Chapter 1

“You’re coming for Thanksgiving, aren’t you?”

“Of course!” Shannon said. “I always come, don’t I?”

As she held the phone she could see the scene in her mind’s eye, unchanged year after year: the old home in Madison, Wisconsin, the dining table with the leaves pulled out (something only seen on special occasions), the turkey hot from the oven, the cutlery and serviettes neatly laid out, and the faces gathered around, waiting expectantly. Her two sisters, an uncle perhaps, her dad, so laidback as to be horizontal. And her mom, the homemaker deluxe, always fussing round. Oh, she’d be there, alright. Living far away in the plastic bubble of LA, she needed to keep a sense of family and belonging.

“We haven’t seen you for so long, almost eight months,” her mother went on.

“I know, I’m sorry, I’ve been really busy. Lots of assignments. But I’ll be there.”

For Shannon, Thanksgiving had long been a special occasion. There was the obvious reason, and there was another. She was a model. She had a figure to keep. She had to watch what she ate; that pretty much came with the job. No ice-cream binges. No pizza parties. And beware pasta! Every calorie had to be watched. But this was the one big occasion when America gave her a license to indulge, and she always took advantage. This year, she knew, would be no exception – who’d want to reduce Thanksgiving to a thin slice of turkey meat on a cracker?

Still, she approached it this time with a little misgiving. For after five years of working as a model, slim and trim at 117 pounds, she had found herself over the last year or so gaining some weight; at first a few pounds, then up to five, more recently ten, steadily creeping up, giving her the start of a pot belly, padding her out a bit in the chest and face. She was bemused by it all; she still watched what she ate, she thought, though she accepted that during a recent holiday in Hawaii with her on-again-off-again boyfriend there was more food than usual to watch. Was this the change in her metabolism her mother had told her expect? Already, at 25? Or was it a gene thing, something over which she had no control?

At first Shannon had easily found ways in her mind to minimise these changes. Yes, she’d got a bit softer round the middle, but it didn’t show, did it? Or didn’t show much. People in the modelling business still wanted her; still said she looked beautiful. And wasn’t a tummy just another curve?

But after Hawaii it had become harder to juggle these thoughts. Some favourite clothes had become too tight to wear, and she’d had to admit to friends and colleagues that she’d “gained a few pounds”. One day she overheard a photographer at a session complain behind her back that she was “starting to fatten up”. With that phrase ringing in her ears she’d gone back home and fetched out the scales. She was 129 pounds. No words had been said officially, but she’d begun to realise that perhaps she was now skating on thin ice, and a few pounds more might make her fall through. Even at the best of times it was hard to come back from Wisconsin and not be at least a pound heavier; at Thanksgiving it was impossible. “Oh well,” she thought to herself, “I’ll just hit the treadmills extra hard as soon as I get back.”

She took a good book to read on the plane. At least she’d been told it was a good book. “Herzog” by Saul Bellow. It was a famous novel. She wanted to read it. She wasn’t an airhead; if her looks hadn’t caught a photographer’s eye when she was sweet sixteen she might have gone on to spread her wings in further education, get a solid degree, cram knowledge into her head. But she had these cheekbones, this natural blonde hair, a gift from her Swedish grandparents, this mouth that said “Desire me, desire me”, and those pert pair of breasts, just big enough to give a kick to a figure toned and sleek as a gazelle. The die was cast. She had to be a model.

Sitting on the plane, she thought about her agent’s parting words. “Don’t eat too much, will you?” he’d said. No, no, she’d replied, and to show willing she refused all in-flight food. Just a Diet Coke. Nothing more, nothing less. The head-set entertainment didn’t entertain her; and the more she looked at her novel the more forbidding it became. So she flicked through the airline’s magazine to see if any model she knew was featured in the advertisements. Petra was there, of course, the deodorant queen, cool as a mountain stream. Petra was always there. And Roxanne, modelling spectacles; taken after her nose job, apparently. The big bucks girls, the ones the ad agencies loved. There they were, shiny and thin, looking as though their daily diet was carrot juice and a muesli bar.

Shannon herself was still working the clothing catalogues and leaning on car bonnets in auto shows. She felt a spasm of jealousy pass through her, but no more than a spasm. The bigger a model’s fame, she reasoned, the bigger the pressures. Even with her more modest career she felt she was living in a goldfish bowl. Everyone was eyeing you, expecting you to be sexy and smiling even if you had a hangover and felt like the inside of a paper bag. You were always on show. You could never just be you – supposing, that is, you knew who you were.

She looked around at her fellow passengers, few of them with a model’s figure, and let out a little sigh. Another hour to go, and then the change at Chicago. She felt the cover of her novel staring at her. Clearing her throat, she picked it up and turned to the first page.

“If I am out of my mind,” she read, “it’s all right with me, thought Moses Herzog.”

“H’m,” Shannon mused, “this is going to be a bit different.” She took a deep breath, in the process feeling the apron of her belly pressing against her slacks. Settling back in her seat, she read on. Unseen, across her waist, underneath her blouse, the fat on her midriff eased itself into a little roll.

****

“Shannon!”

“ Hi, dad!”

There was the usual kiss and hug round the waist. He lingered a little as he met smile for smile. Something was different about the face, Lester thought. Maybe she’d changed her hairstyle. Old gallant that he was, he took her suitcase and led the way through the arrivals hall to the car park.

“Brought your appetite with you?” he said, humping the case into the boot. “It’s going to be a good dinner tomorrow.”

“Oh yes.” Shannon could have said something more, but she kept her thoughts hidden. They buckled up.

“Buckled in, are we?” he asked. Shannon grinned. Always the cautious driver. He grinned back, and noted how her cheeks looked rounder, and how her seatbelt as it rode down her chest seemed to dig into her breasts more than before. Then he realised what had happened. She had obviously gained some weight.

She asked, “Have you got any errands or business things to do?” He hadn’t; his work as a builder and decorator, he said, was winding down for the winter. He’d be in his workshop for the duration, making bookshelves to sell in the spring.

“But I’ll go home the scenic route.”

Shannon’s eyes widened. “A scenic route? Here?”

“Well, Memory Lane, then.” He settled into the highway leading out of town. “See, they’ve finished that shopping mall. The Emerald Mall. Another one. Just where we used to live.” On the left, approaching, rose a huge squat box of concrete and glass, roadways leading in and out like an octopus’s tentacles.

“My God, it’s enormous! And there used to be trees, and fields!” She sounded personally affronted.

“And our house.”

Twisting her torso, she looked back at the monstrous growth as it receded through the window. Lester took his own farewell glance, accidentally catching along the way a tiny flash of exposed flesh round Shannon’s waist. His eyes returned to the road ahead.

“Yes,” he said, philosophically, “everything’s changing. Nothing stays the same.” Yes, he said to himself, thinking about Shannon. She looked nice, he decided.

***

The car turned into the driveway. There was the house, the porch, and the garden, looking manicured but sullen as it always did every November. And the Stars and Stripes, up for the holidays. A house. A home. Shannon’s apartment in LA never felt like a home.

And there was her mom, looking as always like Betty Crocker or some other face on a box of cake mix, the hair swept up, the smile bright, the figure well-cushioned, welcoming her to the domestic hearth.

“My baby!” Ingrid cried once they got through the door. The kisses. The hugs. “It’s been too long!” Her hands clutched Shannon’s arms. “You’re looking very well!”

“Thanks, I am well. And you?”

“Can’t complain.”

“Oh, she does,” said Lester.

“But let’s sit down. Let’s catch up!” After a bit of bustle, coffee was brought, and a plate of biscuits. Shannon sat back on the sofa, slipped off her jacket, and absentmindedly gave her left thigh a few pats with her hand. Handing out the coffee, Ingrid caught the gesture, and began to take in the visible swell on Shannon’s tummy, the new touch of padding in the cheeks, and the puckerings around the blouse buttons that suggested the breasts were having trouble fighting for space. “You look like you’ve filled out a bit!” she said.

Shannon’s heart skipped a beat. Her mother’s tone was cheery and approving, but still the remark left her feeling exposed. When she’d been sizing up the Thanksgiving trip she had only worried about the pounds she might put on; she’d forgotten to worry about the pounds already there, sitting in residence, rounding out her body. Over the last few months she’d reluctantly grown used to them, just as a temporary measure. But here she was, on her family’s doorstep, suddenly looking twelve pounds heavier. Or was it more? Whatever the numbers, as she held her cup she felt every one of the extra pounds that were “filling her out”, pressing against clothes meant for someone a little slimmer. A few feet away, on a shelf, she could see a framed photo of herself, slender in a swimsuit, one of her early modelling assignments.

“I have put on some weight, just a bit.” She sounded rueful, apologetic.

“It’s nothing to get upset about, Shannon! It’s a natural process. And it suits you, too. Doesn’t it, Les?”

Lester looked again at his daughter, the face glowing, the whole body lightly kissed with fat. “The picture of health,” he said. “Never looked better.”

“You think?” Shannon was starting to feel slightly less awkward. Did the pounds really make her look better? Or was this only parents being nice? Resting her cup, she touched the clasp on the front of her slacks. “I’m starting to get a bit worried about it,” she went on. “There’ve been comments at work. You know, photographers.”

“Oh, they’ll get used to it! Put it out of your head. You’re here to eat, remember. It’s Thanksgiving.”

“I know, mom, but...“. Shannon found herself looking at the plate of biscuits, and realised suddenly that she’d had hardly anything all day. Breakfast was just a coffee and half a muffin. On the flights she hadn’t even touched the salted peanuts; only liquids. It was now early afternoon.

“But what?” said Ingrid.

“Oh, nothing!” Shannon reached for a biscuit. She was here to have a good time, she decided. And she was hungry.

****

Up in her room she did her usual coming-home ritual, walking round slowly, taking it in, inspecting the shelves. It was all there. The gym trophies. The teenage fiction she’d once devoured and found hard to throw away; perhaps she could ditch “Herzog” for one of those books? The little seat under the window where she’d spent hours reading, dreaming, combing her hair, planning her future.

She knelt on it and looked out, over the backyard, to the houses beyond. Time stood still for a moment, and her life along with it. Did she really want to spend the next five, ten, maybe more, years, living before the camera’s eye, just a smile and a body, a desirable object for consumers? Would employers even want her? Already her body was doing things she didn’t really want, building up fat across her tummy, widening her thighs.

Her bed beckoned. She lay down and from the bedside table picked up Wodger, a toy rabbit that had lost a lot of fur to love when she was small. “Hi, Wodger,” she said. He seemed pleased to see her. She played with his ears, and turned him gently in the air. “I love you no matter what you look like. Do you feel the same?” The rabbit’s beady eyes glistened. And with a kiss on the nose she put Wodger back, nestled up against the bedside lamp.

“Good old Wodger,” she sighed, and rested her head on the pillow. Without much conscious thought she began running a hand over her chest. The hand spread over one breast; then the other hand started fingering its partner. They never filled so much space before, Shannon thought. Moving on, the hands then spread down and outwards, towards her hips, feeling the fat clustered round her sides, and inwards again, onto her tummy, pressing into the flesh trapped behind her slacks. “Oh!” she groaned, not without pleasure. “Either I have to lose this weight, or I have to get slacks in the next size.” Then she turned to her mother’s words, about filling out and how it suited her. Was that true? If so, was it good or bad? She just didn’t know.

The reverie was soon shattered. The door burst open. It was Adele, her younger sister, loud, boisterous, a little chunky, just arrived from Chicago, released from university for a few days. They were probably glad to get rid of her. “Shannon!” she cried, and she leaped onto the bed.

“Adele!”

Making room for her, Shannon swiftly scooped herself up from the horizontal, forcing the fat slumbering on her tummy into its roll, just about visible between the blouse buttons. But Adele’s attentions were occupied elsewhere. She was kissing and squeezing shoulders, saying “It’s so good to see you!”. Her sister’s face, she spotted, was rounder than usual. “You’re looking well!” she said.

Here we go, Shannon thought. They held hands briefly, allowing Adele to size her up further. She saw the breasts, the tight slacks, and, circling the waist, poking out, several ounces of spare tyre. “Looks like you’ve put on some weight!” She said it with surprise and wonder, the kind of tone you might adopt if you were seeing the Taj Mahal for the first time.

Shannon’s heart didn’t stop; it just quivered. A model, she knew, should be used to the scrutiny of others, but she still found it unsettling to get this kind of scrutiny, and this kind of comment, right from the family’s bosom. Models, after all, shouldn’t gain weight, and she had, and everybody here was noticing.

“I’m probably a bit heavier, yes. Well I know I am. Not sure why.”

“You’re eating more, I guess. It happens. You know about the freshman fifteen?” Shannon gazed up at her and saw someone who was now, on her last admission, twenty pounds heavier than before she’d gone to university. Abandoning athletics; the student buffets; the pizzas; the drinking: it was easy enough. By now the family had got used to Adele being rounder, with tummy flab and a slight double chin.

“But I’m a model, not a freshman. There isn’t a model fifteen. Not usually, anyway. It’s bad for business.”

“Well change the business!”

“It’s not that easy,” she said. Fresh pastures beckoning: a pleasant thought, Shannon told herself. But scary. Could she make the jump into the unknown? Thanksgiving wasn’t the time to thrash this one out. She got up from the bed and stretched her arms. “But I’m not going to worry about a few pounds now,” she said, obviously worrying about them.

“You don’t want to eat, do you?” Adele said, hopefully.

She broke into a reluctant grin. “Starving. Haven’t had a thing all day.”

****