Читать книгу Size Zero: My Life as a Disappearing Model - Victoire Dauxerre - Страница 17

I left on my own a few hours before the rest of them on a different plane, because Silent had taken care of my return ticket. At the end of our family trip, I’d fly to New York from Los Angeles to get straight down to work and they would return to Paris. All of which meant that I was travelling with Air France and had been upgraded to business class like a star! I wondered if this was a foretaste of the new life that awaited me. The armchair that became a bed was a delight, as were the billion options available on my personal in-flight computer and the little complimentary beauty set. True luxury! And just as miraculous was the adorable air hostess who seemed to find it perfectly normal that I turned down my three-star meal in favour of fresh fruit.

I was in a bizarre state: both worried and excited, detached and nervous, grown-up and childlike. It was the beginning of adulthood for me, but I don’t know what I would have done without Yùki there to comfort me.

I got a yellow cab to the hotel. Wow! New York! It was like being in a film, and not in the audience but on the screen: the taxi and all the smells, the car horns, the swarms of people all sweating profusely, Brooklyn Bridge, the Manhattan skyline … I was in New York, New York! I was sure I was going to love it here.

As soon as my parents and brothers caught up with me, we began to explore every corner of the city. It was all set to be a dream holiday: New York, San Francisco, Las Vegas and Los Angeles, the five of us together and staying in incredible hotels. We’d been talking about it all year long and were so looking forward to it. And yet, though I didn’t want to admit it, I was having trouble keeping up. I was absolutely knackered, almost certainly because of the jet-lag, which I just couldn’t get over. And also because of that crazy month of July spent running around every which way, fretting over what choices I should make and what I was going to become, worrying about Granddaddy and trying to come to terms with my failure to get into Sciences Po.

And because of the fear, this constant nagging fear.

Traipsing around New York with the boys and Mum and Dad, I couldn’t help thinking that in a fortnight’s time I’d be here again, but all on my own. Central Park, the Guggenheim, the MoMA, Tribeca, Ground Zero, Broadway, the Rockefeller Center and the Statue of Liberty: everything that I’d always dreamed of was there within my reach, at my feet. Initially, it astounded me and then, all of a sudden, it overwhelmed me: I felt like I was losing my grip on the cliff face and that I was going to fall, and go on falling for ever. I didn’t say anything to them about it so as not to ruin their trip.

One great thing here, though, was that the calories were marked on every item of food you bought. That way, I knew more or less what I was doing and it made up for the fact that I couldn’t weigh myself, because there weren’t any scales in the hotel rooms. I tried not to think about it too much. On the day I left Paris, my hip size was 35 inches and I weighed a teeny bit over 51 kilos. I absolutely had to lose at least one more kilo, but two or three would really set my mind at rest …

Just a stone’s throw from our hotel, there was an enormous store: Victoria’s Secret. Mum knew that it was my dream to work for them. Who knew, perhaps in the not too distant future I would be one of their brand ‘angels’? In the meantime, she took me there to treat me to some lingerie. I chose a very pretty black lace ensemble featuring a discreet little pink bow. A ‘size 0’ pair of knickers, which presumably corresponded to a size 34, and a 32A bra. It might have been bad news for me that I’d gone down two cup sizes, because personally I was fond of my breasts, but it certainly wasn’t bad news for fashion week (I had of course noticed that many of the girls on the catwalks were flat-chested). I hadn’t had my period either that month, no doubt on account of all the stress, but I wouldn’t have minded it continuing that way – at least I wouldn’t have that to worry about at work.

On the food front, Dad was starting to get annoyed. He was getting more and more insistent that I should eat some meat or fish and some vegetables. It drove me mad – that was my problem, not his. And if I’d started eating just like that, without being able to weigh myself, I’d have ballooned before I knew it. It was out of the question and so, as a compromise, we agreed that I’d eat out with them every other meal rather than all the time. So half the time I let them go off and have lunch or dinner while I found a nice piece of fruit or a low-calorie salad to eat on my own in peace and quiet, without having to endure my father scrutinising the contents of my plate all the time. You had to know what you wanted in life. He had been the first to encourage me to sign that contract and it was too late now to back away from the consequences.

When we turned in for the night, I cuddled up to Alex. All three of us slept in the same room – Alex and me in the double bed and Léo in the single bed. My brother didn’t say anything, but I knew he could tell that things weren’t OK. And I’d fall asleep clutching Yùki tightly and trying to convince myself that it would pass.