Chapter 5 - discoveries

“The best ones are definitely the red velvet muffins, Alec” Lisa said.

“Lisa, are you sure we’re eating the same thing? These pumpkin spice muffins are clearly better” Amber laughed.

“Oh please, the nutella ones are the best, I could eat it all day” I said, finishing my seventh muffin.

“Right, the skinny one knows better than us” Said Lisa as we all laughed.

“I’m so glad you liked it! We’ll add those to the menu next week then” said Alec bringing another tray of muffins for us.

It’s been two months since I moved with the girls and I couldn’t say I wasn’t happy, it was like the old days. Aaron was still being an ass about me living with them, but he still didn’t want to leave his parents house and frankly I didn’t know if I still wanted to move in with him.

“Do you girls want more?” Alec Asked.

“Obviously” Lisa and Amber said together.

“I’m good. I shouldn’t be eating like this anyway, Aaron said I gained weight” I lamented.

“Vic, the only extra weight you’re carrying is this awful boyfriend of yours” Lisa said.

Aaron wasn’t wrong, I did gain some weight. Living with Amber and Lisa was very hard if you wanted to maintain your weight, they always had so much food around and were always having fast food, plus working in the coffee shop wasn’t easy either, Alec was always testing new flavours and I was his official tester. I’ve gained 15 lbs in these two months, nothing alarming since I was still 125 lbs, but Aaron was giving me a hard time for it.

“Uh fancy restaurant. Are we celebrating something?” I asked him as we entered the restaurant.

Aaron brought me to a new italian place that had just opened, Lisa went on a date there and had made some great recommendations.

“I’m thinking about ordering these bruschettas, the fettucine alfredo and two cannoli for dessert, Lisa said it’s delicious” I said looking at the menu.

“I think you should go for a salad, you’ve been eating to much carbs lately” he said “you’re getting fat”

“It’s not like that, I just gained a few pounds” I said, a little uncomfortable.

“All right, do whatever you want” He said, but I knew he didn’t mean it.

I ended up ordering just a salad as Aaron wished, we ate silently, the only noise was the silverware hitting the plates. I went home hungry that night and a little upset that I didn’t try any of the plates that Lisa told me about.

“What do you mean with just a salad?” Lisa asked me when I told about my dinner.

“It was Aaron’s suggestion. He thinks I should go easy on carbs” I explained, as my stomach growled.

“Girl, you can’t go to bed with an empty stomach, let’s grab something to eat” Lisa said.

“I really shouldn’t…” I started saying but was interrupted by Lisa that pushed me out the door.

We went to the burger joint near the apartment, as expected everyone knew Lisa and we didn’t need to make an order, she just handed the money to the young guy behind the counter who flirted a bit with Lisa and said he would bring the food to our table.

“You are quite popular” I observed “Every guy flirts with you”

“Not all of them. But I can say I have a few admirers” Lise bragged.

The guy from the counter came back with a tray filled with 4 burgers, a basket of fries, 2 large sodas and 1 milkshake.

“I’ll come back with yours” He said to me and came back with a similar tray for me.

“Lisa, I can’t eat all of these” I said.

“Don’t worry, I didn’t say anything so he thought you had an appetite like mine” She said between bites “Eat whatever you want, we’ll bring the leftovers home”

We ate and talked about Lisa’s life, how it changed and how happy she was. She told me about her dates, about her job, about the times she was able to travel to other countries because of it, I didn’t see the time go by or how much I was eating, only the sound of the empty milkshake cup that made me notice my tray, it was empty, only wrappers and empty containers.

“It looks like we underestimated your appetite, I’ve never seen someone your size eat that much” Lisa said impressed.

“Yeah, I was hungry” I said, confused. Something inside of me craved more, but I couldn’t stop thinking about what Aaron would say if he saw me in that state.

“We should go back home” Lisa said “I have an australian client early in the morning and you have to open the coffee shop”