by Nora Price
“Why?” Alexandra asked.
“Because. It was a certainty, and I liked it that way. I liked my apple and my yogurt at lunch. I liked rewarding myself with low-fat ice cream. I liked knowing that I didn’t have to think about food or wonder what to eat or how much. It was like wearing a uniform to school, something I always secretly wished for. I didn’t have to devote a single thought to it. There were no questions. Ever.”
None.
“Nothing else in my life,” I went on, “was like that. I woke up and got out of bed every morning with no idea of what the day would bring. As soon as I got to the bathroom to brush my teeth, it started: Was my skin going to be good today, or would it break out? Would I have to spend the whole day angling my face away from people so they wouldn’t have to stare at a boiling patch of acne? Did my breath smell? Would I have to play basketball in PhysEd? Would my deodorant work? Would I get sweat patches in my underarms before lunch? What if I accidentally scratched a zit during Spanish class and it started bleeding, and the boy next to me points to my forehead and hands me a Kleenex? What if Elise was sick again and didn’t come to school? What if I got my period and bled through my pants? What if I have razor burn on my legs?”
I was speaking from experience, not hypothetically.
“These questions,” I told Alexandra, “are shooting through my head every day before I even spit out the toothpaste in my mouth. Do you understand?
She nodded. I was gripping the sofa too tightly.
“It. Does. Not. Stop.”
Removing my hands from the leather upholstery, I transferred them to my thighs, which I proceeded to squeeze as tightly as a stress ball.
“But that’s not all,” I went on. “There’s also the fact that my best friend is perfect. Literally perfect. My best friend is a tall, lanky, beautiful girl that everyone falls in love with on first sight.”
I felt a sharp pain. My nails were carving half-moons into my thighs. I’d been clutching my legs so tightly that my fingernails had broken through the fabric of the leggings and were pushing against my skin. Almost as soon as I registered the pain in my legs, it disappeared.
“When I finally figured out that there was something within my ability to control, I controlled it.”
I collapsed back into the sofa, winded. The light in the room seemed to be growing brighter and brighter. What time was it?
“I see,” Alexandra said.
There were tears in my eyes, but they did not feel like tears. They felt like hot water or Tabasco sauce. They scorched my skin and dribbled onto my leggings. Hot and sour tears. I trained my eyes on Alexandra’s shoes in order to avoid making eye contact, but the sight of the bright yellow material was beginning to make me feel off-kilter in a different way. I put my head in my hands and squeezed my eyes shut. Velvet blackness swept around me like a curtain, but Alexandra’s yellow Mary Janes were imprinted in my mind. I could feel the sticky paste of damp Splenda on my fingers and hear the sound of the garbage disposal churning. It was a terrifying sound. Back in the kitchen at home, doubled over with panic and stomach cramps, I saw my mother’s face, taut with anger, as she plucked the kitchen scissors from the butcher block and snipped my silk pouch in half, then into quarters. A cloud of white powder floated to the counter as the last bits of Splenda evaporated into thin air.
“No more of this, Zoe,” my mom said.
Of what? I wanted to scream. My mother had never understood what I was doing, or why I was doing it. She had never asked. She had never known.
“Do you hear what I am saying to you?” she whispered, her voice thick with fury. But I couldn’t speak. She grabbed my wrists and pinned them, forcing me to look into her eyes.
“You will not,” she said, and then dropped my hands, trembling. “You will not lie to me again, Zoe.”
The scene spun out like a broken reel, and midnight poured itself around me. Blackness again. A high buzzing sound filled my head, and I was aware of a cold, twinkly feeling radiating from the place right behind my ears. Like a TV set unplugged from the wall, everything went quiet.
I wasn’t sure what was happening, so I lay still, breathing fast but no longer crying. Something soft and warm covered my body. My feet felt different; wiggling my toes, I realized that I was not wearing shoes. When had that happened? The darkness around me looked different, not too black anymore but more like the color of a storm cloud. Was it safe to open my eyes? I tried, with great caution, to do so, but nothing happened. I tried again and couldn’t do it.
My eyes were already open. A shape materialized above me. A voice was connected with the shape. But the sensations didn’t fully overlap, and I couldn’t tell whether it was Angela or Alexandra who hovered nearby. The voice sounded like Angela, but the face looked like Alexandra. Black hair. Skinny limbs. Someone brought another blanket and gently unfolded it on my body. But it wasn’t the white afghan I was holding before, and I couldn’t feel the blanket even though I could see that it was on top of me. I heard people talking. Not sentences, just words.
Under observation …
Triggered by …
Be fine, though we ought to …
A memory …
Then the words disintegrated into sounds, and the effort of decoding became too great. Either Angela or Alexandra put a hand on my forehead. I closed my eyes again and surrendered to viscous sleep.
[Day Nineteen]
Breakfast
Chicken broth (2 cups)
White toast with butter (2 pieces)
Orange juice (8 oz.)
Lunch
Chicken broth (2 cups)
White toast with butter (2 pieces)
Hot lemon water (8 oz.)
Dinner
Chicken broth (2 cups)
White toast with butter (3 pieces)
Hot lemon water (8 oz.)
[Day Twenty]
Ever wondered what it feels like to fall into a volcano? If so, allow me to recommend a panic attack. A panic attack is what happened to me yesterday afternoon in the middle of therapy. I was telling Alexandra about a fight I’d had with Mom when I began, quite suddenly, to feel dizzy and hot, as though I’d plummeted through the office floor into a pit of lava. I seemed to be falling for a long time, and just as I approached the molten flames at the bottom of the pit, everything went dark.
How’s that for a waking nightmare?
I woke up several hours later in a lamp-lit room, covered in blankets, with a nurse helicoptering over me. Alexandra was there, too—or it might have been Angela. In that state, I couldn’t have distinguished a pineapple from a kiwi.
A few hours later I was allowed to go back to my room and rest. With Caroline otherwise occupied, I had almost a full day of privacy. In theory. I say “in theory” because I have not, in truth, had a second of privacy in my bedroom. At all times there are ten faces staring at me from atop Caroline’s dresser. Ten faces gazing upon every banal activity I embark upon. When I put on my striped socks, I feel their eyes. When I untangle a knot in my hair, I feel them, too. When I undress for a shower—you get the idea. It sounds funny, but a photograph has a distinct presence, and ten photographs are almost unbearably intrusive. Even if the photographs are of a child.
Still, I would never ask her to remove the pictures. I would never be that brave. Shuddering under their surveillance, I felt the limits of my existence vividly, almost physically, as though I were handcuffed.
At dinner time, Angela brought me a tray loaded with plain white toast, soup, and hot water, which I picked at in bed, like an invalid. I hadn’t eaten white toast in years, and I was surprised at how sweet it tasted; almost like angel-food cake. The other girls were at dinner, and my room was silent as a crypt except for the crunch and slurp of my eating.
Toast reminds me of midnight snacks and hotel breakfasts. Many years ago, I sat in the kitchen of our house watching my older brother make toast in the broiler. The square footage of our kitchen was so dinky that my mother refused to buy an actu
al toaster. (“Not enough counter space,” she said, confirming my theory that all moms everywhere are obsessed with counter space.) I developed a scientific interest, that morning, in observing Harry prepare his toast. I must have been eight years old. He was crouched by the stove, bouncing on his heels and waiting for the bread to hit that perfect shade of golden-brown doneness. “Remember to flip it,” I told him. People always forget that a toaster does all the work, but a broiler only does half of it.
“That’s what I hate about toasting in a broiler,” he said, tapping the oven glass. “Touching the soft side of the bread that doesn’t face the flames. It feels creepy.”
When the smell of toast was in the air, Harry yanked the broiler door open and pulled out the tray. One side of the toast was done. As he reached for the bread and flipped it over, a look of disgust crossed his face. It only lasted a second, but I remember being pleased, because it meant that he had been telling the truth about his aversion.
“Yech, it’s like touching mold,” he said.
I miss Harry, too.
Angela asked, this morning, if I would like to talk with my mother on the phone after the panic attack. A special exception to the rule, she said. I declined—not to be vengeful, but because I have nothing to say. It happened and it’s over. Done. Finished. I’d like to forget about it—to smooth it over like a cowlick. I don’t want to talk about the memory that triggered it, and the rest of the time I was unconscious. So there you have it.
[Day Twenty-One]
I was late to breakfast. When I arrived, Devon had taken the vacant seat at Victoria and Haley’s table. The only chair left stood between Jane and Caroline, and directly across from Brooke.
Splendid.
Victoria gave me a helpless glance as I entered and sat down. Are you okay? she mouthed. I nodded. Caroline stood to pour ice water for Brooke, Jane, and herself, conspicuously skipping my glass. I poured my own ice water and waited quietly for Devon to call us up for food as they talked amongst themselves. When it was our table’s turn, I trudged over to the sideboard, steeling myself for what awaited. Devon, with an apron tied around her waist, happily accepted my plate and dug a spoon into the serving tray. Although we are still allowed to serve ourselves, nobody does so anymore because no matter what size portion you take, Devon always adds more. If I take one slice of toast, she ups the ante with another slice. If I serve myself a dollop of almond butter, she triples the dollop. Now I just hand over my plate and let her do it. It’s easier that way.
“Southwestern omelet,” Devon announced, depositing a floppy oval of egg onto my plate. I detected red peppers, onions, chives, and cheddar cheese from the steaming, pillow-shaped object. A cube of cornbread was added to the plate, and immediately commenced soaking up excess egg juice like a sponge. I prodded the bread away from the omelet with my finger.
“How’re you feeling, Zoe?” Devon asked.
“Fine.”
Did they tell Devon about my panic attack? I hate the idea. The last thing I need is extra attentiveness from her.
I returned to my solitary perch at the table and focused on the wet raft of cornbread, alternately preparing for and avoiding the task ahead of me. After nearly three weeks, I still can’t adjust to the sensation of packing such large amounts of food down my throat. It has indelicate effects on my digestion. Worst of all, what if I get used to it? It is inconceivable that I will eat a tenth as much as I’m eating here once I return to normal life. I watched the food on my plate carefully, as though it might—if given the proper encouragement—evaporate all on its own.
Spoiler alert: It didn’t.
Out of habit and politeness, I waited for everyone to return to her seat before I began eating. Not that it mattered here. (I also cover my mouth when I yawn or sneeze, hold the door for others, put my napkin in my lap, and leave the bathroom in spotless condition. Again, not that it matters here.)
Caroline sat down next to me, followed by Jane. The smell of eggs was overpowering. For some people, food is a comforting thing—a way to soothe bad moods and feel better instantly, if temporarily. But for me, it doesn’t work this way. For me, a bite of ice cream is not just a bite of ice cream, but also a threat: the threat that I’ll want more ice cream than just that one bite, and the threat that I’ll keep wanting it and wanting it until I can think of nothing except ice cream, and about what would happen if I ate the ice cream, and about how disappointed I’d be with myself afterward.
Some people find it impossible to be unhappy while eating. I suppose I am the exact opposite.
Waiting for the others to return proved a mistake. As soon as Brooke returned to the table, a horrifying charade of consumption played itself out before me: She bent down and crammed food into her mouth, throwing back gulps of water to push it down her throat. Jane and Caroline seemed thoroughly accustomed to the performance, and they embarked upon their own strange eating rituals without a second glance at their tablemate.
I shrunk into my velvet seat, smushing my cornbread into the shape of a pancake with a spoon. I cut the pancake into eighths, then lifted a slice to eat. The voyage from my plate to my mouth seemed to take years. Between Brooke and the cornbread, there was nothing in my field of vision that didn’t act as a potential enemy.
When it arrived, the cornbread tasted like wet paper towels and undercooked eggs. I swallowed and put my fork down.
Except for Brooke, the other girls seemed to have similar opinions.
“At least the portions are getting smaller,” Jane was telling Caroline. “They’ve been getting progressively smaller every day. Have you noticed?
I looked down at the football-sized omelet. Was it smaller? It didn’t look smaller. It looked mammoth.
But Caroline concurred. “It’s hard to detect because the change is so gradual,” she said sagely.
This didn’t make sense to me. The more we ate, the more food our stomachs could handle. Why would the portions be getting smaller? I gazed longingly at the other table, where Victoria was whipping Haley’s hand with a stringy piece of caramelized onion. Never again, I told myself, cursing my seat. I am never going to be late again. Brooke furiously speared her last chunk of omelet and chewed at least thirty times. When finished, she wiped her mouth and stared straight at me through smudged glasses.
“Stop staring,” she said.
“What?”
“Stop staring at me.”
“I wasn’t—”
“You were. You’re always looking at me.”
“I—”
“You look at me as though I’m the one who’s a freak,” she went on. “You, of all people! Given your history, I can’t bel—”
Brooke stopped on a dime and shut her mouth tight.
“My history?”
“Never mind.”
“No, tell me just what you mean by my history!”
“You know exactly what I’m talking about.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Brooke was the weirdo, not me.
Caroline and Jane stared at me with undisguised contempt. They planned this, I thought. They saved the seat specifically to torture me.
Was I imagining it?
Ignoring Brooke’s speech, I bent to face my waterlogged cornbread and gelatinous eggs, wishing I could hide beneath the table like a five-year-old at Thanksgiving. Even my coffee was cold. Somehow I’d have to coax myself into swallowing the entire heap with the eyes of my tablemates trained curiously on me.
A white envelope was visible through the slot. I squinted harder. Was it an envelope I’d seen before? Impossible to say. Viewed through a quarter-inch opening in a small box, all standard white envelopes look the same. I straightened up and flicked a piece of lint off the top of the red box as I waited outside for my session to begin. By now I’d learned a few things about the red box:
One, that it was easier to discern the contents if I kept one eye closed while I peeked inside.
Two, the box never contained more than one envelope a
t a time.
Three, the envelope was always positioned facedown, with the address hidden from sight. These facts, so far, had not been disproven.
The door swung open. I nodded to Alexandra, whose appearance every day was another invitation to play the color game. Today the game was hard, because she wore no belt, no jewelry, no hat, and no scarf. For shoes, she’d selected simple white leather sandals. As we took our respective seats in the bleach-white room, I wondered if Alexandra had—was it possible?—forgotten to add any color at all to her getup. I hoped not. If so, I’d have to revise the rules of the game. And I really hate changing the rules of a game.
“Tea? Water?” she offered.
“No, thanks,” I said. We assumed our positions on the chair and couch.
Alexandra smiled and folded her hands across one knee. The gesture revealed what I’d been searching for: Ten nails were painted electric tangerine. The color of deer-hunting caps.
We faced off in silence for a moment while I squirmed for a way to broach the subject.
“Have you ever seen a nature documentary about Africa?” I asked, still distracted by her nails.
“More than one,” she said. “Probably a hundred. I have two boys, so …”
“So you know the territory. Nature movies were the only common ground I had with my brother, as far as TV-watching went. So we watched a lot of them together. I can still tell you everything you need to know about bush elephants and cheetahs and African hunting dogs. And hyenas, too. Did you know they eat dry bones? Hyenas?”
Alexandra shook her head.
“Anyway you’ve seen those movies, so you know what happens to zebras.”
“Remind me,” Alexandra said.