Paint Me Beautiful

be a joke, but I have a hard time smiling at it because I know what Emmett is doing. He's trying to engage me with food, make it fun, show me there's nothing to be afraid of. He thinks I've made a crucial first step to changing myself by eating last night. If he only knew that instead of taking a step forward, I took a hundred back, he probably wouldn't be leaning over to kiss my cheek right now, smiling a goofy smile and looking positively precious.
    “ Sounds great,” I tell him because what else am I supposed to say? That there's nowhere for me to purge in the tree house? That if I go up there and eat, that I'll be stuck with that food inside of me, burning hot as coals? I try not to think about it, but I can feel the fear lurking dark and hungry in the back of my mind.
    “ Awesome!” Emmett says, rolling over my legs and landing on the floor with nimble feet. He's the very picture of health, sort of the opposite of me. He snatches a purple knitted beanie off his dresser and tugs it down over his mussy hair. Bits stick out in all directions and now I finally understand why it's always all over the place: he rarely brushes it. “I will bring you breakfast in bed. You just wait here, beautiful.” And then Emmett disappears and leaves me alone with my guilt and my obsessive thoughts.
    I roll to my side and search around Emmett's crowded bedside table for my phone. It's sitting between my moose mug and an empty water glass, right where I left it last night. When I flip it over to check the screen, I see that I have several new messages and dozens of old ones. My mom and Marlena have been calling and texting incessantly. Big Bob has not tried to reach me at all. I ignore the voice mail, certain that I don't want to hear either of their voices. I'm in such a weak place right now that I'm afraid if I do, I might crack and spill all my secrets. I decide that texts are much safer, that I can read them to myself in careful monotone and not feel the emotion.
    Please call us, Claire. I have to spend at least an hour a day promising mom that you're still alive. If it wasn't for Emmett's solemn promises that you're okay, I would be frantic right now.
    I stare at the words for a long, long while and then I take the phone, and I throw it across the room. It lands softly in the pile of clean clothes that Emmett has draped over his dresser. I drop my face in my hands for just a moment and let my feelings slide over and off of me like water on a duck's back. Suffice it to say that I won't be checking my phone again, not for a little while anyway, not until something changes. There is a pivotal moment fast approaching on the horizon, and I am either going to live and thrive or I'm going to die. That's just a simple fact of life. Right now, I'm not emotionally stable enough to listen to the fears and worries of others, not even my family's. Either they'll be waiting for me at the end of the road or waving goodbye as I leave it. That's it.
    “ Are you ready, Claire?” I hear Emmett asking. The question feels poignant to me even though it shouldn't. He wants to know if I'm ready for breakfast, but all I can wonder is if I'm ready for change. I think that last night I proved to myself that I wasn't. I need to be, but I'm not.
    I smile.
    “ Yep.”
    I watch as Emmett comes around the corner with a silver tray in his hand. At first, he tries to carry it with just one, holding it over his shoulder like a waiter in a fancy restaurant. And then it wobbles precariously and threatens to crash to the wood floor.
    “ Oops,” he says with a cheeky smile as he grabs the edge of the tray with his other hand and maneuvers it down to my lap. I stare down at the plate of food and realize that most people would be underwhelmed with such a small breakfast. To me, it looks huge. “I hope it tastes okay,” Emmett says as he adjusts the glass of orange in the corner. Resting on the edge of the rim is a small, pink peony, positioned just so. I take it in gentle hands and put it behind me ear.
    “ How do I look?” I ask, and Emmett just stares at me like he's really thinking about his answer. When he finally smiles and it does come, I can tell he thinks it's the truth, even if I don't believe it.
    “ Beautiful.”
    I drop my eyes from his and look back at the plate. Emmett leaves the room but only for a moment and then he's back, climbing onto the bed with his own food and crossing his legs beneath him while he picks up a slice of turkey