I am caught between being impressed by her and pitying her. Across campus we’ve all found ourselves morbidly fascinated with the buoyant blonde tennis fanatic that allowed her boyfriend to regularly force feed her Big Macs. While fucking her. From behind.

The irresistible gossip was efficiently served across campus, promptly reaching the smokers area outside my resi block before being presented to me on a silver platter. It pays to have a best friend that chain smokes. Mali and I sat on her king single cross-legged, thighs spilling out of our branded sports shorts, drunk on the superiority that fatness gives you to talk shit about skinny people and food. Jessica was not someone we’d ever been able to recall eating anything that wasn’t carefully measured and macroed. And now this?!

Of course, a year ago Jessica just looked like Jessica and it all felt harmless.

🍔🍔🍔

I was first allowed a Big Mac in primary school. We were visiting our cousins for New Years Eve and my parents must’ve been in a good mood. I ordered a large Big Mac meal with a Coke Zero. My parents exchanged a look I couldn’t decipher, but with every glance they shared I felt a magnet inside my stomach trying to pull me into myself. My sister didn’t want the rest of her Happy Meal once we arrived and I finished it alone in the parked car even though it was tasteless. I still did not feel full.

🍔🍔🍔

Months ago, imagining Jessica as still skinny, Mali and I reenacted the alleged feeder routine on my bed. Guffaws galore. There is indeed a lot to think about as the eater: being jostled while trying to breath, chew, swallow, look hot. There’s room for a bit of moaning but all in all we deduced it’s more difficult than it’s worth.

‘How’re you going up there, champ?’ I ask a thrusting Mari.

‘Fuck it’s annoying to pass you the burger…’

‘Do you think he does it in front of a mirror? To watch?’

‘Obviously.’

🍔🍔🍔

Peplum was popular when I was in school, which was a godsend because it was imperative that mid-fat girls kept their bodies secret. I skipped lunch just to keep up the illusion that I, like the other girls, was also skinny. The first time I had sex I tried to keep my shirt on, and mid-protest the boy delivered:

‘It’s not like I don’t know you have a gut!’

I let the little rat finish and then I never spoke to him again.

I identify with loving doggy. One guy thought that meant anal and I acquiesced since I was more interested in his five-star rating than the sex itself. Besides, whichever hole it was, the act allowed that my stomach wasn’t in view and I wasn’t a shameful starfish! Serving the back door made me feel very mature and sexy and unique.

I later read that statistically fat girls were way more likely to do anal and I did not feel mature or sexy or unique after that.

🍔🍔🍔 

Mali grew up with a family that never commented on her body or told her to slow down when eating. She says needing to be skinny is a white person thing. I tell her I need to ignore that until my mid-twenties because I can’t hate too many things about myself at once. We laugh.

Being around Mali, who wears tight clothes and no shame, stirs a revolt inside myself. As our friendship deepens, I too am wearing figure-hugging clothes. I have also (mostly) stopped sucking in my stomach and trying to hide my figure with my posture. Once my hair was curly and someone told me I looked like a Botticelli painting: now, as long as I avoid the mirror I can walk around imagining I look just like a piece of art. Cured!

🍔🍔🍔

Men who are obsessed with fat girls fall into a few distinct groups (according to Mali and I):

-       huge gym rats (they lift weights so that they can lift you!)

-       skinny twig nerds (usually gamers)

-       brown and black men (ones who’ve dodged white supremacist ideals)

-       older men (40+) (but only if you’re 30 or under)

If a mid-size white guy is into a fat girl at uni, he’ll only fuck her in secret and definitely won’t date her. Even if he’s fully in love. The least problematic of the white guys is usually the twig man, and as a rule you should avoid the 40+ (if anything just to dodge all the complaining about his ex-wife and the kids he gave up custody of but now yearns to parentify).

🍔🍔🍔

Mali and I met because I accidentally set a fire in the communal kitchen during O Week in our first year. I poured oil in a saucepan then put the lid on. Turned the burner on and got distracted. Cue alarms. Mali had made too much dinner, so fed me after putting out the fire. I hate cooking. Ingredients freak me out. I need them to already be a meal. Mali comes from a big family so doesn’t know how to make single portions. That first dinner together we realised we must’ve been at the same interschool debating tournament as kids, and we had lectures together.

We walked to class together daily, and debriefed about our tutes on the uni lawn. She soaked in the sun while I covered my face with a hoodie to avoid burning. Mali’s boyfriend was taking a gap year overseas, and I had never had a boyfriend. Our conversations rarely passed the Bechdel test, if ever. Long distance was hard for Mali but she was managing. I started pointing out which uni relationships were toxic to distract her. It worked. This was closest, purest version of friendship I’d ever known.

🍔🍔🍔

I am unpacking after summer break and someone knocks on my door. I swing it open with abandon, expecting Mali. It’s Jessica. I forget to be polite.

‘You’re back!’

‘Yeah…’

‘Oh my god, so many people left res after first year, there’s only like a fifth of us still here.’

‘I think my room is next to yours.’

‘Great!’

‘Yeah.’

‘Oh… we should, I mean Mali and I… you should – you can come grab dinner with us tonight if you want?’

‘Oh! Yeah I’ll be there.’

‘Great!’

‘See you tonight.’

‘Yeah we’re leaving at like… seven I think. But we’ll knock on your door anyway.’

As soon as she’s out of eyeshot I text Mali.

WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU??? COME TO MY ROOM NOW BITCH OOOOOMGGGGGGG

She replies.

okok i’m on my way, chill tho

I respond.

NO SEROIUSLY RUN YOU’RE GONNA DIE

A minute later she responds.

seriously**

I throw back.

YOU DON’T EVEN USE PROPER CAPS!!! Ok I’m chill but seriously !! I’m dead rn fr

I workshop how to word the news.

🍔🍔🍔

 Mali rocks up about two hours later. Her mum had dropped her off and there’s no hurrying them. Especially on a move-in day since her mum drove her and helped. Besides, she doesn’t yet know the magnitude of the situation. And I don’t have room for impatience over my jealousy of their relationship. I’m closer to Mali than my own mother.

Mali flops on my bed and gestures with her hand.

‘Well? Psycho?’

I launch into it.

‘Big Macs!! Fat! Jessica!! Not skinny! Next door! Right now!!!’

As soon as I say it I feel cruel. And a bit stupid. It’s definitely not how I’d rehearsed.

Mali is quiet for a bit.

‘Yeah I ran into her in the hallway earlier.’

‘You didn’t tell me?!’

‘Was gonna tell you after your news.’

‘That was my news.’

Quiet still. I panic.

‘Wait what just happened? I feel like something happened and I missed it. Why is it weird now?’

‘Oh shit you don’t know what happened.’

‘With Jessica?’

‘Her boyfriend. Dumped her. Wants to date someone who takes care of themselves.’

‘Oh…shit!’

‘Yeah.’

‘...now I feel like a bitch.’

‘Nah you’re okay, she’s weirdly okay. I invited her to get burgers with us.’

‘Oh my god so did I. I was like… is that really random for her given everything but also I need the hot goss with Mali!’

‘Nah not like that, to actually catch up.’

‘Of course, yeah. That too.’

‘Love you, missed you.’

‘Love you, missed you. What’re the partner dorms like?’

‘Oh bitch we have a BATH.’

‘A bath??’

‘Well a half bath but still! I’m chillin, actually chillin.’

‘I’m obsessed with that.’

‘Mum’s still faffing about so I’m gonna go say bye, but I’ll see you for dinner?’

We hug, cheeks touching to feign a kiss and she’s gone. Mali’s right, we should be supportive of Jessica. I try to unknot in my head whether it’s a ‘fat-allegiance’ thing or just a general ‘we know her and she just got dumped’ thing.

Watching Jessica move back on res a year later, freshly dumped, with 40kg of luggage and 40kg of extra weight, I wonder if she’s one of us now or if this is a temporary setback for her. I think about her probable addiction to processed food, her internalised shame and self-hate, and I wonder whether stairs are hard for her now. I mean, they were hard for Mali up on level two with me last year but she smokes a pack a day. 

🍔🍔🍔

I cannot conceptualise what it’s like to have skinny sex. Truly. That’s not even a body positivity thing. That’s a real blank for me. What does anyone hang on to? What does anyone look at? What are they complimenting? Wouldn’t it be all boney? One time a guy complimented me on my ‘tiny baby pussy’ and I think if that was the only compliment I ever got I’d have to stop having sex forever.

🍔🍔🍔

After driving all the way into the town centre, there are no seats at Grill’d. We end up ordering take away and coming back to the dorms. Jessica offers her room since she’s fully unpacked. I notice her cellulite as she walks ahead of me and try to remember what her legs look like before. Her and Mali jump on the bed first so I get the floor.

I push around my chips as Mali tells Jessica how happy she seems and how good she looks and Jessica tells us how happy she is and how good she thinks she looks. I quickly look away when I catch myself staring at her back roll, bra too tight, visible through her baby tee.

Jessica asks about our relationships and after Mali goes into detail about her long-distance relationship and soon-to-be-reunification, I inhale to respond. Mali summarises me before I can say anything.

‘And this one isn’t dating anyone and hasn’t! My little baaaabyyyy!’

I think about retorting something about babies not doing anal with strangers but think better of it. I say something about focusing on settling into uni last year. Mostly I miss the rest of the conversation, only really hearing Jessica’s voice rather than Mali’s or my own.

‘I could lose weight if I ate less. Like, I’m not naturally as skinny as I was before but I’m definitely eating too much. But I also didn’t eat properly for all of high school so I’m kind of like… fuck it.’

‘I reckon I’ll hold off on dating for a bit, just re-meet myself, you know?’

‘My whole family’s fat, you know? My mum and sisters. Like this size I am. When I went home for Christmas I felt a bit embarrassed for putting on weight but like… it was the first time no one commented on my food and I actually felt this relief. Like I am not thinking about this thing all the time. I’m just eating.’

‘Fuck it, I look hot now I reckon. My nose doesn’t look too big anymore. Plus he was condescending.’

‘Not really, I loved him so wasn’t a big deal. Only the weird thing about the weight. But like… one plus one equals two, you know?’

‘I’m actually relieved less people are staring at me now.’

‘Mali! I have been meaning to ask where you get your jeans though I feel like we have similar proportions and the waist to hip ratio is always wrong for me in these.’

 I’m not hungry anymore. I offer my decrepit chip remains to the cross-legged pair on the bed. Jessica takes them, and eats them three at a time. I surrender and leave them, I know I must be ruining the mood. It’s oozing out of me.

‘I’m exhausted, might head to bed. Gotta be up early for preferences.’

 Mali reaches for a hug.

‘Sleep tight bitch, I’ll try and get up for ten.’

‘Try?!’

I pull away and give Jessica an obligatory farewell hug also. Mali continues, ignorant of the awkwardness of this embrace.

‘I wanna stay up and go get free welcome drinks with Jess. First day back on resi celebrations.’

I think about reneging on the early night but Mali hasn’t fought me on it and there’s that magnet again, pulling me inside myself. My final goodnight a whisper to no one as I walk out the door.

I do a few crunches in bed before giving up and sprawling. I fall asleep to the muted outlines of their animated conversations a wall away, breathing as quietly as I can.

🍔🍔🍔

When I was a kid there was a popular term used to describe some girls: butterface. Everything is attractive but-her-face. No one ever called me that. I used to think ‘I might be fat but I can lose weight, what’s a butterface gonna do?’ I never let myself consider what I would do if someone called me ugly. Even now I don’t let myself consider that. I’m not a starfish and I’m not a butterface.

🍔🍔🍔

The next morning, I wake up well before first round timetables are released. To kill time, I clean out my fridge. The grocery shop I did yesterday makes no sense, there’s no room for real food in there. It’s full of Mali and I’s favourites with no rhyme or reason. When I’m done, my bin is full so I take it downstairs to the dumpster. No one’s up yet so afterwards I run up the stairs to my room’s level. I focus on levelling my breathing as I walk back to the dorm. I catch myself in a reflection, the angle of a glass door showing a row of me staring back at myself running. I don’t think about it too hard.

As I walk past her room and think…I’m happy for Jessica, I really am.

Flick wrote SLUTNIK™, SLUTNIK™ 2: Planet of the Incels, mutual obligations and GAG REFLEX for the stage. Other writing published with Sprig Mag, HNDL Magazine, Humana Obscura, Osborne and Fawkner Publishing, CREATurE Magazine, Vellichor Literary, YDAS and now Slush Press. Recent writer in residence with Darebin Arts, La Mama and the City of Melbourne; member of the Australia Plays Transform National Playwriting Group; Cybec Electric writer with Melbourne Theatre Company. Recovering workaholic trying rest, ponder, and (un/re)learn theological theory & practice, mathematics and emotions. Soon to graduate from the University of Melbourne with a Master of Creative Writing, Editing & Publishing.