for the past three months, I never had a desk of my own. What a pain that would be to clean out.

I don’t even say goodbye to Priscilla, the buyer whom I’d become somewhat close with, or Tabby, the regional merchandiser, someone whose job I hoped to have one day. I’m just too ashamed to tell them what just happened and I feel worse when I suspect maybe they knew all along.

When I first got the job for the popular yoga clothing chain, Rusk, I thought I’d finally made it. I’d spent enough time taking two steps forward and one step backward. The city doesn’t always make it easy on you, no matter what industry you’re in. And fashion is definitely one of the more challenging ones.

I went to college with Stephanie at the Art Institute in downtown San Francisco, connecting with her after being decades apart. I grew up near Steph in Petaluma, a town north of the city, and I knew her in grade school until my parents got divorced and I moved with my mom to the Pacific Heights in San Francisco to live with her terribly rich new husband. Long story short, after spending high school with the rich kids – and being one of the rich kids – I enrolled myself in college, wanting to do something with my passion for fashion. After all, the garments I designed and made in my spare time, ones with screen-printed graphics and kooky phrases, would never grant me an income or a career. They were good but not “that good” (as my ex-stepfather had pointed out). So, I thought a career in fashion merchandising would be the next best thing.

And it was. I mean, school was amazing. I finally felt in my element, surrounded by people who understood my passion, who “got” me. But finding jobs after school wasn’t so easy. And even though I managed to snag a few internships in some pretty important places (Banana Republic being one of them), I struggled to find a job that was related to my field and paid enough to give Ava everything she needed.

That’s usually what it came down to, my daughter. Her arrival was a curveball to my perfectly crafted life but I took it in stride, determined to love her. And I do, with all my heart. I never regretted keeping her for a second. But it was Phil, my baby daddy’s leaving that really undid me. And after that, everything just kind of kept falling apart. Me and Ava against the world.

One day, though, while I was still with Phil, I thought my prayers had been answered. I had gotten a job at an online jewelry store as the copywriter and buyer. It was actually pretty amazing. The pay was excellent and all signs pointed to a long and promising career. But online retail is a cutthroat and fickle industry, so after a couple of years the site went bankrupt. I was out of a job. Then I was out of a boyfriend. Then my mother cheated on her new husband and, thanks to the indemnity clause, I was out of any extra financial support as I bounced around the city from a nice apartment to a so-so studio to a run-down in the sketchy Tenderloin district trying to find work again in the industry.

Finally, after a yearlong maternity leave stint as a sales clerk in the Nordstrom shoe department (not at all what I wanted to do but it paid the bills), I came across the position at Rusk. I thought I found something that would kindle my passion while providing the financial support I wanted for Ava. It’s not that she asked for anything, but I wanted to be able to give her whatever she desired. I’d do anything for her including working my ass off just so she could have all of life’s opportunities.

Rusk promised a great career in visual merchandising and an amazing paycheck with fabulous benefits. Even though my probationary salary was barely above minimum wage, I was fueled by their beautiful promises. I quit Nordstrom and jumped at the chance. I really thought everything would change.

And it did. For the worst. Now…now I’m hurrying past the people on Sutter Street on the verge of a panic attack. Every person’s face is a blank blur and my vision occasionally clouds over as tears swarm my eyes, hot and potent. They never fall, though. That has to mean something. That I’m a trooper. That I will get past this.

I will find another job. I will find another chance.

Sometimes I feel life is just one episode after another of trying to find another way. I wonder what happens when you discover there is no other way this time.

I make my way down Leavenworth as the streets become a little less clean and the people a little less friendly. Or too friendly, depending on how you look at it. The same man with his toothless smile asks me for change outside a liquor store, but today I don’t spare him a cent. I just keep my head down and brush through the riff raff of the neighborhood, a place I’ve resented ever since it became my only option in this high-priced city until I’m unlocking the door into the lobby of the apartment building.

Pausing, I stare at the door just as I’m about to close it behind me. The door is glass and there are long vertical bars on the windows, indicative of the neighborhood. I remember when Phil moved out and I lost my job at the online retailer, how I could no longer afford to live in Noe Valley, a gorgeous neighborhood next to the Castro. That apartment was everything to me but there was no way I could afford to live there on my own while supporting Ava. The two of us bounced from apartment to apartment, the standards of living slipping each time, until I found myself staring up at the bruised façade of this building, both hoping I could get an apartment and promising myself I’d move us out of there the first chance I got.