A Pointless Passage

"Sacrificing for the team... Sacrificing for the team..." I pressed my face against the table, trying to focus on why I was doing this to myself, "Sacrificing for the team... I can get through this... Sacrificing for th-"

"What are you doing?" a voice asked from behind me.

I straightened up and pointed accusingly at my mom, "This is all your fault!"

My mom stared at me, confused. Despite my being a teenage girl, it was rare for me to raise my voice to my mother. It was actually pretty rare for me to raise my voice at all. My mom attempted conversation, "What's all my fault?"

I pointed at the cookies, "You bought THOSE! I'm trying to be healthy, and you bought cookies! Delicious, wonderful, sugary cookies that could very likely bring about my destruction!"

"O...kay..." my mom replied hesitantly.

I sighed and allowed gravity to pull my head back down on the table. It was quite painful. I groaned, feeling satisfied with my outburst now that my rage was subsided, "Sorry, Mommy..."

"You want to tell me what this is all about?"

"Coach keeps giving speeches about commitment," I grumbled, "And how it's not a real commitment unless we actually have to make sacrifices, and how we're not committed to our team unless we make sacrifices for the team blah blah and other junk like that. Then, the girl's team decided that we were all going to make one change in our diet to be more healthy. I decided to reduce my snacking on unhealthy things..."

"I take it things aren't going as easy as you'd hoped?"

"It's a nightmare!!" I cried, throwing my hands in the air, "You keep bringing sugary snacks into the house, and I can't resist! There's cookies, chips, laffy taffy, and the list just keeps going on! I NEED sugar!"

"I'm sure you'll be fine," she replied, patting me on the head for support.

"If you want it to be fine, buy me more peanut butter," I remarked.

"Peanut butter?"

"It's delicious, and has a similar texture to cookie dough," I stated, "And it has protein! And yogurt!"

"Peanut butter has yogurt?" Mom gave me a questioning look.

"No," I replied, "But yogurt is sweet and comes in flavors like Boston cream pie! It's not as great as the real thing, but i can help me get through these tough times... Sugar..."

"I see..." my mom watched me, "This is really hard for you, isn't it?"

"It's harder than running one of Coach's workouts that's designed to make you breathe hard."

"I take it," my mom replied, "That's really hard for you?"

"I have asthma!!" I cried, "Of course it's hard! I start wheezing halfway through the first three minutes! I need every second of recovery time!"

My mom smiled, "Well, I'm glad to see that you're actually trying. Keep up the good work!"

"Screw it," I muttered, "I'm having a cookie."

"What about..."

"My goal was to reduce my unhealthy snack intake," I remarked, grabbing a cookie, "Not give them up. The way I see it, I would have normally taken three by now. If I eat only one, I'll have won!"

"I see..."

I stuck the edge of cookie in my mouth, using my lips to hold it in place to free my hands. I could eat my cookie and do other things. The doorbell rang and I took off towards the door. In the door stood a tell man with red hard and green eyes. He raised a hand in greeting, "Hi, Evelyn," he said in a deep voice.

"Ah, Cody, hi," I muttered around my cookie and called over my shoulder, "Onii chan, your friend is here!"


My brother's loud footsteps thundered up the stairs as he sprinted over, "Hey, Cody!" Charles paused and pointed to the cookie in my mouth, "Any normal person with your diet would be really fat by now, you know. It's going to catch up with you eventually."

"Shut up," I remarked, "It's just one cookie... I've been eating eggs for breakfast every day lately, too."

"It's weird for you to be on a diet..." Cody remarked as he brushed past me.

I gently closed the front door behind him, "It's not a diet, it's just trying to eat healthier. I would NEVER go on a real diet."

The boys walked away and I headed to my room. I listened to the music that was playing on my boombox with my ipod plugged into it. It was playing my Fullmetal Alchemist playlist. I decided that this would be fine and flopped onto my bed, trying to decide what to do. I glanced over at the bookshelf and let my eyes scan the various book titles. Nothing seemed too interesting at the moment, so I looked around my room. I could crochet, work on my Japanese, paint my nails pretty colors so I wouldn't bite them, or... What else could I do? Was that really all I could do? I looked around and decided that I had to do something that wasn't boring. I jumped off my bed and started dancing to the music, flailing around randomly. This was the extent of my dancing abilities. Typical nerd. I didn't really care whether or not I looked cool, I was just having fun. That was my general policy: Do whatever is fun or makes you happy. That was why I never worried about wearing make-up to look pretty, or dieting to stay thin. I had a high enough metabolism that getting fat wouldn't be a problem for me, anyway. I'd always wear my hair in strange fashions with a chopstick because it was fun. That day, all of my hair was braided halfway down it's length and was twisted into a bun at the end that I held in place with just a chopstick. Seeing how it was in the back of my head, I wasn't really sure how it looked, but I had fun doing it, so I kept it. Sometimes, you've just got to do something out of the ordinarily in order to just have fun.