her eyes red and streaming, her knuckles tooth-marked and pink, saliva dribbling from the side of her mouth. She failed. Failure wasn’t acceptable.
Her mum asks her, ‘You’re not making yourself sick, are you?’
Teeth jam together.
I wish. I wish. I wish
…
‘No, Mum, of course not.’
Mum looks at her disbelievingly.
Stupid girl, don’t eat that tomato.
She eats it anyway. She used to be stronger than this. People remarked at her willpower before this happened. They marvelled at her resistance and jealously admired her strength. Now they retract that envy with a breath of relief at their own normality.
‘So how are you today, Grace, really?’ Friends tend to qualify their questions with a ‘really’ or an ‘honestly’. She gives them what she thinks they ‘really’ want to hear.
‘
Really
, I’m much better.’
She takes a sip of her Diet Coke and sucks on her Marlboro Light.
It is the first Christmas since the announcement of Grace’s anorexic status. Six o’clock with stockings in Mum and Dad’s bedroom; stockings full of presents: make-up items, chocolates, sweets and oranges. Grace still gets the chocolatesin her stocking, packed in with the hope that Christmas might change her, or that for one day only she will let go, drop the fierce willpower, change the rules, stop the game or at least pause it. But she doesn’t. Instead, she sits with her hot-water bottle and layers of thick jumpers, with her hands alternating their hold on the bedroom bay-window radiator. She carefully places all the chocolates, dried fruit and clementines to one side. She decides that she will give them out to others later on – ‘Happy Christmas’, she will say – (just because she doesn’t eat, it doesn’t mean that others can’t!).
Grace’s Christmas lunch is a salad with chopped-up tomatoes and a bit of cottage cheese and a couple of rice cakes. She also eats a bit of mashed potato (because she can feel the fire of the opposition in the deadly silence around the table). She knows that there will be much guilt later for this out-of-character mashed potato eating. Then she watches television and counts the hours until the end of the day. She can’t get her exercises done because the house is full of people. She goes for a walk with Mum and Dad. She asks them if she can buy herself an exercise bike because she is sure that if she is more formally allowed to exercise, then she might find eating a bit easier. And they sigh.
PLAY ON
[A group of school friends sit around a collection of pub tables, talking and laughing, sharing stories of university and new experiences. Grace walks in. She is dressed in a bright outfit. Too bright, too present. She should be dressed in black, a symbol that she is defeated and unwell. But the bright outfit and a new haircut make a statement. The faces around her smile at her entrance. There is no outward sign of their shock. It is only when they begin to speak that there is an obvious sign of hesitancy in their voices.]
FRIEND 1: How are you?
FRIEND 2: Really like the hair.
FRIEND 3: Isn’t it cold outside!
[Grace sits quietly, nibbling the straw of her diet drink. She nuzzles under the collar of her thick coat as she jitters. She is visibly shivering, although she is wearing several layers: thermal vest, tucked deep into two pairs of tights, two pairs of socks, thick velvet trousers, three jumpers and a coat. She is freezing. We see her hug the radiator, feeling her hand around it for the warmest part. The coldness produces a feeling of hollowness. She is shaking inside but she doesn’t say anything. The suffering is as secret as the inside voice, which plays out over the tableau.]
GRACE (INSIDE VOICE):
So when you get home you’ll go straight to bed, OK? No cereal, not one mouthful. Go in the door and up the stairs and get into bed. But I’m quite hungry, I think. Maybe an apple then? But that would mean fifty extra calories, maybe even seventy-five if it’s a
Her mum asks her, ‘You’re not making yourself sick, are you?’
Teeth jam together.
I wish. I wish. I wish
…
‘No, Mum, of course not.’
Mum looks at her disbelievingly.
Stupid girl, don’t eat that tomato.
She eats it anyway. She used to be stronger than this. People remarked at her willpower before this happened. They marvelled at her resistance and jealously admired her strength. Now they retract that envy with a breath of relief at their own normality.
‘So how are you today, Grace, really?’ Friends tend to qualify their questions with a ‘really’ or an ‘honestly’. She gives them what she thinks they ‘really’ want to hear.
‘
Really
, I’m much better.’
She takes a sip of her Diet Coke and sucks on her Marlboro Light.
It is the first Christmas since the announcement of Grace’s anorexic status. Six o’clock with stockings in Mum and Dad’s bedroom; stockings full of presents: make-up items, chocolates, sweets and oranges. Grace still gets the chocolatesin her stocking, packed in with the hope that Christmas might change her, or that for one day only she will let go, drop the fierce willpower, change the rules, stop the game or at least pause it. But she doesn’t. Instead, she sits with her hot-water bottle and layers of thick jumpers, with her hands alternating their hold on the bedroom bay-window radiator. She carefully places all the chocolates, dried fruit and clementines to one side. She decides that she will give them out to others later on – ‘Happy Christmas’, she will say – (just because she doesn’t eat, it doesn’t mean that others can’t!).
Grace’s Christmas lunch is a salad with chopped-up tomatoes and a bit of cottage cheese and a couple of rice cakes. She also eats a bit of mashed potato (because she can feel the fire of the opposition in the deadly silence around the table). She knows that there will be much guilt later for this out-of-character mashed potato eating. Then she watches television and counts the hours until the end of the day. She can’t get her exercises done because the house is full of people. She goes for a walk with Mum and Dad. She asks them if she can buy herself an exercise bike because she is sure that if she is more formally allowed to exercise, then she might find eating a bit easier. And they sigh.
PLAY ON
[A group of school friends sit around a collection of pub tables, talking and laughing, sharing stories of university and new experiences. Grace walks in. She is dressed in a bright outfit. Too bright, too present. She should be dressed in black, a symbol that she is defeated and unwell. But the bright outfit and a new haircut make a statement. The faces around her smile at her entrance. There is no outward sign of their shock. It is only when they begin to speak that there is an obvious sign of hesitancy in their voices.]
FRIEND 1: How are you?
FRIEND 2: Really like the hair.
FRIEND 3: Isn’t it cold outside!
[Grace sits quietly, nibbling the straw of her diet drink. She nuzzles under the collar of her thick coat as she jitters. She is visibly shivering, although she is wearing several layers: thermal vest, tucked deep into two pairs of tights, two pairs of socks, thick velvet trousers, three jumpers and a coat. She is freezing. We see her hug the radiator, feeling her hand around it for the warmest part. The coldness produces a feeling of hollowness. She is shaking inside but she doesn’t say anything. The suffering is as secret as the inside voice, which plays out over the tableau.]
GRACE (INSIDE VOICE):
So when you get home you’ll go straight to bed, OK? No cereal, not one mouthful. Go in the door and up the stairs and get into bed. But I’m quite hungry, I think. Maybe an apple then? But that would mean fifty extra calories, maybe even seventy-five if it’s a
Similar Books
