Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot
Love Sex and a Bottle of Vodka
Chapter Five
What really bugs me is when people say they're fat, you know? So that other people would reassure them that they AREN'T fat when they already know that they aren't. Because there are so many annoying people in the world like that, no one takes me seriously when I say I'm fat. It doesn't even matter if they tell me that I'm not, it's how I see myself that matters to me and when I look in the mirror, I don't even recognize myself. All I see is a stranger, maybe a sparkle of who I was. And now I'm getting worried that maybe someday when I look in the mirror, there won't be a trace of me left there and all I'll be left staring into the eyes of a stranger.
Hermione let her pen trail and make squiggly marks down the page of her journal. Honestly, ballpoint pens were so much more useful than quills. No messy ink spills or no need to sharpen quill points. Absentmindedly, she let herself doodle, making loose circles all over the page, some even eating up her writing. Her mind was floating back to earlier in the summer.
Flashback
"My god Hermione!" cried her mom. "How much weight have you lost?"
"It's hormones," said Hermione, lamely. That didn't stop her mother from grabbing her around the wrist and dragging her to the bathroom.
"NO, I don't WANT to be weighed!" cried Hermione. "Let me go, this is summer break for god sakes, leave me alone!" But her mother didn't.
"Not until you get on that scale. What have you been doing all school year Hermione? Starving yourself!" Hermione finally, reluctantly, got on the scale and her mother let out a sharp gasp.
"I taught you to be sensible Hermione," she said, looking angry, disappointed, and sad.
"I AM sensible, Mom, I get the best grades in the whole damn school, isn't that enough for you?"
"You're seeing a doctor, as soon as possible Hermione, I don't care if you hate me for the rest of your life as long as you go." Hermione ran to her room and slammed the door shut. Her parents had a thing about having locks on doors. They said that it was one of the reasons why families these days were always shut out of each other's lives. So Hermione pushed a chair up against the door and huddled in a far corner of her room. God she hated her life.
Hermione winced thinking about that day. She made her mother cry. Although her mother didn't let Hermione see her tears, Hermione could hear the tears in her voice as she phoned Hermione's dad.
"She's barely eighty pounds! Honey, she's 5' 6"!" her mother had said. "I know, I've already got an appointment lined up. No, don't talk to her; she won't come out of her room. I know. I love you. See you soon. Bye."
Her mother had sounded detached and lonely. It almost made Hermione want to push the chair aside and run and hug her mom. Almost, but not quite. Then, there was the appointment.
Flashback
"So Ms. Granger, can I call you Hermione?"
"Um, yes," said Hermione. The woman seated in front of her was the kind of woman people might call handsome rather than pretty. She was solid and compact and looked as if the chair she was sitting in was made for her. Dressed in a no-nonsense suit, hair pulled severely from her face, she reminded Hermione almost of Professor McGonagall. Hermione promised herself that she wouldn't be intimidated but it was hard.
"How long have you believed that you were fat?" she asked. Hermione squirmed a bit in her seat.
"Summer of fourteen," Hermione answered. She wasn't sure if it was true or not but did it really matter?
"Do you know why you might be doing this to yourself?"
"I'm not happy with myself, I feel like I have to prove something to my family and my friends, I think that being thin is the only good quality that I have." Hermione felt proud of herself, that she could name all of these things and still go home and throw up the salad that she'd buy for herself. Of course the psychiatrist wouldn't know that. She'd think that she was finally making progress. Let her think that.
So Hermione let her doctor think that for as long as it took. Then she started to run away from home. Tell her parents she was staying at a friend's house and just go out dancing. She'd never try to drink. That time, when Draco brought her home, was really when she had ever gotten drunk and it wasn't her fault. Instead she'd drink water with lemon, then go out to a twenty-four hour mini-mart and buy powdered donuts and root beer and eat them on the curb outside only to throw them back up six hours later. That summer her clothes were stained with powdered sugar and she constantly smelled like processed sugar.
"Hermione?" This time it was Draco standing outside the door and Hermione sulkily refusing to open it. After Draco had kissed her, Hermione had no clue what to do and she just bolted like a deer in the headlights. Now she was seriously regretting it but she can't change the past. Something changed when she woke up in Draco's apartment. Hermione didn't really want to be who she was this summer. With a start, Hermione realized something. Draco was healing her.
"Hermione?" This time his voice was more urgent. Hermione flung open the door and fell into Draco's arms.
"Thank you," she said, voice muffled into his shirt. Draco was bewildered.
"For what?" he asked. He awkwardly stroked her hair. She smiled although Draco couldn't see her.
"I don't know yet," she finally answered. She tilted her face up and kissed him. It took her a moment to get enough control to speak.
"But thanks." Draco grinned.
"No," he said softly. "Thank you."