Redefining Beautiful

Chapter Seven: Mystery's Pieces

It was the second to the last week of school, and I hadn’t talked to Destiny in three weeks. I guess that was good because maybe I don’t need to rely on her for everything anymore.

After school, I waited by the front gate. Not for Destiny, but for Emma. Emma told me at lunch that she wanted to come over to my house. Startled by the rush to get an answer out me, I said she could without even asking my mom. Destiny drifted by with her arms linked with Megan, Madison, and Malia. Our eyes locked on each other, time stopping, and she just grinned sympathetically before giggling away with her three new best friends.

I wanted to cry. I wanted to beg Destiny to come back. I wanted to be Megan and Madison and Malia so bad. I wanted to be a part of their group. I wanted to do makeovers and share clothes and laugh at pointless things.

I wanted to be in my best friend’s new world.

“Ready?” Emma popped up next to me.

“Yeah,” And the two of us, not giggling or linking arms like Destiny and her friends, headed toward my house. Emma just hummed to herself. Eventually, I grew frustrated as to why she even wanted to come over when she wasn’t going to talk to me, but I remained reticent.

The sun gravitated higher above me, burning my cheeks. I couldn’t wait to get home to get some water because the heat was killing me. We were a block away from my house when Emma stopped humming, and she was staggering behind. I thought she was doing it for some sort of attention because I had not said a word, so I continued walking.

I didn’t quite understand my own annoyance with Emma. She didn’t do anything to me, but Destiny did. So my frustration was caused by Destiny to disguise my hurt, and Emma just fueled my annoyance because she’s the closest person to me at this point. Not able to bare it any longer, I spun on my heels, prepared to scream at her.

But I froze.

Something about Emma’s exhausted stare, flimsy limbs, and her mouth gaped told me that she was about to collapse.

“Emma?” She didn’t respond, I stepped closer to her. “Emma, are you okay?” She was scaring me. She appeared like a zombie and I didn’t know what I could do for her to snap her back to normal Emma mode.

“I’m fine,” She tried shoving me away, but her energy plummeted, and she leaned against me instead. “I just need water.”

“We’re almost to my house,” I tried holding her up, but even as light as she was, it wasn’t working. “C’mon, walk. We’ll get water when we get to my house.”

“I need to lay down right now,” She whispered, releasing all her weight onto me.

“No, no. Bad idea,” Just as I was about to drop Emma, Trevor raced up from behind me and helped position Emma upright. I know I should have been grateful for that, but I wasn’t going to let Trevor off that easy. I can’t blame my pathetic life on him, but he sure did not make it any better. “Great, it’s you.”

“Emma,” he said to her. “What are you feeling right now?”

“Dizzy,” Emma’s head slanted back, and Trevor caught it, holding it upright in his strong hands. “And...not so good.”

Trevor scooped up Emma in his arms in a way that was so heroic. I could see his perfectly carved biceps exposed because he was wearing a blue muscle tank. I envied Emma at that point because her head was against his broad chest and her limp arm hooked around his firm neck. Trevor’s arms supported her back and her legs as she rested her body against him.

I ushered Trevor to my house. When I opened the front door, he laid her on the couch. “She needs protein,” was the first thing Trevor said to me when he entered my house.

“Fridge,” I sat on the edge of the couch next to Emma while Trevor searched the fridge.

“I can’t eat anything,” Emma said, her eyes sealed shut.

“You need to,” I insisted.

“You don’t understand,” She paused. “I haven’t been eating.”

It took a few minutes to process, but finally I understood just what she meant. I wanted to say something, but I wasn’t sure what. I just stared into her big, dark brown eyes until Trevor came over with bacon and a glass of cold water. I took the water from him, then told him to hold off on the bacon. He set the plate on the coffee table in front of the couch.

Emma absorbed the water from the cup before handing it back. She seemed better, but I started not to feel too good.

“Are you alright now?” asked Trevor who seemed genuinely concerned. “You look better.”

“Yeah, I’m okay. Thanks,” Emma tenderly smiled.

“No problem,” He viewed his watch, then said, “Damn, I’m going to be late for practice.”

“We’ll be...I mean, she’ll be okay. Just go,” I said. And without a goodbye, Trevor walked out of my front door. For some reason, a part of me wanted to ask him to stay. I guess I just loved the way I felt when he was near.

“You like him, don’t you?” Emma questioned me, smirking.

“We’re not talking about me,” I said defensively. “Eat,” I held out the bacon strips on the plate to her. “And tell me what all that was about.”

“I’m not hungry,” She pushed the plate away with a finger.

“How long have you been doing this?” I asked shaky.

“I started when I first moved here,” She answered. I asked why, so she said, “I was so unhappy with myself.”

Welcome to my life.

“It sucks trying to be something you aren’t in hopes it’ll make your life easier,” Emma shook her head in unison. I used to feel comfortable being myself around Destiny because I thought she understood me, but Emma is the one who truly understands how I feel.

“Do you think you could...” I just wanted to try it, to see if it was something I could manage. “...show me how you do it?” Emma didn’t say anything, she just nodded.

We locked ourselves in my restroom where Emma demonstrated how to purge, and I guess it wasn’t that hard to do but I needed Destiny there so I could see her long, slender legs and her small waist, and twig-like arms to remind me that if this was what made girls beautiful, then I had to do this.

Emma recalled the roots that begun her eating disorder. I saw that she wasn’t crying, but I heard it in her voice. “You won’t look at food, or another girl the same...” she said. “It’s like, your mind kind of takes over everything in you and you can’t stop it.”

I couldn’t relate to Emma. I didn’t know what she was talking about, but I knew eventually I would if I continued to search for all her pieces. While I peered into the white toilet bowl and Emma held back my hair as tears from my eyes dripped into the water, I realized that this was just a small piece—a short story—of Emma Green. Now, I carried this piece along with me like a burden on my shoulders, and this story I have volunteered to be a character in is narrated by Emma Green.