Turn 6 of 8

Tell her the truth about the wish

Lena looks at the ruined table, at the smear of glaze on her thumb, at the way her own stomach rests warm against the wood, and decides she is drunk enough to be honest. That is the excuse she gives herself. Underneath the excuse there is something else, something that wants it said out loud in a lit room with a witness.

"I made a wish," she says. "Six weeks ago. In my bathroom, at about eleven at night, in front of the mirror. I said I wished I could feel comfortable in my body for once. Really comfortable." She wipes the thumb on a napkin at last, slowly.

"And something heard me. And this is what it decided comfortable meant."

Priya's face does the thing faces do when they are waiting for the punchline and the punchline does not come. She glances at the empty wine glasses, then back, and Lena can see her rebuilding the whole evening from the ground up with this new piece dropped into it.

"Okay," Priya says carefully. "You're saying that as a joke."

"I'm saying it as the only true answer to your question." Lena shifts forward, elbows on the table, and the movement pushes the fullness of her up and out and she does not adjust for it.

"I haven't changed anything. I mean I have now, I eat like this now, but the first two weeks I ate the way I always ate. Weighed things. Skipped breakfast. And I gained anyway. My jeans stopped doing up on a Tuesday and I hadn't done a single thing differently. I went to the doctor. Bloods were fine. Thyroid fine. Everything fine."

That lands. Lena watches it land, watches Priya stop being amused, because Priya has known her long enough to know that Lena Park does not invent medical appointments for a bit. The bar noise goes on around them, someone laughing at the counter, a glass ringing in a rack.

"There's a voice, too," Lena hears herself add, and her own calm about it is the strangest part. "Not voices, don't look at me like that. One. It tells me it's better this way. It tells me to let it keep going." She spreads her palm flat over the tight curve of herself and feels her pulse in it.

"And Priya, the thing is — I agree with it. That's the bit I can't get underneath. I agree with it and I can't tell anymore which of us thought it first."