(one/how to be overly critical of yourself before your day has even started)

With as much grace as possible, Suzan Mackintosh stripped out of her polka dot pajama bottoms, then leant forward and wriggled from the matching top. The waist of her bottoms caught on her foot and she hopped over toward the five-foot mirror on the back of her bedroom doorway, losing all attempted grace in the process.

It was seven in the morning on a school day, and she felt all the groggy misery that went with that fact. Her alarm was still blasting a morning talk show on her bedside table, but she was too lost in the fatigue of just waking up to walk over and turn it off. She wouldn’t be required at the breakfast table for another few minutes, so the allotted time was now for a school day preparatory self-examination.

She squinted at her reflection, standing there in her pink and blue undergarments with discarded laundry at her feet. Her dark brown hair was a tumultuous storm falling over her shoulders, and her face was still blotched with shadows from slumber. Letting out a heavy sigh, she tried to straighten up, glaring back at her image as she did.

Suzan had two dreams that she had retained for the majority of her seventeen years; she figured she was being unrealistic with the both of them.

The number one life dream seemed the more attainable one: to take her laughable little hobby of doodling and turn it into a lucrative career by becoming a master comic artist. She reminded herself of this in all of the small clips of art she had taped up on her bedroom doorway all around the mirror. She had been wielding a Bic pen against unsuspecting sketch books since she was a toddler and she hoped perhaps a lifetime hobby would turn out to be time well spent in the end. Underneath all of her passion for it, she tried to be realistic, but realism could be a painful thing to work with. It was much easier to be passionate and idealistic.

So then, there was her number two life dream, which seemed a bit more difficult: become comfortable with her body and stop thinking about it from there on out. She was mentally exhausted from years of wanting to lose the baby fat, but she had reached a point in her life where she had to accept that this was more than just baby chub haunting her from her more youthful years. This was the shape genetics had decided was best for her; she wanted to take her DNA and strangle it, showing it the correct shape a person should be.

She eyed the love handles hanging from the bottom half of her hourglass shape, giving much too much of an S shape to her contour. And then a little lower from there, her two tanned legs sprouted from the rest of her body, thick as trunks, her upper thighs enjoying a rhythmic, wobbling dance whenever she walked around in shorts. But that wasn’t the worst of it.

She let her hands trail up toward her shoulders, her fingers splayed out, gesturing to the literal biggest problem of all. Her brassiere was barely able to contain them; double D’s, like two white pillows of insulation under her clothes, overflowing over the rim of the cups that were supposed to hold them at bay. She knew breasts and their size was an object of attraction, but she could tell when a situation was ridiculous.

This well-endowed state she had acquired from her mother, who prided herself in being a busty housewife with an impeccable lawn and furniture arrangement. Suzan couldn’t locate any pride for herself, and beat her forehead on the kitchen table whenever her mom tried to remind her of the family “gift”.

This so-called “gift” came with big everything – hips, thighs, upper arms. She wasn’t happy to accept it, and wanted nothing more, except for comic artist glory, than to shed the weight and be a more socially acceptable size. She liked to think she had a non-conformist mindset, but with some things she felt she just needed to be reasonable and believe that certain goals were possible.

Because not everyone in the family was given this sizeable genetic present. Her little sister was nine years old and sported a wiry frame that would probably never be acquainted with stomach fat or jiggling arms. Rozie Mackintosh was a little wiggling minnow, dressing up in tights for her ballet classes and being smaller than Suzan felt she ever had been.

Envy was such an unattractive thing to sport around, but she felt she could see it all over her face that morning as she glowered at the mirror: it was the shadow under her eyes and that furrow in her brow.

Suzan took out the frustration in her comics, where justice was served on the unjustifiable dealings of the world, on people and their overall ridiculous state of being.

She bent down and picked up a relatively clean pair of jeans. It was epic battle time, where pants were donned and buttons were fastened. It was worth it to be skinny if it meant not fighting with articles of clothing.

Trumpets sounded in her head as she yanked up the zipper and buttoned the jeans, the shape of her legs formed into an acceptable lean look. She felt like dancing and fluttered her hands around in her triumph when a warning sounded from the kitchen.

“Suzan, you’re gonna miss your ride and mom said get your big butt down here and eat your waffles right now!” Her little sister Rozie, despite her stick torso and skinny neck, had ironclad vocal chords. Her voice tore through any peace the morning could give.

“I’ll be right down!” Suzan hollered back, annoyed and sliding a shirt over her head.

“Right now! You’re gonna be laaate!” Rozie screeched up the stairwell.

Suzan kicked her door open and tied up her unruly hair. She wanted to pulverize her little snot of a sister; she threw a pair of dirty pants down the stairs at her face. The tiny fetch of a human being wailed and ran toward the kitchen.

“I’ll be right there!” Suzan screeched back, slamming her bedroom door shut and feeling ill prepared to tackle another school day.

(two/how to disagree with your mother)

The kitchen table was a map of waffles and juice containers. Suzan slouched down in a chair and eyed the breakfast contemplatively for a moment before giving herself two waffles on a plate. It was the most important meal, after all.

“Jesus, Suz!” Rozie sneered from the other side of the table, her stick legs folded in front of her. She had two waffles on her plate as well; Suzan knew what her little sister was implying with her statement. Infuriated, she took a plastic fork from the container in the middle of the table and bent it back. When she let go of the top, the pronged missile went flying and struck her sister in the shoulder.

“Ouch! Mom!”

Their mom had just entered the kitchen as the fork rocket had gone off, but she ignored their bickering and set to work on dirty plates in the sink. She was round and rosy in her duster, her frizzy dark hair pulled into a pouf on top of her head. She turned on the faucet full blast and droplets of water flew everywhere.

Rozie tried again. “Dad! Dad!”

“Daddy’s at work,” their mom spoke up without turning around. Rozie sulked in her chair, and Suzan stuck her tongue out at her little brat sibling. An immature gesture, but she was beyond frustrated with how inferior her sister made her feel. She knew a nine-year-old shouldn’t hold sway over a seventeen-year-old’s self-esteem, but Rozie was a viper. She knew how to get to all the soft spots.

And it didn’t help that she was adorable with a gap in her front teeth, able to bend herself into a pretzel in pink tights and ballet slippers. All while being a snake. Suzan seethed.

“When are you two going to be home today?” their mom asked, a question that was repeated every morning. She angled herself toward them, her hands covered in soapsuds.

“I have dance,” Rozie sang, shoving a whole waffle into her mouth. Their mom smiled at her, shaking her head. The following silence meant for Suzan to speak.

“Mm.” She felt uncomfortable, knowing what the ensuing conversation would be like. “I’ll be home later; I don’t know when.”

“Where are you going?” Her mom’s voice rang with surprise and she turned from the sink, putting one hand on her hip. Suzan felt the corner’s of her mouth turn down and she tried to cover her face to hide her distaste for what was coming.

“Natasha and I are going to the mall,” she mumbled.

“The mall, on a school night?”

“I told you,” she said, raising her voice a little. She specifically remembered telling her mother the entire scenario before, and she was rue to go through this again. “Today’s the deadline for that young adult comic contest. I need to drop off my submission at Castle County Comics. You know where that is.”

“Oh.” Her mom frowned immediately. “Aren’t you too old for that contest? I thought we talked about this.”

“No, mom! There’s an age range, and if anything, I’ll be on the younger side for contestants.”

“So you’re too young? What kind of comics are these?”

“No. I’m… I already talked to you about this, mom.” Suzan sighed, shooting her grinning sister a silencing look. “Not all comics are Garfield and Batman. I’ve worked really hard on my submission, and I have to go today. Natasha’s driving me anyway.”

“Suzie-doozy, I can’t wait until you get out of this whole cartoon phase,” her mom sighed back; Suzan cringed inside. “You have to think about something more serious, because college is just around the corner. What are you going to go for? You can’t go for cartooning. You need to find something to do.”

“Actually, you can go for fine arts.” Suzan murmured into her hand. She didn’t understand why her mom was so dense when it came to art. Everybody else knew about at least a few of the legendary, award-winning comic series, like Maus, Persepolis, or Sandman. She could be one of the elite if she tried hard enough.

“I don’t watch cartoons.” Rozie said proudly. Suzan flicked a piece of waffle at her.

“You still watch the Disney channel. Just because it’s not always cartoons doesn’t mean you’re being a big kid,” she shot back. Their mother was oblivious to their banter, staring off at nothing, lost in thoughts. Suzan could just imagine what they were. When is my daughter going to grow up and decide what to do with her life? When is she going to pick a major? All of it, a waste of time thought process.

“Suzie-doozy, I don’t know what I’m going to do with you,” her mom finally said with a morose tone, turning back to the dishes. Suzan stabbed her fork into her waffle and grounded it to mush.

In that moment, a car horn sounded from the street.

Natasha, finally.

“’Bye.” Suzan leapt out of her chair and snatched up her backpack. She was out of the house before her mom could turn from the sink or her sister could tell her to get out.