Free The Secrets of Married Women by Carol Mason Page B

was totally odd, perverse behaviour for two adults who work together.’
    ‘What was it all about?’ I’m agog. Wendy, looking young and sparkly in a ‘dressy up’ version of a skimpy, ragged John Rocha sweatshirt, crosses her arms and leans on the table.
    ‘Well, Leigh was telling me Fatz isn’t a popular brand with the size 16s and over. But he’s squashed her idea to launch a ‘Thin’s Not In’ fashion show, since he apparently spoke with one of his celebrity friends who said you’ll never sell any woman on the concept that fat is more acceptable than thin. Leigh said she wasn’t trying to change people’s perceptions about body image, she was only trying to find a fun way of selling fitness wear to ‘normal’ people ie: those of us who don’t look like catwalk models. I saw some of the models she had in to audition. They were ‘normal’ bodied Sophie Dahl or Nigella Lawson types—which was supposed to say you don’t have to be thin to wear the Fatz brand.’
    ‘What’s wrong with that?’ Sounds rather God-who-cares? to me.
    ‘Well it’s all wrong Jill. The opposite of thin isn’t ‘normal’ is it? I mean, I’m a size fourteen at my thinnest, and I’m normal. By saying Thin’s Not In and showing somebody like me, well, it’s supposed to be liberating and legitimising me, but really it’s just saying I’m somehow unacceptable. It just perpetuates the notion that if you’re not Kate Moss you’re not good enough.’
    The waiter slaps our pizzas down. I’m ravenous but Wendy is far more interested in conversation than food.
    ‘It’s Bridget Jones all over again. I mean, Renée Zellweger wasn’t heavy, was she? Yet the character in the book was so obsessed with her weight, that when you saw Renee you just went, well what’s wrong with her body? Many women would kill to have it.’
    ‘I know.’ I shake hot chillis on my pizza which looks perfectly-cooked, moist, and free of too much mozzarella; just how I like it. ‘I always said they needed more of a lard-arse in the role.’
    Wendy gets her analytical look. ‘So in this case, I would have thought if you’re making a powerful statement like ‘Thin’s Not In’ you need to have some very real-looking people who are genuinely large and proud of it.’ She taps her knife handle on the table. ‘I hinted this to her, but she said there was no way Fatz clothing was going to be seen dead on a load of ‘heifers’.
    ‘She didn’t say that!’
    ‘She did. But the very point of the show was to attract heavier people to the brand! So see what I mean? Sometimes her thinking doesn’t make sense.’ She rotates her pizza plate between her hands, like it’s a steering wheel, like she’s trying to decide which triangle to cut into first, then she abandons it again. ‘If it were me organising it, I’d have the fashion show, but I’d get rid of this ‘Thin’s Not In’ business. I’d put a wide range of body-types up there to show that it’s all about the clothes not the weight, and Fatz is for everybody. Then you’re making it a positive thing rather than fixating on this tiring issue of thinness.’
    ‘Makes sense.’ So Leigh, what she’s basically saying honey, is that your brilliant marketing idea lays an egg . I smile. Wendy is like a kid in a toy shop. Totally newfangled with this idea of the working world. I’m happy for her. ‘It seems like an awful lot of drama to sell exercise pants, Wend, if you ask me. I think I’m glad I have a simple job, with sexy footballers to look at and a group of girls who work to live, not the other way around.’ She mops some of the oil off her pizza with her napkin. I’m hoping this is a sign we’re going to start eating. Wendy’s about the only person I know who knows little gems of dietary wisdom like the fact that most of the calories of Brie are in its skin. Sometimes she’ll use her knowledge as a reason to desecrate the stuff or refuse to go near it, other times, to say, And