Chapter Twenty Two:

Ella:

Her mother stopped cutting the lettuce that she had placed on the sink and stared at Ella, her lips curled up in a somewhat disgusted look.

"What?" Ella asked, resting one of her arms on her suddenly upset stomach.

Her mother shook her head.

"Nothing." She said dryly as she put down the knife she had been carrying and grabbed a towel nearby to dry her hands. "Nothing at all."

Ella could feel herself start to get furious. She knew what her mother was trying to do. She was trying to get Ella to realize that her weight was a problem, without actually saying anything out loud so she didn't look like the bad guy.

Ella rolled her eyes.

"What're you making for dinner?" She asked, trying to change the subject.

She could already feel the horrible taste in her mouth start to go away, so maybe there was still hope that she could keep her promise to Antonio after all.

She walked over to the stove and saw that her mother was roasting something.

"Well, the family is having roasted chicken and potatoes." Her mother answered as she went back to cutting up the vegetables.

Ella turned to look at her mother, one eyebrow raised in confusion.

"The family?" She said. "Are grandma and grandpa coming over?"

Her mother shook her head.

"No, it's just us." She said, not bothering to look Ella in the eye.

"Then why say it like that instead of saying we?" Ella asked.

Her mother sighed.

"Because you could do with just having a nice organic salad, instead of the fattening dinner the rest of us are going to have." She answered.

Ella said nothing. She just stared at her mother's back, not really shocked since she had expected her mother to do something like this someday.

She just didn't expect her mother to say it like that.

"Fine." Ella said, walking towards the door again.

"Where are you going?" Her mother shouted from behind her.

"Out to eat." Ella replied coldly.

"Oh no you're not! We don't have money to waste like that, and you don't have a job so you can't pay for it on your own. You're not going anywhere!"

"Well I'm not staying here and watching all of you eat actual food while I get stuck with plants for dinner. I'm leaving." Ella exclaimed as she grabbed her keys from the living room table.

"Do you not see what you look like, Ella?" Her mother shouted again. "You let yourself go! You ruined yourself! You used to look so beautiful, so skinny and pretty. Now you're just the opposite, and all I want is for that old daughter of mine to come back!"

"What happened to a mother's love being unconditional?" Ella said. She could feel the bad taste returning to her mouth and all she wanted to do was get out of there and away from her mother.

"My love is unconditional." Her mother said, and Ella snickered.

"Yeah, as long as your daughters are thin and beautiful it's unconditional. As soon as one of them gains a few pounds, that all comes to an end." She explained.

Her mother said nothing after that. She just stood there, watching Ella, her lips pursed.

Ella rolled her eyes as she put on her shoes.

"You're not leaving." Her mother said, calmly this time.

"Yeah, I think I am." Ella said as she stood up.

"No, you're not. You're not going out to eat junk food!"

"I knew it!" Ella shouted back at her mom. "This isn't even about me spending money, it's about me going out to eat at a fast food restaurant and gaining another few pounds! Newsflash, mom, it's my body! Get over it."

"I can't get over it!" Her mother exclaimed. "I can't get over the fact that whenever my daughter leaves the house, people are always calling me and asking how I could let you get so fat."

Ella looked down at her mother and saw that she was still mad, but now there was a sort of sadness to her eyes too.

"What people?" Ella asked, partly hurt that other people were apparently discussing such a sensitive topic behind her back.

Her mother sighed.

"Everyone." She explained.

"Who's everyone?" Ella demanded.

"Lana and Kristen's mom. Neighbour's. Everyone, Ella. Everyone is always calling me up and asking me why you did that to yourself."

Ella didn't say anything. She just stared at her mother, who had stopped looking at Ella and was now just staring at the ground.

She couldn't tell if her mother was lying or not. Even so, she knew there had to be at least a bit of truth to what her mom had just said.

Some people had to have talked about it with her mom. She didn't know if it was exactly everyone, like her mom had insisted it was, but she knew there had to be at least one or two people.

And that hurt.

Her mother had stopped looking at the ground and was now staring Ella straight in the eyes.

Ella stared back, seeing for the first time what looked like actual sadness in her mother's eyes.

Sadness and a type of vulnerability she never thought her mother was capable of showing in the first place.

That sadness made Ella feel like she could trust her mother again, like she had been able to when she was little.

Suddenly, without thinking, Ella took a deep breath and blurted:

"I think I'm bulimic."

Ella stayed staring at her mother, who had her mouth wide open in shock.

"Excuse me?" Her mother said, her voice cracking.

Ella nodded.

"I think I might be bulimic." Ella said again, this time more calmly.

"Bulimic?" Her mother repeated, and Ella nodded again.

The two of them just remained standing, staring at each other, none of them speaking.

It was partly because Ella didn't know what to say next. Her mother clearly didn't either, since she kept her mouth shut as she stared at Ella.

Finally, after a few minutes of just staring at each other, her mother broke the silence.

"Ella, that isn't funny." She said.

"Who said it was?" Ella asked, confused.

Her mother shook her head and pursed her lips again, clearly all signs of shock erased from her expression.

"Ella, you are not bulimic and you shouldn't joke about something like that!" Her mother shouted.

"Who said I was joking?" Ella exclaimed.

"I don't want to hear anymore, Ella, just drop that sick joke of yours! You are not bulimic, do you even know what bulimia is?"

"Yes, mom, I do!"

"Clearly you don't if you think you're it." Her mother stated. "Ella, a bulimic person is pin thin, skin and bones! You're none of those things!"

"Mom, just listen to me..." Ella started, but her mother interrupted her before she could finish her sentence.

"Enough." Her mother said. "Stop trying to get attention and my sympathy, Ella. You are not bulimic, you're just overweight. Now I want you to drop your facade and tell me that you were just joking."

"But I'm not!"

"Ella, I already told you I didn't want to hear that anymore. Now tell me that you were just joking." Her mother said, placing her hands on her hips in a stern way.

Ella sighed.

Her mother didn't believe her, and it was hopeless to try and get her to believe that she was suffering from something so serious.

She decided to drop the subject and nodded at her mom.

"Fine." She said. "I was joking."

She saw her mother relax when those words left Ella's mouth, a sense of calm falling over her.

"Good." Her mother said as she turned her back to Ella and started walking back to the kitchen. "You know, you might joke about these things now, but maybe sometimes throwing up after dinner might not be such a bad thing for you."

Ella stared at her mother's back, gobsmacked.

Hadn't she just been yelling at Ella for admitting that she had an eating disorder not moments before? Hadn't she basically begged her to admit that she was joking?

And now she had the nerve to tell Ella that making herself sick wasn't such a bad choice for her.

Ella had had enough. She just shook her head and bit back the tears she could feel were about to fall.

"Maybe next time I'll think about it." She said, turning around and running up to her room.

She didn't feel like talking to her mother anymore, and she knew that if she stayed, she might actually throw up in front of her.

The last thing she wanted was her mother to get the satisfaction of her youngest "fat" daughter getting sick because of something she said.

She didn't want her mother to know that she had that power over her.

Ella locked her bedroom door behind her and ran to her washroom. She closed that door too, and knelt over the toilette for a good few minutes or so.

She could feel her body convulsing as she forced her stomach to rid itself of nothing, since she hadn't eaten anything for her stomach to attempt to digest. All of the food she had eaten that morning had probably gone down with the laxatives.

She finally gave up on it, feeling weak, and decided to lay down on the floor of her bathroom, trying to calm herself down.

She replayed her conversation with Antonio, feeling bad that she had tried to go back on her word so soon.

Then she replayed her conversation with her mother and felt herself grow angry, all thoughts of her promise to Antonio erased.

She stood up off her bathroom floor and clutched at her sink, staring at herself in the mirror above it.

"Ugly." She repeated to herself several times as she continued to glare at her reflection in the mirror.

She lifted her shirt and revealed her belly, which was just slightly sticking out. She grasped her belly fat in her hands and screamed at her reflection again, this time yelling: "Fat!".

"Ugly and fat." She sang to her reflection, like some crazy person in a movie. "Ugly fat and worthless. That's all you've ever been, and that's all you'll ever be."

Suddenly, she found herself laughing at how ridiculous she must look standing there and shouting that out to her reflection.

She finally realized how stupid her mother made her look when she allowed her comments to get to her.

She made a promise to herself this time that she wouldn't let that happen to her ever again.

At least, that was before she remembered the website the girl at the party had given her and went on it to see what it was about.

That website changed everything... and it wasn't for the better either.