ThinandBeautiful.com

by Liane Shaw

  I logged on to the site and took a deep breath. It was silly but I felt almost as nervous as I had at Suzanne’s party. I wanted these girls to like me. Even though they would never actually see me. Maybe that was the good part.

  divinethinspiration says:

  Hi

  lookingforlight says:

  Hey a newbie. Nice handle.

  divinethinspiration says:

  U don’t think the name is lame?

  bodaciousbod says:

  Ha ur a poet. No, ur name has to be u. if u like it that’s cool. We’ll just call u dt. Everyone’s on?

  lookingforlight says:

  Yes. Hey, dt, we meet here every day at 11. we try anyway.

  bodaciousbod says:

  Yeah. Always good to have newbies.

  divinethinspiration says:

  Thx. I’ve been reading. Hope thats OK.

  lookingforlight says:

  Totally. Nothing to hide. Nowhere to hide. Lol

  bodaciousbod says:

  All friends here. No secrets. No judgments. No shadows.

  divinethinspiration says:

  I like that. Can I ask a question?

  bodaciousbod says:

  That’s what we’re here for!

  divinethinspiration says:

  Anyone here have their period stop for no reason?

  bodaciousbod says:

  i have. it’s so cool not to have to do the whole tampon crap. i haven’t had one in six months!

  nevertoothin says:

  i’m going on two years. my mom hasn’t even figured it out yet. i just keep flushing the tampons down the toilet once a month.

  lookingforlight says:

  I still have mine. I kind of envy you guys but i worry a little about what it’s doing though, sometimes. i mean, don’t you need it to be a mom someday?

  nevertoothin says:

  my doctor found out and told me that my body was confused because it wasn’t getting enough fuel to grow properly and so it thought I was a little kid again and stopped my period. omg, they blame everything on being thin! unbelievable!

  I stopped reading and sat back for a minute. Was it possible that dieting could actually stop the clock? Defeat Time? Make my body think it wasn’t old enough for all of the fuss and mess and worry?

  I remember my first period like it was yesterday. Actually it kind of reminded me of that whole pants-peeing incident on the trike. I felt just as gross and uncomfortable, and scared, that first time I went to the bathroom and saw the mess of my panties. I knew what it was, of course. We had learned all about it in health class, girls talked about it all the time, and there was a commercial on TV about it every thirty seconds. My mom hadn’t really talked to me about it much but I knew she had supplies in the bathroom cupboard. At least I thought she did. I kind of wadded up some toilet paper and put it in my pants before pulling them up and started digging through the closet, hoping that the package would have directions. I thought about asking my mom to come in and help but I wasn’t sure if she would really want to. It was kind of gross and it’s not like I was a baby or anything and needed my diaper changed. Although those pads on TV looked kind of like diapers, only smaller, and those other things just looked like instruments of torture. I didn’t have to worry about which one she had in there though, because I couldn’t find anything at all. This left me with no choice. I took a deep breath and went to find Mom.

  “Mom?” I called, not very loudly.

  “Yes?” she answered from right behind me, making me jump.

  “Um, I need some supplies,” I said in code. I don’t know why.

  “Supplies??”

  “Women’s supplies. My period seems to have started.” I shrugged my shoulders. I felt kind of like I should apologize. I don’t know why.

  “Oh. I see. Well. I guess you’re growing up.” She seemed a little distracted as she started looking through the cupboards I had already messed up.

  “There isn’t anything there,” I said helpfully.

  “I see that,” she answered, turning away from the cupboard and looking at her watch. “I’m sorry, Maddie, but I have to leave for work now. I’m already running late.”

  “What am I supposed to do?” I asked, trying not to whine. A girl in the process of turning into a woman shouldn’t really be whining. But why did becoming a woman have to be so messy and complicated?

  “Well, you can just run down to the drugstore and buy some pads. Slim fit because you’re so young, I think.”

  “I don’t know how to buy them! I don’t know what aisle they’re in or what to call them or how much they cost or anything!” I kind of yelled in a panic.

  “Well, you can wait until your dad gets home and ask him to go for you.”

  “Dad can’t do it!” I don’t know why I said that either but it just didn’t seem like a very dad-like thing. At least not for my dad.

  “Then you’ll have to wait until I get home or go yourself. It is a perfectly natural part of growing up and no one will think anything of it. It’s no different than buying tissues or toilet paper. Just take a twenty out of my purse. You’ll be fine.”

  I decided not to point out that I didn’t usually buy either of those things either. I could feel the panic building.

  “Fine,” I repeated in my best sulky three-year-old voice. Why do we say “fine” when we mean the exact opposite? We should say “not fine.” I stomped off to get her purse, grabbed a twenty and shoved it in my pocket.

  We live in a suburb on the edge of the city. It’s kind of like a small town around there. Everyone goes to the same drugstore and grocery store when they need something. I always see someone I know when I go out. There were much larger stores right downtown where no one would know me but it was too far away to bike to and still be home for supper.

  After the world’s most disgusting ride, with toilet paper bunching up into unmentionable places, I parked my bike at the rack in front of the store, defiantly not locking it. If it got stolen, I was planning on blaming my mother. I wandered into the store, trying to look like I was just browsing. I stopped at the cosmetics aisle, even though I never wore makeup. I tried on lipstick and perfume samples for a while and wondered why people bother to put this stuff on every day. I then wandered down the hair section and thought about dyeing my hair just because it would bug my mother. I moved to school supplies and wondered whether or not I needed a new binder. I contemplated the candy. I read the back of several romance novels featuring beautiful heroines. I bet they never had to shop for their own supplies! I read a few pain reliever packages, figuring that I might need some in the next five minutes or so. I even looked at toilet paper and tissues for a minute, to build my courage up a little.

  Then I ran out of aisles. I looked up and there, right next to the diapers, was my target section with the quaint heading “Feminine Hygiene.” Like we’re dirty or something. Looking up and down the shelves, I realized that I had never actually appreciated the startling array of possibilities before. Why do there have to be twenty-seven different varieties? I couldn’t for the life of me remember what color the package my mom usually bought was, let alone the brand name! Pink, blue, green, orange, yellow, fuchsia, purple! Thick, thin, slim, long, short, day, night, gel lining, with tabs, without tabs, with wings, without wings! Why do they have to call them wings? Butterflies have wings. Birds have wings. Angels, fairies, and the occasional dragon have wings, not feminine hygiene products! Do they want us to believe these things are really the objects of dreams and fantasies? Nightmares, maybe.

  “Can I help you with anything?”

  The words echoed throughout the store as if they had been broadcast over the PA system. I looked up to find Angela Stanton smiling sweetly at me. Of course, I knew her. She used to go to my school and her sister was still in my class.

  “No, I’m OK.”

  “You seem a little confused. Let me get someone over here to help you. This isn’t my section.”

  “No, please, I�
�m fine. I don’t need any help,” I stammered but she had already gone off to announce to the entire staff that I had started my period and was standing like a dweeb in the feminine hygiene aisle. Before she actually made it to the microphone, I grabbed the nearest package – ultra thick, extra long, with wings. Good, maybe I could fly home. I ran blindly down the aisle to the cash, threw my money down, and headed out of the store. I didn’t even wait for my change.

  I peddled home with the package hidden under my shirt like a shoplifter. About halfway there I changed directions and headed for Annie’s house, even though, as far as I knew, none of my friends had started yet. I guess they were going to wait until they were older than the ripe old age of twelve. Well, technically eleven, as I was about a month away from my birthday. But even though I knew Annie hadn’t started hers, I needed someone to help me figure out how to get myself fixed up so that I wasn’t walking around feeling like everyone knew my secret. Have a happy period? Not likely.

  bodaciousbod says:

  u there dt? you having period blues?

  divinethinspiration says:

  no period for a while. maybe not blues after all. not so scary if i’m not the only one.

  nevertoothin says:

  everything’s better when you have your girls. the gws.

  bodaciousbod says:

  totally.

  lookingforlight says:

  so glad you came on board, dt. hope you come every day. good to have new blood!

  divinethinspiration says:

  i’m glad too. i’ll try to come. gtr. school tomorrow. sucks

  bodaciousbod says:

  me too. g night.

  lookingforlight says:

  sleep tight

  nevertoothin says:

  don’t let the bed bugs bite. hah. ttfn.

  I turned off my computer and sat looking at the blank screen for a moment. I felt like I could almost see their faces in the screen. The girls without shadows. The GWS. Like a club. And now I was a member. I wondered about all of that period-stopping stuff. It can’t be that rare if two out of three of the girls had it happen. I spent a little time searching the web to see if there was some medical stuff on the issue. Like everything, there were conflicting views depending on whose article you read. I decided I didn’t really care why it stopped. I was glad it stopped. I didn’t like it anyway. I hated getting all bloated every month, feeling like an overgrown balloon that was too heavy to float. I was thrilled that I could feel normal all of the time. What did I care about babies somewhere down the line? I was years away from that and most likely everything would start working if I ever decided I wanted to do the baby thing. Besides, I was pretty sure I didn’t ever want to do the baby thing. I mean, babies make you fat. They stretch your belly to enormously grotesque proportions and make horrible marks on your skin. It is so not worth it! Not that I need to worry about babies. As I understand it, I will have to have at least one boyfriend first.

  May 1

  So this is where I’m supposed to say that going to group made me see the light and I found my soul mates or sisterhood or whatever you want to call it and decided to embrace the cure and live happily ever after. That would be pretty, wouldn’t it? But that sort of thing only happens in sappy teen novels and on bad movies. In my version of real life, the group thing didn’t really change much for me, although I have to admit that some of what the girls said kind of struck home with me. Some of it I had actually felt myself and some of it reminded me of things people had written on the girlswithoutshadows chat page. It made me wonder again for a second if it might feel OK to actually talk to my fellow “guests” here the next time I was sitting in the sunroom thinking about lemonade and boys. Although it’s kind of strange hearing your own thoughts echoed like that. I mean, it really takes away from the whole “I’m an individual” thing. Of course, if we were all really individuals with unique thoughts and feelings, the pseudo–health professionals wouldn’t be able to take a bunch of personal emotions and lump them all together into the definition of a disorder. If there weren’t any disorders, the people who own this fancy clinic couldn’t persuade innocent, gullible parents that their children had something life-threatening that could only be cured by spending gazillions of dollars in a place that was so cheap it wouldn’t even let me have the Internet.

  I wonder how much this place does cost? Where are my parents getting the money? I don’t think they’re exactly among the über-rich. I’ve heard them worrying about paying for university and stuff like that. Steve works part time all year and full time in the summer to help pay his way through. He even lives at home to save on rent and food and things like that. He’s going to be some kind of engineer or something equally guy-like. Not that I buy into the whole gender-specific thing. I mean, I totally know that girls can do everything guys can – and a few things they can’t. My grandma gave me this whole speech one day about how lucky girls of my generation are and how great we have it because we can have it all, career and kids. I suppose guys kind of have the same options these days too, even maternity leave without having to give birth first. Once guys have to have periods, PMS, babies, and stretch marks, the world will be a much fairer place. Anyway, I guess we all can choose to be whatever we want to be. The problem is that I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up. I don’t even want to think about it. I’m having enough trouble just surviving being a teenager long enough to actually make it to being grown-up. People keep asking me what I want to “do.” Right now all I want to do is get through high school … which is going to be pretty hard if they don’t let me out of here.

  I am going to be so far behind. I can’t believe they took me out of school for this. All my life, my parents have given me the big “school is important” speech. You know the one. School is the key to your future. A good education will get you the job you want. A good education will teach you to think outside of the box and become a full contributor to society. Blah, blah, blah. So they shoot me the lines for seventeen years and then decide that it’s OK to pull me out of school before I can even finish grade eleven. That means I’ll have to finish grade eleven in grade twelve and then I won’t be able to graduate with my own age group and will have to come back and do a victory lap. Victory lap. That’s what they call it when a kid has to stay in school for five years instead of four. I have trouble seeing the victory in that. It’s more of a loser lap, which I now have to do because of my parents. I don’t want to go to school by myself when everyone I grew up with moves on! I mean, even if I’m not exactly friends with any of them anymore, it’s still better than having all the younger kids know I couldn’t get through school like a normal person.

  All through school, Annie and I used to talk about going to university together. I never thought it would happen any other way. We even had the school picked out. Growing up doesn’t ever seem to turn out the way you plan it.

  I don’t know if there is any GWS left because I’m not allowed to talk to them anymore. I mean, what if they found some other group to join and I can’t find them or something? Then I’d be lost and on my own for real.

  Marina is cool, though, and funny. I shouldn’t admit it but it’s especially funny when she bugs Wolf. I think I’m kind of pissed that he ditched me at group. Not that we were on a date or anything, but he did sit with me and then leave me alone. Typical guy. Typical guy reaction to me, anyway.

  Maybe Marina and I should make our own group. We can plot the demise of this “guesthouse” and draw up a plan for world domination.

  chapter 14

  I wasn’t actually looking for a boyfriend. I didn’t have a lot of time. Keeping my weight under control took up a lot of it. I had to study my calorie books and websites, I had to chat with my girls to learn new ways to get my weight down, and then I had to work on the new ways until I got them right. Somewhere in there, I had to fit in my schoolwork and spend enough time with my parents to keep them off my case.

  I didn’t have to fit Annie in so much
though. After the whole Taylor fiasco, I didn’t know what to do. I was so mad at her, I didn’t know how to talk to her. So, at first I just didn’t. I made sure I headed for school a little later than usual so we didn’t accidentally meet up on the way. I left school right after the afternoon bell rang so I wouldn’t bump into her on the front steps. I was acting like a reverse stalker and it started to feel silly. By the time we could almost smell the summer I gave up and starting heading for school at my usual time, telling myself that I wasn’t exactly looking for her but if I happened to bump into her I might try saying hello.

  We did ‘bump’ into each other and I did say hello. It was awkward at first. We both carefully avoided talking about anything to do with Taylor or weight or computers. We stuck with homework and other unimportant topics. We slid into a new kind of relationship, sort of a friendship without the fun or the trust or the understanding. We walked to school and back together when the timing worked and talked a bit in the halls. She came over once in a while but never stayed long and called me once or twice. I don’t remember if I bothered trying to call her or go over to her place. Probably not. I was pretty busy, after all.

  I didn’t make much effort to see the other girls either. I didn’t really have time for anyone outside of school with all of the other things I had to focus on. I talked to them online sometimes, but I honestly couldn’t find very much to say. I didn’t run and hide or anything when I saw them at school, but I didn’t try to find them either. I was busy at lunch, trying to get caught up on schoolwork I hadn’t done at night, so I wasn’t in the cafeteria very often. When I did make it in, I usually sat with Suzanne Albright and co. I still didn’t have much to say to them either but they didn’t seem to care. I guess I was a bit like a table decoration, an extra groupie to make sure that SA’s popularity quotient stayed high. I didn’t go to any more parties though. She did invite me once or twice but my waist wasn’t ready. I didn’t tell her that though. I came up with some other pathetic excuse that she didn’t really care about.