Okay, it's not like I've ever been fat. I was really skinny as a kid. But then, you know, you get hips. I just started noticing, with Snake gone and all the fast food take out crap I was putting into my body, I started noticing a few unflattering pounds.
Things were falling apart, had been for awhile. It really started with Rick. We were all horrible to Rick. Rick was horrible to Terri. Rick shot Jimmy. Where does it end? Then Jay and gonorrhea and Sean moving away. I kind of felt unanchored with Sean gone. We didn't even always talk to each other but I liked knowing he was here. Now he was in Wasaga Beach. Far away. Then because Peter was completely terrible to Manny I couldn't just date him out in the open like I wanted to without Manny freaking out. And I wanted to be loyal to my friend, I wanted to be a good friend. But I'd seen the other side of Peter, the side that's a little more defenseless, a little sweeter. And of course Snake and the principal. And Snake moving out and my mom was unhappy.
So I thought I could at least lose a few pounds. Exercise more, eat healthier. That was something I could do, something I could control. I could control what went into my body. And it worked. I cut out sweets and desserts and cut down portions and started running and then my tight jeans were loose and things fit better and I felt better. It worked.
But then, I don't know. I wrote down everything I ate in this food journal and I started to feel guilty for eating at all. I started to feel guilty if I didn't run at least three miles a day. I started to realize that if people thought I was eating then I wouldn't have to eat. I could chew food and then spit it into my napkin. I could say I already ate. I could wear bulky sweaters and big sweatshirts and then no one could see.
I started feeling funny. Kind of light headed. It wasn't all that unpleasant. It was kind of…floaty. And I was winning. I weighed less than I had weighed, I was a strong person. I didn't need food. I could control things. I could be in control. So I would lose Manny or Peter when the shit hit the fan, so what? It didn't matter if I could just keep losing the pounds. So my mom was miserable because Snake was a cheating bastard, so what? It was okay if I could run five miles a day, and then six, and then seven. So the Rick thing still upset me and I missed Sean and I still didn't feel like the girl I was and nothing was going right, so what? None of that mattered if I was skinny and pretty and in control.
I ran before school and after school. I ate apples and celery because they had negative calories. I wouldn't touch milk or cheese, so totally filled with fat. I wouldn't be disgusting anymore. I hid the French fries in my pocket. I couldn't eat fried food. I drank water with lemon. Water had no calories. Lemon was a diuretic. I was doing everything right. Then in school, in the hall one day, I just fell. There was no more energy left. Things became a swirling blackness, a blackness that wanted to embrace me. So I went, willingly. It was almost a relief to be checked out of the world for awhile. Things had become too much.
But then I lied. Said I was okay and even though people doubted they had no choice but to believe me. They had no choice. No one knew that I really wasn't eating at all. No one knew that I ran three miles before school and four miles after school.
Food couldn't control me, not anymore. Rick and his stupid gun couldn't control me. Manny and Peter couldn't pull me apart. My mother's sadness, a sadness I felt so responsible for, that couldn't make me feel that sorrow anymore. I was above those things. I was above my own life. I was, finally, in control.
Things were slipping, slipping out of control. I guess that's what happens. You hold the reigns too tight and they slip from your grasp. I couldn't function in school. I could hardly stay awake. I ate bites of cereal here, the skin of an apple, the end of a banana. Lots of lemon and water. I couldn't run so much anymore, but I would still do what I could. 100 sit ups when I woke up, push ups, a mile or two. The pounds still melted away.
Lying in the hospital bed after that fiasco with Manny and my parents and Peter, where they all saw how very flawed I am, I was still thinking about losing weight. What kind of a death wish was this? But there it was. It had been a coping mechanism and it didn't want to go so easily. I breathed in my oxygenated air, laid stick thin and gorgeous under the hospital sheets, and thought about losing weight.