Bullied

Chapter 3

I sighed heavily, disappointed with myself as I stepped off the scale. I had only lost three pounds. It wasn't good enough. Why did losing weight take so long? I stood in front of my mirror and pinched all the fat I saw on my body. My fat thighs, my fat love handles, my fat cheeks, my two chins, and most of all my fat, roly-poly stomach. Today was the day I went back to school. A few days off had turned into two days shy of a full week. Every time I would get up and start to get ready for school I would throw up from the anxiety and I would lay back down in my bed, defeated feeling. My dad was concerned, as he probably should be, and told me that if I didn't go to school he was taking me to the emergency room. He didn't understand that it was stress that made me throw up. He had probably never been stressed a day in his life.

Ugh! I'm so completely hideously obese!

I really didn't want anyone to see me like this at school, but I feared going to the doctor even more. I suffered from headaches, nausea and the shakes. Water and celery were the only things I was eating. If I didn't need something in my body, I probably wouldn't eat at all. I worried that the doctors would tell my dad what I had been doing to myself. I was paranoid that he would find out that I wasn't eating much and that the thought of putting food in my mouth made me want to vomit. I was hoping I would have lost more weight by now, but it was an ill conceived notion that I could lose all my weight in a week. I had to be at least 40 lbs overweight.

That wasn't going to go away overnight. Deep down I knew what I was doing was unhealthy, even though celery and water themselves were actually healthy, but so was what I was doing before, I reasoned with myself. At dinner with my father was the worst. During the day I could happily avoid food. Soon I was going to start to exercising. Once the headaches stopped, of course. Like I said, dinner was the worst. I had to pretend to eat as I spit food into my napkin, pushing the rest around on my plate. When he seemed like he was going to ask me what was going on, I talked and talked and talked to sidestep the subject of food.

Eventually he dropped it and while he was busy eating, answering my questions and statements or looking at his food, I would dump food into a towel. After dinner, I always jumped up to clean up and hurriedly dumped the food down the garbage disposal before my dad could object. Most days he was satisfied and generally always helped me with the dishes. I knew I was acting sketchy, but I did my best to not concern him with my problems. I got tired of him basically telling me to suck it up or ignore it.

As if that shit worked.

I sighed, telling myself that I would be alright. They'd most likely lose interest in me when they couldn't get clips of me eating anymore. At least, that was my hope. I wasn't for sure convinced it would work, but for the time being, it was all I had to cling to. I was nervous to be back at that god-forsaken place, but I knew it was just something I had to do. I couldn't run away from my problems and I certainly couldn't talk to anyone about them. Besides, who would I tell? My dad? He just offered up unsolicited advice that didn't work. He was completely useless in a fight.  I had no friends, no allies, no one who honestly gave a shit. The thought made me sad, but I was also used to being rejected.

After all this time of being bullied, all these years, you would think that someone would have the common decency to say something, but nobody ever did. I felt so alone. Isolated. I was trapped inside of my own skin, struggling to break free and completely failing to do so. Shaking away my most self-deprecating thoughts, I finished getting dressed and headed off to school. My dad had left me breakfast, but as much as I wanted it, I wouldn't let myself eat it. I dropped it in the trash can before leaving, making sure to put other things on top of it to hide the fact that I hadn't eaten. I was becoming pretty good at hiding things now, which didn't exactly make me feel like a wonderful person.

I tried to keep my head down and focus on my schoolwork, but it was nearly impossible with everyone tracking my every move. A lot of people had their cell phones out and were busy taking snapshots of me, which was pretty confusing at the time. What are they doing?! I heard people whispering about me, talking about the website. They referred to it as Whale Watching. Seriously? What is wrong with these people?! Later on I learned that people were sending in pictures to an anonymous email to be posted on the site. During sixth period I had my study block and was finally able to escape to the library. I was starting to become curious. Finding the most secluded spot I could in the corner of the library, I looked up the website.

I hesitated momentarily before going to the photo section. Blowing out a shaky, anxious breath, I clicked the Enter button with the mouse and gasped. Bringing a hand to my mouth, I gaped in shock at the photos I saw. There were ones of me walking, opening my locker, biting on my pen in class, staring out the window and sitting in a chair in Home EC. They all had captions below them that I'm sure the site creator thought were witty or clever, but to me showed exactly how immature this person really was. Who did this? At least they were smart enough to not leave any leads pointing directly to them. Cowards! I needed some air. This was just too embarrassing. It wasn't enough that I was trying to change for the better. They still hadn't moved on from using me as their entertainment for week.

I didn't understand what I had done to deserve all this. Yes I was fat, but it wasn't the worst thing to have to deal with. Was it? I was so pissed off that I kicked a trash can in frustration, grunting with the effort it took to swing my great, big ham hocks towards my target. I heard a laugh and looked up, expecting one of my classmates snapping photos of my obvious breakdown, but instead was greeted with a handsome blonde stranger. Great! Now strangers are mocking me. He scratched his head as he looked at me with what appeared to be a genuine smile.

"Hey, what'd that trash can ever do to you?"

I almost bought his sincerity, but instead of answering him I walked off haughtily, trying to ignore the cute way his light brown eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled.

"Alright then. I'll see you later then, okay?"

I looked back once more to see his hand still raised in a wave as he watched me waddle off, suppressing a grin. At least he's not taking pictures of me. In case you haven't guessed, I'm usually wary of nice people. In most cases it's a trick. I'm tired of being fooled. I won't fall for his nice guy routine, no matter how many times he smiles at me. Oh my goodness, he smiled at me. I frowned at myself in frustration. I didn't see him for the rest of the day. Thank God. I managed to ignore the rest of my school mates as I tried to absorb knowledge rather than to give in to the overwhelming panic I was feeling. It wasn't until I got home that I saw a sight that made my heart skip a betraying beat. Guess who my new neighbor was?