Bethany Winters was a changed woman.
A short five months ago, she tipped the scales at two hundred and four pounds. Not a bad weight, if you stand six-feet-four-inches tall, but at five-foot-two, that's what they nicely call "A Big Girl."
Back then, her appearance didn't bother her. She was a well-paid, seasoned, divorce attorney; a lifetime career woman. Working for the law firm of Duncil and Beck, she was well respected in her field, considered a fierce competitor.
It has been said, that pain or fear of pain, is the single most motivating factor for change to occur in a persons life. So it was with Beth.
She and her boy friend, Bob Yates, lived in her downtown Atlanta high-rise. Bob was the assistant to the Assistant Clerk of Courts for Cobb county; a not-so-snappy title for a fairly powerful position. They had been living together for almost six years.
Bob, at age fifty, was going thru his mid-life crises. They were having constant arguments, over things like: His new corvette, all the time he was spending with his friends, why she never wanted to go out and why didn't she want to go to join the nudist camp up in Ashville.
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It was another late day at the law office. She was tired from dealing with an unyielding client who was more interested in getting a pound of flesh rather than getting the compensation she deserved. As Beth turned the key in her condo door she was looking forward to a relaxing evening at home. She only wanted to sit and let the stress leave her body. She hoped Bob would get her a cold beer, as she sat on the sofa and called for Chinese Take-Out. As she walked in, there was a yellow legal pad sitting on the dinning-room table with a hurriedly scrawled note.
Beth,
You have turned stagnant.
I need to grow and do things.
You are no longer attractive to me in the ways
that you were when we first met.
I need to leave and put distance between us.
Good bye, Bill
She read and reread the note as her remaining reserve of strength seemed to evaporate. She was angry, hurt, her heart ached, and she wanted to cry and scream, but couldn't. At this moment, she couldn't even assess blame. She felt drained; drained from dealing with moronic clients, the craziness of everyday life, and from Bob.
-----
A few days later:
"Beth, I need to see you," John Blake, one of the senior partners, called out to her as she passed his office.
When Beth entered, John was wearing his; I'm troubled and deeply concerned look. He cleared his throat and began.
"Beth, I'm troubled by what I must tell you."
"How so, John?" She had a feeling she was about to get a dressing down for some of the harsh words she used on Mrs. Webb for her pigheaded, unwillingness, to negotiate on the divorce settlement.
"Well, Beth, as you know, we are trying to adapt to the new image that is in demand out there. People are looking for a younger, more athletic appearance."
"John, I sense you're trying not to hurt my feelings. Are you telling me to go on a diet, join a gym? What?"
"I'm sorry, Beth. We just hired a replacement for you; a younger woman, with a more... more feminine appearance. That is what our clients are looking for. They want an attractive package for our product.
"We will be giving you a very nice severance package for your years of loyal service..." He never got to finish.
"John, what in the hell are you doing to me? I'm forty nine. I'll be fifty in two more months. I know more about divorce law than any ten, young, skinny, blonde, buxom broads you could hire. This can't just be about a skinny ass and big boobs!"
"Beth, I'm going to trust that you won't take what I'm about to tell you and hit us with a discrimination suite. Smiling, pretty faces, a good rack, nice hips and ass is exactly what this is all about, because that's what our clients want. It's not just about results. They want a youthful image and in order for us to survive in this highly competitive market, we must give them what they want."
For the first time in many, many years, Beth had nothing to say. It was like she had been sucker punched twice now. All the air was gone from her sails. She stood displaying as much pride as she could. She thanked John for his honesty and went to her office to pack the few things that she deemed important enough to keep.
-----
Two weeks later.
She was sitting on the toilet. She was horny, so very horny. She couldn't get anyone to have sex with her. No man would even look at her.
She was trying to masturbate, but her pudgy fingers couldn't make it through the folds of skin to get to her clit. The best she could do was to lift up one of her distended teats and suck on it as she cried an endless river of tears.
She woke. Her body was covered with a sheen of perspiration.
"Thank God," she said to only herself.
"This was all just a bad dream." She wiped the tears from her eyes, looked at her tear-stained fingers and realized not all of it was a dream. The fear that her dream may harbor more truth than just real tears, galvanized her into action. This bad dream was to be the turning point in her life.
It was four o'clock in the morning and the new sun had not yet risen as Beth went on the internet, searching for someone to help with her problem. After hours of looking at diet plans, exercise machines, health clubs, fat farms and spas, she came across something that caught her interest: Tanya Carter, originally from Atlanta, now on the staff at Rhodes Clinic in Palm Springs, California.
The article explained how Tanya, five-feet-four-inches tall, weighed in at two hundred and seventy pounds when she first met Dr. Carol Rhodes. Through a combination of a regimented diet and exercise program, psychological counseling and plastic surgery, she lost one hundred and forty pounds.
There was no deception in this article. It went overboard in stressing that this type of transformation was no overnight miracle. It gave details of the diet and exercise program as it told the true story of her struggles and triumphs. There was a psychological profile of Tanya and a description of how she overcame her problems.
The liposuction and cosmetic surgery was documented for you. There were graphic pictures; not just the before and after; but ones of the surgical scars, giving explanations of their locations and why they were required. Best of all, there was a number to call for a face-to-face video conference with Tanya.
Beth called the twenty-four-hour, toll-free number. She was set back when the answering voice was a real human, and after the greeting, the woman asked if she preferred speaking in a language other than English.
On a whim, Beth said, "Si, perfavore, possiamo parlare l'Italiano." The woman on the other end did not miss a beat as she sweetly transformed from a Mid-West American accent to a Tuscan Italian and began to communicate so rapidly that Beth's poor grasp of Italian could not keep up.
"I'm sorry. Can we go back to English? And how many languages do you speak?"
"I'm not as fluent in Portuguese or Greek, so I can't really count them. Aside from English, I speak Italian, French, German and Castilian."
"Well," she now asked, "what if I wanted to speak in Mandarin?"
"I would have had to turn you over to one of the other girls who could communicate with you. Now, how can I help or direct your call?"
Beth told her of the article and that she wanted to have a conference with Tanya. After hearing the scripted statement on Tanya, she opted for the first open video conference connection at 9:00 a.m. Pacific Time. She was given the Adobe communication site and told of the expected etiquette and of the minimum computer requirements needed.
Great! She had three hours to rush out to a computer store, buy a camera, and learn how to use it. Two hours and forty-five minutes later, feeling haggard from the rushing around, she was now over-educated in the use of the computer camera by a true computer geek. She had cleaned herself up, put on make-up, a nice dress and jewelry.
"Shit," she complained, "I don't get this dressed up to go out."
She made herself a cup of tea in the microwave, then turned the computer on and logged into the site. The logo of the Rhodes Clinic, a pencil sketch of a nude woman in a design similar to Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man, filled the left side of the screen. A picture collage of the clinic filled the right and a timer indicating a countdown was at the bottom. Beth still had three minutes until noon, Atlanta Time. All Beth's attention was focused on the timer. She found herself counting the seconds remaining...
"Stop it!" she told herself aloud. "You're more nervous now than you were at your first trial. Get a grip woman!"
A few seconds early, the monitor changed and focused on a woman who looked like she just stepped out of Sports Illustrated Swim Suit Edition. She was wearing a white one-piece. You had to call it a one-piece, though there was very little material. The front bottom of the swimsuit came up her crotch in a V. The small piece of V material joined a two-inch-wide cloth belt that had a small gold buckle in front. There were two, four-inch-wide straps that came from the front of the belt and formed an X, covering her nipples and little else. The strap rose over her shoulders and around her neck. The back of the suit was just the belt and a one-inch wide strip of material that quickly vanished between her two tapered cheeks. The suit was so tight to her you could see she had a very pronounced labia.
"Good morning," Tanya began.
"I see all three of you are on line and on time. It seems, however, that the rest of you are in afternoon and evening."
Three small squares popped up to the left of her screen. Beth's face, shoulders, and bust appeared. The other two women must have had more experience with the camera, because only their face and upper shoulders were in the screen. Beth was in the bottom block. Tanya seated herself and began.
"I noticed each of your facial expressions as you saw me enter the camera viewing area. It is looks like those that I get my gratification from. I'll tell you now; it is the feeling of power and edification that will make you succeed in looking like the woman you what to be. Make no mistake ladies; you will get a lot more gratification out of looking like this."
A nude photo of Tanya filled the screen, and she continued.
"Than you ever will looking like this," a picture of a naked fat woman came on the screen. Beth recognized the face of Tanya, despite the hanging flesh that gave her a tired haggard look. The screen went back to the live Tanya.
