Thank you for clicking on this story. Just as a fore warning, this does contain a theme of eating disorders, so if you are suffering from one, and this will be triggering for you; which it probably will, I beg you, please do not read it. If I knew that my story was triggering people further into their ED, I would never ever forgive myself. I wrote this story, because it's something that has been on my mind since Episode 24, and I had to write it out.

If you like it though, please leave a comment, a constructive one please, it will help me get better at writing.

She can hear the dripping of the tap. Drip. Drip. She shakes her loosely curled hair gently, brushing it from her face. She cleared her throat, and looked behind quickly to check the toilet door was locked fully. Reaching over, she grabbed the roll of toilet paper and pulled at it a couple of times, twisting the cheaply manufactured material around her hand a couple of times before tearing it from the roll. The bundle of paper was placed on the cool, black tile floor of Waterloo Road's staff toilets, and she was not going to get whatever filth was on the others' shoes on her new designer pencil skirt. She kneeled down slowly, preparing herself, lowering her knees on to the scratchy synthetic paper.

Lorraine closed her eyes, and exhaled deeply, getting into the mode she needed herself to be in. Words swished around her head, too loud, making everything fuzzy. Her sister's voice pierced through her skull and she shook her head again, as if to literally force the sound out.

"Your girlfriend….,"

Repeated over and over, in various tones of voice. Lorraine hated her sister in that moment, for revealing one of the things that she had worked all her life to hide. She hated Sonya for bursting out with that information. She hated Michael too, for that goddamn smug look on his face, as if he knew all along – which of course he couldn't have. She had been so careful.

Lorraine remembered the time, at the start of Year 11, one of the girls that had been in her circle of friends had told them she was a lesbian. She remembered how the rest of the girls had turned against her, calling her derogatory names, ignoring her when she spoke, avoiding her eye contact in the hallways, as though someone's sexuality was contagious. That had been a siren call for Lorraine, confirming that there was never a good time to come out to her friends, it wasn't worth it.

For years, Lorraine had put on such a bravado front, that once she had left sixth form, she barely knew who she was anymore. She had spent every evening sitting in the park, with her 'best friend forever' Siobhan, and a group of whatever boys had taken a fancy to them that week. They sat beside the bushes, drinking bottles upon bottles of cheap vodka, until their throats were burning and standing up seemed like a hilarious concept. They lay on the rough, short grass scratching at their thighs under their school skirts, smoking whatever was handed to them by the older boys. Occasionally, one would sit too close to Lorraine for her liking. He would reach over and put his arm around her, stroking her back too roughly, his breath too hot on her neck. Lorraine would feel the unshaved stubble of his cheek rub against the side of her face, and she knew that if she just closed her eyes, and pretended his tongue wasn't circling around her mouth, and his hands weren't touching her in places that made her feel physically sick. She would breathe deeply, and do everything that she was supposed to do, she would kiss him back, stroke his face and take as many of those little white pills he carried, as was expected. She pretended not to cringe every time his hand stroked her thigh, knowing it was going to happen again, and she'd have to endure another couple of minutes of heavy breathing, rushed hands, and his rough whispers in her ear about what he could do to her if they were really truly alone. Then, she would have to lie to Siobhan again, about how much she fancied him, and how they'd have to meet up the next day and do it all again.

The dripping of the tap brought Lorraine, back to reality. That tap, she thought, would have to be fixed. All the money that she had thrown at the place, and nothing had been fixed. She would have to speak to Michael. That's if she could ever face him again, after the cat that Sonya had let out of the metaphorical bag, Lorraine knew he could never take her seriously.

She really liked Nicki, really liked her. And she was pretty sure that Nicki felt the same, but she couldn't do this, she just couldn't. She couldn't walk down these halls knowing what everyone was thinking about her. She had always put business before her personal relationships and she didn't see this being any different. In her head, she could see Nicki's face, and she could feel her heart break. Ending it with Nicki would destroy both of them, but Lorraine knew she had to.

It's what she had always done, held the people she cared about most at arm's length. It was easier that way, nobody was disappointed. Apart from this time, Lorraine thought, her manicured fingernails touching the ceramic toilet seat. This time, people were going to get hurt. Lorraine knew she would just have to walk to the PRU, and say it, no beating around the bush. If she faltered, or even if Nicki looked at her in a certain way, she would change her mind, and she couldn't change her mind, not now. It had gone too far. Michael knew, Sonya knew. Soon, Michael would tell Christine and then everyone would know her little secret. Lorraine screwed up her face as she imagined what Christine would say to her once she found out. That woman has always had it in for me, she thought, waiting for a stick to beat her with. And this was the straw that would break her back.

Everything swirled around Lorraine's head, Michael's face mixing with Nicki's, Christine's voice ringing through her ears. She let out an exasperated gasp and she tried furiously to get rid of everything. She lifted the toilet seat, the clanging of ceramic-on-ceramic echoing around the small bathroom. Lorraine checked her watch, lunchtime was over in twenty-five minutes, and she'd have to get going soon to catch Nicki before the kids were back in lessons.

She lifted one hand to keep the seat upright, and leaned forward slightly. She screwed up her eyes, trying to remember the last time, the feelings, the thoughts. She could feel it happening inside her, it was coming. She tried harder, but nothing happened. Realising that she couldn't conjure it up today, she used her other hand, and gagging, emptied the contents of her stomach into the toilet bowl.

She retched for a couple of moments, her eyes streaming. Once everything was up, Lorraine sat back on her heels, breathing deeply. She flushed the toilet, and replaced the seat back down.

She stood up; throwing the toilet paper she had been kneeling on into the bin. She straightened her patterned skirt, and patted her hair. Turning around to look in the mirror, she wiped under her eyes, where her mascara had run slightly. Pinching her cheeks to encourage some colour to return to her face, Lorraine sighed, picking her bag up from where she had placed it on the window sill.

After washing her mouth out with water from the tap, she chewed on some gum for a couple of seconds, before reapplying her lip gloss.

Finally, she sighed at her reflection. An unhappy woman stared back at her.

Lorraine wondered when her life had taken this route, where she had decided that throwing up her lunch was the way to happiness. After twenty years, she had come to realise that, in fact, it had pushed her away from happiness. All she had received in return, was loneliness, hunger, bloodshot eyes, and bruises that seemed to appear out of nowhere from a feather touch.

Lorraine shook her head as tears began to well in her eyes, she couldn't get emotional about this now. She was at work, she had to be professional.

She was Lorraine Donnegan, benefactor, woman extraordinaire.

With a sharp pain in her chest, and her heart beating loudly in her ears, she unlocked the door, and went to find Nicki.

As she walked, Lorraine felt a coming sense of dread, as someone of death row walks to a noose.

Because this was the end of the first relationship she had ever had that felt right. Lorraine doubted that there was ever going to be another.

This was the beginning of the end.

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