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By @Madison
It isn’t until the middle of our merry making
That my stomach begins to protest my meal
Leaving the color draining from my face
As I rush inside without explanation.
I race down the hallway to the bathroom.
I am just barely able to close the door behind me
Before I fall to my knees
Heaving the contents of my stomach into the toilet bowl.
Tears burn at the corner of my eyes as I retch to no end
Trying my best to keep my hair back.
Just when I wish that there was someone there to hold it back for me
Izzy bursts through the door
Left unlocked in my urgency.
“Oh, Candace!”
Without being asked
She kneels behind me
Collecting the long, slightly sweaty strands at the back of my neck.
My nausea slowly subsiding
I finally lift my head from the bowl.
Throat raw, I manage one word in Izzy’s direction.
“Sorry.”
She doesn’t reply, gently placing the back of her hand to my cheek as I turn to face her.
After a while, she pulls away with a sigh.
Just when I stand up
Flushing the toilet and preparing to brush my teeth
She places her hand on my arm.
When I turn around
Her eyes are fixed on mine
And it’s clear
That I’m not getting out of this easily.
This fact is confirmed when she speaks again.
“Tell me what’s going on. Now.”
Suddenly, under the bathroom’s bright orange lights
I know that I am no longer the girl I was thirty minutes ago
Celebrating her freedom.
I’m back to being screwed-up Candace
Puked out and frozen in fear.
Unsure of what else to do
I sit back down across from Izzy
Forcing myself to speak.
“What do you mean?”
She stares at me sternly.
“Candace,” she says.
“I’ve been trying not to pry, but something’s been off for weeks now. You hardly ever talk or eat. You aren’t speaking with your boyfriend. You’ve obviously been dancing around Alex and I. And now, you’re throwing up.”
I just barely see the flash of worry in her eye
Before every horrible possibility except the one at hand comes spewing out of her.
“It’s an eating disorder, isn’t it? Or are you depressed? Did Todd do something? Or is it someone else? Is there another boy? Or maybe a girl? Does it have anything to do with your mother?”
All I can do is shake my head
Pained by how clueless she is.
Unable to listen to any more
I interrupt her spiel.
“No.”
She freezes.
“No?” she asks.
“No what?”
I shake my head.
“It’s none of that.”
Just when she looks as if she might ask another question
Her face falls.
Realization dawning
She crumbles before my very eyes.
She reaches out and grabs my hand
Eyes already becoming misty.
She says my name again.
“Candace,” she whispers.
“Please tell me you’re not pregnant.”
Pain returning to the pit of my stomach
And climbing up to my chest
All I can do is hang my head
And repeat that one word from earlier.
“Sorry.”
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