Chapter Five

A Chapter by animamundix3

He weighed me again the next day. I had lost a pound. I heard him mumble “Jesus. Seventy-eight pounds.” He shook his head at me. I wouldn’t wear a bathing suit that day. I was angry that I hadn’t lost more weight. I knew it was because of the frozen yogurt. I hadn’t thrown all of it up. I promised myself that I wouldn’t eat for the rest of the three days that I was there. Jason kept pushing me to eat something, but even as the family came up to me trying to get me to eat something, I made up excuse after excuse.

The next day, Jason, as much as he had wanted me to eat it, helped me avoid dinner that night. He said that we were going to eat outside near the pool, and ate some of it, and threw out the rest for me.

I fainted that night again, and this time I didn’t wake up right away. I woke up a few minutes later, my entire body aching, and I felt a hand wrapped around mine, as always, and before I even opened my eyes, I knew that it was Jason’s. There was a glass of water in his other hand, and even though I was refusing to drink it, he put it next to me. I tried to make it up the stairs, insisting to Jason that I was okay, but a few minutes later he found me, yet again, passed out on the first landing of the stairs. He picked me up, and carried me to a chair, pulled out the bed from the couch in the game room, and carried me to it. He saw me shivering, so he went upstairs to get me a dry t-shirt, and I saw his face when I took off the wet one. At the time, I thought it was from the bruises all over my body. He kissed me, and we fell asleep together. In the morning, I watched as Jason went upstairs. He told the family that he was going to bring me breakfast, but ate it himself. I realized that he had finally given up trying to change me. It made me happy to think that there wasn’t anyone to stop me.

That last day was almost depressing. The fun Jason and I had in the morning just made it harder to think about when we were forced to say goodbye, and I would leave the place that had brought us together. I had a feeling that once the vacation was over, things would go back to what they had always been. We would only talk when there was no one else to talk to. We would go back to being absolutely nothing.

“Hey.” I heard Jason say from behind me. I turned around with a pair of shorts in my hand. “Packing?”

“Unfortunately.” I said, smiling.

He put his arms around me, slid his thumbs in the loops of my jeans, pulled me in and kissed me. I pulled away and looked at him, biting my lip. I didn’t want to ask him if we were going to go back to nothing. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know the answer. I was afraid. But it was something I needed to know.

Just as I was about to say something to him, Jason suddenly asked, “Hailey? Can you weigh yourself again? Honestly, I can’t stop worrying about you. I’m afraid of what’s going to happen when we leave. I don’t want to lose you.” He said it quickly, and he wouldn’t even look at me. It wasn’t like him to get like this. He had gotten emotional within the time we spent together, but he had always looked me in the eye. He was always honest with me. I felt like there was something he wasn’t telling me. “Please?”

I hesitated for a minute, and said, “Okay…”

I took his hand and led him down the hall and opened the door. I was panicking that he would tell someone if I had lost more weight, but then I worried if I didn’t let him see my weight, he would want to tell someone even more. As I was about to step on the scale, I looked at Jason, and he looked like there was something more he wanted. I knew what it was. I slipped off my shorts and my sweatshirt and I stood there in my bikini, dreading seeing that number on the scale. Once I saw the zeros, I stepped on it, and looked at the swirling lines until finally, the number appeared.

I had gone hit my goal and passed it…But I saw myself in the mirror in front of me and the thirty-five pounds I had lost still just weren’t enough.

“Hailey…You’re… You’re 74 pounds.” I could barely even hear him say the words. It sounded like his voice was caught in his throat. I stepped off the scale and put it back in the closet as tears streaked down my cheeks. I turned around he kissed me on the forehead then hugged me tight, his breathing becoming uneven. I felt his hands running slowly over each of my ribs, the bones in my spine, in my lower back. I pulled away, angry.

“Stop it.” I said, pushing him away, hard.

“Hailey. We need to tell someone. Anyone. You need help.”

“No, Jason.” I yelled. “You’re not telling anyone. You promised me that you wouldn’t tell anyone.”

“Hailey, you’re gonna die from this!”

“I’m not going to die.” I said, and he opened the bathroom door trying to get out. I slammed it closed again and started yelling at him again.“Stop! Don’t tell them, Jason. I’ll hate you. Honest to God, I will hate you.”

“I can deal with you hating me. I want you to live.”

“Don’t you dare tell anyone!” I walked away, and slammed the door in his face.

I didn’t talk to him for the rest of the day. I made an excuse and walked away every time he tried to talk to me. I had to pack or I needed to get a bathing suit from downstairs. I avoided him all that I could, and hoped to God that he wouldn’t tell anyone before we left. I didn’t even say goodbye as he sat on the stoop when we drove away. I guess I never had to worry about what would happen after we left the beach house.

Later, as I looked through my contacts for Casey’s phone number since I had put her under some weird nickname, I saw that Jason had put his number in my phone that day. I hadn’t even seen him do it. He was good that way. As I went to delete the number, I thought about it, and something in me made me decide to keep the number there…Just in case.

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