Rupture and Repair (gmw/Lucaya)

Chapter nine

Friday cams quickly. Maya was slipping. She knew too many tricks. She walked everywhere, she never ate more than 300 calories a day, she only showed up to lunch half of the week and when she did, it was all that she ate all day, though she didn't eat up to half of it because she didn't like throwing up. She wore baggy clothing to hide her body and she was always so busy that Riley wasn't expecting her to come to her place daily. The crack was growing as Maya was shrinking, and it was inevitable that she was going to slip through if no one stepped in. In a way, she already had, drowning in her addiction.
Now it was lunch and Maya rolled a clementine around her area at the table.
Riley saw. She didn't know what to do. So she watched. She didn't know the extent of the recently developed eating disorder because Maya's clothes were always so baggy. Lucas was too terrified of the sight of her playing with it as if it were a ball, that he had to speak.
"Do you know how unhealthy your weight loss is?"
"I'm not loosing weight." She said, defensively, looking up and piecing his eyes with her bloodshot, tired eyes from the energy she wasn't getting from food.
"You can seriously say that?"
"Okay, maybe I lost a few pounds. So what? So fucking what?"
"Maya!" She didn't turn at the sound of Cory's voice as he walked over to the table.
"You have detention Monday and Tuesday." Now she looked up at him.
"Seriously. Don't you hear students cussing all of the time and you punish me for one time."
"Because I know you're better than that."
"Better than swearing? That doesn't even make sense."
"Don't argue with me. I know you and you don't cuss."
"Well apparently you don't know her too well." Said Jason, a friend of Mayas, walking by. She rolled her eyes, wishing that he'd watch his mouth sometimes.
"He's right. I guess I don't know you. And neither do any of your friends anymore. Remember the girl that said that she had to be able to talk to us? Where is she?" He walked away.
"Look, Lucas. I'm sorry about cussing but it's just not a topic that I'm comfortable talking about."
"Normally, I would respect that but this has to do with your health, so I'm not going to."
"Plea-"
"I think you should go to the nurse."
"I told you, it was only a few pounds." She said, getting up and walking out. He ran out after her and grabbed her shoulder as she walked down the hallway, turning her towards him.
"It's not a couple of pounds. It's like fifteen."
"How do you know that?"
"You've lost fifteen pounds! That was just a random number. You actually lost fifteen pounds!"
"No. I lost like five." She lied.
"You lost fifteen."
"Quit saying that. I told you, it was five."
"It was not five pounds. Now quit lying to me."
She pushed his arm off and turned around to walk away. He wrapped his arm around her right as she was about to step away and pulled her back. His first thought was of how little she actually was. The feeling of her body in his arms made him feel a bit uneasy. He trying to get her to stay when he noticed the way she was breathing as she gave up fighting. Without letting go, he moved his head around side of the girl and looked at her.
"You're crying."
"No shit." She said through her tears. He had heard her swear a few times before but they were strong words that shocked him every time he heard them.
"Shh, shh. It's okay." He said, putting his hand on her head as she cried into his shoulder. He slid down, leaning on the lockers so that they were sitting but he still held her. They stayed that way until lunch ended.