UNTITLED.

“Have a good evening, class! Don’t forget, your essays are due on Monday!”
I lift a hand in acknowledgement to my European history professor and head out of the room behind the rest of my class. There’s not many of us- most people don’t like to take their classes at four in the afternoon. I have work in an hour, so I head home to change and make some coffee before my shift.
As I’m struggling to pull on my Bamboo Garden uniform shirt and measure coffee grounds at the same time, my phone starts to buzz on the counter.
“Fuck,’ I mutter under my breath, dropping the measuring spoon and scattering coffee on the countertop. I yank my shirt on, grab my phone without checking the Caller ID, and answer it on the third ring.
“Hello?”
“Is this Chelsea?” Female voice, vaguely familiar.
“Yes. Who’s this?”
“It’s me. Cassie.”
My heart stops and I stumble to a chair.
“Cassie.”
“Yes. I’m here in New York for the next three weeks for a school trip. I was wondering if you wanted to meet up.”
“Meet up?”
“If you want to, I mean,” she says quickly. “You don’t have to. I get it if you don’t. It’s been a while.”
“No… I’d like that. I’m working tonight, but I’ll call you tomorrow to make plans. Okay?”
“Okay.” A pause. “I really miss you, Chelsea.”
Her voice tugs at my heartstrings. “I miss you too, Cass. I gotta go. I’ll call you later.”
“Bye,” she whispers, and then a click.
In twenty-four hours, I’ll be with Cassie again. Something is brewing inside me, some strange mix of terror and anticipation and longing. I don’t have time to think about it now, though. I have to get my coffee; I have to get to work. I look up at the clock- only quarter after.
As I measure out the rest of the coffee, add the water, start up the coffeemaker, I realize I should probably call Scarlet. She’s number one on my speed dial, with work as #2. I hold down the button until the phone begins to ring and bring it to my ear. She answers quickly.
“CJ? What’s up? Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. But… Cassie is coming tomorrow. I’m gonna call her in the morning. I’m seeing her.”
“Oh man.” Scarlet sucks in her breath. “It’s really happening, huh?”
“Yeah. I’m terrified.”
“I can understand that, babe. Listen, though, I gotta get to the restaurant. You caught me at just the right moment, I just left the clinic.” Scarlet works as a paid intern at a pediatric clinic as part of her pre-med training and then at a Mexican restaurant for extra cash.
“I gotta leave for work soon too. Call me later, though. I really need to talk about this.”
“Of course, CJ. How about we meet at Starbucks at 10:30? I’ll buy you a coffee or something.”
“Sounds good. I’ll see you then.” I hang up just as the coffeemaker beeps. I pour a mug and sit down on the couch, where the cats are sleeping. Holden stirs slightly and opens his blue eyes. I stroke his striped fur and sip my coffee, waiting for the clock to hit five-thirty. When it does, I pull my hoodie on, grab my phone and keys, and head out to my car. The October wind is biting.
As I drive along, I turn up the radio and sing along to a random Avenged Sevenfold song. Before I know it, the red sign for Bamboo Garden appears. I park in the back and head in, shielding my face against the wind.
When I enter the kitchen, Alanna is stirring a pot on the stove and Brock, my other co-worker, is filling water glasses. He blows me a kiss as I pass him and I playfully slug him in the arm.
“How are you, Miss Chelsea?” Brock is Southern as they come and even gayer than that. He’s a true sweetheart and a great waiter too.
“I’m okay. Stressed.”
“What’s going on, my darling?”
“Cassie’s in town and I’m seeing her tomorrow.” It’s all I need to say. Brock knows the whole story with Cassie, and he nods sympathetically.
“Nervous?”
“Extremely.”
“Let me go drop off these waters and we can talk about it.”
“Oh, sure, make me do all the work,” Alanna quips from the stove.
“You’ll be fine, Alligator. The place is almost empty. Only two or three tables.” Brock heads out with his tray and I plop down in a chair.
“So the ex is back, eh?” Alanna asks, switching on the rice steamer.
“Yeah. I’m excited to see her, but I’m freaking out at the same time.”
“I get that. I’ve felt that way about guys before. I mean, it’s probably different with girls, but still.”
Brock returns. “So what’s the story?” He sits down next to me and hands me a glass of water. “I mean, besides the obvious. How do you feel about this?”
“Thrilled that I’m seeing her again. I miss her a lot. I’m terrified of what’s gonna happen, how it’s gonna work out. And I’m trying to decide if I want to tell her the truth about why I broke up with her.”
“What’s the truth?” Alanna asks, joining us at the table with a plate of chicken. The smell is tantalizing, but I bite my tongue until the urge to devour it fades.
“I told her I cheated on her, but the truth is that she was so skinny that she triggered my anorexia and made me sicker.”
“Oh, man. And she forgave you?”
“I’m not sure if she ever believed me to start with. She says she misses me, and I miss her. I still love her. I think I always did.”
“I can understand that. I broke up with Derek before I moved up here three years ago. I told him I needed space and freedom to explore, but really, I was just afraid he’d forget about me or cheat on me down in Georgia. It was really hard for me. I told him about a year ago, though, and he forgave me. We’re still friends.” Brock steals a piece of chicken from Alanna’s plate and she slaps his hand. “Hey! I’m hungry!”
“Get your own!” she sneers at him. He gives her the “talk to the hand” gesture. “Damn, someone’s sassy today.”
“Girl, I was born sassy.”
“Got that right. Now get your own food.”
He crosses the kitchen to the stove just as our boss, Joanne, walks in.
“What’s going on in here?” she asks in a mock-scolding voice.
“Brock’s being Brock, Chelsea’s seeing her ex tomorrow, and I’m just chilling here with my chicken and my heterosexuality.” Alanna pipes up. We all burst out laughing.
“Well, I’m used to Brock, and how delightful for you. As for you, Chelsea, Cassie’s here?”
“Yeah. For school I’m really nervous.”
“Oh, I can understand that. It’ll be all right though. From what you’ve told me, she loves you a lot. I wouldn’t worry.” Joanne is a fifty-something woman who looks thirty and acts twenty. She’s the best boss I’ve ever had, and Brock and Alanna are great coworkers. Work is one of few things I really enjoy anymore, even though I’d rather be alone in my apartment.
The other employee for the night, Tara, pokes her head into the kitchen. “I need two waters and an order of dumplings. Steamed.”
“You got it,” I reply, standing up and heading for the stove. We use frozen dumplings, but nobody ever seems to notice. We don’t claim to be fancy, but we’re cheap and open late, and that’s really what sells in a college town. I set a pan of water to boil and then pour out two glasses of ice water, handing them to Tara as I pass the doorway.
“Thanks, CJ.” I don’t know Tara well, but she’s a good employee and nice enough. Cute girl, with long braids and a gap-toothed smile.
The rice cooker beeps and Alanna heads over to dish out food. Brock brings it out and I set a new pot to cook. Joanne disappears to her office. The kitchen is quiet.
It stays calm for the next few hours. Not many customers come in, and the ones that do have simple requests. By the time ten o’clock rolls around, we’ve only served thirty people tops. I hug Brock and Alanna goodbye and drive over to Starbucks, where Scarlet is waiting in a booth with two coffees and a muffin.
“Hey. How was work?” I greet her, sliding into the booth.
“Really slow. Was everyone out for Chinese tonight?”
“Nope. It was pretty empty.” I sip the coffee she hands me and ignore the muffin, greasy and sweet on the napkin in front of me.
“I see. So what are you guys gonna do tomorrow?”
“I don’t know, honestly. We might just hang out at my apartment.”
She raises her eyebrows. “And do what, CJ?”
“Nothing. I’m not gonna try anything. God.”
“But if she makes the move, you’re not gonna say no.”
“If she wants to, maybe. I’m not gonna do anything stupid.”
“All right. Eat that muffin.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“What have you eaten today?”
Silence from me.
“That’s what I thought. Eat.”
“No.”
She sighs. “CJ, you need help.”
“No, I don’t. I’m fine. I’m not skinny.”
“Yes you are, Chelsea. You’re too skinny. But I’ll let it go, for once, because I think you want to talk about the Cassie thing.”
“Scarlet, I think I need to tell her the truth.”
“About her triggering you? And that you didn’t really cheat?”
“Yeah. I don’t think she really believed I cheated, but… I don’t know. It’ll upset her if she knows she triggers me.”
“She deserves to know so she can help you.”
“I’m scared, Scarlet. What am I gonna do?”
“CJ, just tell her the truth. It’ll be better in the long run, I promise.” She yawns.
“Maybe…” I don’t want to talk about this anymore. “How was the clinic tonight?”
“Pretty bad. Lots of kids with the flu. We had a kid puke in the waiting room. It was ugly. His mom flipped on him, too. I felt so bad for him.”
“Poor baby,” I wince. I debate telling her about my own puking session a few nights ago, then decide against it. “You should probably be getting home.”
“Yeah, you’re right. I have a double shift tomorrow at the clinic. You headed home?”
“Yeah, I think so.” I grab my coffee, hand Scarlet hers, and stand up. “I’ll see you later.”
“Take that muffin with you.”
“I don’t want it.”
“Please, Chelsea?” Her eyes are sad and I can’t stand it anymore.
“Fine.” I grab the stupid muffin, wrap it in a couple napkins, and shove it into my purse. “See you later.”
She pulls me in for a hug. “God, CJ, you’re so thin. I can feel all your ribs and your spine and everything.”
I pull away. “Shut up, I’m not skinny.”
She sighs. “I’ll see you later, Chelsea. Don’t do anything stupid.”
When I get home, my apartment is pitch-black. I stumble to the kitchen and turn on the light over the table. The muffin is still in my purse. I fish it out, set it down on the counter, and stare at it.
Grease has soaked the wrapper and the napkins. I peel them off and gaze at the crumbly cake, flecked with bits of grain and chunks of berries.
I remember when I could have picked up the muffin, eaten it without a second thought, and gone on my way. I was young then, probably only eleven or so. Anorexia grabbed me by the throat and dragged me into her personal hell when I was barely fourteen, after years of struggling to lose weight to please my asshole father.
My father. Adam J. Taylor, loving father and husband- at least, that’s what’s on his tombstone. He died of a heart attack when I was fifteen after years of abusing me, my older sister, and my mom. He beat us, screamed at us, called us every insult in the book, and generally treated us like shit. He wanted a son after Cora was born, and he was furious that my mom popped out another girl. He started hitting me when I was two- slapping me across the face for spilling my juice or playing in the dirt- and constantly told me how awful I was. He hit Cora and my mom too, but not as much as me- I wasn’t in school, so he didn’t have to worry about anyone seeing my bruises. My mom worked as a lawyer, so she was constantly gone, and Cora used every excuse she could to stay out of the house. So I spent long days alone with my father, being smacked around for everything and screamed at nonstop.
When I was eleven, he started getting on my case about what I was eating. Whenever I ate more than a couple of bites of anything, he would make oinking noises and say, “Watch it, piggy, or you’ll end up just like your mother. Don’t you know that girls get fat around your age?”
So I decided I just wouldn’t eat.
Nobody noticed. My mother was rarely home and when she was, she was usually locked in her office. I loved not eating- it shut my father up, and it gave me control over something in my shitty life.
By my fourteenth birthday, I weighed 115 pounds on my 5’4” frame. I looked good, but my mental state was a disaster. That was when I realized I was no longer starving to please Daddy- I was a big girl, I could do what I wanted- but to please myself. I wanted to drop more and more weight. Cutting calories, adding exercise. Long days at school, struggling to focus on an empty stomach, and evenings at the gym on the treadmill until they had to ask me to leave at closing time.
This was also around the time I met Cassie. She was my safe haven- I could go to her house whenever I wanted, get hugs and home cooking from her parents, curl up next to her in her tiny bed and feel protected from the world. But then she started triggering me and I started getting sicker and finally, everything collapsed.
I remember the day my mother found out I was anorexic. I was sixteen. My father was in the hospital and would die just two weeks later. She found my food journal, which didn’t consist of much food- gum, coffee, the occasional drink or snort. Lots of cigarettes. Celery and cucumbers, diet soda, and apples. When I came home from school that day, I went upstairs to change into my workout clothes and found a note on my desk, a pink slip of paper stuck to my well-worn gray journal. The page it was stuck to read something among the lines of “no food since Monday, only water”. The note read “We need to talk.” My mother’s small, even handwriting, dancing across the paper in perfectly straight lines.
I crept down the stairs and to her office. The door was closed tightly, but I could hear muffled sobs from within. With a shaking hand, I turned the knob and pulled the door open.
She turned to face me, her face red and soaked with tears.
“Chelsea, what are you doing to yourself?”
“Nothing. I’m fine.”
“That’s not true and you know it!” she cried, banging her hands on the table. “Don’t lie to me, Chelsea Jane!”
“Why does it fucking matter? It’s not like you give a shit!”
“Excuse me?” she roared. I felt my blood begin to boil.
“You never fucking tried to protect me from your husband! Ever! You ran and hid and you kept Cora safe but you never gave a fuck about me! You left me here with him! You let him beat the shit out of me and scream at me and call me all these horrible things and you never tried to stop him! You NEVER FUCKING CARED!”
Her face- and her voice- turned to ice.
“I worked to keep this family alive. To give us a foundation. To give my children something to fall back on.”
“You let your daughter- your own fucking child- go through hell JUST TO PROTECT YOURSELF!”
She slumped into her chair and burst into tears again.
“I wish I was never born,” I snarled, and slammed out of the house.
Two weeks later, my dad died. I refused to go to his funeral. I spent the day getting drunk in my bedroom, alone.

I snap out of my thoughts as my phone starts to buzz. Tears burn the insides of my eyes, but I blink them away and answer with a mumbled, “Yes?”
“Chelsea? It’s me, Cassie. Sorry it’s late; I just wanted to know what time you want to meet up tomorrow.”
I sink into the couch and click on the lamp. “What are you doing tomorrow?”
“I have a class from eight-thirty to ten, so do you want to meet up after then? We can hang out, maybe get some lunch, spend the afternoon together, have dinner. Whatever you want to do.”
“That’s fine. Want to meet up somewhere? Or do you just want to come here and we’ll figure it out then?”
“I’ll just come to your place. What’s your address?”
I rattle off the name and numbers. “Tell the doorman you’re meeting CJ. He knows me.”
“Okay. No problem.” A moment of silence. Then, softer: “I can’t wait to see you.”
A shiver runs down my spine. “Me either. I’m gonna go turn in, so I’ll see you in the morning. Night, Cassie.”
“Good night.”
I hang up the phone and stare at the walls for a while. The cats jump up onto the couch and rub against me. Holden meows and I scratch between his ears.
“I hope this goes well tomorrow,” I murmur towards him. “I just hope everything goes okay. I miss her.”
He purrs gently and I feel a bit of weight lift off my shoulders. “Thanks, baby,” I whisper, stroking his fur. “Nighty night.”
I head for my bedroom, strip down to my underwear, and fall asleep as soon as I hit the pillow. My last thought is simple.
I’m afraid.