Here in the ward, we outnumber them. They may walk around with charts and fancy white outfits, but we’re all starving to death. Sure, the IVs fatten us up for a while, but then we go home. Then we resume life as we know it. Life as a battle of will. And we’re winners.
That’s why people fight us. No one likes to see a young girl win. We’re supposed to be nice, well-behaved things. Pliable, fearful things that cry a lot, especially when we have our periods. I don’t get my period anymore. I haven’t bled since I was fourteen.
It happens in high school. Other girls start losing all their power—other girls start only caring about boys—they get fat and self-conscious, their grades slip. They hang out with each other, stuffing their faces with Twinkies and chips. They lie around, watching movies, saying oohh, I wish I was Winona Ryder. She’s so skinny.
They become shy and don’t talk much in class. When a teacher calls on them, they giggle and don’t know the answer. They’re too busy dreaming about being a movie star. Dreaming about an ass they’ll never have.
Not me. I’ve never lost power. In high school, I got straight A’s. I ran on the cross-country track team. I had the lead in every play, I ran the student council, I tutored the learning disabled, I did everything and then some. At home, I came in when I wanted, I bought all the clothes I wanted, I wore all the make-up I wanted.
And I fucked any guy that I wanted. I fucked the quarterback, the editor of the school paper, and the richest guy in the entire school. I count every bite of every thing I eat. I had a notebook for a while, where I wrote it all down. Half an apple. Two bites of toast. What can I say? Self-control doesn’t begin to describe my power.
Oh, here they come again to go check on the new girl. Cute thing.
Paula Bomer, Inside Madeleine, Soho Press (May 13, 2014).