My friend Winnie is an incredible cook. Divine, absolutely marvellous—she could turn a courgette and a potato into something… well, you’d just have to taste it to believe it! And her baking! That golden, succulent roast of every kind!
But that’s not what this is about.
Winnie is plus-sized. Quite a bit, actually, but she’s genuinely lovely—smooth as a polished apple, lively, no breathlessness, no high blood pressure. She’s been married to Nigel for fifteen years. All fifteen of those years, Nigel has relished tormenting her about her weight, creatively and with gusto. In front of friends. In front of strangers. He invents what he thinks are affectionate nicknames—my little heifer, my hippopotamus. “Oi, she stepped on my foot, now my whole Nigel’s broken!”
He lavishes praise on gym-sculpted acquaintances or anyone blessed with genetics that match his narrow tastes. A few times, even I got a dose of those backhanded compliments, and pointlessly leapt to Winnie’s defence, babbling about metabolism and heredity. Useless.
Winnie always kept her composure, even smiled at the jibes. She’d even poke fun at herself. After their daughter was born, it worsened. The girl inherited Winnie’s apple-shaped figure, and as she neared adolescence, Nigel turned his comments on her: “Blimey, where do you put it all? You’ll end up like your mum. Don’t you want to be pretty, not some shapeless grazing animal?”
And that’s when Winnie suddenly woke up. She talked to Nigel once, twice, a third time—told him it had to stop. Of course, it went nowhere. Then, about a year ago, something snapped. I wasn’t there, but I heard. When Nigel launched into his usual routine about her figure in front of company, she just said, “Nigel, sod off. If you don’t like how I look, I won’t keep you. Go find someone slim. I’ve had enough.”
She called a cab and left. Nigel kept blustering and cracking jokes, in no hurry to follow. “Where’s she gonna go?” he scoffed. “She’ll have a strop and cool off. She knows she looks like an overripe tomato.” Even their mates tried telling him he was out of line, that Winnie looked smashing, but—no surprise—it fell on deaf ears.
Winnie wasn’t at home. Neither was their daughter. Turned out, they’d packed their things and moved in with Winnie’s parents, who had a place across town. A bit of a trek to school, but manageable. The second blow came when Winnie filed for divorce. Nigel was stunned—”What, over a few jokes? Can’t be! She must be seeing someone!” Then he backtracked—”Who’d want some fat bird anyway?”
You’ve probably guessed. There was no one else. Winnie was just done. She held a good position at a big firm, earned a tidy wage, and with help from her parents—without waiting to split their flat—she bought a decent two-bed in a new build for her and their daughter.
After the settlement, Nigel was left with a poky one-bed. Had to sell the car, split the cash. He’s paying child support for three more years, and with his meagre salary, a quarter gone leaves him scraping by. The worst part, he tells his mates, is that his ex—that cow—spoiled him rotten with fifteen years of proper meals, so now he’s stuck with ready-meals or popping round his mum’s for tea after work. “Her roast chicken,” he moans, “haunts my dreams. Her pies! Rows of pies, all fillings! I wake up weeping.”
Tried finding a new woman? Oh, he tried. “Cooks absolute slop, inedible. Yeah, she’s slim—well, sort of. Not like there’s models queueing up at our age. Why not a younger one? Well, the pay’s not up to scratch, and let’s face it—I’m no Adonis. Gut, bald patch, huffing like an old steam engine. Fifty’s fifty.”
The bitterest pill? Winnie lost weight. Not drastically, but noticeably—dropped a couple dress sizes, easy. Mutual friends say she and their daughter eat differently now—still tasty, but more veg. Neither of them ever craved meat like Nigel did. And those sweet pies? Mostly his demand. He had a sweet tooth.
Recently, he says, he saw her in the supermarket—struck dumb. Went up to her, all smooth: “Blimey, you’re looking alright, actually. Fancy giving us another go?”
Her response? A single, succinct syllable.
He’s fuming. “I came at her with my heart on my sleeve, and she sends me packing. Ungrateful, cold—” (here, he gritted his teeth) “—woman.”
Judy Wainwright.
