I try to keep my voice casual and fail. He hears it and takes my hand. No longer lighthearted, Matthias says:
You are the bravest girl in the world.
He does understand. He does hear the constant screaming in my head. But he will not give me pity, so he asks:
Did you pick the Frosted Flakes?
Taken aback, I answer shortly:
No, Matthias. Plain Cheerios.
How could you possibly pick the Cheerios? We both know they taste like cardboard! The Frosties, on the other hand, are grrreat!
And his favorite. And, incidentally, covered with glistening, frightening sugar crystals.
I happen to like Cheerios,
I object, my feathers ruffled the wrong way.
But Matthias calls my bluff:
No you don’t. You like Frosties. Or at least you used to, and Lucky Charms.
Not at all!
I protest, my claws out in defense of my anorexic lie. I ready myself to counter with arguments of food coloring and high sugar content … but Matthias speaks before me:
The bottom line is that Frosties are endorsed by Tony the Tiger.
I cannot believe my ears.
So?
So tiger trumps bee, obviously. When in doubt, pick the cereal endorsed by the tiger. That’s Frosties. I rest my case.
I laugh, genuinely, at my husband’s unconventional approach to therapy: Pick the Frosties. Do not be afraid. Tiger trumps bee and anorexia. Simple.
If only it were, if only it could be. If only I could believe it.
Tonight, though, I want to. It is such a beautiful evening out here. Matthias looks handsome. He smells nice. He loves me. He is smiling mischievously.
So I let myself play along, if only for an evening. All right, Matthias,
Next time I will pick the Frosties,
because a talking tiger said so.
32
She was going to die.
What do you mean: “The machine is out of order”?
It was 7:00 P.M. on Wednesday. They were at the movies. Matthias and Anna went to the movies on Wednesday nights. Anna began fasting on Wednesday mornings—Tuesday nights she ate an apple, perhaps—so that by 7:00 P.M. on Wednesday her brain would allow her to have the popcorn. Small.
Anna had movie theater popcorn once a week, on Wednesdays. She compensated for the oil by skipping breakfast and running for ten extra minutes on Thursdays. But that particular Wednesday it was 7:00 P.M. and they had bought their tickets, but the popcorn machine was out of order and she was going to die.
May I offer you any other concessions? Anything else at all?
She had long passed hunger and was nauseated with starvation. Her eyes blurred as she looked at the display.
A pretzel? Impossible.
Candy? Had the world gone mad?
Nachos? She could not accurately estimate their calorie content.
No, he could not offer her anything else, because there was nothing else that she could eat.
It is all right,
said Matthias,
we can eat when we get home,
steering her away from the concession stand.
No they could not, she almost screamed. Home was a two-hour movie and drive away from here. She would be dead by then.
33
Evening snack is interrupted by the sound of a siren and the flashing lights of an ambulance streaming in through the windows.
Direct Care does not look surprised; she glances at her watch and nods. She stands up and says:
Ladies, I’m going to leave you for a few minutes. I trust—
But she actually does not, she realizes. She calls to the nurse’s station:
Mary?
Mary watches us sternly while Direct Care goes to the front door.
Men in gray jumpsuits wheel a stretcher in. I notice the doors are wide enough. It takes less than a minute: the weekender and her blanket are lifted from the couch. Onto the stretcher and rolled away. The sirens and lights fade out. Julia had been right: she had not left the couch. And we had not learned her name.
I feel sick. I turn to Julia for help. She just shrugs. She told me so. The rest of the girls, even Valerie, keep eating, looking straight down at their bowls.
Later, much later, I cannot sleep, thinking of the bed that freed up in the psych ward of a hospital somewhere today. Julia cannot sleep either; I can hear her music through our wall. And her footsteps, pacing, pounding in rhythm.
Julia only acts nonchalant.
She had gone through two full packs of gum, then upstairs after her snack. I had followed shortly after to escape the macabre mood in community space.
Now, hours later, the house is quiet, except for Julia’s music. And she is crying. Perhaps she feels lonely, scared, trapped, sad, in pain. Perhaps she feels sorry for the weekender, perhaps she feels sorry for herself. I knock on our wall:
Hey.
Silence. Then:
Hey.
No need to say any more.
I hate the night. The dark, ironically, makes many things far too clear. I hate empty beds, in treatment centers, psych wards. Matthias in ours alone.
I cannot sleep as I wonder how long Matthias will keep coming back. How many visiting hours it will take before he grows tired and stops. If he does, will I blame him? Will I be able to let him go? Do I love him enough? I love him more than anything.
Then what will happen to me?
Julia had called girls like me lucky, because they have a reason to survive. On the other side of the wall, she plays Billie Holiday, in my honor.
34
Thursday morning. Eleven A.M. Something different is happening. Instead of a therapist, the nutritionist walks in the sunroom, announcing:
Weekly meal planning,
to which the room responds with a general groan.
Indifferent, she sets three stacks of forms on the floor. The patients seem to know what to do; they stand in line, each girl takes one set from each pile and returns to her seat.
I go last and then, forms in hand, look awkwardly around for help. The nutritionist ignores me studiously, examining the polish on her nails.
On Thursdays we get to choose all our meals for the coming week, Monday to Sunday.
Emm. She pulls her seat closer to mine. I could hug her. I do not dare.
Professional as ever, she hands me a pen before I even ask for one. She has two, just in case. Of course she does.
All right, you should have three sets of seven: breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Good. We have twenty minutes to fill them out. Let’s start with the easy ones: breakfast.
I look at the first page: Breakfast 1—Monday. Two options:
Circle A or B.
The choices are straightforward enough:
Frosties or Cheerios on Monday?
Plain oatmeal or cinnamon on Wednesday?
Vanilla yogurt or strawberry?
Not circling either is also a choice,
says Emm.
Liquid nutritional substitute.
Even the dense, high-calorie supplement is offered in a choice of three flavors:
Vanilla, Chocolate, Pecan
Emm and I fill out the breakfast forms rapidly. Lunch and dinner prove more complicated.
Every lunch and dinner menu comprises three courses: an appetizer, a main dish, and a dessert. Two options are offered for each.
Again, circle A or B,
and Emm begins to fill hers. But I lag behind, frozen at the starting line: the very first appetizer on Monday.
Caesar salad with dressing and Parmesan cheese OR
Basket of French fries Parmesan cheese? Caesar dressing? French fries?
I skip the appetizer for now.
Perhaps the main course …
Fish fillet OR
Mac and cheese I am about to cry.
I know they look scary. Don’t let them overwhelm you. Let’s start with the first one,
Emm says.
I am so grateful. I look at her shakily:
You do not have to do this.
I know.
Her poker face is replaced with a smile. For a second.
Didn’t Valerie tell you the rules? It’s what we do.
Then she snaps back to business and the menu:
Caesar salad or fries?
Salad, I suppose, but before I circle it, Emm says:
A few rules first.
Number one: know yourself. I know the salad seems a safer choice, but if you aren’t willing to down a gallon of mayonnaise and eat every bit of cheese, then stick to the French fries.
I hesitate. Then circle the fries.