Fat Camp = by Broken Cassette (~BHM ~BBW ~FFA ~Romance)

[BrokenCassette]

~BHM ~BBW ~FFA ~Romance

[Author's note: I've been wanting to write a story like this for so long, I finally got it down on paper (digital paper, at least). It's probably gonna be on the shorter side, but I've got a lot planned for it, so I hope you all enjoy.

Fat Camp
by Broken Cassette

CHAPTER ONE

I’ll admit, I never thought I would be the kind of guy to give into an idea as dated and ineffective as ‘fat camp’, but then again, it wasn’t entirely my idea. It wasn’t a direct command from anyone else, either. Not really. Every time I came back home for a weekend my mom would mention how much her church group’s sons and daughters had enjoyed it, and how much weight they’d all lost. She didn’t spare any details, either - she was already passing photographs to me before the words had even fully left her mouth.

One particularly shocking photo was of a boy who weighed close to 500 pounds before going to the camp - his “before” picture looked like a pile of pink play dough someone had molded into a crude effigy of some shy looking guy with big blue eyes and more rolls than a bakery. On the right was what I assumed was the same boy, only about three times smaller, striking a confident pose at the camera as he grinned happily and gave two thumbs up, a pair of blue shorts hugging his now slim and toned legs.

Another she loved to show me was of a girl that, no offense to her, really did look like a small whale stuffed into a garish yellow sundress. For her “ after” photo she was shown holding up her old jeans, looking into the camera with such relish it made me a little uncomfortable. Although I tried to seem interested, it didn’t stop my mother from hanging them both on the fridge door. The subtlety of her hinting was getting ridiculous.

I had just come back from my third year at UCLA, and as much as I enjoyed my program and everyone around me, it was impossible to ignore the effect it was having on my already considerable waistline. It never would have crossed my mind to buy a scale for the apartment we’d recently moved into - I footed the bill for an extra fridge in the laundry room and even one in my room, but a scale never even occurred to me.

I always took some comfort in the fact that my roommate, Jerry, was a few sizes bigger than me, but he’d been hitting the gym so often that his extra blubber was quickly melting away. I secretly nicked a pair of his biggest sweatpants before he threw them out, as if in a futile attempt to hold on to the idea of my friend’s formerly big fat butt.

It didn’t help that my ex-girlfriend Lisa had given me the boot a few months before. She never even brought up my weight, but it was pretty clear that was what had driven us apart. I could see her smile slowly become a rigid frown as the distance between her two hands while hugging me grew further and further apart. We were “too different”, she told me. I wish she had just come out and said it.

I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t noticed how much I’ve porked up in the last few months alone, though. The stress of my classes along with the occasional pang of romantic loss was more than enough to justify a carton of ice cream or a nice sheet cake, in my mind. Whenever I could, I would spend time in my boxers, since the days of comfortably-snug jeans was long behind me.

My belly didn’t use to press against my shirts with such determination, but one day I came to the realization that I didn’t own a single one that was immune to it. Jerry never mentioned the weight either, though I couldn’t help but notice the looks of pity as his eyes drifted from his salad to whatever fatty food I happened to be gobbling down at the time.

I was a big kid, and an even bigger teenager. I had the luxury of going to a school where I wasn’t the fattest one around, so I was spared the usual horror stories of being mocked and called awful names, at the very least.

Being an only child whose parents were often away on business, I had the house to myself more often than not. The only babysitter they ever got was one of our batty old neighbors who did little beyond asking what sort of pizza I wanted before passing out on the couch.

My parents didn’t even have the time to shop, so once I was old enough to stay home alone they’d just leave me a fifty and let me go crazy. Usually that meant fast food, and lots of it. I became an expert on every burger joint within five miles of the place, able to tell which pizza place a pie was from within two sniffs. It wasn’t a substitute for love, but it certainly didn’t make it harder.

The town I lived in was small - the sort of place where everybody knew everybody. That included the restaurants - more than half of them had people I knew from school or were someone’s parents. On hot summer nights I would keep my friend Lisa’s mother company down at the ice cream parlor, eating anything that was just going to be thrown away.

She didn’t have to do it, but she did. She used to tell me how much she appreciated having such a cute, chubby little boy like me to talk to after everyone else had gone home. Some people might have thought it a bit rude, but Lisa’s mother never said or did anything rude. She’s still one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. Every time I have a dish or three of Rocky Road I can’t help but think of her.

Before long I was outgrowing my clothes faster than they could buy them for me, but my parents never seemed to say much. I think they felt guilty about never being around, and so they figured I should at least get to eat whatever I want. I can’t possibly deny it - I love to eat.

I have plenty of friends - despite my size I’m a pretty friendly fella - it’s not one of those ‘food is my only friend’ cases. I just love food. I love eating it and thinking about it and smelling it. If I had any kind of talent for it I’m sure I would love cooking it too. I don’t think I’ve ever tasted something I didn’t enjoy, which might not sound like much to some, but to me it’s like a miracle.

All those years of food have blown me up to nearly 425 pounds, though I’ve had people guess upwards of 550. Nothing in my closet is smaller than a 4XL at this point, and even a few of those leave a little strip of belly showing out the bottom. I had a strong double chin by the time I was 15, and now it’s more like three and a half; I usually have to cut the neck of my shirts just so it doesn’t feel like I’m being strangled. Last time I checked my pants were nearly 55” around, which is part of why I prefer my sweats most days. I’ve got some decent muscle on my arms and legs, but it’s all completely buried beneath years and years of fatness.

Despite my massiveness, I guess overall I’m a decent looking guy. I don’t think about it too much. My hair is so blonde my eyelashes are practically white, and I’ve always liked my brown eyes. I’m the kind of guy with cheeks that are constantly bleached pink, so when I’m genuinely blushing my face looks a bit like an oversized hothouse tomato.

“You’ll have fun, honey.” my mom told me when I finally caved and agreed to go along with this whole scheme. The entire time I was throwing clothing into my one suitcase and begrudgingly trying to not think about the next few months without my usual creature comforts, I couldn’t push the idea out of my mind that it would be like the movie “Heavyweights”. Even when I brought it up, my mother skirted around the comparison. Sure, I might be 21 now, but I figured it must be the same concept - Rabbit food for all meals, large amounts of exercise, sickeningly perky counselors with impossibly beautiful bodies and faces. Every fat kid’s worst nightmare.

I’m still not sure why I went through with it. Maybe a tiny part of me was hoping I would actually lose weight and become some sort of stick-like fitness guru. The thought should have elated me, but really it only caused me to shudder. Maybe I wanted my parents off my case, or maybe a tiny part of me thought that a slimmer me would make Lisa come crawling back. Whatever it was, it was powerful, because that Monday I packed up my car and set out down the highway, my Mom and Dad waving goodbye, looking excruciatingly proud. You would have thought I was leaving for the Marine Corps.

I would be taking my own car there, and so I decided that before committing myself to what was sure to be the summer from Hell, I would hit some of my favorite haunts along the way. McJoe’s burgers was one of my favorites, and although it was a while out of my way I knew I had to go and give it a proper farewell. I hit up two or three other joints along the way, knowing full well that despite what I try to convince myself, a belly like mine can handle several meals at once without even breaking stride.

They knew me by name at McJoe’s by now, even through their prehistoric speaker. I knew both Jane and Sarah - the morning clerk and the evening one. A few times I’ve even encountered Keith, the strangely perky nighttime clerk. He was a bit too friendly for my liking, though he did always seem to give me twice as many fries. I never understood why, but I wasn’t complaining.

“Sammy! We haven’t seen you in ages!” Jane exclaimed as I pulled up to the window for what was likely to be the last time in a long while. The last time I had paid them a visit was when I came down for Christmas.. I couldn’t take another second of the off-key caroling by my extended family, so I drove over to enjoy a peppermint milkshake and a few jumbo burgers. To be perfectly honest, I would miss Jane just as much as the delicious grub. She never looked at me with anything other than compassion and kindness. I’d think it was just her exceptional customer service skills, but I’d seen her treat plenty of customers without nearly as much care.

I had always thought she was rather beautiful, too. Working at such a restaurant had given her a very plump, but shapely figure. Her sleek, jet-black hair looked straight out of a 1950s soda shop, and the ruby red lipstick she always had on only completed the package. As she handed me the overflowing sack of food, I thought I caught a sort of sadness in her expression, though it was quickly replaced by her usual toothy smile.

“Thanks a lot, Jane, hopefully I’ll see you soon.” I said, already forgetting that I was going to a place where greasy burgers like these would be about as common as a three dollar bill.

“See you, Sammy. You take care, now.” she told me, waving a hand with nails just as bright as her lips. I waved back, hoping I could remember this delightful smell when confronted with a diet of carrot sticks and mineral water.

The camp wasn’t too far away, and though I finished off the bag of food in a pretty short amount of time it gave me a nice, pleasant stretch of highway on which to enjoy what was sure to be the last time of the summer my belly would feel content and full. It came dangerously close to touching the steering wheel, only an inch or so separating the two.

As I got closer and closer to “Camp Murtallach” even the trees started to look like they stood a bit taller, going from thick, sturdy trunks to svelte, fragile stalks. I sighed, wondering if getting my parents off my back was worth all of this, or if I would even lose any weight at this crazy camp. It frightened me how little I seemed to care about either at this point. I sat in the car for a few minutes after pulling up to the gravel lot, gently rubbing my belly as though we were about to be separated. In a way, we were, and how I felt about that was so muddled and confusing I quickly pushed it out of my mind.

(Continued in post 5 of this thread)

[Tad]

I enjoyed the start....nice job of getting right to the point at the opening, then weaving in his background in a natural, converstational, sort of way. And I like that this first section leaves the eventual outcome still pretty wide open (too many stories point in one direction in the first paragraph then never deviate....actually I just skipped two thirds of a novel for that reason, and sure enough the final ten pages were pretty much exactly as predicted, so I was extra happy to read something that doesn't telegraph the ending so clearly!)

I'm looking forward to reading more!

[agouderia]

Can't wait to read what you have planned!

And I can only second Tad .. it's always wonderful to get introduced to a character in a casual, natural way, not be assaulted by a flood of statistical data down to a characters shoe size in the first three lines...

So more hopefully soon!

[Jerry Thomas]

This is very nice and, as usual, I'm enjoying your excellent writing technique and creative way with words. Keep it going - I can't wait to see what happens next. Just one minor pedantic point: he weighs 425 pounds and has a 55 inch waist? Dude, I wear a size 54 and I'm "only" at 280! Or maybe I'm just a lot chubbier around the middle than he is.

[BrokenCassette]

CHAPTER TWO

Before I had walked ten steps into the campground I was out of breath, unsurprisingly. I had only brought one suitcase but it might as well have been a block of cement. Before I had time to completely recover, the light sound of trainers coming across the soft rubble interrupted the silence.

“Hi there! How’re you doing today? Name?” Looking up I saw a fit boy wearing shorts so tight he might as well have been wearing none at all. He didn’t even wait for a reply to his first question before pulling out a clipboard, scanning what must have been a list.

“Simms.” I told him. “Samuel Simms.” I started putting my baggage down for the moment, thankful for the chance to catch my breath. The boy looked not unlike an impossibly perfect store mannequin - his abs were visible even through his bright red polo shirt.

“Got it. Come with me, Sam, we’ll get you all set up!” As he picked up my suitcase like it were a fluff of cotton he started down one of the many trails, motioning for me to follow.

It must have looked a little like the Stay Puft Marshmellow man being guided by one of Santa’s Elves, and that’s how it felt. As we continued down the worn path, I could hear the distinct sound of heavy feet stomping along the ground coupled with a chorus of heavy breathing.

Looking around I could see the cabins that lined the property were not unlike the ones at any other summer camp - save the wideness of their entrances, which must have been at least double.

The place smelled distinctly of burnt hotdogs and insect repellant - I had a feeling it had smelled like this for years. The scent of hotdogs, charred as they were, was enough to make my already cantankerous belly let out an annoyed growl. The gentle rub I gave it only seemed to irritate it more.

We finally arrived at a cabin near the end of the row that looked even more beat up and exhausted than the others. The boy put down my bag, looking as perky as ever.

“Alright Samuel, this is where you’ll be staying for the next few months. It sounds like your roommate is already here.” Indeed, a disinterested grumble came out of the darkened corridor, about as inviting as a roll of fly paper. The boy motioned for me to follow him, the white of his eyes showing as he finally got a decent look at my protruding gut. I had half a mind to bowl his skinny ass over with it, but figured that wouldn’t make me too popular around camp.

Flicking the lights on only caused the source of the grumbling to escalate - I could now tell it was coming from the bed on the left side of the room. A hispanic-looking boy with messy black hair was lying on his back, his sides starting to spill over the frame. He couldn’t have been more than 300 pounds or so, but I could already tell he was on the short side, which always makes a big difference. The book he was holding up came down onto his face, his hands grasping each other as the skinny boy walked over.

“This is Leigh.” he said with such masked exasperation it made me dislike both of them. “He’s not the friendliest of types but I’m sure you’ll get along.”

From underneath a thick copy of “The Bell Jar” came a muffled but distinctly cynical voice.

“Just because I don’t like YOU doesn’t mean I’m not friendly.” he retorted, the boy shooting me a mean glance as I stifled a laugh. He quickly regained his composure.

“Anyways, get yourself settled. Our introductory ceremony is right down the hill at seven sharp, you can’t miss it.”

As I lay my suitcase on the frustratingly narrow bed frame, I realized something.

“Wait...I only have one roommate? I thought these cabins held four.” The boy scoffed, trying too hard to look understanding right afterwards as though trying to make up for it.

“Well...we decided it was better to have just two to a cabin with this program. We’ve got plenty of space and many of our attendees require...” he fake coughed into his hand, “A bit more space than most.”

It was pretty clear what he was saying. Two fatties in one cabin was already pushing it.

“I look forward to seeing BOTH of you at the ceremony.” he announced, throwing Leigh a glance at the word ‘both’ that my new roommate promptly ignored. As soon as the door closed Leigh went back to his book as if I were no more than a lamp that had been dropped off.

“Hi. I’m Sam.” I said, not pushing my luck with offering to shake his hand.

“I know.” Leigh replied without a moment of hesitation. “Welcome to Hell.”

----

There wasn’t much to do before the ceremony started, so after unpacking what little I had brought with me I spent some time peering out the window at the rest of the arrivals. The only thing they all seemed to have in common was that they were fat or, in some cases, pretty obese. One particularly large girl looked as if she were about to burst into tears when the impossibly trim counselor showed her cabin, sniffling for minutes afterwards. A few of the attendees seemed to be well into their 40s and 50s, which I’ll admit I did not expect.

Before long seven o’clock came along, and so me and Leigh waddled ourselves down to the main auditorium, several feet from each other, of course. By the time they had all of the ‘campers’ in the rather stuffy auditorium the air was so full of pants and overly warm bodies I was ready to bolt.

Just when it felt like I could take no more, a short, plump woman made her way to the microphone. Her formal wear wasn’t the only thing that made it obvious she wasn’t a part of the weight loss ‘crew’. I was a few rows away but I could have sworn she still had a tiny stain of ketchup on the cuff of her sweater.

“Welcome, campers!” she boomed in an earth shaking voice hardly requiring amplification. “It’s so nice to see so many bright shining faces this year. For those of you who might not know me, my name is Martha Ellis, the owner of this campground. While it’s technically a multi-purpose campus, I’ll admit I think it’s ideal for this program specifically! ”

“And I totally wasn’t paid to say that.” Leigh whispered behind me in a voice just barely quiet enough to avoid detection. The kid may be unfriendly but I had to admit, he was good for a laugh. Martha, who looked like she was slowly roasting beneath the harsh lighting above the stage, continued.

“Now, I’m sure you’re all eager to hear what’s going to be in store for you this summer, but I’d like to set a few ground rules. I hope you’ll keep in mind that these restrictions are for your safety.” Martha’s warm, motherly expression immediately became somber. “First of all, any sort of damage to any part of the property will result in immediate expulsion, and legal repercussions if necessary.”

Talk about a steel butterfly - this woman looked less threatening than a ladyfinger, but she clearly meant business. The plump girl sitting next to me looked positively horrified. The already heavy breathing in a room filled with fatties became more urgent, the air seeming to get hotter with each passing second.

The feast I had devoured only hours before had already worn off, and as I watched Martha closely I tried to prevent myself from noticing how much she looked like a squat yellow cupcake. It didn’t help that I was squeezed between two large girls on either side, feeling a little like the fleshy inside of a big jelly doughnut.

“Next, curfew. We take our curfew very seriously. Outside of a life-threatening situation or direct orders from your supervisors, campers must stay indoors between the hours of 10pm and 5am.” Didn’t sound so horrible. It didn’t seem like there would be much to do around here in the daylight, let alone in the pitch black.

“And finally.” Martha concluded, a hint of her normal bubbliness starting to return, “Leaving the premises without written permission or authorized accompaniment during said hours will result in permanent expulsion from this property.”

Harsh. I guess that means discrete trips to McDonalds or Krispy Kreme under the cover of night are out. As I continued to feel the pressure from both sides of me, accompanied by Leigh’s occasional exasperated sighs, I started to realize something. The camp hadn’t even officially started, and I was already concocting ways to cheat my way back to fatty foods and staying as huge as I already was. Did I really not care? Why was I even here?

I didn’t get a chance to think things through too thoroughly, because as Martha bounced back to her seat a deafening sound began blaring from all sides of the room, spooking the majority of us blubber cadets like a pack of horses. As an intense, uplifting cacophony of throbbing dance music started filling the already crowded room, a line of people in nearly identical uniforms appeared at the edge of the podium, their arms stretched to the ceiling, giant smiles on their faces.

“Welcome, campers!” A blonde, stick-like man in the center called out, waiting a few moments for a response that never came before continuing, unaffected. “It’s great to have you here! Y’all having a good time so far?”

The deafening music was still playing, but I could make out Leigh screaming “I love safety regulations!!”

As sudden as it had started, the music was replaced by silence, though the counselors continued smiling. They had now put their hands on their hips, looking like a paper doll chain from Brain Dead Jock Weekly. The blonde man started again. “We’re so glad you’re all here. This is our biggest turn out ever, and we’re determined to make it the best Camp Murtallach ever!”

This is the point where I would have toned everything out, letting my thoughts return to the warmth and unique satiety of the five burgers I’d inhaled that afternoon, had it not been for this next part.

“I know a lot of you have been here before, but I want to start by saying things are going to be pretty different this year!” That was enough to regain my interest, though from the sound of it Leigh had already pulled out his book and started reading again. In front of me a blobby teenage boy was slowly lifting what looked like a handful of Kisses from his pocket. Just as I was wondering how he would possibly get those to his mouth without anyone noticing, the man spoke again, kneading his hands together.

“This isn’t the Camp Murtallach you know. This is a Camp Murtallach without a single rule.”

Wait.

What did he say? Didn’t Martha just finish telling us all of the rules and regulations? Every person in the auditorium was looking intently at the man now - even the boy in front of me dropping those Kisses to the ground in shock went undetected. I couldn’t see him, but I had a feeling even Leigh was stunned by this revelation. After a few seconds of the most still silence I’ve ever experienced, he went on.

“I wanted Martha to speak with you all first so that you know the rules regarding the property that she owns, out of respect for her. What a great job she did, too!”

Martha took a series of bows as if she had discovered a cure for skin cancer. The man’s smile became just a bit less robotic.

“We’ve learned from our mistakes. Our methods worked for a few of you, but not nearly as many as we wanted. We want a 100% improvement rate for our participants, and after ten years of the same pattern, we feel it’s time for something new.”

As though they were acting out some awkward film-school piece, a svelte girl with the reddest hair I’ve ever seen stepped forward.

“This year, we will be implementing an honor system. There will be no weight loss enforcements, no mandatory exercises, not even any restrictions on food intake.” That last comment is what really set the crowd into a controlled frenzy. The boy with the chocolate quickly scooped his treasure back up, unwrapping them all with superhuman speed before eating them in one go.

“You’ll be expected to come to our weekly meetings and counselor check-in sessions from time to time, and of course we’ll still be offering all the great programs we always have, but beyond that you are free to do as you please.” I was stunned. It’s as if they had constructed this entire program around my own lack of self-restraint. The low buzz of chattering campers soon crescendoed into a babble worthy of any bustling city street. The blonde man put a hand up in hopes of coaxing them back to silence, which somehow worked.

“I hope you’re all as excited about this as I am, but at the same time, I hope you’ll also take the time to consider what this means to you. For some of you it may be easier, for some more difficult. But in the end it will make all of you stronger, and I have faith that we will see quite satisfying results! Now, let’s head to dinner, y’all! And welcome!”

And with that, we started being herded out, our collective trot nearly shaking the ground beneath us. The chatter had started up again, the feeling of fear and dread that hung in the air at first replaced by such lightness you’d think we were going to an ice cream social. Leigh was a few feet in front of me, and though it only took me a few seconds to jog up to his side I was already tired and ready for a nap.

“Crazy, isn’t it?” I asked him, his face back inside his book.

“I guess.” he responded, his normal deadpan tone laced with just a hint of disbelief. Though we didn’t say another thing to each other before reaching the mess hall, he didn’t move away while I walked beside him. It was small, but it felt like the beginning of trust.

The mess hall, which was uncharacteristically spotless for a camp facility, consisted of several long, reinforced tables with a surprising but appropriate amount of space between seat and table. Along one wall was an old fashioned cafeteria buffet-line with several piles and pools of what was likely to be mediocre food, at best. I had been considering what all this meant for the last few minutes, and I think it’s appropriate to say that I was rather shocked. I was only pulled back to reality when the girl behind me bumped into my thick back after I failed to continue moving forward. I grabbed one of the orange plastic trays as I continued mulling it all over.

Maybe all these people were as unmotivated as I was. Maybe this would all be a big disaster and we’d all get even fatter than we already are and they’ll have to close the camp and never speak of it again. Somehow it didn’t seem likely. I came into this expecting at least a little guidance and, yes, restriction. But there was none. There was nothing to stop me from driving back to McJoes and ordering another heap of fatty burgers, at least in the daylight. Not one thing. This was truly worse than anything I could have possibly imagined.

I was still thinking about it as I mindlessly moved through the line, letting several bored-looking cafeteria attendants pour and ladle hospital-grade foods onto my plate - a sloshing of green beans, some lifeless tater tots. I really must have been in a haze because it took the same girl who bumped into me jabbing her elbow into the side of my bulging gut, recoiling from the sheer softness of it. “Hey jumbo, she’s talking to you.”

I looked up from my plate, which I had fixated on while spacing out, and to the person holding a spatula full of a surprisingly plump morsel.

“Would you like some meatloaf?”

She was shorter than me by a few inches, and probably a fourth my size. Though she had on the same plain, bleached white apron as the drones serving everything else, just the sight of her had paralyzed me. I gripped the plastic tray tightly in my hands as struggled to remember how sentences were formed again. Her bright brown eyes looked up at me earnestly, a few strands of her dark hair peeking out. Even with a hairnet on she looked stunning.

“Yes, please.” I finally squeezed out, feeling foolish and stupid all of a sudden. She gently slid the morsel onto my plate, her eyes settling on my big stomach for just a moment before they flew up back towards my face. Her expression was hard to read, but it didn’t seem blatantly disgusted.

“There you go. Enjoy.” she chirped, just the smooth sound of her voice enough to make my fat legs tremble. She was smiling.

“Thank you.” I mumbled, turning away from her quicker than I intended to, trying to hold her appearance in my mind. I knew this feeling. My blotchy red cheeks were getting redder as I suddenly longed for the cold night air we had come in from. I took a seat next to Leigh without caring if he wanted me to or not. It didn’t matter much, as I didn’t pay him any more attention than he did to me, which for once suited both of us just fine.

I realized minutes later that she had been wearing a name tag I didn’t even have the good sense to look at. I felt if I had stayed a moment longer my knees would finally buckle and I might just collapse right then and there. I hate meatloaf, but I ate every last bit.

[Britt Reid]

Bump after edit and move from archival forum