Story of My Life

Confidence and Trust

Eliza:

After the whole I love yoy debacle, Sam took me back to his, well Mrs.Green's, place and I went up to get changed. I was about to go grab my pajamas when Sam walked into the room, not even bothering to knock. It's like he's completely oblivious to the fact that I'm literally in nothing but a bra and underwear.

"Do you mind? I'm still getting dressed."

"I know. This is the first step to liking you for you."

"Look, Sam, it's freaking cold in here, I'm not standing in front of the mirror for three hours in my bra and underwear."

"Yes you are and I'll turn up the heat so you won't freeze in here."

"I hate you."

"I love you I hate that I love you," he sang, horribly off key.

"You're such a dork."

"But you love it."

"Shut up."

With that, he dragged me into the freezing cold room with the full-length mirror and held me there.

"Do you trust me?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you trust me enough to let me hold you like this when you're like that?"

"I guess?"

"Then why do you still go into the room to change when we're alone?"

"I was raised that way. It's what I was always told."

"But did you always follow that?"

"No."

"Exactly. Because then, you felt good enough about yourself to not care about who saw what. So what changed?"

"Why are we doing this in front of the darn mirror?"

"You'll see. Now answer the question."

"When I was little, it was just my mom and me. She was the only role model I had. She always lived by skinny is pretty and pretty is rich. She struggled financially and had to do some non-PG things to make money. She was never the most confident but could fool anyone with a smile. I never really thought much of it then because I was so young and didn't know what it meant but I realize I probably learned from her. I may not care about making money as much but being skinny, yeah. I didn't care about it for a long time because I went through a period of time where I resented her for leaving me all alone in this cruel world. This resentment turned into an I don't care attitude and I liked it. People praised me for my style and attitude and I lived for it. But then I started getting attention from the wrong people and understood what I had always been warned about by learning the hard way. I guess after that I began caring more about being perfect and just fell deeper and deeper into the same dark hole my mom went down."

"Do you still resent your mom for what she did?"

"No."

"Good. You shouldn't. You love her right?"

"Of course I do."

"Then win this battle for her. You're stronger now, you have her strength and your own within you. She's looking out for you. Do it for her Eliza. Be the person she wasn't able to become."

"Yes. Now, why are we standing in this freezing cold room not properly dressed?!" I spoke getting annoyed at having to stand there for so long. It's a freaking freezer in here I swear.

"Look yourself in the eye."

"What? Why."

"Just do it."

"I am."

"No, you're not. You're avoiding eye contact."

With that, I slowly lifted my gaze up and was shocked at what I saw. For once I didn't hate what I saw. I had always seen my stomach poking out and my lack of cleavage when I got dressed and would be disgusted by it. But when I saw myself in the mirror clearly for once, I saw the beauty within me. The way my eyebrows arched at the perfect angle gave my eyes a nice show. The curves I never knew I had and how they suited me. But what surprised me the most, were my legs. They were so much skinnier than I realized. I always thought of them as giant logs that were disproportionate to my twig-like arms, but instead, they were actually relatively thin and well-defined from when I used to swim when I was younger.

"Well, what do you see?"

"I don't totally hate it. I never knew my legas were so thin. I always thought they were huge."

"Your legs are perfect. Just like the rest of you."

"Thanks."

"For what?"

"Making me see that sometimes the mirror shows the beauty that lies under the shadows."

"Always."