by Donna Cooner
“God, she takes up so much space. Just look at those thighs. I can’t believe her fat is touching me.”
Kristen scoots to the far side of her chair away from me, nervously twisting a strand of hair around and around her finger. I cross my arms even tighter over my chest and pinch my arm between my thumb and finger. Harder. The pain helps me focus on something besides the eyes.
The gym is as quiet as it’s going to get. The principal, a middle-aged man with a forehead that stretches well over the top of his head, walks to the podium and taps the microphone a couple times. After a few attempts at getting the top rows of students to stop talking, he introduces the junior class president.
She is a black-haired girl wearing silver hooped earrings that swing back and forth as she marches up to the mic. Her name is Tracey Bolton, and she’s never said a word to me. Skinny’s filled me in on what she thinks about me, which isn’t much. Tracey places a couple of typed pages on the podium, and I see her hands shaking. She’s practiced long and hard for this moment in the spotlight. When she starts to speak, I have to admit I’m surprised. Her voice, unlike her hands, doesn’t quiver.
“Principal Brown, members of the School Board, teachers, parents, friends, and fellow classmates, it is an honor to speak to all of you today. Go Hornets!”
I slowly stretch my feet out in front of me, trying to make myself longer. Leaner. It isn’t working. Kristen makes a big huffy noise.
“God. You are a cow!” Skinny fills in her thoughts.
I tune out a couple of sentences into Tracey’s speech. I watch Jackson.
Back when we were ten we’d never seen snow before. So when the weatherman announced the possibility, it was like Christmas came early. There was a buzz every where. Grocery stores, sidewalks, libraries, and, most of all, school. Everyone wanted to talk about the weather and the possibility of snow. When it actually happened, I was stunned. I opened my upstairs bedroom curtain to see every thing coated in white. I hardly slept the night before, wishing for the possibility. My mom came in and told me the even better news: School had been canceled. I did a snow dance in my bedroom. It was perfect. I thought it couldn’t be a more perfect day. I was wrong.
Jackson knocked on the door around ten that morning. I dug up every piece of winter clothes I could find and met him at the door with rubber rain boots and two gloves that didn’t match. I had on two sweaters, a coat a size too small, and three pairs of socks. I walked like a mummy rising from the dead. Jackson had a hooded sweatshirt on over several layers that >made him look like a pillow-top mattress. His eyes were bright with excitement, and he clapped his red-gloved hands together and stomped off his boots on my porch.
The sun sparkled off the white piles of snow on the bare branches of the trees, making starlike shimmers of ice. The few orange leaves left on the tree limbs drooped off the brown sticks in surrender. Every once in a while a big plop of snow fell out of the tops, reminding us both that the melting had already started. We had to enjoy it fast.
“This is your opportunity to make a difference in the world . . . blah blah blah,” Tracey drones from the podium.
The air was visible every where. Puffs from our mouths, from cars, from the tops of houses. Little white clouds of excitement. The cold made our cheeks pink, and I had to blink the dryness out of my eyes. A flake landed, like a frozen moment in time, on Jackson’s thick, black lashes. He blinked, but it stayed stubbornly in place. I reached up to brush it off. My throat ached from breathing in the air, but I didn’t mind.
I remember crunching down the sidewalk toward the soccer field, delighted with the double trail of boot prints left behind. No one had been there before us. Not even a rabbit or a squirrel. It was a white stretch of untouched fun. We stomped out into the field, laughing and slip-sliding on an icy undercoat of grass. Jackson scooped up a big pile of powder and plopped it down on my head. I squealed and rolled away, reaching for my revenge scoop to push down the back of his sweatshirt. The fight was on. I ducked behind a park bench and just missed a flying snowball that broke up into a fine mist of powder as it hit a tree trunk behind my head. I waggled my fingers beside my face and stuck my tongue out at him.
“You’re going to get it now!” he yelled.
“You couldn’t hit the side of a barn,” I yelled back.
I ran, and he chased me. Catching me by the soccer goals, he grabbed me around the waist, and we rolled onto the field. Lying on our backs, the cold seeping beneath our layers of clothes, we gasped for breath. I opened my mouth at the sky and stretched out my tongue. A perfectly aimed snowflake drifted down and landed on its outstretched tip. I glanced over at Jackson. He was watching me so intently, so strangely. He rolled over suddenly, heavy with all his layers of clothes on top of me, his hands outstretched to clasp mine in the snow. He looked down at me.
“How did it taste?” he asked.
I could hardly breathe, but it had nothing to do with the cold now. “Wet,” I said.
The sun shining over the top of his head left a shimmer behind like a halo. I narrowed my eyes to see him better. His face was so close. His cheeks so red with the cold, his eyelashes wet and spiky. I wanted to push his hair out of his eyes, but he held my hands down into the snow on each side of my body. And I didn’t want him to move. I didn’t want to do anything to make him move.
“My nose is cold,” I said, because I needed to say something. I thought he would laugh and roll off of me. I thought that would be the end of things. Instead, he leaned in even closer. Closer. And then he kissed the tip of my nose. Very softly. I blinked up at him in amazement. He kissed me again. This time on the lips. Soft at first and then a little more urgent. Our cold lips melded together in a frozen moment of absolute perfection.
Now I watch him across the crowded gymnasium pulling at the ponytail of the blond flute player who sits in front of him. The snow day was a long time ago, but I remember. Every >detail, every day since. And I wonder, how could he have forgotten?
“As we move forward toward graduation and our lives to come . . . blah blah blah.” I’m vaguely aware Tracey is still speaking into the microphone.
No warning. One minute I’m a million miles away in a snow-covered field tasting flakes on my tongue and Jackson’s lips on mine. The next minute I am sitting on top of a broken wooden chair in a crowded high school gym. My teeth snap together with the force of the fall, my head jerking upward. A collective gasp echoes through the rafters. Rows and rows of horrified eyes stare down at me. I’m no longer in the chair. I’m on the floor. I’m on the floor. I try to take it in. The sound of the crash echoes. The speech stops. The chatter stops. The world stops. All eyes focus on the fat girl sitting on top of the crushed remains of what was once a wooden chair. Kristen stares down at me from her seat with a horrified expression of absolute disbelief. By sitting beside me somehow the ultimate humiliation has spread to her.
“Oh. My. God,” she whispers, mortified.
I look beyond her — up and up to the rows of shocked eyes. Tracey stumbles over her speech but somehow keeps going. I know she will never forgive me for spoiling her moment. A teacher jumps out from behind the curtain, leaning over me.
“Are you hurt?”
“No,” I say, struggling to my feet. “I’m fine.”
Tracey keeps going at the microphone. “Our lives will be forever changed by our high-school experiences.” You think?
Another teacher pulls a chair out from somewhere. He puts it behind me and I have no choice but to sit down, though I’m careful not to lean back. All I want to do is leave. Run as fast as my fat little legs can carry me. Behind the curtains and out of sight of all the eyes. But I can’t leave. So I sit there. My legs shake from the strain of trying to not put any weight on the chair, and I try to ignore Skinny’s voice in my ear.
“I knew that would happen one day. Did you see that fat girl?
I can’t believe I just saw that. Wonder if anybody got that on video — got to post it online!”
My eyes are full of tears, but I will not cry. I’ve already done enough to draw attention to myself. But there is one thing I can’t stop myself from doing. I look at Jackson. He is staring at me now. Just like everyone else in the gym.
“He feels sorry for you. He thinks you’re pitiful.”
I look away, down at the floor in front of me, feeling like I have a huge red target right over my heart. I feel Wolfgang shift restlessly in the chair beside me, and he glances over quickly. His look is intense.
“Every hunter knows you have to kill something when it is wounded. It’s just a question of how deep the wound goes before it’s put out of its misery,” Skinny says softly in my ear. “There’s a point when he realizes the poor thing is so wounded it can no longer be fixed.”
I bite my bottom lip until I taste the blood. I’m not at that point. I can be fixed. I clench my hands into fists at my side. There is still something alive deep inside of me. I can feel it beating against my rib cage with iridescent shades of ruby and amethyst wings. The next time I’m on a stage and people are looking at me, it will be different. Jackson will look at me the way he looked at Gigi. I will be in the spotlight — to sing for everyone and to hear only applause.
“Are you crazy? There aren’t parts like that for fat girls like you.”
Then I won’t be fat.
The idea of talking back to Skinny is appalling. Something I’ve never done before. But it’s a simple solution, really. Girl loves boy. Boy loves girl. Girl gets fat. Boy leaves. Girl cuts her stomach up into a little bitty pouch to get boy back.
“You will die,” Skinny hisses in my ear.
I don’t care. If I die, I die. I will do whatever it takes. I will let them cut my stomach open and change my internal organs forever. Even if I have to have a stomach the size of an egg for the rest of my life, I will never feel this way again. I focus my whole being on trying not to cry. I don’t hear the speech at the microphone or the applause that comes from the crowd. I don’t hear the principal calling out the names for the awards. I only hear one sound in my ear. I’ve never heard it before, but it bounces off the inside of my brain and pounds against my ears. It’s Skinny, and she’s laughing and laughing and laughing.
Chapter Five
About two weeks after the chair incident, I have my first appointment for the surgery. Dad goes with me. They do a lot of tests, and we fill in a ton of paperwork, and then sit silently in the waiting room until a tall, silver-haired nurse comes in with a laptop. She’s wearing a headband with a sparkly pink bow on top that would have been more appropriate for an eight-year-old, but she’s old like a grandmother. She says hello to my dad, but talks to me.
“Have you tried to lose weight before?” she asks.
I nod.
“How?”
I tell her about Weight Watchers when I was nine and fat camp when I was eleven. I tell her about cutting carbs and counting calories. She types it all down on her computer. Silently. I don’t tell her about the cabbage diet or the lemon water diet or the cayenne pepper diet, because that’s just crazy. My dad throws in the hypnotherapist I went to see down in Conroe when I was twelve. I forgot about that one. I could have added more, but she closes her laptop and stands up. “The doctor will be in to see you shortly,” she says over her shoulder as she leaves.
A few minutes later, a man knocks on the door and comes in with his hand extended to my dad. Thin, dark-haired, with a beard, he could have played Abe Lincoln in a school play with only the addition of a tall black hat. He sits down on a rolling stool, and my dad and I listen to exactly what will happen to my insides. My brain feels cluttered and cramped. My dad frowns the whole time and asks a lot of questions.
“Why can’t she take nutrition classes or something like that instead?”
The doctor looks over at me. “How many calories is a Big Mac?” he asks.
“Five hundred and sixty,” I answer automatically.
He nods. “How many calories do you need to eat every day to maintain a weight of three-hundred-and-two pounds?”
“Three thousand, two hundred and eighty.”
The doctor turns back to my dad. “She doesn’t need a class,” he says.
“Isn’t she too young for this, Dr. Wilkerson?”
“With obesity on the rise among sixteen- to nineteen-year-olds, many doctors have begun approving the surgery for teens — the youngest on record being twelve years old.” The doctor smiles at me, but his eyes look too busy to really focus.
“How did you let yourself get in this condition? Obese teenagers. It’s a national epidemic.”
“Because she is only fifteen, you will need to sign that you give your permission.” The doctor holds out a clipboard and pen to my dad. Dad hesitates.
“What if she doesn’t do it?” he asks, his empty hand hovering above the paper. “What if I say no?”
The doctor looks from me back to my dad. “This isn’t about looking good in your jeans. Morbidly obese teenagers turn into overweight adults with a reduced life expectancy.” He glances down at the folder in his hand. “Your daughter already has signs of high blood pressure. She could also develop diabetes and heart problems.”
I swallow hard. He’s talking about me. Reduced life expectancy. Morbid obesity. My head is floating, disconnected from my body.
“It’s okay, Dad,” I say. My voice cracks a little, but I cover it up with a small cough. “This is what I want.”
My father nods and reaches for the pen, but his hand shakes a little when he signs his name in an erratic scrawl on the bottom line.
“It’s good you’re here,” the doctor says to my dad. “Obesity surgery is a major undertaking, and it’s really important that your family be well educated about the procedure, the expected consequences, and potential problems.”
“Her stepmother would be here with us, too, but she had to work. We’re all in this together — the whole family,” Dad says. I wonder if he’s checked with Briella and Lindsey about that.
“Good.” The doctor looks at me directly now, brown eyes unblinking behind his wire-rimmed glasses. “Because weight-loss surgery and the way it changes your life will affect your entire household. You will need everyone’s support to be as successful as possible.”
From his folder he pulls out a colored flyer, props it on one knee, and reads it out loud. “In gastric bypass procedures, a smaller stomach pouch is formed in the upper portion of the stomach and a new stomach outlet is formed. After the intestine is divided, the lower intestine is connected to the new stomach outlet.”
All the words surround and smother me. I can’t breathe. I bite my lower lip to feel the pain and nod like I completely understand what he’s talking about. But I don’t. Not really.
“This definitely isn’t something to be taken lightly,” the doctor adds. “Surgical risks from operating on the stomach and intestines can include infection, suture leaks, and blood clots. Changes to the digestive tract may cause ulcers, bowel obstruction, or reflux.”
“Great,” I say, sarcastically. Realizing it doesn’t come out very enthusiastically, I clear my throat and try again. “I’m very excited. What’s next?” I ask, trying to sound ready to go even though my stomach feels like a shaken-up Coke.
“Before you can schedule your surgery, you must attend a dietary education session and a pre-op educational support group. We also strongly encourage you to bring a buddy or family member with you.” I wonder who I’ll take. “The seminar will be facilitated by the surgeon and staff members. You’ll have all the time you need to ask all of your questions about your post-operative diet and follow-up care.”
On the way out of the office, I’m handed a big blue folder with the words Gastric Specialists of Central Texas stamped on the front in gold letters. I open it up and flip through the pages of materials included. Pre-surgery, post-surgery, diet, food lists. My stomach lurches again. I’m overwhelmed. I close the folder again and mumble my thanks to the receptionist.
; That night, with my bedroom door shut tightly, I slide my laptop out from under my bed and log in quickly. I go to the bookmarked site as soon as the wireless connects. It’s labeled “Shoes” on my favorites bar even though the likelihood of someone caring enough to search my computer is next to nothing. It should be labeled “Fatties” because it’s a home for the masses out there looking for weight-loss surgery to save them from their blubber prisons. I click on the forum, “Teen Patients.” I’ve been coming here for almost a year now.
Trying to hang in there. Just can’t figure out what is wrong with me and why this is working so much better for others on here and not working so good for me. THANKS for the encouragement.
Don’t give up!! Next month will be two years for me. I know it is hard not to, but celebrate what you have achieved and what is yet to come. You can do it! If I can, you can. I started at 249, this morning was 107. This surgery was the best thing I could have done for myself. Hang in there.
Was 284 Pounds! ! Holy Beep!!! Size 22/24 2X/3X WHO WAS THAT GIRL??? Now — 169 pounds!! 5'7" size 4/6 tops and 9/10 bottoms. I did NOT lose any muscle mass and my body fat is 33%!!
Now I know what it feels like to cross my legs and to fit in an airplane seat.
I was told yesterday that my throat is totally inflamed and food is now going into my lungs. I have pneumonia due to the inflammation. They also said this IS life threatening. Help! Anyone else had this happen??
I scroll through the postings, reading until my head is buzzing with the words of the escapees. Some have made it out into the sunshine. Some are still trapped in the tunnel they dug for themselves. I don’t know which one I’ll be, but I know I can’t stay locked away in my prison of fat for the rest of my life.
I shut off the computer and slide it back under the bed. I put the packet from the doctor’s office under there, too, and turn out the light. Looking up at the ceiling, I can still feel the chorus of voices seeping out from the website. Sad. Joyous. Defeated. Angry. Amazed. Hopeful. My headphones lie on the nightstand, but I know there is no music that can drown them out.