big tear rolled out of her eye. She blotted it away with her napkin.
Grace, the dietitian, put her hand over Laura's. "You don't have to tell this." Her voice was brusque. "It always makes you cry."
"But I do, Grace. Don't you see? People need to understand— they have to!" She turned back to Biggie, who was listening with a little frown on her face. "The trip was lovely. We visited four schools and were greeted warmly at each one. After that, we visited Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket. We drove up through New Hampshire and Maine. We ate our fill of Maine lobster and clam chowder, shopped at L.L. Bean, explored some lovely New England villages, then boarded our plane back to Texas satisfied that our trip had been a rousing success."
"Which school did she choose?" Mrs. Muckleroy asked.
"None of them. Something happened that made her decide to stay home."
"For heaven's sake, what?" Miss Julia wanted to know.
"Some of the other girls in her high school became jealous of her— because she was going East to school, you see. They began writing nasty notes and putting them in her desk at school. They started a rumor she was pregnant— by the school janitor! And you know kids; they believed it. The rest of her senior year was a living hell. My dear sweet Ellen became so depressed, Mama had to have her committed to a mental hospital."
"But why— why would they do that?"
"Because she was FAT!" Monica bit into her fourth cream puff.
Biggie looked daggers at Monica. "Was that it?" she asked Laura.
Laura nodded, wiping away another tear. "She was the only one of us girls who had a weight problem. She took after two of our aunts on my father's side. It wasn't her fault— it was genetic, don't you see? Ellen wasn't even a heavy eater. She just metabolized her food differently— and she was so sweet and funny, we never even thought about her weight until that happened. Then we knew we couldn't ignore it any longer. She was sick because of her size; it was as plain as day."
"I'm sure glad I don't have that problem," Babe said. "I never gain an ounce no matter how much I eat." She got up from the table and started reloading her plate just to prove it.
"Just wait until you hit forty." Grace glared at her.
Babe stuck out her tongue at Grace.
"So what happened to Ellen?" I asked. "Did she ever get to be an actress?"
"No. When she came out of the hospital, she was changed. All the spark had gone out of her. She didn't seem to care about anything anymore, and within a year, she weighed over four hundred pounds. The family was worried and urged her to look for a job in Tyler where we could look after her."
"Nobody would hire her I bet." Monica is my friend, but she has a smart mouth on her.
"That's right. She couldn't find work. She went to the community college for a semester and lived at home with Mama and Daddy. In her spare time, she would help out down at the little theater, painting sets and being stage manager, stuff like that. They never seemed to have a part for someone her size. By that time I had married my first husband and had a home of my own in Tyler. We used to go out to lunch from time to time. By then Ellen had lost her sunny nature. She hardly ever did impressions anymore or told jokes. We all missed her infectious laugh. Then two things happened. The first was, Ellen got a job. Oh, it wasn't much of one. She worked in the stockroom of one of those giant office supply stores. She spent all day loading heavy cartons onto shelves and pushing furniture around." Laura paused, thinking. "She seemed happy, though, making her own money for the first time. She even lost a few pounds. Then one day the store held what they called a Review Day. That's when the big shots from the regional office would visit to grade the store's efficiency. Ellen was behind a stack of heavy boxes working away when she heard one of the inspectors talking to the assistant manager. He said, 'Get that fat heifer out of here before she falls down and we have a lawsuit on our hands.' Poor Ellen got her purse and walked right out of there without even turning in her resignation."
"I can't believe