Notes: Nina is 18 at the beginning of the chapter, it ends about a month after she turns 19.

Gloria is 22


Nina glared at her reflection in the mirror. She looked thin, tired, and ridiculous in her new In 'N' Out uniform. She was pretty sure that the image before her was not what anyone back home pictured when they told her she was going to change the world. Nonetheless, it couldn't be helped. Money was needed to eat and books alone were more than a thousand dollars, not to mention room and board which wasn't covered by her scholarship. Reluctantly packing her textbook for the train, Nina took a deep breath and made her way to her first day at work.

It was horrible.

She smelled of grease, people were rude, they didn't close until 1:30 in the morning, meaning she worked until 2:30 and she was pretty sure her manager was a pervert. " Pacencia y fe," she told herself as she lay in bed, thankful for her roommate's active social calendar which often left her alone at night. With only a few hours before her 6:00 am shift at the local gym, one of the few twenty-four-hour places in the area, she needed all the peace and quiet she could get.

The blaring of her cell phone woke Nina from her restless sleep. Looking at the caller ID she saw her mom's name flashing.

"Hey Mami!" she greeted trying to sound cheerful as she looked around frantically for her shoes, not even bothering to change out of the sweatpants she slept in.

"Hola mi'ja, how's school? Are you done with classes for the day?" she asked innocently.

"It's you know, hard. Lots of homework, I actually have one more class today."

"You're used to hard work. Always the smartest one in the barrio." despite her word's good intentions Nina couldn't help but feel the weight of them. As a boricua she was always expected to work harder, not complain just get things done, that's what her people did. Yet some days it all felt like too much, too much work, too much school, too much pressure to always be better than everyone else.

"I know Mami, I've got it covered," she responded stepping outside, surprised by the dwindling sunlight.

"I'm surprised you have a class so late, it's almost six, shouldn't you be getting dinner?" Camila asked, causing Nina to stumble from the shock.

"Um, it's a study group in the library, not a real class and we're eating there." she covered too embarrassed to admit the reason for her disorientation to her mom. Her parents hated the idea of her having one job let alone two. "I actually have to go, I'm here already. I'll call you later Mami, I love you! Say hello to everyone for me." She barely heard her mother's farewell before hanging up. She'd missed a class. She'd only ever missed one day of classes in her life and that was towards the end of her senior year of high school once she was already accepted into college. In fact, it was the day after she visited Benny freaking out about her partial scholarship and moving so far away from everyone she knew. She knew even back then that the experience would be harder than anything she'd ever done before so she decided to treat herself to a rare day off and play sick. Given that she normally begged to go to school her parents easily caved and let her stay home.

Home.

She'd been at Stanford almost a full semester and California didn't feel like it would ever become home. For Nina home was her parents, Abuela, Usnavi, Vanessa, the ladies at the salon, little Sonny, and Benny.

Benny, she hated thinking of him. Months away from home and still her little crush lingered. It was frustrating, to say the least, yet she didn't know how to let it go. In her defense, though he made it impossible to forget him. Just as she thought her crush was ending she'd get a picture in the mail of the whole gang or more recently of her empty fire escape. Just remembering that thoughtfulness, made her tear up.

Determined to get some work done and live up to all of their expectations, Nina made her way to the library before her next shift.


Leave of absence.

That's what the school called it, to Nina it was the end of the world. Despite not being officially kicked out, she was asked to take the rest of the semester off to find her footing. She'd be able to register for the next semester and even apply to get her scholarship reinstated if her GPA was high enough. They made it all sound positive but it wasn't. She was homeless, broke and worst of all a failure. She officially had two days to get her stuff out of the dorm, but first, she needed to get to work and pretend everything was fine.

"Hey chica, how's it going?" a bubbly trainer by the name of Gloria greeted her.

"Don't even ask." she sighed clocking in and talking her spot behind the counter. At least this job was mindless, all she had to do was sit and check people in.

The best and worst part about working with someone like Gloria was her boundless energy and genuine interest in people. Unfortunately for Nina, Gloria decided to direct her energy into fixing Nina's day. That's how she found herself on Gloria's couch revealing everything she'd been going through for the past year.

"Well I don't know what to say about the school thing, but you can stay here." she offered, gesturing around her tiny studio apartment.

"What?" Nina asked in shock, no one outside of the people in the barrio had ever been so nice to her.

"I mean it would have to be on the couch, but it's something." she shrugged.

"I can help with rent or groceries." Nina offered, too proud to take charity.

"You still need to save while you figure out a game plan, and you won't have a room...so how about a third of the rent and you bring home In 'N' Out after your shifts?" before Nina could protest the generosity, Gloria added, "If you decide to come back after the summer we can look at getting a bigger place and split the rent then. It might be cheaper than the dorms."

"Thank you," Nina said quietly trying not to well up.

"Hey, we gotta stick together! Why don't you crash here tonight, and tomorrow we can pack up the dorm?"

"I have to go to work in an hour." Nina protested.

"Call in sick. And now that you're not taking classes you can probably put in for better hours too." Just what Nina needed, someone on the West coast as bossy as Vanessa.