While your parents sang hymns on Sunday mornings, you and your sister sat in the fourth pew.  You would pick at the tears in your tights, slowly turning a pinhole into a sewer opening.  You would twirl your feet around and scuff your Mary Janes—the black gloss tarnished by a streak of grey, your crisp lace socks brushed with dirt.  You wouldn’t care. You would just listen to the squeak of left on right. Right on left. Then, at dinner, you would drop ketchup onto your blouse—red on white that turned pink with your mother’s scrubbing.  Her hand moved like hummingbird wings, pausing only to wipe the smudge from your cheek or to straighten the bow in your hair.  She spoke between swipes, grunting about the importance of keeping up appearances, as she frantically sprayed stain remover.  Spray. Wipe. Scrub. Repeat.  You scrubbed a little more with your tiny, pudgy hands before going out the door, following her footsteps.

When you were twelve, you had a slumber party: pink pajamas, movies and buttery popcorn, pillow fights, and magazines.  You and your friends sprawled out on the floor and fingered through the pages, awing at the beautiful women—who were not bigger than the stick your grandfather used to walk—adorned in lavish diamonds and silk fabrics.  Each of you took turns trying on items from your mother’s closet: patent leather high heels, pearl necklaces, evening dresses, and even the coveted feather boa.  It was your turn.   You stared in the mirror, adjusting and turning to see from every angle the awkward, frizzy-haired, chubby-cheeked figure that glared back at you.  You fidgeted uncomfortably, shuffling your feet and tugging at the sides of the little black dress that clung to you.  The other girls didn’t seem to notice, but you did.  Your lip slowly formed into an upward curl.

In high school, you tried on prom dress after prom dress, sequins and sparkles after rhinestones and ruffles, only to find that you weren’t the same size as the beautiful women from the mountains of magazines you read.  Once again, you fidget—feet shuffling and hands tugging—in front of that figure in the mirror: now long legged, smooth skinned, and thin.  Yet, you only see that same frizzy-haired, chubby-cheeked girl who dropped ketchup on her shirt.  Nowadays, you cake makeup on your face—dark streaks of eyeliner, deep red lipstick, a mask of powder—and stick your finger down your throat over a cold, hard porcelain bowl, that swallows all your tears and imperfections, because you know all too well the importance of appearances.