I go to the mall because my aunt can’t bend her toe. It’s the big toe on her left foot that is stuck, that will not bend or flex. “It’s because of all the running I did,” she says as she looks down at my thighs, how these thighs are six sizes smaller than they were last year, how I now hold twenty-five pounds less of myself, and how my family worries about this—this fact that now, at age thirty, I have to shop the little girl’s section of Target to find pants that fit. How they suspect I disregard what my two therapists advise—to stop running, because the running will encourage my weight to plummet even more. And how because of this my bones might go, might give out, might shatter. Osteoporosis. My mother has it. My aunt has it. And I do not care for it. I hold my commitment to the eating disorder tightly to my chest, tight like the little girl’s size twelve jeans I am wearing right now, the ones that reveal the lack of thighs my aunt is staring at.
We stand in the middle of a Croc’s store stationed in the middle of a mall. Some mall. They all look the same. Smell the same. I hate malls, haven’t been to one in over eight years. There’s just too much consumerism going on, too many people buying things they tell themselves they need. Not want, but need. Like how I want my aunt to go see a doctor about her toe, but instead she will buy four pairs of Crocs today because she needs them. Because she says they are the only brand of shoes she can wear. Her big toe on her left foot is stuck, it will not bend or flex.
“It’s because of all the running I did.”
I nod my head knowingly, understand what it is she is saying to me. She hurt herself running. I should take this as a warning. The definition of unwanted advice. And the self-righteousness ringing in her voice as she throws this faux-off-hand comment at me. This is her way of addressing my inability to let go of the eating disorder. And her eyes are on my thighs. And I stare at her staring. And I say nothing. She finally looks up to my face. My head continues to nod knowingly. I know of these unspoken things. We both know. But we do not address them directly. No, we do not overtly acknowledge the fact of my unspoken things. Because no, I do not tell her the story of how I ran twelve miles this morning, fourteen the day before.