Short and Sweet

AKA Compete

TW: ed, sh

It was always a competition. Always, even if it was unanimous, even if it was always gone unsaid, it was a competition.

She didn't have to be the prettiest. Or the smartest. Or the funniest. Or anything like that.

But she could be the skinniest.

So that's what she did.

She'd never really done anything about it at first. She'd often just wish for the legs or the arms of someone else she noticed walking by her, someone who didn't possess the excess fat that she did. She'd wish for their body, but never did anything about it.

Until two years later, when she was at the ripe age of fourteen. Most of her friends had started to cut, to burn, to have outbursts of rage, to break down in tears. All her friends received that outlet, all of them but not her.

Sometimes she thought that they forget that she was human too.

Her rage, her devastation, her hurt, her guilt, all of it manifested itself in the food that she forced out. Out of her system, out of her body, out of her mind.

When she felt even a little joy, it was because of the numbers that she saw, the only numbers that she cared about. She gave it an algebraic value because she didn't like to think of it as what it actually was. She called it C at the back of her mind, and she did not consume more than 800 of it a day.

It was really, really hard for her to continue to compete in this competition. While many of her friends seemed to be blessed with high metabolism, she was not given the same gift. She had to work extra hard.

It was especially difficult at first, because her change in appetite was somewhat drastic. Often, hunger would pinch the insides of her stomach, begging for more but she could not give it what it wanted. She had to power through. Sometimes, she did satisfy her cravings, but it was just too bad, like she cheated halfway, and she didn't want to cheat, didn't want to be a cheater. So if it didn't come out, she tried to burn it off completely. She was starting to develop and train her muscles, especially around her thighs and stomach, for it had the most fat of them all. Her body would always be so sore in the days after, aching from the stretch and hurting from the lack of fuel.

Then the distortion kicked in. It soon came to be that when she stood up too fast on some occasions, her world would appear tilted on an axis, lines blurring and ground shifting underneath her feet. It would take a moment or two for the dizziness to go away, which ended the spell most of the time. When it was horrible, stars would appear, random blots of black and white in her otherwise coloured vision. She'd wonder if she was about to keel over, but thankfully that was not the case.

While she did, in fact, do all this, it was not so noticeable that anyone realised exactly what going on, and she didn't tell either. No one needed to know. While her parents did make a few comments, being the loving people they were, she often managed to fool them and play with them for a bit, and they would let it go.

She was satisfied.

That was, until she came to a realisation.
There was no end to the competition. It would go on and on, every day of her life, with every person she ever met, until the day she died.
And if there was no end...that meant that there was no winner, because it would always change.

She could not accept this. All her hard work, and for nothing? No, it couldn't be. But it was, and that was the straw that broke the camel's back.

Goodness, and how was she supposed to move on when she had devoted years to this competition? She'd given up so much...all for nothing.

That was it.
It meant nothing.

So whatever she did, it didn't matter.

She could faint in her room, and it wouldn't matter.
She could stretch and exercise
until she bled,
until she tore a muscle,
until she broke a bone
and it would not matter.

She could starve to death, and it would not matter.

Nothing mattered.
Nothing mattered.

Everything just started to spiral from there, and she could not bear to do anything but watch her skeleton body live the life of someone who was already dead, who died long ago.

Now, a mere 7 years later, she stares out the window of her hospital room, which may as well be her new home with the number of times she's been here already.

She still hopes she can emerge as victor.
Even if her final stage to glory is to end it all.