The Adventures of Phatgurl
by Emily Suzanne
Smiltneck
The
Adventures Of Phatgurl
is a serial collection of stories about the adventures of Jany, a
plus-sized young woman who, in desperation, places an ad on a
personals website. As she embarks on her dates, she meets many
different kinds of men who expect many different things from her.
Some of her adventures are wildly amusing and others are more
serious and even sad.
If you have any
ideas or experiences, funny or otherwise, that you would like to see
depicted in a future Phatgurl story, please e-mail me at
emilysuzanne20@hotmail.com.
I will do my very best to incorporate all reader ideas into future
columns. Thanks!
The Ad
(Part 2)
SWSSBBW seeks SM
who will not rape her, emotionally or otherwise. The ability to
both speak and write in complete sentences is a plus. Must not
inadvertently throw her down stairs or pretend that she is “Mama.”
Intelligent conversation, a little respect, and the lack of a
current significant other will get you far. And a well-developed
sense of humor won’t hurt, either. If you like smart chicks with
jelly bellies and thunder thighs, reply to
phatgurl@personalz.com
Looking Back... Continued
Jany slowly opened her eyes.
She was tense, nervous, and had no idea why.
Cautiously, she pushed the blankets down to her waist and
stretched an arm out. It
touched flesh. Jany was
standing up next to her bed before she realized she was even moving,
then let out a shaky sigh of relief when she saw Selena sprawled
across her bed.
Then, the relief gave way to something else, anxiety, maybe,
or embarrassment. What
should she do? She
didn’t want to leave the room, the comfort of Selena’s company, but
she wasn’t ready to talk about what had happened yet, wasn’t ready
to talk about what it might mean.
And if she was there when Selena woke up, the conversation
would be inevitable. She
started to sink back onto her bed, then froze.
The shifting of her weight onto the mattress might wake
Selena up. Instead, Jany
sat at her desk and turned her computer on.
She checked her e-mail, but there was nothing exciting to
read. Then she went to
the web site for the university she wanted to attend.
It was too late to sign up for any fall classes, but she
mostly just visited the web site to dream anyway.
Someday, maybe she’d have the courage to start taking art
classes, but not yet. It
was a scary prospect; if she failed, if she wasn’t any good at art
after all, her dreams would be dead.
Too depressing to think about, and she had enough to deal
with today.
Absent-mindedly, she went to Personalz.com and logged in.
No new messages, but she spent a few minutes perusing the
profiles of the men she had yet to make a second date with.
There were only three that she really wanted to see again.
Three that made her feel like a real woman, just as
attractive as any other woman, a woman who had options.
The rest didn’t seem to fit who she was anymore.
She paused to smile at that thought.
Perhaps she was starting to be who she wanted to be instead
of who she felt like everyone thought she was supposed to be.
Jacob was a lawyer.
A professional.
He hadn’t been a creep—no almost-rape, no groping in the backseat of
a car, no head-shaving requests on their first date.
The only thing he’d had working against him was that Jany
didn’t think she deserved him.
That and the fact that he’d brought her to the Club Bubbles
before she was ready to accept the fact that places existed where
she was the norm, even one of the “cool kids,” instead of being a
fat freak.
And there was Trent.
He’d been fun and funky and artsy, just the kind of guy she’d
always imagined herself with.
Even though he’d taken her to a play about transvestites with
an audience of half naked people, and even though she, herself, had
been one of the half naked spectators, he’d made her feel completely
comfortable. She’d felt
confident after their date, strong.
The only thing that had kept her from contacting him was that
he’d told her he wasn’t really into fat chicks.
Granted, he’d also said weight didn’t matter at all to him,
but it was hard to believe that an average guy, one who didn’t like
her merely because she was a plus-sized woman, could like her.
The third guy she still wanted to go out with was Haroon.
She hadn’t gone out with him to begin with, but he’d been
friendly when she’d met him in the park, and he
had given her his number.
Contacting him would take a lot of courage, though, since she
didn’t know for sure that he had feelings for her.
He also didn’t have a profile on Personalz.com, so she
couldn’t check out his status to see if he was still single.
And there was William to think about; they’d stayed in
contact and he had said he’d like to see her again.
And Michael, who loved her but wouldn’t meet her anyway.
And looming above them all was Selena.
“Jany? Morning.”
Almost as soon as Jany thought Selena’s name, she heard
Selena’s voice coming from directly behind her.
“Oh, hey.
Morning.” Jany busied
herself with rearranging things on her desk so she didn’t have to
look at Selena. She
wasn’t used to waking up with someone, to the morning after.
“So—did—last night didn’t mean anything to you, did it?”
Selena’s voice was soft and sad, and Jany finally forced
herself to look up.
Selena was standing behind her, studying the computer screen, which
displayed William’s Personalz profile.
“I—yes. Yes it
did, I just don’t know what yet.
I know I keep avoiding this issue, but I really don’t know
what I’m doing here.”
“Jany, you can’t keep messing with me.
I can’t take it.
One minute you’re all warm and soft and then you’re cold and hard
and looking for someone else, for a guy.
You always talk about how you never feel like you’re good
enough for anyone because they never want anything more from you
than to cop a feel or get their rocks off, so you of all people
should know how I feel when you keep changing your mind about me.
It’s driving me crazy!”
“Selena, I’m really sorry.
I don’t have the words to explain myself is all.
Last night, in bed?
After the wine started wearing off a little, when we were
falling asleep? I’ve
never felt that good before, that—acceptable.
I loved how I felt.
But I don’t know if I’m really gay or bi or whatever or not.
I mean, I guess I know I’m not gay, ‘cause I do like guys,
but I don’t know if I feel like I do about you because you’re a girl
or just because you’re you.
I mean, it might just be you being a friend and making me
feel good that makes me feel that way.
It’s just so—weird for me, still.”
“I know what you mean, but maybe you’re just going to have to
make up your mind pretty soon so I don’t, like, lose it.
This yes-and-no, hot-and-and-cold stuff is killing me.
And maybe it doesn’t matter if you like girls or not.”
“But—I think it probably matters.
I mean, you are a girl.”
“No, that’s not what I mean.
This is a strange idea, I think, but I’ve always had it.
I’ve just never tried to explain it to anyone before.
What if—what if it doesn’t matter if someone is a girl or a
guy? That’s what it’s
like for me. I honestly
don’t really care at all what parts a person has, it’s just, like,
the way they make me feel that matters.
And sometimes it’s a guy that makes me feel all excited and
jittery and giggly and sometimes it’s a girl.
It’s the—like, the feeling that matters.
Maybe most people don’t think that way just ‘cause they know
they’re supposed to only feel that way about the opposite sex.
Do you get what I mean?”
Jany got up from the chair by her desk and arranged herself
cross-legged on her bed, then immediately regretted the move because
there wasn’t anything other than Selena to pay attention to.
“Kinda. I
understand what you’re saying, I just don’t know if I agree or not.
I mean, I totally understand, because last night I felt
really, really good being with you and I didn’t even really think
about you being a girl.
At least for part of the time.
And I was—well, I mean—never mind.
I enjoyed it. But
sometimes, I really do want to feel a guy’s arms around me and
stuff. There are times
when I want to be with someone and I know for sure it’s a guy I want
to be with.”
“So are you saying you were turned on last night?”
“Oh, god, Selena, I don’t know.
I don’t want to say that.”
“But it is what you were going to say, right?”
“Kinda. Maybe.”
Jany had never looked so closely at her bedspread in her
entire life.
“And sometimes, guys turn you on.
Like when you’re in the mood, you think about a guy
automatically and not a girl.”
“Yeah.”
“Okay, so think about this, then.
What if you were in a relationship—would you expect to never
get turned on by another person, ever?
That’s, like, totally not how it works.
You just learn to, like, kinda tune it out or whatever.
You don’t act on it.
So as long as guys and girls can both turn you on, it’s just
like—whatever. You just
don’t act on your feelings with someone besides the person you’re
with.”
“I get what you’re saying, I do.
I just—this is the first time in my life that I’ve ever felt
like I have options. I
mean, I don’t really feel like I have options, but I feel like I
might have options. And
I’m afraid I’ll regret it if I don’t take advantage of them.
What if I don’t at least try to see these guys again?
What if I say, okay, fine, I’ll try dating you, and then you
decide you don’t like me anymore?
It’ll be too late for any of the guys I’ve gone out with
already, and there’s no guarantee I’ll ever meet anyone who likes me
again.
“I think about that just about every day.
I’m afraid to be happy with what I have right now because it
could all be gone, just like that.
Every time someone touches me or kisses me or even says
something nice to me, I think that it could very well be the last
time it ever happens.
Don’t you see? Can’t you
be patient? No matter
what, I’ll always be your friend, but I just have to explore all my
options before I can settle down with anyone.
It’s too scary not to.”
“Whoa, girl.
Slow down. First
of all, you’ll totally always have options.
Don’t be silly.
And I get it that you want to, like, check things out and finish off
your list of dudes before you take yourself out of the game, and I,
of all people, know how scary it is to make the decision to swing
the other way. I’m okay
with you going out with the rest of the guys or whatever.
I just gotta know if I’m, like, still on your list or what.
I gotta know how you feel.
It kills me to have to be wondering all the time where I
stand.”
“You’re one of my favorite people, okay?
I like you a lot.
You are one of my best friends, probably my best friend, and I think
you’re beautiful. It has
nothing to do with you as a person.
I’m just not ready to make a choice yet, at least not if that
choice is a girl. I
really don’t know if I’m fighting it so much because I’m scared of
an actual relationship or if it’s because I’m really just not made
to ‘swing the other way.’
But I definitely don’t want to give up my friendship with
you. I just need time.”
“Okay.
But do you just need, like, time to decide, and we can still
see each other and stuff, or do you want time completely away from
me?”
“No, no, no.
We can still see each other.
I’ll even—I’ll even go out with you or whatever.”
Jany ducked her head even lower as her cheeks blazed.
“I just want to be free to test my wings on the guys I
haven’t gotten to see again yet.
I decided something, though.”
“What’s that?”
“I was going to go out with all of the guys
again, even the ones I didn’t really like, because I thought it was
just my insecurity or whatever.
But now I decided to just get ahold of the ones I liked.
I’m getting better, I really am.
Maybe I’m getting closer to knowing who I am.”
“Okay.
I’ll take it. I’m
okay with that.”
“Good.
Now, should we go get some breakfast or something?
This is the problem with a relationship between two chicks, I
think. Too much
thinking, too much talking.”
Jany stood up, finally looking at Selena again, and took a
few steps toward the bedroom door.
“Yeah, that kinda is a problem.
Let’s get outta here and go have some fun.
We can get all emotional and depressing again some other
time.”
