FAT CHANCE

F. Michael LaRosa

He liked ’em fat.

          Really fat.

          “Super-size,” they called ’em.

          Big, rotund women.

          B-B-BBWs.

          Yup.

          He didn't understand it himself—didn't know where the attraction came from.

          His mama hadn't been fat. Nor his sister. Nor anyone in his family but sad, fat ol’ Aunt Peg who was not in any way “sexy fat” but a sort of weird, square, flat-butted fat with small breasts and a big belly like a man‘s.

          No. That wasn't the kind of fat he liked.

          He liked 'em round.

          Curvaceous.

          Rubenesque.

          Big, wide, pear-shaped women with nice tits, and huge, fat derrières that turned into pale, massive, bumpy thighs.

          Big, blue-veined thighs.

          Soft, fat, cottage cheese thighs that rolled and bumped their way down fine, thick legs to pudgy, dimpled knees and wide, heavy calves and chunky ankles and short little pig-like feet that were crammed, tight and sweaty, into tiny pumps, and the whole, fat, lip-smacking enchilada stacked precariously on four-inch heels.

          Yup.

          Floppage.

          Spillage.

          Seam-poppin’, button-snappin’, fat-assed spillage, oozing like cookie dough from a tube—like ham sausage, sweet, salty, and delicious.

          He liked a fat girl who liked to show off. Who knew she was hot.

          Who wiggled and waggled and swung her big, delectable tail. Who was in a sort of demolition derby with the world, knocking crap over with her big, crazy ass.

          “Pardon me,” she'd say. “I bumped your car with my ass.”

          While the alarm went off.

          The air bag inflated.

          He liked a big, fat, long-haired, butt-swingin’ hussy.

          That's what he liked.

II

She was sort of like that.

          Not so bold. Proud, maybe. A big, proud woman.

          I mean, she knew she was fat but she didn’t care. Well, maybe she cared, but she was sick of caring. Sick of dieting. Sick of feeling guilty. Sick of trying to be somebody she could never be.

          Sick of being jealous.

          Sick of Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie.

          Those skinny bitches.

          Sick of Tyra Banks, who talked as though she was fat or knew something about being fat but really didn't know shit about it—was not fat and never had been and probably never would be.

          Sick of Oprah. Sick of Kirsty Alley.

          Jennie Craig.

          Slim Fast.

          Sick of all of it.

          She wanted something different.

          Freedom. Self-respect.

          But more than that.

          She wanted to indulge, without guilt.

          She wanted fat, juicy steaks and a ton of French fries.

          Blue cheese dressing.

          Pizza buffet.

          Beer.

          Ice cream. Chocolate. Oh, yes! Chocolate!

          And sex.

          She wanted a guy all over her.

          Kissing.

          Licking.

          Wallowing.

          And not some liar—not some wimp who wanted to stick his pecker in her all the time at home but acted all ashamed in public—who would stuff her face, then ooh and ah over it, then pretend he didn't know her if they happened to see his colleague or, worse, a relative or friend..

          Nope. She wanted a real man.

          A sexy man.

          A lover.

          Trim.

          Muscular.

          Powerful. Sure of himself.

          Confident, but kind.

          She had heard of guys like that—good-lookin’, successful guys who liked fat girls.

          Online, there were dozens of ads.

          “The fatter the better,” one said.

          “I'd worship you,” said another.

          But she didn't like the idea of meeting a guy online. I mean, he could be anybody.

          He could be a serial killer.

          Some fat-hating son-of-a-bitch who'd drive her to an isolated spot in the boonies, tie her up, and cut her throat.

          But, damn, she was lonely.

          Sick lonely.

          Cryin' lonely.

          And horny, too.

          God, what she could do to a guy. 

          She sat on the sofa in sweat pants and tee-shirt, her fat little feet propped on the coffee table, and consoled herself with a half-gallon of Rocky Road ice cream. None of that light shit, either.

          She was sick of that, too.

          “Fat free” gave her diarrhea—a helluva price to pay for something that wouldn’t make a bit of difference. 

          No. This was the real thing.

          Rich, creamy, with huge chunks of chocolate.

          She washed them down with Coke. Not Diet Coke.

          She chugged it from a two-liter bottle.

          Had he known, it would have made his day.

          It would have tripped his trigger.

          But he was home, alone, tripping his trigger while looking at digital images of fat women on the Internet.

III.

He had dated some women in his day.

          Mostly thin ones.

          Acceptable women.

          Classy.

          Slim.

          Elegant.

          Especially in the beginning, when he was taking them home to Mama.

          Auditioning them, he thought.

          Good-looking girls.

          Girls other guys would have loved to have dated.

          But he always had an eye for the chubby ones.

          Fat girls.

          In tight jeans.

          Bellies hanging over, squeezed out over the belt loops.

          Love handles.  Queen-sized muffin tops.

          Like Gloria, who had dropped out of school in her sophomore year. Gloria, in her skin-tight jeans and skimpy little tees.

          Big tits and belly combo.

          Big, fat ass.

          But he’d never have dated a girl like Gloria.

          He was hiding back then. Nobody knew how he felt, what he liked. Nobody knew he was into fat girls.  Things certainly would be different if he had it to do over again.

          Or would they?

          There was the woman he’d seen at the beach not so many years ago—big, fat, sexy heifer in a bikini.

          Yup.

          Two-fifty, maybe three hundred pounds. Fat rolls dripping down, hanging over.

          Massive breasts.

          Huge, fat ass.

          Christ!

          There she was, out there prissing about the shoreline, letting those lucky breakers lick her fat little toes.

          Giggling with her lover.

          And here he sat on a damp towel with Savannah. And it wasn’t Savannah's fault. As a matter of fact, she would have been perplexed had he expressed himself—had he told her he was sorry she‘d worked so hard for that taut little tummy because, in his secret dreams, he yearned to bury his face into the big, soft, sagging belly that teased him from thirty feet away.

          Oh, there were other fat women on the beach.

          In their long skirts and baggy shirts. In their billowing muumuus.

          Hiding their big, delicious bodies. Or trying to.

          “Like trying to hide a cow under a blanket,” he thought.

          So it wasn’t just about the fat, and it wasn’t even about how the fat was distributed.

          It was about attitude.

          The fat woman of his dreams was not ashamed or guilty about who she was. She didn’t try to hide the fact that she enjoyed life.

          Nope.

          She was a rebel. She ate what she wanted, packed on the pounds, and flaunted it on the beach in a goddamned bikini meant for someone half—a third (!)—her size.

          Yet, he still questioned himself. How was it he was with somebody like Savannah—Savannah with her so-called cute figure, pert ass, perfect little cupcake breasts—yet yearned for the big, sexy whale he’d seen dallying on the beach?

          A genuine fatty.

          Obese.

          A clown.  Anathema.

          Disdained. Laughed at. Pointed to.

          Yeah, he still felt it was somehow wrong. . . .somehow unacceptable to be so excited over a woman like that.

          Yet, he couldn't seem to help it.

          And, God knows, he tried.

          Banging away, groin to groin, with Savannah that night, determined to make it happen. Sweating. Working. Endlessly pounding into her, trying to get off, and finally, that woman crossing his mind‘s eye like a some sort of obese angel, and Geezus, it had happened instantly.

          Gallons. Spasm after powerful, mind-bending spasm.

          “Oh, baby!”

          Jerking and squirming on top of Savannah’s bony little frame, letting her think she'd done that to him, when all he could think about was the woman on the beach.

          “Did you see it,” he asked himself later as Savannah slept and he masturbated behind the locked bathroom door. “Did you see that fat bitch?”

IV.

          She dared herself to wear a short skirt to the mall, but was having second thoughts.

          First of all, it was too tight.  She’d ordered it online from a shop that catered to obese women—had worked hard trying to measure her waist and her big, fat ass. She had confessed her height and weight on the goddamned order form, had paid way too much, and counted the seven days it took to finally find her via parcel post.

          And then it was too damned tight.

          And even though the waist band was soft elastic, it seemed to cut into her.

And the fabric, touted as “slimming,” showed every bulge and ripple.

          Her belly peeked out from under the hem.

          The blouse, too, which had hung in the closet for two years, was way too small.

Tiny, really. It squeezed her like a corset, the buttons threatening to pop any second.

          She looked like a fat whore, she thought.

          “Big, fat, ugly whore!”

          And yet, she was sick of caring, and she wanted to prove it. She wanted to not give a damn anymore.

          Her idea was to carry other clothes—something she could pull over these in case she lost her nerve, or it became too much for her.

          People pointing. She knew they would.

          Laughing. Making jokes.

          “Fuck ’em,” she said.

          She pushed her fat feet into those little high heels, grabbed her purse, stood up, and wobbled to the front door. The steps were tricky, and she almost lost her balance.

          Thank God she didn't.

          She imagined it: Imagined laying there like a big roach on her back, arms and legs flailing, the neighbors, unable to lift her, calling the fire department.

          Channel 19 rolling up.

          Her on the Six O'Clock News.

          But she made it down the stairs, then focused on maneuvering the sidewalk.

She was already self-conscious—could have sworn that every neighbor was watching from his or her window even as she made the precarious journey to the carport.  She was scared to death some kids would meander past—boys on their bikes with nothing better to do than to point and stare and giggle and say mean things.

          But she made it to the car unaccosted, and squeezed herself behind the wheel.

It was tighter than she remembered, even with the seat pushed all the way back.

She had put on some weight since she last drove. There were disadvantages, she supposed, to having her groceries delivered.

V.

          He worked out six days a week. It was, along with masturbation, one of his few indulgences. Sometimes he couldn't believe his life had become like this. Working. Working out. Jacking off. Sleeping.

          He hardly even saw the boys, now that Savannah had remarried.

          He was, he told himself, just preoccupied.

          Trying to work it out.

          Figure it out.

          Fat women.

          Fat women eating. Stuffing their faces. Wallowing in the sheets, filling their big bellies.

          He imagined himself bringing them food, feeding them.

          Breakfast in bed.

          Lunch.

          Dinner.

          “Didn't get up again today,” she’d say.

          Big, lazy cow of a woman lounging in her negligee.

          Big tits. Big ass.

          “Here, darling,” he’d croon, ladling in a spoonful of lasagna. “Enjoy.”

          “Yes, my love.” It was ice cream this time. Or chocolate. “Be free.”

          In his fantasies, his women chugged Coke from a two-liter bottle, just like she’d done the night before.

          Chugged that Coke—the whole goddamned thing—then belched like a man.

          Just like she’d done.

          Only he didn’t know she’d done it.

          He didn’t know she existed.

          He’d never seen her before in his life.

VI.

          She couldn’t drive in the high heels any better than she could walk in them, and it took awhile to get them off and up in the seat where they’d be out of her way.

          Then, when she turned the key, the engine was slow to turn.

          Weak battery.

          She hadn’t been out in awhile.

          These were, she felt, warning signs—indications that she should not follow through with the bizarre idea of parading through the mall in next to nothing.

          But then, on the third try, the Buick started.

          Contradictory omens.

          “Okay,” she sighed.

          And she put the car in reverse.

          She felt so uneasy—so unsure of herself. She had been driving for years, yet was all over the driveway as she backed out. Once at the end, she had trouble turning her head to see. There seemed to be a lot of traffic on her street, which was usually not busy at all.

          Maybe school was letting out.

          She felt as though she had been sitting there, looking huge in the seat, for fifteen minutes, though it was closer to five.

          As the cars whizzed past, she imagined the children inside pointing at her.

          “Look at that fat lady,” they’d say. “In that little car.”

          But finally there was a break in the traffic, and she backed on out into the street, and headed toward the mall.

VII.

          He worked out at Ace Gym, which shared, of course, its parking lot with the mall.

          Maybe it was part of the mall. He wasn’t sure.

          It was expensive, really. But nice.

          Clean. And with enough equipment available that he seldom had to wait on a particular machine.

          He had no set routine anymore.

          He pretty much free-wheeled it, working legs less than he should, and back. Focusing on biceps and pectorals.

          A poser.

          But he looked good.

          Big, veiny arms. Nice chest. Washboard abs.

          The whole package.

          Girls who hung out at the gym had been all over him at first, but he’d never given them the time of day.  He wasn‘t playing that game anymore. He knew what he liked, and they weren’t it. They consoled themselves by thinking he was gay. He’d overheard it once.  Women would think that, rather than thinking they might be unattractive to him. Especially those women, with their hard-won little athletic builds.

          “Fuck ‘em,” he said.

VIII.

          The mall loomed like a fortress in one of those so-called epic movies.

          Target. Macy’s.

          Places frequented by . . . who? By everyone, she thought. It was nothing for most people to go the mall.

          To wear a skirt. To wear whatever the fuck they wanted.

          High heels? Why not?

          Tight, sexy blouse? Of course.

          She sat for . . . what? Twenty minutes? Thirty? Staring at the mall, her mind racing. God! What had become of her?

          Why?

          Why her? Was she such a bad person? Was she such a pig?

          She had always been fat—always dreamed of being thin, of being normal.

And she could remember every word that had been uttered to her about her size.

          Billy Stewart in third grade.

          Johnny Miller, whom she secretly loved.

          Sarah Shelton, that bitch.

          Her own father.

          The tears were starting to roll, which was all she needed.

          “Big, hysterical heifer,” she thought. “Fat pig bitch blubbering like a goddamn baby.”

          No. She was sick of this.

          “Fuck it,” she said, checking her mascara in the rearview.

          She opened the car door, grabbed the high heels and set them on the pavement. It was going to be a chore to turn in the seat, get those heels on, and stand up.

          To walk across the parking lot.

          In that skirt.

          “This is crazy,” she thought.

          Yet, she scooted her wide rump across the seat, squeezing out from under the wheel and turning so that her dough-pale legs hung out the car door.

          And then her feet—fat little pig-like feet—were in those pumps.

          And, grunting, she managed to stand.

          The mall seemed to rise up before her, ominous and ugly.

          She stood there, in the glow of the car’s dome light, the door hanging open, and stared.

IX.

          He liked to park at the Target, walk through the mall, then cross the parking lot to the gym. He wasn’t sure why. The people maybe. He was lonely, and there were people at the mall. Hustling and bustling.

          Kids.

          Moms.

          Young teens hanging out after school.

          He seldom made eye contact.

          He moved, he thought, like a ghost through the crowd.

          Anonymous.

          It had crossed his mind that people might think him a predator of some sort, skulking about the mall almost daily, never stopping to buy. But he was just an ordinary guy.

          He meant no harm.

          He pulled into the lot and decided to park at the outskirts. The longer walk would do him good. He drove to the edge of the parking lot and made a left. And that's when he glimpsed her—just as he turned to begin the slow trawl for an empty space—a big, fat, cow of a woman in some sort of knit miniskirt.

          High heels. Skin-tight blouse.

          “Goddamn,” he said aloud. “Did you see that?”

          He sped up a bit, looking for a way to cut through the double row of vehicles to the other lane, where he could loop back and get a better look.

          Was she for real?

          There was an occasional empty space, but none that went all the way through, so he wound up driving to all the way to the stop sign in front of the Target. His intention was to make the two quick lefts and speed down the lane to catch her before she drove away, but, between the pedestrians and other drivers, it seemed to take forever.

          Then some stupid bitch decided to back out just as he made the second left.

          He laid on the horn, cursing her and, as though she could feel the intensity of his anxiety, she pulled back in.

          He drove much too fast to the other end of the lot, made the left, and got an eyeful.

          There she was.

          Just standing—posing—as though to model for him.

          He let his eyes dance over her big, curvy body.

          Big, sexy ass, barely covered by that little skirt.

          Fat, bumpy thighs.

          Massive calves. Thick ankles.

          High heels.

          “Goddamn,” he said again.

          “She has to be somebody’s,” he thought. “Something that special, that wonderful couldn’t be available."

          Perhaps some big ape was sitting in the car and he just couldn't see. Or maybe she was waiting for somebody—some handsome Hollywood type who would take her home, stuff her pretty face, then have his way with her.

          He had slowed to a crawl so as to take her in, but didn’t want to make himself conspicuous, so he sped up again, made the turn, and shot back down to the end of the lane, keeping an eye peeled for a cut-through.

          Some son-of-a-bitch was buying a giant television or something, and loading it right there in the middle of the goddamned road.

          “Fuck!”

          He yelled it out, forgetting his window was down. The loaders stopped and just stared at him, open-mouthed. Flustered, he tried to get by the obstacle, only to meet oncoming traffic.

          “Shit!”

          He backed up to allow three or four vehicles to pass, then pulled around again. This time he made his left and sped back up the lane for the third time.

          He saw her again as he made the left, still standing, gazing at the Mall.

          He should say something. Nothing out of line. Something nice. Some mild compliment.

          “You look great,” he could say. “Wonderful. Like an angel.”

          But she might think him forward—a stranger saying such a thing. Yet, he was certain she got hit on a lot.

          “A lot of guys like fat chicks,” he said.

          He let his eyes linger, sucking her in. Long hair hanging down her back. Skin-tight blouse that displayed every enormous bump and crevice, its buttons hanging on for dear life. What could he say to such a woman? How could he approach her?

          “I'd worship you,” he thought.

          She moved as though to turn toward him and he spontaneously hit the gas, taking the left that would lead him around the loop again.

          That's when he decided that he didn't care—that he was going to approach her.

          Next time around.

          Honest.

          This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. What in God's name did he have to lose?

          Yup. He was going to speak. What harm could it do to say hello?

          His heart was racing now.

          He rolled up to the stop sign in front of Target and sat for a minute, collecting himself, letting his mind roll over some ideas—something clever? Or just hello?

Thank her. Thank her for letting him see her—just for letting him look.

          Just for being alive.

          “If she says, fuck off, so be it,” he told himself.

          And he eased on out, made the two lefts, and drove up the lane to where she had been standing.

          He was not speeding this time.

          He was, he had to admit, scared to death.

          And he made the left.

          But she was gone.

X.

          She just couldn't do it.

          Couldn't put herself through it.

          No.

          Maybe if she came off a few pounds. Maybe if she cut back a little.

          Fit into that skirt better.

          She squeezed back into the car, feeling defeated.

          Deflated.

          A tiny, battered soul in a big, fat body.

          And drove home. She shuffled barefoot up the walk, carrying those goddamned stupid pumps, climbed the steps with great effort, and flopped down on the sofa, exhausted.

          She let go, crying until she couldn't catch her breath. She sat for . . . how long this time? An hour?

          Two?

           Finally, she pulled herself up and wobbled into the kitchen to see what she might find to eat.

          Eclairs, she thought.  Yeah . . .

          But first she’d call out for pizza.

Mike has had stories in a smattering of magazines over the years, including Leg Show, JUGGs, Evergreen Chronicals, and The Nocturnal Lyric. Most recently, he’s had stories in The Old Red Kimono (a college literary magazine) and Underground Voices, an online publication.