Page 5 of Not Mine To Love

“Oh well, back to minimum wage,” I said forlornly as I guided the car away from the school and toward home.

Home was a very modest, kind of ugly, mustard yellow condo building on the rough side of town. My father had lived there for at least ten years now. The building was kind of rundown and in exchange for rent, my dad did random jobs around the condo for the manager. He was a handyman and sometimes worked retail too when money was tight. Growing up money had always been tight, but I would have rather been poor than live with my mom any day. My mom drove me crazy.

Speaking of which, I hadn’t heard from her in about a month. Thank god. No wonder it had been such a great month. I instantly felt bad for thinking that, but decided to harden my heart a little. She didn’t deserve person of the year or anything. I wondered about my siblings. We weren’t close since they lived so far away, and they were all younger than me. I sent birthday cards and presents when I could, but never heard anything back from them. Sometimes I wondered if my mom even told them about me since she pretended that her first marriage to my father hadn’t really happened. And when I had decided to go live with him after their divorce, she had punished me by not speaking to me for years.

I pushed thoughts of my mom away and made my way toward the unit I shared with my dad. I could see a few of my neighbors lounging on their patios, fiddling with their plants or just enjoying the weather. The neighbors were really nice and most had lived here for years. I was greeted by a group of them sitting in white plastic chairs, playing a game of dominos, in the courtyard that sat directly in the center of the condo’s outdoor space.

Mrs. Nguyen waved to me and greeted me in Vietnamese. She was determined to teach me her native language, but I had barely learned hello. Languages just weren’t my specialty. Honestly, I wasn’t too sure what my specialty was. I was still trying to figure out life.

“Hi, Mrs. Nguyen. Isn’t it a little too hot outside for you?”

She shook her head. “It’s fine. Better the heat than the cold. I hate the cold.” She narrowed her eyes at me and said with a voice full of judgment, “Weren’t you wearing that the other night? You said you were on your way to work. Exactly what type of work do you do, young lady? You’re not one of those sex workers, are ya?” She arched a brow and waited for me to answer.

The others stopped playing dominos and looked toward me waiting for me to confirm probably what they were all suspecting. Great, my neighbors thought I was a prostitute.

I sputtered, “Mrs. Nguyen, of course not. You need to stop watching so much Crime TV.”

She shrugged. “No way. I need to know what’s really going on in the world.” Without another word she turned back to the dominos game along with the others.

I shook my head and heard a laugh near me, “Did Mrs. Nguyen just accuse you of being a prostitute?”

Dad was standing there with the door open. Apparently, he had overheard our conversation. I wasn’t surprised. I was sure the whole condo building had heard our conversation.

“Yes. I’m just going to pretend that never happened.”

He frowned. “That dress is a little too short.”

“Dad,” I whined like a teenager, “it was for work.”

“Maybe you need to find a different job then. You’re a smart girl. There’s no need for you to be doing whatever it is you do...” He paused and said, “What is it that you do again?”

I rolled my eyes and made my way into the condo. He closed the door behind me, and I stomped off into my room and changed clothes. It was hot. I didn’t know how much more of the heat wave I could survive. August sucked.

I came out to join him at the table where he was busy sorting bills. He frowned as he did.

“Bad news?”

“Bills are always bad news.”

He was right about that. We were always on a budget. Money was always tight. I hated checking the mail. I had foolishly taken out student loans for my undergraduate program, and I was kicking myself now for accepting them. I hated debt. I hated not being able to help more with the bills. I felt like I was a burden on my father although I would never tell him that. It would hurt him if he knew I felt that way and since he was my biggest supporter in the world, I would never say or do anything to hurt him.

I sort of felt like it was just me and my dad against the world.

“I should have a check coming in soon,” I said with false cheer. “I ran into my boss at Meredith’s talent show.”

“How was the talent show?” he asked as he looked through the bills, frowning.

“Great,” I said, looking at him. His brows were pinched with worry, and I watched as he scratched at his hairline. He was going bald but was too proud to just completely cut off all his hair, so he just had combed over the bald spot with what little hair lined the top of his head. I had tried to get him to cut it all off when he had first started going bald last year, but he had stubbornly refused.

“Some hair is better than no hair,” was his mantra. I totally disagreed.

“Dad.”

He didn’t answer.

“Dad,” I said again as he frowned at a bill.

“Huh?” He looked up then.