***
Over the next week, I worked seven days straight, working fourteen hours a day, and still there was no sign of Jay. I had given up on the idea of him coming in to relieve me. It felt like I was serving a life sentence in solitary confinement. The sooner I got used to it, the easier it would be. After a while, I adapted to it. It was still bad, but not as unbearable as the first couple of shifts had been. The worst part was the isolation and the boredom, but also breathing the dust and fumes all day was seriously affecting my health. I would routinely have coughing fits and headaches.
I didn’t even know my schedule for the next day until about 6:00 p.m. That’s when Jay would usually call and inform me he needed me to come in the next day, bright and early. I didn’t want to complain, so I did everything he asked of me without question. But it was really starting to irritate me that he was making me work every single shift. I was running out of things to do. I was so sick of looking at the food and beverage manual from Ray’s. I had memorized every ingredient in every item on the menu, including the drinks. I was not sure how much more of this I could take. I was at my breaking point.