Who's Fault?

Chapter Three

I glanced back up at her for a moment. I struggled to think of the name of the band for a minute and started to panic again, "take your time. It's okay."

I thought about it again for a minute and remembered this time. I could tell my breathing was very slowly getting back to normal because it was getting easier to communicate, but we weren't completely there yet, "twenty... one pilots."

"Good," she said and smiled at me. "How about a color. Give me a color you can see right now. Any color." She's so calm.

I looked around for a minute, then focused on her button-down blouse, "pink."

She looked down where I was looking, though I'm sure she knew her shirt was pink and smiled again, "good. One more, okay?" I nodded in response, "what's one thing you can hear right now?"

I sat with my eyes closed and tried to focus on listening to different things around me, but only one sound stood out, "yelling. From the... kitchen."

"Nice job, Wren." Colleen said to me, then she continued, "I guess I'll have to tell them to keep it down. Alright, look at me." She told me one more time. When I did as I was told her smile grew bigger. "We're gonna breathe together for a minute, alright?" Nodding, I let her continue, "Pick a number."

"Six."

"You know what to do, right? Breathe in through your nose and out of your mouth. We're going to do it six times, ready?" And we began breathing, and she counted to six. Before I knew it, everything was as normal as it could be. "Now, tell me. Did something happen?"

There was no point in lying, if nothing happened, I would have to go back and suffer without anyone knowing. I didn't want to lie to Colleen either, not after all she had done for me. It didn't seem fair to her, so I nodded, before taking a few breaths and explaining what happened with my most recent table to her. Her body was tense by the time I finished telling her what happened, "I'm sorry." I apologized, believing I had done something wrong. Well, I did. I abandoned my job.

"No, honey. Don't you worry about it. Absolutely not. Don is covering for you right now. I want you to come inside take a few minutes, have a drink of water, and then I will check in with you to see if you feel up to finishing your shift, okay?" Once again, I only nodded.

After sitting for a few moments, pulling myself together, and making sure I could walk without getting lightheaded, I decided I could go back and finish my shift. I only had a couple hours left.

When Colleen returned, I told her I wanted to finish the night off, so she explained to me that they had told my tables that there was an emergency I quickly needed to take care of but didn't specify what it was. She gave me another minute before I could return. She also warned me the group of men were still at their table, but that they shouldn't be a bother to me anymore and if they were to let her know.

I quickly got back to work. Those men were polite the rest of the time they were there and didn't speak to me unless they had to. I went back to acting normal, smiles and all.

The rest of the night went by quickly and before I knew it, I was able to go home. By the time I got there, my mind had once again gone against me.

I rushed upstairs and before I knew it the tears were flowing again. I hate this. I hate it so much. I can't do anything right. I always fuck things up. Always. Why can't things just go back to normal, how they used to be?! I hate being such a screw up. What's the point if that's all I do? No one would even miss me. I have no one. No one would care if I just disappeared.

My thoughts spiraled, and I couldn't get control over them, no matter what I tried. I can't stand this. I can't do this anymore. Those were my last thoughts before I passed out from exhaustion.