Chapter 1

“You’ll never guess what my mum just asked me,” Karina said as they left her parents at the station car park and headed for the train trip back to London.

“I saw her whispering in your ear…”

‘Oh, it was ridiculous.” The dark eyes of the mixed-raced beauty seemed almost on fire, further tightening her slim features, lending extra lustre to her light brown skin. “She actually asked if I could gain some weight before we got married.”

Tom stopped dead in his tracks. “WHAT?”

Karina dragged him along. “We’ve got to keep moving. We’ll miss the train. It’s this Indian thing. A rural tradition. Family pride. If a bride looks chubby and well-fed it’s supposed to tell the in-laws that she’s wealthy and healthy.”

“But – ”.

“Tell me about it. I said it was ridiculous. For one thing my mum’s been in England for decades. She’s in hospital administration for God’s sake. And my father’s a doctor. And he’s bloody English. We’re thoroughly Westernised. Why is she bringing up this stupid old thing from her family’s past? Oh God, what’s our carriage?”

They hustled aboard, conversation dropped in the hurry to claim their reserved seats. The train was crowded. Talk was only resumed after their weekend suitcase was stowed, with the train moving off, rain speckling the windows as it emerged from the station into the open.

“But what exactly did she say? Was it like a command?”

“A suggestion more than a command. And to be fair she did say it would probably sound silly. Didn’t stop her saying it, though.” She glared briefly out of the window at the rain and the landscape beyond. Warehouses, railway sidings, a canal. “Look at it. This is Leeds. The north of England. Not deepest India.”

“How did you – I mean, what did you say?”

“We were saying our goodbyes. I didn’t want to make a fuss. I think I said something vague, like ‘I’ll bear it in mind’. Well, I’ll bear it in mind by ignoring it completely. I mean, when did I last gain weight? Never!”

“Absolutely. It’s just not something you do, is it?”

“And I’m not going to start now. Mothers!” She raised her eyebrows in a gesture of despair.

“It’s unbelievable.”

Meanwhile, Tom’s memory bank retrieved images from seven years ago – their marriage had been a long time coming – when they’d met as university students. The ‘bridge’ photo immediately came to mind: a photo snapped in Cambridge when Karina, Tom, and Clive, collectively known as the Three Musketeers, always together, always intermingled, were larking about one of the river bridges, friendship and youth personified. Karina’s slim physique and chiselled features with a slight hollow under her cheekbones; her tousled shoulder-length black hair and dusky skin; her lustrous brown pupils, standing out brilliantly from the whites of her eyes; her winning, slightly wry smile: all these had barely changed.

Since those years, the threesome had spun off in different directions, pursuing their goals (Karina, Clive) or twiddling their thumbs (Tom), before reforming as just two, Karina and Tom, first living apart, then living together, and finally deciding in their mid 20s to get respectable and tie the knot. Initially, at Cambridge, it was Clive who seemed in the running to win the magnetic Karina’s favours. He was the one who was pin-up handsome; Tom was more ordinary, and shorter. Clive was boisterous; Tom was quiet.

But it was Tom who persisted, while Clive spun off, determined to chase his ambition in natural sciences and spend a life abroad wearing cargo pants, working on wild life programmes for TV. Meanwhile Tom, who wanted to be a writer but could never think of anything worth writing about, filled in time at a literary agency. Karina, for her part, furthered her music studies, played the violin, never put on weight, often skipped breakfast, went to the gym, and stood on the scales at a steady 118 lbs.

“Did she go through this rubbish herself? Before she got married?”

“I don’t know. She’s plumpish now. But that’s just life, I suppose. Well, her life. Not mine.”

“Certainly not. It’s never going to be yours.” They clutched hands, and Tom moved in for a kiss. “You’re my slim angel.”

“That’s right.” She looked out of the window again. A field with cows. Neat hedgerows. A gentle river. It still didn’t look like India. “And besides,” she marched on, “the thing only makes sense in India if it’s an arranged marriage, and the bride only turns up on the wedding day. But your parents have known me for years. Having me suddenly turn up at the altar all chubby isn’t going to impress them a bit, is it?” She continued fulminating, on and off, for the next twenty-six minutes.

***

The months before the wedding found them busy and sometimes distracted. Karina’s career as a violinist was at a critical stage, as the new music ensemble she played in – indeed helped form – was just starting to get a reputation in a competitive market. There were eight core players, with add-ons where necessary, and to mark themselves out from rivals they had chosen a distinctive name, The Fire Brigade. Someone unhelpfully pointed out that fire brigades put out fires, while musicians, speaking metaphorically, should ignite them. But by then the name had already gained traction, so they felt they should stick with it.

There were hours of practice, rehearsals, some concerts, and planning for a provincial tour. Tom didn’t see much of her in their small rented flat. Nor was he much there himself. The agency he worked for, Wisdom Associates, a name he thought inappropriate, had landed him the unappetising task of trying to winkle a book of memoirs out of the experiences of a woman who suffered from a neurological disorder that meant it was physical hurtful for her to be near anyone with a switched-on cell phone, or any other kind of active device. With his phone safely off, he’d sit in her house, and commit her talk to an ancient cassette recorder. In between, the pair made their plans – registry office ceremony, a reception at the Blind Curate, a neighbourhood pub, a honeymoon break in America.

On the day itself, Karina wore a clinging white dress, specially bought. After some weeks of rushing about and not eating much, she had lost a couple of pounds, and cut a particularly slim figure, hips barely showing, breasts petite, tummy flat. Clive, fitting in the wedding between important work assignments (he didn’t have any other kind) gave her a string of compliments at the reception. “Stunning as ever, Kari. You never change!”

“I try not to,” she said.

“Of course, you know you’ve married the wrong bloke. I’d be a much better match.”
He was being jocular, but he also meant it.

“Oh well, Clive, my loss. I have years of regret ahead of me.”

And with a sweet smile she excused herself. She saw her parents and in-laws knotted together in conversation, and joined them. None of them looked visibly disappointed that she wasn’t carrying any surplus fat, though her mother was good at acting and told her daughter, with proprietary pride, that she was ‘the picture of happiness’.

Some of Tom’s work colleagues were there too. One of them, Dave – there is always a Dave – jokingly said that he’d expected Tom’s cell phone woman to be there as well.

“Impossible,” Tom told him. “With all the live gadgets in this room, she’d be puking away in a corner.” He was glad to be going on his honeymoon break, away from his absurd assignment. He was equally glad that the reception speeches by his best friend Dirk and, not least, his own, were done with. Nothing to do now but to chat, drink, feel happy, and finally have their own sliver of the wedding cake they had ceremoniously cut before.

“Here,” he said, handing Karina an accidentally thick slice of powerful fruitcake and buttercream icing. She suddenly realised she had skipped lunch and most of breakfast and pounced on it like a long-lost friend. “M’m. This is delicious. Really good.” She said it again: “Really good.”

***

Their choice of honeymoon destination? America. One week in New York City, then exploring the Hudson River. Big city vibes, plus picturesque little towns and vistas, and the great river rolling along. A luxury Manhattan hotel of course would have been nice, but they compromised with a budget place, with rooms containing a bed, wardrobe and not much else. Karina wasn’t keen on the shared bathroom facilities down the corridor, but they had to face economic facts, and coming from Britain the exchange rate wasn’t in their favour.

There were no eating facilities in-house, but plenty of restaurants and coffee shops nearby. Each morning began with an imposing breakfast: waffles one day, eggs how they liked them the next. Karina, never in America before, was taken aback by the size of the portions; the size of the sandwiches too: “They’re like a whole meal!” This didn’t stop her from enjoying them. After a few days, in the early hours while she slept, a small collection of fat cells, leftovers from the day’s carbohydrate intake, started settling into their new home on Karina’s body, just below her belly-button.

For all the bustle of NYC they had a relaxing time as they visited the obvious sights, took in an art exhibit or concert, or lingered in Central Park. Then a rented car, and out and about up the Hudson, where the pace was slower; quaint antique shops, homes of writers and artists, the birthplace of a President neither had heard of, romantic restaurants, and always the wide river. They had plenty of memories to keep them company as they settled into their seats on the plane back, though Tom’s contented look suddenly curdled when his eyes took in the unusual tight fit of Karina’s white jeans as she prepared to fasten her seatbelt.

He started out being light-hearted. “I was thinking of carrying you over the threshold when we got back, but I might have to revise my plans. It looks like you’ve put on a little weight,” he said. “In the tummy area.” He shook his head. “That’s a no-no!”

“It certainly is. I do feel a bit constricted. I guess we’ve been eating quite a lot.” She clasped and tightened the seatbelt around her waist. “I’ll soon work it off,” she said. He nodded vigorously. They understood each other.

***

Back home, the normal routine of life returned, but with some variations. Tom was told that the mobile phone phobia project had been dropped, not before time, so the agency gave him a new assignment, reading the manuscript of a history of punctuation. “Start at the beginning,” his boss had said, “and read until you come to a full stop.” Tom had laughed grimly.

Karina’s days had their usual variety, sometimes spent at home keeping in practice with her violin or learning new music, or venturing out for group rehearsals or pitching in on recording sessions – the usual scattered life of the freelancer. Her plane remark about “working it off” had been more a rhetorical gesture than anything reflecting serious thought. Breakfasts might have shrank back in size – no stack of waffles to work through – though a general loosening of her appetite, formerly so controlled, remained.

At breakfast she started to have two slices of bread or toast, rather than one, the slices cut rather more thickly than before. At restaurants she expressed interest in the desserts, and found herself buying flapjacks, granola bars, little things she could snack on at home, or take along as an energy boost to outside engagements. They looked healthy, she reasoned, and tasted healthy: they couldn’t do her any harm.

It took about a month for both of them, in different ways, to realise that this regime had consequences: that, slowly and quietly, she was gaining more weight. Tom first suspected that her dusky body might be changing in what her thought of as the wrong direction as they went about their business in bed. Foreplay alone told him she felt smoother to the touch, more cushioned around the tummy. After that he began looking more closely whenever he saw her naked – taking off clothing, putting it on, going to and fro in the bathroom.

Then one morning he found her sitting on the bathroom stool after a shower, towelling down one of her cocked legs, two little rolls of tummy fat spread over the front of her waist, speared with a crease through her belly-button. This was the definite, disconcerting proof: far from shedding her American pounds, she’d been steadily acquiring new ones. He was displeased, and felt he should say something. At the same time, being English, he felt awkward about it. He didn’t want to wag his finger and hurt her feelings if it wasn’t necessary. The problem, he persuaded himself, would probably go away as she’d soon take rearguard action herself. It was just a blip, a post-honeymoon blip.

Karina herself, aware of feeling increasingly snug in some clothes, equally tried to turn a blind eye. She avoided looking at herself closely in the mirror and also steered clear of the areas where she knew she had gained in New York. ‘Ignorance is bliss’ is the phrase, but ignorance couldn’t be bliss for long, and the bliss period ended when she foolishly thought of fishing out the jeans she’d worn on the flight back from the States.

This time, they weren’t just a tight fit. She couldn’t clasp the zip at the front. Over the apron of her belly a curve of fat had now built up, fat she could smear a finger through, as if it was soft butter. This is what happens, she told herself, if you eat a little more, stack up on calories, every day. She felt mortified, even disgusted, as she prodded her tummy, tweaking the flesh between her fingers. This was Karina, the perpetually slim Karina?

She decided that the safest short-term solution was to keep quiet, not mention it to Tom, and cut back on snacks. The fat would just fade away. It wasn’t something permanent, only a blip. Another post-honeymoon blip.

Cutting back was her resolution. Turning it into practice, though, was something else. Sometimes she achieved it, most times she didn’t. Over the next month her tummy’s curve gradually grew more prominent, enough to give her difficulties when she had to try on a clinging black dress needed for a high-profile concert at London’s prestigious Wigmore Hall.

“What do you think?” she said to Tom after pulling the dress down over her waist, gently, nervously.

He looked at her carefully, noting the puckered material around the hips and the clear outline of a belly pooch looming out at the front. He could hold back no longer. “I really think you should go on diet. You’ve been steadily gaining weight ever since we got married.”

She sighed, with frustration. “I know, I know. I thought I could get away with this dress,” she said, turning around in front of a mirror, seeing if the view was any better from the side. It wasn’t. “I just got into a kind of routine, eating a bit more. If we’d gone to Sudan instead of America it wouldn’t have happened.”

“No-one goes on their honeymoon to Sudan unless they want to end up dead. But don’t worry, love.” He put an arm around her, newly aware of feeling the extra flesh lining her body. “It’s reversible. We can lose this. Cut your intake, exercise more, and hey presto, slimline Karina is back!”

She attempted a faint smile. “You make it sound so easy…”

“It is easy, you’ll see!”

Meanwhile, Karina still had the day’s dress problem to solve. She decided to wear it. There wasn’t another black alternative, not for the Wigmore Hall. She wished there was, especially after her oboist colleague Jenny immediately spotted her looming tummy in the shared dressing room.

“Do I hear the patter of baby feet?” she cooed, pointing in the bulge’s direction. “You’re not pregnant, are you?”

How she cursed the dress. “No I’m not,” Karina had to say. “I’ve just gained a bit of weight.”

“That’s really what I thought. I mean, if you were pregnant you’d have told us. It’s just a few pounds, probably.”

Karina tried to look nonchalant, but she knew ‘a few pounds’ was understating it. She hated all this. She hated people spotting her gain and telling her about it; she hated having to explain or comment. It didn’t matter so much with Tom, though she disliked the fact that Tom disapproved, that by gaining weight she was disappointing him, just as she was disappointing herself. But outside eyes noticing: that was extra embarrassing.

And the list of embarrassing feelings and experiences kept growing. Wriggling to get into jeans and dresses that she could previously slip on with ease. Sensing her tummy almost imprisoned under her clothes. The shaming sight of the clothes she’d already outgrown, hanging in the wardrobe, useless.

Alongside all that, she hated the thought that after all that consternation when her mother suggested she put on weight, here she was doing it on her own. Was this gaining an Indian gene thing, the Indian part of her gene cocktail kicking in? She thought of her mother’s own ample midriff. Was this her future too? The thought made her shiver.

***