TW: Eating disorders

The last chapter of Autumn in Philadelphia is almost entirely a Flashback, and it was very hard to write. When I started writing AiP I was in the middle of my own battle with diabulimia. I've been in recovery for 17 years and often talked about it so it really caught me off guard that the actual feeling I had during that time were so hard to revisit.

The next couple of flashbacks will be an abridged version of the larger flashback. If you'd like to read the flashback in its entirety you can find in Saudade: The Truth about Audrey.

Once again, I want to take a moment to thank my own found family for their support through writing this chapter and always. You are an amazing group of people and I appreciate you all so much.

JustAnotherPersonWhoWrites and Mirandabelle, a special thank you to you two. From helping me sort out scenes that just weren't coming out at all to listening to my own story and helping me sort through my feelings, you two have been incredible. I can't really find adequate words to express how much you both mean to me.

Things started small.

Jon had noticed for quite some time that while Audrey did nearly all of the cooking, she rarely ate much of it.

There was always an excuse.

"I sampled so much while I was preparing it, I can't eat much else."

Or

"I ate a big breakfast/lunch/dinner."

Then there were the times she would eat the way he and Shawn did: hot dogs, popcorn, pizza, all standard junk food.

Then she'd go back to cooking and excuses.

It wasn't that she didn't eat.

He saw her eat.

But she was thin, and he swore he could see her getting thinner. He couldn't figure out how someone could eat, sometimes a lot, and still lose so much weight.

She didn't seem to be an excessive exerciser either. She still danced but between work, school, and them, she didn't have time to do much of it.

But she was losing weight.

And she didn't have any to lose to begin with.

Something was very wrong, but he had no proof of what it was.

In the months that passed since September, Audrey had become his best friend, superseding Eli. He could talk to her about anything.

Except this.

Every time he tried to bring his concerns up, she reacted like she did when he confronted her earlier in the year about why she knew so much about eating disorders. Although she had yet to storm out on him and tell him she never wanted to see him again, he pushed her pretty close to that point.

He always apologized and held his tongue until the next time.

At the bookstore one weekend, he came across a newly released book, Little Dancers in Pretty Boxes. The picture on the cover caught his attention: the ballerina looked like Audrey. He bought it for that reason.

It was an eye-opening read. Apparently various eating disorders were prevalent in not only ballet but figure skating and gymnastics as well. This sparked a research frenzy into the world of ballet and eating disorders.

His newfound knowledge was a dangerous thing as he was unable to keep his mouth shut when he saw Audrey doing something that reminded him of what he'd read.

Every time he said something, it sparked an argument.

For a long time, they were able to keep these disputes hidden from Shawn, but eventually Jon opened his mouth at the wrong time and set her off in front of the teen.

"What is your problem?!" Shawn growled furiously. He jumped in front of his teacher as Audrey slammed the apartment door on her way out.

Jon held his hands out to the side and let them fall against his thighs.

He didn't know what to say.

That wasn't good enough for Shawn. "Are you tryin' to sabotage our family?"

Jon stared at him. "No!"

"Well, why did you pick a fight with her then?" The teen got within an inch of his nose. Hurt and fear mixed with the anger in his eyes. "Is this what you do before you breakup with a girl? Pick a fight and then take them to that stupid Italian restaurant?"

Shawn's mouth fell open in shock as he heard his own words. "Is that what you're gettin' ready to do? Take us to La Familia and dump us?!"

"Of course not!" he snapped defensively. Shawn's assessment of his dating and break up habits was eerily accurate but that was absolutely not the case here.

"Then what are you doin'?!"

"I-," Jon dropped to the couch and put his head in his hands. "Somethin's wrong with her, Shawn. I'm tryin' to find out what it is."

"By buggin' her about what she eats?" The teen knelt on the couch next to his teacher. Seeing how lost Jon looked made him reassess the situation.

"She isn't eatin' that's the problem."

"She says she is. She says she's fine."

Jon sighed and shook his head.

"How do you know?"

"I don't," he admitted. "I just have… a feelin'."

Shawn bit his bottom lip. He could see his teacher's concern was sincere, but he was terrified that by pursuing this, Jon was going to run Audrey off. "Don't ruin this for us," he begged, grabbing ahold of Jon's sweater. "Please. If Audrey says she's fine, then she's fine. Please, don't ruin this. Please, Jon. I need her."

He knew that.

And he needed her too.

So, he let it go.

Then he remembered the note for the doctor he saw at her place the first time he went over. It disappeared once he and Shawn started spending time at her house starting in December. One time, while Audrey was working with Shawn in the kitchen, he did a little searching and found a number for Dr. Amsden in her dresser drawer.

He hated snooping, but he knew she wouldn't offer that number if asked.

She's too important to ignore what's goin' on, he told himself to assuage his guilt.

The number turned out to be useless. He was refused information because he was not her husband nor was he an emergency contact.

So he tried to find out information on his own.

His knowledge of the internet was less developed than the internet itself. Shawn was better versed in searching the World Wide Web but once the teen found out what he was trying to do, he refused to help.

Without a New York City phone book, Jon couldn't find any information. The college kids at the library were no help; they just pointed him to the internet.

So Jon stayed silent and when the urge to say something got too much, he went for a walk until it passed.

He started walking a lot in February.

February brought Shawn's birthday which brought him a fresh look at Audrey. A look he'd tried very hard to avoid. She was beautiful, he couldn't avoid acknowledging that, but he could choose not to think about her without also thinking about Shawn.

It was crucial that he didn't.

Shawn had to be the center of everything they did for multiple reasons. As time went on the primary reason became because everything had to stay platonic until after May.

But that was impossible.

Shawn quite literally set him up to fail and he willingly went along with it.

He also set himself up to fail.

Shawn used his party, held on Valentine's Day, to get them together and he used Shawn's party for the same reason.

Their plans overlapped and he ended up on the rooftop of the apartment kissing his student teacher.

It was a one-time thing.

Just like Christmas.

It couldn't happen again until after May.

Then came March and with it came Katherine.

In the beginning, there were no issues except that she wanted to get back together, and he did not.

So she shifted her story and claimed she wanted to be friends only; something they really weren't before. She started showing up to the apartment at inopportune times forcing him and Shawn to hide Audrey. When she started waiting for him in the foyer of the apartment, Audrey stopped coming over all together and they went to her place instead.

Then came the calls and the insistence that she know where he was at all times.

He told her it was over. That coming over to his place was over.

When she refused to respect those boundaries, he lost his temper, much to Shawn's delight.

Then the key incident happened.

That was the last straw for Jon.

He wanted nothing else to do with her and told her so.

They had peace for a while.

The more time that passed the more Jon fell in love with his little family. His thinking had shifted so dramatically that he no longer questioned his place in Shawn's life or Audrey's.

While he had already promised to make their situation permanent after May, he couldn't yet bring himself to utter the words "marriage" and "adoption".

"I love you, Audrey" had been on the tip of his tongue since Christmas, but their situation had not changed so there it had to remain.

These words along with marriage and adoption had to wait until May passed.

And they did until his former fiancée came to town.

Initially, it was a one-time dinner date to catch up on old times. He was certain they wouldn't make it even that far as he was convinced Melanie had not changed. She proved him wrong from the moment she stepped inside the apartment.

He left that dinner feeling conflicted as Melanie wasn't the person he remembered. She had changed quite a bit and he was stunned to find he really liked her. A trip down memory lane recounting the history they shared confused these feelings even more.

When he came back to Audrey and Shawn, he found he couldn't talk to either of them about what happened. He sent Shawn to bed and asked Audrey to stay with him. He couldn't express his thoughts or feelings, so he simply held onto her until she had to leave.

That should have been the end of Melanie, but it wasn't. She came back and moved herself into the apartment.

Shawn resented this and so did he. But he knew there was a part of Melanie that had not changed; she still had a foot in the world he despised. Trading in her fur coats was one thing, trading in a comfortable life in a comfortable neighborhood was still beyond her. He knew she wouldn't mesh with the lifestyle he and Shawn led.

So he let her stay and asked Audrey to stay away because he didn't trust Melanie enough to tell her about his student teacher.

Shawn, predictably, rebelled over the situation. Eventually, he was pushed to the breaking point when Melanie insisted on "babysitting" him. He repaid this offense by making her think he took off into the night when he was really on the roof watching her frantically search for him.

Melanie had no choice but to come to him and admit her failure. When he and Audrey returned to the apartment in search of the teen, Shawn was sitting on the couch watching TV.

The event forced Melanie to finally admit why she came back to see Jon. Naturally, being friends had little to do with it. She left quietly after he introduced his girlfriend and bluntly told Melanie that he loved Audrey.

Shawn was over the moon at this announcement and nearly injured the three of them in his excitement. Audrey, in her quiet, understated way, let him know she was equally thrilled.

He was relieved the feeling was mutual, but he wasn't happy.

That was not how he wanted to tell her.

I love you.

Words he had never said to anyone, and she knew it. She deserved to hear those words from him for the first time with all his attention focused on her.

He could never get that moment back.

Audrey said it didn't matter.

But it mattered to him and to Shawn who, after his initial excitement, was not happy with the way he chose to tell them.

But it was out.

I love yous had been exchanged all around.

The ring was in Jon's dresser drawer.

The guardianship paperwork in his desk drawer.

All he needed to do now was ask the question and sign the dotted line.

And try to ignore the nagging feeling that something was seriously wrong with Audrey.

The weather was growing warmer, and Audrey's clothes were growing bigger. Oversized long sleeved shirts and baggy jeans became her uniform outside of school. Her school uniform of black slacks and a white long sleeve shirt, once fitted, became oversized as well.

Once he came home from a grocery run and found Audrey sitting on the couch wearing his leather jacket during an unusual spring heat wave. It took a ridiculously long time to coax her out of it. Then, while he was hanging the jacket up, she found one of his hoodies to replace it with.

Her explanation for this was that she was always cold, which was true when the air conditioner was on, but the AC unit had been broken for almost a week.

This incident made it harder not to say something because the more he read, the more signs he saw of an eating disorder- the change in habits, in clothing, the excuses.

To distract himself, Jon decided to talk to her about something else that had been concerning him- how he told her that he loved her.

She maintained that it didn't bother her.

There was something about saying "I love you" that made him so insecure and vulnerable that he started babbling about anything and everything that came to mind.

"I worry about you so much," he mumbled into her shoulder. He was sitting on the back of the couch. She stood in front of him with her arms wrapped around his neck and her fingers in his hair. "I can't bear the thought of somethin' happenin' to you. I love Richie, Aud, but this is one part of his life I do not want to repeat."

She knew he was talking about what happened to her father after the death her mother. She entwined her fingers in the curls around his shirt collar as she laid light kisses along his jawline. "You won't."

He hugged her, acutely aware of the lack of space she occupied in his arms. He worriedly searched her eyes for some kind of hope that his concern was unfounded. He found no such reassurance. "How can you say that so confidently? Richie never thought he'd lose Lizzie."

She continued her kisses rather than responding.

This made Jon incredibly anxious.

"That's different," she finally said. She kissed his lips then pressed her forehead against his. "My mum was having problems for a long time; she just couldn't get a diagnosis."

He searched her eyes again, this time for some sign she was open to listening to him. Those gray eyes were so soft and inviting that before long he was lost in them.

"I love you," he said rather than confront her.

He held her by the hips. While his tone was light and sarcastic, his eyes were dark and serious. "I swore I'd never say 'I love you' but you got me to say it. So now you're stuck with me. I absolutely refuse to go through this again. You can't do anythin' to make me lose you like Richie lost Lizzie."

That was as close as he could get to begging her to tell him what she was keeping from him.

Her smile turned dreamy, and she melted against him, humming to herself. Through half-closed eyes she let her guard down so completely that her native Manhattan accent saturated every word. "I won't, Jonny, I promise. But ya gotta promise me the same."

"I promise, babe."

All semblance of a platonic relationship within the apartment and her home was gone now which made it imperative that Shawn stay close to them, so they weren't ever completely alone.

She was still his student teacher and there were some things that could not change yet.

However, some things did change with her.

And he really liked the changes he saw.

One night, after Shawn skipped out on post dinner cleanup to talk to Cory on the phone, Audrey was in a particularly playful mood and seemed happier than he'd ever seen her. She danced around the kitchen with some sort of ballet moves, laughing and flirtatiously teasing him.

With no experience in dating or romance, she had always been a terrible flirt. And he absolutely adored her awkwardness. Still, he played annoyed, but her laugh was infectious, and he couldn't help but join in her banter. At one point, he grabbed the sink sprayer and soaked her.

"Augh, Jon!" she shrieked in laughter trying to get the hose away from him.

He grabbed her and held the sprayer out of her reach which wasn't hard to do as small as she was. It was while he was playing keep away with one arm around her that he realized not only did she look different, but she felt different too.

Back before Shawn's birthday when he saw her in night clothes for the first time, he could only describe the way she looked as being drawn by an animator.

Slim curves.

Those slim curves were a little more pronounced now and she had a healthy glow about her.

He shouldn't have done what he did, but he couldn't help it.

He let go of the sink hose and wrapped both arms around her. Nuzzling her neck, he took a moment to inhale her scent, a peculiar mix of the seasonal chocolate peppermint tea she loved and citrusy shampoo.

In her ear, he promised, "Startin' next Christmas I'll buy you enough of that tea to last the whole year."

When she looked up at him, he kissed her.

Running his hands down her waist to her hips, his brain shut off and emotion took over. Without thinking, he pressed his mouth against her ear and said, "You look so good with some extra weight on those curves."

It was the worst thing he could have said.

Any words other than extra and weight.

Any.

Instantly she recoiled.

He might as well have said she was the most hideous woman he'd ever seen.

She didn't storm out of the apartment. She just stumbled away from him and sank onto the couch, struggling not to cry.

He went to her immediately to explain himself and what he really meant, stressing that he always loved the way she looked.

Always.

He reiterated that he was just so worried about her being so thin that he was thrilled with the way she looked now, healthy and more beautiful than before. In a very unwise move, he detailed everything about her, physical and otherwise, that he loved.

But his words didn't penetrate the wall she'd put up.

It was like he didn't say anything at all.

Many thanks for reading. I really appreciate that you spend your time with me. Messages are always open. Until next time.