Callie
It’s almost eight in the evening when I finally peel myself away from Grandma’s bedside. I’d stay longer, but my manager has offered me a night shift on overtime, and God knows I need the money.
The nurses have been trying to get rid of me for most of the day. I heard them talking about how I’m interfering in my grandmother’s care. But how can I not? How can I leave the woman who raised me to be cared for by strangers who don’t even know her. I wish I could have kept her home, but after she left the house in the middle of the night and I spent hours driving around searching for her and calling hospitals, I knew it was too unsafe. I knew she needed more than I could give her.
Sometimes I wonder who I might’ve been if life hadn’t shifted the ground beneath my feet so early. If Mom hadn’t gotten sick and slipped away before I learned how to live without her. If the father whose name I don’t even know had ever bothered to look for me.
Gran took me in when I was eight, brought me to live with her in Las Vegas with nothing but a backpack full of clothes and a heart full of grief. She worked the front desk of a hotel until her memory gave out, and then it was my turn to take care of her.
High school became half-days, then no days at all. While everyone else was choosing colleges and futures, I was learninghow to translate medical forms and count pills into tiny plastic containers. I traded diplomas and dreams for the only family I had left. And I’d do it all over again… even if it means the rest of the world sees me as just another cocktail waitress in a casino.
The cold rush of Vegas night air hits me as I step off the bus and into the neon glow of the Strip. Every billboard screams luxury, sin, wealth… everything I don’t have. I tug my uniform top higher over my cleavage and hurry toward the staff entrance of Korolyov Hotel and Casino.
Just a shift. Get through the shift. Then you can rest.
Inside, bright lights and pulsing music swallow me whole. People want to believe Las Vegas is magic, and maybe it is. But the real magic happens behind the glossy walls, where debts are collected, secrets are buried, and where the house always wins.
I keep my head down as I pass the glitzy shops, dark bars and velvet-roped lounges, but a few patrons glance my way. Not at my face, of course. The uniform is designed for attention, which means I spend hours pretending I don’t feel the hungry gazes crawling along my thighs and cleavage. I’m a walking reminder that in this city, even bodies are currency.
What would my life have been if Grandma hadn’t gotten sick? If I’d gotten into the art program I dreamed about. If I hadn’t traded pencils and paint for cocktail trays and aching feet.
I could be sketching in some sun-lit studio, not praying that the tips will be good enough to keep the care home from calling me about late fees again.
But this is what life does. It takes what you love, and it asks how much more you’re willing to lose.
A woman at a slot machine accidentally spills her drink as I walk by, and I crouch instantly, wiping up the sticky mess while she barely notices me. The ice bites my fingertips, anda headache throbs behind my right eye. One of those slow-building ones that comes from too little sleep, even less food, and too much worry.
I’m terrified all the time.
Terrified of Grandma slipping away when I’m not there. Terrified this job isn’t enough to keep the bills paid. Terrified that I am not enough.
But I keep going because she used to tell me, “You’re tougher than you think, Callie-girl.” She believed in a version of me I’ve never quite managed to find.
“Keep moving,” I whisper under my breath like a prayer only I can hear. “Just keep moving.”
The tray gets heavier the longer I carry it. The noise gets sharper. My chest gets tighter. And I know, if anything happens to Grandma because I didn’t do enough, I’ll never forgive myself.
Working overnight is extra pay, but tips can be harder to come by unless there’s a party happening. I’m three hours into my nine-hour shift when I slip into the utility closet to take off my heels and rub my aching feet. I allow myself exactly sixty seconds before returning to the bar to collect more drinks.
“Callie!” my supervisor barks. “Delivery to the high-rollers suite, then lounge service.”
Only another two hours and I can take a break. Call the nurses to make sure one of them has checked in on Grandma. But until then I’m just another waitress in a too-tight uniform, carrying trays of drinks for people who wouldn’t blink if I vanished.
I plaster on a smile that doesn’t reach my eyes and weave through the maze of machines, winding my way toward the private elevators. The tray in my hands shakes slightly. I blame the three hours of sleep and the memory of Grandma’s thin, fragile fingers curling around mine.
You’re going to be okay, I told her.
But I don’t know if that’s a promise or a lie.
I drop the first drinks off to the high-rollers suite to men who can’t even take the time to look up from their hands, never mind thank me or tip me. I smile anyway and leave quietly, squashing the urge to reveal what cards they are each holding. I’d probably get fired for that, or worse, knowing how seriously some of these people take their gambling.
I turn towards the lounges, but the hallway ahead is quieter than it should be. No security here. No staff. Just an eerie hush that prickles down my spine.
I must have taken a wrong turn somewhere.
Shit.
I spin, scanning dull concrete walls instead of the usual polished marble. The casino’s backstage veins, where only the people who belong here walk. And I don’t belong here.
