Sour Grapes

you take those things to keep your weight down? Tell me the truth, dammit This is important.”
    She tried to pull away, but Savannah held her tightly. “No. It’s just that sometimes... I get bloated, you know. Like water weight. And if I take a water pill and some of those, I can drop a couple of pounds right away, and then I look better.”
    “Look better? You’re gorgeous! A little scrawny at the moment, but you’re a beautiful girl. Why would you mess with your health like that? Don’t you know, you’re not just washing away body fluids, you’re losing minerals and lots of good stuff that you need to function? You’ll wind up in the hospital if you don’t watch out.” Atlanta put on her most sullen face and pressed her lips together until they nearly disappeared. Savannah knew the look: The kid wasn’t talking.
    “Honey, tell me the truth... are you puking, too?” No reply.
    “Are you inducing vomiting? Is that part of your routine, too?”
    “No.”
    Savannah didn’t know whether to believe her or not. She felt as though her own stomach was doing a flip-flop. This was bad. This was potentially very, very bad.
    Finally, when she received no further response, she released the girl and walked back to the bed, where she sat down... hard... her legs weak beneath her.
    “All right. If you don’t want to discuss it now, we won’t. But this subject isn’t closed. This is a serious matter, whether you think so or not... far more important than whether or not you can fit into a size six swimsuit.”
    “Size six?!” Well, at least she was talking. “What makes you think I’m that big? I’m a four!”
    “And you’re a big girl—five feet eight and largeboned. It’s ridiculous for you to be that thin. You’re starving yourself to death.”
    “I’m not going to discuss this with you anymore.” She walked over to her own bed and threw herself across it. “Let’s talk about something else.”
    A bell went off in the back of Savannah’s brain, an alarm that jerked her back to the reality that she had been struggling with before she had lain down for her all-too-short nap.
    Barbie Matthews.
    “Oh, man...” she said, “this is like waking up from a bad dream and finding out that everything’s okay... only in reverse.”
    “You didn’t ask me about my tour,” Atlanta said, happily rattling on, obviously relieved to have the subject of her habits put aside for the moment. “It was really cool. Mr. Villa took us through the vineyards and showed us the different kinds of grapes. I tasted one that was awful, really sour. But then, they aren’t ripe yet.
    “And then he took us into the place where they mash the grapes in these huge crusher things, and then the fermentation place where juice rots and turns into wine and then the barrel room where there’s a million barrels... and the place where they bottle it all and put labels on it and...
    “Gee, I had no idea there was so much to making wine. All these things can go wrong, and then the whole batch is ruined. Mr. Villa says it’s an art, making good wine. You could tell he’s really into it. Believe it or not, but some of us girls think he’s kinda sexy... you know... for an old fart.”
    “And old fart? He’s in his forties. Believe me, when you get there, you won’t think it’s all that old.”
    “But he’s got gray hair.”
    Savannah thought of the bottle of Midnight Brown— Color That Gray hair solution under her bathroom sink at home. “So, silver hair doesn’t make a person old or a fart, so watch your mouth.” “ Touchy, touchy.”
    For a moment neither of them spoke as Savannah considered the best words she could use to gently break the news about Barbie’s demise. Atlanta was a very emotional, sensitive girl; Savannah didn’t want this experience to scar her soul.
    “Ah, ‘Lanta, there’s something I need to tell you. About Barbie Matthews, she—” “ Yeah, I heard. That really sucks... her going off a cliff like that you guys were up all night looking for her, and there she was hanging from a bush, like, who knew? Too weird.”
    Savannah blinked and shook her head. Okay, so much for her little sister’s delicate psyche. Maybe there was something to this “desensitized new generation” thing after all. Too much television and not enough trips behind the woodshed... that was Granny Reid’s opinion on the matter.
    “Were the other girls as... traumatized... as you were over the news?” Savannah