This is how you get thin; this is how you get even thinner; this is how you tell yourself to be skinny is to be beautiful; this is what you eat; this is what you don’t eat; this is the proportion of food you are allowed to eat; this is the proportion of food you are not allowed to eat; you can have one serving per meal a day; unless you have the bracelet, of course, that allows you to eat as many meals as you want for being underweight; this is how you cook a healthy meal; this is how you cook an unhealthy meal; this is how you work out; this is how you don’t work out; this is how you use the weights; this is how you do not use the weights; remember not to use more weight than you can handle, work your way up to the top girls; this is how you go to boot camp every day to work off those extra pounds; this is the voice of your mother telling you that this is what you need; you’re getting heavy and need to control your weight; this is how you try even harder on that soccer field even though you absolutely hate soccer; this is how you tread water in a deep-end pool for as long as you can without drowning; this is how you work hard as hell just to make weight that coming Sunday; an empty room; the director, co-director, yourself, and a scale; how many pounds did you lose this week?; Two? Disappointing. Some of the other girls lost 10, 12, 13 pounds, as if I haven’t ******* noticed; this is what it feels like to not “make weight”; this is what it feels like to work, and keep working but never feel thin enough; this is what it feels like run drills as hard as you can just for the adrenaline; just to run for the hell of it even though you’ve always been a terrible runner; this is the constant sound of your mother on repeat; you’re getting fat; this is what it’s like to be there in spite of her; this is how you put walls up; this is how you break them down; this  is  how  you  gain  more  insecurities;  this  is  how  you  shut  them  out; to be skinny is to be beautiful; and this is  how you eventually  realize it never should have mattered at all.