Then Felicia decided she needed a luxury SUV to look successful in real estate. Her damaged credit required a co-signer, and she came to my apartment crying, promising commissions would cover everything within months. The commissions never came. For nearly four years I paid $480 every month to protect my own credit while she drove the vehicle to showings, restaurants, and networking events. I skipped vacations, drove a sedan with more than 200,000 miles, and kept telling myself family sacrifice came back around when you truly needed it.
My body gave out before my faith in them did. Two years earlier, a warehouse storage rack had failed near Bay Four. I shoved a new employee clear before the structure collapsed, but a heavy crate struck my lower back. The first hospital called it a severe bruise and sent me back to modified duty after ten days. I kept working through worsening pain because my parents depended on me and Felicia’s car payment never stopped. By the time an Atlanta spine specialist ordered a new MRI, two badly herniated discs were compressing nerves and destabilizing my spine. “Without surgery soon,” he said, “some of this damage may become permanent.”
