𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐟𝐨𝐨𝐥

027. christina cunningham.

TW: mentions of past eating disorder.
(not too detailed.)

CHRISSY FLAT out giggled and covered her hand when she saw the text saying anything for u baby from Key. She doesn't even know why she feels the way she does, but nothing else has made her feel like this, not Jason and she finds it so refreshing it's someone she's actually attracted to and genuinely likes this time around.

But then her mom called her down for supper so she couldn't even reply, leaving her phone and joining her parents at the table where they're enjoying some Chinese take out her mom picked up and brought home when she came back from her errand runs of the day.

She doesn't feel guilty about it, like she usually does and actually finds the meal fulfilling. Afterwards, she likes to go on walks with her dad and it's usually just around the block, sometimes to the park just to sit at the bench there and talk. Today is one of those days as her dad sits first, patting the spot and smiling at his daughter. She sits, smiling back and Mr. Cunningham sighs quietly.

"Christina, I hear... you've been going steady with Mr. Wilson's daughter?" He says and Chrissy laughs, scrunching up her face. "Dad, come on, don't say going steady. No one says that anymore." She says and he laughs. "Okay, dating, is that the correct term in your generation?" He asked her and she just glanced away, faintly smiling.

"Yeah... Key and I are dating." She says, fidgeting with her hands because, when she was growing up, her dad was always going on and on about how she's so good with playing with her dollies, pretending to be their moms, that she'd be a good mom one day and stuff like that, mostly with the hope it'd be with a man. Chrissy knows she can totally have a baby with another woman as the other mother, but she also feels sad for how her father use to hope for her future, perfect marriage, perfect husband and the perfect family like theirs.

Christina Carver. Would've sounded gross honestly. "Dad?" She looks over and he glances away from the view, smiling at her as he hums. "Do... you still love mom? I mean... you guys barely look at each other." She looks away and he just looked the other way, before getting up. "I'm feeling a stomachache coming on, we should get home..." He says and she feels bad, feeling like she's the reason the mood became sour as they walk home.

"I'll always love your mom." He says on the walk home, rubbing his stomach as he does, so maybe it wasn't an excuse or lie. "We had our rough patches, as you know, because... well, obviously you know." He sighs and she quickly looked down at the ground as she walks a couple feet behind her dad.

"But she's the love of my life. I guess that's why we act the way we do... because I never thought she'd ever say words like that to the miracle we created together." He says and Chrissy pursed her lips, thinking back to that time. It was maybe two years ago, her mom noticed how thin she got, her ribs were showing, she barely ate and when she did, she'd spend a couple of minutes in the bathroom, running the water.

And Mrs. Cunningham had her suspicions of what it was, she'd sometimes sneak over to Chrissy's locked bathroom door and hold her ear to the window, listening to her daughter retch and then the toilet flush. She confronted her daughter one night, when Chrissy sat down for dinner to find her plate empty so she reached over but her mom stopped her, basically slapping her hand away.

"If you're just going to be eating the food and vomiting it out anyway, why bother?" She had asked and Chrissy stared at her like a deer in headlights, her dad was only shocked, looking over at her fifteen year old daughter. "Christina, is this true?" He asked and she glanced st him then gently shook her head.

"Oh, come on, don't sit there and lie to your father, who works hard to put this food on our table to feed us. Now that's just cruel. But at least you noticed how fat you were and decided to lose the weight. You wouldn't wanna be some ugly, fat cheerleader. And Jason would've found you disgusting." She said and Chrissy just blinked, feeling the stinging tears before she quickly got up to leave.