By the time I walked in for my last training shift on a Sunday night, I was thinner, my spirit was beaten down, and I was worried about the road I seemed to be headed back down.
I was also still broke. I’d trained for seven shifts at $10 an hour, and I was relieved when my trainer asked me to take this shift alone. The managers were nowhere to be found, as usual, and she wanted to meet up with her boyfriend — a musician who was always cheating on her. The restaurant was slow, she told me I now knew what I was doing, and, best of all, she would let me take all of the tips I made home.
At nearly 9 o’clock, three women walked in: two women I’d never seen before and the…