My Anorexic Heart

Chapter 1 - The Voices

**Dedicated to Shawn, becuase you're you and that means the world to me.**

"I am not fat."

"Good. Now say – 'I am in control,'" Betty's voice rings with a pride. 

I grit my teeth fighting the urge to roll my muddy-green eyes. "I am in control."

"Last one: 'I am worth love,'" the word rolls off her magenta lips into the dim light of her peach office like a curse.  

A knot forms in my throat.

One. Two. Three. The numbers whisper in the voices of three wraithes who follow me everywhere. My hands fist and I spit, "I'm worth love," as I fight to contain the fear leaking into my veins. 

She looks at me, analyzing. Her brow scrunches as she jots something down on her yellow notepad. "We'll work on that," she states more to herself than to me.

When Betty is done, I am a bit calmer but unable to loosen my hands. She puts down her pen and looks at me, surveying. Her eyes search for answers or some sense to my insensible behavior. The air conditioning kicks in and diffuses her strong perfume around the room. The scent burns my nose. 

"Tell me – what's been going on with Caesar?" She folds her delicate arms over the slight pouch in her belly that comes with age. I shiver at the thought. 

"Same."

"Care to elaborate?" Her head tilts to the side, her golden pillow of curls brushing her age-thinned shoulder. 

No. I sigh. "He calls – a lot. Daily. He follows me everywhere, but my dad gave me pepper spray, which I fully intend to use. If necessary." I wish I had the pepper spray and the sense to use it the night I lost my virginity to him. What a waste.

"Have you decided if you're going to report him?" She peers over the rim of her fuschia reading glasses.

"It's not necessary." I don't do attention. Cops coming to my house, filing a restraining order, it all seems too dramatic, too "look-at-me."

"Hmm." She jots feverishly on her notepad.

Great, I've probably earned myself another month's worth of therapy, easy.

"Needless to say I highly disagree. It's completely necessary." Her stern glare scorches my face. "How about your eating? How is that going?"

I hesitate, "Good." It isn't a lie. When I eat, eating goes ... okay. I definitely eat more than I have in the past few years. It's just ... I don't like food. Food makes me fat.

She pulls down her glasses and rubs the bridge of her nose. "Define 'good,' Nina."

"I eat. I've gained a few pounds," I say what she wants to hear. I should be glad I'm getting "better," but I don't feel better. I feel much worse. I feel fat.

Betty replaces her glasses on the bridge of her slightly crooked nose. Her eyes gaze upon my body and then come to rest on my face. They reflect a meloncholy blue in the dim light cast by her Tiffany lamp. I'm probably her most difficult patient. I don't try to be, it just comes naturally.

"It's hard, Nina, but it's necessary. You know that?"

I nod. I don't need the if-you-don't-get-better-you-are-going-to-die speech again. I get it, but what if I don't want to live?

"With time it will get easier."

I nod again. I hear the same thing every week. I'm still waiting for easier to show up.