AllFreeNovel
Share Us
CHAPTER 5
In a moment as rare as a Loch Ness monster sighting, Everly’s brother and mother were both standing in her apartment at the same time.
In her bathroom, to be exact. Well, technically, Ellis was loitering awkwardly outside of it, but their mom’s tiny body filled the space until Everly’s lungs tightened like there was no air left.
“Explain this to me again.”
Everly sighed. “You know what’s going on, Mom.” Though she’d told her family about being on the show weeks ago, her mother had not taken it well, nor had she stopped reminding Everly at every opportunity that she disapproved of this decision. So Everly shouldn’t have been surprised to find her on her doorstep this morning before her alarm went off. It was the first morning of filming, and Penny Winters was not exactly known for letting a topic go before she had beaten it fully to death.
Everly tried to focus on her reflection in the mirror. Logan would be here any minute to get her geared up, and she was trying hard not to succumb to her nerves, which felt as raw and electric as a live wire.
Her mother’s presence was not helping matters.
She frowned at Everly. “I just don’t understand why you would want to be on a show that encourages people to be fat.”
A frustrated groan rammed its way up Everly’s throat, but she swallowed it down. “That is not what it does. It shows people how to feel good about themselves exactly as they are.”
There was so much more she wanted to say. Like how after watching the episode where Hannah tried on a crop top for the first time, Everly had cut the bottom off an old T-shirt to see how she’d feel in one. And she’d cried because she’d looked just as good as any thin person. She hadn’t had the courage to leave the house in it yet, but she wore it around her apartment, and it was the most skin she’d shown outside the shower in years. She wanted to tell her mom about the forum post she’d read where the poster was determined to stop calling themselves fat when they were having a bad self-esteem day, because they realized the damage it caused after watching Nelly’s episode. This show made a difference every day.
“Which makes them not bother to lose the weight,” her mom declared.
Strangling the handle of her brush, Everly pulled it through her straight, reddish-brown hair. This was why it was easier to shut down and stay quiet. The road of least resistance and all that. She would never change her mother’s mind. For Penny Winters, weight loss was the magical cure for everything. A bad day at work? Lose five pounds. Money trouble? Just diet a little. Global climate crisis? Drop a size. But losing weight was not easy, or even safe, for everyone, and, as earth-shattering as this fact might be to her mother, being as small as possible was not what everyone wanted. It wasn’t whatEverlywanted.
“Ma.”Her big brother to the rescue. Ellis and their mother exchanged a glance that stopped whatever words might have been poised to leave her mouth, as if the two of them were twins who shared a secret language.
They might as well have been. Though almost a foot apart in height, Everly’s brother and mother had the same slim shoulders, straight back, and blond-copper hair. Their chocolate-brown eyes, bow-shaped mouths, and high-arching cheekbones all a match. It was like someone had photocopied her mother and then stretched her out and squared her off to make Ellis.
Meanwhile, the only thing Everly inherited from her mother was her congenitally missing teeth, which had led to a fun half decade of braces.
The rest of her echoed her father—average height, round cheeks, greenish-blue eyes, hair somewhere between auburn and brown. Every time Everly glanced in the mirror, she saw his face and wondered how he could leave her behind when everything about her claimed him. Ellis insisted they didn’t need him, but their father was an internal scab she didn’t know how to stop picking at, even fifteen years later.
Her mouth a taut line, Everly’s mother swept her daughter’s hair off her shoulder. “You should add a little more makeup.” She frowned at the mirror. “And maybe have gotten a haircut and a new outfit.”
Everly ground her teeth. “Mom, the whole point of this is to be myself. I don’t need a makeoverforthe makeover show.”
“But you’re going to be on TV. You want to look your best. That’s the point, right?” Her mother had somehow armed herself with a powder brush and was aiming for Everly’s cheeks.
Shaking her head, Everly ducked toward the door. The point was to learn to be comfortable as herself. And to reclaim some of the person she’d lost over the past few years.
ImaginethatEverly. She’d have a booth every year at the Collective. And her own chair at a tattoo studio. She’d be wearing the bold, bright,loudpatterns she loved. And she’d probably have asked James out by now. Maybe they’d be dating—living out some of the stairwell fantasiesshe’d only allowed herself to think about in the privacy of her own bedroom, covered in darkness.
The thought alone brought enough color to her cheeks that her mother set down the brush. Instead, she turned to exalting the miracle (according to her) that was shapewear as she followed Everly into the living room/kitchen combo that made up most of her apartment above the garage.
Everly almost jumped when her mother grabbed her hand and squeezed. “I just want you to be happy,” she said. “That’s why your brother and I are here. We wanted to make sure you were okay for your first day.”
It was clear she meant it, even if she didn’t understand what happiness looked like for her daughter. This had always been the way with her mother: the best of intentions, the worst executions. Everly squeezed her mom’s hand back. “Doing this will make me happy.” Her gaze cut between her mother and her brother. “And having you both be a part of it.”
Out the window, she saw a shiny black SUV pull up to the driveway. Logan slid out of the passenger seat a moment later. He was wearing yellow-and-green plaid, his sleeves rolled up again. The muscles in his thick forearms flexed under the weight of the boxes he hefted out of the back.
“They’re here,” she announced. The words kicked her heart into high gear. The moment she stepped outside, this would be it. No turning back.
Her limbs were stiff enough to creak as she trailed her family down the stairs that stretched the side of the garage, watching Ellis disappear back into his house, and her mom climb into the red Toyota she’d had since Everly was in junior high. She rubbed at her arms to try to quell the nervous thrum that buzzed beneath her skin.
How was she supposed to do this? What if she was so awkward or loud or weird that the viewers hated her? What if she didn’t like any ofthe clothes Jazzy picked out? What if Jazzy and Stanton didn’t think her art was any good? What if James came to talk to her while Logan was filming?
That final thought had Everly wishing she could lie down on the stairs. The very idea of her and James on film, for anyone to watch, to speculate about, to laugh at, blew her knees right out.
She had to grip the railing to pick her way down to the driveway.
