Turn 59 of 228
Walk her home for the first time and tell her she doesn't have to perform for you either. The last Saturday film night of your vacation comes and Diane has some changes. She seems more relaxed, slightly larger, slightly less put together, and slightly more content.
Lena takes the bag from Diane's hand. Diane's fingers are still trembling and Lena holds the bag and holds Diane's hand for a moment — just a moment, the way a person holds something they're not trying to keep — and then lets go. They walk east. Not toward Lena's building. Toward Diane's. The route is different from the one Lena knows — three blocks north on Garfield, then a left on Elm, past the laundromat Lena never uses and the barbershop that's been closed since she moved to the neighborhood. Diane walks a half-step ahead and her boots are less steady than usual and the leather jacket is pulled tight around her and she doesn't speak.
They reach a brownstone with a green door and Diane fumbles for her keys and Lena says, "Diane." Diane stops. Lena says, "You don't have to perform for me either. You never had to. Not at work. Not at the movies. Not on the sidewalk. Not tonight." Diane looks at her and the tears are still on her face and the green door is behind her and the streetlight catches them both — Lena at 301 pounds and three weeks unwashed and Diane with her shaking hands and her careful face finally cracked open — and Diane says, "I know." She goes inside and the green door closes and Lena stands on the sidewalk for a long time and then walks home.
The last week of vacation passes. The scale reads 301 and then 302 and then 301 again and the wish hums and Lena lives on the floor and the cycle continues and the apartment accumulates and the console glows and the vodka is cold and the weed is strong and the days lose their edges. She doesn't hear from Diane. She doesn't text. She doesn't ask. She lets the green door and the shaking hands sit where they are and she games and she eats and she comes and she wins and the week ends.
Saturday. The last Saturday of the vacation. Lena peels herself off the floor at six-fifteen — earlier than usual, because she wants to walk slowly, because 301 pounds moves at its own pace and the pace is not fast. She walks to the Charleswood and the evening is warm and the sidewalk is rough under her bare feet and the marquee glows and Diane is at the entrance. Lena sees her and stops.
Diane is different. Not transformed — not the way Lena has been transformed — but different in the small ways that add up to something larger. The leather jacket is unzipped. Beneath it Diane's blouse isn't tucked in. Her hair is down — not the ponytail, not the twist, just loose against her shoulders in a way Lena has never seen. Her face is softer. Not rounder, not yet, but the set of her jaw is looser and the lines around her eyes are less precise and she looks like someone who has been sleeping without an alarm. There is a small stain on her blouse — coffee, maybe, or sauce — and she hasn't changed. Her pants are tighter than Lena has ever seen them. Not tight the way Lena's clothes were tight at the beginning — not straining — but tighter, the waistband pressing into a softness that wasn't there two weeks ago. Diane's hands are in her jacket pockets and they're not shaking.