chapter 25

Truth be told, Hilly had never been in a real relationship. Oh, she had boy friends on and off but nothing that lasted more than a couple of months and certainly nothing exclusive. And at first that's what she thought she had with Brad. He was rich, handsome, influential, and still unattached, so Hilly felt like there was something wrong with this picture, that at the very least Brad was relationship averse.

So at the beginning, she and Brad would go out to dinner a couple of times a month. Just dinner, nothing else. And frankly, she thought their whole dating thing would never get off the ground. For one thing, Brad had this bad habit of always ordering dinner for her. It wasn't that he did a bad job of it, just the opposite. He seemed to anticipate her every gastronomic whim. He always ordered the right thing, which Hilly found just a tad annoying.

Then, out of the clear blue sky, Brad asked her out two weekends in a row. Hilly didn't place any particular significance to this development because, thing is, she LIKED Brad. He was fun to be with. He was intelligent, well-read and VERY sophisticated. And he liked women too. He was truly interested in her opinions and it wouldn't be unusual for them to close a restaurant after a five hour dinner conversation. She hoped that he noticed she was attractive, but she never once caught him making one of those gawky stares, admiring this or that body part.

And so it was that slowly but surely Brad and Hilly became a couple. It was the first real relationship Hilly had ever been in. So there were little things that she never noticed happening, until it was too late, of course. Like, for instance, she soon discovered there was no such thing as a diet in a relationship, especially a new one. It wasn't that she set out to eat more than she had been doing, she just stopped paying attention to what and how much she was eating.

At first it didn't matter much. She was still working out religiously, burning off almost as many calories as she was putting in. But as the relationship deepened, she and Brad started to spend more and more time with each other. Not surprisingly, Hilly started skipping her normal workout schedule, to the point that she was lucky if she got into the gym more than once or twice a month.

It was on the night of their six month anniversary as a couple. She wanted to wear something special to dinner. So Hilly rummaged through her closet, looking for the dress she wore to Michael and Amanda's wedding. It didn't take long. She slid it off its hanger and stepped into the dress. Except that this time she had a bit of a hard time getting the dress to slide over her slightly extended butt. With some pulling and tugging she got it on, thinking nothing about what this meant. Little did she know this would be the first in a series of such little "surprises" that would mark her time with Brad!