Big Summer

by Jennifer Weiner

congratulating the strong, welcoming backsliders back into the fold, and celebrating with the women who’d hit their goal weights. Valerie would begin each meeting by showing a poster-size picture of herself. In a blue satin dress with her hair in a short, black bob and bright red lipstick on her lips, she didn’t even look like the same person. Her breasts and belly bulged, her hips were so wide they seemed to strain the seams of her dress. She had a wide smile on her face, a paper plate of food in her hands. There was only Valerie in the picture, but, if you looked closely, you could see a man’s arm at the edge of the frame. Sometimes, I would let my mind wander while Valerie talked, and wonder if the hand belonged to a father or a brother or a husband or a boyfriend, someone who’d loved Valerie when she’d been that big. “That was me,” she would begin, her voice serious and quiet. “Oh yes! Oh yes it was!” she’d say, as if someone had voiced their doubt out loud. “I was twenty-six years old.” Her voice would get louder and louder as she went through her litany. “I weighed three hundred pounds. I was morbidly