Starved

The skin on her forehead is bloody and cracked. Lips pale, skin a greyish blue. Ellen dips her chin forehead as she massages the base of her neck with her fingertips. 

Mmm. she moans.

Each stroke is a painful reminder of the past week. 

The overdue bills.

Finn is sick.

She takes the tips of her fingers and runs them past her concrete shoulders. Each gentle push cracking a knot.

Ouch. Ellen relieves.

She relishes in this moment, and she wants more. She craves the touch of someone else’s fingertips on her skin, sinking their tenderness into her bones as she melts beneath them.

"Reach your finger tips forward, and we’ll meet in table top", Sally, the yoga instructor says.

Ellen knocks her hands together, each movement slow, a struggle. 

When she looks up, her eyes are struggling to refocus. A watery blur, her eyes holding onto each drop, too scared to fall. 

‘And we’ll meet in a downward facing dog’. Sally calls.

Each toe begins cracking and popping as she pedals her feet on the mat. Conscious of the sounds of her body, Ellen breathes deep, exhaling with a sigh.

The sigh felt heavy, like she just washed away one of her many worries.

My demanding job hours.

The wine stain on the rented carpet.

***

“You look like shit”, Jack says as he lifts the martini glass to his chin.

Ellen cocks her head to the side, placing her roll up to her cracked lips. “Cheers, wanker”’.

Ellen then takes the menu, scouring for the cheapest food item.

Cheesy chips.

A side of kale and pine nuts.

She’s starving. Ellen would much prefer the upside down burger with loaded fries and aioli. But she cant. Ellen's got four pounds fifty to her name, and she has to tip at least two pounds of it before she leaves the restaurant.

“If you’re that strapped El, this is on me”, Jack says as he stares intently at his own menu.

Stubborn, ego bruised, and a people pleaser at her core, Ellen sulks into the menu and looks up, only showing off her large hazel eyes. “No, I got this”.

Jack kicks her foot under the table and gives her a gentle smile. “Please accept a kind gesture from time to time”.

~

Ellen’s belly starts swishing around, recreating the burger she consumed half an hour ago. Her lactose intolerance has denied the cheddar cheese and she's filled with light headiness and nausea.

When she opens the door, her dog, Finn, is pressed up against the stairs eyes wide open and waiting patiently for Ellen.

“Hey, baby”. She whispers, slipping her trainers off her feet and using the wall to help her stand up.

Finn doesn’t move. Wag-less tail and eyes back asleep, he stays as he is, a large hairy lump on the floor.

He’s sick, she knows that. But she can’t help but feel rejected even by her own dog.

Ellen heads towards the kitchen and starts brewing a calming remedy of lavender, lemon and valerian root. She’s on day four of her insomniac episode, and she’s trying anything to help her get a good nights rest.

But she can’t sleep, can she?

She takes one look at the wine stained carpet and her eyes finally release the tears she’s been holding back all day.

I have to be out of here in one month. 

It’ll be two weeks tomorrow that Mike left me.

Ellen’s thoughts spiral into a concoction of mania and rationalisation.

It’s going to be okay. There’s always a way.

What if there isn’t. What if I’ll never get better.

Breathe in, breathe out.

I can’t do this anymore. I need a fucking hug.

My heart hurts, I miss Mike so much.

Fuck Mike, he left you without a word.

What if I lose Finn, too?

He’s still young. He’ll fight this.

What if he doesn’t. What if he leaves me too.

Ellen’s slow sobbing turns into a swift panic. She takes the pillow from behind her head and screams into it, soaking the fabric with dribble and tears.

Finn walks in, his heavy paws clunking against the carpet and stopping at her bed.

His presence soothes Ellen. She pulls the pillow away and lifts Finn up to the bed. His usually high energy, now lifeless and vacant. He closes his eyes, allowing Ellen to fill his fur with more tears.

“Please, please, don’t leave me.” Ellen pleads.

***

“I can’t loan you any more money.” Ellen’s mum says on the other side of the phone.

“Just another grand. I have to make my life work here. You know I’ll pay you back, I always do”.

“I know love. But Graham and I are wanting to go away this year. An Italian summer for our second wedding anniversary. You understand, don’t you. One day, this will be you”.

The cold tone of her mum's reasoning sent her into a numbness she knows far too well.

“It’s fine. I’ll figure out something”. Ellen mutters.

“Okay, love. You know you can always come back here and try again”.

***

Finn passed away peacefully in his sleep. Ellen knew it was coming, but it hadn't stopped her heavy heart throbbing every time she breathed.

Ellen's back at mums. Squeezed into a matchbox-sized room with a single bed that is so small her legs spill off the sides. Mum loves her being back. She’s been knocking at her door every other hour bringing cups of tea and sugary biscuits to soothe her heartache. 

But Ellen constantly feels sick. She would rather not eat. She’d rather dull her senses, pull the duvet over her head and pretend she doesn’t exist.

I'm back at home at 30 years old.

I have to go to go for a job interview tomorrow.

Ellen’s thoughts only scream louder as her mum turns the lights out. Anxiety always catches you late at night. Just as it gets to the darkest shade of black.

But this time, the rational side of Ellen’s thoughts scramble for her phone on the bedside table. She starts typing in the search bar.

‘Meditation to calm the nervous system’.

Ellen starts breathing in and out to the slow sounds of the Tibetan bowls. She closes her eyes, letting the thoughts drift in and out like passing cars.

You can do this. This feeling is temporary.

She manages to go further than she has in weeks. Her whole body is in a state of stillness. For a short moment, she forgets she’s at mums, that Finn is dead, that she’s broke, single and thirty. She isn’t her right now. She’s just a soul in a body that doesn’t belong to anyone or anything or anywhere.

She's starved herself for so long, she doesn't know who she is any more.