The greediest of them all? Entrant 5: Lady Charlotte Atwood

If Amelia was born with a silver spoon in her mouth, then she has mother’s golden shovel to thank for it. Even as a small child, Charlotte Hunter was keenly aware of the power of her own beauty: how a sunny high-cheeked smile or a dip of her curling eyelashes could get her another ten minutes on the slide, an extra slice of cake from Grandma.

Unfortunately there was one adult who was far less enamoured with young Charlotte’s good looks. Elisa Hunter had been on the verge of signing her first modelling contract when she’d fallen pregnant. A difficult labour and the sleepless nights that followed the birth drained her spirit and left the once-stunning Elisa bag-eyed and saggy chested. ‘Oh, but you have such a beautiful baby!’ her friends cried, cooing over bright-eyed little Charlotte and tickling her tummy as she dribbled and giggled delightedly at their attention. And Elisa gritted her teeth, and tore up another letter of rejection.

Things only grew worse as Charlotte grew older. Taking every compliment to her daughter’s increasing prettiness as a stabbing insult to her own fading beauty, Elisa gradually descended into a state of Havisham-like bitterness. By the time Charlotte was ten, she would return from school most days to find her mother slouched in an armchair, gobbling chocolates and swigging vodka from the bottle, her eyes glued to endless reruns of America’s Next Top Model, an old catwalk outfit straining around the obscene bulges of her booze-ruined figure.

But though Elisa resented her daughter, her real rage was reserved for her husband, the man who’d destroyed her life - who’d forced her to go through with her unwanted pregnancy. Where other children would rush downstairs to hug their daddy when he returned from work, little Charlotte would hide on the landing, gripping the balustrades and pushing her small head between them, watching her mother’s beer belly quiver and bounce as she swayed drunkenly and stamped her foot, shaking her vodka bottle furiously at her hunched and grumbling husband, whose absences on business trips gradually grew longer and longer until, one day, when Charlotte was just twelve years old, her father simply didn’t come back.

Elisa, of course, blamed Charlotte, and turned the full weight of her bitterness on her daughter, forcing her to do endless chores and refusing to provide more than the meagrest portions of food. Abandoned by one parent, poor Charlotte dared not disobey for fear of losing the other. For three years she lived like a modern day Cinderella, scrubbing her mother’s vomit from the sofas and bathroom floor, hanging out laundry, subsiding off school lunches and scraps from the microwave meals that fell from greedy Elisa's plastic tubs when she paused her gobbling to belch or swig vodka.

But though she grew thin and drawn and miserable, nothing could dull Charlotte’s beauty. Boys blushed and quickly averted their gaze as she passed them in the corridors, and even some of the male teachers looked at her in a lingering way that Charlotte knew was more than friendly. And when she overheard one of the handsome young PE teachers describing her as looking “a bit like a skinny Marilyn Monroe”, the young blonde was intrigued. She had never heard the name, but there was something immediately glamorous, almost magical about the way it sounded. Or perhaps it was the way the teacher had said it. Marilyn Monroe. Hurrying home, Charlotte pried the laptop from beneath her snoring mother’s bloated leg and crept up to her bedroom, where she typed each letter into Lycos with trembling fingertips.

What she found thrilled her beyond anything. She had been compared to one of the most famously beautiful women of all time! The best part was, she did look quite like her. A similar shape of face, at least. The same bouncy blonde hair. Even a matching mole, albeit on the opposite cheek.

But what really entranced Charlotte, as she read on, was the power Marilyn Monroe held over men. Men of all ages and types and eras. Now sixteen, Charlotte knew she was pretty. But this… this was something else. And they did look alike. Charlotte’s spine tingled and her ego began to swell. Could this power be hers, too? Thrilled, she searched and scrolled late into the night, gazing at every image. At the weekends, as her mother slept off her hangovers, Charlotte stole money and hurried to Blockbuster. Within a month she had watched every Marilyn film, pausing and replaying her favourite scenes again and again, practising the poses and expressions in the mirror. While her friends mimicked insipid popstars, Charlotte was perfecting the mannerisms of the most seductive woman of all time – every playful giggle, every sultry dip of the lashes, every coquettish tilt of the head.

There was just one problem. Undernourished for several years, Charlotte’s figure was thin and narrow. Without proper food, she had no hope of developing the curvy hips and “jello-on-springs” wiggle of her idol. Once again, Marilyn provided the solution. Charlotte discover that, as a child, Norma Jean (as Marilyn then was) had been brought up by a succession of foster parents. Charlotte didn’t want that, exactly. She knew that if she called the police about her mother or informed her teachers, she would end up facing her mother’s wrath. And even if they believed her, who knew what sort of family she would end up with, or how long the process would take.

But if she was clever about it. If she found the right family…

It didn’t take long. Alex Chang, a besotted and bespotted boy in Charlotte’s maths class, whose parents owned a Chinese restaurant, was the perfect target. Sitting in Alex’s room one evening, listening to him explain differential equations, Charlotte suddenly began to sob. In hushed tones and with quivering lip, she told the tale - only modestly embellished - of her abandoning father, her mother’s drunken rages, her constant hunger... And as she felt Alex’s skinny arm tighten manfully around her shoulders, Charlotte felt that tingle once more, as the thrill of real power surged through her for the first time. And she smiled.

From the next evening onwards, once Elisa was safely snoring in her armchair, Charlotte’s unlikely Prince Charming would climb the tree outside her window with portions of food pilfered from his family’s restaurant. And as hungry Charlotte wolfed down chicken chow mien and egg fried rice under Alex’s adoring gaze, and then felt his cheek burn under her greasy lips when she rewarded him with a kiss, she felt again that intoxicating surge of power. Here, she realised, was someone who would do anything to please her.

And so it proved. Within a few months, and after a few more tales of suffering, Alex and his family were practically begging Charlotte to come and live with them. After umming and ahhing for a few days about leaving her “poor alcoholic mother”, Charlotte relented, hugging her new adoptive parents warmly and showering Alex with grateful kisses once they were alone. Furious at first, Elisa was far too lazy and far too drunk to do anything beyond drinking even more. Besides, she soon came to see the benefit of not having to pay for school uniforms or look at her beautiful daughter – though with nobody to cook her microwave meals, her diet deteriorated still further to the point where she was living almost entirely on chocolate and alcohol.

Charlotte, meanwhile, was exceedingly well fed. Sympathetic to the horrible ordeal that had left her so thin, her new family plied the pretty blonde with all manner of food, heaping her plate with extra helpings. Mounds of syrupy pancakes for breakfast, with toast, coffee and a side of bacon. Plentiful pocket money for break-time croissants and pastries from the school canteen. And the most incredible dinners: crispy duck noodles that overflowed the bowl, sizzling beef slices in a tangy sauce, roast pork belly and oh, such puddings! So spongy and creamy and soft. And when they had all finished, whatever cake or pie of sponge remained on the platter was always pushed over to Charlotte for a second helping, which she graciously accepted after polite protests, eating until her buttons strained and her fork-hand fell exhausted by her side. Her adoptive family doted on their beautiful guest, emphatically waving away her sluggish offers to help with the cleaning up after meals and smiling happily as she staggered to a comfy armchair, those beautiful eyelashes fluttering as she fell into a food coma, one hand resting atop an overstuffed middle.

With such an abundance of rich food and no housework to burn it off, Charlotte found, to her delight, that her figure was rapidly filling out, so that by the time she turned eighteen, she had perfected that hasty Some-Like-It-Hot jiggle as she strutted through the school corridors, every male gaze tracking the sway and bounce of her ample backside. Again, she tasted that surge of power and found it as delicious and nourishing as the huge meals she devoured every night. The twisting necks, the dropping jaws, the veins stretching in the teacher’s eyeballs when she set her elbows on her desk and cupped her hands around her chin, pushing her button-straining bosom forward. Charlotte grew drunk on the attention. The pretty but rail-thin blonde had blossomed into a curvaceous fantasy object. The fact that she was dating a scrawny maths geek rather than the jocks who threw themselves at her, made her all the more intriguing to girls and boys alike - though no one, least of all Alex himself, really believed their relationship would last. Like her heroine in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Charlotte had, without shame or remorse, set her sights on real wealth, a life of absolute luxury and security. She dreamed of Cartier diamonds, Mauritian villas and Versace ball gowns. And she was growing tired of chicken chow mein.

Few people were surprised when, leaving school with mediocre A-levels, Charlotte took a job as a flight attendant at a luxury airline, and quickly managed to get herself assigned to first and business class cabins. A tight, revealing uniform that flattered her excessively curvaceous figure and countless opportunities for close-quarters flirting with impossibly rich men travelling abroad, away from their wives and families… It was the perfect hunting ground. And with access to the passenger lists, Charlotte could even research her targets beforehand.

After several “practise runs”, the perfect one appeared.

Lord Bertram Atwood. 50 year-old CEO of the Corvus Minerals mining empire, and owner of a string of hotels and restaurants throughout Europe. Worth hundreds of millions, if not more. Already on his third marriage, and, if his company’s websites were anything to go by, a man with a tendency to employ large numbers of attractive young women.

Within a week of meeting Charlotte on a flight to Dubai, Lord Bertram was once again divorced and had whisked his stunning new squeeze away on a lavish month-long tour of Spain in his vintage black Ferrari, where they shopped in all the designer stores and jewellery departments, drank with celebrities in exclusive clubs and hopped between the penthouse suites of Lord Bertram’s various hotels, dining every night on Michelin-star cuisine in the hotel restaurants. Charlotte was in heaven. She returned to England bronzed, bedecked in diamonds, and, much to the secret delight of her envious colleagues desperately in need of a larger uniform.

Not that Charlotte cared, particularly. Eating well had given her the curves that were the source of so much power, and she still associated thinness with those early years of misery and deprivation, living with her drunken mother. Besides, the enormous Tiffany diamond that sparkled on Charlotte’s ring finger was more than enough to distract from the slightly straining gold buttons around the waistline of her uniform. A uniform she would never have to wear again.

And it was a good thing too. For having snagged the titled peer of her dreams at the age of just nineteen, the now Lady Charlotte had achieved her dreams. All that remained was to enjoy herself, throwing herself into the life of luxury that she’d so long craved, her every whim attended to by servants, personal chefs and her doting fiancé. Her priceless Vera Wang gown had to be let out five times in as many months in the  run up to the wedding, at which a triumphant Charlotte ate so many slices of her Sophie Cabot cake that her new husband had to cut short the consummation of their marriage to call an ambulance.

Nowadays Charlotte’s golden shovel is used to transport heapings of French, Italian cuisine into her mouth. For her ladyship, eating is often just something to do to pass the time. Still, you don’t balloon to nearly four hundred pounds by your late thirties without a truly concerted effort of gluttony.

Only one thing holds her back. Unlike her own daughter, Amelia, who never wanted for anything, Charlotte’s hungry childhood has left her with a tendency to gorge too quickly on whatever is set before her, as if deep within her subconscious she fears that the food might suddenly be taken away or become scarce. Often this results in  awful bloating that cuts her feasts short, and increasingly plagues her ladyship as she enters her late thirties.

Gluttony rating: 🍰🍰🍰🍰🍰🍰🍰🍰

***

Wow, that turned into a bit of a biography! Sorry it took so long to get it out. I hope it isn't too rambly, and adds a bit of depth to Charlotte's character. She probably comes across as a bit of a stereotypical aristocrat in The Perfect Dress, but I've always had in the back of my mind that she had a difficult childhood. Hopefully this will add some spice to the dynamic between her and Amelia (and others) in the upcoming chapters.

Also, let me know what you think of the pic. I'll be honest, this one was a real struggle, hence the two variations. I'm not particularly thrilled with the outcome of either, especially the fall of her dress around the lower belly, which I just couldn't seem to get right! Daz... make some better clothing for bigger women! 😂 

Oh well, the upshot is that I've got a three-pic weight gain sequence (including a brief short story) in mind for Charlotte, which will hopefully turn out a little more polished!

Also, while editing it I stumbled across a pixelating filter. The result seemed fun and reminded me a bit of my old gaming days (Monkey Island, anyone?) so I decided to share it too, because... well, why not?

Oh, and the restaurant manager in the pic, who also happens to be Lord Bertram's doubles partner in tennis, is another character I plan to feature a bit. I've been playing a bit of tennis m'self lately, and it has given me a few tasty story ideas. 😏

Thanks once again for your support. There'll be more to come soon! 😊