Stella scowls at Jessie, but I think that just motivates her to lecture us in an even sterner tone of voice. “There’s clearly no better time than the present to start building camaraderie. Remember, it’s important to work together to try to integrate everyone’s ideas. And I expect everyone to keep an appropriate, positive attitude as you work. By this Thursday, you guys should have a list of the things you need the camp to order to decorate the cabin. There are paper and pencils in the next room. Why don’t you all get started?” //
So begins the first brainstorming session for Project Safe Space, or, as Stella takes to calling it half an hour in, Project Doesn’t This Violate Some Sort of Labor Law? I’m not sure how to quantify the amount of progress we make over the next two hours. We decide, for example, that the color scheme will not include orange or yellow or violet, because Mason will “literally do everyone a favor and vomit on the walls,” or black or gray, because, as Ben notes, “Is there any better way to encourage someone to hang themselves from the ceiling fan?” We also decide that the cabin cannot have any mirrors, as that would be insensitive to people with eating disorders (“and people with faces like Mason’s,” Stella adds), and duly note that “posters of some made-up inspirational Marilyn Monroe quote about loving yourself printed over a picture of the sun setting over the Appalachians” are unacceptable on account of being “bullshit, and also way too girlie.” Things we do not manage to decide: what we actually want the color scheme to be, what wouldn’t be horribly offensive to put on the walls, literally anything else. It’s almost incredible, how much a group of five people can disagree on. I’d be impressed, if it weren’t so discouraging. //
“We should get one of those four-seasons painting collections,” Ben suggests. “That’s literary and calming.” “No,” I say immediately. It is the second time I’ve spoken in here. Everyone turns around to look at me and I feel myself flush. “It’s just—There would be four,” I say. //
“No kidding,” Stella says. “A four-seasons painting collection would have four paintings?” She’s sprawled out on the floor of the cabin, doodling on a sheet of paper. Her nonchalance is suddenly infuriating. “Shut up, Stella,” I say. The panic is rising up in my chest and I can feel my breath slipping away even as I say the words and I squeeze my eyes shut to try to get it to stop, but I can’t; it won’t—that’s never worked before and it doesn’t work now. The images come on too fast, too vivid—four paintings in a row, incomplete, not enough, not okay, not good, not safe, dangerous; four, and I can feel my brain short-circuiting; four, and I am watching the cabin get destroyed in front of my eyes; four, and disaster after disaster plays out in my mind, an uninterrupted sequence of catastrophes, each more real than the last. //
The roof, caving in after a snowstorm. The walls, blown over by torrential wind. The entire cabin, burning down after a candle falls or some idiot tries to smoke a cigarette indoors. Someone trapped inside, someone crushed by logs, someone burning alive, someone—“Clarisa!” Stella shouts. I open my eyes and realize that I’m shaking. 1, I think automatically, counting breaths, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. //
“Are you okay?” Ben asks. He moves over next to me and tries to put his arm around me, but I shake him off. I can’t take the contact right now, and I don’t deserve the comfort, anyway. “If we’re going to have paintings, there have to be seven. It’s the only way the cabin can be safe,” I say, avoiding eye contact with everyone. There’s no response. It’s the only thing that’s been suggested that no one argues against. //
DINNER IS WHEN everything gets fucked up.
Breakfast is okay. A bagel is 450 calories—around there, anyway—and I know I need to eat around there on most days, just to stay alive. Eating less than that is how The Incident ended up happening, and—well, I’d obviously like to avoid a repeat of that in the near future.
Lunch I just throw out, because there are so many people milling around the picnic area that it’s easy to slip to the trash cans unnoticed, and because I’ve already gotten my 450 calories for the day, so what’s the point? Stella gives me a sort of suspicious look as I sit back at the table, plate totally cleared, but what is she going to say? “Go get your lunch out of the trash and eat it”?
Then dinner comes around, and I discover quickly that I am totally, totally screwed. Jessie spends the entire meal sitting at our table, talking to us about how our day has gone and whether or not we’re enjoying our time at camp so far. I’m so agitated that I barely have the mental focus to listen while she and Stella get into their seventh fight of the day after Stella sarcastically describes Project Safe Space as “fucking delightful, thanks for asking, Jessie.” Will Jessie care if I leave dinner without eating anything? Will Jessie notice if I leave dinner without eating anything? The look she gives me when I try to edge off the table midway through her argument with Stella says pretty convincingly that yes, she would care, and yes, she would notice. So—and what choice do I really have here?—I force myself to eat.
It’s kind of sad how quickly I stop wanting to get better. At 500 calories, “better” seems like a pretty okay thing to be. But then I get halfway through my spaghetti—+100, +200, +300, +400—and I can practically feel the carbs becoming fat and I’m thinking about all the work I’ve put in to get to where I am now and “better” starts sounding a lot like “disgusting.” It’s hard to want to get better when I’m staring down the calories in my head, I guess is what I’m trying to say.
I want to go to bed the second Jessie tells us we’re done for the day. If I go to bed, then I can fall asleep, and when I wake up, it’ll be morning. Back to zero. Fresh start, new beginning. But I can’t. I’ve just eaten an entire meal, and if I take off my shirt to go to sleep, I’m going to look down and see my stomach protruding and I just—I can’t. I know what it looks like, and I can’t look at it right now, and I know it’s there, so I can’t not look at it if I do go to bed, so I sit in the lounge and watch Mason and Ben argue over whether or not movies have any value to society. I want to grab my guitar from my room and write music, but everything I write in moments like these is crap because I can’t think straight, and besides, my band fulfilled its quota of sad ballads about hating yourself, like, three EPs ago.
I know something’s up when Stella joins me on the couch. She’s pretty much refused to talk to anyone the entire day, and I don’t think I look particularly fun while drowning in my own self-hatred.
“So,” she says. “You’re in a band?”
“Yeah,” I say.
“What’s it called?” She doesn’t sound genuine exactly—more like she’s referencing an inside joke between the two of us that I’m too stupid to even know about, or have somehow forgotten. But she also doesn’t sound completely offended at my existence, either. I take this as a good sign.
“Um, The Eureka Moment,” I respond. “Because, like, we were all sitting around Aidan’s basement, trying to come up with a band name, and no matter how long we brainstormed, we just couldn’t think of the right one. Like, dude, we were throwing around options like Abyss Gazers and Between Bruises—it was bad. I called Aidan’s suggestion some ‘tween pop bullshit,’ which is pretty much the worst thing you could say to a serious musician. Anyway, before Aidan could punch me, Jake was just, like, ‘Guess we’re still waiting on that eureka moment, huh?’ and everyone realized that that was it, that that was—”
“That’s cute,” she says, cutting me off.
Anything else, I probably could have taken. She could have called it weird, or stupid, or even asked if we’re a “real band,” like every adult insisted on doing when we first started. She could have laughed out loud, for all I care. But cute is too much.
“It’s not cute,” I say. “It’s not cute at all—we spent, like, three hours coming up with it and would’ve spent three more hours coming up with something