CLEANER: Chapter Four - Part Three

DAHLIA

When I got downstairs, Maxine and the other cleaners were hanging around just outside the main entrance smoking cigarettes and chatting. Maxine was the loudest as usual, ruling the roost, gabbling on in her provincial UK accent. When I saw them I got the usual butterflies in my stomach, but it was worse today somehow, probably because I had been reflecting on how far I’d changed.

Weight gain was a funny thing. It crept up on me slowly with only periodic realisations of how far it had gone; how much more deeply I’d entered the world of obesity… because surely I must be classed as obese now. Since my last realisation I’d grown used enough to being plump that my observations this morning had been another level of shock. It didn’t help that Maxine and the other girls had taken to calling a particular nickname.

“Hey look!” she cried jovially. “Here comes Chubby!”

The other cleaners looked my way and smirked. The wind went out of my sails and I slowed my pace.

“Blimey but you’re getting fat now,” said Maxine. She nudged the girl next to her wither her elbow, a new girl who had only been working at the hotel for a few days but was already more in with the other cleaners than I was. “When she started working here she was thinner than me,” she said. “Now look at her.”

The cleaners sniggered and Maxine gave a brazen laugh. Eager to ingratiate myself with them I made myself chuckle too, even though it felt like a betrayal of myself.

Every time I went to see Melissa she asked me if the other cleaners had accepted me as one of them yet and I was feeling the pressure of that as increasing desperation.

“You’re going to need yet another uniform soon Chubby,” crowed Maxine. “That one looks like the buttons are about to pop. It’s the unlimited food here,” she said to the new girl. “It’s a killer.”

“Yeah,” I said, eager to please and smiling like a fool. “It’s ‘cause I’m such a pig. I can’t help myself. The buffet’s like a trough. I just stick my snout in a gobble up everything I can.”

All the women laughed and I laughed with them, but I knew they weren’t laughing with me – they were laughing at me – and it made me hate myself, even as I went on laughing.

“Actually that would be a better name for you Chubby,” said Maxine. “Now you’re getting so fat. You aren’t just chubby anymore, are you?”

They all looked at me and I felt I had to fill the pause. “No.”

“Now you really do look like a pig.” They all laughed. “What do you think to the name Little Piggy?”

The smile dropped off my face and the women laughed all the more.

“What do you think Piggy?” asked Maxine.

I thought about Melissa and her admonition that I should do anything I could to fit in and I said. “Well if the shoe fits…” I grinned. “It’s nothing if not descriptive.”

They all laughed and I laughed with them, but this time it felt like there was genuine camaraderie.

Maxine nudged the new girl. “Piggy isn’t so bad when you get to know her. She thought she was lady muck when she got here but she’s alright really.”

I smiled with relief to hear that: the first real hint that I wouldn’t be ostracised anymore.

“She’s not a bad worker I suppose,” said Maxine. “She does half my work for me, so she can’t be that bad!” She laughed loudly. “Isn’t that right Piggy?”

The headache pulsed behind my eyes, drawing the moisture out of them but I gave her another grin and nodded eagerly. “All part of the service.”

Maxine smiled, stepping out of the group and grinding out her cigarette with her foot. Immediately, in response to the unspoken command, the group started to disperse. “You should maybe join us for poker tonight Little Piggy,” she said. “Give me a chance to steal most of your wages as well. That would be hilarious!”

I nodded happily, keen to accept the invitation that had never before been presented. This was so positive. It meant I was really making some headway into being one of the gang.

The girls dispersed, leaving me standing in thought. I imagined myself at their poker table in the staff room, drinking beer and laughing, then I had a little fantasy about letting Maxine win so that she really did take most of my earnings. That brought the rosy feeling back between my legs.

I felt my roll of stomach fat, chewing the name they’d christened me over in my mind, trying to purposely alter my self-image to fit in line with it. I pictured myself as other’s might see me except in my mind I pushed the bloating even further and I imagined myself with the head and trotters of a pink-skinned pig.

I had been a famously beautiful model on the verge of a spectacular comeback.

Now look at me.

I was a fat cleaner at a rundown Greek hotel, submissively doing everything I could to ingratiate myself with minimum wage domestic staff who did nothing but run me down.

Had my self-image altered so much that I could allow this?

But then, I wasn’t a beauty anymore. I really was getting as fat as a pig. I couldn’t expect any better treatment and I needed to put up with it if I wanted them to be my friends.

Somebody like me couldn’t expect better treatment like this and at least they were including me now. I’d much rather be made fun of a bit than be excluded.

It was worth being called Little Piggy to achieve that.

I walked back inside the hotel to start my duties but paused when I saw the cook come out of the back corridor, looking as greasy and dishevelled as always.

He looked at me and gave me his usual suggestive leer. Normally I looked away but this time I went on with the eye contact and perhaps emboldened by that, he gave me a little wink.

I wasn’t better than these people. Not anymore. I felt like I’d been telling myself I was on the sly, no matter how much I tried to get down to their level. Things felt different now. I was Little Piggy now. I’d accepted that nickname gladly. I wasn’t superior to any of these people; quite the opposite.

I made a decision.

If the cook made another pass at me then I wouldn’t put him off. Next time I would say yes. I’d spread my legs for him if he wanted me.

He gave me another brief leery smirk and this time I smiled back.

Yes. If he wanted me then he could have me any way that he wanted.