A Broken World

Chapter 1

October 2000

I adjust my long gray skirt and black button down. I can hear the men at table five taunting me. They've been loud and obnoxious since they showed up. I'm shocked that my manager hasn't kicked them out yet. They are a group of five guy ranging from mid-twenties to early thirties. They came in about twenty minutes ago and of course I just happened to be lucky enough to be their waitress. I turn and one of them is staring at me. He wipes the dark hair out of his face and turns acting like he wasn't looking.

I finish getting their drinks together which mostly it consists of beer, there's only one water. I gather it all on my brown tray and walk back to them. They are talking loudly to each other as I hand them each their drinks. One of them grabs my wrist and I try to pull away.

"Hello Darl'n, when's your shift end?" he questions.

I pull my wrist from his grip and stumble back a bit.

"Touch me again and I'll have you kicked out," I warn.

"Oh, someone is feisty," one of them says.

The guy who'd been staring at me is quiet, too quiet. He laughs with them on occasion, but mostly says nothing. I roll my eyes and walk away. I look down and see that one of the laces on my black converses has come undone. I bend down to tie it and I hear one of them whistling. I turn to give them the finger and the quiet one is staring again. I quickly adjust my shirt hoping he didn't see too much.

I sigh dropping my tray down on the counter. My best friend Katelyn comes over from her table and peeks over to where I'm looking. She rolls her eyes, and pulls the black hair tie from her wrists to pin up her blonde hair.

"Those guys are pigs!" she states.

"Tell me about it," I sigh.

"Ask Roger to switch tables," she suggests.

"Honestly, I'm so used to this shit because of my stepfather it doesn't even phase me anymore," I admit.

My stepfather is the definition of evil and honestly I don't even know why my mom married him. When I first met him he was nice, he'd been living in New York for a short while and met my mom at a bar. That should have been the first strike, but I went with it. Six months later we moved down to Georgia, two weeks later they were married, and I've been here ever since. That was almost three years ago. I hate it, I miss New York. I plan on going back one day, but first I need to save up money.

"You shouldn't have to put up with that shit," she says.

"I know."

"Table five is up," I hear Rob call from the window.

I grab all of their meals and head for the table. They don't seem to care that I can hear everything they are saying. One of them mentions a drug deal, while the other two talk about stealing cars. Figures, I knew they looked like guys that my stepdad would work with. There are always random guys at my house all hours of the night. It gets scary especially when random people start living in our unfinished basement and have full access to everything on the main level.

"Can I get you guys anything else?" I ask, immediately regretting my choice of words.

They all laugh as one that looks like the leader of the pack says, "You can put those sweet lips of yours on my..."

"Don't even finish that sentence," I warn.

"Or what sugar lips?" he whispers.

"Don't you sugar lips me you bastard," I growl getting in his face.