Perfectly Thin, page 26
Tia leaves, and picks up pace while repeatedly extending her arms above her head, then lowering them. She’s left me staring at a blank space of where she was.
Does she want to die?
Because if she continues doing this, she’s going to die.
“Jane, are you okay?” Leo asks.
I turn my gaze to him, and I’m not sure how to respond. I have to tell him what she told me, but then she whispered it, and I don’t think Tia would want me to tell. “I... um, I ah, I...” I can’t even form a complete sentence.
“Are you okay?” Leo sits beside me.
Softly, I shake my head. I don’t think I am. Lowering my chin, I close my eyes and rub at the center of my forehead with my left palm. Tia’s put me in a difficult position. She’s told me a secret, but if I don’t tell Leo or Izzy, and she dies, then I’m going to feel terrible knowing I could’ve done something to help her. But telling on her isn’t something I want to do because then, any trust she had for me will be destroyed.
“I have to go to my room,” I finally say. Springing to my feet, I take off, get to my room, and slam the door shut. Why would she do that? Why tell me something so life-altering?
The door opens within five seconds of me being in here alone. “What’s happening?” Leo asks. He closes the door behind him.
Pacing back and forth in my room, I don’t know what to do. “I’m stuck,” I finally say.
“In what way?”
“I’m stuck,” I say again, this time adding my left hand as a gesture of being in the middle of something.
“Has this got to do with you, or Tia?”
I stop walking. “How do you know I was talking with Tia?”
“Because it’s our job to know. Now, is it about you or Tia? Because you looked like you were a mess when she left.”
“It’s about her.”
“What about her?”
A sudden pang of pain shoots across my head. Great, this is all I need, a damn tension headache. “She told me something.”
“What did she tell you?”
Guilt envelops me, and I feel like I’m betraying her if I tell Leo. How much worse will I feel if she dies because of her actions? I need to do what I think is right. But then, do I sell her out, or do I do something that might save her life?
I’m second-guessing everything.
I don’t want her to think I’ve betrayed her.
“Leo, I don’t know what to do. Please, help.”
“I’ll make this easy for you. Whatever it is she told you, it’s obviously made you quite upset. Will this thing put her into danger?”
“Yes,” I answer without even having to consider.
“Now answer this for me. Would you tell me if this could potentially kill her?”
Fuck. Closing my eyes, I take in a deep breath, and softly nod. “This can kill her,” I whisper.
“Can you look her family in the eye at her funeral and tell them you did everything you could? Or would you hang your head in shame?”
“Damn it, Leo. Why put the fucking guilt trip on me? She’s in here for the same reason I am. That’s not fair,” I scream at him before bursting into tears.
“You have to do what you can live with, Jane. Whatever the consequences are.”
“Why do I have to? That’s Tia’s choice, not mine!” I grab a tissue, wipe at my eyes, and blow my nose.
“Jane, if you’re telling me whatever it is she’s doing out of spite and hate, then spite and hate will come back to you tenfold. If you tell me what she’s doing because you genuinely care, then genuine care will come back to you tenfold.”
“I hate this,” I say as I throw my tissue out.
“Ask yourself this. In this moment in time, this very minute, these seconds, can you do something, out of the goodness of your heart, to help another human being who’s going through the fight of her life? If you think ‘no’, keep her secret. If you think ‘yes’, here’s your chance to not only help Tia, but to help yourself.”
I despise how Leo is so calm, knowledgeable and so damn understanding. “I hate you so much,” I say.
He shakes his head. “I don’t think you do.” He cracks a smile. “Because I don’t hate you. I just want to help, before you, and Tia, and everyone else who’s in here, turns out like my brother, Chris.”
“She’s made a hole in the wall, vomits, and pushes the vomit into the hole so no one knows,” I say quickly before I talk myself out of telling him.
Leo nods. “Thank you. And although you think Tia will hate you, in time, she’ll thank you for saving her life. But rest assured, we won’t tell her you said anything.” I sit on my bed, and he moves toward the door. “You know what, Jane?”
“What?”
“You’re going to be okay.” He leaves my room, and I’m left reeling. I’m so upset at myself for betraying Tia’s trust. But she’s so young, and she has her entire life ahead of her. She can’t spend her time throwing up and forcing it inside a wall cavity.
Jesus, life’s way too short to do something like that.
“Thank you,” Izzy says the moment I enter her office.
“What for?”
“Because we did a room search last night, as you know, because yours was searched, and we found what Tia was hiding.”
“I didn’t want to have to make that decision, but...” I bite my lip, trying to form a sentence. “She really worried me.”
“This is all part of healing.”
“What? Hiding vomit in the wall?”
“No, not for Tia, but for you. Anyway, sit.” She gestures for me to sit. “Other than the guilt, how are you feeling? I see you brought your journal. May I?” She holds her hand out for it. Without a second thought, I hand it to her. There’s not much written in it, and it takes Izzy only a moment to read it.
An intense feeling of worry clouds me. What if I’ve said something wrong in my journal? What if I’m not being honest enough for Izzy? Tapping my fingers on the pillow beside me, I’m nervous about what she’s going to say. “I was honest,” I blurt as if I’ve just been caught cheating in a test.
“I didn’t expect you not to be.”
Rolling my shoulders, I want to jump to my feet and pace back and forth. Just get this nervousness out of me. I chew on my thumb nail, and I wait for Izzy to say something.
“Eating disorders are about what’s going on in the mind, rather than what’s going on with the body.”
“So I’m crazy?”
“What’s living in your head is a controlling one-dimensional asshole. An eating disorder actually doesn’t give a rat’s ass what you weigh, just what you think about yourself.”
“So... are you saying I’ve done this to myself?”
“I’m saying, something that may have started innocently, by maybe wanting to lose a few pounds, escalated because of something else.”
Like being called a something, not a someone.
My shoulders drop, and I know exactly what Izzy’s trying to say. “I went on a date with a guy,” I start recalling the painful memory.
“What happened?”
“Carson Baker. Popular, every girl wants him. I didn’t. But I was flattered when he paid attention to me. Being fat and all. I had already lost like twenty pounds, and I was walking taller and with my head high. You know, I was proud of myself for managing to lose that weight. I wasn’t starving myself or anything, I’d done it all properly. Eating well, and exercising. Which is quite hard when you’re brought up in a Greek family who loves to cook and loves to eat.” I smile, though I know the happiness isn’t deep within.
“And what happened?” Izzy asks.
“Although I was proud, I still wasn’t confident. I didn’t know why a boy like him would want a girl like me.”
“Why wouldn’t he?”
“Because I’m blah,” I say.
“Blah in what way?” Izzy pushes.
“The best way to describe me is, meh. Non-descript. Beige. Just, not interesting.”
“Is that how you saw yourself?”
“I still think I’m boring, and forgettable.”
“I’m going to come back to what you’re think about yourself. But I want to know more about what happened with this Carson Baker boy,” Izzy says as she makes herself more comfortable in one of the spare chairs.
“We went on a date. It was shit.”
“Can you clarify what you mean by ‘shit’? Did something happen?” She becomes suspicious, her tone dropping.
“Nothing like what you might be thinking. But it was shit. First, he was insensitive and rude. Asked if I wanted to go halves on a pizza with him.”
“Did you?”
“Nah, he offered me a slice, but I didn’t want any.” I pick at the chair’s arm, not wanting to tell her the rest. But it’s in my best interest to tell her the truth. “He started kissing me, and it was going okay, until he said, and I quote,” I stop talking when my voice breaks. I swallow, gather my strength, and look up at Izzy. She’s watching me, but her lips are smashed together in a tight line. “He said, ‘I’ve never fucked a fat chick before’.” I nod my head, embarrassed and ashamed. My body quakes as I can barely say any more through the tightness of my throat. “He also said someone like him wouldn’t ever be interested in something like me.” I lower my head, and cry silently at the pain he caused. “He called me a something.” I cry some more. “A fucking something. I feel like this memory is destroying me, absolutely shredding me and tearing me apart.” I rub at the pain in my chest. My breathing is shallow, and I can barely get air into my body. “Why would someone say anything so hurtful?” I feel unworthy. “Don’t I deserve to be loved?” The tears can’t stop falling.
Izzy moves to sit beside me. She wraps her arms around me, and pets my hair as I cry into her shoulder. “People have the ability to lift, or to destroy.” I sit back, and wipe my eyes again. My breathing is shaky, and I’m grappling with the words he spoke. “He has no power over you, Jane.”
“But his words hurt. They hit my heart. They annihilated me.”
“Unfortunately, he spoke those words and you heard them. They can’t ever be unsaid. What we have to do is find a way to reduce their hold over you, and dismiss them.”
“The worst part was when I wouldn’t have sex with him, he left me at the lookout, and I had to call Emma to come get me. Not only did he make me feel worthless, he humiliated me as well.”
“He doesn’t sound like a particularly nice boy.”
“He’s not. But I can’t get it out of my head.”
“That’s impossible, you’ll never get it out of your mind. But we can find ways for you to cope better. Tell me something. If he hadn’t said that, do you think you’d be where you are today?”
“What do you mean?”
“Would your weight have plummeted to the point where your heart couldn’t cope and you’d have had a heart attack?”
Holy shit, abrasive much? I guess, Izzy has never sugar-coated anything in my past interactions with her, what makes me think she’ll start now? “I’m not sure. But he was a driving force. Not him, but what he said.”
“So, if he hadn’t said that you likely wouldn’t be in this position.” She stares at me for a moment, before writing something on her laptop.
“You’re saying it’s because of him I’m like this?”
“No. I’m saying something he said stuck in your mind. Then, your mind took it, magnified it, and tricked you. We, as humans take our thoughts as facts. He said it, it’s stuck, so it must be true.”
I notice when Izzy talks, she uses her hands a lot. Waving them around, and tapping on her temple. “Okay,” I say, watching as Izzy breaks it down for me.
“Then we have to slow down, and use our lawyer skills. Is there evidence to support what he said? Are you, in fact a something? Or a someone? Your heart beats, you bleed red, you walk, talk, and think, so you’re not an inanimate object.”
“Are you saying my brain is screwed up and there’s no hope for me?” Man, don’t I feel shitty?
Izzy smirks and shakes her head. “What I’m saying is you need to slow it down, look for evidence. If you look at, say, a piece of fried chicken, and you really want to eat it, but that voice in your head says, hey, you’re going to blow up and put on twenty pounds. You have to slow it down.” She holds up one finger. “Look for evidence. Will eating a piece of fried chicken really cause me to put on twenty pounds?” She holds up a second finger. “If the evidence says, ‘The last time I ate fried chicken I gained twenty pounds’, or, ‘The last time I ate fried chicken I felt great because I was with my family or friends, and I didn’t gain any pounds’.” She holds up a third finger. “Then we have to take note of what our thoughts are, so we can recognize them quicker and earlier, and we can categorize them in two baskets. Basket one, liar, liar pants on fire, or basket two, okay, you have a point.”
I laugh when she says, ‘liar, liar pants on fire’. “This seems like hard work.”
“It is.” She tilts her head back, and has a wicked gleam in her eyes. “Remember, I never said it was going to be easy. It’s difficult, and tedious, and frustrating. But once you can start recognizing the dangerous, dishonest thoughts quickly, you can overcome anything.”
“How do you know all these things?” I ask. “I mean, I know you’ve gone to college, but you talk about this, like you’ve been through it.”
“I have. But not an eating disorder. For me, it was social anxiety. Just after I finished college, it was absolutely crippling. I couldn’t leave the house without having a complete meltdown. When I was out of the house, my God, the panic attacks. The heavy breathing, sometimes not even being able to breathe. But, I have a great therapist who’s helped me. And I’ve adapted the techniques that I know work for me here to work for people who have eating disorders.”
I sit back and stare at Izzy with mouth open. She had anxiety? I can’t believe it.
“You look like you don’t believe me,” she says, with the widest, proudest smile I’ve seen on someone.
“I was just thinking how you’re so confident, and self-assured. It’s almost impossible to think you’ve ever suffered from anything.”
“Mine started in college actually, but it progressed to make me so dysfunctional that eventually I had to seek help because I knew I couldn’t do it by myself. I had a fear of public speaking, and I had a few oral exams in college, which snowballed over time to me not being able to leave the house.”
Fascinated, I’m completely engrossed with Izzy. “I have to admit, Izzy. I never ever thought you’d be telling me you had issues.”
“It still gets to me occasionally. But I practice what I preach, and at first it was so hard, analyzing each thought, trying to figure out if it was a lie, or if it was the truth. But it got easier, because the more I did it, the stronger I got, which meant I was able to identify and rationalize the thoughts quite fast.”
Izzy speaks in a way that truly inspires me. I want to be able to be at the point where Izzy’s at. I’m ready, raring to go and grab these thoughts, put them in the liar, liar basket, or the truth basket and learn how to read them. “I admire you, Izzy.” She’s given me something to look forward to.
“Great.” She claps her hands together once. “When we get to lunch, you can start exercising your brain. When it tells you you’re going to put on weight, you can decide if it’s a lie, or a truth.”
“Yeah, I can do this.”
“Yes, you can. And don’t beat yourself up over falling. This is all new to you, but you have to remember this, we’re here for you, because you want the help.”
There’s a fire in my belly, and now I can’t wait to try.
I’ve been pacing back and forth since I left Izzy’s office. I know lunch is soon approaching, and my mind is going crazy trying to pinch its toxic talons into me.
“I can do this,” I keep repeating to myself. My self-confidence isn’t quite as high now as what it was. But I have to try. I have to do this, if not for myself, then for my family and friends who are supporting me.
I look at the time, and know the music is going to start any minute now, which means lunch is being served.
My palms are sweaty, and as I pace my room, my stomach churns. “Jesus, it’s just food,” I say to myself. I round my shoulders, preparing myself for what’s about to happen. I’ve put this unusually high expectation on myself, and I’m petrified I’m going to fail.
The lunch song plays, and my fears escalate even more.
“I can do this,” I pump myself up. Ready. Though terrified.
The song stops, which means the dining room is open and the bathrooms are locked. I have to try. I have to do this for myself. Heading to my door, I place my hand on the knob, and turn it.
“Man,” I whisper to myself. Letting go of the knob, I step back, shaking my head. My heart’s beating rapidly, and my hands are shaking.
Yes, eat so you can stack on the pounds.
The voice in my head is loud. I’m frozen in fear, not wanting to leave the safety of my room. In here, I can hang out on my bed, not eat, and no one will know. Problem is, I’ll know. I’ll know how I didn’t try.
Fatso.
Closing my eyes, I take several deep breaths, letting them out slowly. I focus on my breath, and only my breath. I push the hurtful voice down, and focus only on what I’m capable of doing.
I can do this.
I. Can. Do. This.
I will do this.
Opening my eyes, I let out another breath, and step forward. My skin erupts in goosebumps, and my head is quickly filling with unhealthy noise. “Okay brain, you’re telling me I’m fat. I’m not fat. I’m not fat. I. Am. Not. Fat.”
The second I leave my room, it’s like the corridor has shortened in length, and in no more than three steps I’m at the dining room. The universe is conspiring against me. I’m sure the walk from my room to the dining room was longer.
Izzy’s sitting at the head of the table reading a book. Parker, Wade Tia, and Winona are here already. They all look at me when I enter the dining room. Russell, Karen, and Erica have yet to arrive.
