Under her skin

I'm a liar, a liar and a cheat. I looked over at Emily's answers in
a maths test. I'm a horrid girl; I squished a snail for fun when I was
little. I was so bad - I love animals and I want to look after all of
them, even the snails. But I don't deserve to look after them, even
though they'd love me back, because I don't deserve that love.

I can't get anything right. Mum tells me not to worry about school
tests and stuff but how can I sleep when I might get the worst results
in the class and everyone would know how stupid I was.

And now the sandwiches. How can they be so cruel? I couldn't finish
dinner, I just couldn't; there was butter in the potato and butter is
fat. The sandwiches grin at me, smiles filled with cheese. A cheesy
grin! I'd laugh if I didn't want to die right now rather than fill
myself with the fat and get fat and gross. I'm trying to work out how
fat they'll make me and I can't stand it.

First bite? the bile rises. I try to swallow without chewing, but my
throat's too dry and my mouth ulcers scream for mercy. It's sticky and
slimy and oily and fatty and when I swallow I feel like I'm dying, like
I'm swallowing poison.

I look around in panic - there's nowhere to hide the sandwiches,
they'll know where to look. I want to stamp on them until they're
crushed. They couldn't force me to eat them then. I think of yesterday
when we all got together and drew an outline of the shape we thought we
were on the wall. Maybe I am thinner than I think, but it can't be thin
enough.

I've done so well so far? I thought I'd finally found something that I
could get right. I started counting the calories of everything in the
cupboard, and if it had too much, I stopped eating it. I told mum I was
a vegetarian so I didn't have to eat the fatty meat and I got good at
shredding the leaves up so I could hide them. Then I did a hundred sit
ups every morning and I jogged to school and if I was bad and ate a
chocolate I made myself sick. I went to the scales every day and I was
so happy as the fat went and went. Mum thought I looked thin, but I
just told her I'd been a bit tired and ill. I found a website where
other girls helped me to avoid eating - they said the things to say,
how to hide food, how to make it look like you were eating. They were
all glad when I told them how much weight I'd lost and they helped me
not kill myself when I put some on.

I was careless one night - I didn't wipe the link to the site and mum
saw it. She came in when I was getting changed and she just stopped and
said 'Oh God!' and she said it again and again and she cried. That's me
all over, making my poor lovely mum cry, but I didn't understand why.
We went to the stupid lady doctor. She told me I might die if I kept on
like this. Mum was begging and pleading with me to eat the food and I
told her I didn't care if I died. I said they wouldn't miss a bad
daughter like me and she cried some more. I thought it was all a
trick.

They took me to the big house early, when it was still dark outside.
They hadn't told me too much about it, they knew I'd run away if I knew
what was going to happen. I wished I could look like the other girls,
they looked so light, like fairies. I thought they must all be laughing
at how fat I was behind my back, but they were very kind all the
same.
It just feels wrong, us all forcing to be happy for each other as we
get more fat when none of us mean it. We tried swapping tips, but, as I
said, the doctors and the helpers know it all already. It's
torture.

Talking of torture, I look at the plate and realise that one square of
sandwich is gone. Only three to go. Maybe I should just cram them all
in and see what I can swallow. I can always do sit ups to burn them off
once the lights are out.

I pick up the next square and gag - if only I was clever enough to
think of some way out of this! I manage a few chews, I swallow. I can
feel myself getting fat, I'm so useless not being able to refuse to do
this. I take a deep breath and stuff in the third, almost
choking.

Dr Lewis says that my brain is fooling me, that I am trying to control
things, but really something else is in control of me now. She says
that if I really want to be in control I need to eat again. But I
can't, I can't , I can't. I mustn't. I don't deserve it. I don't want
it.

But? what if I tried not being afraid? What if I let that last piece of
sandwich grin at me all it likes and ate it like I used to eat? I'm so
scared. I think of the relaxation Sarah taught us. I breathe deeply, I
try to think of happy things. I look at the plate again. It's so
little, only a tiny thing. Was I being silly?

Something swims under the surface as I look at it, but I don't want it
to come out. I won't let it. I try to remember how things used to be -
even though I never liked cheese sandwiches.

I pick it up, I feel it, I look at it. It grins its yellow grin at me.
I don't take a big breath before I put it in my mouth and I put it in.
It tastes nasty, but my mouth seems to remember something. For a moment
I don't think about the number of chews, I don't notice myself
swallowing.

When Sarah comes back in I laugh and then I cry.