chapter 1

Walking to the kitchen he sighed as he adjusted his belt. He was more and more aware of the slight jiggle that his stomach and hips had developed over the past few months -- especially when it was evident every morning as he came down the stairs.

"Toast, sweetheart?" Emily said as he walked into the room.

"Nope! I don't have time. I'll just grab some snacks to eat in the car." Reaching for his sports coat he smiled at his girlfriend. She always looked so good in the formal clothes she wore for work. "But thank you."

She watched him reach into the cupboards and drop a few candy bars into his bag. "I wish you wouldn't do that," she sighed, "you're going to get fat if you're not careful. Can't you have your secretary bring you breakfast instead, Tom? Get something a bit more healthy?"

"That's not in the job description, I'm afraid. It'll be fine." Tom leaned in to kiss her.

Prodding his stomach, Emily tutted. "Just be careful. You know you're up to 180 since you got that promotion."

"If I didn't know, you tell me enough that I would've cottoned on by now. Just because you work all day marketing exercise equipment doesn't mean you need to do it at home too. It'll be fine." He kissed her quickly and left.




A slim woman holding a clipboard was waiting outside Tom's office by the time he got to work. He unbuttoned his jacket and put a hand into his trouser pocket as he walked up to her.

"Can I help you?"

She looked up from her clipboard as Tom opened his office door. "Hi, yes! It's nice to meet you, sir; I'm Tegan. I'm your new secretary."

"Call me Tom. New secretary? What happened to Claire?" He walked into his office and could hear Tegan following him.

"Family emergency. Something to do with her mother. She flew back to France early hours this morning. I've printed off the email for you. Here."

Tom turned around to take the email and raised an eyebrow at what Tegan must've picked up whilst he had turned around and entered his office. She stood there with a bakery box and coffee.

Taking the email off of her and setting it down on his desk, Tom nodded to the table in the corner: "if you'd like to put your food down."

"My... Oh! Oh no. This is all for you. I didn't know what you liked so I just got a few of everything: bagels, muffins, doughnuts, a few cupcakes. Hope that's okay. Oh, and the place I got them from does this amazing coffee with the most delicious milk so I grabbed you one of those too."

Tom licked his lips at the mention of doughnuts and Tegan giggled. "What?"

"Nothing... Just... Well you had chocolate on your lips, but you've got it now."

Trying hard not to blush and thinking about the 6 candy bars he'd torn into on his drive in, Tom walked Tegan to the door.

"You could've told me about the chocolate before the entire conversation we had," he grunted.

Tegan nodded: "well how about if you get doughnut glaze around your mouth, I'll tell you ASAP?" She smirked as he looked away, clearly embarrassed. "Claire left a pretty good handover so I know what I'm doing today. Just let me know if you need anything... and let me know how you like the stuff from the bakery. That way I'll know what to pick you up from there next time."

Tom watched Tegan walk to her desk before shaking his head and going back into his office, closing the door behind him. He put a hand on his stomach and thought about how he shouldn't eat anything that Tegan had brought for him. Emily would kill him.

"But it smells so good," he groaned as he sat on the sofa next to the table. He'd thought that he was only going near the box to pick up the coffee, but before long he was eating cupcakes in two bites and working towards an empty box.



COPPERBOOM SAYS: Have you met him yet?

TEGAN321 SAYS: Yeah, just left him in his office with a box of snacks.

COPPERBOOM SAYS: And the coffee?

TEGAN321 SAYS: Of course -- got to get those supplements in somehow!

COPPERBOOM SAYS: Haha, good. I'll keep checking in. Good work.

Tegan closed down the IM app and glanced towards the door of Tom's office. He hadn't been out since this morning. It was now nearly 1:30pm.

"Well, he might be hungry. Can't risk that."

She opened another app and it wasn't 45 minutes later when the delivery guy showed up outside of Tom's office with pizzas, fries and soda... All nicely topped with a "Didn't want to disturb you, but figured you'd need some lunch. Tegan x" note. She didn't see him come out to accept the delivery. She was in the break room drinking tea and messaging with Copperboom.



"Excuse me, si- Erm, Tom?"

A grunt came from the office and Tegan took that as permission to enter.

"Sorry to bother you, it's just it's nearly 6pm and Claire's planner says you usually leave around 5 to be home by 5:30 and - oh..."

Tom was laid on the sofa, his belt undone, the boxes from all the food he'd consumed that day on the table next to him.

"Really? That - ugh - late?"

Tegan reached over and helped him sit up. She quickly smiled as she glanced down and saw how tight his shirt was. "Ate a bit too much?"

Nodding, Tom braced his hands on the edge of the sofa and hoisted himself up with a grunt. "Emily is going to be mad at me."

"Well get a move on and you'll be home as quick as you can. I'll call you a taxi. You don't seem to be in the mood to...(move?) drive. You'll only be an hour late, tops. You can even blame it on me! Say you had to stay late to train the new secretary, but you might want to do your belt up before you saying that one."

Looking down dumbly at his belt - the view to which was slightly obscured by his stuffed stomach - Tom mumbled: "it was hurting my belly."

Tegan was now by the door, ready to go home. "Maybe get a material one rather than leather. It'll bend easier."

"I shouldn't. I should just stop eating more than I should. You know I've put 20lbs on in the past 9 weeks?" Tegan listened to Tom talk. He was practically slurring his words -- it was like he was drunk on being so full. "I need to stop eating so much. I'll get fat."

"What? No!" Tegan walked over and kissed his cheek, sneakily brushing her hand lightly across his packed gut before backing away and starting to leave. "It'll be fine."