Everything starts with a doorbell

Awkward hand shaking, shoulder patting
Dead air between eye contact of old friends,
family even
A shuffle of feet, plates clanging, silverware
clattering against the table
This can’t be postponed any longer
He’s shoving his mouth full of anything he can
grab
Hands dripping with gravy, mashed potatoes
smeared across his cheeks
Chunks of butter between his fingers, he asks to be excused from the table

Stuffed with food his vomit an exercise of his
muddled self restraint

And she?
She sits with her knees in her chest
Plate empty like her eyes
She fiddles with her name card,
chipped fingernails against the edge of the cardstock

Pulling her hair in wisps to cover her collarbones
Checks puckered like silver dollars
A dinner, or lack of
To not eat or to binge and purge
Two family members across a table both waiting to
watch me choke