The Year I Went Pear-Shaped Read Free

them, I think I might be allergic to them and they’re loaded with fat of course but I know you don’t worry about stuff like that.”
    I shot her a look of pure venom but as usual she didn’t notice.
    “Are you ok, Darl? Your face has gone all funny?”
    “I’m fine thanks Kat and no, I don’t want your chocolates, you should eat them, I’ve heard they’re great for PMT.”
    Truth was, I badly wanted them. I wanted to rip them out of her skinny, manicured hands and shove them into my mouth with both hands. The battle with my weight was now into its 22nd year. For 22 years I’d dieted, denied myself, starved then binged, counted calories, had thyroid tests to see if my metabolism was slow, gone through hundreds of pairs of running shoes, sweated through countless aerobics classes, and spent thousands of dollars on everything from Chinese Slimming Tea to colonic irrigation and heart rate monitors that beep when you’re in the fat burning zone. I’d tried the Zone diet, the cabbage soup diet, the liver cleansing diet, the high protein diet followed by the high carb diet. I’d spent three days eating nothing but apples, I’d fasted for a week, run marathons, bought books called ‘Get slim through self-hypnosis’ and listened to positive affirmation CDs that promised to ‘reprogramme my subconscious to make my body burn fat’. I’d eaten nothing after 5pm for three months, and then swapped my meals around so that I ate dinner in the morning and had cornflakes in the evening. I’d had acupuncture, hypnotherapy and counselling. I’d joined slimming clubs, been to a health camp, and had kilojoule-controlled meals delivered to my door three times a day.  I’d taken speed and ecstasy and even tried to develop a smoking habit.
    But nothing worked.
    Now, at 34, I’m 10 kilos overweight and I haven’t had a proper boyfriend in four years. Countless one-night stands, I might add, but no boyfriend. I blame my weight. I just know that I’ll never meet a man until I lose all this ugly fat. I’ll never be happy. And I’ll never achieve my one burning ambition, which is to have a night of unbridled passion with Dr Rick Ramswell aka Gordon Worsley. That’s right, my ultimate mission is to get Dr Ramswell into the sack. Just a fuck, meaningless sex. The same thing that every girl back at school except me got. Even bloody Sharon Greese with her huge buckteeth, cross-eyes and dribbling problem. When I heard about Sharon and Gordon’s coupling in the medicine ball cupboard at the back of the gym, I went home and ate a three-kilo tub of chocolate ice cream. Even for me that was an almighty effort and I had to go to bed before dinner with stomach cramps. At school the next day Sharon was walking around like she was some sort of queen and relaying all the gory details over and over again to an ever-changing circle of giggling girls in the loos. The way she told the story, gangly Sharon came across as some kind of seductive Mae West. I burned with jealousy and vowed that I too would one day get myself into the same position. Now, almost 17 years later, a plan was forming. My job at Lush! meant it was easy enough to arrange an interview with some celeb on the pretext of doing a story on them, or using them in a feature. My plan was to work out a story idea where I could meet Gordon, seduce him, get him into bed, then forget him forever. And it all looked to be turning far easier than I could have possibly hoped.
    “Darla! Amanda! Features meeting in my office in ten minutes. Bring some good ideas.”
    I hurtled back to reality, feeling the burn on re-entry into the Lush! stratosphere. “Sure thing Arabella, no problem.” I shouted at the briskly retreating figure, her blonde bob flicking side to side in time with her perfect arse.
    “Oh god,” moaned Mandy, the features editor, once Arabella was out of earshot. “Do you have any bloody ideas? How can I be expected to come up with a constant stream of stupid story ideas