Thankyou so much for all of your lovely reviews, I really do appreciate it. Here is the third chapter. As usual, please feel free to let me know what you thought, again this was written quite quickly on a train journey, so I apologise for any mistakes! X
It had been a week since Carla had last seen Michelle, that night when she had found the younger girl alone in the park, she had point blank refused utter more than a few sentences. Carla practically watched the shutters come down as Michelle seemed to shrink back into a shell, it was incredibly frustrating for Carla to watch someone she had now grown to care about struggling so much yet being unable to help them. After several hours of sitting with Michelle, she had given up on the hope of a conversation and chose to walk her home and ensure she got home safely without any hassle from her parents. None of them had noticed her presence had been missing, and she had been able to rush upstairs and change into a pair of pyjamas before going to join her boyfriend and son who were settled in the living room watching the TV screen with her parents. Carla was both amazed and un nerved at how easily Michelle seemed to change. She went from the vulnerable wreck to her typical normal self in an instant, she had truly mastered the art so it was no wonder nobody else had noticed her pain, there was simply no way they could.
Carla decided that today she would make an excuse to go around and check on Michelle, it had been driving her crazy all week, she knew that today Paul was in work and would not be at home, but decided she would pretend to have forgotten or mixed her days up, purely as an excuse to get round there. She was determined to speak to Michelle, she decided to use a different approach this time, talk to her and get her to talk, maybe then she would end up opening up to her, having had it all bottled up inside her so long.
Michelle sat on the edge of her bed rocking baby Ryan gently in her arms, all the while staring straight ahead of her, last night had been particularly bad. Dean had been to see a couple of his friends and had a few drinks, so she had been left alone with their son, and it seemed to her that he had cried and woken up a ridiculous amount of times during the night, and even when Dean had returned, his alcohol fuelled evening meant her had been no use to her, she had sat with the tiny baby at 3:30am attempting to feed him his bottle whilst the tears had dampened her own face, her mind completely elsewhere until the high pitched screams of her son had snapped her from her thoughts and back into reality. She felt incredibly weak this morning, the exhaustion was both physical and mental, she had continued to practically starve herself, not that it was hard, she had no appetite anyway but it had been more of a struggle on the days when her meals had been cooked for her by Dean or her Mother, she had to force the food down her throat, it making her feel sick with each mouthful, but not wanting to be questioned she had done it, but always found an excuse to disappear upstairs straight after to bring it all straight back up, she would sob as she sat on the floor near the toilet, reaching for her toothbrush turning it round and quickly pushing the end to the back of her throat, quickly bringing the contents of her diet back up. Over the weeks she had gained the skill of doing this with both ease and speed so that nobody worried and checked on her, she knew she had to be careful, her mum was not easy to fool. The weight had been dropping off extremely quickly but Michelle had also learnt which of the clothes from her wardrobe disguised it well, she would wear baggy jogging bottoms in the day with a thick long sleeved jumper, able to get away with the casual wear these days and so far nobody had noticed a thing. Michelle knew she was losing weight rapidly, the jogging bottoms were becoming looser each time she slipped them on, and her bracelet was now threatening to slip off her wrist which she knew looked extremely small these days. Each time she managed to catch a glimpse of herself in the mirror she was shocked at how her usually flawless complexion looked dry, her skin a duller shade than usual. She was a mess and she knew it
Dean finally awakened, rubbing his eyes as he slowly sat up instantly noticing Michelle and feeling increasingly guilty about the previous night, she looked exhausted and he put it down to caring for Ryan all through the night with no help from himself.
'How about I take him for a walk and give you some time to yourself, maybe have a bath or something hey'
Michelle simply nodded in reply, relief flooding through her body at the prospect of a few hours without the baby, or anybody else smothering her for that matter. She watched Dean stretch before slowly getting out of bed and begin rooting through the draws for some clothes, she willed him to hurry up, desperate for him to go. She dressed the young baby and strapped him into his pram, so he was all set to go as soon as Dean was, and she quickly put on her best smile, swiftly kissing her boyfriend as they left, quickly shutting the door behind them before releasing a sigh of relief.
Carla quickly made her way to the house, she knew Helen and Barry had taken Liam out for the day and Paul was at work, so she was pleased when she passed Dean just down the road on his way to the park, quickly chatting away and discovering that he was giving Michelle some time to herself. It wasn't long before she was at the house and gently tapped on the door, awaiting Michelle's answer.
Michelle jumped slightly in shock as she heard the knock at the door, praying that Dean had just forgotten something, he couldn't be back so quickly, she hadn't even gotten into the bath yet, she quickly through her jumper back on, forgetting about the joggers. Slowly opening the door, looking at the floor as she saw Carla.
'Pauls not back from work yet, he'll be home about 6ish' she muttered quietly under her breath
'Well I think I'll come in and wait' Carla gave Michelle no option, stepping in and pressing her foot against the door as Michelle quickly tried to shut it, her strength no match for Carla though and she reluctantly let her inside. Her eyes dropping to the floor as she could feel Carla's eyes scanning her body, undoubtedly she would be the one to notice the change in her.
Carla looked on in shock, it had only been just over a week, only 7 days since she had last seen the younger girl and she could not believe how slight and frail she looked, her legs were much noticeably slimmer, she couldn't find any words to say as she looked Michelle up and down, her eyes focusing on the protruding collar bone that Michelle had not managed to cover up, how on earth had nobody noticed, and it was now that Carla knew that Michelle's problems were much worse than she originally thought.