“I don't know.”
“You don't know?” Kylie asks as she pushes through the doors. I'd been expecting a school cafeteria look, something with trays and long, Formica tabletops, lunch ladies with nets, linoleum floors. Instead, we walk into a carpeted area that looks an awful lot like the restaurant my parents used to take Marlena and me to after school on Friday. It even smells the same – like mac 'n' cheese mixed with steak sauce. Hmm. I hope to God it tastes better than the food at the hospital. “That's a good sign then, I guess.”
“Why's that?”
“Because you fell together accidentally. You didn't make a conscious decision. That's good.” Kylie walks me over to a table and pulls out a chair. Unsure as to what exactly it is that I'm supposed to be doing, I follow her lead and take a seat. “When you make a conscious decision to be with someone, there's always the risk that you're using your head and not your heart. Heads make logical choices; hearts make soulful ones.”
Kylie sits down next to me and pulls out a pair of menus from the center, sandwiched between a small, silver bucket full of white flowers and a container of napkins. The plastic foldout Kylie hands me looks like something you could find at any restaurant, minus the prices. There are instructions to choose one entree, one vegetable, and one starch. Next to each item, are calorie counts.
This is when I begin to freak out.
356. 291. 782. 447.
My breath starts to catch in my throat and my mind goes into overdrive. I'm so skinny right now, if I eat too much, my starving body will absorb every bit of fat and I'll balloon up overnight. I try to calm myself, try to insert logical thoughts. That doesn't make any sense, Claire. You're half-dead. Relax. You could eat 5,000 calories a day for months and not get fat. But even rebirth can't cure all your demons.
If Kylie notices my panic attack, she doesn't let on.
“This place might not look like much, but it's the,” Kylie makes little quotation marks with her fingers. “'premier center for those suffering from mental, physical, and emotional disorders.' We actually get to order and they bring us our food. Beats standing in a line and getting slop slapped onto a tray. Costs a pretty penny, too.” Kylie puts her menu back and rests her elbows on the table, watching me with wide, curious eyes. Nearby, one of the employees hovers and checks something on his clipboard. “Since you're a 'suspected',” Kylie makes another set of quotation marks. “Anorexic, they're going to make you choose at least 500 calories worth of food.” I startle a bit and give her a wide-eyed look. I want to deny her accusation, swear up and down that I'm not anorexic. Anorexic. Even the word makes me shudder. What a nightmare. Am I that obvious? Do people see me and just know? How long have I looked this way? I glance down at the menu and then back up at Kylie. “Want my opinion?” she asks.
Kylie doesn't wait for me to respond. Maybe she can see that I can't right now, that I can't move. I'm frozen, stuck halfway between who I was and who I want to become. It's terrifying. I've been counting calories for months now. I can't just stop looking at those massive numbers like they're bad things. On the outside, I tell myself that I'm too thin, that I'm sick. Inside, I still believe that I'm weak, that I'm giving into my body's temper tantrum and submitting to debility. “Well, I'm going to give it to you anyway. My sister was anorexic. She was in and out of this place for years. Anyhow, once they started trusting her and took her off the feeding tube, she ordered the same thing for every meal.” Kylie grabs my menu and slides it out of my frozen fingers. “If you don't make quote – smart – end quote choices, then they'll start making them for you.” Kylie looks up at me and arches a single, golden brow. Impressive. “And you are damn lucky you're not actually in the ED program.” Kylie shakes her head, scans my menu and puts it back.
She doesn't tell me what she's going to order.
I put my hands on my thighs and curl my fingers, scraping my brittle nails against the fabric of my jeans. I don't want to know; things are better this way. If I don't know what Kylie's picked out, I can stop obsessing over the calorie counts and the fat until I get the dish, and even then, if it's something complex, I may not even know. Yeah right. Keep telling yourself that, Claire. I start to stress out anyway.
Sweat begins to bead on my forehead.
When the waiter or whatever the hell he is comes over, Kylie gives him our order. Two iced teas, unsweetened, two plates of the roasted chicken with the lemon pepper rub, a cup of raw green beans, and mashed potatoes with butter.
I seriously almost gag on her words, managing just barely to keep the emotion held in check until the man walks away, taking his judgmental eyes and his clipboard along with him.
“What did you do that for?” I ask her, absolutely terrified at the prospect of mashed fucking potatoes. Logically, somewhere inside of myself, I know how ridiculous I'm being. I realize that mashed potatoes are not the be-all, end-all of life as I know it. However, old habits are hard to break and right now, my brain is absolutely, one hundred percent fixated on my mother's animal fat mashers. I mean, I'm sure the people here don't use lard in theirs, but how I am supposed to know?
“Do what?” Kylie asks, leaning back and watching me inquisitively. I wonder what she's thinking. If her sister had … God, I can hardly even think that word … anorexia then she must know the signs. I look away, but not because I'm ashamed; I won't be. This is my life and these are my choices. Yes, I'm ashamed at some of the things I've done to the people around me, but not about the state I now find myself in. I got here chasing something bigger than me, searching for happiness, fighting with every last ounce of strength I had in me. And there's nothing, nothing, nothing that can make me feel bad about that.
“Order mashed potatoes. They had boiled baby red potatoes.” Kylie chuckles, putting a small hand to her mouth. She looks young on the outside, but her eyes hint at deep, deep pain hidden in there somewhere. I can't even begin to guess her age.
“Listen, Claire, if you want to get out of here, you'll eat the food. Trust me. Madelyn did it. She ate what she was supposed to, took food shopping seminars, went to therapy. And when she got out, she still had the presence of mind to wither away and die. So, don't worry. Whatever happens in the next few days can easily be undone.” Kylie doesn't stop smiling; I think she really means what she just said. I think about responding to that, but I can't. There's nothing I can say. “Listen, I'll help you polish your plate off and then you can come up to my room and take my phone time. It's not like I have anybody left to call.”
“Kylie,” I begin and when she looks at me, her eyes seem a tad wider, like maybe she's holding back tears. “I'm sorry about your sister.”
“Yeah,” she says, trying to keep a smile plastered on her face. “Yeah, so am I.”
I wish I could say that lunch was uneventful, that I just dutifully ate my meal with a false smile tacked to my lips and went about the rest of my day with glee. That would've taken a miracle.
I ended up sitting there, staring at a plate that was more numbers and less food.
One chicken breast, slow roasted, 282 calories. One cup of raw green beans, thirty-four calories. One serving of mashed potatoes, 237 calories.
This combined with the orderly I had hovering over my left shoulder and you've got the perfect recipe for disaster. If it wasn't for Kylie sneaking bites of my food while the bitch's head was turned, I'd have never escaped that room. Even now, as we walk down the hall towards Kylie's room, my mind tries to guess at a total count. I ignore it. It's not easy, and it actually ends up giving me a migraine right before it dumps the number on me anyway: 396. I don't know how it arrives at this number, but it does and it leaves me feeling worse than ever.
Imagine this: you are suffering from morbid obesity and starvation both at the same time. That's how I feel right now. My body feels one way; my mind feels another. It's enough to make me want to curl up on my bed and sob.
But then I think about Emmett and those words and what they could mean for my life. Modeling is important to
me, but love is … love is everything. Could I give up one for the other? I don't know. I hope I wouldn't have to, but at least there's a chance that Emmett's feelings for me could become a contender, one of only a handful of things in this world that even compete.
Kylie lets me into her room, hands me the receiver for the phone and then immediately heads for the bathroom. She pauses in the doorway and leans her head out to wink at me.
“I'll be in here with the faucet on, my ass planted on the toilet seat, and a book in hand. I won't hear a damn thing.” She closes the door behind her, giving me at least the semblance of privacy. In all reality, she isn't the one I have to worry about eavesdropping on me. It's the employees that work here. With the exception of Dr. Hial, everybody here seems vindictive, like they have a personal bone to pick with each and every one of us. Their looks of contempt do not go unnoticed. God, I can't even imagine someone checking themselves in here voluntarily. Rock bottom wouldn't even be enough for me; I'd have to fall further than that, straight into the fiery depths of hell.
I dial Emmett's number and immediately, my heart starts to palpate painfully, a hollow sound of desperation and longing buried beneath the fragile bones in my chest. He picks up on the second ring.
“Claire?”
“I'm sorry,” is the first thing out of mouth. I need him to know that I didn't end the call and that I've been thinking about him all day.
“For what?” he asks me, and I can already hear the smile in his voice.
“For hanging up on you.” I pause and wet my dry lips. “Well, I didn't exactly hang up. Apparently, they have a time limit on phone calls. I met a girl in therapy and she let me have hers.”
“Are you okay?” he asks, and in the background, I hear crickets chirping and leaves rustling.
“Are you at the tree house?” Emmett chuckles softly.
“How can you tell?”
“I smell an escape,” I respond, wishing I was sitting there across from him, gazing out that glassless window at the afternoon sun, waiting with barely contained anticipation as he inches forward, fingers teasing my bare arms. I shiver. “I can't wait to go back there. That's the first thing I want to do when I get out. And then I want to lay in bed with you for days and not move – except to make love, of course.” If you're even able to climb that ladder. Think about that the next time you almost gag on your food. Don't you want to be somebody who matches Emmett? Whose body is just as strong and healthy as his?
“I'll do whatever it takes, Claire,” he tells me, and I can hear the resolve in his voice; it rings strong and clear through the telephone wires, managing to carry along a bit of soul with the sound.
“God, Emmett, you mean you're willing to have lots and lots of sex? That's awfully generous of you.” He laughs, and I laugh, and Goddamn, but it feels so good. We haven't even been apart for that long and I already miss him like crazy. I guess when you get to see someone's soul, really see it pure and clean and true, open and inviting you in, it's hard to separate yourself from it.
“I still have that class card,” he tells me, almost sheepishly. “So when you get home,” Emmett doesn't skip a beat as he says this. Home. I can't say the same for my heart. It may have even skipped two beats. “We can take classes again. They don't even have to be cooking classes. We could do sculpture or painting or – ”
“No,” I blurt, interrupting him before I can scare myself away. “I want to do the cooking class with you again.” I don't tell him that I don't want to eat the food, though. I just want to get to know it. Oftentimes, fear is based on our inability to understand something that's foreign, something that we perceive to be capable of hurting us. If I can get reacquainted with my worst enemy, learn its strengths and weaknesses, then maybe I won't be so scared anymore.
Emmett knows this so he doesn't bother to say anything except, “I'm glad, Claire. Really, I am. I thought for awhile there that you were going to … die.” Emmett swallows, and I know that word hurts us both to hear, but it's necessary. I need to face the facts. I close my eyes and try to come up with a mantra. My old one – Skinny is beautiful. Skinny is pretty. Skinny is perfect. – isn't going to work for me anymore. If anything, I guess I've learned that sometimes, skinny is ugly. Sometimes it's scary. Sometimes it's deadly. So I keep my eyes squeezed shut and I listen to Emmett's gentle breathing. He stays quiet, too, and lets me think. After awhile, Emmett starts to talk again, and I listen, my mind whirling through the events of the past few days and trying to pull together something positive. “And in that short time where I really believed you were, I almost died, too. I thought, if I can't save her, then there's no hope for me because you're special, Claire, and the world would really be missing out on something if you weren't in it.”
Live for them. Live for him. Live for me.
I smile.
It's corny, but I don't care. Nobody's going to know I'm thinking it except maybe Emmett. I repeat the mantra to myself several times before speaking again.
“I think you're ridiculously romantic,” I admit. “But don't ever stop. It's actually kind of cute.”
“You mean sexy and debonair, right?” he asks, and I chuckle, feeling a tingle inside that can't be stopped. It's a spark for life and it's burning, faintly perhaps, but it's there. Babies don't come into this world knowing how to live it, and so neither should I. I can't be too hard on myself. Right now, I'm remembering how to walk again, and that should be enough.
“On the way here,” I begin, wondering if Kylie's listening in on us at all. I can still hear the faucet in the bathroom, so I'm not sure. “I drew a girl in a dress on the window. It's gone now, but I still can't get that image out of my head. I think I might have to learn to sew.”
“I think you'd be damn good at it,” he tells me and then, almost as if he can sense the phone is about to shut off, he adds. “And Claire, when I said I loved you, I meant it.” Click.
I close my eyes for a moment and press the receiver against my chest. Inside of me, the flames of passion I feel towards Emmett begin to burn away the pain, setting fire to the anguish and turning it to ash. When I finally and fully admit to myself that I, too, love Emmett in return, there'll be none left.
I have a long way to go.
“God, you've got it bad,” Kylie says, making me jump. I was so entranced in Emmett that I completely forgot where I was and who I was with. I set the phone down and turn to glance at her over my shoulder. She's smiling at first, but the longer she stands there and the longer I stare, the sadder she gets. Finally, as if they've been waiting years to fall, tears begin to stream from her eyes. Without a word, I pat the bed next to me, and she comes and sits. This girl that I've known for a few, sparse hours finds comfort in me and lays down with her head in my lap.
She sobs for awhile and then goes quiet, falling into an uneasy sleep and taking her secrets along with her. Again, I wish I knew her story. I stroke some honeyed curls behind her ear and sigh. Love is redeeming, but it's also destructive. Or at least, it can be. That worries me. If I give Emmett my heart, I give him power. But I trust him; I trust him more than I trust myself.
A few minutes later, an orderly comes to check on us, opening the door without knocking and not bothering to shut it behind her. Thankfully, she doesn't stay long.
“When I get out of here, I'm going to finish what I started.” I look down and see that Kylie's green eyes are open wide. They're dry now, but I can see the cold, dull ache of pain throbbing beneath a false brightness. Kylie seems outgoing, talks big, smiles wide, but she's dead inside. I know because I almost was, too.
“You're going to kill yourself?” I ask. I try not to sound judgmental, but maybe I do because my new friend sits up and stands, looking down at me with an expression that says she sees deep, far deeper even than I. It's then that I understand she already knows me better than I do. We're cut from the same cloth, her and me.
“Is that any different than what you're doing?”
“I want to be a model.”<
br />
“Bullshit.” I stare at Kylie, at the redness in her cheeks and the anger in her fists. I don't blame her. She doesn't know me, doesn't know how badly I want this, how badly I've always wanted this. “Don't play that crap on me. This isn't about being skinny, not really. This is about punishment. You're punishing yourself because you don't think you deserve any better. I know that because I watched Madelyn do it to herself, day in and day out since she turned thirteen.”
“Everyone's different, Kylie,” I snap, feeling a little angry myself. I look up at her standing silhouetted against the window and realize for the first time since coming in here that Kylie does have bars on her windows. “Even anorexics. Believe it or not, we've all got our reasons.”
“And so do I. If I want to bleed myself dry, whose business is it? If love drained my soul and killed my spirit, why should I stick around and stare at the rubble of my dreams?” Kylie's eyes get moist, but she doesn't cry again. She stands there, strong and simmering, full of passion, but unaware that it's there. She says she has nothing to live for; I see everything in her eyes. I wonder briefly if I'm the same way. “If I can't have him, what else is there?” She switches her gaze back to me. “If I can't have the one thing I've always wanted, why bother?”
I look her straight in the eye and tell her the truth as only Emmett knows it.
“Even when you think there's only one road to your destination, you can always find a scenic detour.”
I can't wait until I believe that.
The nights at Crescent Springs are so much worse than
the days.
When the sun's up, Kylie and I pretend we're on vacation, just lazing away the days sitting on her bed and talking about nothing. Occasionally, a hard topic comes up and promptly gets dropped. Other than our conversation my first day there, we do not talk about suicide or anorexia or depression again. Instead, we talk about nail polish and designer clothes and magazines. We talk about celebrities and movies and rock stars. We go to our counseling sessions and keep our lips sealed and the locks to our secrets shut tight. Nobody gets in; nothing gets out.
Color Me Pretty Page 5
