Fat Chance (14 page)

“Sounds like a cruise ship,” Taylor says, smirking.

I ignore that.

“Chairs are getting wider and selling better because of it,” I say, giving him some background. There's even a 500-pound lift recliner that lifts and tilts forward to help an obese person get out of the chair. He groans, and I begin telling him about clothing. “Many of the major retailers are
now catering to plus-size women. JCPenney began a new division in 1999 catering to full-figured women, and Kmart not only increased the area devoted to plus-size clothes by 25 percent but also introduced a junior-plus-size department in 400 of its stores. So has Hot Topic. They have a chain called Torrid aimed at plus-size teenagers. According to one estimate I read, plus-size clothing sales are a $17-billion-a-year business, outperforming the rest of the garment industry. Overweight women can now buy better-quality underwear, lingerie and wedding gowns. And the best news is that now there are even online dating sites so that heavier women don't have to compete with model types for men.”

“Wow,” Taylor says. “I had no idea.”

“Most people don't, and you just don't see it in California,” I tell him, “and you don't see it in New York City. But travel around the country, and you see the problem of obesity when you walk down the street. According to some statistics, half of all American women today wear a size 14 or larger. In 1985, the average size was 8.”

I don't even go into the medical field, where obese patients have special needs, including larger wheelchairs, beds, special air-circulation mattresses to prevent bedsores, and on and on, or in the travel field where an obese person has to buy two airline tickets.

We segue into more familiar ground: food tricks instead of diets. I start with the obvious: having fresh fruit instead of juice because it has more fiber and higher satiety value. We talk about heating V8 and sipping it slowly as a soup, instead of downing a chilled glass of it in a second. For whatever reason, when it's hot—and you can add some cut-up vegetables—it seems to be more filling and satisfying. The same goes for pureeing vegetables into a soup instead of eating them cooked or raw. Another trick is to buy plastic ice
pop containers and make your own ice pops using plain old water, or diet soda instead of sugary juice.

“Water pops?” Taylor find this funny.

“Believe it or not, it helps to just have something in your mouth,” I say, and then, oh God, start to blush. He turns toward me and smiles. Now we're talking about something that Taylor can relate to. He leans over and kisses me so softly that I'm not even sure that he did, and for some reason, the sweetness of it, especially in the middle of the late afternoon with the warm sun bathing the office in sunlight, turns me on more than anything else he could have done.

“Something in your mouth, huh?” he says softly. I lean back and nod, very slightly. And then, as if on cue, the mood is broken as the phone rings. He doesn't answer it, but a moment later, there's a voice on the answering machine—the head of production at his studio—saying that he needs to talk to him, right away. Taylor exhales and gets up, looking down at me on the couch, with my head resting back on the cushion. He smiles and shrugs his shoulders, helplessly, then walks to his desk to make the call.

L
ater on that evening, we're off to the party. It's in a beach house that's within swallowing distance of a giant tsunami, and once in the door the walls feel like sausage casing squeezing all of Hollywood together. All intimate friends, all familiar to Taylor. Very. Was his mouth sore from hello-kissing so many pumped-up lips? My guess is that most of the group is from TV, but I watch so little that I can't tell a soap opera vixen from a surgeon on
ER
.

This is Taylor's extended family. Women are flashed his full throttle smile, hugged, smooched, whispered to. This is no place for the insecure at heart. Wondrous cleavages abound. So do pert asses, great legs, perfect cheekbones and twenty-thousand-dollar smiles. Taylor introduces me around, but after the polite smiles, I fade into the crowd like an extra. Everyone wants a part of Taylor. Women and gay men want to sleep with him, and the straights want to meet
him for golf. If he minds being a body pillow, he hides it well. My leading man is a born party animal.

The room gets smoky, close, and I need air. I ease away from him, averting my eyes from the buffet table, cognizant of the fact that neither the giant pyramid of bite-size quiches nor the mound of golden crab cakes has been touched—w
hat else did you have to know about this group?
Do you know how wild I am about crab cakes, especially when they're made with chopped red pepper and lots of dill? And what better to go with them than the nearby pot of golden lemon mayonnaise!

I snag one and walk out to the beach, glancing back at the party through the picture window. Planet Hollywood. Faces that I have no interest in meeting, or talking to. I mostly avoid parties, uncomfortable with keeping up the forced banter, steering oneself from one group to another, chatting with one eye fixed on the door to monitor flow. Another future column—the pain of being out and on display?

Maybe it all brings me back to grade school proms, hugging the side of the room near the windows and sitting in a folding chair for the entire junior high school prom when my mother convinced me to go even though I didn't have a date. How clearly I recall crossing the great room with all the couples dancing when I had to go to the bathroom. One of the greatest things in life for me is knowing that now that school is over, I never again have to wonder if someone is going to ask me to the prom.

Through the window I see a curvaceous blonde howling with laughter. Well, this was nirvana for any celluloid wannabe—producers, directors, cameramen, studio heads, stars. But for an ink-stained wretch from the Big Apple? And talk about accepting fat? It was a nonissue at this party, if you didn't count the kind that's taken from your rear and injected into your face.

Tex would know the feeling. If he were here we'd be exchanging glances, and I'd see it in his glazed look. Oceanic boredom. I feel as though I'm looking at him through a giant zoom lens. Where was he now, with Sharon having feijoada with black beans at Casa Brazil? Scarfing down a three-pound lobster at The Palm? Maybe he was just home watching the news. If I was with him, we'd be twittering about a breaking story, bad-mouthing some government official, laughing over a correction. Or a correction of a correction. He'd be on the phone with the office, opening his eyes to me in exasperation. Life seemed more sharply focused at home. Edited of excess. At the moment, it seemed like a warm bathrobe, instead of a snug, scratchy, organza dress.

I reach for my cell phone and almost automatically start dialing the New York area code, 212. I'm not even certain if I want the call to go through, but when I hear it ring, I reason that fate has ruled me.

“Metro.”

It's Larry, and in a heartbeat I've got to decide whether to ask for Tex or just hang up.

“Hey, Lar, it's Maggie. How's it going?”

“Fair to middlin',
et tu?
”

“Good, good,” I say, hastily.

“Hold on, the Texan's on the horn.”

I'm walking deeper into the ocean and wallowing in the thought of my solitary existence here, knee-deep in the ocean under a moonlit sky, while on the other side of the country, my colleagues are sitting in a neon-lit newsroom trying to shoehorn copy into too little space.

“How's the California dreamer?” Tex says.

“Oh, you know, working hard. It's a rotten job, but someone's got to do it.”

“So where are you now?” he says.

“In the ocean.”

“Watch out for Jaws.”

“The killer sharks out here don't swim in the sea, they work in the studios.”

“I wouldn't know about things like that,” Tex says. “I'm a country boy, remember?”

“So ya starving to death without me?”

“Well, let's put it this way,” Tex says. “I had lunch with Justine yesterday, and she left over half of her food.”

“Sounds like the perfect lunch partner. You paid for one lunch and got two for the price.”

“But then she dragged me to a fashion show. Wanted a man's perspective on a new collection.”

Hmmm, that gave me pause for thought. “So did you trade in your football jerseys for black silk shirts?”

“Nah, just a black opera cape and a white silk aviator's scarf, why?”

“I'm on the next plane home.”

“So you've come to your senses.”

“Don't bet on that.”

“So what are you cookin' up out there?” Tex says.

I'm not sure how to handle that question. “Oh, you know, just spreading the overweight gospel to the uninitiated.”

“We need your help more than they do,” Tex says.

“And why is that?”

“Justine's threatening to get the Atkins police after me.”

“Send her to Paris. Make up a new designer, make up a scandal. Hemlines are going up to the navel.”

“Hmmm, now that's a thought.”

Then there's a call waiting for him, and another one after that, and after a quick “Don't forget us,” he hangs up.

I call Tamara. Turns out she's spending more and more
time with Ty—in his West Side apartment that looks as if it was done by a decorator from the Sports Channel. She's told him about her novel. Apparently she's finished it and mailed it off to one of the leading publishers. It's about two women, a writer and a photographer, who meet at a weight loss center. I wonder what the romantic angle is, and it occurs to me that it could be Taylor's next movie.

I slip the phone back into my bag as I walk up toward the house. I spot Taylor through the window—a romantic film star of the silent screen. The only thing missing is the plonkety piano. He's telling a story. Everyone is enthralled, then they're in hysterics. This is his town, and I'm the bag lady who comes over from Ireland. I walk farther from the house, down toward the water, kicking off my shoes and lifting my dress. The wind blows at my back, ballooning out the front of my skirt. I turn the other way, feeling the force of it wrapping the fabric tightly around my legs. Fat, thin. At the whim of nature.

A milky glow surrounds the full moon and casts a haze on the slate black water. It's almost 80 degrees here and below freezing at home. I want to imprint this moment in time in my memory, a visual souvenir of a perfect winter night in Southern California.

I use these memories like a life raft to spirit me away from reality's disappointments because they testify to the existence of a higher life. I call upon my mental scrapbook of memories when I want to catalog my life's most poignant moments. Waking up in the Texas hill country in the early-morning chill with a sky nonstop blue; walking along an empty beach on private Palm Island in the Grenadines. The manicured gardens of the Villa Borghese in Rome, the air perfumed with flowers as I walked with a dark-haired Italian boy. These
were gifts in the montage of memories, experiences when life reveals itself at its best, awing you with its raw beauty.

I try to memorize everything I see as I stand ankle-deep in swirling water. It would all be pushed aside when I was home. Tamara would move up at the paper, and I'd have to find another support person. I'll miss having her sitting outside of my office every day. I don't like to lose people. But to see it happening to Tamara doesn't surprise me. Life is all about serendipity. You just have to be open to it.

Like Taylor's call, and the changes in my life that it set in motion. And it wasn't just the weight. It was the stimulus for getting me to the point of shaking up the status quo and trying to make things better in my life. It gave me the boost to say that I would try to do better for myself. That I was worth it. That I would strive to be the best Maggie that I could. And that whether I failed or not, I would know that I tried—that I dieted, that I exercised, that I was ready to take responsibility for myself and help determine the course that I would follow rather than bemoaning my fate and throwing up my hands in surrender.

For that alone, I owed Taylor. And now that I'm exercising, I'm convinced that it's the perpetual motion that is largely responsible for keeping the weight off. That's definitely a column. I savor the last bite of the crab cake and lick my fingers.

I glance back at the house. Was he doing some coke in a back bedroom now? Behind a closed door with some leading lady? Nothing would surprise me. He seemed pretty relaxed about everything.

Why don't I take lessons from him? Breathe, ease my choke hold on life. It's hard to do if you live in New York. Everyone wears body armor, assumes a sense of entitlement, a self-preservation mind-set. City life calls for being a strategist, figuring your way around the crowds, traffic, sealing out noise, adapting to tight spaces, getting by with less. I'm gazing at the water when a hand on my shoulder makes me jump.

“BOO! It's only me.” Taylor laughs, kissing me on top of my head.

I turn abruptly. “You scared me. I guess my mind was someplace else.”

He nuzzles my shoulder. “You're just having a great ole time, right?”

“No, it's fine, I just don't know anybody. Anyway,” I say,
gesturing around me, “I usually don't get a chance to spend my nights like this so—”

“Guess I should have realized you wouldn't exactly feel at home here.” He slips an arm around my waist.

A male voice calls Taylor from the house. The words carry against the wind… “Hey, Mike, get back here, there's somebody who has something nice for you.” Then a high-pitched woman's laugh.

“You're wanted.”

He frowns and shakes his head. “I don't think I'll be missed. Everybody's half-wasted in there, anyway.”

“How's your blood chemistry?”

He tilts his hand back and forth. “C'mon, let's go home.”

“Going home.”
That was a wild thought. We walk to his car only to find an offering parked on the hood: a sad blonde in a black cat suit who's also ready to go home with him.

“Michael.” She slides down, pressing herself up to him. I, of course, am invisible.

I stare with disgust and sympathy…
Great, another Venus flytrap.

“Melanie, I think you need to go home, babe,” he says softly. He looks at me, his eyes widening in desperation.

“Take me with you, Michael, I want to go home with you.”

He puts his arm over her shoulder. “I'll walk you back to the house.” He tosses me the keys. “Prepare for launch.”

Melanie snuggles against him as they walk. Her slurred words trail after them… “Remember how good it was with us that night, Michael, remember?”

I start the car and drive slowly toward the house. The headlights blind him when he comes toward me. He holds up his arm to shade his eyes.

“Get in, Taylor. I'm your designated driver.”

He walks around to the passenger seat. “I don't know who I'd put my money on, me half in the bag, or you sober.”

“Taylor,” I say, brushing white powder from his top lip. “You need to chill.”

 

I could never have imagined myself being seduced by a car. Maybe it was a California
thang,
something in the air you breathed that gave you a 911 turbo high. I hold the wheel loosely as it snakes along the curving road. I glance at Taylor, who has his head back against the seat, eyes closed.

“Where's Jolie tonight?” I ask lightly.

His eyes open and he squeezes them for a moment, as if to focus, then shakes his head.

“She was in a pissy mood, and decided to do a magazine shoot they offered her in Phoenix. She'll be back next week.” He rubs his eyes. Had the drug cocktails gotten to him, or was there something on his mind? I couldn't tell.

“Listen, for whatever it's worth…she's not the love of my life. It's more of a convenience thing, for me at least. It's probably more to her…I don't know, but for me…” He shakes his head.

Was that his spin on “my bedmate doesn't understand me”? I'm not sure what to say so I'm silent as I drive up the hill and punch in the codes. I know them by heart now. I pull into the garage and turn off the ignition. Neither of us moves. Finally, I reach for the door, but he leans over and holds my arm.