Sarai Walker - Dietland

In between media interviews, Marlowe had begun writing a new book called The Jennifer Effect. The sound of her furious typing filled the kitchen as I finished my baking for the morning. I wrapped up the pastries and cakes, then sorted through the piles of newspapers and magazines that were scattered all over the table. “Leeta Albridge in Montana?” read one of the familiar tabloid headlines. I barely noticed these stories anymore. Wherever Leeta was, I was sure it wasn’t at the fast food restaurants and shopping malls where she was routinely spotted.

With Marlowe and the other women busy with their projects, I began to crave one of my own, something beyond cooking and eating, writing in my journal, and obsessing about Jennifer. Marlowe was so engrossed in her work that she didn’t respond when I tried to start a conversation, so I washed the dishes and prepared to go out for the afternoon.

I forced myself to go out for a while each day. When I did, I often had run-ins with people who stared at me in a way I didn’t like or who were somehow rude. I’d perfected the evil eye, and my favorite response: What the hell are you staring at?, which I sometimes upgraded to What the fuck are you staring at?. I had begun to look forward to these encounters. The people I confronted seemed shocked that I responded and didn’t give me a fight. Sometimes I wondered if a fight was what I wanted. After years of not fighting back, I was coiled like a snake.

I took a few freshly baked ladyfingers from the kitchen and ate them as I headed to the bus stop, the front of my dress speckled with powdered sugar. “Look at that big lady,” said a little girl as she walked by, holding the hand of her mother or nanny. The woman blushed and was about to say something, but I spoke first.

“Yeah, look at me,” I said, popping the last ladyfinger into my mouth and brushing the crumbs from my hands. “Aren’t I fabulous?”

I rode the bus to Midtown, then got off and walked for a few blocks. Through the forest of buildings, I looked up and saw part of the Austen Tower’s chrome trunk. Kitty was up at the top and Julia was down in the depths.

Back at street level, another familiar sight: a poster of the lilac negligee woman, whose breasts I’d seen sailing around town on the sides of buses. Outside one of the flagship branches of V— S—, the poster was more than two stories high, the woman’s breasts tire-size. If I’d had Jennifer’s powers, I would have demanded the posters be taken down. They were everywhere, like leaflets dropped on a population during a war. Propaganda.

When the hordes of pedestrians thinned out, I could see myself reflected in the plate-glass window of the store, superimposed over the lilac negligee woman’s knees. I was wearing my knee-length brown and violet dress, with violet tights, the black boots on my feet. I smiled at my reflection, which then disappeared behind a group of people streaming by. No matter how big the crowd became, the woman on the poster loomed large, her breasts conquering Manhattan. I’d first seen her the day I saw Leeta on the T-shirt: two women, two different messages. I could never be like the negligee woman—I no longer wanted to—but I wondered if I could be like Leeta.

A Baptist isn’t afraid to become an outlaw.

I headed to the drugstore to buy supplies and gather my courage. Then I breezed into V— S—, doing my best to appear nonchalant. The sizes at Bonerville didn’t reach the outer limits, so the sight of me entering the store raised some eyebrows. One of these things is not like the others! A bouncy-haired salesgirl bodychecked me at the entrance. “Can I help you with something?” she said.

“I’m shopping for a normal-size person. I hope you don’t mind that I’ve come in here.”

“Not at all. I’m here to help,” she said, expertly deflecting all sarcasm.

I was left alone to roam the store, the walls lined with life-size posters of the Swedes and Brazilians who modeled the lingerie. As I pretended to browse, I discreetly slipped things into my satchel, using my bulky body as a shield. That part was unexpectedly easy. The difficult part was removing the security tags. I needed to be in the dressing room to do that, but I had no reason to go in there. Even the robes weren’t likely to fit me, the unfuckable female.

Though I’d said I was shopping for someone else, I spotted a display of scarves, necklaces, and other size-free items in the middle of the store that I could pretend were for me. I selected a few accessories that would go with my dress and asked the salesgirl if I could try them on in the dressing room, to see how they looked. She wasn’t suspicious of me; people rarely were.

In the dressing room, I used the scissors I’d bought at the drugstore to cut the saucer-shaped security tags off the underwear. The scissors weren’t quite sharp enough and I gnawed at the fabric and ruined the items, which wasn’t something the average thief would have done, but then I had no intention of wearing the underwear. I didn’t know what I was going to do with it, but stealing it felt good.

I was prepared for the alarm to sound as I walked out the door or for the bored security guard to tackle me, but nothing happened. This was one of the most reckless things I’d ever done, and though I wasn’t likely to see my face printed on T-shirts anytime soon, it gave me a thrill.

At home, I dumped the lilac negligee and the rest of the contraband in my closet. calliope was born in this room / january 1973.

“What are you going to do with all that underwear?” Sana asked when she came upstairs to visit me in my room, looking at the tangled, frayed, colorful heap on the closet floor. I confessed to her that I’d stolen it. She clearly disapproved, but didn’t berate me.

“I’m saving it for a special occasion,” I said.

“Waiting for Mr. Right?”

“I already met Mr. Right, didn’t I tell you? I encountered him in the subway station. He punched me in the face.”

For the rest of the week, I settled into a routine. In the morning I was up at the sound of the music and made breakfast for everyone. After the women cleared out of the kitchen, I’d spend a few hours baking, still in my nightgown, listening to the radio for any news of Leeta. While I stuffed myself with cupcakes and popovers and whatever else I’d made, I’d call my mother. She wanted to talk about Verena’s book and was full of questions about my new life and where I was living, relieved that I was away from Brooklyn and surrounded by new friends. When I finished baking and eating, I’d put the rest of the baked goods onto platters and trays for the other women and then I’d shower, dress in my new clothes (which were becoming snug), and visit a branch of V— S—.

On the fourth day, when I went down the stairs, ready to go out, I paused in the red-walled entryway to make sure I had put my scissors in my satchel. Then there was the shattering of glass followed by screeching tires. I feared that a bomb was finally blowing up the Bessie Cantor Foundation next door and I was experiencing the blast in slow motion. I stood frozen in place until I felt certain that a fireball wasn’t about to rip through the walls.

I walked into the living room and bent over to pick up what turned out to be a brick with a piece of paper rubber-banded around it. One side of the paper, in block lettering, read: DIE BITCH. On the other side: EULAYLA 4-EVER.

“What’s going on?” Verena said, coming into the living room and taking the brick from me. She read the messages and frowned, seeming resigned rather than surprised. “This happens sometimes,” she said. “Former Baptists. So many of them hate me.” She handed me the brick and asked me to unwrap the rubber band and save the piece of paper.