Chapter 3

“So even when you’re wolfing down pounds of cheap, fatty food while you hit the books, or hang out with your friends, or on your break at work, you don’t make a move. Even though you keep thinking . . .”

“I’m such a pig,” Maria once again said when prompted, through the mounting anger and now the slowly encroaching fear.

“. . . you’re still not thinking about the future. Laziness has set in even while you work hard for the grades. Strange how that works, isn’t it? But I don’t pretend to understand how the teenage mind works. Kids have always been a strange breed. I still don’t know what I was thinking half the time when I was your age. But then, I was doing more rambling and traveling and less, less . . . What is it you do?”

“Stuffing my faaa--” Maria’s voice cracked as she spoke, as if resisting his frightening allure, “--aaat face.” She paused, swallowed hard, and finished the thought, “Until I have to undo my pants.”

Temporary humiliation trumped anger and fear for the moment. She blushed bright red. It wasn’t even true. She rarely ever ate enough to actually have to unbutton her pants.

“Yeah, that’s right. Anyways, what was I saying? Oh, right, since you’re not changing your eating habits for the better, or making working out some, it’s only going to get worse.”

Maria’s stomach twitched. Her hands crawled from her sides to her stomach.

“And worse,” he said. It twitched stronger, groaning quietly.

“And worse,” he said a third time, smirking as he glanced at her.

Maria’s heart sank as she felt her fingers press into her soft tummy. But she wasn’t pressing on it, it was pressing on her fingers. She poked herself, looking down, her fingers delicately trying to detect exactly what just changed on her.

“It might just sneak up on you. You’ve been avoiding the clothes you’re afraid won’t fit, so when you start getting down to your last pairs of jeans, you see the pile in the back of your closet, take a good long look in the mirror, and then you feel it even before you see it.”

Something was happening to her. She cupped her hands softly over her tummy while it groaned, twitching, pressing into her palms. Her stomach had only been loose against her jeans when she sat before, but now, as she hunched over on the stool, she knew it must be leaving a mark. Though her long, loose shirt she could see her pudgy stomach pushing over and under her waistline. Her insides groaned, her stomach feeling full as well as looking bloated. She looked down, then up, then down again, unable to think of anything to say.

“And you realize, you think to yourself what should be an epiphany, a moment when things are going to change,” he said.

Maria, her lips trembling as her hands remained firmly over her now bloated tummy, said, “I’m fat.”

With no mistaken the sickening feeling, her stomach pressed out ever so slightly forward, the fabric of her shirt rubbing against her skin, making her skin crawl just feeling it. In seconds, the tightness of her jeans was even more noticeable than any subtle sensations of her shirt.

“But you’re still not fat. You even tell yourself this, to make yourself feel better. There are plenty of girls around larger than you. You’re not so big. You’re just a little out of shape, is all. But you’re still forced to admit, when you have to suck it in every time you button your jeans--”

“I’m chubby,” there was a slightly frantic tone in her furious voice now. She now officially had a stomach roll, which her hands kept going over, pressing into, afraid to really touch. She didn’t want to sit up straight for fear of seeing just how far out it stuck.

“And hell, since none of your friends are going to say anything, maybe you think nobody will notice. So you go around, putting up with all that new jiggling, pulling your shirt down over your flab, unfortunately, getting used to the sad fact that you’re not quite the little girl you used to be. And you keep eating the same as before.”

Her stomach felt full again as it pressed outward, almost as far out as her modest breasts, still hidden by her shirt and kept in check by her now uncomfortable jeans.

“And soon beautiful little Maria can’t hide it anymore. You need new clothes.”

With another surge, her jeans popped. Maria, her eyes wide, moved her hands from her stomach to her sides, feeling through her shirt two new, weird bulges.

“After all, you have to accommodate your new changes, such as . . . What’s that there?”

“My love handles?” she said. Her hands found softness all around her back even through her shirt, and she felt the back of her jeans straining under her, knowing her ass wasn’t being ignored.

“And your . . .?”

“My ass,” she said. Her face twitched between fear, hatred, and disgust, “My fat ass.”