Sophie waved as the taxi taking Pip to the airport pulled away from the curb. She closed the front door and sighed a contented sigh. She had spent the last two days with Pip taking walks along the Harbour foreshore, getting massages, shopping for clothes and eating delicious food. Michael had been in a great mood all weekend and had cooked garlic prawns and his special fried rice on Sunday night. The lost feeling that had dogged her for the last few months seemed to have faded. She felt lucky to have a nice home, a loving husband, a best friend and a great job. She still didn’t like what she saw in the mirror, but perhaps she never would. She had heard that competing ruins the way you see yourself for the rest of your life because you’re always comparing yourself to your lowest ever weight. If that was the worse problem she had to live with, then things would be okay.
In the bathroom, she looked down at the scales which were covered in a film of dust. She hadn’t yet been brave enough to stand on them. Was today the day? She stood underneath the shower and washed her hair while she considered her decision. She had drunk a cup of tea but hadn’t eaten anything. The meal the night before was home cooked and light so she shouldn’t be holding any water. The veins on her hands and feet were visible and her rings moved around her fingers. She had been doing everything right for the past eight weeks. No refined sugar, no wheat, no highly processed junk food. Although she might have overdone it occasionally on the macadamia nuts, or the dates, or the frozen yogurt and carob buds, she hadn’t binged. Without writing down the calorie values of her food, she calculated in her head that she was eating around two thousand a day. Some of her clothes fitted and some of them didn’t — probably, she assumed, because her shape had changed since she had given up lifting heavy weights. She estimated that she should have only gained a few kilos, perhaps a bit more if she took the cup of tea into account.
Naked and shivering, Sophie stood on the scales. She closed her eyes, exhaled and then looked down. The black display panel flashed up a strange and startling number. Sophie couldn’t believe it. The scales must be malfunctioning from lack of use. She turned them off, walked around the bathroom for a minute and then switched them back on. This time she stepped on with purpose, as if daring the machine to do its worst.
Ten kilos. Ten.
Ten kilos more than the morning of competition day. That was the six she had lost before the show plus four more. She kicked the scales back under the vanity and burst into tears. All her efforts had been for nothing. She might as well have eaten pies and chocolate and not moved off the couch. She looked in the mirror, trying to see what she had missed. Her breasts, her thighs and her backside were fuller, her stomach had a gentle curve, but she couldn’t identify where all the fat had gone. She must be delusional. She had wanted so badly to look normal that she had grown heavy and ugly without even noticing. ‘Fat pig,’ said the voice in her head. ‘Fat pig,’ she said, out loud.
Sophie completed the Monday morning scheduling meeting in seventy minutes, barely looking up from the page. If her colleagues were surprised by her abruptness, none of them took the time to ask her what was wrong. When she walked back into her office, Jenna was sitting in front of the computer with a large square Tupperware container at her elbow.
‘What’s that?’ asked Sophie.
‘Lunch,’ said Jenna. ‘I’ve signed up for Weight Watchers. I made a salad.’
Sophie pressed her arms against the sides of her body, feeling the spongy softness of the fat on her hips yield to the pressure from her elbows.
‘Weight Watchers is shit,’ said Sophie. Jenna seemed surprised and then angry. The fragile truce they had maintained for the past few weeks shattered. Sophie pulled down the show report folder and scanned the documents from the weekend. Jenna stopped typing and waited, her face contracting into a scowl.
‘There’s nothing there,’ said Jenna. The report was for a client who Jenna had worked for every year for the past eight years. Jenna had never said anything critical about the company. The report was clean.
Sophie closed the folder and put it back on the bookshelf. She picked up her handbag. ‘I’m going for lunch,’ she said. ‘Off site.’
On her walk to Circular Quay, Sophie couldn’t decide what to eat. Part of her wanted to restrict, to cut out all carbohydrates and only have protein. The other part of her wanted to devour all the greasy junk food she could get her hands on. She stood outside MacDonald’s waiting for some kind of sign. All she saw were teenage boys with spotty faces leaving the store carrying brown paper bags. She walked in and ordered two cheese burgers, fries and a Diet Coke. She waited until she was sitting on a bench, close to the water before she took a mouthful of the first burger. The meat was dry and the cheese like plastic. She threw the burgers in the bin. The fries were cold but she ate them anyway.
Back in the office, Jenna had disappeared and Beth was pinning up fresh copies of the roster. She looked at Sophie as she threw her bag in the corner.
‘Bad day?’ asked Beth.
‘I’ve had better,’ said Sophie.
‘Anything I can do?’
‘I don’t think so.’
Beth moved to the chair in front of Sophie’s desk. ‘This may not be the right time to ask,’ Beth said, ‘but I was wondering if you still took photos.’
‘I suppose so,’ said Sophie. ‘I still have all the gear but it’s been a while.’
‘I was thinking it would be nice to have some photos of Max and me now he’s getting older. You know, send them to the family for Christmas. But I don’t want any of those hideous portraits with the suede backgrounds. I was imagining something outside in the park.’ Beth smiled. ‘I would pay you of course, that’s if you’re interested.’
Sophie had only met Max a couple of times when Beth had bought him in for the kids’ shows. He was a wiry nine-year-old with orange freckles and spiked hair. He called Sophie ‘Miss Walker,’ and loved Harry Potter. Sophie could think of worse ways to spend her time than hanging out in the park with him and his mother.
‘I’d love to,’ said Sophie. ‘But you don’t need to pay me. I’m out of practice so they’ll probably be crap.’
‘Are you sure? I’m happy to pay.’
‘If by some miracle I come up with a masterpiece, you can let me use it to advertise my talents one day in the future. Let’s just call it a workshop.’
‘Could we do it tomorrow night after work if we sneak off early? It stays light until eight. At the park near my place?’
‘Give me the details and I’ll be there.’ Sophie felt a small buzz of excitement at the base of her skull. She would have to pull her DSLR out of the cupboard tonight, clean the lenses and charge the batteries.
The phone on Sophie’s desk rang. Beth smiled and gave Sophie a thumbs up before going back to her computer.
‘I’m working on next year’s schedule,’ said Kim Chen, on the phone, ‘and I wanted to check your availability.’
A sliver of light shone through the blackness of the day. Kim Chen wanted to work with Sophie again. She must have done a good job.
‘We have a grant to take Fault Lines to the States,’ he said. ‘Would you be interested?’
‘Of course,’ said Sophie. ‘I’d love to come.’
‘We’ll probably need you for a whole month — ten days of rehearsals, travel time and two weeks in South Carolina. Originally we thought about February, but that’s when James is getting married, so we’ve decided on April.’
Sophie’s heart seemed to stop beating and she felt as though she couldn’t get enough air into her lungs. Her breath became short and shallow, like she had just finished sprinting. James married. Was this something new or had James been engaged from the moment she had first met him? He had lied to her, or at least, not told her everything. She wanted to call him and ask for an explanation. But she had no right to care. She wasn’t any part of his life, she couldn’t be. He didn’t have to explain himself to her.
‘I’m sorry, Kim Chen, did you say April?’
‘April, yes.’
‘I’ll need to check with my boss but I don’t see a problem. Send through the contract and I’ll work things out this end.’
‘We’re also planning to create a new piece in the second half of next year. It would be great if you could work with us from the very beginning. Nothing concrete yet but I’ll let you know.’
‘I’d love that.’
‘You’re the best Stage Manager I’ve ever worked with,’ said Kim Chen. ‘From now on I have to have you on all my shows.’
‘Thank you. Let’s talk soon.’
Sophie put down the handset and looked across at Beth. ‘Do you have any plans for April next year?’ asked Sophie.
Beth shook her head.
‘You do now,’ said Sophie. ‘You’re the acting Head of Stage Management for a month.’
‘Cool,’ said Beth. ‘Where are you going?’
‘South Carolina. I’ve never been to the States.’
‘That’s one way to brighten up a bad day,’ said Beth.
‘You’re not wrong,’ said Sophie. Except it still was a bad day. James was getting married and without any reason she could articulate, Sophie felt hurt. The kind of hurt that reaches into your stomach, pulls your intestines out onto the floor and then stomps on them. The bleeding, dying kind of hurt. Sophie wanted to cry but she forced herself not too. She had been crying altogether too much recently. It would have to stop.
That night, while Sophie picked at her chicken salad and Michael ate pizza in front of the television, she told him about the job in the States.
‘Kim Chen wants me on all his shows from now on,’ she said. ‘He said I’m the best SM he’s ever worked with.’
‘He probably only said that because he’s been through every other stage manager and no one wants to put up with him,’ he said. ‘You probably let him get away with murder so of course he wants you around.’
Sophie looked at her husband, barely able to believe what she was hearing. ‘Is that what you think, seriously?’ she said, her voice cracking. She felt the tremble start in the back of her throat and spread to her whole body.
‘You let people take advantage of you, it’s always been your problem. You’re too accommodating, especially to dickheads.’
‘I don’t—’
‘—Funny how you’re so nice to everyone else and such a bitch to me.’
‘What do you mean—’
‘—Save it for your theatre buddies.’ Michael sighed. ‘I’m too fucking tired for this tonight. I’ll see you later.’ He went to the fridge, collected a beer, walked to the study and slammed the door.
Sophie sat on the couch, stunned and still trembling. It seemed as though Michael hated her. A stabbing pain cut through her ribs. She looked at the pizza box. There were three pieces left. She was full but she thought about eating more. First, she would succumb to the sensory pleasure of crust, salty bacon, fatty cheese and rich tomato sauce, her thoughts silenced by the pleasure. Once the food was gone, the voice in her head would berate her for being so weak and undisciplined, while at the same time she would be distracted by trying to find a way to relieve her physical discomfort. She would need to think about how to get rid of the calories she had just consumed, either by taking laxatives, doing extra exercise in the morning, or both. What was clear was that if she started a binge, she wouldn’t have to think about how fat she was, about James getting married, or about Michael’s disgust.
But she couldn’t do it.
The one thing she could rely on to take the edge off her pain was gone. She couldn’t binge. How many more things would she have to lose before the losses stopped?
Her phone rang. It was Pip. She must have felt Sophie’s need to talk to someone.
‘I rang to say thank you for the weekend,’ said Pip. ‘It was amazing.’
‘You’re more than welcome. It was great seeing you.’
‘And I’ve got some news. You’ll never guess what I’ve decided to do next year.’
‘You and Nathan are getting married?’ said Sophie.
‘Not likely.’ Pip laughed. ‘I’ve decided to compete again. I’m going to do Fitness Mania in March and I want you there to glue my bikini to my arse.’
‘Of course,’ said Sophie.
‘This is going to be the last time. We’re going to try for a baby once I’m done.’
‘Oh, sweetheart. That’s wonderful news. Why wait though, couldn’t you get pregnant now?’
‘Just one last shot, Soph, then it’ll be out of my system. I know you understand.’
‘Congratulations. Sounds like next year will be huge.’
‘I know.’ Pip giggled. ‘Anyway, how are things?’
Sophie looked down at her thighs, at the empty pizza box and at the closed door of the study. ‘Perfect,’ she said. ‘Things couldn’t be more perfect.’
‘Great,’ said Pip. ‘Gotta go, Nathan can’t find the remote. Bye.’
The phone beeped the disconnect tone. She switched it off and put it on the coffee table. She thought she might cry but her eyes remained dry. She felt sick and tired and disappointed. The last two months she had tried so hard to turn her life around and instead of getting better, everything had got worse. She was beaten, bruised and bleeding and had no idea what to do next.