Becoming Wendy

Chapter 5

Raphael strut his burly 6'4 frame into the kitchen, and Brian/Boyfriend basically jumped into his arms.

I was staring a little too obviously, at this point I'm sure I had a bit of drool coming out of my mouth. Raphael waved at me while simultaneously trying to pull Brian off of him. I wiped my mouth on my sleeve and tried to remember how to make coherent words.

Raphael had hair the darkest shade of black and gleaming eyes to match. Wendy's fragile little body could not handle this right now, I felt myself almost fall over every time he looked at me. I need to pull it together. I have a boyfriend, clearly, and he is not Raphael.

"Where've you been, Italian Stallion!" Brian slapped him on the back.

"I just left for a bit. I needed to get away from L.A. Visited some family." Raphael replied not making eye contact.

"Welcome the guy home Wendy!" Brian pushed me towards Raphael.

He opened his arms for a hug and I awkwardly walked into him. His arms encircled me and I felt his breath against my ear.

"I came back for you," he whispered.

He did?!

"You did?" I looked up at him.

"Of course." He let go of me and looked over at Brian, "We should all go out for dinner tonight, on me."

What the hell was going on here? I wish I could have been given a quick review on Wendy's life before just being thrown into it.

"Sounds good man," Brian excitedly replied.

"Alright, I have a few things I need to finish up, but I'll meet you guys at Stonehedge grill in an hour and a half?..."

The rest of the conversation droned on without me. I tried to discreetly walk away from the two men in search of my bedroom. Wendy had to have something personal in there, something to give me a clue about her life, like a diary or something. Do 22-year-olds have diaries?

Through the kitchen there was a small living room area, with two large plushy leather couches. This room was impeccably clean as well. There was magazines laid decoratively on the table, a pile of coasters and a vase with a huge bouquet of fresh flowers.

I walked past that to a steel spiral staircase. I quickly hopped up the steps and found myself in a hallway with several closed doors. I peeked in the first one. A stunning guest bathroom that looked like it had never been used.

I opened the next door. It was a neatly organized storage closet with skiing equipment and huge winter coats.

I'd never been skiing before. It was not something my mother could afford to do.

My mother, Savannah, had me at a young age, and her parents didn't approve. My dad wasn't ready to take care of a child and Savannah felt trapped in a corner. She ran away with me and got a job as a waitress across the street from where we live now. She rented a small apartment above a convenience store and the owners took a great liking to her.

Seven years ago, Theresa, the female half of the couple running the store, faced an unfortunate event. Her husband Garrett passed away. She was in her seventies and felt too exhausted to go on running the store alone. She decided to move in with her daughter in Seattle. Thus the store was given to my mother.

I heard the door close downstairs signaling that Raphael had left. I needed to hurry, I'd rather not have Brian see me suspiciously snooping around. I know it was my own house but it might still look strange.

I quickly tiptoed across the hall and opened another door. Voila, the master bedroom.

The entire room was decorated in pristine white. White walls, white cieling to floor drapes covering two large windows on the back wall, in between them a giant white bed.

Rooms this white scared me. I could literally imagine thousands of scenarios in which I could ruin this flawless white room.

I tried to be careful and looked around to see where something useful might be placed.

There was was a large white dresser on the right side of the room. The top of it empty besides a water bottle and a glass tray with a few rings and earrings. I slid open all of the drawers looking for I don't know what. Each drawer just contained different sets of folded clothes.

Well what did I expect? I didn't keep anything in my drawers besides clothes.

I looked over and noticed the bedside table. The drawer was slightly open. Hmm, seems pretty promising. I scurried over and kneeled down to peer inside the drawer. There was some loose change, a romance novel, scraps of paper, pens, pencils, a small bottle of white out.

How appropriate for this room. I briefly wondered if she ever used the white out to hide stains...

I shuffled past these items and saw at the very bottom was exactly what I was looking for.

I slid a small purple journal out from under all the junk in the drawer.

Suddenly the bedroom door creaked open causing me to jump.

I turned around and saw Brian looking at me curiously.

"You scared me!" I said to him.

"Sorry." He said, then looked down at saw the journal in my hand. I quickly tried to hide it behind my back but obviously he'd already seen it.

"Wen, I don't know what your obsession with that journal is, but we have to be ready pretty soon. I'm going to take a shower if you'd like to join me," he winked at me.

So not happening.

I shook my head vigorously.

He sighed and entered a bathroom located on the other side of the room.

Once I heard the shower turn on, I kicked off my heels and jumped into the bed. Ahh, it was even more fluffy and comfortable than I imagined.

I laid on my stomach and propped up on my arms, getting comfortable to begin reading Wendy's journal.

I flipped to a random page not sure if I should start from the beginning or if that'd be a waste of time and I should just look at recent events.

There were random scrawls in different places on the page. Maybe she wrote in haiku?

Then I realized a lot of it was mostly numbers. Maybe Wendy is a secret genius mathematician. Eh doubtful.

I looked closer and realized this was a food log. Wendy recorded everything she ate and the calories.

The more pages I turned the less she was eating. There was pictures cut out from magazines and some printed out of celebrities. Other pictures were just of random body parts. All of them outrageously thin.

I felt quite sick for a moment as realization dawned on me.

I think Wendy has an eating disorder.