The first week of winter break at Lucia's place was magical so far. Although I had still been hesitant to eat and was still limiting my intake, I still felt safe to eat just a little bit around them. Even if it was just a few bites here and there, I was proud of myself. The rest were also proud of me too.
          Even just eating cereal one morning, my friends comforted me and let me know they were proud of me for kind of recovering over this break. It was the morning two days before Christmas, just before going on a shopping trip to buy gifts for one another and wrap them. Luckily, Lucia's parents know about my eating disorder now and are supportive of me through it now.
          "Hey Scarlett, I want to let you know how proud I am of you for recovering today. Just take it one small step at a time, okay?" Cam said. Their voice was so calming to listen to, a breath of fresh air.
          "Thank you so much, Cam," I replied. "I just finally feel safe around you guys to eat, even just little things here and there."
          "I'm proud of you too, Scarlett! I would never let you stay with someone who makes things worse for you," said Lucia.
          I smiled at her. "Thanks again, Lucia. I just wrote another poem last night too. I think it would be cool if you all would hear it tonight. I wanna start sharing my writing a lot more."
          "Yes, please do! I was thinking of performing a drag routine I've been working on in my dorm room and in my room here alone... in the late hours of the night," Harper jumped in.
          "Oooh," jumped in Lucia's dad. "That's why I kept hearing music at two in the morning!" We all laughed at that, just taking it as a joke. "Well why don't we have a little talent show tonight? Scarlett can read their poem aloud, Harper can do his dance drag show, Cam can show us some of their art, and Lucia, wanna sing us a song?"
          "Actually, I did write a pretty cool song recently. One of my best lately, I'd say. I'd love to share it tonight. One of my only songs that's not sad," Lucia laughed. We all just laughed with her.

The rest of the afternoon was spent at the local mall, shopping for gifts. I didn't have much money on my debit card, so I spent it wisely but managed to get everyone a small but valuable gift for each of my friends. I wanted to buy gifts for Lucia's parents, but I couldn't really afford anything and did not know them too well yet. I decided I'd write some kind of "thank-you" poem for them instead.
          For Lucia, I got a distortion pedal to go with her electric guitar from Guitar Center. For Harper, I bought a few new makeup items from Ulta. And for Cam, I bought a nice art kit, complete with a huge variety of colored pencils, pastels, oil paints, watercolors, and calligraphy pens from Michaels. With the help of Lucia's mom, I wrapped the gifts at the gift-wrap table in the mall. And at the end of the shopping day, we met up again with many gifts to load into the car and see under the tree Christmas morning.

Then the mini talent show happened. This was my first time ever sharing my poetry with anyone, and it surprisingly went well. Similar to how sharing the stories in Dr. Mariss's class went. I read it dramatically, and I even went on to read one of my other short stories (not the one from writing class but another one I'm proud of). Harper slayed his drag dance performance to a cool 2000's pop music mashup, Cam presented their most recent artworks with pride, and Lucia sang her beautiful, upbeat song about friendship. Recovery is coming slowly, but surely.