Page 6 of Accidental Irish Daddy

“Your ma refuses.”

“Right. She’s staying with me right now, so it’s fine. I’ll need to get her a nurse. The doctor says she’s going to get worse as time goes on. Someone will need to be here for her when I can’t be.”

“Let me cover that expense,” he says.

“No. I’m more than capable of doing that—”

“I insist. It’s the least I can do for her.”

I make more in a month than Da makes in a year, yet he wants to pay for her care.

It’s insane, but…who am I to say no? If he has some debt of guilt to repay, I’m certainly not going to stand in the way.

“Fine.”

Ma rolls her window down before glancing at me with a perturbed expression.

“Can you cut it short? I’m missing my shows.”

“Talk to you soon.” I hang up and get into the car.

As we pull out, Ma asks, “So, how’s your da?”

I just laugh. Can’t ever get one over on her.

2

Aisling

“As off this moment, we have to let you go.”

“What…why?” I’m trying not to cry. I’m, at least, trying to keep the tears threatening to spill out of my voice.

Nancy, my boss, pauses before speaking, “It’s because of your other job…at the gentlemen’s club, dear.”

My entire body goes cold as I sit behind the wheel of the car in front of the house, getting the worst news I could possibly get right now. My eyes begin to burn. I swallow to stave off the incoming crying fit as the first tear drops down my cheek.

“I don’t work at a gentlemen’s club,” I lie. “Who told you such a thing?”

Nancy sighs. “We got a call from someone claiming to have seen you there,” she says. “You know this is a Christian hospital, Aisling. There is a morality clause that we all have to abide by in order to work here.”

And suddenly, everything in me goes hot. Anger starts to boil up from inside me. “I just worked a ten-hour shift. You couldn’thave told me any of this during the ten hours I was cleaning bedpans and wiping arses?!”

“I’m sorry, Aisling, but this arrangement just isn’t going to work out. I wish you luck in the future.”

“Yeah? Well, you can turn that luck sideways and feck off with it.” I press the hangup button fiercely.

What am I going to do now?

I close my eyes and push down my rage, taking deep breaths. At least I still have the job at the club. It pays more anyway…even if it’s not what I want to do with my life.

Ugh. I hate working at the club. Every bit of it. Dancing naked for drunken horny men is not what I thought my life would be when I signed up for nursing school. Hell, none of this is what I thought my life would be.

By now, I thought I’d be a nurse working in a hospice or maybe in some of the group care places in the city. I thought I’d be a lot farther than this. Maybe if Ma and Da had lived, I would be. Maybe if things were…

Maybe.

My whole bleeding life is filled with maybes.

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