Queen of Nothing

7. I Have Done Nothing To You

I inhaled, then exhaled, and repeated until I felt lightheaded. 

"You okay?" Priscilla approached me, and I turned, ready to dissolve into tears. 

"No," I admitted, "that girl that you seated in my section, she goes to my school." 

"Oh," she whispered, "I'm so sorry, I didn't know." 

"How would you?" I gasped, "It's okay. I'll take care of it." 

"If she's getting on your nerves, I can always reseat-"

"No," I interjected, "I love you for that, but no. I'll deal with her on my own. I got it."

She enveloped me in a hug, "You got this." 

I nodded. If only she knew the type of person I was, really. Or the way I carried myself at school. Would she still be nice to me? If she knew about that persona, or the things I thought and did. Casa Nova's was out of the way from Crestwood, and lay far outside of the perimeter that my classmates explored. 

Never before had my two lives come this to crossing. I had chosen it for this very reason, not because I was ashamed of working, but because of how paradoxical it would be for me to serve the very people that I had decided were beneath me. 

So I took another breath, grabbed two waters, one with ice and the other, setting them in front of father and daughter. Lily wasn't meeting my gaze, and in that moment, I realized that she was just as terrified in this situation. 

"Can I get you guys started on anything?" 

Her father started, "Uh, yes. If we could start with the calamari, and then a medium rare steak for me, a caeser salad for my wife..." At the mention of his wife, he squeezed her hand, and I surveyed her. She was east asian, with lovely almond shaped eyes and pin straight black hair. She was drop dead gorgeous, and it became evident where Lily had gotten her heart-shaped face from, or even her full-lips. But where Lily was all light and sun, her mother was dark and alluring like the moon, with the beauty of a silvery goddess. I wondered where that could have come from. 

Certainly not from the professor-esque man that sat opposite to the pair, with his messy hair and glasses, or shy demeanor. 

"Did you get that?" Her mother asked, before smiling at my warmly. Something about the scene in front of me, of my biggest foe, and her loving family, made me sick. I stammered, 

"Oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't catch that. What can I get from you, Lily? " I narrowed my eyes in contempt at her ever so slightly, while still plastering on that customer service smile. 

I could see how it unnerved her, as she shifted uncomfortably in her seat. Instead, her mother spoke, 

"Do you two know each other?" 

"Yeah," I said brightly, "from school. We met at my boyfriend's party last Friday." 

Lily's hands clenched in her lap, and her mother frowned, "Party? What party, honey?" 

"Can I have the penne alla vodka with chicken, please?" Lily interjected, her voice unnaturally high. 

"Of course you'd want the vodka pasta, you animal," I winked at her, "anyways, is there anything else I can get you guys?" She turned a bright red and her parents both looked at her, clearly agitated. 

They shook their heads, partly in shock and partly in confusion, and I took it as a sign to recuse myself. 

I should have been ashamed of it, that need of mine to destroy the things I saw in other people that I craved, wanted above anything. But there was something satisfying in the turn of my heel, in her mother's voice when she asked,