My Mission
by Madison Wells Bunting
after Carmen Maria Machado
Growing up, the kids in my neighborhood would always laugh and call me names. The girls would refuse to be my friend, and the guys would play pranks on me. I had always felt out of place, yearning to fit in. I was this odd girl with a weird style and short brown hair; the only thing I liked about myself was my eyes. They were as blue as the ocean--or so went the only compliment I ever got. It almost felt like an experiment where all of us were being created in a simulation, and I wasn’t supposed to be part of it.
I managed to make it through middle school and became the new girl at a brand-new high school. This is when my body started to fill out, a “late bloomer” as they say.. My breasts grew slowly, not in the plump and round way society liked. They hung low and small, with stretch marks and fat on my arms. My legs grew longer, but my butt wasn’t as round and large as I found the boys my age liked. I felt far from beautiful.
Every day felt like a repeat. School. No friends. Mean boys. Nasty comments. Rivers of tears. Whether I was wearing the wrong colored pants or my belly rolls were showing, I would find comments on my social media degrading my appearance. Until I saw her. There was something about her that would make my heart rise, and the butterflies in my stomach flutter. She had long, luscious golden locks and the perfect body, the body that guys craved and girls wish they had. Hell, even I wish I looked like her. I even just wanted to be near her. If anything, I wished to just be followed by her on Instagram. I made it my mission to become that girl.
***
Week 1: Weight 145 pounds
Scale. Scale. Scale. Looking through the long, thin mirror, I saw a figure that needed to be fixed. Altered. Changed. I looked in all directions, left, right, straight on, and behind. All I saw was a version of myself I wished I could make disappear. Stepping onto the scale, my weight was 145 pounds today, far too heavy for a girl like me.
Week 2: Weight 140 pounds
Run. Run. Run. I ran until I was near passing out and vomiting uncontrollably. I ate less and less, counting the calories. Looking in that same mirror, I started to see hope.
Week 3: Weight 135 pounds.
Cardio. Cardio. Cardio. My stomach was an empty pit. My ears came to know deeply the flushing of the toilet after every meal. But the more I looked in the mirror, the more I learned to love.
Week 4: Weight 130 pounds.
The kids in my school began to notice. The boys looked at me with the eyes that made it known they wanted you and the girls to complement. I changed my style to fit the norm, and I got extensions in my hair so it could be at a length that the boys could like. I even got a boyfriend who was popular and wasn’t bad to look at. Although I never felt those butterflies in my stomach, I received a lot of likes and comments on my Instagram for being with him. My social media following grew, and I started getting invited to parties.
Week 5: Weight 125 pounds.
I couldn't stop. I refused to eat, and when I did, the sound of the flushing toilet came again. I looked in the mirror once again, but I found my body slowly fading. It started with my arms and legs.
As weeks passed, I felt thin enough to rest my mind at night. Although my nightmares consisted of food, I always ended up on the scale before I woke up. But every morning, more of my body slowly began to disappear; this time, it was my torso.
I had sex for the first time with the same popular boyfriend, it was painful and, in a way, numb. I felt nothing; no matter how much I changed my body, there was still a part of me that I knew I could never change, no matter how hard I tried. I couldn't help but picture someone else. My desires were locked in my chest along with the girl I hated. The next morning, I looked in the mirror, but this time it was only my face left.
I found that using makeup helped me feel confident enough to cover my face entirely. I have now become that popular girl, the long, luscious, beautiful girl I wanted to be. I became the mirror now, looking at who I created in that same simulation, the girl I knew was gone. Lost. Drifting in the unknown.
I became the girl I sought after the most. Yet, no matter how many Instagram likes, comments, or glances from boys, the hole inside me continued to grow. I felt an utter loneliness and an unbearable hunger to lose more weight. It continued to get worse as the years passed, and my family grew concerned about me and rarely ever saw me indulge in food.
That's how I ended up here in the mirror again. I don't know if I will ever find the will to eat. look through the window at the luscious locks of beautiful blonde hair, on her now slimmer body, walking down the long and narrow hallway across from the room I was in.
I knew it was her. She was here.
Madison Wells Bunting is a returning student in her second year at Columbia College. She is on the Women’s soccer and tennis team, pursuing a major in Marketing with a minor in English. This is her first published story.