“Fucking Texas,” she said, reaching forward and turning her air vent so it blew toward me instead. Her sweatshirt was over-sized but the sleeves were rolled up. I looked at her forearms, tan and furred, reminiscent of every health class PSA about eating disorders: anorexia, bulimia, laxative use, diet pills, compulsive exercise. As a girl she had been delicate, according to my mother, anyway. Then she had been buxom before it was time to be buxom, a little girl’s soul, trapped in a bikini model’s shape. Now she was just insufficient, her body like a winter coat designed for style, too thin to keep her warm.

Leah spoke about Australia for the rest of the drive. She used the word “pressure” a lot, said her parents worked obsessively, said she was lonely. She was acutely aware of her emotional landscape, her “problems,” which surprised me.

“Running makes me sick,” she said. “But I need it to get by. And to win, I need to stay small.” She said that negotiating the cost of survival was the sad reality of global capitalism. That along with responding to humanitarian crises, rampant racism, cultural appropriation, and economic inequality, on a personal level we were all tasked with determining lesser evils. Which for her meant running and the dietary modifications she imposed upon herself to stay weightless and fast.

“People don’t understand what it’s like for me as a transplant,” she said. “They think that just because Australians speak English it’s not a totally different culture.” She told me she was still a virgin. “Boys aren’t interested,” she said, and I wanted to help her. I considered suggesting she achieve a curvier aesthetic. Until recently, I hadn’t realized that’s what men wanted, so maybe Leah was the same, and simply didn’t know. Then again, she had just told me she was small for a reason, sick for a reason. I didn’t want to make her repeat it.

AT THE HOSPITAL I showed Leah the way to my mom like I hadn’t just figured it out myself. She stood in the elevator, the doorway of my mom’s room, with a shocked look on her face, a stuttering Skype. I walked in ahead, motioned at the blue chemo armchair.

“You sit there,” I said loudly.