Help from the unexpected
WARNING: Contains mature content, possible trigger warning for anorexia/ bulimia. If you are in any way affected by the symptoms seen here, or suspect someone of suffering from an eating disorder, then please seek professional help.
DISCLAIMER: I do not own Harry Potter or Warner Bros., and am in no way affiliated with either parties.
Prologue
Gabby sat up in her bed suddenly, and gasped as the adrenaline the nightmare had left in her coursed through her blood. Her head span, and she slowly manoeuvred herself so she was sitting on the edge of the four poster bed, but so that her legs were still within the yellow drapes. She hugged her blankets around her, keeping out the chill that inhabited her body these days. Through the curtains, she could see the faint light of dawn. She stood up, pushing her way into the rest of the room, and looked around at the other three beds in the common room.
Her fellow Hufflepuff girls, Hannah, Susan and Megan, were all still sleeping behind their curtains, and she sneered at them. She knew for sure how their days would go. Wake up, eat, lessons, eat, more lessons, eat even more, homework, then bed and, possibly, more eating... She didn't know how people could live like that, eating that much... It was disgusting.
She moved into the bathroom, keeping her blankets wrapped around her and locked the door, before unwrapping herself from the cackoon and taking off her night clothes. She looked at her naked form in the mirror, and ran her fingers over her ribs, enjoying the feel of her bones. She frowned when her hands still found themselves sinking into her when she touched her stomach. She needed to get rid of the fat.
She stepped onto the scales, almost dreading looking down at the numbers that would tell her what she already knew. She was fat. An abomination. She should be dead. She'd rather be dead than fat.
Gabby looked down quickly, and heaved a sigh of relief. She still weighed just under 100 pounds. She hadn't gained. But her relief was soon replaced by annoyance. She still hadn't lost! Not since last month!
Tears threatened to fall, but she wouldn't let them. She was strong, and that was why she wasn't as fat as all the pigs she shared a room with. Although why their repulsive eating habits hadn't transferred onto her, not once in almost six full years.
Even when filled with fear, she had stayed strong through petrification, through a murderer breaking into the school, through the death of one of her housemates, the rise of the Dark Lord and torture by Umbridge. Nothing would make her crack. She was strong, and she could cope.
She stepped into the bathtub, turning on the shower head and feeling the warm water that seeped over her cold body like an antidote. The water wasn't harsh, it wasn't judging her... Maybe she should just stay here...
But the hammering on the door soon brought her back to reality, and she left the bathroom in the hands of Hannah Abbot, by far the chubbiest girl in the dorm room. Gabby wanted to tell her about how she managed to stay like she did, wanted to share her secret... But she knew Hannah wouldn't understand, knew she would tell an adult that there was Something Wrong.
But there was nothing really wrong with Gabby Hammond. Not to her, anyway.