Chapter One: Goodbyes and New Beginnings

 

I'm a little teapot, short and stout
Here is my handle, here is my spout
When I get all steamed up, hear me shout
Just tip me over and pour me out!

 

            As soon as the words playing on the kids’ channel registered in my mind, I quickly changed the station. It was an innocent song, or so people seemed to believe. To me, though, it was so much more than that. It was a rush of memories, ones I tried to bury in the deepest depths of my mind, but ones that always seemed to resurface at the most unexpected of times.

 

            Marley was to blame without a doubt. She’d been watching television in my room again. She probably thought I wouldn’t notice, and she probably would have been right if not for the fact I rarely ever watched the Disney Channel. Marley, though, she was a typical thirteen-year-old who loved the Jonas Brothers and Hannah Montana. Then, of course, there was High School Musical and the love of her life, Zac Efron.

 

            I sighed, shaking my head and hopefully warding off a teeny overload induced headache, as I settled for the news. I dragged myself out of bed before I began to change out of my pajamas and into the clothes I’d set out the night before. I’d tried to prepare myself for the big day ahead as much as possible, but now that the day had arrived, I couldn’t help but feel completely unprepared for what was ahead of me. I knew it was mostly just nerves finally getting to me, but I dressed slowly, taking several deep breaths and reassuring myself that everything would be fine. It didn’t seem to help much, but at least it gave me something to do.

 

            Downstairs I could hear movement, so that meant that I wasn’t the only one awake. I figured it was my mom. She’d always been an early riser, and she had a day of work ahead of her. This was a point I was painfully aware of because while she set off for a day of work, I would set off for Stanford University. I wasn’t sure what part of this scared me the most. Going to college or going without my mom. Not that I typically clung to my mom or anything. I just hated the idea of riding in the car with my dad, Rick, for nearly an hour.

 

            Of course, my older sister, Aly, would be with us, so that helped some. It also couldn’t hurt that Aly had just graduated from Stanford a few months earlier, so the chances of getting lost once we reached the campus were greatly diminished by her presence. This still didn’t make the ride in the car with our dad sound anymore enticing, but there really wasn’t much I could do to change that. Our mom couldn’t cancel her meeting. I’d asked, many times. But she’d had this meeting planned for several months, and it took her several months before that to even get the appointment. There was just no way she could get out of it. Damn lawyers.

 

            Besides, she’d said, “Elzy, your father is more than capable of taking you. Don’t worry.”

 

            Yeah, don’t worry. She wasn’t the one that had trouble carrying on a conversation with him. But, then, she probably wouldn’t still be married to him after twenty-four years if she did.  I supposed on some level I was just being whiny and worrying over nothing. It wasn’t as if I actually had anything to be afraid of. It wasn’t as if my dad treated me badly. We just didn’t seem to know how to talk to each other. I was sure there could be worse things.

 

            I tried to shake off my worry as I made my way down the hall to the bathroom. I made sure to be quiet because I was sure my brother, Thad, and sister, Marley, were still fast asleep. After all, they still had another week before school started, so that was sure to mean late nights and sleeping until noon. At least that was what it had always meant for me. I envied them that. I really did.

 

            I quickly washed my face and brushed my teeth and ran a brush through my hair. That was my routine, and it was always short. I wasn’t the type of girl that felt inclined to stare at herself in the mirror for any prolonged amount of time.

 

            This used to be because I hated looking at myself. Maybe it still was, but for a different reason now. Before, it was because I repulsed myself and made it a point not to look at my reflection unless it was absolutely necessary – like to make sure I didn’t have anything on my face or, worse, stuck in my teeth.

 

            Now my reasons for avoiding looking in the mirror, while possibly still routing from self-loathing, were slightly different. Most days when I looked in the mirror, I didn't recognize the face I saw. The girl standing there was a stranger, someone I've yet to acquaint myself with, but she had my eyes and lips and when she spoke, she even sounded like me. I just didn't know her yet. Her body was foreign to me. Too small to accommodate me. I felt like a fraud that jumped into her skin, and I was afraid it was going to burst at the seams because she was too little, too delicate to hold everything inside of me inside of her.

 

            I guess for that to make sense to anyone else I’d have to explain some things first. I liked to think of my life in two phases. The first phase was the first fourteen years of my life. I, not so affectionately, referred to them as my fat years because I was. Fat, I mean. 

 

            Those were the days when I weighed more than my three siblings combined. The days when I found myself expanding at rapid speed and outgrowing all of my clothes before I ever really had a chance to wear them.

 

            Those were also the days when the kids at school would whisper behind my back or ‘oink’ when I passed by. The days when Jon Martin would ask how much I sold my blubber for. The days I’d come home, lock myself in my bedroom and just cry.

 

            Those were also the days I tried to forget, tried to pretend they never happened. If possible, I would have erased all of those years from my memory and pretend that the first phase of my life never happened at all. Of course, life never worked that way.

 

            The second phase of my life is still new to me. I call it the thin phase. I suppose the explanation of this name is obvious, but maybe I should really think of my life in three phases because there was a phase between fat and thin. That was the phase when I actually lost all of the weight. It was a four year process, so I guess it would be unfair to gloss over it. Losing a hundred pounds – basically another person – in three years without any type of surgery wasn’t exactly a walk in the park.

 

            But, like the fat phrase, I didn’t like to think about it. Probably because I had to get honest with myself and face everything I’d been doing wrong and become health conscious. It wasn’t easy. Sometimes it still wasn’t easy, but it was necessary because if I was certain of anything, it was that I would not be revisiting the fat phase ever again.

 

            The fourth year of the phase between fat and thin was probably the hardest. I spent more of it in and out of the hospital, letting doctors reconstruct all of the damage I’d done to myself during the fat phase. I guess that was why I was still getting used to my new body and felt like it didn’t belong to me. My last surgery had taken place during spring break of my last year of high school, and the scars were finally beginning to fade away, giving me a chance to finally see what I’d been left with.

 

            As much as I’d like to pretend that losing weight and fitting into the same size of jeans as most of the girls that pointed and laughed at me in the locker rooms had changed everything, I really couldn’t. The kids at school were still the same. Instead of being the resident fat girl all throughout my senior year, I was the former resident fat girl.

 

            Of course, I didn’t expect any different from them, but I suppose that was another cause for my current nervousness. Would college be like high school? And, if so, how would the kids there react to me now? I knew there would be no way they’d know about my former fat status unless I told them, so any judgment they’d make would be based solely on the new version of me. I liked to think of her as Elzy 2.0. The new make, the new model.

 

            But I’d already decided that I wasn’t going to go in and try to pretend like I was something that I wasn’t. I’d never been a big fan of make-up, and it was just too early to really care, first day of college or not. I knew I should have been more worried about making a good first impression, but after my previous school experiences, I knew that it really didn’t matter what you did because people would think whatever they wanted anyway. I wasn’t going to do anything different in college than I had in elementary or high school. I would still be myself because, fat or thin, I was the same girl I’d always been.

           

            With my bathroom routine out of the way, I went back to my bedroom and took a quick look around, realizing this would be the last time I’d see it for a while. I had mixed feelings about this. While there was fear about leaving home, there was also a thrill at the thought of getting out and seeing the world from another perspective. Maybe that perspective would only be an hour’s drive away, but to me, that felt like a whole other world. One that I was scared to death of but also one that I was eager to enter.

 

            I made my bed out of habit, thinking my mother would throw a fit should she enter my room for some reason and find it untidy. As my hands worked to place the pale blue sheets and the quilted comforter in their rightful places, I again felt a wave of worry. Would my bed in the dorm feel as warm as this bed? Because this bed had been my refuge too many times to count. These pillows had absorbed countless tears and bore witness to my pain and struggles over the course of my life.

 

            I shook my head, knowing I was just worrying myself more than was necessary. I made my bed without anymore thought before I slipped my feet into my shoes and switched off the television. I took one last look around before grabbing my purse and heading downstairs. I’d packed up my stuff days ago and I’d already placed most of my stuff in the trunk of my dad’s red Sentra yesterday. Only my purse, backpack and laptop case were left to load in the car, and the latter two were waiting for me by the back door.

 

            I went downstairs, and sure enough, my mom, Amy, was seated at the kitchen table sipping her morning coffee and reading the newspaper. “Good morning,” she said pleasantly, lifting her eyes to look me over.

 

            “Morning,” I answered. “Is dad up?”

 

            “Out for his morning jog,” she replied. I should have known. Even if he had to wake up at the crack of dawn or by some shocking chance, snow decided to fall over the great state of California, he’d still make it a point to run every single morning, as if taking one morning off would somehow ruin his perfect physique. Even I, the former fat girl, didn’t run every day. Three to four days at the gym worked perfectly fine for me.

 

            I turned away from my mom and rolled my eyes as I went to the refrigerator. I took out the Tubberware container full of sliced fruit and scooped some into a bowl before placing it back in the refrigerator and grabbing a fork and walking over to sit down across from my mom at the table.

 

            “I already called Aly,” my mom commented. “She should be here any time.”

 

            “You mean she was actually awake?” I was impressed. Aly was not a morning person.

 

            “Of course not,” my mom grinned as she took a sip of her coffee. “I woke her up, but she promised to be here in half an hour.”

 

            I speared a piece of melon and popped it into my mouth while mentally calculating the probability of Aly actually arriving when she said she would. It wasn’t that she was typically late. She was just slow moving in the morning. For her sake, I hoped I was wrong. Our dad would not be pleased if we got off to a late start.

 

            As if on cue, I heard the front door open and a moment later, my dad entered the kitchen wearing shorts and a t-shirt and his running shoes. “Morning,” he murmured as he went to the refrigerator and grabbed a bottle of water.

 

He gulped it down quickly, and I went back to spearing my breakfast as my mom repeated her comments about Aly arriving soon. I only glanced at my dad, but I could see that he too wasn’t sold on the belief that Aly would be here any minute.

 

            “Well, I’m going to jump in the shower,” my dad replied, seeming to decide that his suspicions about Aly were best kept to himself, as he slipped back out of the kitchen and headed, no doubt, upstairs to the master bath.

 

            Of course, that was the way with our family when it came to Amy Teeger. She didn’t like negativity. Unless, of course, she was the one being negative. Then it seemed to be okay. As for the rest of us, it was best if we kept our doubts to ourselves. Of course, that didn’t mean that we weren’t allowed to feel however we felt. She just didn’t like to hear us whining around about the injustices of trivialities of every day life.

 

            “So, are you all packed up and ready to go then?” my mom asked finally sitting down the morning paper to fully look at me.

 

            “Yes,” I answered with a nod of my head.

 

            She smiled at me, her blue eyes glittering and for a moment I thought she might be about to cry, but instead, she pushed her blonde hair back over her shoulder and sighed and looked away. My mom wasn’t good at goodbyes. I remembered the day Aly left for college clearly, and my mom spent the whole morning trying to act normal, but when she and my dad arrived home without Aly, her eyes were red rimmed and her cheeks were stained. She claimed it was allergies, but I hated to think she thought we were all stupid enough to actually believe that was true.

 

            My mom stood wordlessly then and stepped out of the kitchen. I could hear the heels of her pumps clicking on the wood floors and then when she made her way up the staircase. I hoped she wasn’t fleeing from my sight so she could go have a cry about my departure. I hated to think about causing my mom any kind of sadness. I felt like I’d caused enough of that already.

 

            Before I lost the weight, I knew she could see how miserable I was, and I think that in turn made her feel miserable. Maybe that was why we just never talked about my weight issue. She knew how much I heard about it from the kids at school, and she just didn’t want to bring it up again. Or maybe it just wasn’t an issue with her. I knew my mom loved me. She told me often enough that I couldn’t doubt it.

 

            But my weight was an issue for me because I was the one stuck in the fat suit, and the more I weighed, the unhappier I became. There were times when I’d notice my mom watching me with a frown on her face, as if she could read my thoughts or sense how I was feeling and that reflected in her own mood.

 

            But it wasn’t just that way with me. She was the same way with Aly, Thad and Marley. I used to think that all moms’ moods reflected that of their children. It wasn’t until I met my best friend, Clea Thackery, and went over to her house and found out that her mom was always grouchy, regardless of how Clea or her sister felt, that I figured out that maybe my mom was just more sensitive to our feelings than other moms.

 

            A few minutes later I heard footsteps on the stairs, and for a moment I thought it was my mom coming back, but the lack of clicking heels on the floor told me otherwise. I looked up from my breakfast as my dad reentered the kitchen. He stood there for a moment, looking at me as if he wasn’t sure he wanted to really enter the room, before he put on his brave face and walked over to the pantry, pulled out a granola bar and walked back over to the table.

 

            He sat down slowly, and neither of us spoke, which just seemed to be the way with us.  My dad and I were so different. Sometimes I felt like we were complete strangers. If we were alone in the same room, it always felt tense. It was as if neither of us could think of a single thing we had in common to talk about. I used to always feel like he was looking at me like I was some sort of a disappointment. I suppose this would make sense since he was always health conscience. He ate right, worked out and certainly wasn't about to let himself go.

 

            I, on the other hand, was the poster child for bad health. I hated eating in front of him. I felt like I repulsed him. The funny thing about it was that he never really said anything to me about my weight, so it wasn’t like he was one of those hounding parents that made their kid feel bad about themselves by verbally berating them. It was always just the way he looked at me, and I felt like I could read his thoughts. Why is she eating that? Does she really need that much? Would it hurt her to get off her butt and go for a walk? Does she even realize how fat she is?

 

            Somewhere along the line it felt like the lines between the dad of my reality and the internal dialogue of the dad in my head blurred, and I just seemed to start to shy away from him. I hated looking at him, looking at me, and seeing how disappointed he was in me. Even as I was losing the weight, I still felt that way, like I never should have had to lose the weight in first place.

 

            “Looks like your mom was wrong about Aly,” he commented after a moment.

 

            I bit my lip and nodded my agreement, but I didn’t speak. I was surprised my dad didn’t think I was mute or something because I rarely ever spoke when I was around him. Maybe it was just because he was such an intimidating guy. He was tall and muscular. He looked like he could handle himself pretty well. Not that I was physically afraid of my father either. I just didn’t know him very well.

 

            It was sad, really, but I just didn’t know what to do to fix it. Because it wasn’t like I didn’t want to. Fix it, I mean. What girl wanted to feel uncomfortable sitting across from their father at the kitchen table? What girl wanted to be a mute around their dad? Weren’t girls supposed to love their fathers and go to father daughter dances together? Or cry on their dad’s shoulders when they were upset?

 

            Aly was good at that sort of thing. Of course, Aly was good at everything.             Aly was beautiful and always had been. She was the picture of perfection, and everything I wished I could be. It wasn't just the beauty on the outside. It was her friendly warmth and compassion as well.

 

When she could have turned her back on me and pretended as if she didn't know me to save herself the embarrassment, she instead took me under her wing and made me feel like it was okay to be me, fat or otherwise. She was the best sister anyone could ever ask for.

 

I knew Clea fought with her sister often, and being in the middle of it was comparable to entering a war zone, where items were being pulled from various surfaces and chucked across the room, aimed with great precision, shooting to wound, toward the other's head. The only thing one could to do to avoid being in the crossfire was duck and run. I'd seen enough of those fights to know that while I often felt like life or God had slighted me in some way, at least I'd been given the world's greatest big sister.

 

Then, as if sensing that I was thinking about her, the front door slammed shut and Aly bounced into the room. Because Aly never just entered a room. It was as if the aura around her was just too great to be ignored and heads turned to look at her. She never seemed to mind, and if the heads stopped turning tomorrow, she probably wouldn’t even notice because she wasn’t vain like that, which only seemed to make her appeal that much greater.

 

“Hello,” she smiled as she crossed the kitchen and sunk into the chair to my left.

 

“Good morning, Aly,” our dad replied, eyeing her as if to gage her reason for being so bright and bubbly.

 

I suppose it was odd since she typically wouldn’t roll out of bed until at least noon. I suspected her boyfriend, Joel, must have stayed the night. Sex always seemed to make Aly even more exuberate than normal. Even if it was morning.

 

I didn’t know much about that since my experience with the opposite sex was limited, and what experience I did have wasn’t something I wished to think about. Ever.

 

“Where’s mom?” Aly asked, looking around as if to make sure she hadn’t overlooked her lurking somewhere in the room. “She didn’t leave already.”

 

“No, no, she’s just upstairs,” our dad reassured her. “I think she’s trying to drag Thad and Marley out of bed to say goodbye.”

 

“She didn’t have to do that,” I said quickly, seeming to forget to worry about my usually muteness around my dad. He seemed to notice too because he looked slightly taken aback by the sound of my voice.

 

“Oh, don’t be silly, Elz,” Aly said, either oblivious to the awkwardness between our father and myself or choosing to ignore it altogether. “You’re leaving for college. They have to say goodbye.”

 

Then as if to emphasize this point, the clicking of our mom’s heels echoed on the floor as the sounds of bare feet padded behind her. Then she appeared at the entrance to the kitchen with my two sleepy siblings right behind her.  Marley stifled a yawn, but smiled as she stepped around our mom, and I noticed she was carrying a small package in her hands.

 

“What’s that?” I asked as she held the package out to me.

 

“A gift, silly,” Marley answered, her bright blue eyes somewhat subdued from lack of sleep, but her smile was true. “You’ll have to open it to find out what it is.”

 

“You didn’t have to get me a present,” I persisted, ignoring her obvious teasing, but I took the gift anyway. I turned it over in my hands for a moment, wondering what Marley could have possibly bought for me, and hoping against hope that it wasn’t something to do with High School Musical. The last time I watched something related to it, I had “Breaking Free” stuck in my head for days. I didn’t even really like the song to begin with, and it was pure torture.

 

I noticed everyone was watching me and realized they were waiting for me to open my gift. I tore off the paper slowly, peaking inside slightly and I couldn’t help but feel a great sense of relief upon realizing it wasn’t Disney related in anyway. Instead, in a clear case, I found myself staring at a fifty-dollar gift card for iTunes.

 

“We know how much you like music,” Thad commented, obviously trying to hint that this gift was from him as well.

 

I smiled up at him, his brown eyes meeting my hazel ones, and said, “Thanks, both of you.”

 

“Your father and I have something for you as well,” my mom commented.

 

I sighed, looking up at my mom, preparing to tell her that gifts weren’t necessary, but she hushed me with one look. She walked over to where her purse sat on the counter and thumbed through her wallet for a moment before she pulled out another card. For a moment, I thought it was just another gift card, but when she sat it on the table in front of me, I saw that it was Visa card.

 

“Mom …” I began uncertainly.

 

It was my dad who cut me off. “It’s two hundred dollars. In case you need anything.”

 

I glanced at him, but the stern look on his face made me uneasy, as if he thought I might decide I needed to gorge myself with food or something like that, so I looked back at my mom. “You didn’t have to, but thank you,” I said, trying to force a smile, but I could still feel my dad’s eyes on me.

 

“Only you would try to turn down money, Elz,” Aly chuckled, shaking her head and sending her blonde waves bouncing around her head.

 

I shrugged a shoulder modestly. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to accept gifts. Most of the time I just felt like I didn’t deserve them – especially when it was money from my parents. It wasn’t as if they were in debt, but I did know they paid a lot of money out of pocket for my surgeries. I somehow felt like that had been gift enough.

 

“So, are we ready to head out then?” my dad asked.

 

I nodded wordlessly and stood up, pocketing the Visa card, as Marley stepped forward and wrapped her thin arms around my waist. I was still in awe of the fact she could get her arms all the way around me now. I hugged her back, touching her soft blonde hair and holding her close for a moment. I was going to miss her, but I knew she’d be in the height of her glory having my television to use at her leisure. I was taking the small set Aly had used during her college days as well as a few other various items. I suppose that was another luxury of having an older sibling – hand me downs abound. Unless, of course, you were the youngest because the hand me downs would probably be pretty shabby by then.

 

I squeezed Marley extra hard, as if to apologize for this before I finally let her go. There was sadness in her eyes, sadness I hadn’t been expecting, but I gave her my most reassuring smile. I wasn’t sure it did much good since I was sad as well, but she smiled back at me nonetheless.

 

She stepped to the side by Aly, who wrapped an arm around her waist. I noticed her give her a gentle squeeze as well. Marley glanced at her and smiled, seeming more genuine this time. Aly seemed so natural at reassuring people. I wondered where that came from as Thad stepped toward me. He wasn’t big on the hugging front, but he seemed to sense that this was one of those acceptable hugging moments.

 

He wrapped his arms around me, and to my surprise he lifted me up off of the ground, effortlessly. I’d seen him do this to Aly and Marley too many times to count, but it was still awkward for me. I couldn’t help but think that he was going to hurt himself even though I knew logically this was no longer a threat.

 

“Stay out of trouble, okay?” I said, looking up at him as he sat me back down on my own two feet. It still stifled me that I had to look up to my little brother.

 

Thad rolled his eyes, as if it were a completely uncalled for comment, but he didn’t have me fooled. Fifteen was a great age to start getting into trouble. Especially for him since he’d be starting high school in another week. I just hoped he’d be smart about things. After all, I wouldn’t be there to look after him.

 

“Well, I guess it’s my turn now,” my mom commented, touching her hands to Thad’s shoulders and moving him aside so she could hug me herself.

 

I smiled at her, seeing the sadness yet again before she pulled me into a warm embrace. “Don’t cry,” I whispered into her shoulder.

 

“I’m not,” she said indignantly as she pulled back so I could see her face. “Do you see tears?”

 

“Not yet.”

 

“Don’t worry about me,” she assured me and smiled warmly. “Aly and your dad will help you get settled, and I’ll call you tonight when I get home from work. I’ll want to hear all about your day.”

 

“Okay,” I nodded, and I hugged her again. “Good luck with your meeting.”

 

“I love you, Elizabeth,” she said, speaking softly into my hair.

 

“I love you too, mom,” I replied, taking a deep breath, inhaling the scent of her perfume – vanilla and raspberries - and hoping that I wouldn’t be the one who started crying instead.

 

“Okay,” my dad said, seeming to realize that maybe this was about to become a true Hallmark moment with tears and the whole shebang and thinking it was his job to put a stop to it. “We better get going.”

 

My mom pulled away from me slowly. She looked at my face, as if searching, but I had no idea what for, before she kissed my cheek softly and smiled. Her eyes were glistening, and I suspected the tears would begin as soon as I was out the door. “Okay, you have fun and don’t be scared. It’s going to be great.”

 

I nodded my head, even though I wasn’t exactly sold on the greatness of the experience soon to come. Voicing that belief would be negative, and obviously that wasn’t acceptable – especially since my mother was barely holding it together, despite how well she seemed to think she was hiding her true emotions.

 

“I’ll talk to you tonight,” she said and stepped away from me.

 

Then Aly and our father were ushering me toward the back door as I pulled my purse across my shoulder. I didn’t look back as I grabbed my bags from by the door because I knew I probably would cry. After all, this would be my first time away from home and my family for any extended amount of time.

 

I missed them already.

Reviews

Wonderfully crafted first chapter. It gave enough back story while still keeping the story moving with the family 'conflict' (may not be the right word for that but the uncertainty and stuff like that she feels around her father) that keeps it interesting. Like the prospect of an uncomfortable car ride and a girl starting off on a adventure while she's uncomfortable in her own skin. I think its also very touching and will allow for Elzy to have a lot of personal growth and eye opening experiences in later chapters. I think its great. There;s a lot of directions this story could go. Goodluck!

[miss sunshine]

I really liked the beginning of this. I think you've captured the emotions of leaving home for the first time really well, Elz's mum reminds me of mine when I went off to uni so I can relate. I also like that you're tackling the issue of insecurities when it comes to weight- even though Elz has physically conquered it, emotionally she still has a long way to go. I'm looking forward to taking that journey with her. :)