Joanna Lawson walked into Mercy Creek Medical on a cold Tuesday morning in January while carrying a small rolling suitcase. She wore a wool sweater she had owned since her sophomore year of college and carried an exhaustion that came from months of learning how to keep moving while her life quietly caved in.
The automatic doors opened with a hiss and let out a gust of over-heated hospital air that smelled of antiseptic and coffee. Outside, the sky over Charlotte was a pale, colorless gray that made the city look unsure of its own identity in the winter.
Inside, everything was warm and procedural as though bodies had to be coaxed into believing that pain could be made orderly with enough clipboards. Joanna had packed her bag three times before she finally left her apartment that morning.
