Elinor brought out the cake, creamy and glistening with silken highlights in the warm, midday sun and split the whole loaf into three pieces. "So, you would do a nude scene?" Elinor asked. "If the price was right, I guess. But they'd have to pay a hell of a lot to see me in the buff!" "I hate to break this to you, but right now, I don't think anyone's going to b paying anything to see theat bulgy belly of yours." "Oh yeah? Well how much does The Inquisitor cost?" Lisha shot back. "Because there's going to be a LOT of people buying that!" They finished the cake, and then they finished the second cake Elinor brought out; Lisha was leaning back in her chair yet again, immobilized as she'd been at nearly every meal since she'd been in the Hamptons. "If I stay in this chair and never move and just keep eating, do you think my blubbery butt will grow through the chair webbing like trees grow around wires? I'd have a fat knobby butt and wouldn't that be attractive?"

She stood up from the chair, and felt the now-familiar shifting inside her stomach as the weight of the meal succumbed to gravity's pull. "Well, I guess this is as huge as I'm going to get today, so we might as well take some pictures while I still look like I'm about to give birth to a medicine ball. Did you remember the camera, Emma?" "Yup! And y'know what the best thing is? Stephen's got one of those super high-tech, high-end digital cameras -- $10,000 worth of circuits -- so there's no need to get these things developed. Just click, click, and plug it into the computer."

The three of them waddled down to the blanket, Lisha and Emma holding hands while Emma carried the camera on the tripod; Lisha kept wishing she could put her other hand on Elinor's soft hip, but she was walking just far enough away to make that impossible. When they got down to their spot, Elinor laid down on her blanket and Lisha had Emma sit on the other one, while she moved back and set up the camera. "What are YOU taking pictures of?" Emma said. "You're going to be the subject." "Yes, but I've got to figure out what I want you to take the pictures of." "Look, Lee, I know you want to be a director but..." "Hey! Everyone's got to start somewhere! Now scoot over a little bit... and turn a little bit sideways... look over at the house..." While she was talking and giving directions, Lisha was hitting the shutter release, experiencing the somewhat odd sensation of taking a picture without any sound of advancing film. "How many pictures does this thing hold?" she asked Emma, who answered, saying, I think it'll hold about thirty-two shots, but -- you're not taking pictures now, are you?" "Of course I am! And it's quite a lot of fun, too! Now how about you, Elinor?" You can take all the pictures you want, but you'll have to come to me, 'cause I'm not moving!" "Okay, fine!" Lisha said, turning the camera over to Emma. "What a bunch of party-poopers!"

Lisha kneeled on the blanket and made herself ready for her first pose, but when she looked over at where Emma should've been, she saw that her girlfriend was moving away down the beach. "Where are you going?" she yelled, her voice practically disappearing into the crashing of the waves and the rush of the ocean breeze. The wind brought Emma's voice back to her, and she was saying, "It's supposed to be a paparazzi picture -- from like a hidden location or something." Emma was right, so Lisha continued posing, picking positions that she thought would make her look fatter; for a couple of shots, she even forced herself to chow down on some chocolate chipp cookies Elinor had brought out for that purpose. Pretty soon, Emma came back to the base, saying, "Well, that's a wrap! Good thing I had a wide angle lens." "Why, you needed one for me? I'm not that fat, you told me." "No, a wide angle lens makes things look further away -- you know that..."

Feeling full and somewhat drowsy, their tasks accomplished, the three women relaxed on their blankets, talking meaningless talk, rubbing suntan lotion into each other's skin -- both the rubber and the rubbee enjoying the process, and without even realizing it, most of the day disappeared. Emma, whose fair skin was beginning to burn, was the first to call it quits, saying that she was going to go inside and see about downloading the photos from the camera into the computer. Both Lisha and Elinor were ready for some shade, as well as being interested in seeing the results of the photography session, so all three of them picked up their belongings and headed for Stephen's house.

Lisha volunteered to bring them all something to drink, and when she came into the computer room carrying the tray of beers and glasses, she saw that Emma had already loaded the photo previews. The ones Lisha had taken were close-up and full of detail, demonstrating the warmth of Emma's smile, the generous curves of her naked flesh, the beautifully varied shades of red and orange and auburn that gave her hair such life. Elinor, too was well-represented: her creamy, light-brown all-over tan warming up the monitor screen. One of the shots Lisha took while Elinor was lying on her back and she was standing at her feet. The camera had so foreshortened her thighs that they were too wide for the bottom of the frame, her belly-button floated like a boat on an immense sea of blubber, her boobs drooped down her sides so far that her nipples practically brushed the blanket, her hands were behind her head leaving her upper arms flattened out thicker than Lisha's thighs. Her mahogany hair and dark brown eyes both showed sparkles of sunlight, and the smile on her face was echoed in Lisha's own expression.

It was a small room, and the three women were crowded together in front of the monitor. Emma, of course had the seat of honor, as she was busy flipping through the photos. There wasn't much room to the right of the workstation, so Elinor had taken a seat behind her and slightly to the left; Lisha couldn't get past Elinor's bulk, so she kneeled on the floor next to the big woman, resting her arm on Elinor's well-padded thigh. Her fingers absent-mindedly stroked the soft flesh while she looked at what was going on on the screen. One of the photos Emma had taken from far back was filling the large monitor, and Lisha watched carefully while Emma zoomed in closer and closer and closer, the image becoming grainier and grainier, but still easy enough to make out Lisha kneeling in profile on the blanket, the far hand resting on her bulgy tummy and her near hand feeding herself a Smackers bar which Elinor had kept stored in the small cooler.

"It's strange," Lisha said, "but I've been looking at myself in the mirror ever since I started gaining some weight, and -- I guess it's true that the camera really does add fifteen pounds. I mean, all this time I've been focusing on whether my belly's gotten bigger -- and it has -- but look at those boobs! If they weren't hanging down like that, someone would think I had an operation! Are they really that big, or is it all the camera. Elinor reached over and hefted one of Lisha's plump breasts in her chubby hand, saying, "No, it's not an illusion -- you've gotten pretty buxom, all right." Lish returned the gesture, exaggerating by using both hands to lift one of Elinor's enormous boobs, saying, "Well, if I'm 'buxom', have they invented an adjective to describe you?" "Try 'zaftig'," the older woman answered, then laughed out loud, saying, "'cause once you've tried zaftig, there's no going back!"

Emma shifted in her seat just then, pushing her spread-out naked butt against the open back of the office chair; Lisha couldn't resist the temptation, quickly letting go of one woman's body part and grabbing a handful of her girlfriend's ass. "Hey!" Emma said. "This is delicate work!" "And, you'd better watch out, Emma," Elinor said. "This girl is so fickle. One second she's groping at my bosom and the next second she's fondling your butt. You might want to invest in a leash..." "Oh, baby, YES!" Lisha squealed in mock delight. "And one of those choker collars and some leather corsets and then you can drag me around downtown, forcing me to polish your boots with my clitoris..." "You are really sick!" Emma said. "Oh, I love it when you insult me!"

"Cut it out and look at this," Emma said, pointing to the picture of Lisha with the candybar. "I looked at all the others, but I keep coming back to this one. I think this picture'll work. Just a little manipulation..." "Can you manipulate my belly bigger?" "Maybe," she said. "But, I don't know. It's kind of tricky..." "Hey! Y'know what?" Lisha asked. "Go back to the pictures I took." Emma brought up the page that showed thumbnail views of all the pictures and Lisha pointed at one of the photos of Elinor, telling Emma to blow that one up so the picture of Lisha and that picture could be side by side. "See!" Lisha said. "See what?" Elinor asked, leaning in and resting one hand on each of the girls' shoulders. "It's the same pose," Lisha said. "Elinor's even eating a candybar in this one. You can just put my head on Elinor's body and we can really make 'em think I've gotten fat!"

Elinor leaned back and laughed, both hands holding her jello-like stomach. "How many days have you been gone?" she asked. "I think I've been 'missing' for like four days." "And you expect people to buy into your gaining almost 250 pounds in four days?" "Well, it's probably possible if I really ate a lot." Emma said, "There are these things known as biological limits that apply even to you. Even if Elinor and I tied you down and stuffed you full of pure butter, like we were hand-packing a quart of ice cream, and even if we took turns keeping you stuffed like that twenty-four hours a day for all these four days, you wouldn't even be as fat as me yet, let alone as big as Elinor!" Are you saying I couldn't physically gain seventy pounds in four days?" "Look," Elinor said, "it's not a challenge; it's just a fact."

If you've got any comments or criticisms, you can post them on the WeightBoard or e-mail me at: melaniebel@aol.com.

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