[For the record, Lucy has no mental issues besides her eating disorder in this. And yes, her eating disorder is canon, listen to the recording of A Little More Homework for her monologue, it's "I got diagnosed with an eating disorder."]
xoxo
Naked, she examines every trace of fat she can find. She swears her thighs have gotten bigger. Her stomach is too full and round, it makes her want to scrape the back of her throat until swirls of red are distorted in the fat. But the fat has settled in her limbs and is bunched up in her stomach. And she knows boys like Brett Sampson don't go for girls with chunky thighs or bloated stomachs.
With a Sharpie, she traces over the outline of her bones. The black is bold and thick against her pale flesh. She turns, checking in every corner of the vanity mirror for how big her hips have gotten. She isn't happy with it.
Not even a little.
And she doubts boys like Brett Sampson will be either.
2 weeks of coughing up the fat and skipping the meals she always substitutes for water that turns cold and sloshy inside her later and Brett Sampson is asking out Kendra — her best fucking friend — right in front of her very eyes. It makes her sick to her stomach and she wishes she could lean on the toilet bowl and let all the aching out. And she swears she almost passes out when Kendra — that damn traitor — squeals yes.
So she forces her eyes off the scene and something shiny new catches them. She knows she's never seen him before — Lucy Dunn has a brilliant memory. But then she realizes her cue and takes it.
Part of her wants to look back and wave at the shiny new boy. The rest of her knows she has to make herself good enough for boys like Brett Sampson.
And Kendra Quaker — best friends or not — has to be taken down for her to be good enough.
She can't help but want to scream at that thought. Bestest friends aren't supposed to do that to each other, after all.
She still hates that fucking sloshing in her stomach — it's nauseating and she hasn't even been able to stomach food in hours.
"I want it gone," she mumbles, the water churning too much inside with the ice. But she knows more vomit could mean her pretty hair falling out or her pearly teeth decaying. Careful, she always has to be careful. Clumps of discarded curls and rotting teeth mean she would be even further from good enough.
Slosh, slosh, slosh.
It's sickening. She needs to eat something to balance it out. Crackers will do — not the kind fat asses eat but light crackers. They help when your sick, she feels sick.
But maybe it's how fat she's getting.
Would the cute boy from New York be okay with that?
Somehow she feels like he'd be less judgmental than boys like Brett Sampson. But she remembers that she has to get Brett Sampson to win and that she loves winning.
If winning means being skinny then —
The crackers feel stale and overly moist in her mouth.
Evan. She learns his name is Evan Goldman. He's the cute boy from New York and a part of her wants him — even if he is having a stupid Bar Mitzvah that she made fun of. It was a joke and she swears he cracked this slight smile which means he got it.
Brett Sampson didn't. And maybe that frustrates her because she wants a smart boy with a sense of humor beyond that of a 6 year old. But she's supposed to want a boy like Brett Sampson, that's why she pukes out the fat and trashes uneaten food.
That doesn't stop her from touching him the first chance she gets — and she likes the way it feels as she dances past.
"I can't wait to go to your party."
And she really can't.
But she can't go to a party when she swears her thighs are getting bigger and she's getting kankles.
You're a good girl, so be a good girl, and shave off all that weight.
Singsong with that pretty voice to Kendra about everything that could go wrong, Lucy.
She has to listen to that little voice (the one that tells her when she needs to throw up the carbs and the one that tells her when she can feel skinny for once). She just has to. It's always right, no matter how many times it degrades (but really, she swears it's helping) her.
And ruining it for Kendra — as much as it's killing her inside — is what the little voice is telling her to do.
It also tells her to stay a safe distance away from the buttery popcorn and chocolate dunked candies at the theater while she's on Tongue Patrol. Even if she didn't listen, she'd have to scrape it all out within the hour or she'll get fat.
(And she hates that theaters want nothing more than to fatten her up for a profit.)
Fat.
She almost bursts out laughing — it would've been cruel, empty laughter — when Kendra thinks she's fat and that Brett Sampson wants to be with Lucy.
It's sickening so she fixates on Evan. Maybe she could be with him and screw all this "good enough" and "skinny" crap. But that little voice says otherwise.
She can still taste Brett's mouth on her tongue and that's a godawful taste if you ask her. Like candy and fried chicken. She tries and tries to wash it out but it just won't go.
She knows how this will play out and that he'll be crawling back to Kendra soon enough so she tortures him (and she won't admit that the little voice flips the game against her). She piles up all the accusations of flirtation but all the while her eyes are glued to Evan Goldman because he's just so interesting — and she's long identified him as her opponent in this game.
There's this wonderful realization that she doesn't think so much of skinny as her brains when she stares at Evan and she almost smiles.
Then Brett's hand is on her ass and her mind races back to all the traces of fat she can still pinch and squeeze and twist before her vanity mirror.
She wins. Kendra loses.
But the real opponent hasn't lost. And she hasn't really won. It's just a broken wreck they salvage what they can from — she claims Brett, the bestest friend she had to backstab, and the same popularity; he claims Patrice (that freaking hobbit), a manipulative bastard of a best friend, and a little piece of mind.
And "fat" and "skinny" still have to matter because she still has to worry about boys like Brett Sampson. And really, it's the most miserable thing ever.
Especially when she realizes Evan wants her too.
xoxo
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- Ari
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