The Making of Us

by Debbie McGowan

  But no, Leigh didn’t care. Or rather, they did care about how it made me feel. They didn’t dismiss it or lie to me and tell me I wasn’t fat. They accepted…loved me for who I was, and I wished so hard I could’ve taken back that warning, because I was the one fat-shaming. I was also pissed off how easily I’d reverted to it, as if I’d left my Fat Pride in Cornwall. Maybe it had been the pixies weaving their spell and the effect had worn off.

  “Show Leigh the garden, Jesse,” my grandma suggested after dinner—roast beef, roast potatoes, Yorkshire pudding, veggies and gravy—which sat in my stomach like a lump of lead.

  “Will do.”

  Leigh followed me out through the conservatory into the garden. They’d hardly spoken during dinner, and it was my fault, therefore I needed to fix it.

  “Come and see the greenhouse,” I said. I wanted to put as much distance between us and the dining room as possible.

  Leigh followed me into the greenhouse, arms folded defensively. I closed the door and gave them a moment to look around, but they didn’t take me up on it, instead staring at me expectantly.

  “OK,” I said. “Can I explain where I’m coming from?”

  “Yeah, it might help if you did.”

  And so, I told Leigh everything—how I’d been put on diets as a kid and been dieting ever since; how I’d tried every single fad diet that came on the market, been to Slimming World, Weight Watchers, joined a gym for a year and visited twice. I told them about starving myself, and the binges, and the bullying, the horrors of weight management clinic, and why I’d have still been trying to do all of those things if I hadn’t met them. Lastly, I admitted how terrified I was that being fat would kill me.

  My self-pity was…pitiful, and totally not the point. “I’m trying,” I said. “I promise I’m trying.”

  Leigh gestured with a sweep of the hand. “You look after all this?”

  I nodded.

  “And the garden?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s amazing.”

  “Are you deliberately changing the subject?” I asked, tongue-in-cheek, because it was what they’d asked me the last time we’d had a difficult conversation.

  “Just taking it all in.” They leaned sideways and looked behind me. It was a big greenhouse, and sometimes it could be overwhelming, especially in early summer when there were so many tomato plants to tend to. But I always got there in the end.

  Leigh returned their attention to me, locking their gaze with mine, and I couldn’t look away.

  “I get why you’re scared, Jesse. Living with a life-threatening condition. It’s a challenge, and I get scared, too. Or I used to, before you. So…it seems to me, what I need to do is figure out how to make you feel safe.”

  “No. This is my problem, not yours,” I argued.

  “Nuh-uh. Not anymore.” Leigh lifted their dog tag and held it up in front of my face. “Shipmates, right?”

  “Right.”

  “And who’s got the wheel?”

  I fought a smile. “That would be you.”

  “OK.” They tilted their chin up and pointed at their mouth. “A kiss, please.”

  I did as Leigh asked, keeping my lips together—Grandma’s greenhouse, after all—but in no rush to break contact. When we finally did, Leigh took my hand and we went back outside. It was getting dark, but I still took them around the garden, pointing out the different shrubs and trees I’d ‘helped’ my grandma plant when I was little: buddleia, wisteria, lilac—the ‘pretty blue flowers’ that led to the discovery of my colour blindness—pears, apples, plums and blackcurrants—‘don’t eat too many, you’ll get tummy ache…’

  “How do you feel now you’ve told me?” Leigh asked as we reached the conservatory, ready to return to Mum and Grandma.

  “Better…” I did a quick mental check-up to make sure it was true. It was. “A lot better.”

  “Fat crisis averted?”

  Now I smiled for real. “Yes. Thank you.”

  * * * * *

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Monday morning back on campus was like the biggest hangover of my life. My head was full of candy floss and I could’ve sworn my legs were attached to someone else’s body. I had a pretty good idea why I felt like crap, but I didn’t have the luxury of being sick this week, so I dragged my backside to the study centre and logged in to the network. At least I could work on my dissertation. I had a meeting scheduled with my supervisor at one p.m.—time to get the theory section outlined.

  But my brain wasn’t playing. Or rather, it was playing musical body parts with my kidneys. This was so not happening to me.

  I made it through another fifteen minutes before the nausea hit; a further fifteen spent in the study centre loos and I was past being embarrassed by potential discovery. I just needed it to stop.

  At the point where my stomach felt ready to turn itself inside out, I heard the external door open and close.

  “Jess? You in here?”

  “Yeah, mate.” I finished off with a retching, nothing left to throw up.

  “One of the study support people said they saw you come this way a while ago. They thought you’d gone to get a drink.”

  I flushed the loo and opened the door, leaning on the wall because I could barely stay upright.

  “Jeez. What’s the matter?”

  “I dunno,” I said miserably, even though I did.

  “Food poisoning?” Noah speculated.

  “Could be.” It almost certainly was.

  Noah stepped closer, but I shook my head.

  “I might be contagious.” For the next seventy-two hours, which would take me through to Thursday…election day.

  Noah backed off, and I went to wash my hands, making sure I did as thorough a job as I could. “Could you do me a favour? Go to the shop and get me some of those anti-diarrhoea pills and paracetamol?”

  “Don’t you think you should go home?”

  “Can’t. Got a meeting this afternoon, and election stuff to do.”

  Noah observed me for several seconds, then said, “No worries. Where will you be?”

  I clamped my lips together and dived into the toilet cubicle again.

  “Right here, then.” He left me to my bodily evacuation.

  By the time he returned, I’d managed to stay a full five minutes—I was counting seconds as my phone was on the desk—without further loss of body fluids, but I was physically exhausted and needed to rehydrate. Noah handed me the pills along with a bottle of water, which I sipped slowly in spite of the way my belly cried out for sustenance and cramped again at the small amount I had given it.

  “What election stuff?” Noah asked.

  “Just being around, really.” I needed to catch up with Jazz and Matty, see how things were going, check in with Neema, and pop to the SU office to make sure everything was as it should be—all of which depended on my ability to safely leave the bathroom. Ha. Back into the cubicle. Up came the water. Idiot, idiot, idiot. I spat, trying to clear the bitterness from my mouth, and called through the closed door, “Can I ask another favour?”

  “Go for it.”

  “Please can you tell Leigh to keep away from me for a couple of days? I’ll text them later and explain.”

  “Sure. Have you got your phone?”

  “No. It’s on the desk.”

  “OK. Be right back.”

  Noah left. I chanced a sip of water; the neck of the bottle juddered against my teeth. I was cold and tired. I needed my bed.

  Noah returned and slid my phone under the door. “Call or text or whatever if you need me. I’ll be just out there.”

  “Cheers, mate.”

  He left again. I was only delaying the inevitable, I knew, but the short walk home was impossible from where I was standing, and sitting, and standing, and damn it, was this ever going to stop?

  It did eventually stop—or the anti-diarrhoea pills kicked in, at any rate—about half an hour later, and I returned to our desk, falling into my
seat. Noah’s quick glance up from his note-taking confirmed I looked as bad as I felt.

  “What did Leigh say?”

  “Thank you for telling me.”

  That sounded about right.

  Still scribbling, Noah asked, “Are you going home?”

  I sighed. “Yeah.”

  “When?”

  “Soon.” If I could find the energy to move at all. “I need to show my face in the SU office first.”

  “Want me to come with you?”

  “Nah. Stay here. It’ll save me carting all my junk.” Gingerly, I got to my feet and waited for the blood to reach my head. I set off towards the lift, thought again, and used the stairs, keeping my teeth tightly gritted all the way to the ground floor.

  It was a dull old day but still far too bright, and the autumn chill was both too much and not enough. I was shivering and sweating and desperate to do what I needed to and get home. I walked as fast as I could, holding my breath and praying I could hold off on throwing up long enough to find Carlos or someone, I didn’t care who. In fact, screw finding Carlos… I dodged into the café and made a beeline for the toilets. More retching, no vomiting. I risked another sip of water and went back outside.

  “Jesse!”

  My stomach lurched—in panic this time—and I held my hands up in front of me, stopping Leigh from coming close.

  “Aww. You’re really sick.”

  I nodded. “Food poisoning.”

  Leigh frowned. “But how? I’m OK. We ate exactly the same thing. Are your mum and grandma sick?”

  I sighed, resigned to the fact I’d have to come clean. “It wasn’t Sunday dinner that did it.” I’d established that earlier while I was sitting in the library loos. A text to my mum to ask if she was OK—she was—followed by one to ask how long that piece of barbecue chicken had been in the fridge. Her response? What piece of BBQ chicken?

  I explained, “I got up in the night for a drink, and I was hungry. There was some chicken in the fridge.” The thought of it made my stomach contract and set the cramp off again. I tensed and groaned, and became aware of Leigh’s hand rubbing my back. “Don’t do that. It’s contagious.”

  “Yeah, only if we kiss or your personal hygiene’s gone to hell since last week.”

  “It hasn’t,” I confirmed.

  “See? It’s fine. So, where are you going now?”

  “SU. I need to let someone in Pride know. How could I be so stupid? I really need to be here this week.” I’d well and truly seen off my chances of beating Danny Goodman now.

  “It’s not stupid. Look, come and sit.” Leigh led me to a low wall and kept hold of me until I was safely sitting. “I’ll go see if Carlos is in the SU office and let him know. If he’s not, I’ll text Matty or Jazz. OK?”

  “Yeah, thanks.”

  “And then I’m taking you home.”

  “You don’t need—”

  Leigh’s raised eyebrow was enough to stop me arguing. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  “OK.” I watched Leigh retreat for as long as I could cope with the eye movement. Everywhere ached, and the cramp had started up again. I doubled over and clenched my fist against my mouth.

  “Jesse?”

  Agh. Just bloody perfect. “Hi, Sarah,” I said without looking up. “I’d keep my distance, if I were you.” I’d hoped that would send her away. It didn’t, but she didn’t come any closer.

  “What’s up? You look like crap. Sorry. That’s not what you want to hear, is it? Did you have a good holiday?”

  “Yeah, thanks. It was awesome. And I’ve got food poisoning.”

  “That sucks. Did you pick it up while you were away?”

  “No, last night.” I didn’t want to talk about it and made a tactical switch. “How are you feeling? Any better?”

  “Getting there. I’ve only come in to drop off my doctor’s note. I’m signed off for the rest of this semester, but I’ll be here on Thursday.” Sarah stepped wide around me and sat a few feet along the wall, facing me. “I’ve been thinking a lot about what you said during the question panel.”

  “Let me guess. The allies issue?”

  “What else? I agree with everything else you stand for.”

  “I stand for what our members want. At the end of the day, I’d be their representative.”

  “Yes, but they also look to the committee for protection.”

  “Which they only get if they fit your narrow view of what it means to be queer.”

  “Er…what?”

  “Your anti-allies stance. We don’t know how many of our ally members are in the closet or still trying to figure stuff out.”

  “Pride should be somewhere they feel they can be honest about that.”

  “A safe space?” I said. Sarah nodded. “How safe do you think it feels to come out when you’re seen as not queer enough?”

  “What do you mean by ‘not queer enough’?” She used air quotes at me. I hated air quotes.

  “Did you just come to have a go, thinking I looked too ill to fight back?”

  “I came to ask if you were all right. I wish I hadn’t bothered.”

  “Why do you even care?” Ouch. I shouldn’t have said that. “Sorry. That was a low blow, but you called me a liar, Sarah. You laughed when Carlos took the piss out of me.”

  “I was wrong, and I said sorry.”

  “Tell me again how it’s a safe space.”

  She looked perplexed for a moment and then the light bulb must’ve come on. “This is about me doubting you’re bisexual?”

  “Bang on the money.”

  “I believe you.”

  “Because I’m with Leigh. Or do you still think I’m using them as an entry ticket?”

  “Of course I don’t.”

  “OK. Say I had a girlfriend instead? Would you doubt it then?”

  “I don’t know.” Sarah’s lip quivered, and she turned her face away. It left me torn between sympathy and mistrust.

  “I’m sorry if this seems heartless,” I said, “but if you’re trying to manipulate me again…”

  “Again?” She turned back so sharply her hair flew over her face. She shoved it out of the way. “I have never manipulated you.”

  “You’re telling me you didn’t try to push me towards standing?”

  “Believe me, Jesse, you were the last person I wanted to stand for office.”

  “Which is why you helped me get out of the debate. You must’ve known it would cost me votes.”

  “You’re wrong. So, so wrong.” She was breathing hard out of her nose, although I took it as a good sign that she was still breathing. I really didn’t want to be held responsible for her having another asthma attack.

  “That’s how it looks, and not just to me.” Leigh was on their way back from the SU office; I got up really slowly. “I’m not intentionally running away from this, Sarah. I need to go home.”

  She nodded and got up, too, but didn’t move to leave. “I keep messing this up.”

  “Why? What are you trying to do?”

  “Say sorry…give you the explanation you deserve.” She offered a watery smile. “For the record, I want you to win. Whether I agree with your policies or not, you’re exactly what we need on campus. You stick to your guns, and you make a very convincing argument, but you also care.”

  All the while she was speaking, Sarah held eye contact, and she sounded sincere, but she was a skilled politician, so I was taking her words with a pinch of salt, but I still said, “Thank you.”

  “Would it be OK if I email you?”

  “I guess.”

  “OK. Get well soon.”

  “I’ll do my best. See you on Thursday.”

  “You will.” With a nod at Leigh, Sarah called, “Good luck, Jesse,” over her shoulder and marched off in the direction of Student Support.

  “Come on, you. Home,” Leigh ordered.

  “My bag’s in the library,” I mumbled helplessly. The conversation with Sarah had stolen my last rese
rves.

  “Noah’s going to drop it off later. Aunty Sheri’s giving us a lift.

  “I might throw up in her car.”

  “You won’t.” Leigh reached into their bag and pulled out a bin liner.

  “OK.” I submitted and let Leigh lead me to the car park, where Doctor Powell reversed out of a space and stopped. Leigh opened the passenger door and then waited to make sure I was safely inside before they got in the back.

  “Jesse, this is my Aunty Sheri. Aunty Sheri, this is Jesse.”

  “Hello,” I said. “It’s nice to meet you. Well…you know.”

  Sheri smiled. “It’s nice to meet you, too, Jesse.” She put the car in gear and moved off. “One of you will need to direct me.”

  “Left out of the exit,” Leigh said.

  I leaned back and closed my eyes, focusing on their directions, and the bin liner in my lap. I didn’t need to use it, although it was a close call, and when we reached the flat, I said thank you and made a run for it. I got to the bathroom in time, but not the toilet.

  “Have you got any rubber gloves?” Leigh asked.

  “I’ll clean up,” I said into the toilet bowl.

  “I don’t mind.”

  “You can’t do it.” I wasn’t being a martyr. If I passed this on to Leigh, they’d probably end up in hospital, and they knew it, so they didn’t argue. But they did stay and look after me. Ice chips. The key to a vomit-free recovery. Well, those and my beautiful Leigh, of course.

  I was napping on and off, and heard Noah and Matty arrive. They must’ve hung around until my mum got home from work, because Leigh gave her a nurse-style report and then came to say goodbye.

  “I’m keeping count of all the kisses I’m not getting,” I said.

  Leigh ruffled my hair. “It’ll be fun catching up. Sleep well.”

  “Thank you for looking after me.”