An excerpt from a short story: (not yet titled)
story by James W. Lewis
artwork by Eamon Burke

How do I tell my woman that her weight gain is a turn off?

Carl couldn’t prevent the contempt that stirred within him as he gazed at his girlfriend, Vanessa Davis. She had left the bathroom door open just enough for him to get an eyeful of her shower-fresh nudity. Beads of water slid down her mahogany-colored skin as she reached for the towel, humming a Luther Vandross tune. 

He lay naked, sprawled on top of the bed sheets, his hands crossed under his chin at the edge of their queen-size waterbed. A green washcloth lay near his knee, disguising the sticky evidence of his early morning sexual release.

As he glared at her, he allowed a short breath to hiss through his lips. With Vanessa’s laid-back attitude and failure to consider the unattractive visual her weight gain displayed, the chances of his fantasy coming true were the equivalent of Jennifer Lopez committing her healthy package to Carl David Lovell for life. And he knew that wouldn’t happen. 

Carl kept his aggravation well hidden. Vanessa never knew how often he scanned every inch of her body after she showered, cutting his eyes at her, shaking his head behind her back. She never knew of his diminishing attraction to her expanding body that required “re-sculpturing.”

He wished Vanessa could see what his eyes had grown to despise. No matter how many times he tried to show her--without telling her because it would cause an avalanche of tears--the shit just wouldn’t sink in. And now she stood swiping the towel around her legs and humming as if a microphone were pressed to her lips, her melodic purr morphing into lyrical chants that rivaled the best of today’s R&B singers.

She turned his way. A wide smile lit her pretty face when their eyes met--and still she seemed oblivious to the resentment in his gaze. How could she be so ignorant to what the mirror revealed to her every morning? 

He could see all her unsightly mass, but for some reason, she couldn’t. 

They were all there, everything that was stripping away his attraction for her: the protruding oversized breasts swaying back and forth as she wiped her backside; the puddle of cellulite on her arms shaking in unison with her breasts; streaks of wrinkled, discolored skin tattooed in sporadic areas around her hips and thighs; and what he despised the most—her pooch belly.

He believed that if Vanessa would make a wholehearted effort she could reshape her loose skin into toned muscle. Then his eyes would never go AWOL because a “bangin” body would already be by his side. 

Carl sighed. I’m getting tired of her gaining more weight. That shit is not attractive to me. I wish she would just stick to a diet and exercise so I don’t have to look at those rolls every morning. She’s got all the potential in the world to be tight as hell, but she ain’t feelin’ it.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Vanessa asked, interrupting the torrent of words inside Carl’s mind. She tilted her head and rubbed her dark hair. Thick strands dangled against her shoulder, concealing the gross indentation caused by her custom bra straps.

Carl had stopped browsing through a Muscle Fitness magazine and begun fantasizing that Vanessa’s body was as toned and luscious as the Hawaiian woman on the cover, a fantasy he now realized was destined to remain just that: a damn fantasy. 

“Noth--nothing, baby,” he stuttered, turning back to the magazine. 

“Well, you going to take a shower? You know I want to go to the department store and buy that skirt today.” She tilted her head to the other side. 

Without responding, Carl rose from the bed. His bones snapped and popped as he stretched out his arms. Vanessa walked into the bedroom, the towel draped around her shoulders. Large breasts that hung midway down her torso tapped against each other. She stopped in front of him and caressed his body, her honey hued eyes as illuminating as the sparkle in her smile. 

He pushed her hands away. “Baby, come on now. I gave you some this morning.”

“Well, damn, all I’m doing is playing.” She rolled her eyes, releasing her breath in a hiss that brushed his chest. “Forget you then.”

Carl ignored her, feeling no motivation to reciprocate her playful affection, and proceeded toward the bathroom. Before he entered, he turned and saw a deluge of wrinkled skin undulating down her lower back. His scowl deepened, so he whipped his head back around. 

***************************************

As streams of warm water pounded against his tall frame, Carl continued to have nagging thoughts of an overweight woman he had somehow failed to mold. Vanessa had been a little overweight when he first met her, but at the time her weight had been tolerable enough to work with for a while until the Jenny Craig professionals or some fitness center came calling. Hell, he had even thought the furnace heat they usually generated in the bedroom would be enough to melt at least ten of those pounds if they kept it going five times a week for a month or so. 

How wrong he was.

He thought Vanessa would lose the pounds once she firmly committed to a weight-training regimen. He had devised many regimens during the infant stages of their relationship--and she made attempts to stick to them--but with their conflicting work schedules, NFL-NBA-MLB games, and plain old after-work lethargy, Vanessa’s enthusiasm for physical “torture” would eventually fade. It never failed.

Through twenty months of weight-training regimens, skin-toning cream, high-protein, low-carb diets, early morning walks, yoga tapes, kick-boxing videos, stints at the gym and suicide 48-hour diets, somehow another thirty pounds had crept up on unsuspecting body parts.

At the rate Vanessa was going, she wouldn’t hear “Here comes the Bride” any time soon if Carl could help it. Every visit to mall jewelry stores that Vanessa forced upon him became two-minute stops. He couldn’t see himself dropping $11,000 on a ring until she dropped the “extra baggage.” He felt it should be a two-way street: lose thirty-five pounds and he would finance the two-and-a-half-carat Marquise diamond ring she so desperately wanted. In his eyes, she should be more than willing to satisfy him physically in order for him to satisfy her financially.

It wasn’t happening, though. Now it seemed Vanessa had come to grips with her weight and had decided to give up trying without telling him. With that attitude, in a year she could be well over the two-century mark. 

How could Carl make her understand? He didn’t want Vanessa to leave him, but he knew he had to reveal his displeasure soon because he could no longer stand her overhanging belly. A woman as beautiful as Vanessa didn’t need extra flab, anyway. 

Vanessa’s sweet hums startled Carl. He was so deep in thought that he hadn’t noticed Vanessa come into the bathroom to prepare for a day of debt upheaval at a department store.

Carl slid the plastic shower curtain aside and glanced at her as she combed her thick, black hair. He loved her full-bodied hair, a blessing produced from her half-Puerto Rican, half-black blood. Caring for her hair was a full-time job in itself. He wished she dedicated as much time and effort to caring for her body.

After pulling the curtain back, he ran the soapy washcloth down his legs and feet, trying hard not to dwell on his present dilemma. More than once he griped his thoughts out loud, to which Vanessa would respond, “Who are you talking to?”

After showering, he snatched his towel off the rack. Vanessa was treating her teeth to a massive dose of Crest with an electric toothbrush. As she scrubbed, Carl noticed her gaze roaming from his toned arms to his abs and down to his “Piece”. 

She leaned over the sink and spit out toothpaste. “You look sexy when you’re wet,” she said. 

Carl turned his back to her while wiping his behind and said, “Yeah, I know.”

He hesitated, knowing he had to return the compliment, rolled his eyes, and said, “You, uh, look good, too.”

Vanessa smacked her tongue. “Damn, you sure don’t sound like you mean it,” she replied. “I know you wish I looked like one of those girls in that magazine.”

Carl shook his head. “Naw, girl, you know I like you the way you are.” Yeah, right. 

He sat on the toilet, lifted his foot onto his knee, and wiped the towel through his toes. He knew she was staring at him, hissing under her breath, so he kept his eyes off her. 

Vanessa turned off the water and placed the toothbrush in a small cup. “Whatever,” she replied. “Can’t even give my man a compliment? I’ll just be quiet.” She turned and stomped into the bedroom. 

Carl looked up and saw her dimpled butt cheeks wiggling toward her dresser. She grabbed a curling iron. 

He shook his head, and stepped onto the small rug in front of the sink. Facing the mirror, he grabbed his toothbrush and toothpaste from the cabinet and commenced a thorough teeth detail. 

After his two-minute Colgate scrub-down, Carl reached into the cabinet and grabbed his razor and a small, black comb. As he began clipping his mustache, he turned to the bedroom. Vanessa was looking into a small mirror atop her dresser, a curling iron in one hand and a wide-toothed comb in the other, straightening her naturally curly hair. Carl stopped for a moment and stared as she gave her hair the length and style he loved to see. 

Such a pretty face, he thought. She will be my wife ... one day. Just gotta work on the expanding waistline first.

Vanessa then disappeared into her closet. A minute later, she returned with a medium-length sleeveless dress. After grabbing a bra and panties from her top drawer, she curled around the bed and stepped out of the bedroom, clothes in hand. Why she sometimes dressed outside the bedroom, Carl had no idea. He shifted his eyes back to the mirror to focus on his mustache. 

With excess hair mauled away, Carl’s thin mustache was good to go. He caught his reflection in the mirror and saw an above-average looking man with a medium-brown complexion. He ran his hand across his razor bump-free, baby-soft cheek as “vain” eyes perused the same sculpted arms Vanessa admired earlier. 

He growled, wearing his best warrior face as he tightened his jaw and pursed his lips--convincing himself that the “rock-hard” body of Carl David Lovell--all 6”2’, 185 pounds of him--belonged on the September edition of Muscle Fitness magazine. He ran his fingers over his self-made six-pack, a satisfied grin etched on a conceited face. 

Then he balled his fists and raised both arms, flexing his biceps like a light heavyweight Lou Ferr-Negro, trying to strike a better stance than the pro builders in his magazine. His scrunched face resembled someone suffering from constipation than that of a man posing. He had no doubt in his mind that his six-day-a-week workouts would allow him to send in a before-and-after picture soon. 

Carl gave his biceps a quick inspection. The mirror never looked so good. No fat, no flab, and he did it all for Vanessa. His toned, tall frame caught her eye in the first place, so he always hits the gym to maintain her personal eye candy. He didn’t want her eyes straying elsewhere. They belonged on him only. 

But he couldn’t tell her to hit the gym. Vanessa would hit the roof instead. 

After a few more minutes of self-flattery, he walked into the bedroom and threw the towel on the bed. Rays of morning summer heat seeped through the blinds. He yanked open his middle dresser drawer, grabbed a pair of denim shorts and a white tank top and threw them on the chair in front of the computer. 

He stared at the monitor and saw a nasty image in his head. The corners of his lips curved up. 

After pulling a clean pair of Fruit-of-the-Looms from the top drawer, he strapped them up his legs, walked over to the computer desk, and reclined in the adjustable chair. He grabbed the mouse, clicked on the Internet Explorer icon and, with the speed of DSL, the Yahoo! Web page jumped to the screen. Ever since they switched from dial-up modem to DSL a few months before, Carl had become a late night Internet junky, especially on nights when Vanessa dozed off on the sofa. With his girl occupied with rapid eye movement, it was the best time for him and his Ebony Ecstasy pin-ups to partake in a freaky fantasy right there in his bedroom. 

With a quick head turn to the doorway, he made sure the coast was clear. Before typing in the Web address, his fingers froze above the keyboard. He shook his head and put a halt to his X-rated secret, finally acknowledging what the left side of his brain was trying to tell him. Knowing him, he would be so occupied in Pornoworld; his Vanessa “spidey” sense would vanish along with the drool rolling off his lip. 

Carl didn’t want to begin his day on the wrong foot. If Vanessa caught a glimpse of a cyberspace woman with thick legs spread and plastic breasts staring at her man from a 17-inch computer screen, a flying object marked for his head would jack his day all up. His late-night hobby was for him and “Little Carl” only. He had to check his females another time, when Vanessa couldn’t mess up his nasty flow. 

He sighed, and whipped his head around again to make sure she wasn’t standing in the doorway. Deciding to play it safe, he checked his email. 

A list of junk advertising from a gazillion folks who bought his email address littered his inbox:

Subj: Get 2% APR on a VISA!

Subj: Are you drowning in debt?

Subj: Why didn’t you call me last night?

Subj: Hi, it’s Kathy! I got my WEBCAM up!

Subj: Thank you for your order!

Subj: If you want it, come and get it…

Email filters and address blocks couldn’t stop all cleverly disguised X-rated advertisements. Sneaky online spammers used more creative ways to get past them. As many X-rated web sites as Carl visited, Hugh Hefner, Larry Flint, and any other tycoon specializing in visual candy were probably having a bidding war over his email address.

He deleted his junk mail before closing the browser. As he stood from the chair, he caught a glimpse of Miss Hawaii on a magazine cover and smiled, deciding to give her a mental visit. It was a swimsuit edition, so he plopped down on the bed and flipped through the pages to find her. 

With his eyes roving the full-page spread of her golden body, her naked image manifested on his waterbed, lying against his large pillow, staring at Carl with exotic cat eyes. Her tongue swirled around her cherry lips. Naughty eyes invited him in ... drenched hair draped over hot Hawaiian skin ... D cup-sized breasts ... meaty legs spreading wider ... and wider ... and--

“Carl, you want some pancakes?” screamed Vanessa from the kitchen. 

Carl flinched, then punched the pillow where Miss Hawaii once lay. "Yeah!" 

He chuckled and then whispered, “Man, I was just about to get in some Aloha ass…” 

After flipping through more pages, he decided there was no use torturing himself, so he threw the magazine on his dresser. 

He dressed, grabbed some lotion and his hairbrush and walked out of the room. The aroma of Vanessa’s mouth-watering pancakes tickled his nostrils as he entered the small dining area. Vanessa had just flipped one in the skillet. On the counter sat a plate with three cakes stacked on top of each other.

“You ready for yours?” she asked, her back toward him.

“Hell, yeah,” he replied, wiping lotion on his arms. “Hungry as hell.”

It was a typical Saturday morning ritual. She had set the protocol for their weekend togetherness, always up-and-at-‘em before Carl would set a foot out of bed. Vanessa’s magic would tug at Carl’s nose hairs and have him floating toward the kitchen, no matter what he was doing. Before meeting Vanessa, he didn’t know anyone with the same culinary skills. Her nimble hands would always whip up seemingly uncoordinated dishes that would first make Carl lift an eyebrow in skepticism and ending with him asking why she didn’t make more.

Even though he despised the weight she had gained, he couldn’t see himself telling her not to cook certain foods that her body couldn’t afford. He decided since he couldn’t cook and since he loved to eat, it didn’t make sense for him to say, “I want you to cook some baked potatoes, fried chicken, buttermilk biscuits, and green beans —but you can’t have none ‘cause it’s too fattening.” 

At times he definitely wanted to tell her that, since no other method seemed to work. 

Her weight is damn sure getting on my nerves, Carl said in his head. Should I tell her that, though?