THINNER
by
Antigone
Chapter 9
The Chapters
Month three, Frank wrote, things are
changing.
He had never kept a journal, but
he did so loyally now, filling it not with personal thoughts or worries,
but of his brother’s activities: how often he was dizzy, what times,
when he slept, how often he exercised, what shirts didn’t fit. His
concern for his brother had turned in to all-out fear, and he was no
longer alone in insisting that Joe need to eat more, exercise less, stop
taking diet pills.
“This is unacceptable,” his
father had told the younger Hardy when Frank had informed his father
about the Dexatrim he’d caught his brother with. “Joe, do you know
what diet pills can do? They cause all sorts of health problems,
everything from heart attacks to strokes to seizures to cancer. And as
for your eating, we’ve noticed. You don’t eat enough to support the
kind of exercise you’ve been doing.”
“Sweetheart, we’re not
trying to say you’ve been irresponsible,” Laura Hardy had said.
“It’s just that you need to take a step back and look at yourself.
You’ve lost a little too much weight. It’s beginning to show, okay?
Just start eating enough to maintain until wrestling is over, and then
you can work on building muscle again…”
“I don’t want to be
where I was before!” Joe had erupted, standing up so fast he had
knocked his chair over. “You all just…expect me to be one way,
and when I’m not you can’t handle it, you want me back where I was,
when I don’t like myself that way, I don’t like myself this way,
and none of you have any right to tell me I can’t change!”
The pen shook in Frank’s hand
as he remembered that night, two weeks ago—had it only been two
weeks?—the first real argument, when the other three Hardys had
realized that this was not a “phase” or an “accident” or a
“slip-up” Joe had missed in his athletic zeal: this was borderlining
something bigger, something far more frightening, something that none of
them wanted to associate with anyone they knew, yet alone their fourth
family member.
Another fight at dinner, Frank
wrote, returning to his journal. Mom and Dad more anxious than ever,
insisting Joe tell them number-wise where he is, insisting he needs to
stop, that it’s too much too fast. Borrowed one of my belts today.
Figured he’s losing between five and ten pounds a week now. Will
“Frank?”
The elder Hardy jumped; he
hadn’t heard his brother come through the bathroom.
“Need something?”
“I was just wondering if you
have any collard shirts I could borrow. I have to give a presentation and
we’re supposed to look presentable. As if I don’t already.”
“Sure…” Frank said,
scrutinizing the black shirt his brother was currently wearing, the shirt
that had once fit him perfectly, the shirt that now fell loosely over his
brother’s shrunken torso. Frank’s shirts would probably be too big.
And Joe had always been bigger than him…
What the hell is going
on?
“Here,” he mumbled, tossing him a blue shirt and avoiding his
brother’s eyes.
“Thanks. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I mean, something. You.”
“Me? All I did was ask for a shirt…”
“You’re too thin.”
Joe sighed angrily. “Not this again…”
“Look at yourself!”
Joe glanced down at his shirt, pulled it in front of him, nodded.
“Looks fine.”
“It’s—“
“Damnit Frank, I’m tired of this! Can’t we have a
conversation without you harping on my weight? You’re worse than Mom
and Dad.”
“Then why won’t you listen.”
“Because you’re overreacting,” he sighed, turning back to
his room. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
The younger Hardy turned and cut back through the bathroom between
their rooms, but Frank was not to be left behind.
“Joe,” he sighed. “All I’m saying is…”
He stopped dead in the doorway; his brother had removed his black
shirt and was pulling the blue one over his head. His spine cracked his
back’s surface, his ribcage jutted forward: Frank was horrified to
realize his brother had become a skeleton.
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Disclaimer
The Hardy Boys belong to Simon and Schuster and the Stratemeyer Foundation. The Hardy Boys Fan Fiction authors of the Hardy Detective Agency have just borrowed them for an adventure or two. The authors promise to put the boys back when they are done with them. The authors do claim copyright to the original characters in this story. Please do not borrow original characters without express permission of the authors.