School’s a torture chamber,

especially since

my best friend moved away.”

“Sounds like you’re being bullied.

That hurts. It’s scary.”

“Nothing I can do about it.”

“I can help you confront the bullies

and cope with your feelings,

if you want.

Just say the word.”

“The word,” I whisper.

Doc used Patches to get me talking.

Doggone good trick.

THE QUESTION

A shark invades my safe harbor.

Enemy Number 3 is at a library study carrel,

and when I sit down at one, he gets up

to move a little farther away.

Good!

I didn’t want to sit by him, either.

We’re even.

One of his shoe soles is loose,

flapping and furling,

and he trips over it.

His eyes scan the room.

Nobody saw it except me.

“What are you staring at,

Megaptera novaeangliae?”

The scientific name for a humpback.

I give him points for originality.

In silence, Enemy Number 3 studies, and

I write in my journal until the bell rings.

“Everyone would leave you alone

if you just lost weight, narwhal,”

he tells me as he gets up to go.

“Have you ever thought about dieting?”

And there it is.

The question everybody asks if you’re fat,

as if they’re doing you a favor

to suggest it,

as if an overweight person’s

never thought about going on a diet.

Oy!

ADJECTIVES AND NOUNS

I remember my first diet.

I was four.

On Thanksgiving,

after I gobbled down turkey and

all the fixings and

reached for one of

Nana’s oatmeal raisin cookies,

Mom slapped my hand.

“That does it.

I’m putting you on a diet tomorrow.

You. Are. Fat.”

Technically, Mom used fat

as an adjective

to describe me,

but with her tone,

she made it a noun

to define me.

Until that moment,

I had never thought about

my body being big

and big being bad,

something to be ashamed of,

to hide,

to hate.

But since then,

I haven’t stopped thinking about it.

DIETS, TRIED AND LOST

Thanks to Mom,

if a diet exists,

I’ve tried it.

Twice.

Probably three times.

Grapefruit diet?

Lost weight and gained

mouth sores

from all the citric acid.

High-fiber diet?

Lost weight and gained

these gross things called hemorrhoids.

You don’t want to know.

Chicken diet?

Lost weight and gained

feathers.

Okay. Okay. Okay.

It ended up being

stray feathers from a pillow

stuck to my arm.

But still.

ART LESSONS

It’s as if all my weight’s in my feet,

I drag them so heavily

when I walk in and find

Dr. Woodn’t-You-Like-to-Know

at a table topped with art supplies.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Art is Viv’s thing, not mine.

“We could talk for an hour.”

She bats her lashes as she

peers over the reading glasses

that rest on the tip of her nose.

“Art it is, then.”

I flash a snarlcasm lip curl:

one part snarl, three parts sarcasm.