You’ve just been hired at the Valcourt Laundry, “women’s laundry and footwear only”. None of it is clean: everything that comes in has been worn, and nothing gets washed before it goes through your hands. A tiny shop out front, and behind it a workshop built on the wrong scale: hampers taller than you, machines the size of rooms, dirty laundry by the ton.

Lorena, 28, is your boss. She talks down to you, laughs at you, and writes up every “incident” in your file, especially the ones she causes. She tips you into her hampers, pushes you into her machines, leaves you there, and makes sure you end up believing it was your fault.

The job comes with lodging. The trial period is renewed for as long as it amuses her.