Nora stared at the eviction notice taped to her apartment door. The red ink blared at her like a siren. FINAL NOTICE. PAYMENT DUE IN 48 HOURS. Her stomach twisted into a painful knot. She had been scraping by for three months now, barely making enough from her barista job to cover groceries and utilities.
The rent on this studio apartment was twelve hundred dollars a month, and she was two full months behind. She had promised herself she would figure it out. She had applied for a second job. She had called her parents for help, only to be told they could not spare a dime. She had even tried selling her old clothes online. Nothing worked. Now she was twenty-four hundred dollars in the hole, and the landlord was coming for his money.
She pulled the notice off the door and pushed inside he
