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People had always looked down on him, on his ideas, his interests, his way of talking, his body language, his choice in clothes, his hygiene, his shape, his eating habits. He used to laugh about it. It was never funny but he used to be able to laugh it off. Then he started agreeing. He was stinky, he was indecent and unsettling, devious, demented, sinful and a little fiendish. He was all of those things and proud. At first. But as time went on and the others called him these and other names, he grew more and more resigned. Even if he answered with the same bravado as always, he believed every word. He was icky, scary, bad, horrible, awful, wrong, gross, disgusting, ugly, unlovable and every other word they used. He couldn’t remember the last time Thomas had willingly let him contribute. If he couldn’t even do his job, the very reason for his existence, if he really only got in the way, he was nothing but a nuisance, he really was worthless.
What really got to him, however, was not the insults or them explicitly telling him they hated him because he could pretend, they were jokes. No, what really got him was when he heard them talk about him, when they thought he wouldn’t hear, when they looked at him, groaned at him in a way that made clear just how annoyed they were at his presence, how badly they wanted him to leave. Even the dark sides were ashamed of him, he knew. He was trapped with a bunch of people in the small space that was Thomas’ head and he was completely alone. He learned to hate what he saw in the mirror. He learned to hate himself. So, when one time he ate something that made even him sick and he threw up and he realized he could do it all the time, was it really any wonder that he did?
If he did, he figured, he’d lose weight. If he lost weight, he’d be thin, attractive. He wouldn’t be so flabby and gross. He’d look good in his clothes. He’d be more like him. And everybody loved him, right? If he did this the others would start liking him, too. They’d give him a chance, listen to him, see he was just as good as his brother. They’d love him too.
Vaguely, he knew his reasoning was off but he couldn’t admit it consciously. This was all he had. He couldn’t change who he was. So instead, he shoved anything and everything he could find into his mouth, chewing harshly and swallowing even long after his stomach started hurting. Eventually he had to stop. It hurt too bad. It hurt so much he started crying from the pain. He wasn’t sure if he could move to the bathroom if he tried. He swore to never eat again.
Somehow, he managed to drag himself to the nearest toilet, tug his shirt off and hunch over the bowl. He stuck his fingers down his throat and hurled, his stomach contracting violently. Too much at once was pressed through his oesophagus. It dropped out his mouth into the water, splashing everywhere. His stomach convulsed again uncontrollably, before he’d been able to take a breath and more vomit took an indirect route to his hair. He took a desperate breath that was cut short by more involuntary heaving. He emptied his stomach and still retched when there was nothing left to purge from it. When the gagging finally let up, Remus was left seeing stars. He slumped against the toilet, his chest throbbing and his throat feeling scratchy. He took a few shaky breaths, as he rested his forehead against the cool ceramic. After another moment he got up and took greedy gulps from the faucet. He stood up straight again and bounced on the balls of his feet before bending over the toilet again. And again. And again. Until all that came out was sickly, almost neon yellow bile. It tasted more bitter than anything else he’d ever tasted and his stomach hurt so much. He could feel the pressure in his head, as he forced it out. A few tears, from the strain or misery he didn’t know, escaped him, hitting the water in time with the other fluid. He wobbled up and stood on the scale. The same weight he’d had before eating.
He flushed.
He took some toilet paper to clean up the floor, the toilet and the radiator next to it. He could see stains behind it, too but he was too exhausted to care. He’d get them some other time. He threw the paper in the water and flushed again. Going to clean himself up next, Remus looked in the mirror. He was sweaty, his greasy hair and mustache speckled with vomit, a vein in his eye had popped, his teeth were yellowed and he still looked so fat. He looked- No, he was disgusting. He hated himself more than ever before.
The others didn’t, in fact, love him next time they saw him. They grimaced, commented on his teeth, said his eyes looked even more crazed than usual, due to the now yellow blotch in one of them. Remus insisted that that was what he was going for, even as he felt nauseous, only sure that what he felt in his throat was a metaphorical lump because he knew for a fact there was no food in his system. God, he was hungry. It was as though hunger was a physical thing, pressing and shoving against the walls of his stomach, like it was growing and tearing the organ open. He wanted to eat so badly, even if he wasn’t certain how long he’d let it stay in his body. He made his way over to the cabinets, rummaging around for something that he could maybe, just maybe excuse as healthy enough to let it remain long enough to make it to his intestines.
"Ugh, are you kidding? You keep taking all the food! Seriously, how hungry can you be?" He didn’t say "you pig" but Remus felt he might as well have. They were all looking at him the same way; annoyance, disgust, hatred.
They were right. He’d been misusing, wasting their food. Stupid. He’d been gorging until he couldn’t anymore. Disgusting. He’d been purging. Pathetic. Why couldn’t he just lose weight like everybody else? He’d simply never tried hard enough before. He was so lazy. Why couldn’t he just be normal? They were right to be mad at him. They were right to look down on him.
He closed the cupboard and left with a snarky quip on his lips and false confidence in his stride. He shouldn’t eat at all he thought. He didn’t deserve it. And besides, he liked feeling hungry, he decided. It was a constant. He could tune it out somewhat, into something akin to comfortable. Without the heavy weight of hunger, he’d feel empty.
They were right to hate him.