Chapter 26

Day 245 Sunday

Denise peeked out the peephole of the door to see who was ringing the doorbell so early in the morning. Stepping back, she looked over at Dale in horror and said, "It is my mother."

"Get dressed and met us on the front porch," Dale said calmly getting up from his chair. He looked over at Victoria and said, "Prepare a tray with coffee, cups, cream, and sugar and bring it to the front porch."

Victoria answered, "Yes, Dale."

Denise ran to her room to get dressed while Dale answered the door. Alice was startled when she saw Dale at the door rather than Denise. She said, "I'm looking for Denise."

Dale stepped out of the house and closed the door behind him. Gesturing to a set of chairs on the porch, he said, "Have a seat. She'll join us out here in a minute."

"Oh. I thought I had the wrong house. I didn't think Denise could afford a house this big on her salary," Alice said still a little overwhelmed by the neighborhood. This was one of those areas where the houses were not visible from the street. She knew that meant big money was involved.

Dale said, "This is my house. Denise lives here while she's in the program."

"Ah, this mysterious program," Alice said.

Dale looked over at the car parked in the driveway and asked, "Where's your husband?"

"He had a little bit too much to drink last night. I left him at the hotel nursing a hangover," Alice answered.

Nodding his head, Dale said, "I always found a blowjob first thing in the morning helped me get over hangovers."

"Excuse me?" Alice said shocked at his blunt language.

"Yes. It seems to stimulate the endorphins and does wonders for headaches. A couple of glasses of water followed by a blowjob and then a shower and I'm set to go for the day," Dale said watching Alice's reaction.

"I've never... ," Alice said stuttering.

"Pity. I'm sure that your husband would enjoy that treatment right about now," Dale said. He gestured to the chair and said, "Please have a seat. Denise will be out in a minute."

Wondering what her daughter had gotten into as a result of associating with such a crude man, Alice sat down on the chair. She said, "If you don't mind me saying it, I find you to be a very rude man."

Dale took a seat and replied, "I don't mind you saying it, but I'm concerned that you believe it. I'm blunt and honest. I realize in today's world of political correctness that can be viewed as rude, but I assure you that it is not."

"Oh," Alice said frowning. She was trying to decide if she had been insulted somehow, but decided not.

Denise stepped out of the house wearing her best work dress. She looked over at her mother and said, "Hello, Mom. I'm kind of surprised to see you here. I thought we were meeting for lunch at noon."

"I wanted to talk to you without your father around," Alice said.

Volunteering data that Alice would have preferred unvoiced, Dale said, "It appears that your father is nursing a hangover and your mother thought it would be better to be here than taking care of him."

"Mom is a little reserved," Denise said.

"Pity," Dale said shaking his head. He wondered at times where people got their sense of propriety.

"I'm here to talk to my daughter, not to you," Alice said.

"That's okay. Victoria will be out with some coffee in a minute. We'll drink our coffee and then I'll leave you two to talk," Dale said.

He had just finished saying that when Victoria stepped out of the front door carrying a tray loaded with the coffee items. She set it down on the little table on the patio and said, "I put a little of the coffee cake on the tray in case you'd like to snack on it."

Alice stared at Victoria open mouthed. Hiding his irritation at her, Dale said, "That was nice of you."

"I'll go back in the house. Just knock on the window if you need anything," Victoria said.

"Thank you," Dale said.

"You're naked," Alice managed to say.

"I know. Why anyone would want to look at me is beyond my understanding," Victoria said walking back into the house. She wished that she could stay there to hear how they explained her to Denise's mother.

"What kind of program is it you are running, Mr. Speers?" Alice asked glaring at the man.

"A very successful program. Every woman who has entered it has reached her target weight and has kept it over the years. Even more significantly, they've all obtained their dreams," Dale answered. He leaned over and picked up the coffee pot. Looking at Alice, he asked, "Coffee?"

"Yes," Alice answered staring at him in disbelief.

Dale poured a cup and asked, "Cream and sugar?"

"Yes to both," Alice answered wondering if she had stepped into an alternate reality.

Dale fixed the coffee and handed it over to Alice. Looking over at Denise, he asked, "Coffee?"

"Yes, please," Denise answered watching the expressions flitting across her mother's face.

As Dale prepared Denise's coffee, he said, "While my methods may appear very unorthodox, I deliver results. From my conversations with Denise, I believe that you have known Susan since she was a young girl. Did you ever think that you would see her like she was yesterday?"

"Not really," Alice answered. She had always believed that the two girls would get married one day, but she had never thought that they would look that good at the time.

"Susan graduated the program a couple of months ago," Dale said. He handed the cup of coffee to Denise and asked, "How many pounds did she lose?"

"She lost forty pounds," Denise answered.

"That's right," Dale said fixing a cup of coffee for himself. He asked, "How many pounds have you lost?"

"I think it is close to thirty two or thirty three. I haven't weighed myself in a couple of weeks," Denise answered.

Alice stared at Denise unable to believe what she was hearing. Ever since Denise had been a young girl, she had weighed herself two and three times a day. Every gain or loss of an ounce was tracked with a sick single minded obsession. She asked, "You don't know how much weight you've lost?"

"Well, the point of the program isn't to lose weight. It is to redefine us as something other than fat women," Denise answered.

Dale sat back and took a sip of his coffee. He said, "Victoria did a good job with the coffee this morning. Her skills in the kitchen are improving. At least she has figured out how to measure the two ingredients for coffee."

Denise took a sip of her coffee and nodded her head. She looked at her mother and said, "I've been in the program for eight months. I'm well on my way to reaching my weight goal. I've got about sixteen more pounds to lose. Last night, I jogged four and a half miles. Can you believe that?"

"Miles?" Alice asked.

"Yes," Denise answered. She reached over and picked up a piece of the coffee cake and took a bite out of it.

Alice looked at the coffee cake and asked, "Aren't you supposed to avoid things like that on your diet? It has to have a lot of calories."

Dale said, "We don't count calories. She eats when her body requires it and eats enough to satisfy the body's needs."

Denise was quiet for a moment and then said, "I haven't felt guilty about eating in months. I hadn't really thought about it."

Dale smiled and said, "That was the day you stopped being a fat woman."

Denise said, "I've got to lose about two pounds a month. That's not too difficult."

"Oh," Alice said finding it hard to believe that Denise was saying it was easy to lose that kind of weight. The entire time Denise was growing up she had watched her daughter try one ridiculous diet after another.

"Try the coffee cake. I made it," Denise said with a smile.

Dale stood and said, "I've finished my coffee. If you ladies will excuse me, I'll leave you to have a private chat."

"Thank you, Dale. I'm sure there's a lot that Mom and I need to catch up on," Denise said with a smile. She hoped she was hiding how nervous she actually felt.

"It has been a pleasure talking with you," Dale said to Alice.

"Same here," Alice said with a polite smile.

"I'll pretend to believe you," Dale said before he returned to the house.

When the door closed behind him, Alice growled, "I hate that man."

"I used to feel that way," Denise said taking a sip of her coffee.

"What is going on here? Yesterday I catch you doing dirty things in the coatroom and today some naked woman is serving us coffee," Alice said.

Feeling nervous, Denise answered, "You caught Larry and I having a romantic interlude. While I'll agree that it probably was not the best time and place, I will argue that it wasn't dirty. He and I are lovers. We were doing what lovers do. I was giving him pleasure."

"But... ," Alice said.

Interrupting her, Denise said, "You should do that for Dad. I'm sure that he'd enjoy it."

"That's disgusting," Alice said.

Denise said, "The first hundred times you do it, you might feel that way. Then one day you'll wake up and see it for what it really is — a very intimate and personal way to give pleasure to a man."

"Don't lecture me about sex, young lady," Alice said.

"I will lecture you about sex. Until I entered the program, I had never had sex with the same man more than one time. I was a lousy fuck. No man in today's world is going to marry a lousy fuck," Denise said leaning towards her mother and pointing a finger at her. She added, "Do you know why I was a lousy fuck? I'll tell you why. I listened to your sex advice growing up. Let me tell you something, it was the worst advice one person could give another."

"Why I never!"

"That's the problem. You never learned to enjoy it. You never learned that it wasn't about duty, but that it was about pleasure," Denise said.

"Sex is private," Alice shouted back.

"Okay. So it is private. That doesn't mean you can't do it for fun!"

"But..."

Denise said, "I never saw you naked when I was a little girl. You wouldn't even change into your bathing suit in front of me. I learned from you to be ashamed of my body. As I got fat, the shame grew larger than my body."

"You've been telling that man that I'm the one responsible for you being fat, haven't you?"

Shaking her head, Denise said, "No. It is interesting, but Dale isn't concerned about why we're fat. He is concerned with breaking bad habits and treating insanity."

"Insanity?" Alice asked.

"Yes, insanity. He told me a couple of weeks ago that I had been insane when I started the program. I didn't believe him at first, but he convinced me that he was right," Denise said.

"I don't believe it," Alice said.

Denise said, "I was paranoid. I felt that everyone was out to get me. I viewed every compliment or nice thing that someone said to me as a setup for an insult. I was always waiting for the next person to hurt me."