✩ #17 in body positivity ✩
Holly needs a job. And some cash.
That's how she ends up at Cafe by the Sea, hired by the assistant manager, Oliver, who's cute, annoying, and totally unattainable. She's not really looking to fall in love though - it's...
During the next meeting with Dr. Inho, Holly overheard her telling her parents she had "self-destructive tendencies which may stem from lack of self-esteem".
She really hadn't meant to. She was supposed to wait in the little room while Dr. Inho went to fill out some paperwork or something after their talk that day. But she'd gotten thirsty and unable to find a cup or bottle of water in the room, had decided to walk towards the waiting room for one.
Holly had numbly returned to her little room, with its cozy walls and cozy beanbags. She had initially wanted to cry, but found that she was kind of tired of crying and couldn't really seem to muster out the tears anymore.
So she had mostly just waited for Dr. Inho to return.
When she did, she smiled as usual at Holly and acted like they were great friends. Holly wanted to tell her that she knew. She knew that smile was fake. Dr. Inho didn't actually care about Holly - she just wanted to put a convenient label on her.
She went home that day with a prescription for an anxiety medication and an antidepressant. The orange bottles now glared at Holly from her nightstand. She wanted to throw them out the window, shatter those plastic child-safe tops, crumple the pills into dust.
But she didn't. She left them untouched on her desk. After her mom had caught her not taking them, Holly started flushing the pills down the toilet. She thought it was satisfying to see them swirl
down
and
around
and
around
until they were swallowed up by that now familiar belch from the toilet.
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These couple of chapters before and after may be a bit difficult to read. I'm sorry, and I'm getting sad too. I want Holly to get better quickly! I miss how sassy and bright she was in the beginning :(
But I wanted to show the toll that certain events can have on people. People can't just move on.
But this story is just as much about healing and learning to love yourself and learning to move past adversity as it as about capturing the reality of these situations.
So hang tight. It will get better.
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