It was a dull, boring Saturday afternoon. Daniella was hoping to change that. She sat in her room, in front of her mirror, making sure her outfit matched well and that her mascara wasn't smudged. She had been staring at her reflection for nearly two hours, and she had finally decided that she looked somewhat satisfactory. With a deep breath, she crossed the room, pushed the door open, and ran into her mother.
"You're not planning on going out looking like that, are you?" Her mother asked her, eyeing her from head to toe.
"Um, yeah?" she replied, "I'm going to the mall with Janet."
"Well, what's the point in that?" Her mother scoffed. "You won't even be able to find anything in your size. Besides, you look terrible. Stay home."
"But we've been planning this for weeks! I just want to get out and do something. Please." She implored her mother.
"You should have thought about that before you gained all that weight. I'll not have anyone seeing my daughter look so..." She paused, grabbing Daniella's arms and lifting them slightly, examining her even more closely. "Plump. Do you remember what I've told you time and time again?"
"Bony is beautiful." Daniella replied, rolling her eyes. "I guess I could stay in today. I'll call Janet and tell her to just go without me, I guess." She resigned, her head down.
"Good girl. Trust me, my dove, the thinner you are, the happier you'll be. Just stop fighting me."
So Daniella did. She stopped fighting her mother's expectations of her, and she stopped eating.
She didn't have breakfast, or even lunch, anymore. At dinner time she ate as little as possible and went to bed with her stomach growling angrily. But everyone was so supportive. Her parents beamed proudly whenever they saw her decline food, and her friends all proclaimed their jealousy at her strength and willpower and told her what an inspiration she was to them.
And after a few weeks, she lost weight. In fact, she lost a lot of weight. Her collarbones became clearly visible, and her arms shrunk. Her face became gaunt and bony. She was breathtaking. At least, that's what everyone told her. She wasn't quite so sure.
One evening, when she came home from a party, she found her mother waiting up for her, reading a magazine on the couch. Daniella's mother stood up and strode across the room to her, a wide, proud smile on her face as she wrapped her arms around Daniella.
"Now do you see? Aren't you so much happier now that you listened to me? Now that you're thin?" Her mother asked her earnestly.
"Yeah, Mom. I feel great." She replied with a fake grin. What she wanted to say, the truth, was that she didn't feel great, not in the slightest. She felt sick, weak, and hungry all the time. Still, she liked how everyone treated her now that she was thin.
"I'm so proud of you, sweetie. I knew you were strong enough to do it." Her mother kissed her forehead, something she hadn't done since Daniella was a little girl. "Goodnight."
Later that night, Daniella went to sleep. She never woke up.
Her funeral was a grand affair. Everyone from her school showed up to mourn the beautiful girl. Her friends and classmates were there, and so were all the people who hadn't even looked at her before she lost the weight. They all passed by her coffin, peering in and murmuring about how thin she looked, how lovely she was, and what a shame it was that she had died.
At her funeral, her father spoke. "Daniella was my daughter. I loved her, and so did her friends. She was a size four for such a long time, and I know it made her unhappy. When her mother finally got through to her, when she finally lost all that weight, we were both so proud of her. She had finally gotten healthy, and she was beautiful. She just wasn't strong enough to be as beautiful as she could be."
