Abolition

Rachel

"Meanwhile, you are losing – yourself, your mind, and, most important, weight."

- Purge: Rehab Diaries by Nicole Johns

They didn't win.

They probably didn't win because of her. She's not very good at singing anymore. Her voice sucks. Everyone thinks so. Everyone hates her for taking up the spotlight. Her own mother doesn't want her – she's too ugly.

This is what Rachel thinks about as she eats cookie after cookie, slowly devouring one sleeve of the package, then another, and then another. Between that and large swallows from a jug of skim milk, her stomach feels like it's about to explode. So she leans over from where she's sitting on the bathroom floor, sticks her face in the toilet, and makes herself violently ill.

It hurts more than usual. When she pauses and opens her eyes, all she sees is red. Literally, red. Red blood stains her milk and cookies medley. Red blood droplets slide down the edge of the bowl. Red blood swims through her insides and outsides and all over the world.

She closes her eyes and keeps going until she's sure it's all gone. When it's over, she wipes the dripping blood off her lips onto the back of her hand. She stares at it for a long, long time.

…

They sing a sappy song to Mr. Schue. Everyone cries like it means something. Quinn's back in school but she doesn't look at anyone and her eyes suggest she hasn't slept since she gave the baby away. Brittany asks Rachel why her throat sounds so raspy, but Rachel just bites back and asks why Brittany can't walk in a straight line.

Honestly, she's getting pretty tired of this whole "losing weight together" deal. As if they were ever working together. Brittany's just good inspiration, even though looking at her body makes Rachel seethe with jealousy. Why is it so easy for her?

Why can't she just lose some damn weight? Why is everyone else so much thinner than her?

Finn sneaks cough drops into her locker and she smiles and says she just has a sore throat, nothing's wrong, perfectly happy over here. And she should be happy. She finally has Finn, doesn't she?

There's only three weeks left of school. 21 days, to be exact. Simple. Just make it through that and then she's home free. An entire summer to change. An entire summer to spend with thin and diets and no more binging, just lemons and water and sunglasses that make her nose look smaller…

Everyone's singing whatever they want in glee club since they don't have any competitions to prepare for, but she can't really sing anymore, so she watches everyone crowd around Puck's guitar and laugh and dance. Well, not everyone. Quinn sings to herself quietly in the corner, and Brittany sits in the middle of it all smiling away, probably because dancing makes her too dizzy but she'd never tell anyone.

And suddenly, she just really, really wants to go eat about a dozen candy bars and then puke. She stands up to leave, quickly, balancing herself by grabbing the back of her chair, and Finn grabs her arm, a look of surprise on his face as he realizes how much smaller her arm is.

"Are you okay, Rach?"

"I'm fine."

Her smile leaves a hollow reassurance as she disappears from the room.

…

Finn comes over after school. They lay on her bed, fashion magazine propped open in front of them. She flips through it idly, admiring the thin models with pursed lips. Her boyfriend is less than amused, but he doesn't complain.

"I want to look like that," she says softly, pointing to a tall blonde with a thin frame wearing a bright yellow bikini.

Finn looks puzzled. He doesn't see why she would ever want to look like that. Skin and bones chicks are kind of scary, not to mention completely abnormal. No one looks like that in real life.

"Why would you do that?" he asks, "You're beautiful the way you are."

She turns and looks at him like she's staring through a fog, coming out of a dream. She doesn't understand him. How can he not see it?

What the heart wants, the heart wants…

And Finn has no idea how many boxes of laxatives or breath mints or cans of air freshener she has stored underneath her bathroom sink (13, 27, and 4, respectively). He doesn't know about the candy stashed underneath her bed, in the back of her closet… He doesn't know a damn thing.

It's funny, she realizes, when you live in a world full of people, yet you're all alone, and no one even really knows you, the real you.

In fact, it's fucking hilarious.

Please review! It means a lot to me! :)