May 7, 2001
hunger
part eight
this is an au; the topic upsets me a great deal.
by bianca
They stare at her with the lights turned low, for maximum studio effect. She imagines hidden cameras, mirrors that are really windows in every corner. The therapist, a horrible woman named Tracy with a fixation for pigs, narrows her eyes at her.
"Relena, I've heard from people that you've been feeling sick lately." The girl's heart begins to beat wildly, but she swallows, smiles, and says nothing.
The other woman, the school nurse, tugs on Tracy's shoulder and they converse for a moment, beside their hands, school girls talking about the outcast's funny shoes and new mullet haircut.
"Are you feeling sick, Relena?"
'Right now?' she wants to scream. 'Am I feeling sick now, you bitch? You horrible bitch!' They creep closer, making her feel closed in and claustrophobic. She wants to ask to call her lawyer, but knows they would find her unreasonable. From here, everything she says is suspect.
"No," she lies.
"Are you sure?" asks Tracy, as if Relena were a stuffed doll that would ultimately spit out the right answer if prompted.
"Yes," she says.
"I've heard from close friends that you've been throwing up," says Tracy, eyes wide with triumph. Ah, thinks Relena, the first ace has been thrown down. She doesn't ask which sources. It could be anyone, or no one at all. Too many people know for her to be safe.
"I haven't," she says.
"Really?" And Tracy smiles, almost supportively, as if trying to make Relena confess to a crime she didn't commit, leading her to the electric chair with a pan flute and a kind grin.
"Really," she says. The two women pow-wow again, and then the nurse, Falley, shrugs.
"You can go, Relena. We're sorry for wasting your time." She nods graciously, and slides from the vinyl examining chair, wincing at the squeak of her thighs against the plastic.
She turns back, a moment before she steps from the room, and cannot help but feel that the two women are disappointed, having wanted to catch a fellow woman in her ultimate shame, and been denied.
"Goodbye," she says, and leaves the health center.
End Part Eight
Bianca
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