Free Fatty Patty: A Romantic Short Story (San Juan Island Stories #1) by Wendy Lynn Clark Page A

you unless I fix this."
    Dread uncoiled in Pepper's stomach.
    The Sharpie touched the laminate.
    Pepper snatched her tag away, black ink drawing
a long, wobbly line across the top. She tried to wipe it off. The
line smeared like the grease of an old food stain.
    Allison reached for her nametag. "But no one
will know—"
    "I want to be myself now. Thanks." Pepper
pinned the badge above her left breast. A smudge was still better
than what was about to be written. Her heart beat, hard and
regular, in her chest and she shifted her handbag higher on her
shoulder.
    The waning sun seared her pale shoulders. Pale slim shoulders.
    She tucked her salon-relaxed walnut hair behind
her silver-pierced ears. "Is Julian here?"
    "He's already inside." Allison leaned forward.
"You won't recognize him. He's changed so much. It's huge ."
    No way. "He's fat?"
    Allison's brows knit. "Huh? No, he's turned
into … well, you'll see." And then her brows lifted, as though she
had solved a problem. She heaved herself to her feet, crossed the
deck to the main cabin, and threw open the doors.
    The other members of their class stood in
cliques—the same ones as in high school, it seemed—an odd mix of
optometrists, seafood vendors, and hair dressers milling around
under long swathes of purple and gold decorations. She knew from
their MySpace profiles, the ones who had let a few months go by and
then suddenly had the guts to friend her. She had friended them
back, sure, but never posted a self-portrait. Let them think she
was the same, let them settle into the routine of their lives, let
them post their own fattening photos as they gave up intramurals
and exercise to settle into grad school, marriage, and kids. Things
she didn't have. Things they probably thought she never
would.
    Her stomach twinged again. She tightened her
Pilates-toned abdominals. This was not Homecoming. She was no
longer the only one stepping into a dim music-filled room without a
friend or a date.
    And even if she were, that wasn't why she was
here. She wasn't here for herself.
    She was here for revenge.
    Across the almost-familiar faces, across the
almost-filled buffet, across the almost-emptied wine bar, she
locked eyes on the one man she had come to see.
    Julian.
    He chatted with a shorter man and a buff woman
in skin-tight bike shorts. Tanner and taller, fitter and
full-postured, Julian settled on his heels as though he had finally
discovered his true center. Why had Allison thought he looked
different? He was still a snowboarder without a mountain, a surfer
without a swell, an athlete without a field to dominate. Except for
his hair, and maybe his posture, he was exactly the
same.
    Without any reason, without any rhyme, he
turned in her direction and looked up. His gaze locked on
her.
    The intensity hit her with a hot force. A
pulse-beat in her belly, sure and strong, regular as the tremble of
her fingers curling around her purse straps, undeniable as the
awareness flushing through her body. His chin rose and his gaze
raked her figure once from tip to stern to tip again. His hands
tightened around his drink and his brows lowered.
    He was going to be so sorry for what he had
done to her.
    She would make sure of that.
    Pepper smoothed her mini, tucked any stray
locks behind her ears, and started forward with a radiant
step.
    Allison stepped forward at the same time and
threw her arms wide. "Look who's here, everybody." Her hand swung
at Pepper's cheek.
    She jerked back, too committed to
duck.
    "It's Fatty Patty!"
    Pepper's Kate Spade four-inch heels slipped out
from under her as though skidding across a seaweed-coated rock. In
front of everyone's shocked gaze, she tumbled like so many
scattered pebbles to the unforgiving deck.
     
     

     
     
     
    Julian was smart. Smarter than she was, even
though she worked a thousand times harder to make it show in her
grades.
    He was also brave, strong, and
beautiful.
    She snuck glances at him in third-year French
class while he fended off