Shame,
Dana realized.
It’s all about shame.
The thought bounced around her brain like a pinball, ricocheting against sore spots she barely knew she had.
Another Web site explained, “Bulimics aren’t always thin. The huge intake of calories during bingeing can be partially offset by purging, but it is a relatively inefficient means of weight loss.”
She clicked on the link to a page of suggestions for parents. The first point seemed to blink out at her from the screen: “Be aware of your feelings about your own body. Don’t communicate dissatisfaction with your shape to your children. This leads them to believe they should be self-critical, too.” Dana was certainly dissatisfied with her shape, as well as several other of her physical attributes. She didn’t talk about it—why bore others with your insecurities? But had she somehow “communicated” this dissatisfaction to Morgan? Morgan was a perceptive girl; how was Dana supposed to counteract this subtle transference of information? Sing her own praises? Lie?
At lunchtime she went into the kitchen and microwaved a potato, careful as always not to take too much butter. But from what she had read that morning, she didn’t want to “restrict” herself either.
Where’s the line?
she wondered.
How much is enough but not too much?
Dana was scrubbing a hardened spill of applesauce in the refrigerator when Morgan came home from school, saying, “. . . so annoying how she’s like OHMYGOD every ten seconds, like everything on the planet needs an exclamation point or something.”
“I
know.
” This second voice wasn’t immediately recognizable. “Most stuff is so boring it’s not even worth
mentioning.
”
“Just throw your jacket on the bench,” said Morgan. “We’re supposed to hang them up, but we never do.” The girls came into the kitchen. “Mom,” said Morgan with a look of veiled pride, “this is Kimmi.”
“Of course!” Dana said brightly. Morgan narrowed her eyes. Dana dialed back her smile. “From the party. How are you?”
“Fine,” said Kimmi. “How are
you
?” Dana noticed that she held her lips slightly parted, which had the effect of sucking in her cheeks.
“Are you girls hungry?” Dana asked, immediately second-guessing herself. Should food be the first thing she mentioned? Probably not. And yet the Web sites said to promote healthy eating . . .
“Um,” said Morgan, waiting for Kimmi’s response.
“No thanks,” Kimmi said. “I don’t really like to eat between meals.”
“Let’s go up to my room,” said Morgan, and the girls headed for the stairs.
A moment later the phone rang.
“Uh, hi . . . Is this the . . . Is this where . . . I’m looking for Alder Garrett. Is she, you know . . . there?” The voice was low and full, but the stammering made him sound as if he were about fourteen. Dana grinned. It was cute, this young man’s nervousness. Maybe he was calling to ask Alder for a date. Maybe now she would stop hanging around with Jet, the pot smoker.
“She’s not home from school yet,” she told him. “Can I take your name and have her call you back?”
“Oh.” The caller took a moment to consider what to do next, letting out a prizewinning string of “uh”s and “um”s. Finally he decided to employ some actual words. “Did she ever get a cell phone?”
“Unfortunately not,” said Dana.
“Stubborn.” He chuckled to himself. “Okay, yeah. Could you tell her E called? It’s Ethan really, but she calls me E. And, um . . . could you tell her—ask her—to call me?”
“She has your number?”
“Yeah,” he sighed, though Dana wasn’t sure whether it was happy or sad. “She knows it by heart.”
Dana prepared dinner that night as if dieticians, rather than children, would be eating it. She broiled fillet of sole, topped with a smattering of butter and bread crumbs—with doubtful hope she had chosen the most eating-disorder-aware quantities of each. She also made brown rice, spinach salad, steamed green beans, and glazed carrots.
“What’s with all the vegetables?” Morgan asked.
“Just trying to eat healthy,” said Dana. “Have as much as you want.”
“That’s easy,” said Grady. “I’ll have zero.”
“Grady,” Dana said wearily, “you don’t have to eat a whole serving, but at least please have a bite.”
He snorted. “Why?”
“Because . . .”
“Because
why
?”
“Because you’ll never know if you like something if you don’t try it.” Dana could feel her voice getting tight. “And because I worked hard to make this meal—the least you could do is show a little gratitude.”
“But I don’t
like
it. Why should I be all gratitudey for stuff I don’t even
like
?”
Before Dana could answer, Alder claimed the airspace over the table. “ There’s this kid at school who skateboards everywhere. I mean, like,
everywhere.
The thing’s practically glued to his feet.”
Grady looked over at her, suspicious but interested. “Really?”
“No lie.” Alder took a big bite of sole. She glanced at Dana, nodding her appreciation.
“What can he do?” challenged Grady.
“All kinds of stuff.” She took in a forkful of green beans and let out a little grunt of approval.
“Can he land a seven-twenty?”
“What, when they spin around twice? I don’t know. Maybe. Jet says he hangs out at Glastonbury Skate Park. Maybe when I get my car fixed, I’ll take you to watch him sometime.”
“That’d be
sick,
” murmured Grady.
“Eat a green bean and I’ll get you a peanut-butter-and-ketchup sandwich.” Alder looked over at Dana for confirmation that this would be acceptable. Dana shrugged her consent. She had made too much of it, she could see that now. Trying to do the right thing, she had done precisely the wrong thing.
Grady reached for the green bean Alder held out. He made a face as he chewed. “Disgusting,” he said, and swallowed it.
When Alder returned to the table with the sandwich, Dana insisted, “At least say thank you.”
He simpered in a high voice,
“Thank you, Alder.”
“Welcome, G,”
she simpered back.
“Oh, Alder, that reminds me,” said Dana. “Someone called for you. Ethan, but you call him E?” She pressed the back of her fork against some stray bread crumbs. “He wants you to call.”
Alder stopped chewing. Her elbows clamped in at her sides as if to buttress her ribs. She swallowed the lump of food in her mouth. “What’d he want?”
Dana puzzled at Alder’s reaction. “He didn’t say.”
Staring down at her plate, Alder shook her head. “Anyone want these carrots?” she asked. “I took too much.”
CHAPTER
15
A
T BEDTIME DANA WENT UP TO MORGAN’S ROOM. She wanted to ask if Mr. Kresgee had had his promised “heart-to-heart,” but she didn’t want to open a can of worms prematurely. She would wait until he called, or until Morgan brought it up.
Morgan sat back against the pillows, studying a copy of
Cosmopolitan
magazine. “Where’d that come from?” Dana asked as she sat down on the bed.
“Kimmi brought it over. Her mom has a subscription.”
“I don’t know how I feel about that,” Dana warned. “
Cosmo
runs some pretty racy articles.”
“All that sex stuff? That’s for freaks. We just like the fashions.” Morgan flipped through the thick, glossy pages. “Like here,” she said, laying the tome out before her mother, smoothing the paper reverently. “See how these jeans are cut way low but they don’t make her hips look big? Kimmi says they’re really flattering. I definitely want a pair of these!”
Dana studied the picture. The young model was impossibly thin, yet not emaciated. Her full breasts seemed to be trying to escape the scant tank top, and her arms were narrow but toned with sinewy muscle. How could anyone look this good? “Honey,” said Dana, “I’m sure this girl is pretty in real life, but I have to guess this photo’s been touched up.”
Morgan studied the picture again. “No,” she countered. “She’s just super skinny.”
“Yes, but think about it—do you know anyone who looks like this?” Dana summoned facts she’d just learned from “Photoshopping Us into a Panic: How the Media Tricks Us into Hating Ourselves,” an article she’d read online. “With computers now they can make a girl thinner or tanner or make her eyes bluer with a few keystrokes. There probably isn’t a photo in here that hasn’t been altered in some way.”
“Well, still . . .” said Morgan uncertainly. “Can I get the jeans?”
Dana squinted at the tiny paragraph on the bottom of the page. “Is that right?” she asked. “Does it say two hundred and fifty-four dollars? I can’t tell without my glasses.”
“Yeah.” Morgan sighed, defeated.
“Wow. Maybe we should figure out a way to
sell
them instead of buy them, huh?”
Morgan crossed her arms over her ribs, pressing in on herself as if to impose martial law on her anarchical body parts. Her chin trembled. “Why do I have to look so . . . like
this
?” she quavered. “I’m so
ugly.
” Tears slid down her cheeks.
“No, Morgan,” Dana soothed, reaching out to hold her. “You’re beautiful, honey.”
“I’m
disgusting.
” Morgan’s weeping escalated. “You don’t even know how bad it is! You’re pretty, so everyone likes you!”
No I’m not
and
No they don’t
were the first responses that leaped to Dana’s mind. Instead she said, “I’m glad you think I’m pretty, sweetheart, but if people only like me for that, then they aren’t real friends, now, are they?”
Morgan groaned. “You don’t think being pretty matters because you don’t think you
are
pretty. You think people like you for
you.
”
Hard as it was to hear her own daughter call her a social simpleton, the comment stung even more for the drop of truth it contained. And now there was confirmation that not only did Morgan know of her mother’s insecurities but in Morgan’s mind they were baseless.
“Hey,” Dana said, pulling back so they faced each other. “Being pretty might get people interested in you, but it’s not what lasting relationships are based on.” She squinted in frustration. “And I don’t like hearing you say the only reason people like me is because of my looks. That makes me sound brainless
and
friendless.”
Morgan sniffled loudly and reached for the box of tissues on her bedside table. “Sorry,” she muttered.
“Okay,” said Dana. She smoothed a tendril of hair off her daughter’s damp cheek. “Listen, sweetie. You don’t love me for what I look like any more than I love you for what you look like. We love each other because we do, and that will never go away.”
“I guess,” whispered Morgan.
“You are so
loved,
Morgan, and for all the right reasons. Not for what jeans you wear or how you look in them, okay?”
“Okay.” Morgan’s eyes drooped, and she lay back on the pillows. Dana pulled the covers up and tucked them tight. She kissed Morgan’s cheeks and landed a last kiss on her forehead. “Cozy-sweet dreams,” she whispered, and turned off the light.
She knew she had gotten off easy, that Morgan was tired and willing to be talked out of an industrial-size fit of self-pity. But Dana felt some small relief at having begun what she knew would be a long, hard swim against the social imperative to be perfect. It was better, at least, than waiting to get washed farther downstream.
On her way to bed, Dana took a detour downstairs to the TV room. Alder was lying on the pullout couch, her face blank, the pink fleece blanket tossed haphazardly across her narrow frame. Her fingers worried at a piece of the hem.
“Just came down to say good night,” Dana ventured from the door.
Alder’s fingers went still. She gave her aunt a brief, wan smile. “Good night,” she murmured.
“Alder?”
“Yeah.”
“You didn’t seem too happy to get a call from Ethan.”
“Not much,” said Alder.
Dana wanted to come into the room, sit on the bed, straighten the covers. But she sensed it was better not to intrude as she tried to glean a little information about her niece’s social life. “Is he in one of your classes?”
“What?” said Alder, turning her head toward Dana as if just noticing her. “No, I don’t know him from here. He’s from . . . before.”
“Was he unkind to you?”
Alder considered this for a moment. Her fingers began to work the hem of the blanket again. “Unkind,” she murmured.
Dana felt weak as she sensed the depth of the girl’s sadness. She wanted so badly to come into the room, but Alder’s manner locked her out. “Alder,” Dana whispered from the doorway. “I’m here if you want to tell me.”
Alder nodded and closed her eyes.
The following afternoon Dana went to Cotters Rock Dental in hopes of convincing Dr. Sakimoto to accept a payment plan. She had no idea what his policies were, but he had given her the impression of a man willing to consider alternatives. And though she’d been wrong about people before, imagining kindness when there was in fact very little, she hoped she was right this time.
There was a new person seated at the reception desk, bent over, squinting at a magazine of some kind. Dana could see the salt-and-pepper roots in her brassy red hair.
“Half a sec,” said the woman, not looking up. “Now, what am I supposed to make of
that
?” she muttered to herself. Glancing finally at Dana, she hoisted up a set of knitting needles tangled in yarn. “Does that look right to you?”
“It looks like the start of something . . .” offered Dana.
The woman studied the shapeless loops. “You think?”
What kind of receptionist
are
you?
Dana thought irritably. “Um, is Dr. Sakimoto running late?”
“Oh, you have plenty of time.” The woman smirked, pushing her brittle hair off her face. “It’s a mess back there. He’s one of those
micro
managers. I’ve temped long enough to know when someone’s going all micro on me. I figured out yesterday to just let him do it all himself. Brought my knitting to keep me busy. Go on back if you want to,” she offered smugly.