Beauty (9 page)

The walk to my room was agonizingly slow, my legs heavy as if filled with lead. In my hand I clutched the tiny
bag
–full of little blue pills—
to
my chest. Adderall…
Becca said that she took them to help her stay up and focused when she ha
d to pull an all nighter. She’d
also said that they would lift my spirits and help me feel better about
what had happened. I’d asked if she had something that would make me forget, but sadly she didn’t have anything for that.

My laptop chirped as soon as I opened the door to my room, signaling that I had an incoming email. More like twenty new emails I realized as I plunked down in the chair at my desk, my head in my hands as I looked at the screen. The first three were from Michael…one of my bottom dwelling friends.

It was shallow, I knew that. But since that one time in the library when June and her friends had got
ten
up and walked out because I was talking to another overweight girl I studied with, I’d been careful to keep the two separate. On my list of
‘
high life
’
friends I only had my suite mates: June, Madison, Gwen, Ashley, and Kerrington. They were all skinny. They were all pretty. And they were all popular. There were nights when I cried myself to sleep wishing I were just like th
em. Sure they included me in their do
r
m
suite movie nights…
I lived there. They also came to me for help in their classes, or even advice about their boyfriends. I never had anything to offer
for the latter
, but I was a good listener, and I guess that’s what made us friends. It didn’t matter that they didn’t acknowledge me outside of that. I knew my place, and it was with the bottom dwellers. Except…I never grouped myself with them. My list of bottom dwelling friends consisted of : Michael, Abbey, Dewayne, Heather, Renee, Gordan, and Buster. They were bottom dwellers because just like me, they had no life.
So what
, they’d thrown me a surprise birthday party a few months ago. I’d spent the whole time hoping that no one saw me with them in the student union hall.
In high school they would have been the leaders of the nerd clique. In college…they were
accepted, but not one’s you spent your time with unless you were studying or needed to be tutored. Half of them were just as chunky or overweight as I was, and none of them ever did anything fun like June and her friends did.

Shit!
I’d forgotten my promise to help out at the blood driv
e this morning. Reading over Michael’s
first three emails, inwardly I cringed at leaving them hanging.
I smiled at the pictures he’d attached to the last email. In it Michael, Abbey and Buster all pretended to choke themselves to deat
h, th
e
ir
arms raised so that the pictured captured the
pint of blood they’d all donated.
The three of them had stayed
for summer semester, all of
them taking the same class
I’d registered for:
Intro to Thermodynamics. Becoming an engineer hadn’t been a decision that I’d mad
e for myself. My father had taken
a shot at it and failed. He was now a high school science teacher, and I didn’t want to follow in his footsteps. I wanted to trample all over them and then say: See, I’m better than you ever were!

I shot a quick email back to Michael explaining that I’d been sick all night and had been in bed throwing up all morning. I’d never let them down before, and so there was no need to sound more convincing. He’d believe me.
It was a tiny white lie. I
had
been sick, and I’d also thrown up several times at Becca’s, but Michael didn’t need to know that. He wouldn’t understand.

The rest of the emails I left for later. I wasn’t in the mood to listen to anyone else’s problems. I had my own to figure out.
After stripping my borrowed clothes off, I stepped on the scale I’d left sitting right in front of the closet. My gaze connected with the full length mirror and I jumped in shock at the fullness my body had taken on. The difference wasn’t huge, but it was definitely noticeable. My cheeks were rounder, my breasts just a hint larger. Where my stomach had been perfectly sculpted the day before, there was no definition now and my sides were showing the beginnings of love handles. My gaze lowered immediately when the scale beeped once to announce my current weight, and I jump from it as if it had burned me.

One thirty four!
I’d gained twenty something pounds in a night!? What the fuck had I done to warrant that kind of weight gain!?

I stepped
back on the scale and then off
again when it confirmed the same exact number as before. I was hyperventilating, my head back to throbbing from the migraine I still had. With shaky fingers I grabbed the tiny Ziploc bag of blue pills and plucked one out, swallowing it dry.

I lay on my bed naked, waiting to feel something…anything…

The witch had never said I couldn’t exercise. I was small enough now to do it without passing out after just a few minutes. It was so simple. I’d beat her at her own game, do what I wanted, and never worry about being fat again.

With that thought I was up and dressed in
a pair of June’s old
sweats,
my new
tennis shoes and a tank top in less than five minutes. Normally I would have been getting ready to head to the nursing home to check on George and the other patients, but for the first time since being here I was jogging my way along the bike trail that led all the way around campus.

“Evelyn is dead…Evelyn is dead…Evelyn is dead…” I chanted as I ran, already feeling better about the last two days of my life.

Being skinny and staying skinny was all that mattered now.

Chapter 7*

The jog up the hill to the student health building more than had me winded. My sides
ached, and my lungs burned as if
they were about to explode at any moment. I hadn’t thought to bring a water bottle because I hadn’t planned on coming here, it just happened. I didn’t want some stranger examining me, and I didn’t want to tell some stranger why I even needed the morning after pill. But, the longer I stood there in front of the steel trimmed glass doors, the more I contemplated the fact that I could possibly be pregnant. I could always get an abortion later… Easier said than done, I was sure of it. Besides…I didn’t believe in abortion.
Did I…?

The water cooler sitting just inside the door –a stack of cups on its top-convinced me that I should at least go in. It wasn’t even officially summer yet, and the temperature was a
lready in the upper eighties. I woul
d pass out if I had to jog all the way back to my room without hydrating.

“Si
gn in please. Name and student I.D
.” the girl behind the glass enclosed desk greeted, stopping me before I’d even drank a full cup.

I could turn around and walk out…

I glanced behind me, my head jerking back around when I caught sight of Abbey trudging her way

up the hill towards the student health building.

What was she doing here?!

Using my fingers I brushed my tangled hair down around the sides of my face, hoping that she wouldn’t recognize me. My name was barely a scribble on the wai
ting sign in sheet, my student I.D
. thrust through the slot.

“Everything correct on here..? Date of Birth? Dorm assignment…?”

“Yes, yes…everything,” I snapped, tapping my foot impatiently as she logged me into the system.

“It’s going to be at least a fifteen minute wait. You can have a seat right over there,” she pointed to the bank of chairs along the wall, sliding a clipboard full of paper
s
through the slot. “Fill this out and give it to the nurse when she calls you.”

“Thanks I mumbled, stepping sideways and then turning away from the person in line behind me.”

Abbey didn’t even look as I took my seat, hunching over the clipboard, so that my hair almost completely covered my face. There were two other girls here, but neither of them looked at me either, their concentration on filling out their own paperwork.

“I wanted to switch birth controls. This one has had my stomach aching for days…” I heard Abbey whisper to the attendant, her
hand clutching her stomach
for emphasis.

As if on cue, a tiny wet sounding fart escaped and I eyed the other two girls as they laughed. Abbey’s face was crimson as she glanced behind her, embarrassed, and I forced a laugh too. I didn’t want her recognizing me and asking me what I was doing here. She turned around, taking the clipboard from the nurse before finding a seat on the far side, away from the three of us.

“Evel…”

“Eve! Here!” I jumped up with my own clipboard, scurrying to the door that had opened in the corner.

“Wait…honey…” She stopped me by my arm as I tried to close the door behind me. Is your l
ast name Barns. I was calling
Evelyn Renee Barns…”

“That’s me,” I hissed, not daring to turn around and see if Abbey had heard.

“Ok then…right this way,” she motioned and I followed all the way down the hall and into an open exam room at the end.

I did as she told me, shedding all but my bra, before I slipped into the makeshift gown.
The A
dderall pill I’d taken was just reaching its peak, and sitting still I suddenly felt jittery. The clock hanging on the wall sounded louder
than
any clock I’d ever heard
,
and before I kn
ew it, my bare foot was tapping
against the metal examinat
ion table
in time to the ticks.

“Ms. Barns…?”

I jumped at my name, extending my hand a little too fast to the doctor in front of me.

“Doctor Graham,”
she smiled, taking my hand before reaching for the sanitizer on the counter.

“I need the morning after pill,” I blurted, my fingers clasped tightly together now to keep me from fidgeting.

“Well that’s a start… Can you tell me why you think you need the morning after pill?” Dr. Graham asked, pen poised over the clipboard I’d given the nurse.

I repeated what I’d written, nothing more nothing less.

“My boyfriend and I…we didn’t use protection…” I whispered, heat filling my cheeks when she held my gaze.

She was a doctor, but it didn’t matter. I’d never t
alked about my sexual history
with anyone, because until
just recently I didn’t have one
. Saying that I’d had sex –out
loud-was enough to send my stomach into a tightly knotted twist.

“Birth Control…?”

“No…”

“Only condoms then…”

“Yes…”

There seemed to be twenty or so more personal questions, and I answered them all, my chin on my chest by the time she ripped off a prescription and set it on the desk.
I lay back as she instructed, watching her retrieve a few instruments from a drawer beneath the counter.

“Ms. Barns…w
ere you raped?”
Dr. Graham asked, taking a seat at the end of the examination table.

My legs were already clamped tightly together, but they seemed to stiffen as my breath caught, the wind suddenly knocked out of me.

Why would
she
ask that? I hadn’t said that! I’d said anything BUT that?!

“The reason I ask…” she paused, pushing my knees apart, so that the heel of each foot rested in the metal stirrups on either side. “
…
is because when I asked if the sex was forced, you said…I don’t know.”

I did?!
Did I?!

“Usually Ms. Barns…if you’re having sex with anyone, you either consent or you don’t. If they do anything without your permission or say so…it’s rape. I just want to make sure you understand that.”

“I do…” I managed to whisper, my entire body now tense from the speculum she’d just inserted in my vagina.

It didn’t really hurt—
hurt, but I was still sore. Sore enough to feel it scraping as she settled it in the right position, and sore enough to let loose a tiny whimper as she took a sample of my insides.

“So…
w
ere you raped Ms. Barns?” Dr. Graham repeated softly, holding up a tiny piece of glass for me to see. “If you want me to start a rape kit, I can do that for you. I can also help you report
it
if you want. It’s not something to be ashamed of…”

Ashamed…?! Half the girls on campus would
’ve
kill
ed
to have slept with Brice Honeycutt. It had been June’s biggest complaint when
she dated him. He was a player…and proud of it.
His father could also have me
kicked ou
t if he pulled some strings. I
couldn’t report Jeremy knowing that Brice’
s DNA might show up too. It wasn’t worth the risk.