Episode 4

Victoria Becker narrating:

I arrive at the diner where I work and go straight to get my notepad to take orders.

"Good morning, Vic" said my friend Den, his real name is Deniel, but I call him Den.

"Good morning, Den" I greeted him.

To everyone here, I'm just a girl who lives with her father and needs some money, and not a girl abandoned by her mother who lives with a drug-addicted father and needs money to have something to eat and eventually escape the hell that her life has become.

But enough talking about problems, the more you talk, the more you attract them.

"Table three is calling you" said Den.

I quickly went to an elderly couple who were calling me.

"Good morning." I smiled. "What will you have?"

"Two coffees and two slices of chocolate cake" said the lady.

"Alright, I'll be right back" I returned to the counter where I gave the order to Den to put on a tray.

The diner is quite large, there's Den and Louise who prepare the orders while I and two other waitresses take the orders, there's also Anny at the cash register.

Today I see that my day will be very busy, as the movement is very large early in the morning.

"Here Vic" he handed me the order.

After taking them to the couple, I go to serve a table where there are four teenagers, they look me up and down before one of them smiles sideways.

"Good morning, what will you have?"

"You, honey" said the blond who was smiling at me in a strange way.

"I'm not part of the menu." I said seriously. "Please, what is your order?"

"We wanted you, but since you can't, bring us three sodas, three hamburgers and a portion of fries" said the blond.

I nodded as I wrote it down.

When I turned my back to leave, I felt a hand on my butt, anger consumed me, however, if I argue, I will suffer the consequences… last month something similar happened, the girl argued with the customer and our boss Mr. George got very angry, because the customer was someone important and the girl was the one who came out wrong.

Unfortunately, this is the society we live in, a woman suffers harassment and she is the one to blame, the man never comes out wrong. I really wanted to punch that boy's face, but unfortunately I know what my consequence will be if I do that... and I can't lose my job.

I swallow all the anger I'm feeling and leave there as if nothing had happened. I ask another waitress to take the order and she does, the rest of the day passed normally, the movement decreased in the afternoon, so I worked less.

"..."

Some weeks later…

I finish lunch and soon feel my stomach churn, the vomit rises in my throat and I run towards the bathroom.

It was almost two in the afternoon when we stopped for lunch, the movement in the diner was very large and only now we had time to eat.

It's been a few days since I've been feeling strange, my body is strange, I've been vomiting a lot and I feel nauseous frequently. — My God, Vic, what did you eat? — asked Den, crouching next to me.

"I don't know, I must have some kind of food poisoning, because I've been feeling bad lately" I said, flushing the toilet and getting up to wash my face.

"You'll be fine soon" he said affectionately.

After that we went back to work, sometimes I felt a little dizzy, but it soon passed.

When I finished my shift, I left the diner and went home where I took a shower and left, because today I would sleep at Joana's house.

Tomorrow her parents will return from the trip and she is very busy helping them with the things in the store, it will also be more difficult for us to have time since she is also studying and will help her mother in the store and I also work.

Jo is studying to be a pediatrician, she doesn't have many friends, but she tells me a lot about a certain Eliza Fitzy, she said she wants to introduce me to her, and she even said that they talk a lot about me and that we will arrange to go out together one day.

"Hi, Jo" I said as soon as she opened the door.

"Hi, my boo" she smiled "come in."

I entered and see that she was watching a movie.

"I put the movie on now, I was finishing making popcorn for us" she said.

"Want help?"

"No need, I'm finishing" she said excitedly "sit there and I'll go to the kitchen and be right back."

So she left and after a few minutes returned with a huge bucket of popcorn, we started eating while watching the movie.

"This movie is great" she said, but I didn't answer, because out of nowhere I started to feel nauseous"Vic, are you okay?"

"Just a little nauseous" I said "lately I've been feeling like this, today at the diner I almost threw my guts out."

"What have you been feeling?" she asked curiously.

"Nausea, dizziness, I've been vomiting a lot and lately I've been feeling more tired than usual" I said, but that must be the stress and lack of sleep, my father has been using drugs more than normal, he disappeared for a week leaving me worried and work is killing me.