Chapter Text
“Mom!” Henry shouted from the doorway, “You’re going to be late for work!”
Emma bolted upright and grabbed the alarm clock on her nightstand, blinking as she tried to process the red numbers. “Shit,” she muttered, realizing they read 8:49i AM. She slammed it back down on the table, pissed that it didn’t wake her in the first place, and swung her feet out of the bed. Black spots immediately started to fill her vision and she fell back down, putting her head in her hands.
“Emma,” her mom called up to her. “Are you alright?”
“Fine!” She shouted back, trying to become aware of her surroundings. Coming into her senses, she became incredibly aware of the hollowness in her stomach as it screamed for sustenance. She smiled to herself as she rose to her feet and changed her clothes, rushed into the bathroom to brush her teeth, and patted down her hair the best that she could.
The blonde came tumbling down the stairs and rushed through the front door, barely listening as Snow called out after her about missing breakfast.
Got to start a morning out right, Emma thought to herself, At least there’s one benefit of over-sleeping.
By the time she got to the station her stomach was loudly protesting and her muscles were screaming at her with every move she made. She plopped herself down in her chair and went to fill her water bottle at the sink. The cool water made itself known every centimeter it traveled down her esophagus and into her stomach. Emma reveled in the feeling of cold water on an empty stomach as she took out a journal buried in her messy desk drawer. It read “Property of Sheriff Swan” on the cover, a gift from her mother when she got the job in the first place.
She flipped to a page about halfway through the journal and read over her handwriting from earlier in the week.
Monday: Apple for breakfast. Water for lunch. Salad for dinner. Ice for dessert. 310 calories.
Tuesday: Banana for breakfast. Salad for lunch. Seven carrots for dinner. 370 calories.
Wednesday: Water for all meals.
Thursday: More water. I’m nearly drowning over here.
She scribbled Friday: Water for breakfast under Thursday and snapped the journal shut, admiring her work. Giving a quick glance around to confirm that there was no one else in the typically empty police station, she walked over to the mirror that hung near the doorway and pulled up her shirt to look at her stomach.
Her hip bones were coming out more every day, and she could see more ribs as the hours passed. A slim finger reached up to trace the outline of her bones and she frowned. Not quite as pronounced as she’d like them to be.
Emma knew she’d have to face the scale today. Tuesday and Fridays were her weigh-in days. When she had started tracking four weeks ago, she was 134.6 pounds, and was hoping to be at 100 by now, but on Tuesday she was 109.2. Taking a deep breath, she walked over and pulled the scale out from her bottom desk drawer and took it to the bathroom.
She stripped completely naked, even taking the time to take off her necklace, and blinked back nervous tears as she took a tedious step onto the scale. Her face pointed toward the sky for a moment before she forced herself to look down at the green glowing numbers at her feet.
103.5.
Now she was really crying. She was so close to hitting 100, but still not close enough. She leaned forward and rested her head against the cold tile wall that stood across from her and let herself cry a bit, wrapping her arms around her shoulders and tracing her collarbones with her fingers. After a moment of self-pity, Emma pulled herself together and re-dressed herself, picked up the scale, and exited the bathroom.
As she turned the corner back into the main room of the station, she froze when she saw her father standing at her desk, reaching for the journal.
“Oh, I’m so glad you’re using the journal, Emma. Your mom was worried you weren’t,” he went to pick it up, but Emma yelped in protest. His head shot up to her in surprise, dropping it back on the desk as though it was on fire.
“Sorry, sorry, private,” he said, approaching Emma to give her a kiss on the forehead. David finally noticed what she was holding. “Everything okay?” he asked, an eyebrow cocked in concern.
“Yes,” she said shortly, walking back to her desk. She prayed to whatever entity was up there looking down that that would be a good enough answer, and that her dad wouldn’t see the red creeping up her face. When David didn’t press the matter further, she thanked whoever was listening. She refused to look at him again, so she didn’t see the concerned glances she was receiving from him every few minutes.
They sat in tense silence until a call came in and Emma immediately took it, walking out of the door with only a “goodbye” and no look back at her dad, a pang of guilt pairing with the rumbling in her stomach.