One Night

ONE NIGHT

You sit on the pavement, tears rolling down your already wet cheeks, staring into the distance, thinking about the person you’ve become. You roll another cigarette and prepare to light it. Your eyes catch sight of another girl. She’s dressed up, has a cigarette in her hand, a vacant expression. Like you. She sees you and smiles, but it’s a faint smile, the smile of a depressed person. You know it, she knows it, but you both refuse to accept it.

You watch her walk away slowly, paying close attention to how skinny she is. You watch her walk. It’s the walk of an anorexic. She stumbles, grasps her chest, and breathes deeply. Then she holds her head high and carries on. You watch her walk into the nearest supermarket and realize what she’s doing, that that’s exactly what you want to do too. Your hand reaches into your pocket and you pull out the £20 note you’ve been saving. Saving for this.

You light the cigarette, take a big drag, and play with your hair, twirling it round and round your fingers. Decide what you will be doing tonight, which role you will be playing. And you get up and you walk, calmly, confidently, mind fixated on the f***ed up relationship you have and the thrill you will soon get, and the fact that it’s destroying you and you love it.
***
You stumble out of the supermarket, carrying a huge bag. You’re about to light another cigarette when you spot her again. She’s eating. You smile to yourself, turning away from her so she doesn’t see. She already knows that you are like her. She’s too shy to introduce herself to you, and you don’t particularly want to get to know her, not when she will die soon.

You know it. That’s what makes you so sad. You walk away from her and find a nice alleyway; you slip down it and open the first bag of crisps. You eat and eat and eat, then bend over and let all your emotions rush out of you. You puke blood and bile and, secretly, you are happy about it. You don’t want to get rid of this disorder. You don’t believe you are ill. This makes you feel better. You don’t want to recover, get rid of the only thing that cheers you up. It’s like being in love, only with a very dangerous man.

Your mobile phone rings. You answer it with shaking hands. You listen to the demands of the person on the other end of the line, and you tell him you will be there as soon as you can. Time for your next fix. You run down the street, with the taste of blood and bile still in your mouth. You see him. Your face lights up. He’ll give you what you want.

You undress, while keeping an eye on the man. You don't know him personally. He's just your dealer. He's saying ‘Babe, babe, you’re beautiful, you’re gorgeous, I’ll give you the gear if you sex me up.’ You panic. You know this isn’t right, but you’re so desperate for your next fix. You will do anything. You have sex with the man; he gives you what you want. Money… and drugs. You quickly thank him and run away, not wanting anything more to do with him. You can’t believe what you’ve just done.

You are thinking, ‘This makes me a whore,’ but you smile anyway when you count the money. You roll a joint and smoke it. You know what this means. You get to do this all over again tomorrow. You get to feed your addiction... literally.

You stop of at an all-you-can-eat restaurant on the way back. You spend one of his dirty notes on food that doesn’t stay in your stomach. You fetch the box of laxatives that you had in your purse and wolf them down with vodka. You’re aching all over; your chest hurts, your stomach feels like it’s being stabbed, you have no energy and you want to collapse. Maybe forever... with luck.

You finally stumble home, late at night. Your mum is waiting for you. She doesn’t scold you for being out so late, she’s given that up. In fact, she gave up on telling you what to do a long time ago. She doesn’t know how far you’re gone though, how ill you are, how you might have a heart attack at any minute. She doesn’t know how much debt you are in. She doesn’t know that you’re stealing money from her purse to pay for food. She doesn’t know that you are hooked on Cannabis and have sex with drug dealers to obtain it. She doesn’t know that you haven’t done your coursework in months, that you are failing college, that you are failing life. She just doesn’t know.

She asks if you had fun, and you smile at her when you say, ‘Yes.’ Little does she know what you’ve been doing at night, and you won’t ever let her know. ‘Cause you’re happy being the way you are. Bulimic. And nobody can ever take that away from you.

***
You wake up the next morning. You’re in pain. You rush to the toilet and let your stomach lining fall out of you. Those laxatives you swallowed last night are burning a hole in your f***ing stomach. You pretend to hate the pain, to hate what you are doing to yourself. Lies. You love destroying yourself.

You undress and look in the mirror. You’re disgusted by the reflection. You’re fat. You suck in your stomach, feel your ribs, pinch yourself everywhere. Decide you need to lose more weight… a lot more weight.

You grab your bag and head off to school, stopping momentarily when your Mum asks if you’re going to have any breakfast. Nod your head and smile. Say, “I’ll pick something up on the way,” even though you don’t intend to. Rush out of the door and look back. You see your Mum staring at you sadly.

You realize that she may know.

You decide you don’t care. The only thing that matters to you right now is losing weight. You don’t care about the future. You don’t care about your friends. You just don’t want to be fat anymore.

You get the bus to school. As you sit down, you look around. Everyone is laughing and joking. They are smiling and discussing after-school plans. A few of your classmates look your way and flash you a grin. You don’t grin back. You just sit there and think about food. You don’t understand how anyone can enjoy life, how they have fun. After all, you only know feelings of depression.

You don’t know how to be happy.

You get to college, step off the bus. Suddenly a sharp pain shoots through your chest. You stumble. People give you cold stares as you stand up and brush it off, saying, “Don’t worry, I just have a bit of a bug.”

You know it’s bullshit. You know people will soon catch on, and start whispering to each other. ‘Bulimic, she’s Bulimic,’ is what they’ll say. Some may even whisper, ‘Anorexia.’ But you know that’s not true.

You’re too fat to have Anorexia, after all.

You walk to class. You feel like you are going to pass out. Ignore all the people who say hello to you, who ask you if you are ok. You don’t want to talk to anyone. You don’t even want to be in college. You have no energy to do anything. You want to die, and you admit that. You’d rather die than live like this anymore.

You burst into tears. You rush out of the room. You hear the whispers of your classmates. You hear the tutor trying to reassure people you’re ok. How the f*ck does he know? You head for the one place you feel safe… the toilets. You pass the kitchen on the way there. You peek round the door, see that the cook has her back turned. You rush in; grab a whole plate of sandwiches. You know they were for the Geography students, for their trip today. You feel slightly guilty about that.

You lock yourself in the toilet and stuff sandwich after sandwich into your mouth. You don’t even chew properly, you just swallow. You do not really taste the food, you’re just eating your feelings.

There’s a knock on the door.

“Are you ok?”

You nod, then realize that you didn’t really answer. “I’m ok,” you say. “I’m just having a bad day. Problems at home.” Your classmate leaves and you sigh.

Time to do this.

You tie your lovely brown hair back in a ponytail and lean over. You begin to cry as you repeatedly stick your fingers down your throat. You don’t want to do this. You know how damaging it is.

But right now, you don’t f***ing care.