2016 – Day 4

Start writing a story that...

Step 1: has a character who: is hidden

Step 2: add this word: throne

Step 3: add this word: tile

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June sat in the bathroom stall, her feet planted firmly where they could be seen to discourage anyone from knocking to check its availability. Through the slit between the stall door and the wall, she could see a line of women snaking around the corner and, she presumed, out the door. Sinatra, her boss's choice, blared from the speakers just outside the women's room.

Nausea drifted through June and she suddenly felt the bile rise up into her throat. Though it burned, she forced herself to swallow it back down. The room hadn't stopped spinning in the eternity that she had been sitting in the stall, so she had no intention of standing up, even if it meant turning to face the toilet so she could expel the toxins from her body. No. Here she would remain, sitting on her throne, until she threw up, passed out, or died.

After the nausea had passed, it left paranoia in its wake. June tried to remember how she had left things when she stepped away to go to the bathroom. Had she said where she was going? Would they come looking for her? She listened to the chatter and other bathroom noises echoing across the tiled walls. Gossiping. Laughing. Toilets flushing. Sinks running. It blended into a wave of sound that crashed around her. But then, a familiar voice came bursting through the din as determined stilettoed footsteps clicked through the doorway.

"June? June! Are you in here?...I'm not cutting, honey, I'm just looking for my friend. Chill.... June?"

Marcy's stilettos, instantly recognizable by their silver embellishments against a burgundy background, stopped outside June's stall.

"I can see your little booties. I know you're in there, June."

June sat frozen, fighting back the next wave of nausea.

"Either come out or let me into the stall. These bitches keep giving me the stink-eye because they think I want to TAKE THEIR PRECIOUS TURN TO PEE!"

"I can't," June whispered.

"Yes, you can."

"Uh uh."

"Sweetie, my skirt is too damn short for me to get down on this disgusting floor and crawl underneath the door. But that is what I will do if you don't open it right now."

June could hear muttering beyond the door, then watched as Marcy's stilettos turned a half inch.

"For fuck's sake, I'm trying to help someone out. And it'll free up your damn stall. Don't be such whiney bitches."

Marcy's feet turned back, then her voice came softly through the crack of the stall.

"Honey, you are not the first to get propositioned by a handsy boss, and you won't be the last. There are a dozen ways you can go from here. Drinking yourself into oblivion and then hiding in the bathroom until everyone leaves is certainly one way. But that won't feel good tomorrow. And I need you to feel good tomorrow. Do you know why?"

June stared at the door.

"Are you listening to me?"

"Yes," June whispered.

"Do you know why you need to feel good tomorrow?"

"No. Why?"

"Because tomorrow we're going to make sure that our boss won't get handsy with anyone else, ever again."

June's stomach lurched. The echoes of the chatter and other bathroom noises faded and she heard only the soft voice on the other side of the door.

"You with me, June?"

Steadying herself, June reached forward and flicked open the lock.