2 ⋆ ˚｡⋆୨୧˚Chapter 1˚୨୧⋆｡˚ ⋆

I stare a the digital clock on my nightstand, one of the few things I've unpacked. 5.57 PM it showed in bold red numbers. I sighed. Any minute now Leila would come knocking on my door sating it was dinner time, a time of day I absolutely dread. At school it's always easy to tell my classmates that I forgot my money at home, or stating I wasn't hungry. At my old school, this was a thing.

I opened the closed box sitting on my bed with the word 'desk' written in black bold letters. The box was fairly heavy, all of my painting stuff was in here and that was a lot of things. One by one, I list up my stack of pencils and paper and lay it it out on he desk not far from my bed.

We've lived here for a week and I hadn't bothered to unpack yet, I always hated packing and unpacking my things. It reminded me of a time I didn't want to go back to. Felix and Alex had already unpacked their rooms and Leila and Greg had almost finished unpacking the whole house. There were still a few boxes here and there, that is to be expected when you move thousands of miles away from your home town.

A knock interrupted me as I walked back and forth with painting things. "Honey?" Leila's voice softly asked behind he door.

"Yes?" I asked a little louder for her to hear me behind the door.

She tried o open the door, but failed. I was only in tank top and shorts, there was no way in hell I was letting anyone see me in these clothes. I could hear her sigh before she spoke. "Dinner's ready downstairs."

"I'll be down in a sec." As I heard her footsteps walk down the hall, I changed my clothes and hurried to the bathroom. While grabbing the empty glass standing on the sink, I turned on the faucet to lukewarm water. I drowned 5 glasses before I walked out of my room and down the stairs, to the dining room.

When I got downstairs everyone was seated in their normal spot. It hadn't changed even though we moved. Felix and Alex were sitting next to each other. Leila on the corner beside Felix, in front of Greg and beside Dakota. My seat was beside Greg and Dakota, also adopted as me.

The food rested on my plate as I took a seat, everyone else was already eating. Slowly, I started eating small bites, taking water in between almost every bite to make me feel full faster.

'Don't forget how much calories there are in this. How much fat. It sticks to your thighs immediately.'

The portion of food looked much bigger than it was yesterday, or for lunch today.

"How was football tryouts?" Greg asked his two sons, Felix and Alex.

"Good." Felix answered with food in his mouth.

"I think we made it." Alex said after he swallowed his bite. He out of the twins had manners, no talking with food in you mouth, respect your elders. He was a gentlemen.

"Oh really?" Leila jumped in. I sat there in silence with Dakota as the family talked to each other. We both knew they loved us, but sometimes we didn't feel included.

"Yes, I think we were on the better part of the team." Alex beamed with joy. He always wanted to be the quarterback and get a full ride scholarship and play for Ohio State Buckeyes. Felix wanted that too, of course. But he didn't want to make a career out of the sport. He had a dream of going to med school.

The conversation about the football team continued whilst Dakota and I sat in silence, slowly eating our food.

After a quiet dinner and convincing Leila that I had eaten enough, I made my way to my room. There was no doubt in my steps as I walked and locked my bedroom door behind me. To make the sound that I was about to do more quiet, I closed the bathroom door as well. I threw off my hoodie and sweatpants, leaving me in a tank top and underwear.

I gaze at myself in the mirror, my brown hair was up in a messy bun, I didn't wear any makeup so you if you looked closely you could see the darks circles under my eyes. My collarbones were visible and I could see my hipbones and an outline of my ribs through the tank top I was wearing under.

But then I look at my arms, it was bumpy with white, red and pink lines all over, both veridical and horizontally. The stitches on my left wrist was visible from when I tried to slit my wrist open not long ago.

'Don't just stand there, do what you came here to do'

I grabbed the extra hidden toothbrush under the sink and hover over the toilet and pushed the toothbrush as far back in my throat as I could and started to wiggle it a little until I puked into the toilet.

I continued to make myself throw up until I felt like I was going to faint and I puked up blood. Straitening up, black spots start to blur my vision but cleared after a few moments. Careful not to make any fast sudden movements, I leaned over and flushed the toilet before walking to the sink and rinse my mouth with water before rinsing the toothbrush and putting it back under the sink.

I gazed up and look myself in the mirror over the sink. I looked even more pale now than I did before.