Sara Shepard - Heartless

“I’m Tara.” The girl spat a little as she spoke.

“Hanna,” Hanna murmured apathetically, moving aside to let an aide in pink scrubs pass.

“You want to eat with us? It sucks to eat alone. We’ve all been there.”

Hanna lowered her eyes to the polished wood floor, considering her options. Tara didn’t seem crazy—just dorky. And beggars couldn’t be choosers. “Uh, sure,” she said, struggling to be polite.

“Great!” Tara—and her boobs—jiggled up and down. She wove through the tables, leading Hanna to a four-top at the back. A rail-thin girl with a long, hangdog face and goth-pale skin was picking at a plate of plain penne noodles, and a pudgy redhead with a noticeable bald patch above her right ear was nibbling furiously on an ear of corn. “This is Alexis and Ruby,” Tara announced. “And this is Hanna. She’s new!”

Alexis and Ruby shyly said hi. Hanna said hi back, feeling more and more unsettled. She was dying to ask these girls why they were here, but Dr. Foster had emphasized that diagnoses were not to be discussed except in private sessions or group therapy. Instead, patients were supposed to pretend that they were here by choice, like this was some kind of freaky camp.

Tara plopped down next to Hanna and immediately started cutting up the impressive pile of food on her plate—she had a hamburger, a square of lasagna, green beans bathed in butter and almonds, and a giant hunk of bread as big as Hanna’s palm.

“So this was your first day, right?” Tara asked cheerfully. “How was it?”

Hanna shrugged, wondering if Tara had overeating issues. “Kind of boring.”

Tara nodded, chewing with her mouth open. “I know. The no-Internet thing sucks. You can’t Twitter or blog or anything. Do you have a blog?”

“No,” Hanna answered, trying not to scoff. Blogs were for people who didn’t have lives.

Tara shoved another forkful of food into her mouth. She had a tiny cold sore at the corner of her lip. “You’ll get used to it. Most people here are really nice. There are only a couple girls to stay away from.”

“They’re bitches,” Alexis said, her voice surprisingly husky for someone so thin.

The other girls giggled naughtily at the word bitches. “They spend all their time at the spa,” Ruby said, rolling her eyes. “They can’t go one day without getting a manicure.”

Hanna almost choked on a broccoli stalk, certain she’d heard Ruby wrong. “Did you just say this place has a spa?”

“Yeah, but it costs extra.” Tara wrinkled her nose.

Hanna ran her tongue over her teeth. How had she not heard about the spa? And who cared if it cost extra? She was totally charging treatments to her dad’s tab. It served him right.

“So who’s your roomie?” Tara asked.

Hanna tucked her pebbled leather Marc Jacobs bag under her seat. “I haven’t met her yet.” Her roommate hadn’t returned to their shared room all day. She’d probably been sent to a padded isolation room or something.

Tara smiled. “Well, you should hang with us. We’re awesome.” She pointed her fork at Alexis and Ruby. “We make up plays about the hospital staff and perform them in our rooms. Ruby’s usually the lead.”

“Ruby is destined for the Broadway stage,” Alexis added. “She’s really good.”

Ruby blushed and ducked her head. Little corn kernels were stuck to her left cheek. Hanna had a feeling the closest Ruby would get to a Broadway stage would be as a cashier in the lobby snack bar.

“We play America’s Next Top Model, too,” Tara went on, stabbing at the lasagna.

This instantly sent Alexis and Ruby into hysterics. They slapped hands and belted out the show’s theme song, very off-key. “ I wanna be on top!Na na na na NA na! ”

Hanna slumped in her seat. It seemed like all the overhead lights in the cafeteria had dimmed except for the one directly over their table. A couple of girls at nearby tables turned and stared. “You guys pretend you’re models?” she asked weakly.

Ruby took a swig of Coke. “Not really. Mostly we just put together outfits from our closets and strut down the hall like it’s a runway. Tara has awesome clothes. And she’s got a Burberry bag!”

Tara dabbed her mouth with a napkin. “It’s fake,” she confessed. “My mom got it for me in Chinatown in New York. But it totally looks like the real thing.”

Hanna felt her will to live slowly drain out the soles of her feet. She eyed two chatting nurses near the dessert tray and wished she could hit them up for a double dose of Valium right then. “I’m sure it does,” she lied.

Suddenly, a blond girl watching them by the soup tureens caught Hanna’s eye. She had corn-silk blond hair, pale, gorgeous skin, and an alluring, indefinable presence about her. A shiver snaked through Hanna’s body. Ali?

She did a double take and realized this girl’s face was rounder, her eyes were green, not blue, and all her features were a little pointy. Hanna slowly let out a breath.

But the girl was now making a beeline for Hanna, Tara, Alexis, and Ruby, winding quickly around the tables. She had the exact same smirk on her face that Ali used to get when she was about to tease someone. Hanna gazed despondently at her dinner companions. Then she ran her hands along her thighs, stiffening with alarm. Did her legs feel chunkier than usual? And why did her hair feel so brittle and frizzy? Her heart began to pound. What if, just by sitting here with these dorks, Hanna had instantly reverted to her lame, loserish, pre-Ali self? What if she’d sprouted a double chin and back fat, and what if her teeth had gone instantly crooked? Nervous, Hanna reached for a piece of bread from the basket in the middle of the table. Just as she was about to shove the whole thing into her mouth, she recoiled in horror. What was she doing? Fabulous Hanna never ate bread.

Tara noticed the girl walking toward them and nudged Ruby. Alexis sat up straighter. Everyone held their breath as the girl approached the table. When she touched Hanna’s arm, Hanna bristled, bracing for the worst. She’d probably morphed into a hideous troll by now.

“Are you Hanna?” the girl said in a clear, mellifluous voice.

Hanna tried to speak, but her words got caught in her throat. She made a sound that was a cross between a hiccup and a burp. “Yeah,” she finally managed, her cheeks flaming.

The girl stuck out her hand. Her long nails were painted Chanel black. “I’m Iris,” she said. “Your roommate.”

“H-hi,” Hanna said cautiously, staring into Iris’s pale green, almond-shaped eyes.

Iris stepped away, looking Hanna up and down appraisingly. Then she offered her hand. “Come with me,” she said airily. “We don’t hang out with losers.”

Everyone at the table let out an outraged gasp. Alexis’s face was as long as a horse’s. Ruby pulled nervously at her hair. Tara shook her head vehemently, as if Hanna was about to eat something poisonous. She mouthed the word bitch.

But Iris smelled like lilacs, not Vick’s VapoRub. She was wearing the same long Joie cashmere cardigan Hanna had bought two weeks ago at Otter, and she didn’t have bald patches on her scalp. Long ago, Hanna vowed to never be a dork again. Those rules even applied inside a mental hospital.

Shrugging, she stood up and plucked her purse from the ground. “Sorry, ladies,” she said sweetly, blowing them a kiss. And then she looped her arm around Iris’s waiting elbow and walked away, not once looking back.

As they strutted through the cafeteria, Iris leaned down to Hanna’s ear. “You totally lucked out by getting a room with me instead of with some of the other freaks. I’m the only normal one here.”