WHEN YOU HEAL

FOOD FIEND

"Oh my, Sana, report him."

"Keela, I don't want any trouble. Lee's message wasn't intended for me. "

Keela shook her head, "what he wrote was out of order. You should at least ask for disciplinary action. Lee has become such a dick since his wife left him for another woman."

"Another woman, you didn't tell me that. Keela, I can't hear you."

Sana pondered; perhaps Keela did tell her at the time, but the beer malt macerating on her gobbled all her thoughts.

"Sorry, I was in the lift," Keela said as she walked out and headed to her office, "Lee has been acting up since. He has become the enemy of the female sex. Do you know what he did a month ago? Rachel Lewis from digital asked him out. Lee said yes, and believe me; it made one heck of a buzz since the guy hasn't dated in over eighteen months."

Sana frowned at the accuracy of Keela's information. She let it pass and continued listening.

"Lee invited Rachel to one of London's In The Dark restaurant."

"In The Dark?"

"You know one of those restaurants where you eat in total blackout."

"Oh, oh, yeah, I see," Sana replied while typing on Google to find out about the concept.

"Guess what Lee did?"

Sana shrugged as if her friend across the channel could see her reaction and went to open her freezer, "I don't know. He threw wine at her face."

"No, the man left."

"What do you mean he left?"

"Rachel found herself doing a monologue in total darkness. The poor woman didn't even realize Lee was gone until the waiter came wearing his infrared binoculars and asked Rachel who she was talking to. Can you imagine that?"

There was a long silence at Sana's end of the phone.

"Sana?"

The burst of laughter almost made Keela drop her phone.

"Oh, my sweet little Jesus in a haystack, the man is devil incarnate," Sana said and stuck a spoon in the ice-cream pot and sat to wait for it to melt a little.

"You see, Sana, you have to do something. We can't let Lee carry on with his woman-busting crusade."

Sana regained composure, "hold up, Keela. I'm not defending the man or anything, but I'm not going to reek a vendetta and become a martyr for all the victims of Lee's misogyny. You told me yourself. Women throw themselves at him. They work with him; most are more inclined to see what type of man Lee is. I mean, you have to be quite desperate to want to tackle and mend a broken record like him. His wife divorced to be with another woman, which must crush a man's ego. The record is all cranky, mashed-up, running the haters tune. Why would any woman want to date that?"

"Oh, Sana, please, so you're blaming the women. Like it's Rachel's fault?"

"No, but that's bad boy wishing-well plot. We know some are not retrievable. Why bother?"

"Sana, I can't believe you. Come on, don't do him this favor."

"No, it's just," Sana reflected a second, "it's just like the message was an opinion. It's his right to think whatever shit. I just happened to see what was on his mind. The man doesn't know me; the message was a bunch of stupid assumptions which we both know aren't true."

At the other end, Keela rolled her eyes, "being a bigger and better person does not apply in this situation with Lee Cook."

Sana sighed, "okay, if we're going to do this, let's do it properly. The message I received won't be enough to take him down. We need other testimonies and witnesses of his behavior."

"I can find that easy at HQ."

"That's what you think, you know as well as I do that everyone clamps their mouth shut when the doo-doo goes down."

"Okay, I hear you."

Sana lifted a brow; something in her friend's voice intrigued her, "why do I get the impression you're keener to take Lee down than me?"

"I can't stand his behavior. Wait a minute, what's that munching sound?"

"It's Ben&Jerrys chocolate chip cookies."

"Sana, I thought you were doing a thirty-day eat healthy challenge."

"I am."

"Then why are you eating Ben&Jerry's at 10:45 in the morning."

"It's 11:45 in Paris."

"Sana, neither of the hours justifies you eating ice cream. It's not even lunchtime."

"Primary school kids eat at this hour."

"Sana, ice cream isn't lunch, and you're not a primary school pupil."

"Perhaps it's lunch in Alaska."

"For crying out loud, Sana, you are a thirty-two-year-old woman who should be watching her diet. You see, Lee is messing up everything."

Keela knew her friend wallowed by overeating. The woman witnessed how Sana blew up from a UK size eight to a bulky size eighteen stretching towards the XL twenty. Her breakup with Winston affected Sana's self-esteem.

Hurt, the woman surrendered to the pleasures of gluttony. Food procured Sana the tenderness she needed. Sana felt loved when she ate as the endorphins did their duty. Loneliness evaporated with the warmth of the dishes seated in her stomach. Her yearly visit to the gynecologist and recurrent chest pains rang the health alarm.

Later another doctor confirmed and diagnosed Sana as bulimic. It was a shock for the woman who people once called anorexic.

Eva Greene, Zoe Kravitz, Keira Knightley featured in Winston's fantasies.

What do they have in common?

Their needle-thin bodies.

Sana, who never questioned her appearance, began to watch her figure to match her man's preferences.

High cholesterol, risk of diabetes, and last but not least, the possibility of heart arrest motivated Sana to battle the Candy and greasy foods that called out her name at ungodly hours. The woman's efforts paid off, she sunk to a remarkable size sixteen, and her entourage recognized Sana fought.

Until those medical exams, Sana did not perceive one instant her body could be so vulnerable at thirty. Medical complications such as cardiac arrest were vascular accidents she imagined reserved for the elderly, and bulimia, an eating disorder supposed to be popular amongst teens and not grown women. Sana found herself bamboozled by her ignorance.

Of course, someone like Lee Cook could not suspect the damage he caused.

Keela feared a relapse, "Sana, please, promise me you won't surrender to your demons."

"Nah, Keela, you know me. Who do you take me for?"

An hour later, Sana sat at the foot of her fridge, which laid wide open and empty. Greek yogurt and granola, fried eggs, Pizza Hut leftovers, micro-wave chicken drumsticks, micro-wave popcorn, Pringles, and Haribo marshmallow to finish, the monster devoured all with Coca-Cola.

It was too late. Sana burped her white flag.