“I know who you are,” she said. Was it because of ballet? Or because of here? I felt stupid asking, so I didn’t.
Margot shifted her weight on the bed. The frame squeaked.
I tried again. “You’re from Esterfall, right?”
She nodded.
“Me too.” I hoped this would be when she said, Oh yeah, from ballet, right?
She said nothing.
“So, um…” Margot watched me fumble and did nothing to help. Coming here was a mistake. “Did you know we took ballet together when we were six?”
She squinted at me and said, “Oh, right. I thought you looked familiar.” I didn’t believe her.
“Yeah. So. I guess I’ll go.” I backed toward the door. “Bye,” I said.
“Bye.” She put her headphones back on and turned away from me.
I showed myself out. That’s what I got for trying to be nice.
Back in my room, I stewed. I had to stop trying to rescue people. It obviously wasn’t working. At least not here.
At home, though, I had a pretty good track record. If people had a superpower, I guess you could say mine would be helping the wounded birds. In fourth grade, when Katrina and I met Priya, she was the new kid, super shy, and had just moved to Esterfall from New Jersey. She was the only Indian girl at our school. For the first two days, no one talked to her. She was invisible. So one day at lunch, when she was sitting alone, I’d invited her to sit with us. Within a week we were best friends.
When Shay arrived the next year, she befriended us, even though she was loud and flashy and not really our type. But she came up at recess, said, “I’m new. I need to play with you guys, okay?” Totally shocked, we said yes on reflex. In sixth grade her parents got a divorce. Her dad moved out of state and her mom went off the rails, and I talked my parents into letting Shay stay with us until things settled down. “Settling down” in Shay’s world meant that her mom hired an Italian au pair. Which we were sworn to secrecy about, because who in sixth grade still had a nanny?
And now? When I’d told them I was coming here, Priya had said, “Oh my God. I promise I will call you every day.”
Shay had nodded along with her. “Me too,” she’d said.
Well, I’d been here for five days and I hadn’t heard from Shay or Priya once except for that one package, the one Katrina had obviously sent by herself. Junior year is busy, I told myself. If I were home, I wouldn’t have time to call someone at a place like this either. But deep inside, I knew they had time. Of course they did.
I was still sulking when someone knocked. I opened the door and there was Margot, taking up my whole doorway in her Carhartt overalls and Docs, headphones around her neck.
“Do you like the Smiths?” she said instead of hello.
“Sorry?” I had no idea who she was talking about.
“The band. The Smiths? ‘Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want’?”
I’d never heard of them. “Uh, yeah. They’re cool,” I lied. “Do you want to come in?”
She sat on my bed. I sat on the floor.
“What’s your favorite of theirs? This is mine.” Margot plugged a speaker the size of a playing card into her iPod. The room filled with a guy droning on about his girlfriend being in a coma. I didn’t get it.
At the end Margot smiled. “Pretty awesome, right?”
Or terrible. “Yeah,” I lied. “They are so great.”
She put another one on. The guy begged to get what he wanted, and Margot studied me. “You have no idea who the Smiths are, do you?”
“No,” I admitted. “I don’t.” Katrina made fun of me all the time for my lack of music knowledge.
Margot snorted. “I knew it. You are a terrible liar. Want to listen with me? They’re really good.”
“I guess. I mean, sure. I’d like to. But can I ask you a question?”
“Okay.”
“Why are you here?”
“At Wallingfield?” Her face closed.
“No!” I said, trying to open it again. “I mean, why did you come to see me?”
“Oh,” she said, tucking her dull hair behind her unpierced ears. “I came because I was rude when you came to see me. Sorry about that. And I remembered you.”
“You did?”
“Yeah. You were nice to me. Not all the girls were.”
“Oh.” I remembered. No one had wanted to stand next to Margot at the barre. Everybody wanted to stand next to this girl Jessica, who had a fancy glitter leotard and rhinestone clips in her shiny brown bun. Margot—Merry back then—was probably the only girl not trying to get a place next to her. Jessica didn’t like that. “Merry has cooties,” she announced. After that, no one would go near her. I wanted to stand next to Jessica, too, but I got shoved out of the way by a girl in a baby-blue leotard and matching tights. I ended up next to Margot, who smiled at me. I’d smiled back and asked her if she knew how to do a cartwheel. We’d stood next to each other for every class after that. “Yeah, so thanks for being nice.”
“You’re welcome?”
She nodded, smiled, hit replay, and the guy started singing again. “Okay, so, the Smiths. Let me tell you about the Smiths.”
And that’s how I made friend number three.
15
That afternoon I met Sally to plan my menu for the next week. I couldn’t wait to be able to finally have some control over my meals, but at the same time, making so many food choices at once seemed impossible. It was food overload.
We met in the therapy wing, in a room barely large enough for two chairs and a desk. The walls were painted light blue. Soothing, of course. I felt better the minute I met her. Something about her gray bob and silver-rimmed glasses and general grandma vibe made me feel safe. When she said it was the end of veggie burgers, hummus, and pita unless I asked for them, I could have hugged her.
“When you start to refeed, there’s a risk of getting sick from too much food too fast,” she explained. “We call it refeeding syndrome. So with new patients, we gradually increase as the week progresses.”
The good feelings from a moment before vaporized. I shook my head, not quite understanding. “You mean the last five days were just a warm-up?”
“Well,” she said carefully, “not exactly a warm-up.”
“But what you’re saying is that I have to eat even more next week?”
“Yes. But, Elizabeth, before you—”
No. The panic started in my jaw. I clenched my teeth so hard they shifted in my gums. “I can’t do it. I can’t eat more.”
I don’t know why I was surprised. I knew that’s how these places worked, but even so. It’s like I’d thought that if I was in control of my meals, I’d all of a sudden be able to cure myself while limiting my food to 800 calories a day.
Sally nodded, her smile full of sympathy. “I’m sorry, hon, but you don’t really have a choice.”
I knew she was right. I forced my jaw to loosen. “Okay, then, let’s get it over with.”
For my three meals and three snacks each day, I needed a certain number of what they called exchanges, which were basically premeasured portions of different types of food: vegetables, fruit, protein, milk, fat, and starch (carbs). Simple enough.
Then I saw how many exchanges I had to fill each day: Protein: 6
Starch: 10
Fruit: 11
Dairy: 3