You know what the grossest rule of all is? The one that I couldn’t even write down yesterday because I hoped they’d somehow change their minds? The counselors stand outside the bathroom while we pee. THEY LISTEN TO US PEE. (Poop, too, obviously, but I haven’t done that yet.) They stand so close I can hear them loud-breathing through the door.
All the bathrooms are locked. Even the ones in our rooms. The nurses and counselors have keys and we have to ask them to go to the bathroom, like we’re in preschool and need someone to wipe our butts. I wonder what happens when someone really has to go. Like emergency pee alert. What if they can’t find a staff member in time? Ew.
They make us count while we’re peeing, too. Out loud. They say it’s so they know we’re not throwing up. So our “vocal cords are occupied.” Yesterday I stopped counting for a second to concentrate and Jean yelled at me. Is it my fault I have a shy bladder? I didn’t end up going at all, and she looked at me like I was breaking the rules on purpose.
I’m not. I think Ali is, though.
I almost feel like I was dreaming this, but I think I heard Ali doing crunches last night. In her bed. At an eating disorder treatment center. The night counselor had just left after checking that we were “safe.” I was trying (and failing) to fall asleep.
Then Ali’s bed started creaking. I rolled over, then squeezed my eyes closed again. I didn’t want Ali to know I was awake. Some light streamed in from the hallway, and the shadow in Ali’s bed moved up and down. She gasped for breath a few times.
I tried not to move so she wouldn’t realize I’d heard her. So the night nurse wouldn’t hear me. We might both get in trouble then.
I wonder if they make us eat more food if we get in trouble. If they bring us to some secret room where there’s a banquet table full of food: turkey and gravy and lasagna and five different kinds of cake. Soft, buttery crescent rolls and apple pies fresh out of the oven. Gingerbread men like Mom makes at Christmas and Grandma Archibald’s famous mashed potatoes.
I think about food way too much. I don’t want to like food. I can’t help it, though. I tell myself I don’t want the food they give us. I tell myself it’s disgusting.
I still want it, though. I’m glad they’re making me eat.
That banquet table would be my nightmare and my dream come true at the same time.
At least they’re not weighing me today. They do that on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. “If we weighed you every day, you’d start obsessing over it,” Jean explained yesterday. I couldn’t tell if she was making a joke. I’m going to obsess over my weight no matter how often they weigh me. It’s what I do. It’s why I’m here.
Jean woke me and Ali up this morning. She poked her head in the door and flipped the light switch on and off three times. I was already awake, but it was still the most annoying thing ever. “Rise and shine, campers!” she exclaimed. “It’s time to start another day!”
I’m surprised she wasn’t wearing a Camp Eat-a-Lot shirt or a lanyard around her neck. I wonder if they make lanyards here. Ali says we do lots of arts and crafts. I’m kind of excited about that. Okay, not excited excited, but there’s a bubbly feeling in my stomach at the thought of picking up markers and pencils again.
I think I might miss drawing. It’s hard to write that, but I do. I used to draw a lot, but I haven’t for a long time. I miss how fun coloring books were when I was a kid, when I was allowed to go outside the lines. I miss papier-mâché day in art class—getting my hands all glue-sticky and wiggling them in the air while Emerson and Josie shrieked and ran away. I miss sitting outside and creating on paper what I see with my eyes.
I shouldn’t miss drawing, though, because I’m not good at it. And if I’m not good at it, I shouldn’t do it. I don’t do real art, not like the people Mom works with. I don’t do modern art, with its bold colors and swirls that are supposed to mean something all deep and symbolic. I don’t make fancy mobiles, like that famous guy who says they symbolize “the way society is forever spinning around.” I tried to do landscapes and vases and ladies in fancy dresses, but something always looked wrong.
My trees aren’t “regal” enough.
My shadowing is somehow off.
My noses are too pointy.
I’ll never be able to do paintings like Mom shows in her gallery. And when I draw what I like, when I doodle faces and penguins and frogs with magic wands, they’re childish. Boring. Normal.
I could be good at running, though, as long as I stay skinny. I could make regionals. Maybe I could even get a ribbon, too: a blue one, a red one, a yellow one … whatever. I just want something of my own. Something I’m good at. Running has to be it. I’m getting better every day.
Not today, though. I definitely can’t run in here. I bet they’ll barely let me walk in here. I’ll sleep all night and sit all day, like a sloth. Like the slothiest sloth that’s ever slothed.
Not running feels wrong. It makes my body feel wrong. My legs feel heavy, like they’re weighed down. Like if I jumped into a pool, I’d sink to the very bottom.
I’d drown.
I’m scared. I shouldn’t be scared, but I am.
“It’s just food.” That’s what Dad says when he makes pancakes for breakfast and ends up screaming at me because I won’t eat them. He doesn’t get it, though. It’s not just food. It’s …
I can’t explain it to Dad. I can’t even explain it to myself. All I know is that the thought of eating a stack of puffy pancakes slathered with butter and syrup makes my entire body clench up. It makes my shoulders stiffen. It makes my stomach churn into a stormy ocean of water and Diet Coke.
Emerson doesn’t get it, either. When I told her where I was going, her forehead got all wrinkly. “How can you not like food? Pizza is the best thing ever. It’s heaven in circular form.” That’s Emerson, though. Emerson the “naturally skinny.” Emerson the “doesn’t have to run extra to stay in the right size pants.”
I think my friend Josie kind of gets it. Well, she did, before she stopped talking to me. Talia used to make fun of Josie, too, for having so many pimples. Josie’s cried about how she looks, too.
I’ve already cried three times today. I miss my friends. I miss home. I miss how things used to be.
I talked with one of the counselors before breakfast. Her name is Heather. She’s always smiling and has this sickly sweet voice that makes me want to give her something sour to eat, just to balance things out. Heather told me their goal is for me to eat “normally” again.
There’s that word again. Normal. Everyone’s obsessed with it. Apparently I’m not normal because I don’t like to eat breakfast. But neither does Mom. And no one’s calling her sick and locking her up. Mom eats diet food, too. She weighs herself every day. No one sends her to treatment.
Julia doesn’t snack much, either. That’s because gymnasts have to be skinny and thin and willowy and every other possible synonym for beautiful. Julia’s underweight, too. But people call her a superstar.
So why am I “abnormal”? What if not eating breakfast is normal for me? Didn’t Mrs. Cashman tell us in kindergarten that we’re all special, unique snowflakes? That we all have different talents and blah-de-blah-de-blah?
What if I eat like a special snowflake, too? But nope. No one considers my opinion. They tell me I’m starving myself. They say they’re doing this to make me “healthy.”
Healthy (adj.) Definition: Fat.
Heather said that fat isn’t bad. That fat in food gives my hair shine and my body cushion. She says that it’s not bad to be fat, either. That my body doesn’t define me, and I can live a great life no matter what I look like.
I know that. I know that bodies come in all shapes and sizes. I don’t care about my friends’ weights. I know there’s nothing wrong with eating a lot. Or being fat.
I just don’t want to be fat. I don’t want to be normal, either.
Normal will turn me back into Roly-Poly Riley. Back the way I was before. It’ll be like the Fairy Godmother scene in Cinderella, except instead of turning into a princess, things will be the other way around: bibbidi-bobbidi-BLOB.
I want to go home. I want to go to track practice before Coach Jackson kicks me off the team. He might anyway. He already yells that I’m “slow as molasses!” I can hear his raspy shout in my head right now.
If I get kicked off the team, I don’t know what I’ll do.
No. That won’t happen. I’ll get out, lose this weight, and be better than ever. I’ll run more than usual to make up for the time I lost in here. I’ll run all day long if I have to. I’ll be good. Better. Best.
Ali keeps staring at me. She’s acting like I’m a frog under a microscope and she’s examining all my parts. I bet she knows I heard her last night. I bet she thinks I’m going to tell on her. I’d never do that, though. I’m not a tattletale.
What I am is jealous.
I’m also “medically compromised.” That’s the technical term the admission guy used yesterday. His name was Bob. A boring name for a boring guy. He had brown hair in a buzz cut and boring brown glasses. Every time he asked me a question or said something to Mom, he spoke in a low, monotone voice. Like nothing exciting has ever happened to him and nothing ever will.
“Do you think you’re sick?”
“What do you see when you look in the mirror?”
“What have you eaten so far today?”
I glared at Mom, then told Bob everything she’d made me eat that morning. Mom had cooked my breakfast, then stood over me while I ate. Watched while I took bite after endless bite and stared until my glass was empty. I’d hated her the whole time.
But right then, with Bob staring at me, I was a teensy bit glad Mom had made me eat. Because I could answer Bob honestly. He’d realize I wasn’t sick and he’d send me home!
(He didn’t send me home.)
Bob acted like he didn’t believe a word coming out of my mouth. I wonder if my parents called ahead to tell him about the Treadmill Incident. The Treadmill Incident definitely needs capital letters. Mom’s eyes still shoot laser beams whenever she mentions it. Dad gets that hurt look on his face, where he bites his lip so hard there’s a line but he still doesn’t tell me why he’s upset.
Bob made tons of notes in my chart. Then a nurse came in. Her scrubs had squirrels all over them. Or maybe they were chipmunks. I always mix those two up. They’re like alligators and crocodiles that way. Or stalagmites and stalactites. Who can remember the difference?
The nurse made me change into one of those faded hospital gowns, the ones five million people have already bled and sweated on. (They say they wash them, but who really knows? Maybe there’s no laundry detergent budget here and they just dunk them in water.) The gown covered most of me, but I felt like it was see-through, like the nurse was staring at every inch of my skin. Like she was checking to see if I was skinny enough to be in here.
She weighed me with my back to the scale so I couldn’t see the number.
She didn’t tell me the number, either.
I wonder what she thought about the number. I wonder if the doctors and nurses are talking about it right now, laughing about my weight in some back room somewhere. Like Talia London did after my BMI test last year.
I hate Talia London.
Talia’s at school right now. Talia’s going to track practice today, getting ready for the meet on Friday and for regionals next month. Talia’s not in a hospital, eating food a bazillion times a day. Talia would never get sent to a hospital for anything. Talia’s too perfect, with her perfect brown hair and her perfect rosy cheeks and her perfect fingernails that she never, ever bites.
I hate Talia London.
The nurse took my temperature and my blood pressure. Then she made me stand up so she could do it all over again. I pretended the cuff was a snake wrapping around my arm, cutting off my circulation.
Death by snake would have been better than going through an entire “intake interview,” where Mom told Boring Bob every awful thing I’ve done for the past year and every way I’ve disappointed her or scared her or made her feel like the WORST. MOM. EVER. She even brought up how she’s afraid this is all her fault. (With tears in her eyes, of course.)
Which meant I had to comfort Mom so I wouldn’t look like an even worse daughter in front of Bob. I hate guilt trips like that. And the second I said, “Mom, it’s not your fault,” Mom’s tears cleared up and a relieved smile washed across her face. She didn’t consider the possibility that even if this isn’t all her fault, she might still have done something wrong.
Apparently I’m the only criminal around here.
Mom and Dad say that I should be in control of my brain. I should be able to “turn this craziness off.” I should be a lot of things:
Skinny.
Artistic.
Smart.
Athletic.
Julia.
But now I’m stuck here. Bob sent us back to the waiting room with a packet of graham crackers and a juice box, while Squirrel Nurse and whatever evil committee lives up here on the third floor determined that I’m “medically compromised.” Not medically compromised enough to have an IV like Ali, but enough to be stuck inside this prison.
(But how sick is Ali really if she’s doing crunches in the middle of the night? Because she was doing crunches. There’s no other explanation for what I saw.)
“We don’t trust you to do this on your own anymore. You need more support than we can give.” Mom sounded like she was reading from a script. She definitely wasn’t saying the real truth: You’re in here so they can fix you. So I don’t have to deal with the less-than-perfect daughter in front of me.
Mom called me selfish last week, when we had that big fight about her putting butter on the green beans behind my back. I thought she was going to throw her plate at me. Either that or stuff the beans down my throat.
“I don’t want butter,” I said through gritted teeth. I never knew that was an actual thing you could do, but my jaw ached from clenching them so hard.
“You need butter. You’re too skinny.”
A thrill went through me when Mom said that. A thrill still shoots through me every time anyone says that. It’s the same way I feel when I step on the scale and see a lower number. It’s the thrill of success, the kind I imagine Julia feels when she sticks a landing. The kind I felt last year, when I tried out for the Bay State Blazes and made the team.
“Stop being so selfish,” Mom hissed. She turned it into this big thing about how I’m starving for attention (she actually said starving) and making myself sick to get back at her for never being around.
(I think Mom’s been reading too many articles about eating disorders. And I think Starving for Attention was the movie they showed us in health class last year.)
Mom doesn’t know what she’s talking about. I’m not doing this for revenge and I’m not jealous of her job. I know she needs to make money. I know she likes working and it keeps her “personally fulfilled” or whatever. I’m not even jealous of Julia. I just want to be skinny. Is that so wrong? Mom wants to be skinny, too. I’ve heard her complain about her thighs and her stomach.
So why is she yelling at me for wanting the same thing?
When Bob came back and told us I was staying, Mom got my suitcase out of the trunk. It used to be Dad’s suitcase, actually. The leather is cracked and it’s this weird faded shade of brown. There are two buckles on it, and an old luggage tag is tied to the handle: ORLANDO, FLORIDA. I’d way rather be in Orlando right now. I’d way rather be in Siberia right now.
I’d rather be in Siberia naked.
Mom had packed the suitcase like I was going on a trip. Everything was folded neatly, and she added one of those sachet things so my clothes would smell good. The rose scent made me gag when I opened the suitcase. There are three pairs of sweatpants, two hoodies, three T-shirts, five pairs of underwear, and four pairs of socks. Comfy stuff. Cozy stuff. Baggy stuff. Good. They’ll hide the hideousness my body is about to become.
Mom helped me unpack. She put everything into the scratched dresser against the wall. I wonder how clean those drawers are. I bet there are mouse droppings or dead ants in there. Not that it matters. Those clothes are going right back in my suitcase as soon as I convince the therapist or whoever’s in charge that I’m not sick.
Mom gave me this journal before she left. It was wrapped in shiny pink paper with a sparkly bow. She beamed as I opened it. “This will be great!” she exclaimed. “You can write about your feelings! It’ll help you get better.”
I bet that was in one of Mom’s articles: HOW JOURNALING CAN CURE YOUR SICK CHILD. I saw her search history the other day when I checked my e-mail on her laptop:
Twelve-year-old daughter + anorexia
Daughter hates me
Ways to add more calories to food
How can parents help + eating disorder
I deleted Mom’s search history after I saw it. I wish I’d been able to delete her memory, too. Then she’d believe nothing’s wrong.
That I’m “naturally” skinny.
That I’m not really sick.
She believed that once, before it got too hard to hide everything. Maybe I can convince everyone else to believe it, too.
The girls talk a lot at meals here. They play games, too. They ask one another questions: “What color would you want to dye your hair?” “Have you ever kissed anyone?” Then they giggle until the counselor tells them to concentrate on their food.
Heather’s in charge of meals today. She tries to be nice, but I know she’s judging me for all the food I had to eat.
I bet she thinks I eat too much.
She’d be right. I’m so full. So disgusting.
I tried to tell Heather I was full, but she didn’t believe me.
I bet they won’t believe anything I say here. I bet everyone thinks I’m a liar. Mom said that exact thing after the Treadmill Incident.
“I can’t believe anything you say anymore. It’s like you’re a different person.”
Duh, I’m a different person. I’m twelve now. Things change when you get to middle school. Mom is definitely not my best friend anymore, especially when she does sneaky stuff to fatten me up.
Being skinny doesn’t change, though. It’s constant. It’s safe.
At one point, everyone was talking about the scariest thing they’d ever done. One girl, Laura, talked about how her plane had to do an emergency landing. Another girl, Aisha, talked about giving a speech in front of the whole school. Brenna talked about coming out as bi to her friends.
Ali isn’t saying anything. She keeps looking at me, then looking away again, back at her food or at another girl or even at the ceiling. Every time I catch her eye, she presses her lips together. She’s not mad, but she’s not happy. Is she suspicious? Does she know I saw her last night? Does she hate me?
Everyone’s my age, but they seem so much older. They know what’s going on around here. They’re funny and silly. They talk to one another and have inside jokes. They might be scared of planes and talking in front of crowds, but they don’t seem to be falling apart.
I’m already in pieces. I’m scared of my food and not running and gaining weight. I’m scared at home and I’m scared at school. I’m scared of what will happen when I get out of here. I’m scared of having to stay in here forever.
When it was my turn, I didn’t say anything. I stared at my plate, at the stack of turkey and lettuce and mayonnaise in front of me. I hate mayonnaise. It looks like milky snot.
This is the scariest thing I’ve ever done.
I’m sick of writing, but there’s nothing else to do during this free time. So I’m keeping my head down and my hands busy. That way, no one will come over and talk about the Red Sox or climate change or how awesome it is that I’m here. I’m writing and trying to draw the television across the room. That’s the kind of picture Mom displays in her gallery, paintings of fax machines and printers done by fancy-schmancy artists wearing horn-rimmed glasses and skinny jeans. Artists who talk about stuff like “the dangers of technology” and how “the color gray symbolizes the downfall of society.”
Drawing electronics isn’t fun, though. Plus, I’m still awful at that whole “perspective” thing Mom tried to teach me. The window behind the TV looks too small.
This is exactly why I took a drawing break. Because nothing I draw is good enough.
I keep getting distracted, too. I don’t think my stomach is working right. Aren’t stomachs supposed to digest food? The food is sitting like a boulder in mine. Like a mountain. Mount Fuji is in my stomach.
Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it. Think about anything but food. Think about the walls. They’re pink. Salmon pink.
Salmon is food.
This is not working.
I didn’t know where to sit for group, so I sat in a blue armchair. I feel like it’s my first day at a new school and I have no friends.
I feel like I did that day in the lunchroom, when Talia convinced everyone they shouldn’t sit with me because of my tuna fish sandwich. When the other kids held their noses when I walked by and sniffed around me before they sat down in class.
When they called me Rancid Riley. Roly-Poly Riley.
I’m not that girl anymore, though. I never will be again.
There are five other girls here besides Ali: Brenna, Meredith, Laura, Rebecca, and Aisha. That’s a lot of new people to keep track of, so I’m keeping a cheat sheet in here, even though I won’t be tested on this. (I hope.)
Brenna is sitting next to me. She’s white, kind of big, and has brown hair, a pixie cut, and bright yellow sneakers. She’s wearing the coolest outfit, too: an orange Camp Half-Blood T-shirt, a pair of blue Ravenclaw socks, and a My Little Pony button. (Emerson says we’re too old for My Little Pony, but she’s totally wrong. There’s no age limit on sparkle.)
Aisha is short and skinny. She’s black, with super-short, curly hair and glasses. Her shirt is this bright turquoise color with pink and orange threads woven all through it that makes her look like a human rainbow. A smiley rainbow.
Meredith is on the couch across from me. Meredith is black, too, with long hair and pretty brown eyes. She’s also sitting up so straight my back hurts just looking at her. That’s because Meredith is a ballerina. It’s totally obvious, and not just because of the ballet slippers on her shirt. Meredith’s skin is pimple-free and her hair is in a bun. Ballerina is a costume she can never slip out of.
Laura’s sitting next to me. She’s white, with these really piercing blue eyes. Her long blond hair is perfectly straight and her cheeks are bright, like she just put on blush. We’re not allowed to wear makeup in here, though, so maybe she’s just naturally rosy. The rest of her isn’t rosy, though. Laura’s eyes are narrowed and her bottom lip is stuck out. If she was a dwarf, she’d be Scary. Or maybe Skinny. I wonder if I’m that skinny.
I hope I’m not.
I kind of hope I am.
Laura keeps trying to look at what I’m writing, which is why my handwriting is super jerky. I have to keep shifting and angling my body. I stopped myself from giving her a dirty look, because the last thing I want is an enemy in here. (Another one, I mean.)
Rebecca’s hiding in her sweatshirt, her head swallowed by the hood like a turtle withdrawing into its shell. All I can see are her pale, freckled cheeks and the outline of an athlete’s body. She looks strong. Muscular. Dad used to call me strong. That was back when I was fat, though, before I started running.
Ali and Aisha are laughing about something they saw on TV last night. That’s what everyone does at night here. After visiting hours, we can watch TV or movies or read or play board games. No internet. No magazines. Just talking and “appropriate” media. We can also go to our rooms. That’s what I did last night. Now I feel left out, though.
Ali laughs a lot. She doesn’t seem to notice her IV much, either. She’s waving her arms around and making funny faces. (I think Ali actually has more freckles than Rebecca.) Maybe she’s used to the IV. She said she’s been here a week already. I doubt a week will be enough for me to feel comfortable with anything here.
Ali’s still super skinny, too. Is that because she’s doing all those crunches? Will I stay skinny if I do crunches, too? But what if they catch me and keep me here even longer?
I don’t think Ali’s worried about that, though. Right now, she’s swishing her long brown hair around and laughing, even though there’s nothing funny about this place at all.
Assertiveness Group was boring. We talked about … wait for it … ways we can be more assertive in real life. Are you shocked? I know I am.
We got homework, too. Booooo.
Now it’s free time. I’m supposed to meet with my therapist, but not for another fifteen minutes. The other girls have appointments, too. Or they’re doing art projects. Or talking. Or in their rooms napping. People are big on naps here.
I don’t want to do any of that. I don’t want to have fun or make something cute or find a new friend. I want to pout like a little kid.
It happened last year, halfway through sixth grade. I was sitting in homeroom when everything started. Mr. Lin passed out a handout, like the teachers always do at the beginning of the day. I usually stuff them in my backpack until Mom fishes them out and yells at me for being disorganized.
I couldn’t forget about this one, though:
Dear Parents,
This letter is to inform you of the Body Mass Index (BMI) Screening Program that will be happening soon at Hawthorne Middle School. In compliance with the state of Massachusetts’s BMI reporting and recording requirements, the Body Mass Index of all sixth graders will be calculated on Thursday of next week.
Students will be called down to the nurse’s office by class on their assigned day, and your child’s privacy will be respected at all times. After results are calculated, our health staff will follow up with your child’s weight status and give recommendations so your child can have the best and healthiest school year possible.
Please indicate whether or not you give permission and return this form to your child’s teacher by Friday.
Sincerely,
Katherine Hunt, Principal
I didn’t think Mom would give permission. Mom hates weighing herself in front of other people, so why would she let me do it? Just in case, though, I threw the form away.
Of course, Principal Hunt e-mailed the information to all our parents. So when I got home from school that afternoon, the printed-out and signed permission slip was waiting on the kitchen counter.
Miranda Logan DOES give permission for Riley to participate in BMI testing.
Mom told me it was important to learn healthy habits early. That I’d been eating too many Brown Sugar Cinnamon Pop-Tarts and not enough vegetables. She even asked Julia’s coach for the Proper Nutrition handout she gives to the older kids.
I should have told Mom that I could eat whatever I wanted, that Brown Sugar Cinnamon Pop-Tarts were a present to the world with frosting on top. I should have told her that I wasn’t a gymnast and that my body was different from Julia’s. I should have “lost” the permission slip. Asked for a new one and forged her name.
Because then Talia wouldn’t have heard the number.
No one was supposed to hear my number. They even mentioned “privacy” in the letter. Nurse Shaw closed her door between each student as we stood in a line outside her office.
Talia was behind me. She’s always behind me. Riley Logan. Talia London. I can never get away from her perfect hair and perfect skin and perfect cheekbones. I wish Nurse Shaw was perfect. Then she wouldn’t have left the door open a crack while I was in there. She wouldn’t have spoken so loudly after I got off the scale.
“Overweight.” She said it like she was a judge sentencing me to death. In sixth grade, being big is worse than death.
No, being big and having the snottiest girl in school find out is worse than death.
“Riley’s overweight!” Talia started laughing. Behind her, Camille did, too.
I wanted to rip the calculator out of Nurse Shaw’s hands.
I wanted to smash her scale on the floor.
I wanted to disappear.
Of course Talia was laughing. She didn’t eat stuff like Pop-Tarts and mayonnaise. She never ate cupcakes during class parties. When we were in fifth grade, she was the first kid to wear a bikini.
At lunch that day, Talia stared at my pizza slice like it was a bomb about to explode on my thighs. She giggled with her friends. I knew they were talking about me.
I ate my pizza that day because I was hungry. But I didn’t eat my dessert. I kept hearing the word overweight. I kept seeing the scale.
Talia kept teasing me, too. Not all the time, but enough so that I never forgot I was overweight. She laughed at my lunch, even when I started bringing a salad like her. Even when I started bringing nothing.
I should have told her to be quiet. I should have told her that my weight was none of her business. I should have told her lots of things. I didn’t, though. I didn’t want Talia to make fun of me any more than she already did.
Emerson and Josie told me to ignore her, but Talia was already in my head. I kept bringing salads to school. I kept bringing nothing.
The number on the scale started going down.
Lower.
Lower.
Lower.
I started running more.
Longer.
Longer.
Longer.
I wasn’t overweight anymore. The numbers told me that.
But I didn’t listen.
My therapist’s name is Willow. Of course. I knew she was going to be all earthy-crunchy. I bet her middle name is Dandelion. Or Moonfairy. I bet she has long hair and a crown of flowers, that she wears tie-dyed shirts and long beaded skirts.
I bet Willow will try to analyze my dreams to “uncover the great trauma in my past.” But what if she tries to hypnotize me and discovers that my big trauma is nothing more than a few silly comments made by a silly girl in my class? Shouldn’t I have been strong enough to not let that break me? Shouldn’t there be a bigger reason that I’m like this? Because if there isn’t, then why am I like this? Why am I sick and Julia isn’t?
I should make up something to tell Willow. I’ll say something about how Mom always tells me I’m fat and that’s why I don’t eat. Chloe’s mom is like that. That’s why Mrs. Fitzgerald makes her run track: so she can lose weight. Chloe hates track, too. She complains about it all the time and says she has her period like three times a month.
I don’t know if I could keep track of a big lie, though. And part of me actually wants to be honest with Willow. Part of me is tired of lying. Part of me is sad that my best friend and my mom hate me. Maybe Willow can help me. Maybe life without starving and running and worrying is possible.
As long as I don’t get really huge.
I checked my e-mail before my appointment with Willow. There’s a shared computer in the hallway we can sign up for during afternoon free time. Ten-minute sessions, no extensions. Brenna was looking at some book blog, but she let me use her last five minutes.
All I had was an e-mail from Principal Hunt saying corny stuff like “We believe in you!” and “The staff is excited to have you back and healthy again!” She’d added five smiley faces at the end.
I guess that’s the one good thing about being in here: I get a break from schoolwork. Not that I’ve been learning much at school. I’ve barely been able to concentrate the past few months. That was Mom and Dad’s first clue: my Bs dropped to Cs. I went from an above-average to an average student.
And for Mom and Dad, average sets off alarm bells.
I’m hearing alarm bells now, too. Because I didn’t have any mail from my friends. There was nothing from Josie. Nothing even from Emerson. I wish I could text them, but that’s against the rules. They took my phone away the second I walked through the unit door, like it was covered in contaminated slime. Jean said they want to “remove technology’s hold on me,” to “separate me from the world of my disease.” I feel like they’ve cut off a limb.
I’d almost rather they cut off one of my fingers. I could survive without a pinkie. Maybe even a thumb, although that might make things tricky. It’d be hard to hold a marker to draw. It’d even be hard to do something simple, like opening up a plastic baggie. But I could give up plastic baggies if it meant being able to text with Emerson and Josie.
If they’d even text back.
There are no crystals in Willow’s office. No rainbows or moonbeams, either. She seems normal, actually, which is annoying. I want there to be something to hate about her, a reason to be rude and stick my tongue out at her. A reason to not talk, even though part of me is dying to let everything out.
Willow’s nice, at least. She’s thin, but the healthy kind of thin. The kind with muscles on her arms and thighs and a little pouch on her stomach. She wears normal clothes: jeans and a plain blue button-down shirt. Her curly blond hair is half falling out of her ponytail. She’s pretty, but not so pretty that I’m jealous. When Willow smiles, her eyes crinkle at the edges.
That’s how you know someone’s giving you a real smile, that they’re not a faking faker like Talia London. Talia fakes nice all the time. The corners of her mouth turn up, but her eyes are ice-cold. She fake sneezes, too, then wrinkles her nose and tries to look all cute. Like a sneeze could ever be cute.
Jacob Sullivan thinks so, though. That’s probably why he asked Talia to be his girlfriend. Either that or because she’s way prettier than me. Skinnier than me, too. I bet she wears a size 0000000. If that was a size, I bet Talia would wear it.
I hate Talia. I hate her sneeze and her smile and her laugh. I even hate her teeth. They’re too white. Teeth should not be that white and perfect.
I told Willow about Talia. I don’t know how it happened. I was trying so hard not to talk about food that when she asked me what was on my mind, I blurted it out really fast: “I hate Talia London.”
Then I clamped my mouth shut. Why did I say anything? Now Willow won’t think I’m fine. She won’t think I’m perfect.
At least Willow didn’t lecture me like Mom would have, about how hate isn’t a nice way to feel and how I should always choose kindness. Instead, Willow said that it’s totally normal to not like people. That even she hates people.
That was nice of her.
Except then Willow babbled on about how important it is to feel my emotions and not stuff them down. She gave me a handout with twenty cartoon faces on it, each labeled with an emotion:
Guilty.
Sad.
Anxious.
Ecstatic.
Scared.
Frustrated.
Cautious.
“What’s your emotion right now?” Willow asked.
All of the above? None of the above? Sometimes I don’t know whether I feel too much or nothing at all. I closed my eyes and waved my hand over the handout, like I used to do with Julia when we played the “Where Are You Going on Vacation?” game. We’d drag Dad’s dusty old globe off the bookshelf in his office, close our eyes, and spin the world around. Wherever our finger landed was where we’d supposedly be going on vacation that year.
France. Kazakhstan. Easter Island. Mozambique.
It was fun to imagine an exotic trip, especially when most of our vacations are tacked on to Julia’s gymnastics meets all over New England. We stay in a hotel room on the same floor as the rest of her teammates. I sit in a stuffy gym for hours, then pretend to be excited about dinner at a chain restaurant and the hotel pool.
An imaginary vacation to France would be way better than all of that.
I could tell that Willow was stifling a sigh when my finger wiggled in the air and then landed on jealous. I bet she’s already sick of me. Mom and Dad shipped me off, and now Ms. Therapist Who’s Supposed to Change My Life is ready to kick me out of her office. No wonder Talia made fun of me. No wonder Josie hates me. I’m toxic.
Willow didn’t kick me out, though. Probably because she’s a professional. She folded her hands on her lap and pretended everything was normal. “Who are you jealous of?”
My mind flashed to Julia, to the looks of pride on Mom and Dad’s faces when she sticks a tricky vault. To the finish line at the track, which I never, ever cross first. To Ali’s body crunching up and down.
“No one. Never mind.”
During snack today, Aisha asked me if I’d been in treatment before. She asked me like it was a totally normal question, like she was asking me what my favorite TV show was.
“Um … no? Have you?”
“Oh yeah. This is my fourth time here.”
Four times? Once is enough for me. Once is too many times for me. Why does Aisha keep coming back? Does that mean treatment doesn’t work? I thought I was supposed to come in here and be cured. (I’m not sure if I want to be cured, but they should at least have truth in advertising or whatever.)
If Aisha keeps coming back, what if I have to come back, too? What if I decide I want to recover and try really hard and am honest with Willow? What if I trust the staff and gain weight and then have to come back and go through this awfulness all over again?
What if this place is like one of those fancy revolving doors in front of hotels, the ones that go around and around? What if I get stuck in that loop forever?
No. I have to get out of here now. Get out and get a little bit better. Enough so nobody notices the sick parts of me anymore. Enough so I feel better.
In our appointment, Willow told me that to get rid of my eating disorder, I have to “make the decision to get better.” I have to decide that health and happiness and not being weak and hungry all the time is better than the number on the scale.
Maybe Aisha hasn’t decided yet and that’s why she’s back.
I understand that. I can’t believe people when they say that recovery is a good thing. Because I don’t want a good thing. I want a sure thing. I want them to tell me they can cure me. That if I eat this food and follow this meal plan and am the perfect patient, then I’ll be happy.
I’d recover if I could get that guarantee. The guarantee that when I leave, no one will make fun of me. That Mom will be proud of me. That Dad will notice me. That my friends will like me no matter how much I mess up.
No one can do that, though. They can’t guarantee anything.
So I’ll stick with the sure thing, even though it hurts sometimes. Even though (late at night, when my stomach aches and I’m filled with regret instead of food) sometimes I wish I’d never started losing weight in the first place.
I did start, though. And now I’m not Roly-Poly Riley anymore. I’m Runner Riley. Skinny Riley.
I don’t have to get stuck in that revolving door. I’m stronger than Aisha. I’ll get a little better, but not too much better. I’ll fool them all.
And when I leave, I won’t come back.
Dinner. Meal four. I’m going to stop counting the times I eat here. I don’t think I can count that high.
There’s a cutout of Elsa on the wall of the dining room. LET IT GO is spelled out on top, in alternating dark blue and light blue construction-paper letters. Taped around Elsa are white snowflakes that patients wrote on. Past patients, I bet, because I didn’t recognize any of the names:
I let go of my desire to be perfect. —Carah
I let go of my routines. —Anna
I let go of the eating disorder’s insults. —Ivy
Lots of the snowflakes are filled, but there are still a bunch of empty ones. I’m not ready to fill one out yet. Thinking about letting go of my eating disorder is scary. It’s good and bad all rolled up together, like the scarves Mom makes with two different-colored balls of yarn. When she knits her stitches together so tightly, you can’t separate one color from the other.
My mind feels like that now. There’s too much going on. I don’t want to change, but I do want to turn my brain off. I want my head to be quieter. I want to be happier.
Brenna sat next to me at dinner. She started humming some song I kind of recognized, by that band Josie was obsessed with last year. Doo-doo-DOOOOO. Dum-DUM-DUM-dahhhhh.
I let Brenna distract me. All the girls distracted me. Or maybe we distracted one another. We talked about school dances and how silly they are. Ali told us how her mom chaperoned her last dance and actually walked over and fixed her hair. I’d totally die.
Laura told us how her boyfriend, Timothy, brought her lilacs before their first dance as boyfriend and girlfriend, but that she’s allergic to lilacs. “My eyes started watering so much that I looked like I was crying.” Laura giggled. It’s the first time I’ve seen her giggle since I’ve been here.
Brenna said one of her teachers yelled at her for wearing pants to the Christmas Dance, but that the girl she likes danced with her.
Meredith said she’d never been to a school dance, because she always has ballet practice on Friday nights. “Had practice, I mean.” She looked sad and poked at her pasta until the counselor told her to watch her “behaviors.” That’s what the staff calls practically everything we do here. If we eat too fast or too slowly, it’s an eating disorder “behavior.” If we chew too many times, it’s a behavior. If we look at our food the wrong way, it’s a behavior.
I had to turn my attention back to my food mountain then, the one I have to climb six times a day. Each step I take, it gets steeper and steeper.
Brenna must have been able to tell I was freaked, because she nudged my shoulder. “It’s hard, but you can do it,” she said. “It gets easier. Take it one bite at a time and I’ll distract you.” Brenna started talking about this awesome comic she’s reading, Ms. Marvel. I’m not really into comics, but it sounded really cool. Female superheroes! Girls who aren’t just sidekicks!
“I cosplay as Ms. Marvel, too,” Brenna said. Then she blushed. “I can’t believe I told you that. It’s so embarrassing.”
“No, it’s cool,” I said. “I’d love to pretend to be someone else for a while, too.”
I took a deep breath and told Brenna about the drawings I used to do, about the unicorns and castles and dragons. About the fancy stuff Mom wanted me to draw instead, because I have “so much talent.”
I talked instead of eating. Brenna ate while I talked.
“Slow down, Brenna,” the counselor said. “Remember to chew and enjoy the food.”
Brenna blushed. She took a sip of her milk. She avoided my eyes.
I wonder if Brenna has bulimia. Or binge-eating disorder. She is bigger than me, after all. I wonder if she’s trying to stop herself from eating as much as I’m trying to make myself start. I wonder if her blush means she’s embarrassed.
Should she be embarrassed?
Before I got in here, I probably would have said yes. I would have said that eating too much is gross. That being big is gross. But Brenna is cool. I like to talk to her. I don’t care that she’s bigger than me. I don’t care what she looks like.
Maybe people don’t care what I look like, either.
I didn’t say any of that out loud, though. I told her that I’m not drawing much anymore, and that all my stuff is at home, in sketchbooks shoved in the back of my closet. I didn’t tell her about the stuff I’ve been working on in here. No one wants to see my awful drawing of a television.
“I’d like to see them someday.” Brenna smiled. “I bet you’re way better than me.”
I bet I’m not.
At least talking to Brenna helped me get through dinner. I forgot (mostly) about the food in front of me. I forgot about the bites I took.
Then it was over. The counselor rang a little bell and we left the dining room.
Another meal conquered.
On to the next one.
Brenna may be cool and Willow may listen to me, but I hate feeling so gross after a meal. There’s a 99 percent chance my stomach is going to explode.
99.9 percent, even.
They’ll have to let me go home then, right?
I can’t do this for another day.
I can’t do this for the rest of my life.
The staff may say recovery’s a good thing, but they have to be lying. This treatment thing is a big scam, a way to get our insurance companies to pay them zillions of dollars.
Why did I think for one second that I maybe wanted to recover? My body is falling apart.
I’ll eat as long as I’m here, but I’m stopping the second I get home.
I called Mom tonight to tell her about my day. About the counting-while-I-pee thing. About how much I’m eating. About how Brenna’s not so bad and Willow’s kind of nice. I didn’t say anything about Ali and her crunches, though. I like the idea of keeping that secret to myself for a bit. Like how Dad always sticks a granola bar in his backpack for later.
Just in case he needs it.
I asked Mom to tell Emerson and Josie to e-mail me. I asked her to visit, to bring books and my special markers, the ones I stuffed in my bottom desk drawer when running started taking over my life. At first, I didn’t mention the markers. I was afraid Mom would start talking about my “potential” and gushing that I “shouldn’t have stopped; you were definitely going places.”
I think Mom’s scared to admit the truth: that I’m not going places.
I’m not going anywhere.
I’ll never display my silly animals or faces in Mom’s gallery.
I’ll never win an award for my art.
And now that I’m in the hospital, I’ll never be the skinniest.
I still asked for my markers, though. They’re nothing fancy, but they do have two sides, one thick tip and one super-thin one, so I can work on details. I have one hundred colors, too. (Well, ninety-eight now. I somehow lost lime green and rose pink.)
Mom agreed to bring them without a word about my “lost future as an artist.”
That’s one good thing about today.