It had been three weeks since that town council meeting, and I was sitting in Dr. Sarah Kim’s little clinic, trying to steady my breathing before my first official day as “Elena Martinez, rural mental health provider.” The name still felt like a costume sometimes, but this was the role I’d agreed to play, and the waiting room was already filling up.
Four people sat out there. A teenage girl who kept her eyes fixed on the floor like looking up might break her. An older man whose hands trembled in a way I couldn’t tell was sickness or nerves. A woman with a balled-up tissue she hadn’t let go of since she came in. And a guy in dusty work clothes who checked his phone every thirty seconds like he was waiting for bad news.
Dr. Kim poked her head out of the hallway. “Elena? Ready?”
“As ready
