Healing Smile

• Jo Carter, Grade 12
• Short Story
• 2011

She looked the same really.
Her hair was the same colour, though a little more lank than I remember. As usual for Liddy she had foundation on, covering any blemishes.
I could see through it though. I was her best friend and knew all her secrets, but maybe I wasn’t as much of her best friend as I thought. She was here after all. Shouldn’t a best friend notice if the other wasn’t eating? Shouldn’t a best friend have pursed the matter when the other brushed off the fact that she was as skinny as a twig, as pale as anything?
She never had a boyfriend in high school, always telling everyone it didn’t matter, she was better off without one and being her best friend I knew it was how she truly felt. We never got into fights over boys and she was constantly being my wing man.
She looked so out of place in that hospital bed. If I bent down so I was level with the glass pane of the wall looking into Liddy’s hospital room and just viewed the top of her she looked like the Liddy I knew, but when I stood back up she looked like hospital patient Liddy.
Her boyfriend attitude changed as soon as she met Josh, Liddy fell in love with him. She was her charming self with him and he soon was swooning. She was so happy. It made my heart swell with joy.
I’ll never forget the day Liddy and I walked into gym class. I heard his voice and hers before Liddy, but I didn’t have enough time to warn her. She turned and saw them kissing and I could see her heart breaking in her eyes.
But instead of kicking and screaming Liddy held her head high and stepped up on the scales. She weighted a thin 47kg for a 17 year old, but once Carol weighed herself at 45kg Liddy decided she wasn’t thin enough.
That’s when the dieting started. The crazy exercise trends. She went insane trying to become thin for him and it broke my heart watching her eat herself away for a guy who was so obviously not worth it.
Looking at her now I was consumed with guilt. Tears sprang into my eyes. I noticed, I watched her do it. I watched her destroy her body and heart for that person, that thing and I didn’t say a word. I wanted to scream at Josh the day Liddy told me she had been admitted to a special kid’s hospital. They told her she had anorexia after fainting one day at work.
I should have noticed. I should have said something.
Looking forward I swallowed the lump in my throat and took a deep breath. I opened the door and Liddy looked up an enormous grin on her face and I couldn’t help, but smile too.