Color Me Pretty

by C. M. Stunich

  “He took out a pistol and pointed it at my chest. Your mom stepped in between us. I mean, I don't know if he was serious or not … ” If it's possible, I think my face pales a little more.

  “No, he was serious,” I say and then I feel sick. How can my family think such terrible things about Emmett? They think he's a pervert because he loves me? Because he chose to worship my body to get to my soul? Fuck them. “What else happened?” I ask because I have to know, not because I want to.

  Emmett sighs and I can tell he doesn't want to talk about it. He sits down next to me and squeezes one of my hands between two of his. Mine are dwarfed instantly, hidden beneath strong, healthy flesh, flesh with color and substance and life. I close my eyes and pretend some of his strength is leaking into me, fortifying me for the shit I know is coming.

  Things are hard.

  They're going to get harder.

  Right now, I'm living through the ugly. One day, I hope it can be beautiful again. I want to paint the world with pretty, to color the earth with joy and life and substance. I think again back to that notebook, that drawing in blue colored pencil and Emmett's offer to let me create a design for his fashion show … It's too soon for that, I know, but at least there's something I can grasp onto, a goal to reach out towards. I tangle my fingers with Emmett's.

  “Your parents took all your stuff. I didn't know how to stop them, how to say no. I just … when they took you away, I tried to see you, but your family wouldn't let me, and then I just went home and laid in bed.” Emmett takes a deep breath and looks at the floor. “Your sister fired me.” I cringe.

  “She had no right to. That's not even legal, is it?” Emmett smiles softly.

  “Sure it is.”

  “Emmett, I'm sorry,” I say, and his gaze snaps to mine, eyes wide, face confused. His hands drop mine and rise to my face, pulling my forehead against his.

  “Don't be,” he whispers. “This isn't your fault.” I pull away and reach up a hand to the tube in my nose. I know Emmett was trying to protect me from this all along. Now I see why. He knew this wasn't going to work for me. God, I need to get the hell out of here. “I think, maybe, if Marlena hadn't come by that you'd have been okay, you know?” Emmett takes a sharp breath and draws my attention back to his face. “Claire, I want you to know that I really thought I was doing the best by you. I never meant for any of this to happen.” I smile back at him and bite my lower lip.

  “I know. And you were doing the right thing. Emmett, I can't have them watching over me, forcing … ” I start to choke on tears, on the feeding tube that's threaded down my throat and into my tortured belly. “Forcing me to eat. I have to do this on my own or I won't survive. Short term, this might work but long term, they'll kill me inside.”

  “I know.”

  Emmett and I stare at each other for awhile. I want to take a cooking class with him, spend a night in the treehouse, go to a movie. I don't want to sit in a hospital with a tube in my nose and worry about what's going to happen next.

  “By law, I have to go to a clinic to be monitored,” I tell him and he nods.

  “I researched it,” he tells me, standing up when he sees Dr. Banerjee through the blinds. “Do you know where they're sending you?” I shake my head.

  “Either Bayview Hills or Crescent Springs.” I pause and take a chance. If Emmett says no, then I may as well consider myself done. “When I get out, can I come back to your place?” Going home will destroy me. I don't tell him that, but it's true. My family might be well meaning, but they have no idea what they're doing. It's like trying to hug a kitten and crushing it instead. The end result is the same: failure.

  When he looks at me, his smile is just a little crooked, like his emotions are leaking into the muscles of his face and he can't control them. Happy. He's happy.

  “I'd like that.” I swallow hard, and even though Dr. Banerjee is opening the door, sliding into the room and watching us carefully, I keep talking. “But not as a roommate this time.” My words sound breathy, like they're barely there, like maybe I imagined them or something.

  “Not as a roommate,” Emmett confirms, standing up, and kissing me on the lips right there for the doctor to see. I don't know exactly what it was I was trying to say with that, but at least it's out.

  Next step, survive rehab.

  God only knows how hard that's going to be.

  My family decides to send me to Crescent Springs, and I don't protest. In fact, when they come to see me off the next morning, I agree to see them. After all, somebody's got to tell them I'm not coming home.

  I look down at the clothes my mother brought for me and try not to feel disappointed. I was hoping she'd pick something comfortable but stylish, like my Dagmar jacquard-knit dress or that cute, little Halston Heritage jersey dress. Instead she brought me old black sweatpants and a baggy T-shirt that must belong to Marlena. I lift up the faded black fabric and try not to cry. Like I don't feel disgusting enough? Are they trying to punish me? That's the only explanation that makes any sense.

  “God, I hate my life,” I choke out as I imagine what else is stuffed into that suitcase out there. Obviously nothing I'm going to like. Might as well spend the rest of the weekend naked. That stupid, childish thought hits me like a freight train and suddenly, I'm leaning against the wall gasping. Naked? Running around naked wouldn't be an improvement over holey sweatpants and a faded tee; it would be a complete and utter backslide. I see the way people look at me. They find me disgusting; I can see it in their eyes. My dad, God, he can't even look me in the face. He just gazes around the room, pretending to be interested in the boring, beige walls.

  “Everything okay in there?” my mom asks, knocking on the door with a gentle fist. I ignore her and reach down to turn the lock. There isn't one. Fuck. Just because I had an accident, I don't deserve a little privacy? I shudder to think what it's going to be like at the rehab center. Hell, I assume. Three days. Just three days and you're out.

  “Fine.” I bite the word off my tongue, so it comes out harsh and angry. Just because I agreed to see them doesn't mean I'm not pissed. The way they talk about Emmett, the way they look at me. Good intentions don't mean everything. They're wrong and eventually, they're going to have to realize that and let me do my own thing.

  “Are you sure you don't need any help?” my mom says, and I can tell by her muffled voice that she's leaning against the door, listening in on me. Her overprotective side is going to get a whole lot worse, I assume. She's always been stuffy and coddling, and I've got the terrible feeling that I've only just seen the tip of the iceberg.

  “Like I can't fucking dress myself?” I ask, rubbing at the bandage on my elbow. At least the IVs and the feeding tube are gone. But God, to get them to take it out, I had to promise to eat everything they gave to me, had to have people over me while I forced stale, unappetizing food down my throat. You'd think if they were trying to entice me to eat that they'd have provided something good, something that actually tantalizes the tastebuds and excites the spirit, food with soul. Instead, they gave me wrinkly grapes, tapioca pudding, and dry chicken, pre-shredded since I'm not allowed to have knives. 397 calories per tray times two trays = I can't even fucking think about it right now. And I'd thought this was a nice hospital. I do my best not to try and calculate the calories from four days of that stupid feeding tube; I'm sure the number's astronomical. “Just leave me alone for five minutes,” I growl, and I wait until I hear my mother move away. She doesn't go far but at least there's a semblance of privacy.

  I turn around, keeping my eyes shut tight, so I don't accidentally look into the mirror. I'm not ready yet, have to brace myself for the moment. It's going to be so bad; it's going to destroy me a little inside. I wish Emmett were here. I wouldn't look at all, but I'm afraid I'm going to end up catching a glance in a window or something and have a freak-out in front of everyone. This needs to happen privately with just me, myself, and I.

  I clutch my ugly clothes against my chest and try
to be grateful that I get to take off this stupid hospital gown. Anything is better, anything. I force my breath to slow, to forget about the horrors of the last few days, and try to imagine something pleasant. Slowly, my mind begins to build a scenario, stretching itself to the limit, fighting to get past the slump I've been experiencing. Lack of food doesn't exactly stimulate the imagination. Eventually though, it begins to spin and the gears click into place.

  A catwalk, high above the glistening water, juts out from the platform and snakes around the pond, held up here and there with stainless steel poles that disappear into the darkness below. I set foot onto the clear, glass surface with a pair of custom sandals on my feet and a couture dress wrapped around my perfect body. When people see me coming, they gasp, and not because I'm fat or skinny, but because I'm just right. As I start to walk, my body morphs a little, changes from slender and willowy to ripe and curvy, womanly. At first, the change bothers me, but then, off in the distance, waiting at the end of the line, I see Emmett Sinclair watching me with half-lidded eyes and a gentle smile.

  A sigh of pleasure escapes my throat, and my heart begins to slow. I can do this. The mind has a lot of power, Claire. Take control if that's what you need to do. Start with your brain and work your way out into the world. My eyes flicker open and the clothes fall from my hands, unfolding as they go, landing in a messy heap at my bare feet.

  I clamp my hand over my mouth to hold back the wail of horror that's clawing its way up from my roiling belly.

  “No.” That one word, a whisper.

  In the mirror, the rapacious monster looks back at me, wearing two dark, purple circles of pain under her eyes. She leers at my affliction, snarls at me as she strips away my disorder and leaves me with something worse – reality. Stark, white, blistering reality. “No.”

  “No?” my reflection asks, smiling back at me with yellowed teeth. “What do you mean 'no'? Look at yourself: this is you. This is what you've become Claire. You're an abomination, an abhorrent miscreant, a cathexis of foulness and decay.”

  A scream builds in the back of my throat.

  Where do I start? Oh, where, where, where?

  The train wreck that I see before me is foreign and familiar both, comforting and terrifying, false and yet truthful. My knees begin to shake and my body goes cold.

  If you're worried about me, you should be. Being born isn't easy; that's why most of us only do it once. And here I am, my second time around. Things have to get worse before they get better – it's a rule of the universe. Progress doesn't always mean flying forward at light speed. Sometimes, it's about knowing when to step back and take a look around. I have to do this or I'll never get better.

  My eyes are big, too big, like marbles, except they're not shiny. Instead, they're dull, matte, just two gray and white splotches of paint in an otherwise colorless face. I'm so pale, I may as well be a ghost. My skin is pallid, almost translucent, tickled through with tiny, blue veins that are pulsing with a soft weakness. My hair … oh … my hair. Where is my hair?

  My hands come up, long and spindly, tipped with those strange, blue nails, and they touch my red scalp tentatively, brush through the splotchy orange. Why did I cut my hair off? I can't even remember anymore. Somewhere, in the back of my mind that image of me falling from the treehouse surfaces and in it, I have the most vibrant, beautiful red hair, bright as blood.

  Tears begin to fall, hot and heavy.

  “Yes, cry,” says the person I was in the in-between. See, there was the Claire from before, the one who wanted to be a role model and make a difference. And there's the Claire now. The Real Claire Reborn. New Claire. Yes, I'm going to call her New Claire. “Look at yourself and see how your dreams have turned to nightmares. Understand me, so you can banish me. Hate me, so you can love me. Know me, so you can forget me.”

  I take the hospital gown off slowly, so slowly, letting the pale, thin fabric float to the floor like a cloud, brushing against my quivering ankles and my dry feet. I hiccup a bit and gasp, but I keep that moan inside, that wail buried.

  My fingers touch my ribs, counting them, feeling them, desperately trying to convince myself that I can't see them. I'm fat. I'm disgusting. It's really hard to keep that line of thought going when In-between Claire is looking at me like that.

  “You've got to be fucking kidding me,” she laughs. “Did you learn nothing when you died? Do you want to do it again? Just remember, Claire, rebirths don't always happen. Sometimes, that infinite blackness is all there is waiting.”

  I drop to my knees, sliding down the wall, hitting the floor with a violent thump.

  My legs are splayed out to the side, twig thin and hard to look at.

  I feel … Lost. Miserable. Lonely. Pathetic. Confused. Angry.

  But I don't feel numb, not anymore.

  I wrap my arms around myself and cry silently.

  “Claire?” It's my mother again. She must've heard me fall. I scramble to my feet, taking the shirt with me and slipping it over my head, so that when she opens the door uninvited, I'm standing there mostly covered, eyes wet but defiant.

  My mom looks … beautiful. Her face is full and her skin is colored, peach and pink, dotted with freckles, and her hair is vibrant as sin. When she sees that I've been crying, she tries to come inside. “Oh, honey.”

  “Please don't touch me,” I tell her and immediately, I see the hurt burning in her eyes like flames. I don't mean to make her feel the way I do. It's just … she doesn't get me at all. Right now, I have to deal with this myself. Even if … even if Emmett were here, I'd have to refuse him. It would be hard, but I'd have to. I have to fall in love with myself, but to do that, I have to get rid of the resentment and the pain. A hug might feel good, but it'd be a placebo.

  I must stand here, alone but strong.

  I raise my chin and I try to communicate all of this with a look.

  Mom doesn't get it.

  “Claire, you'd better learn to stop pushing people away or you're going to end up dead!” This is her pain talking now, just like In-between Claire is mine. Mom doesn't mean it, not really, but she's scared. And I'm vulnerable and volatile both. We've just become a toxic combination.

  I just stare at her, watch her face turn red with a swirl of emotion.

  “Get the fuck out.”

  “Don't you dare speak to me that way,” she says, voice low, like I've never heard before. She's so afraid of losing me that she's lashing out. I wish I could just hug her and make up, but that's not a place I'm at in my life right now. How am I supposed to make up with other people when I can't even make up with myself?

  I lick my dry, chapped lips, and squeeze my fists so tight that my nails cut into the skin on my palms. There's a horrible horde of mean, cruel things I'd like to say to my mother in that moment – how much I hate her, how she doesn't even love me, how fat and disgusting she is. But I don't need lies to hurt her when I have the worst thing of all: the truth.

  “When I get out of Crescent Springs,” I begin as she continues to stare at me like she doesn't even know me at all. “Don't bother coming to pick me up.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I said don't bother coming to get me. I've already arranged a ride.”

  My mother blinks, nice and slow, trying to reign herself in but failing.

  “Emmett?” I smile. I don't mean to, but the pain is still there making me do things I don't want to do. I hope there'll come a time soon, very soon, that I can rid myself of it forever.

  “Yeah, actually. We discussed it when he came to visit yesterday.” My mom remains still for a moment and then starts to turn away. I follow after her and pause with my head poking out the bathroom door.

  “I won't have that boy anywhere near my home,” she says, reaching for the door to the hallway, like our discussion is over. Period. End of sentence.

  “Fine,” I say and I really, really don't like the cruelty that laces my voice. “I didn't plan on it anyway. After I get out of Crescent Springs, I'm mo
ving back in with Emmett.”

  My mom turns around, mouth open to speak, but I slam the door in her face and turn on the faucet, so I can't hear what it is she has to say.

  She doesn't come in after me, and when I leave the bathroom, the nurse politely informs me that my family has already gone.

  I don't want to go to this clinic. It's a waste of my time, and it's pointless – I'm going there for suicide, not anorexia. Thing is, I didn't try to kill myself. I didn't. I wouldn't have. I just tripped while chasing a dream.

  Nobody cares to hear the truth though, not my family or Dr. Banerjee or Donald. Since the minute I woke up, they've all been preaching honesty and yet, refuse to listen. So I let the nurse's assistant escort me out to a white van and strap me in the back seat like I'm a small child, leaving me with nothing to do. What a brilliant idea. If I really was suicidal, I'd have strangled myself to death with the seatbelt. Being left alone for three hours with your thoughts is not a pleasant experience.

  I beg the heavens for a magazine, something shiny and glossy and new. Something with beautiful pictures. I could use a little beautiful in my life right now. Instead, we drive the winding, country road with nineties music trickling out from the front speakers. The side of the van says this is hospital transport, but I'm the only passenger. Just me, the driver, and a male nurse. And not even an attractive one.

  I sigh and slump against the window, letting my eyes flicker closed, trying my best to cook up another scenario like I did in the bathroom. Unfortunately, my mind decides to take me down another path and forces me to relive the act of having my feeding tube removed. I start gagging just thinking about it. There was so much … goop that came out along with the tube … and then my nose and throat were clogged with mucous. Let's just say, I'm glad that Emmett wasn't around to see. Fuck, I'm disgusting. Skinny is supposed to be pretty and perfect, desirable. But none of this is.

  I sit up and adjust myself, drawing the male nurse's head around, so he can study me like I'm an animal at the zoo. I cannot even believe this shit. It's like a horrible fucking soap opera, and I'm the main character. If I get to the clinic and they try to shove pills down my throat and lock me in at night, I am going to flip out. That whole mental asylum thing is so overdone.