Prologue: But First, A Wedding
Terra
My reflection stares back at me from the floor-to-ceiling mirror: she’s displeased.
I smooth my hands over my hips—my wide hips, and my big, jiggly ass. The Spanx constricts me so tightly I can barely move, feeling like I'm wearing a wet suit two or three sizes too small. Yet even then, my shit just fucking jiggles. Because there's a lot of me to jiggle.
I mean, I'm not fat, okay? Not that there's anything wrong with being fat, I'm just not. Not exactly.
The last guy I banged said I was "thick fit", whatever the hell that means. Another guy said I was a short stack with a bangin' bod. Yes, he really used the word ‘bod.’
The woman in the mirror is five-three-and-a-half, weighs 175—180 when I’m retaining water—and has bottle-crimson hair in a thick fishtail braid down to my shoulder blades, with both sides shaved to the skin. Silver hoops run in a ladder up both ears from my lobes halfway up my ear, and I’ve got a moissanite stud in my left nostril. Tattoos cover my arms in full sleeves from wrists to shoulders—nature scenes, mostly. Stylized black sparrows wind around my forearms and fly all the way up in corkscrew around my upper arms, meeting in the middle of my shoulder blades and disappearing under my hairline; in the blank spaces, grayscale wolves prowl, hawks soar, and moose amble. Most of the work is by the same artist, a local prodigy with a penchant for photorealistic tattoos, so anything not the sparrows could be from the pages of Nat Geo. Thick black lines cover my breastbone, clavicle, upper fronts of my shoulders, and the upper swell of my tits in an intricate fractal pattern, the geometry of a spiderweb.
My hips are, as I’ve said, generous, and that’s putting it mildly. My belly isn’t exactly flat, but not bulbous or saggy either, just a little…squishy. I have amazing tits. Huge yet firm, nicely teardrop-shaped with wide dark areolae and slightly too big nipples that are crazy sensitive. Men love my tits.
My ass is the problem. It’s just too big, too round, too soft and jiggly. No matter how much time I spend in the gym, it never changes all that much. I do squats, lunges, hip thrusts, deadlifts, anything and everything. Lots of reps, lots of weight. Every day is leg day. I try to eat healthy, try to monitor how much I’m eating. And yet…I’m perpetually a big booty Judy.
I’ve accepted it, for the most part. My ass developed before my tits did, so it’s not like I haven’t had time to accept the reality, but that doesn’t stop me from chasing the pipe dream of having a smaller, tighter butt.
I groan, once more running my hips over my Spanx-cinched waist and hips. I shoot the evil eye at the dress draped over the chair to my left. My problem isn’t so much with my body right now as much as it is that fucking dress. It’s emerald green, for one thing. I mean, I’ve got pale Irish skin and an almighty fuckload of freckles, so it compliments my skin well—and my turquoise eyes, for that matter. It’s my hair. Red and green? Really? I’ll look like Christmas in fucking July.
“I fucking hate you, Emily,” I shout.
“You love me,” Emily calls from the bathroom. “Quit whining and put it on.”
“No!”
“You’re my only bridesmaid, my maid of honor, and my witness, bitch.” Emily emerges from the bathroom in a lacy white barely-there strapless bra and an equally lacy and barely-there white thong.
She’s everything I’m not: tall, svelte, with big but not too big tits and a curvy but not too big ass, naturally Barbie blond pin-straight hair. She’s beautiful, sweet, and kind. She has a mom and a dad who are present and married and in love, she has a nice normal nine-to-five job at an office, with a regular paycheck and benefits. Her husband-to-be is good-looking, solidly employed, dotes on her, takes her on a romantic date every Friday night without fail…and fucks her brains out regularly.
But I’m not jealous.
No really, I’m not.
Okay, maybe I am, a tiny bit.
But regardless, she’s my best and only friend, and I love the shit out of her. I’d do anything for her. I’ve thrown down in bars for her, played wingman to get her laid before she met Tom. I’ve bought her drugs, held her hair while she barfs, and kept her from getting raped at parties.
Emily’s hair is done in an elaborate updo, courtesy of yours truly. Her makeup is dramatic, with a smoky eye and damn near perfect contouring. Again, courtesy of yours truly.
She plants her hands on her hips and glares at me. “What the hell are you wearing, Terra Siobhan Connelly?”
