Time And Time Again

5

She poked her head into the kitchen to see Jean sitting pretty at the table, gnawing on a pen. She looked up to the taller woman judgementally. While her mess of makeup had even washed off and she looked slightly better than earlier, the black circles beneath her eyes were still painfully obvious. She sat down at the table in silence.
"Why are you looking at me like that?"
"You know exactly why." Her tone was stiff and stern. The artist shifted from foot to foot. Yeah. She knew.
After a few moments of awkward silence, Jean interrupted with a simple, "You should eat, Frankie."
Frankie rolled her eyes; She knew Jean was right. Back in highschool, she was nowhere near as thin. Over the past few years, her weight had dropped drastically; to the point where her friends and bandmates worried about her. She didn't worry much, though. She liked her tall and skinny figure a lot. It fit her aesthetic.
Reluctantly she stood up and placed a slice of bread in the toaster. Her mouth felt so dry, and she knew toast wouldn't help, and she wasn't even hungry, but she knew Jean wouldn't let skipping breakfast slide.
When the toast popped up, Jean turned around suddenly in surprise, to see her friend with a fork in hand, attempting to get the toast out without burning herself.
"You are a mess!" Jean exclaimed before she rushed over to help her housemate get the  toast out without electrocuting herself.
The redhead nodded in appreciation and took a bite of the toast, nearly gagging around the texture. It was dry and sandpapery, rough against her parched throat.
"So. Are you ready to perform again? I wasn't sure if you'd be ready after... Last weekend's incident."
Last weekend...last weekend... Frustratedly, the redhead repeatedly drove her index finger into her head, trying to remember.
She was performing a gig in LA.
The lights were too bright; pain had throbbed behind her eyes. She was sweating buckets in her costume...costume, costume...
She'd taken the stage in a bedazzled white   jacket, with spandex shorts, with white fishnets, a pair of silver, patent leather platforms. Her hair was slicked back neatly with tons of hairspray. Bedazzled sunglasses perched upon her nose, and a pair of oversized feathered wings were harnessed to her back.
The prop wings were heavy; Uncomfortably so, especially for someone with Frankie's thin frame. And she felt like she would topple back with every step.
She managed to make it through the first few songs, up until her hit Hell's White Angel. Halfway through the song, she felt something drip onto her arm. Wetness coated her upper lip. She swiped across her mouth with her sleeve to wipe it away, but her heart stopped when she pulled away and saw a streak of red across her pure white garb.
She was bleeding. She could taste it in her mouth now: tangy and metallic. Her heart rose in her throat. Anger burned in her chest, and she felt dizzy, almost as if she was going to pass out.
In a fit of rage, Frankie kicked over the microphone and threw her electric guitar to the ground. She reached back and started tearing feathers from her wings, and started tossing them into the air. She turned on her heel and stormed backstage, nearly getting stuck in the doorway by her wings.  
She's stumbled back to her dressing room and collapsed onto her chair, panting heavily as she stared at the stranger in the mirror. A shock of red hair and gaudy makeup; Curtain bangs that fell like scarlet waterfalls over her cloudy eyes. Glitter, caked and matted in her hair, and an all too thin body dressed in such flashy clothes. Even despite her skeletal figure, the spandex shorts still dug into her thigh. And she was hot, baking even, beneath the layers of polyester.
The star tore open her jacket to cool herself off, and grabbed a makeup wipe to press against her pouring nose. Flashing lights and swirls of color danced before her eyes.
THUD THUD THUD
"FRANKIE, LET ME IN NOW!"
She could feel her heart pounding in her chest, going a hundred miles per hour. Blood was rising to her ears, and still pouring out of her nose. She could feel it pooling in the back of her throat, and she gagged on the metallic flavor. Frankie scrubbed at the blood trailing down her face as her breath hitched in the back of her throat, and she started coughing, spitting out a mouthful of pink tinged saliva.
"FRANKIE MAY!"
Before she could open her mouth to answer, a particularly nasty wave of vertigo crashed over her, and she collapsed headfirst onto her vanity with a bang.
That was about the same time Jean managed to burst into the room.
"Frankie?" She called, dread settling in her stomach.
She walked over and shook her, earning a groan from her disoriented friend. What could've caused this?
Jean helped lean Frankie back into the chair, but she felt her blood run cold at the mess on the vanity.
Razor blades. A little metal spoon, and a small tin box with a sliding lid. And she didn't even have to open the box to start putting the pieces together.
"Are you okay?" She shook her harder, and her head just fell limp to the side. She noticed the trail of blood now trickling down her neck and staining her white shirt and staining the collar.
"Shit. Shit. Shit shit shit shit."
Jean buzzed about the dressing room in a panic. She grabbed a few bandannas from a rack in the corner of the room, and ran to the sink to drench them with water. She returned to Frankie's side as laid one across her forehead and used the other to wipe her down.
Frankie's eyes fluttered open for a moment, before rolling back and shutting once again, as Jean scrubbed at her face and neck. Makeup and blood stained the white bandanna a shade of peachy orange.
With a grunt, the blonde placed her arms beneath Frankie's armpits and tried to stand her up. Limply, the singer fell against her chest, and her friend dragged her to the door, struggling to keep her in position.
"Shit. You're awfully heavy for someone who weighs only 90 pounds and basically eats only toast and coffee."  She said, heaving breaths.
It was that moment that some medics came rising in, nearly knocking Jean off her feet when they bust into the room.