A strangled wheeze escaped him as the pain finally registered, his body folding inward on itself like a failed structure.
He staggered backward, legs betraying him.
Then he crashed into his desk.
The collision sent everything flying—the ceramic coffee mug shattering against the wall, a stack of folders spilling across the floor, and the framed photo of his smiling wife and children tumbling face-down, glass cracking as it hit the tile.
Paper drifted down around him like dead leaves.
He dropped to his knees, then rolled onto his side, curling instinctively around the agony, gasping and choking, hands clawing uselessly at the floor.
I stood over him, chest tight, heart hammering so hard it made my vision pulse.
My hands shook.
Not from fear.
From restraint.
Every instinct screamed at me to keep going. To disable him completely. To make sure he never touched another womanagain. The training whispered cold, efficient suggestions—how to break a wrist, collapse a trachea, end it in seconds.
I didn’t.
I stared down at the man who had tried to take my body, my job, my dignity—who had stripped away my livelihood simply because I wouldn’t let him own me.
And the reality hit, heavy and unforgiving.
Without proof of the illegal firing—without the recording he believed I had—I stood almost no chance in court. California was an at-will state. He could fire me for nearly anything, or nothing at all, as long as he didn’t say the quiet part out loud.
Harassment cases were brutal. They demanded witnesses. Documentation. A paper trail.
All I had was my word.
A deaf woman. A stammer. A résumé with gaps and secrets that ended in classified.
Against a restaurant manager with friends on the city council.
The weight of it settled on my shoulders like wet concrete.
I stepped around him carefully, deliberately not touching him again. Not giving him anything else to use.
Then I walked out of the office.
The moment I pushed through the swinging doors, the kitchen hit me like a wall.
Noise I couldn’t hear but could feel—the vibration of pots slamming, the hiss of the grill, shouted orders rattling through the floor and up my bones. Faces turned toward me. Curious. Confused. A few wary.
I kept walking.
Head high.
Past the dish pit where my apron still hung on its hook. Past the line cooks who had once nodded hello, who had shared cigarettes on breaks and treated me like I belonged.
Past all of it.
Out the back door.
The cold January air slapped my face, sharp and merciless. I made it two steps into the alley before my legs gave out. I leaned against the brick wall, slid down until I was sitting on the damp pavement, knees drawn to my chest.
