Chloe was having a rough morning. She could feel it in her bones and the jiggles around those bones when she woke up. She knew, just knew, she had gained more weight. Not that she was fat, more around average-sized, but she adored cheesecake whenever possible. She thought about the three slices she had the night before as she examined her five feet, six inches figure in the full-length mirror that morning. She had twisted and turned in her comfy tank and matching pajama bottoms and her comfortable sleep bra, of course.
Chloe always wore a sleep bra as she thought they made her boobs stay up. She vividly recalled her grandmother telling her when she was six, "your boobs are the first to go. Bam! Straight to the floor, they'll be. Darn right, damn gravity!"
Her grandmother was the wisest person Chloe had ever met to date. She held onto those little gems of wisdom so she would do whatever she could to fight gravity.
She figured she was doing an okay job as her 34C boobs weren't much to complain about; they were the perfect size for her and fit nicely on her hourglass frame, she thought. Though her sides were looking a little meatier and her belly wasn't relatively as flat as she'd like, she was pushing 30. She looked pretty good even if she did occasionally indulge in three or more slices of cheesecake in one sitting.
She was married and had been for ten years. She wasn't trying to turn heads. She can damn well eat three slices if she so pleased, thank you very much! At least that was her line of thinking on the matter.
After she finished thoroughly examining every additional inch of herself in the mirror, she looked herself in her blue eyes reflecting back or tried to, but she had some blonde bedhead in the way. She puffed at a strand of disarray hair, and it fell back in place. She puffed at it again a few times until it finally freed her heart-shaped face so she could have her morning heart to heart with herself. She again looked into her eyes and said, "you are not fat. You are beautiful, and you will leave this room loving every inch of yourself."
There, she thought, that should do it. But she better double-check the scale because, unlike her, it never lied.
Two pounds, the scale told Chloe she had gained. Two pounds and she was now 141 pounds on her 5'6 frame creeping closer to the overweight side of the scale. She did not want to be there.
Chloe swam weekly and usually swam three miles in a go, which was a pretty good workout, but she needed to stop eating three slices of cheesecake in one night. Just ten more pounds and she would reach the dark side.
Enough already, she told herself. She stepped off the scale and jumped in the shower.
Chloe got dressed and headed out. Her first stop was McDonald's. Since she was trying to watch her weight, she ordered a diet coke with her McGriddle sandwich. She had lots to do today, so she needed to stay focused. She had to pick up a birthday present for her Crafty Thirty's group member Donna. The group had decided to throw Donna a crafty birthday party on Saturday, and it was Friday.
Chloe, of course, waited until the last minute to pick up a gift. She had to go to the super craft store Fantastic Fabrics to pick up the gift. The store was near work, so at lunch break it was. While she is there, she can pick up some stuff for herself. She needed extra hot glue sticks; one can never have enough hot glue sticks, fabric markers, and fake jewels. The group was going to bedazzle the shit out of something or another at the next meeting. But before all of that, Chloe needed to make it through half a day of work.
"Chloe, did you scan those Chester files? I asked them two hours ago. A couple of pages?" Chloe rolled her eyes at Jane's rambling. "I should just do it myself, really." Jane continued, and Chloe wondered why Jane didn't just do it herself. She always said she should. Every time she complained about Chloe's 'failures,' which was quite often, Jane would end with 'I should do it myself.' And yet, she never actually did do it herself. "I sent them to you 20 minutes after you asked for them. It took 15 minutes to locate them and five to scan the 13 pages. They should be in your inbox." Chloe responded and sighed, not sure why she even bothered. "Well, I don't have them! You must have done them wrong, do it again." "Right away," Chloe mumbled under her breath. "Because I'm not doing anything else. I'm just sitting here waiting for you to give my life meaning." She grabbed the Chester file that she had left out just for this reason. At the copy machine, she decided
Finally, Chloe was done with work. She had to stay late to help process a file Francis forgot about so it could make the deadline. She was now headed to her mother-in-law's house, hoping whatever it was she was needed for this time wouldn't take too long, and she could still make it to Fantastic Fabrics before it closed, which for some reason was 8:00 pm on Fridays. Chloe rolled her eyes before knocking just to get it out of the way. She knocked then came in, although she'd been told to go in without knocking, something about it's practically her home and why doesn't she and Jon move in. Of course, if she did that, she would lose what little sanity she had left. "Oh, Chloe, Luv! I'm in the sitting room," her mother-in-law called out to her. "You said you needed help with something urgent, Mrs. Harris?" "Call me, Mom, how many times must I tell you," Mrs. Harris said for the ten billionth time in the past ten years. She motioned towards a bunch of pain
Chloe woke up later than she had hoped on Saturday, so she skipped the mirror and scale ritual. She already knew the McDonald's from yesterday did nothing to reverse the numbers in her favor. Chloe headed out to try and get her errands done on time and make it to the party with a gift in hand. She stopped and picked up a white chocolate mocha from Starbucks and some daisies from the local florist. No matter how behind she is this week, nothing cuts into Father-Daughter time, and daisies were his favorite. Chloe stopped at her father's grave with the flowers and had meant to get the milk between the Starbucks stop and the florist but completely forgot. She put the flowers in a vase and sat cross-legged in front of his headstone and had her weekly chat with her dad to let him know about what had happened since last week, which wasn't very much. Chloe told her father how she had saved Mrs. Harris from utter humiliation by picking out the perfect painting to hang, how ye
Chloe finally made it to the Auto Dealer, where she met up with Jonathan at the tail end of a business meeting with his father where he went over numbers that his father paid no attention to. "Hey Candy, what's up? Bring my lunch?" Jonathan liked to call her weird pet names. For some reason, he thought it was cute, and she thought it was tacky, but he'd been doing it for fifteen years, and it didn't look like he'd be growing out of it soon. She had known him most of her life but started dating him when 14, Jon was 16. He'd always been a bit thin due to his wrestling and stayed that way through adulthood. He was a relatively decent-looking guy with short-cropped thick brown hair, small squinty blue eyes, a narrow nose, thin lips, and a mediocre square jawline. He was 5 feet, eleven inches tall, and about 180 pounds even though he rarely worked out unless watching Mixed Martial Arts competitions counts. "Yeah, I'm on my way to Fantastic Fabrics, so I figured I'
Chloe pulled into her drive and went through the back door so as not to disturb Jonathan, who would be home by now even though it was relatively early, still not even 7:00 yet. He might be working on something for his golf meeting. She went into the spare bedroom and grabbed the gift that was waiting on the floor for her, then she headed back to the back door. Just before she got to the door, she thought she could hear Veronica Moulton's voice. That wasn't unusual, really, because Veronica was their neighbor and pretty much her second-best friend. Veronica and her husband Nicki were good friends and would hang out with Chloe and Jon. Nicki worked in the Tech department and would often have lunch with Chloe. She had never had any qualms with Veronica hanging out with Jonathan, just the two of them. Never seemed to be any reason to second guess if Veronica's husband Nicki was staying late at the office working on system upgrades or something. Veronica would invite Chlo
Chloe enjoyed the party a little too much. At one point, she started a taco tossing phenomenon. She momentarily let the thoughts of the White Rabbit and Alice scene from earlier surface just long enough for her to lose control and toss a mini taco against the wall. All the other girls had no idea why she had done it but having drunk round after round of cocktails and shots, they found it great fun and joined in with elevated enthusiasm. Tacos were being flung all over the party room. She felt a little bad for the workers that have to clean it all up but damn, it was worth it. It allowed her much needed stress relief. She went to the bar after the party as planned to call her best friend and hear her thoughts on what she should do. Covered in mini tacos, Chloe attempted to brush some of the taco debris off but quickly gave up and just walked into the bar, tacos and all. It wasn't exactly a dive bar, but it wasn't posh enough to turn her and her tacos away, so she sat down and
Chloe took two muscle relaxers and washed them down with two glasses of wine. She took a quick shower to get rid of the tacos, and she crawled into the spare bed with her towel still on. She woke up in the middle of the night feeling hot and strangled in her towel, so she shrugged it off onto the floor. She pushed the comforter off as well and slept under the sheet. Chloe woke the next morning to Jon kissing her. What the Fuck, she thought, very confused for a moment as to where she was and what was going on. She looked around and realized she was in the spare bedroom. Then she remembered passing out in there after her shower, the night before. "Sweetcheeks," Jon said between kisses. "Why are you in here? You should have come to bed, Pumpkin Face." "Huh? Oh, mmtacos." She told him as he made his way down her neck. He had never spent so much time kissing her body like this. "I got tacos…all over and…washed up um, before bed."
Chloe got to the Café, and Nicki was already waiting at a table in the patio corner. She made her way over to him. She had been thinking of how to tell him since yesterday, and she still had no idea what to say. "Hello…" Nicki said as she approached. He paused, noticing she looked anxious. "Chloe? What's up?" "Hey, Nicki," she managed, "Um, how was your workout?" "It was ok. You don't look so good. What's wrong?" Nicki cleared his throat. "Is everything ok? How's Jon? I already ordered, so don't worry. I got you the strawberry chicken salad and an Ice tea." He nodded towards her drink. Chloe smiled gratefully at him and took a massive gulp of tea, practically downing half the glass before she said anything. "Oh, Jon? Umm… He's fine. He's at the club with his dad and the guys. Just yesterday, he was with Veronica. She was fucking him on our bed." Chloe was now rapidly blinking her eyes. Maybe