Who's Fault?

Chapter Three

(A/N trigger warning : self-harm)

It wasn't too long after that, I was sat a table made up of a group of men in their thirties. I was still struggling to get back into it, but I was trying to act like things were fine. This table was very hard for me to deal with the whole time they were sat there. They took every chance they had to hit on me and it was disgusting. I tried my hardest to laugh, roll my eyes, and take everything as a compliment, but it was taking so much out of me.

After I introduced myself, they had already taken it upon themselves to ask me if I had a boyfriend that treated me right, and when I answered without thinking that I didn't have one, their eyes lit up like I had just given them the go ahead to play a game or something. All while I was trying to get their drink order I could feel their eyes running up and down my body and they kept making gross "if I was your man" comments.

The group had been sat for a while and hadn't ordered their food yet, and every time I peeked over to check on them, they were talking or laughing away. While I wasn't there trying to get their order, they seemed to be having a lot of fun together, genuinely having a good time. However, every time I returned to check on them, they had some nasty comment or attempt at a pickup line, that was just degrading.

When they were finally ready to order, they decided it would be fun to make me very uncomfortable by making comments about my looks and describing how nice everything was. As I finished the last order and turned to walk away, I felt a hand on my ass and one of the men say, "nice ass. How much to get it for a night?"

After that, I couldn't take it anymore. I ignored them and walked away briskly, trying to keep the tears in until I at least made it to the kitchen. I could already feel my breathing quicken and knew I had to move fast. When I made it to the safety of the kitchen, my tears began to fall rapidly, and my fingers had already locked up and gone numb. One of the cooks noticed my frantic state and yelled for Colleen, one of my managers.

I managed to make it out the back door before anything else embarrassing happened inside. I struggled to breathe and focus on any specific thing for a few minutes and barely heard the back door open.

After a minute or so Colleen was in front of me. This had only happened a few times over the past couple years that I'd worked there, and Colleen had been the person to help me every time. She gave me a minute to recognize that it was her and that she was there to help me before she began talking to me.

I was a mess, tears were continuously streaming down my face and I knew my mascara was running. I couldn't get my breathing under control and I was freaking out because I couldn't do anything with my hands. Oh my god. I'm going to die.

The next thing I heard was Colleen's voice, she sounded so calm. How can she be calm right now?! I'm dying over here and she's all calm! "Wren, look at me. It's okay. You're going to be okay. No. Look at me."

My eyes kept shifting around, everything was a threat and I couldn't stop it, through many short breaths I managed to get out, "I... ... can't."

"Yes. You can. Give me the name of a song." I didn't answer, I wasn't able to think. "C'mon Wren. You can do it. First song you think of."

"Fall... Away." I stuttered out. I was now looking at my hands, desperately trying to get my fingers to move, but I couldn't do it, and my tears started falling more, if it was possible, at my frustration.

Colleen must have noticed what I was doing because she slowly reached out and grabbed my hands in hers, "it's okay. Look at me." I glanced up at her but couldn't focus on her long enough and my eyes drifted back down to our hands. "Give me the artists name."