Why We're Playing With Fire

10. We Shouldn't Lie All the Time

His words shake me, making my blood run cold. Kill myself?

He's wrong. He has never been more wrong, and I want to tell him that, but somehow the words get stuck when I try to say them. I know, if I told him about the dizzy spells I've had since summer, and how I fainted yesterday, found myself lying on the curb, he would probably freak out even more. But it's not like this is something serious. It's not like cancer, or car crashes, or fires.

Or war. We're not in a war. I'm not close to dying.

I'm not standing on some stupid bridge.

"I'm not... doing that," I tell him, but it feels like a lie as I step as far away as I can from the scale in our small bathroom, still trapped inside it by Darry's body. "I didn't do this on purpose. It just happened."

"You just happened to stop eating? You just happened to lose so much weight you couldn't even walk home from a few blocks away?"

"I run track, Darry! Of course I can walk home."

"You didn't think Two-Bit would tell me? I know he drove you home yesterday."

I cross my arms in front of me, trying a hard stare. "Maybe I just wanted company?" I snap. "I'm allowed to hang out with friends, aren't I?"

"Don't lie to me."

"I'm not!"

"Maybe if you had talked to me, I would have known about this. I could have helped you, but you always clam up. You don't listen! You ask me to be here, but when I am, you pushes me away. You always only talked to Soda, and when he ain't here, no one else is good enough for you."

There is a hint of jealousy in his voice, and I can't look at him. I hang my head, knowing he's right. I suddenly have a hard time to breathe, because I know, deep inside, that things had been different if Darry was the one being drafted. I would rather have him in Vietnam than Soda. And it's so wrong of me, forbidden thoughts I haven't even dared to confess to myself that I have been thinking. It's not that I want Darry to go to war, it's not that at all, I just - I just don't want it to be Soda. It shouldn't be him. And I hate myself thinking anyone would have been better than him. Even my other brother. Even me.

"And now... I don't know what you've been doing, Pony. But it stops now, okay? It stops today! So you better step up on that scale and show me how bad it is. And then we'll deal with it."

xXx

He has been silent ever since the scale showed the verdict. He stared at it and then just left the bathroom, and I stepped down from the scale with shaky legs, shocked by the low numbers. I sat down on the closed toilet lid, biting my nails, wondering what would happen now, trying to think, to come up with an excuse for it being this bad. What if I'm sick for real? But I know that's not it. You can't go days without dinner and only taking nibbles of sandwiches or apples without starving yourself.

But I haven't been starving myself. It's not the weight that is the problem. I don't not eat because I want to lose pounds, I don't feel fat, and even if I did, I wouldn't care. So I don't really know what has happened to me.

I put my hands down and clamped them between my knees. I could feel the bones. And then he came back, jingling with his keys, telling me to get up and out. I should have said no, but I didn't have anything left in me to fight him, and now we're sitting in the truck, him behind the wheel and not talking.

"Where are we going?" I ask him in a small voice. Not the hospital I beg silently, checking the signs every time he turns around a corner, because he doesn't answer me.

When he finally parks it's outside the grocery store. The big one. I glance at him and then out the windshield, and I should feel relieved. I don't, though. Because he still doesn't say a word as he opens the door for me, and he doesn't look back to make sure I follow him as we head inside, walking so fast I have a hard time to catch up. He takes a cart and starts walking down the aisle, grabbing things randomly it seems like, not looking at the prices as he usually always does, just tosses whatever into the cart.

"Toast for breakfast?" he says suddenly, stopping so abruptly I almost walk into him. "Oat meal? Cereal?"

"I..."

"What do you want for dinner? You want chicken? Hamburgers? Lasagna?"

I want to cry. But we're in the middle of the store, lots of people around. And I can't read Darry's face right now - is he angry? Worried? I lift my hand to feel the dog tag under my shirt again, like I do every day I feel anxious.

"Pony," Darry says, strained. "Tell me what you want to eat."

"I don't..."

"You're down to 110 pounds. We need to get the numbers up. And to do that, we're going to buy food, and we're going home to make dinner, and you are going to sit down and eat everything on your goddamn plate." He's talking louder for every word that comes out, almost yelling the last ones. It's like he doesn't care that other customers are staring at us.

I have to swallow before answering him, but even I can hear the lump in my throat. "I want to do that, but-"

"But what? But nothing, Pony. I tell you, this is what will happen. You will eat every meal with me from now on. And if I ain't home, I will have Two-Bit to sit with you. And don't think for a second I won't do it." He grabs the cart again, and I can't do anything but follow him.

xXx

When we're home again, Darry tells me to make mashed potatoes while he prepares the chicken. I stand by the sink with the peeler in my hand, working slowly, trying to feel hungry. Trying to feel like I can do this. Because food is not the problem, so it shouldn't be a problem, right?

"You remember when Johnny and Dally passed away?" Darry says suddenly, and I stop with the peeler midway. "You wouldn't eat. Remember that? You told us everything tasted like baloney."

"I'm just trying to figure this out," Darry says when I don't answer. He walks up beside me to grab the salt from the shelf. "If we don't, I will have to make an appointment with our doctor."

"I told you I'm going to eat," I mumble. Darry places a hand at my side, and I cringe, wondering if he's trying to feel my ribs, but he just nudges me to move so he can open the oven and put the chicken inside.

"You've only peeled two potatoes?" He stares over my shoulder. Then he sighs, taking the peeler from my hand. "Let me do it."

Since Darry took over the duties in the kitchen, I go to my room. I grab a paper and a pen, sitting down by my desk. Maybe it's the wrong time to write a letter to Soda when I feel so drained, so out of control. I try to do it once a week, even if he hardly writes me back, and when he does all I get are these short notes about the weather, the food and his friends. He never tells me anything about the war. He never tells me if he eats all right, if he's scared of dying, if he misses me. He never tells me about the bad things, how he's feeling, if he's crying at night or having nightmares. If he's hurt.

But I'm not better, am I? I write to him about school, that my grades are good even if they aren't. I write that I run track even if I doesn't anymore. I write that I hang out with my friends, even if the only ones I see are Two-Bit and Steve when they come around. Suddenly I get so mad at myself, because Darry is right. I don't want to talk to anyone but Soda, but what we're saying to each other is not worth anything when all we do are telling lies.

And we shouldn't lie all the time. We should tell the truth.

xXx

Hi Soda.

I wish you could stop pretending. I know you're not okay. None of us are. I wish this war to be over so you can come home. I wish you were home. I wish you didn't have to go at all. I wish you would tell me all about it so I know. I'm not scared to know. I'm scared to not know. I'm scared you don't dare to tell me anything.

I don't want to hear about your mosquito bites and the rain and what the rice tastes like. I don't know what you write to Darry because he never shows me his letters, and I don't go behind his back and read them. Maybe I should, if you can't be honest with me.

I'm trying to be honest to you but it's hard. I wear the dog tag and pretend it helps you. But it doesn't. It doesn't help me either, and Darry tries and tries but I think he does it the wrong way. He says I don't talk to him, only to you. But that's not right, either, because we don't talk to each other about what's important. We need to start doing that. I want you to tell me everything. And then I'll tell you everything, too.

Dinner is ready soon and we're going to eat. I'm going to eat all of it and you are going to come home. That's how it needs to be.

Love Pony.

Thank you so much for still reading this story! Your support means everything to me :)