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Miss Etta Matthews propped one arm on the top of her open refrigerator door and gazed longingly at the array of food arranged on the racks. She felt like a saint contemplating the face of God, but she also felt like a sinner contemplating temptation.
Just last month her doctor had scolded her about eating too much. Wagging a skinny finger in Etta’s face, Dr. Canterbury had carped, “Miss Matthews, if you keep this up, your arteries and the Big Dig will be in the same ball park, with too much arterial pressure in the pipes, and an over abundance of pork.”
Everyone in Boston is a joker these days, Miss Matthews thought.
She tried to follow Dr. Canterbury’s diet plan, but it was hard. Although she’d finished breakfast only twenty minutes ago, she was hungry again. You’d think eggs, bacon, sausage, toast, and cinnamon rolls would stick to her ribs, but they only stuck to her body.
She slammed the refrigerator door, causing a jar of a real mayo jar to clank against the Miracle Whip. This was one of Miss Matthew’s ongoing problems. Real mayo tasted a lot better on meat or cheese, but it was loaded with unhealthy fat. Still, Miracle Whips was really `Miracle Wimp’, in her opinion.
She wandered back into her living room, sat down on the blue velour sofa, and thought about her hatred of being fat.
Okay, she thought. It was time to accelerate The Magic Deed. It never failed. In a couple of weeks she could be as slim and sexy as any woman in town. Dr. Canterbury would gush over her appearance, and congratulate her and there would be no more Big Did jokes.
Miss Matthews remembered her happy discovery of The Magic Deed, which stemmed from a diet book her mother once brought back from the library, `What You Eat Is You’” As a chubby thirteen year old girl, Etta Matthews had thumbed through the book, and discovered its theme “The kind of food you ingest determines your entire appearance.”
It impressed Etta Matthews very much. For a fat and ugly adolescent kid who was constantly ridiculed and harassed by other, more attractive girls, it held the key to her later success.
The worst of her contemptuous classmates was a slender, popular girl named Tina Brittany LaMonde. Cheerleader and boy magnet and from a wealthy family, she was also brainy. Her jeers caused Miss Matthews much pain. Until she decided to do something about it
After all, if what you eat is you, why not give Tina Brittany a try?
It was easy. She followed the other girl after school one day, when she took a shortcut through the woods. A quick blow to the head, a bonfire, and then, a feast for Miss Matthews. She put the remains in a black plastic trash bag, along with twenty-five bricks, and threw it into the river.
The girl’s mother was involved in a bitter custody battle with Tina’s father, and just knew that the man had snatched his daughter.
And in a few weeks, a new, beautiful, slender Etta Matthews emerged.
On so it went. When she wanted to excel at tennis, there was that female pro who disappeared in the middle of the night. Never found.
Then there was the time Miss Matthews applied for a job that demanded knowledge of electrical wiring. An electrician went missing, and his wife just knew he’s run away with that bimbo from accounting.
On and on it went.
Of course, these things never lasted. All things pass through the digestive system, and Miss Matthews would slowly revert to her old self. And right now, Miss Matthews was fat, ugly, and out of work again.
Yes, it was time for faster action.
Last week, she’d snatched a lovely young woman whom she met through a block party. Jennifer Eaton jogged every evening at the same time.
Miss Matthews simply interrupted her jogging one night..
It was easy as pie. A meat pie.
Okay, Miss Matthews now thought, I’ll just finish off Eaton, even if I did finish breakfast only a few minutes ago. Time is wasting.
She went back to the fridge, took out a large white platter filled with meat, and plastered real mayo all over it.
Replacing the half-eaten roasted femur in the ice-box, Miss Matthews sighed. “There’s nothing so tasty as a bit of thigh meat before bed." She said to herself.
Then she retired, knowing full well that in just a couple of weeks, she would wake up gorgeous. Then she could apply for a much better job, too.
Ah, she thought as sleep crept into her body, it will be nice to be thin again, and have an income worth putting in the bank.
Life was good, even if she wasn’t.