Jared had been passing by, his mind afire with not only new lesson plans for his students, but the arrival of his best friend which had him exceptionally giddy - not to mention his new found solidified friendship with the brunette bombshell Demitria. It was so rare that Jared found someone he could connect with honestly and here he was with two different souls who seemed to not only tolerate him but rather desired his companionship - despite his awkward social behaviour and lack there of. It wasnât as if the tutor was unaccustomed to otherâs liking him quite the contrary - Jared had been exposed to such a fact when he had begun his teaching in Georgia, that people, despite his reoccurring faux-pas seemed to enjoy his presence, despite the majority of that population being high schoolers. The fact never bothered him, on the contrary, having seen himself as a younger version of physical being for quite a long time Jared revelled in the fact that his peers appreciated him. Still it didnât change the fact that these two women had pulled and were pulling him out of his proverbial shell, and honestly, he liked it - in spite of how awkward he might still be.
It was as his mind raced over both his next interaction with the beauty and his most trusted friend that Jared caught the sound of porcelain shattering - ripping his mind from its delighted train of thought and back to reality. He turned, liquid sapphires landing on the source almost instantaneously. A woman, shrunken and small, chocolate mess of hair disheveled and thin, attempted to collect the broken pieces scattered against the linoleum. Of course the fragmented bits of ceramic had been the first thing to draw his attention but second [and only barely] to that had been the girlâs frame. She was so small. Wrists, boney and obtuse - fingers long and skeletal, terrifying probably to the children of Brielle. The tutor was well aware the Institute was home to patients with anorexia, but in honesty Jared had never met any of them, had never seen with his own ceruleans just what the disease was capable of. Truthfully his only exposure to the world of eating disorders was television and movies and of course those outlets never did the focus justice.
He found himself swallowing hard, brows furrowing slightly as he knelt next to her, taking in the dazed look her features displayed. He reached out then, his slender but not nearly as slender as hers fingers reaching out to touch her arm, unsure if the gesture would effect her but finding himself without care. The woman was unwell and the tutor would do what he had to in order to make sure she was alright. âAre you ok?â He asked, voice laced with concern. Heâd make sure she was stable first - then clean up the mess.
Serena secretly enjoyed counting the days, hours, minutes, seconds... since she had last eaten. Of course she would never admit it to anyone. They were already trying to stop her from being PERFECT, why should she add more fuel to the ever burning, ever growing fire? But the fire wasnât just all around her, it raged inside her every day. Orange flickers licked the walls of her failing heart, the disease she couldnât even admit to herself that she had CHARRING her insides, slowly rising within her, until one day, it was going to be too late to extinguish it. A time would come where there would be nothing left of the girl she once was. A happy and studious Type A, with a flare for flirting and an excellent cheerleader at the peak of physical fitness. Healthy, wholesome and capable of loving herself, even if only for a moment.
But in truth, her whole life Serena had struggled with trying to be better than she was. What she had achieved, the determination she had shown to get there, was never enough. Captain of the cheerleading squad, early acceptance to Yale to follow in her parents footsteps, lined up to be valedictorian, a relationship that from the outside seemed to make her happy. It was all a LIE, a cover story for the war raging inside her own mind and body. Her parents knew it and she knew it. The staff of Brielle know it too, and one day her skeletal frame will crumble. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. A final committal of her body to her disorder.Â
For the moment, however, that day had not yet come. The staff at Brielle had worked tirelessly in the past to stop the day from coming at all. But if someone doesnât WANT to be helped, they would be all to aware of the fact that it is nearly impossible to save them from themselves. Perhaps something would change... a light switch turning on, the penny finally dropping in Serenaâs mind but every time they saw her any hope they might have had quickly turned to dread.Â
As she kneeled on the floor the world began to  t u r n , it was as if she could feel every rotation of the earth she stood on, twirling around and around and around and around, so fast that she felt she might fly off at any moment, out into the universe. The empty feeling inside her made her feel so LIGHT. As if she was a feather and if she were to jump up into the air she could just float away into nothingness. She barely noticed the approach of the man. The sound of his voice and the feeling of touch of his fingers on her icy skin swam around insider her head, trying to find their way to her consciousness through all the white noise. After a few moments of being closer to the ground, the spinning finally began to slow, her heart rate beginning to increase. Some time ago her problem had been her heart beating too fast, over compensating for the loss of muscle it had SUFFERED due to her illness, but now a more troublesome problem had arisen and she was now suffering periods of bradycardia. Her heart beating too slow. Bradycardia if serious enough can cause cardiac arrest and death, the doctors had told her as she yawned. It was nothing she hadnât been threatened with before but STILL they refused to find a solution that didnât involve her putting on a few pounds. For a smart girl she really was stupid, blaming anything and everything else as it couldnât possibly be caused by a disease she didnât have.Â
Her vision had eventually begun to clear, though it became apparent that her balance remained off. In an attempt to straighten herself up to view the man before her she toppled almost immediately and automatically reached out her hand to stop herself. A piece of ceramic JARRED its way right into the paper thin skin of her palm on impact. As she turned her hand towards her face to assess the damage the red ink from her veins began to run down the porcelain white of her wrist and onto her forearm. But she couldnât feel the pain. She just felt numb.Â
âWhat did you say?â she finally replied to the man beside her, her head finally settling back to normal and reminding her that he had actually spoken to her moments before. âIâm sorry Iâm not feeling very well today, I think Iâm coming down with the flu,â she lied. An every day occurrence for her.
