In the next few days, America can only watch himself get worse. Constantly he competes with himself to get longer and longer fasting times, eager to prove that he is in control. Each day he fails, afraid of what'll happen when he strays too far from recovery— he always eats dinner, even if it's late, and then he wakes up in the morning and fasts until the evening just to be miserable.

Almost immediately, though, he sets parameters: he can't fast or restrict the day before he goes back to his domestic job, and he cannot fast or restrict during the work itself; coffee with milk in it is okay in the mornings regardless of whether he's going to eat later or not. After all, this isn't an eating disorder. These rules, about having normal days, prove that he's still doing okay.

His international job isn't protected by such rules, though, and it actually makes it easier to restrict than if he's just sitting at home. Ever since this whole thing had started, America had been starting to think of himself as a bit of a social failure. In fact, he had started thinking of himself as a failure of the worst kind; he knew just about everybody, but he didn't have all that many friends, and he had found himself failing to carry out conversations as of late. Nowadays, now that America has settled properly into his routine, he feels that people like him more. America finds himself having longer conversations, and now that he doesn't eat during breaks, he actually has time to walk around and talk to people he'd meant to get caught up with. To America, this whole fasting thing gives him dignity in front of the other nations, even if he loses it all later when he eats dinner. The only problem, really, is that he can't talk to Britain anymore.

These are the good times. America feels great usually around a full twelve hours of not eating, though he rarely accomplishes it. He feels that people like him better now, and he feels more confident… and even though it's not important, an old pair of pants (which had never really fit him; he had only bought them because he couldn't find the style in any other store) is rather loose on him now. He figures he may as well enjoy them. He has earned it.

They're the good times, sure, but they're not great. While he feels fine after his first skipped meal, he gets insanely tired between breakfast and lunch time; he can barely make himself walk during this time, and has given to a slow pace that he tries to tell himself is leisurely. Because he has made this whole thing about dignity, eating has become an irreconcilably humiliating affair. On top of that, one day he wakes up to his body aching, the way it had when he used to work out, and the pain doesn't go away and he isn't sure what to do about it. In truth, America is familiar enough with the eating disorder community at large to know he should be taking vitamins or something, and he suspects that's where many of his ailments are coming from (aside from the lack of nutrition); however, he is not knowledgeable enough on intentional fasting to know what he's supposed to take, so he just ignores it instead.

On his only day off one week, he meets up with the rest of the Americas. At meetings like this, they exchange food and bitch about Europeans and try not to fight over the political storms that cross them.

While America isn't popular with everyone at these meetings, he doesn't struggle much with mingling. Canada, on the other hand, is very unfortunate in this regard— he is just too northern to really fit in with the others. While America can always make Californian food and only get called a variety of colorful words by everyone else, usually Canada's poutine remains untouched.

"Why won't you eat my poutine? You love my poutine!" Canada exclaims.

"I'm just not hungry."

"You look thinner, Alfred. Have you been eating?" Mexico asks him.

"I mean, I just— I've been busy lately. I've been kind of stressed out. But… your poutine has always made me feel better, Matthew," America says, turning to Canada. Canada smiles and gives him a paper plate filled with poutine.

Nicaragua, who's sitting next to Mexico, murmurs, ""¿Está triste?", motioning vaguely to America while he eats. America gives no sign of understanding.

Mexico asks him, "Are you sad, Alfred?"

"No, I'm okay. Why?"

Mexico shrugs and goes back to her conversation with Nicaragua. America leaves soon after, toting the leftover poutine that Canada had insisted he take. He goes home, still hungry, and eats another bowlful of it. Since this is about discipline more than looks, America supposes he will have to continue this for the rest of his life. There's nothing wrong with wanting to be stronger, after all, so if he stops it must be because he's gotten lazy.

At the same time, though, it's not like he's planning on getting canonized— there's no reason that he should be an almost-religious level of miserable at any given moment. From now on, when America goes to meetings with the OAS and NATO and the other staffers in D.C., he will let himself eat.

Later that night he looks in the mirror, and he realizes that Mexico is right: he is getting thinner. With his old eating disorder, the proper one that was based off looks and not discipline, he would have hated this; even now, the thought of getting more scrawny upsets him, but he can't return to his past habits. He'd totally lost control then, forfeited his days and nights to protein goals and endless repetitions. America really can't afford to do that again. But, really, since his looks bother him so much… he has always hated his jawline, his upper arms, his calves. America really can't imagine getting upset about being thinner if it would make his jawline a little more pronounced, or the less of his body less unbearably soft, even if there's no muscle underneath to save him now. Maybe by the time all this fat (which is perfectly normal and adequate to have, America reminds himself) burns off, he'll be in the right state of mind to start working out again. Wouldn't that be nice?

See, the problem with America is that he just can't fucking control himself. He really shouldn't have been so nice as to make exceptions for when he can eat. The rule had worked well at first, with the occasional fun-sized candy or Canada's poutine or France's god-tier chocolates, but soon he'd found himself looking forward to meetings after work just so he could eat. Soon he finds himself eating a second serving of Canada's poutine right away and still taking the rest home, or having more for breakfast in the morning than just his coffee with milk in it.

America has always brought a protein bar or a little container of nuts to eat during the meetings he attends, but for the first month or so he hadn't needed it. Now, he often finds himself eating goddamn protein bars, and they taste just as shitty as they had when he'd been eating five or six of them a day in a desperate attempt to get enough protein in, and almost always he thinks, For this amount of calories, I could have had two or three slices of cheese and it would have been the same amount of protein, but the point of bringing protein bars in the first place is just to ensure he doesn't enjoy eating anymore, and anyway, he doesn't need to obsess over protein and calories like he used to because he is disorder-free.

To get a handle on his situation, America decides that he is only going to eat if the food is a gift that's either very out of the ordinary (such as the candies Japan sends him, or the onigiri they eat whenever America comes over) or something he can't refuse (such as Matthew's poutine, since nobody else will give it, or Matthew, a shot). He is not going to eat when his coworkers bring donuts or some other normal thing, even if they're from this really great bakery in L.A. that got flown out specifically at his boss's request…

… shit.

America flushes with embarrassment as soon as he finishes his second one. "Alfred? Are you alright?" One of his coworkers asks, touching his arm.

"Yeah, I'm— I'm, uh, fine. I just need to use the bathroom," America says, and he rushes off. There's no reason to respond so quickly; the rest of the people in his unit had all had a donut, too, and they wouldn't understand why he was so ashamed over it. They had been good donuts, but it hadn't been worth breaking his rule; he thinks that surely the number of violations he's committed must say something rather nasty about him.

For a minute or two, purging sounds pretty appealing. Instead, America starts scratching a hole into his forearm. He scratches furiously, with the sole intent of breaking skin, but when the pain really starts to set in he just goes back to his coworkers. In the end, he can't even hurt himself right.

A/N: The other day I was listening to a podcast where two young guys were sharing their experience with having an eating disorder, and the last thing that they talked about was just what their favorite foods were now that they were recovered. I know it probably sounds overrated, but damn, just thinking about it gives me so much hope. I wanna get better so I can experience that.

A review would be wonderful. Have a great day/night and stay safe.