MIRACLE ORANGE ELIXIR

“Is That yours?” P nods toward the mysterious orange lotion in the shadows. She had noticed it when Retrieval Woman had left the sauna. The bottle was enticing. P likes to steal product left behind at the gym even though this goes against the Y’s Core Values. Maybe because it’s against these values?

No, P just likes free stuff. So she’d been eying the orange lotion when RW had reentered the sauna and claimed her elixir.

Laughing softly, RW shakes her head, a strong accent (Russian? Czech? Something Eastern European?) accompanying her embarrassed reply. “Yes, it is mine. I have it for my Fat Stomach.” She giggles strangely. “It gets fatter everyday. I eat a lot of bread and.....”

Her voice trails off as P nods, wondering how the Orange Lotion fits in with Bread Overindulgence.

“Do you swim?” P asks, knowing that she doesn’t but it seems like a good topic to bring up in light of the Fat Stomach Situation.

RW shakes her head, “Oh, no. I do not swim.”

“That’s too bad,” P replies, though secretly she’s relieved. The pool definitely doesn’t need any more swimmers to fill its Aqua Mayhem this summer.

“I use the Lotion on my Fat Stomach and it does help I think,” she continues.

P eyes her in the dark. A white Y issued towel covers her ‘Fat Stomach’; her bleached blonde hair hangs in curly waves round her pale face; her eyes are moist and round. RW seems on the Verge of something and P isn’t really in the mood, yet she feels for her and her Fat Stomach that keeps growing (even though P has no idea what this would be like—all that swimming keeps her stomach at bay)

What could be in the Orange Lotion that could make the Fat Stomach go away? Are there such Miracle Cures for eating too much bread? How does it work? Does one rub it on the stomach and then watch the fat disappear? Does the sauna’s heat help to fortify this process?

P has never heard of such a thing. A lotion that melts away stomach fat. She’s intensely curious, but there’s something delicate about RW. She seems like she’s ready to cry.
P isn’t in the mood for crying. So, she hesitates in her fact-finding questioning.

“I have a surgery 3 months ago,” RW announces.
“Oh?” P nods, wondering what this has to do with anything.
“And since this surgery, my stomach it keep on growing and growing.” She giggles, shyly, embarrassed? “But I do like to eat a lot of bread. This is why my stomach is fatter and fatter....”

P remembers a friend who had a similar stomach issue and thought the growing was due to too much gluten. Her stomach just kept growing and growing and getting bigger and bigger till finally she went to the doctor and it turned out she had a cyst the size of a football inside her uterus.

Damn. P wonders if RW has the same situation? But she said she’d had a surgery, so...Should she mention the Cyst Possibility?

She opts for vagueness: “I hope it’s not something more serious?”

RW sighs, “No, I had the surgery. I am OK. I just eat too much bread.”

P wants to witness the miracle of the Fat Eating Orange Miracle lotion but decides against a request for such a demonstration. She’s curious, but squeamish. What if the lotion bubbles off her stomach in weird little fat globules?

P wouldn’t be able to handle that.

“Well, I hope that your stomach improves,” P offers.

RW smiles shyly. Shakes her head sadly. Is it that hopeless?

Suddenly the day catches up with P and she has to leave the sauna pronto. She needs to get home and eat something. She thinks she has some bread in the freezer. She’ll defrost it. Devour it. Watch the Young and the Restless.

And be glad that she doesn’t have to worry about a Mysteriously Expanding Stomach..... Esp. since she wasn't able to steal That Miracle Orange Elixir.