Mine

Mine - Waiting tables

I remember it like it was yesterday.

She came into the restaurant I worked back then. At the first glance she appeared to be fearless, but I knew better than that. She had this look in her eyes that I knew all too well, from myself and from other people; she was haunted by the past.

Something happened that made her scared as hell, she'd gotten an extreme fear of falling. But she has always been too proud to admit that, she still is.

But somehow this seemed perfect in my mind back then. I would help this girl with her ghosts and she would finally be able to let it all go, to live her life.

A flight risk, but one I was willing to take.

I had been there too, on that dark path, and I'd been wishing that there was someone for me. Someone who would just tell me that it was all going to be alright.

I walked to her table and took her order. When I brought the food, I put a note with it.

I just continued my shift after that, and when it was over, she stood at the place I told her to wait. I was surprised she'd actually shown up. She was impatient and cut immediately to the course, because of this she came off a little bit aggressive.

'What do you know about my past? And how the hell did you find me?'

'Whoa, calm down,' I said, trying to convince her I wanted to help. 'I know nothing about your past; I just recognized the look in your eyes. You're terrified of your past and I've been there before, thought I could help. Just tell me what happened, acceptance is the first step.'

The girl laughed sarcastically.

'It's not really the accepting part. But I do wanna know how you would cope with all this.

So, this is my story:

My own mother kidnapped me and locked me up in a tower for sixteen years, always saying to me that the world was an evil place, that she needed to protect me from. She said that all the people were bad and wanted to kidnap, rape or kill me. Well, on one rebellious day I decided I wanted to see the big "bad" world for myself. And so far so good, no one's tried to kidnap, rape or kill me. I think the worst thing that happened to me was that a small kid that puked on my shoes, but the mother insisted on buying me an ice cream, so yeah...'

'That's... kinda intense.' I didn't really knew how to respond to this.

Her whole story was, is bizarre.

'But how is this still bothering you when you say you've accepted that everything you ever heard was a lie?'

The girl sighed.

'My mum was never really the letting go-type. She has hired spies to find me. Well, thinking about the fact that she locked me up in a tower for sixteen years, it's not really shocking. But because I have no place to stay, it's really hard to stay hidden.'

I smiled.

'Well, that's one thing I can help you with.'