The Atmospherians by Alex McElroy (digital ebook reader txt) 📕

as something both valuable and worthless, something constantly under construction. That was, I believed, what he wanted from me, and, regrettably, that’s what I taught him.

Breakfast is simple, I said. One cup of blueberries. One cup of frozen spinach. Three seconds of skim milk. A banana. Blend until everything’s liquid, drink half, then pour the rest down the sink. It is undignified to finish a meal.

Lunch shouldn’t exceed five hundred calories. An apple is nearly a hundred. Half a granola bar is another hundred. Add to that half a sandwich—one slice of turkey, no mayo, no cheese—and one Hershey Kiss and you’re safe.

Never drink your calories: Water is fine. Soda water is fine. Coke if it’s Diet.

Doesn’t Diet Coke give people cancer? he asked.

How much are you planning to drink?

Avoid restaurants. If you must eat out, order a salad. Dressing on the side. Dip your fork in the dressing before spearing the lettuce. Dressing never goes over the top. Not even vinaigrettes.

If there are no salads, order the chicken. Grilled. Hold all sauces and cheeses. Substitute veggies for fries. Never finish the meal. To-go boxes are your friend. They shout, I’m gonna finish this later! Nobody checks.

Years ago, Dyson promised himself never to comply with his father’s cruelty. He refused to lose weight while the man was alive. His father would take it as proof he’d been right to mock and pressure his son all those years, and he didn’t deserve such vindication.

You don’t think of what we’re doing now as a way of honoring him? I asked on a run.

He wanted me to be muscular, tough But I hope to become nothing. Slim as a pin.

Perhaps I should have been more concerned.

Lift your legs even higher, and slower. It’s not supposed to not hurt. It’s supposed to sculpt.

This is for toning. This is for shaping. When it feels like you can’t do any more do five more and imagine how much better you’ll look when it’s over.

Link: 5 EXERCISES TO BEAT BELLY JIGGLE IN FIVE MINUTES!

Link: 3 SEXY DANCE MOVES YOU NEED TO BE DOING TODAY!

Link: 7 WAYS TO FIRM YOUR THIGHS BEFORE BREAKFAST!

Dyson called this summer the Summer of Hunger. It’s a new day in the Summer of Hunger, he’d say every morning as we started a run.

Gum. Crushed ice. The cap of a pen. Keep your mouth occupied. Keep it calorie-free.

At a party, vodka is your friend. Diet cranberry cocktail is your friend. Gin is your friend so long as you drink it with club soda—or if the tonic is diet.

Beer is nobody’s friend.

Part of me took a wicked pleasure in subjecting Dyson to what seemed, at the time, like fairly innocuous mantras of everyday feminine life. I invited him into a world of self-doubt and surveillance. I was surviving this life, as was half the globe’s population. He had no reason to stay here. For him, this was a vacation. Once he shed the weight, he would return home to the safe shores of masculinity, abandoning me.

What comes after the Summer of Hunger? I asked him one day.

What do you think? he said. The Autumn of Hunger.

After years of hiding his frame beneath baggy sweatshirts and parachute khakis, Dyson had no idea how to dress his thinning, unfamiliar body. I dreamed of designing clothes at that age (an unconscious drive to get back at my mother) and guided Dyson through clothing stores at the mall. He made me the executor of his fashion decisions. I advised him on distressed T-shirts and jeans, advised him against khakis, insisted on sweaters that would flatter his figure, suggested he splurge on a watch. Think of these clothes as investments in your future, I told him.

What does that mean? he asked.

It means you should buy them two sizes too small.

And then there’s celery: negative calories. The effort of chewing a stalk burns more calories than there are in a stalk. Amazing!

It was Dyson who told me. Though of course I already knew.

Dyson’s body at the end of the Summer of Hunger: Thirty-one pounds lighter, no taller, his old clothes flapping on his figure, bags under his eyes. His cheeks deflate. His jawline hardens—no, it arrives. He buzzes his hair to the scalp. He hates his calves for being too stumpy and thick. His thighs jiggle less often—though still more than he would like—and from his biceps hang maddening bat flaps. At certain angles, under rigid lighting conditions obtainable only in his downstairs bathroom, a pair of abdominal muscles can be seen bubbling out at the crown of his stomach. He spends hours in this bathroom. When he thinks no one is looking, he drags two fingers over his belly button, checking for flab. There is always too much.

Dyson showed up at school expecting waves of approving nods and congratulations: a makeover show kind of reception, streamers and classmates applauding, boys and girls pawing his shoulders, telling him how handsome he looked, how fucking hot. Very few people noticed or cared. What happened to you? those very few people asked. What did you do with your stomach?

At home, Dyson grazed the acne pitting his cheeks and the acne dotting his shoulders and chest, all of which had worsened due to the sweaty intensity of the Summer of Hunger.

The Family Dinners began that autumn. After delivering the toast, Dyson would pour himself a half glass of red wine, fill the rest with club soda, then crunch through a raw cucumber as the rest of us ate. Afterward, once everyone left, I encouraged him to snack on the leftovers.

I don’t like eating in front of people, he said. I’ll finish it after you leave.

Nobody checks.

It was my turn to drive to the mall. When he didn’t think I was looking, Dyson slipped a hand under his collar and squeezed a pimple on his collarbone.

Picking will just make it worse, I told