He laughed.
I couldn’t hear the sound, but I could see it—mouth wide, tongue visible, shoulders bouncing.
I imagined it was harsh and ugly, the kind of laugh meant to humiliate rather than amuse.
“Rejecting me.”
The word landed like a slap.
My stomach twisted as the memory replayed itself, uninvited.
A month ago, after closing, he’d cornered me in the dish pit. Steam rising from the sinks. My hands red and raw from detergent. His body too close. His breath heavy with cheap bourbon and garlic.
He’d asked me out like it was a favor.
I’d told him clearly, carefully, that I had a fiancé. That the wedding was close. I’d even smiled, polite, apologetic, the way women are trained to soften rejection so men don’t explode.
He’d nodded. Muttered something about respect. Walked away.
I thought that was the end of it.
I had been wrong.
“You act like you have men lining up for you,” he continued, leaning forward again. His lips curled as the words spilled out. “You’re deaf. You stammer like a broken record. You’re basically disabled.”
Each syllable was sharp. Deliberate.
“And I”—he jabbed a finger at his chest—“the manager of this entire restaurant—ask you out, and you think you get to say no?”
My hands clenched at my sides until my nails bit into my palms. The pain grounded me, kept me from drifting somewhere darker.
The fiancé story I told him the day he asked me out wasn’t entirely a lie—just carefully incomplete.
I lifted my chin and met Hargrove’s gaze, forcing my face into neutrality. I had survived worse men than this.
“Y-you c-can’t f-fire me f-for that,” I said slowly, carefully shaping each word. “I-I’ve n-never b-been late. I d-do d-double sh-shifts. I t-train n-new h-hires.”
He shrugged, an exaggerated roll of the shoulders. “At-will employment,” he said, savoring it. “Means I don’t need a reason. Means you’re out.”
He stood, looming now, clearly enjoying the height difference. Enjoying that he thought he’d won.
“Pack your things,” he added. “And don’t bother coming back. I don’t need broken people slowing down my business.”
For a moment, the room wavered.
My pulse thudded behind my eyes.
“My w-wedding is t-tomorrow, sir,” I said, forcing each syllable through the raw ache in my throat. “I’ll b-be a married woman. Th-this... this isn’t f-fair.”
The words cost me more than he could ever know.
Talking always hurt.
Every word felt like forcing glass through my throat. That was why I stammered—why sounds snagged and broke before they ever reached my mouth. People laughed, mimicked, rolled their eyes. I learned to live with the ridicule, but it never stopped hurting. Not once.
It had been that way for ten years.
Ever since the... the screaming.
