Aphrodite

"We gotta stop this," Corrie groaned as we lay on the bed in the light of late morning, tired and sweaty and full.

"I know," I said.

"I mean, it's amazing, but we have to stop," she continued. "Look at me. I've never been this fat in my life." She grasped the thick roll of her gut, lifting it with both hands.

"Look at us," I corrected, grabbing my own stomach and giving it a vigorous shake.

Corrie swung her thick legs off he side of the best and grunted as she stood up. She stretched, cracking her back and pushing out her stomach. It was...eye-popping.

"Christ, I'm fucking huge," she moaned, looking down. "I can't even see my feet."

"When could you ever see your feet?"

"But now I can't see them because of my stomach, which is now bigger than my breasts, which I can tell because there it is, just sticking way out there!" She started pacing. "I can't believe I let this go on for so long. I won't even make a dent in this by fall. I'll go back to school and every single person I meet will be thinking about how fat I am. They won't say it, but I'll know it. Every single person, I'll meet then and they'll stop for a moment and I'll see Jesus, just look at her, what the hell did she do to herself flickering through their heads."

She stopped, breathing heavily.

"And I'm getting fucking winded just from walking and talking at the same time!"

I stood up and hugged her from behind, putting my hands on her waist and resting my cheek against her temple. We fit together differently now—another thing to get used to.

"I said we'd stop if you wanted," I sighed, "and I guess you want to. So let's stop."

"I kind of do," she said. "You really okay with that?"

I kissed the side of her head, just under the line of her beautiful curls. "It's your call to make, Corrie. That's our agreement, remember? I'm just gonna get rid of these."

She turned around just in time to see me snatch up the box of Aphrodite from the table and march into the bathroom, shutting the door behind me.

"Wait!" she said, pounding on the door. "Ains, wait!"

"Can't hear you!" I said. "Dropping some fudge in the toilet! Literally."

"Ains!"

I flushed, watching the little cubes swirl away, off to make some lucky fish fat and sexy. Then I opened the door again.

"Done," I said, holding up the empty box.

"Oh," she said.

"I thought you'd be happy."

"No, I am, it's just..." She sighed. She plopped back down on the bed. At her size, she could really plop.

I sat down next to her. "Did I screw up?"

"No!" she said. "I'm sorry. I know my emotions are all over the place here. You respected my boundaries, and that's great."

"But?"

"But...I kind of did want to stop and I kind of didn't, you know? As long as we were still doing the trial, it was all kind of unreal. Now suddenly we're done." She looked down at her chest, her belly, her thighs. "I was a love goddess, and now...now I'm just a fat chick."

"You'll always be my love goddess," I said, and I planted a kiss on one plump cheek.

She put an arm around me and rested her head on my shoulder. "And you'll always be mine."

"Forever."

"Forever."

"Through thick and..." I paused. "Well, just thick, I guess."

She punched me in the arm. "Ow!" I said. Maybe she didn't mean to smack me that hard—there was a lot more weight behind that punch than she was used to—but I decided not to bring it up.

"Well, now what do we do today?" Corrie asked. "Since you flushed our plans down the toilet and all."

"If I could undo that," I asked, "if I could un-flush them, would you want me to?"

She laughed. "Oh, God, no! I'm big enough. If I had them back, I'd just keep making excuses, and a week from now, I'd be in the same boat, except they'd probably have to knock down a wall to get me out of here. You did the right thing."

"Yeah, about that..." I said.

I opened my hand to reveal the two final cubes of Aphrodite.

"You didn't flush them?" she squawked, pulling away.

"Oh, I did flush most of them," I assured her. "All but these. I thought we could take one last ride, you know? But if you don't want to, you don't want to."

"Ains, I..."

She reached out her hand. She put her other hand aside her side, feeling the thick, soft roll of flesh, and pulled back again.

"It's okay, Corrie. You know what? I finally figured out a way we can have fun with Aphrodite without you gaining an ounce."

"Hm?" She looked at me, puzzled.

I opened my mouth and tipped both cubes in.

"AINS!" she yelled, her eyes opening wide.

"Wha'?" I said, holding the cubes on my tongue.

"Those are experimental drugs!" she cried. "You don't fuck around with the dosage!"

"'sokay."

"It's not okay!" She lunged for me. "You spit that stuff out right now!"

I slipped out of her grasp and darted around the bed. She tried to tackle me, but she was so slow and ungainly, now, that she didn't even come close, not even with my own extra weight slowing me down.

She flopped over the bed and made a grab for me on the other side, but I wriggled away. I'd already swallowed the chocolate at this point, so it wasn't like she could have stopped this, but she didn't know that.

Okay, so I admit it, she was right. I was being an idiot. I was just really curious what a double dose would be like...and whether a person on Aphrodite would be compatible with someone who wasn't.

My knees buckled as a wave of arousal washed over me, and Corrie succeeded in tackling me. She was yelling something. I didn't care. Her fingers on the flesh of my midsection were red-hot droplets of pure passion sliding down the windowpane of my skin. Is that a stupid metaphor? Probably. I was too turned on for metaphors. I was too turned on for anything.

And then it all went black.

DAY 10 -- 7:01 PM

I heard her voice first.

"Is that you, Elaine? As in, normal Elaine? You back with me?"

I groaned. "Corrie? Where am I?" My mouth felt like I'd eaten a sofa. So did my stomach, actually.

"You don't remember?"

"Nooooo," I moaned. It was all just a blank. Must have been the effects of a double dose.

I opened one eye a crack. I was lying flat in bed on my stomach, my head pressed into the pillow, orange sunlight stabbing in through the blinds. Corrie was sitting in the armchair, her arms crossed. She raised an eyebrow at me.

"...Oh god. What did I do?"

She smirked. "Well, me, for starters."

"Ooh."

"A lot."

"Christ, Corrie, I wasn't...I didn't...I wasn't gross about it, was I?"

"Gross?" Her smile widened. "Ains. You were...unbelievable."

"I was?"

"I think being with someone who's on Aphrodite when you're not is...actually maybe better than being on it yourself, in some ways. You were just so crazy passionate and attentive. You really can't remember anything?"

"No... Corrie, are you mad at me?"

"Well, to be honest, a part of me would very much like to slap your face off for that stunt. I mean, for fuck's sake, you could have killed yourself."

"Sorry."

"But if you're asking if you're in the doghouse with me—no," she said. "For a couple of reasons. One, it's really hard to stay mad as someone who's done to you the sorts of things you've been doing to me. I should be sore head to toe after that workout, but I'm just...perfectly..."

She ran her hands over the flesh of her thighs. "Mmmmm. Perfectly mmmmm. That's the best way I can describe it."

"You do look...worked out," I said. "Did you actually lose weight?"

"A little bit, yes. You really put me through my paces, dear. Are you sore?"

I tried to move. Ouch. "Yes."

"And that's the other reason you're not in trouble, Ains, because I think you've punished yourself plenty."

"God, yes. I don't think I can move. I think I need...liniment, or something. Shit, is that a real thing? I always thought it was just for old people and horses, but I think I could use some right..."

I moved my arm, painfully, and moved it down my flank.

"...around...here?"

I felt around my waistline, or where it should have been.

"Corrie..."

"And this is where you realize when I said you've punished yourself, I didn't just mean tired muscles."

"Corrie...is this...me?" I shot up—ouch, again, but at the moment I barely cared—and looked down at myself.

"Corrie! What the fuck happened?!"

"I know this is a shock," she said. "Just calm down. Breathe. I'm here for you—"

"Fuck! I'm huge!" I gasped. "I'm a whale! I'm fatter than you!"

"—even when you don't make sympathy easy," she finished dryly.

"How the fuck did I get this fat in one day?"

"It was more like five days, actually. Five days of inhaling room service like popcorn gets you..." She gestured at my bulging stomach and tree-trunk thighs. "Well, that."

"And you didn't stop me?" I shrieked.

She frowned. "Honey, I had to sleep sometime. And don't put this on me. That's not fair."

"You're right," I said. "You're right. Sorry. It's just...a little bit of a shock. How much weight have I gained, anyway?"

"Over the last five days, I'd say maybe...fifty pounds? You packed on a good fifty in the run-up, too, so let's make it a nice round hundred."

"Round is right," I said. "Well, fuck."

"I hopped on the scale myself this morning," she said. "I'm up seventy."

"On you it looks good," I said. I'd managed to haul myself out of bed, aching muscles an all, to survey the damage. Jesus. I had a double chin and a gut like a trucker. "I, on the other hand, am a disaster area."

"Ains, you look fine," she said. "Fat, but fine. I mean, you do look like a tornado came through, but that's because you've been passed out for twelve hours. Your pillow is more drool than pillow."

"I'm a blimp. I didn't think I would get this fat!"

"Ains, no matter what size you are—" she began, and stopped. "You know what? I just realized something."

"That you're married to a swimming pool full of pudding?"

"No, I realized...you know, every time you said you thought I was sexy even though I was fat, a little part of me deep down always told me you were lying. And now..."

She put her arms around me.

"And now I know that little part of me is full of shit, because I'm looking at you now, my gorgeous wife, and you're the most beautiful thing I've ever seen."

She kissed me, deeply, our soft, cushiony bodies pressed together as we embraced.

"Now let's see if we can't squeeze you into some stretch pants," she murmured. "I think the both of us could stand to spend some time outside and get our steps in, hmm?"

TWO YEARS LATER

"This is Sheila from AsclepiaPharm—"

"No, thanks," I said, my thumb hovering over the 'hang up' button.

"Wait!" she said. "You participated in a study for us a couple of years ago?"

"Oh," I said. "That."

"Yes, well, we thought we'd let you know that Aphrodite finally made it through testing and FDA clearance and is about to be released nationwide, so—"

"What?" I yelled.

"Who is it?" Corrie said from the treadmill, pulling out one of her earbuds.

"Nobody, just—someone," I said. I muttered into the phone. "What do you mean, released nationwide? You can't sell that stuff! It makes you gain weight like crazy! You'll get sued!"

"That is listed in the side effects," she said. "And that reaction occurs in less that one-tenth of one-percent of people."

"It happened to both of us!"

"Well, congratulations, then, that's literally one-in-a-million odds. Anyway, as thanks for your participation in the development of this exciting new drug, we'd like to offer your household a complimentary case of Aphrodite—"

"No!" I said quickly. Holy shit, a case? We'd be visible from fucking orbit.

"Er, well, how about just a box?"

"No!"

"Oh," she said. I don't think she'd gotten many people turning her down, I guess because everyone else had a grand old time without blowing up like a balloon. But Corrie and I—

Well, let me tell you a little about what's going on with us. Our relationship is doing great. Maybe some of that's lingering effects of the Aphrodite. But some of it's just that we went to see a marriage counselor. I didn't want to go, because, you know, it's not like we were fighting. It's not like we were about to get a divorce. Things were just getting a little...blah, and now they're less blah, and I think the counseling helped a lot with that.

Corrie really hated being so heavy and out of breath. She got on an exercise kick, and never really got off it—she jogs every day now and plays tennis three times a week. It was a complete lifestyle change. She's in amazing shape. She jokes that her key to losing weight was getting really fat.

I always said I'd love her, fat or thin, and I do. I love my svelte, muscular, athletic wife. (Full disclosure: it definitely doesn't hurt that she still has an amazing butt.)

As for me, weight had never really stuck to me, but even so, even when I started eating sensibly, it took time to lose a hundred pounds. I'd taken off seventy by the end of the first year, and figured I was almost there, and then—I stopped.

The last thirty pounds stuck like glue.

Corrie doesn't mind. She says she thinks I'm sexy like this. And I know she means it, but I can also tell she's enjoying having her little revenge for all the times I patted her butt or squeezed her rolls. She certainly squeezes mine enough.

"Well, I'm sorry for bothering you, I guess," the woman on the other end of the phone, said. "We do appreciate your role in the testing. I'll let you—"

"Wait!" I said.

I looked at Corrie, at the way the muscles moved under her lean back, her sculpted legs pounding on the treadmill. She loved exercise. If she did happen to gain some weight, she'd work it off again in no time at all. Even if she chunked up so much she was spilling out of that spandex.

And I still had that coupon she made me for Valentine's day, the one I'd been saving for a special occasion.

For one week, I'll do anything you want.

A whole week of Corrie as my playful, sexy kitten. It would be amazing. And I'd keep her stuffed so full that by the end of the week, I'd be the thin one again—for a little while, at least.

"You know what? I changed my mind. I'll take a box."

THE END