Claire happily greeted her uncle at the door with a hug - she hadn't seen him or her cousin since before the competition started.
"Hey, Claire-bear! It's good to see you!"
"It's good to see you too, uncle," she told him. Her uncle was a tall man, balding, but otherwise the family resemblance to her mother was clear. He was wearing a fancy-looking watch.
Claire looked around. "Where's Diane?"
"Oh, she's in the car. She's still working on her second breakfast." He gestured to the expensive-looking SUV in the driveway. "Why don't you go hop in the back seat with her? I'm sure you girls will want to catch up."
Second breakfast? So Dinae was taking this competition seriously, too.
She opened the car door, and could hardly believe what she was seeing. Back when she'd last seen her, three years ago, Diane had been chubby at most, and certainly nowhere near fat. She couldn't have weighed more than 140 pounds.
But the Diane who was filling the backseat was nothing like that. If Claire squinted, she could pick out some features she remembered: blonde hair, green eyes, freckles. But that's where the similarities ended.
Diane had to be well over 300 pounds, maybe even pushing 400. Her meaty thighs managed to fill up both her seat and the middle seat. And her belly... Claire had never seen someone's belly reach their knees before, but it looked like Diane was getting close. Every inch of her was doughy and soft and squishy.
The moment Diane saw her, she set down a donut she'd been working on and her face lit up. Claire noticed that there were at least two boxes of them on the floor. Was Diane really going to eat all of those?
"OMG! Claire! I haven't seen you in ages!" the enormous girl squealed. She stuck out her thick, jiggling arms, and Claire awkwardly did her best to hug her, which wasn't easy with her packed into a car seat. It felt like hugging a warm beanbag.
"Diane, you look..." Claire tried to find the right words.
"Big?" Diane finished proudly. "I know, right? I feel huge! It feels sooo good. Honestly, I don't know why I didn't do this sooner. Imagine how big I'm gonna be by the time this competition is done!" Diane popped another bite of donut into her mouth, her other hand resting lovingly on her uppermost belly roll.
Claire tried to imagine what two more years of this competition would do to Diane's body. Would she even be able to squeeze into a car anymore?
"You're looking a lot bigger too, TBH. Honestly, when I heard your gain hasn't been going so well, I thought you'd still be skinny-"
"Wait. You heard about that?" Claire felt a flush of embarrassment.
"Duh," Diane remarked, chewing. "This is, like, the biggest family event in years. Everyone in the family is keeping track."
"I had no idea," Claire muttered.
"Anyway. I think you look plenty big. What was your last weigh in?"
"Um... 275 I think?"
"See? That's not THAT bad. You could still catch up... although you'll have to work hard." Diane licked her fingers, careful not to miss a single crumb.
Claire's uncle got in the car, having finished chatting with her mother.
"Oh! Here, we brought you something. Figured you'd be hungry." She attempted to reach behind her seat, but she couldn't lift herself into the right position. Diane's face turned red with the effort as she tried to stand up to reach, but she only managed to lift her sagging bulk a few inches off the seat before plopping back down against the leather seat, shaking the entire car.
"It's okay, I'll get it," Claire said, but Diane stopped her.
"Daddy, Claire's hungry, can you get her food from the trunk?" she called forward, and Claire's uncle nodded.
"Of course, one moment sweetums."
He'd brought her a box of donuts, too. "A snack, in case you get hungry in the car," Diane explained. Claire couldn't even fathom needing a dozen donuts as a snack, but she supposed that explained a thing or two about Diane's unbelievable weight. Just how many calories did this girl consume in one day?
Still, Claire found herself hungry, to her own surprise, and so she decided a few donuts couldn't hurt. Besides, for the first time in ages, she felt like she needed the calories.