Chapter Text
Eating disorders are a fickle thing. They follow you around like a shadow, stalking your side like a parasite that feeds on negativity and sickness. No one ever notices them; they sneak up on you and latch onto your life, pulling strings like a maddened puppeteer until you're consumed by your mind.
It's no big surprise Han Jisung turned out the way he did. All anyone ever did was shun him, some would pray for him, and some would go out of their way to make his life miserable.
He didn't see it coming himself though. One second the mirror was fine, just a smiling face staring back at him. Then it cracked. Then came the shadow. Then his whole world crashed down. All it took was one thought to claw itself into his mind, one single negative thought.
Jisung didn't have one singular thing that triggered it all, there was no snide comment made about his figure, no remark about his eating habits, nothing. He’d actually always been notably thin, so much so that it almost felt like his identity. And yet…one day it just wasn’t enough. But why was it when he looked in the mirror that one singular time the glass shattered?
And why did the coming months full of tears and starving and fainting feel like a warm embrace?
That's the thing though, isn't it? You hide an eating disorder like your life depends on it, it becomes your darkest secret. Something so close and personal that it feels like your best friend.
Han Jisung's eating disorder is his best friend. That's why he won't give it up.
Where was his family when he collapsed on the floor in tears because the number went up on the scale? Where were his friends when the world faded to black, and he dropped to the pavement? Where was anyone when he was hurting?
His mind, his sick and twisted and diseased mind was the only warmth he had.
Yet it left him cold, lifeless, and angry. It tore his very soul from his chest, leaving him nothing but a vast cavern of delirious fantasies. He was...empty, lost in his existence. A wasteland of fickle fancies.
If you were to ask Han Jisung who he was...he wouldn't know. He’s forgotten everything that made him human.
"Do you know why you're here?"
"Check my file, it's all in there," Jisung chuckles darkly.
"I know why you're here, I want you to tell me why you think you're here."
Jisung smiles, sickly sweet and so practised he looks like a doll, "I'm sick."