Size 12 and Ready to Rock

by Meg Cabot

  “Heather, no one should have a kid so it can support them in their old age. That’s one of the worst reasons in the world to have a baby . . . almost as bad as having a baby to save a broken marriage. People are supposed to support themselves. Are you and I going to support our parents in their old age?”

  “God no,” I say, shocked at the idea.

  Cooper reaches out to take my hand, then gives it a squeeze. “So you see? There are no guarantees. We could have kids, and they could turn out like Cassidy Upton or, worse, Gary Hall.”

  This is another thing I had never before considered . . . that Jack, Emily, and Charlotte might turn out to be total and complete assholes.

  “This is true,” I say. “But they could also turn out to be like us.”

  “Heather,” he says, “need I remind you that we hate our parents’ guts?”

  I burst out laughing. “But our parents suck. We don’t.”

  “Look.” He squeezes my hand again. “I’m happy the way things are . . . happier than I’ve ever been in my life. If having a baby will make you happy, then that’s fine, I’ll have a baby with you. But I’m also fine—more than fine—with being . . . what do they call it again? Oh, yeah. Child free.”

  I narrow my eyes at him. “Are you only saying this to make me feel better, because the odds against me ever being able to conceive without medical intervention are so huge?”

  “ ‘Never tell me the odds,’ ” he says.

  Relieved, I squeeze his hand back. “That’s the worst Han Solo imitation I’ve ever seen,” I say. “But thank you.”

  A tightness I haven’t even realized I’ve been feeling seems to lift from my shoulders, and tears have filled my eyes. I’m not sure if they’re tears of joy, sorrow . . . or relief.

  It doesn’t mean I’ve turned my back on Jack, Emily, and Charlotte, I realize. If they happen someday, that’s great. But the pressure of them having to happen someday or I’ll somehow be incomplete or a failure is gone. And that feels almost as good as when Gary Hall took the muzzle of that gun away from my head.

  “Don’t thank me yet,” Cooper says. “I think I have a pretty good idea how this is going to go, and if you think I’m going to let you adopt every misfit toy you meet in Fischer Hall, you’re nuts.”

  “They aren’t toys,” I say, pulling my hand from his and furtively wiping the tears from my eyes. “They’re young adults who only need positive role models and some guidance and direction in their lives. And room and board in exchange for twenty hours of work at the desk or in my office.”

  “Well, whatever they are,” Cooper says, “we’ve got more pressing things to worry about right now. Like what are we going to do about Miss Mexico?”

  “Oh, don’t worry about her,” I say. “I already checked online, and there are a million Spanish flamenco dolls like her that I can buy for about seven dollars. But I decided I’m not going to replace her.”

  “Oh yeah?” He’s reaching into the nightstand drawer again—for the remote, I assume.

  “I’m going to let Miss Ireland have a little breathing room,” I say. “I think Miss Mexico was giving her an inferiority complex.”

  “I think they should do a docu-reality show about you,” Cooper says, placing a small blue velvet box on my lap. “And call it Freaky Doll Collectors.”

  I stare down at the box. “What’s this?” I ask suspiciously.

  “Open it and see,” he says.

  I open it. It’s an oval sapphire on a platinum band, with a cluster of tiny diamonds on either side.

  I glance from the ring to his face and then back again in astonishment.

  “I-it’s . . . it’s the ring from that antique store on Fifth Avenue,” I stammer, feeling myself turning red. “H-how did you know I wanted it?”

  “Sarah told me when I called the office one day looking for you,” he says. He looks pleased with himself. “You weren’t picking up on your cell. And it’s not the ring from that store on Fifth Avenue. I went to the store on Fifth Avenue to look at that ring. Do you know how much it cost?”

  I feel absurdly let down. “Oh. A lot, I’ll bet.”

  “Three hundred and fifty dollars,” he says. “That ring was fake, costume jewelry. I went to my friend Sid who works in the diamond district—legally, by the way—and I had him make you an exact replica, but with real jewels, on a real platinum band—”

  I inhale, shocked. “Cooper,” I say. “You shouldn’t have. It’s too much! It’s too fancy.”

  “No, it isn’t,” he says firmly. “You should have more fancy things. Put that on and tell anyone who asks that we’re engaged. I want everyone to know, especially my family. And we’re not eloping, not anymore. After you get done billing the pants off Cartwright Records Television for my services, we’re going to be able to afford a wedding at the Plaza. How many people do you want to invite? More important, where do you want to go for our honeymoon? What dolls do you need to add to your collection? Paris? What about Venice? How about—”

  I fling my arms around his neck, holding him so tightly that he finally says in a strangled voice, “Heather, you’re choking me,” but I don’t care, because I’m so happy, I never want to let go.

  Acknowledgments

  Many thanks to:

  Beth Ader, Nancy Bender, Jennifer Brown, Benjamin Egnatz, Jason Egnatz, Carrie Feron, Michele Jaffe, Lynn Langdale, Laura J. Langlie, Ann Larson, Michael Sohn, Pamela Spengler-Jaffee, Tessa Woodward, and most especially, all of Heather Wells’s amazingly supportive fans . . . rock on!

  P.S.

  Insights, Interviews & More . . .

  About the book

  Five Questions for Meg Cabot

  Creator of Heather Wells, the Heroine of Size 12 and Ready to Rock

  1. First and foremost, will Cooper and Heather ever get married?

  Yes, unless something goes terribly wrong. Read on for some hints.

  2. Let’s talk about Heather. Not very many authors write about plus-size . . . sorry, average-size heroines, since in the United States, 12 is the most common size. Why did you? Where did Heather come from?

  I grew up in a super-size family. My brother is six feet eight inches tall, and by the time I was twelve, I was five feet eight inches, making me one of the tallest people (of either sex) in my middle school. It also caused one of the cutest boys in my class to loudly remark in the lunch line, “Cabot, if you get any bigger, they’re going to have to bury you in a piano case, like Elvis.” (Elvis was not buried in a piano case, FYI.)

  I immediately embarked on the first of what was to be many unhealthy crash diets. It was called the Sunshine Diet, and it involved eating only oranges and hard-boiled eggs. Although I lost ten pounds, I gained them all back, plus ten more.

  Years later, I discovered that I had celiac disease and had to cut a substantial number of foods from my diet or else risk getting stomach cancer. This included all of Heather’s favorites, such as beer, bagels, pizza, and anything fried. It sucks, but as a fellow celiac sufferer once told me, “Lady, stop complaining. You can still have nachos.” (He was seven at the time.)

  The reality is that most people who are considered “overweight” are not unhealthy, just like most people who are thin are not anorexic. These days, we see some average- and even plus-size female characters in books and film, but I wish we could see even more. It would be great if someday size 12s become the norm on our television screens just as they are in real life.

  So, that’s where Heather came from.

  3. Size 12 and Ready to Rock seems to explore slightly more serious issues than the previous books in the Heather Wells series, like intimate-partner violence and infertility issues. What’s up with that?

  What could be more serious than murder? But I get where you’re coming from. To be honest, incidents of teen dating abuse occurred a lot more often than murder in the residence hall where I worked for over ten years in New York City. Very rarely did the victim (usually female, but occasionally male) come forward h
erself. These incidents were nearly always reported by a roommate, and often accompanied by statements such as, “I don’t understand why she stays with him. If my boyfriend ever hit me, I’d hit him back.”

  My bosses and I always wanted to tell them that if hitting someone back was really all you needed to do to end an abusive relationship, intimate-partner violence (also known as domestic abuse or domestic violence) wouldn’t be the number-one cause of injury to women— which, sadly, it is. It’s estimated that at least two-thirds of restraining orders filed due to sexual-partner abuse are violated. And one in three female murder victims is killed by her intimate partner.

  The truth is, half of the female population will experience some form of violence from a partner during the course of a relationship. Domestic-partner abuse isn’t something that occurs “only” to a single type of person belonging to a particular ethnic, cultural, or socioeconomic group. Statistically, you know someone who has been, or is being, abused. If you or someone you know needs help or more information, go to http://www .thehotline.org/ (but remember that if you are in an abusive relationship, computer use can be monitored and can never be completely cleared) or call 1-800-799-SAFE(7233) or TTY 1-800-787-3224.

  4. Infertility is a subplot of this book. Is this an issue with which you’ve struggled?

  Yes . . . and no! Like Heather, I suffer from endometriosis, and a few years ago I underwent surgery to find out what was going on with a large, painful ovarian cyst that had been giving me trouble for nearly a year. Before the surgery, my doctor asked how important my reproductive organs were to me— meaning, if she went in there and found that she had no other choice but to remove them, would that be okay?

  Up until that point, I’d honestly never given much thought to the matter! Like Lisa in Size 12 and Ready to Rock, I had spent so much time babysitting other people’s kids when I was growing up, and I now have so many nieces and nephews thanks to my husband’s and my own family (not to mention my literally millions of readers, many of whom write regularly to say they’ve grown up with my books), that I’ve always sort of felt like I already have kids.

  So when my doctor asked if I’d be okay with her removing my reproductive organs if she had to, I didn’t hesitate.

  “Of course!” I said.

  I’ve never been worried about not having a family. My husband and I already have our family, it simply isn’t a traditional one comprised of a father, mother, and baby. Instead, it’s made up of friends and neighbors, aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews, parents and grandparents, stepsisters and stepbrothers, cats and coworkers, bloggers and booksellers, readers and librarians, not to mention their wives, husbands, and partners, and an endless stream of children—so many children, frankly, that sometimes those of us who don’t have kids full time wonder how those of you who do have the stamina to keep up with them.

  Fortunately, my doctor ended up having to remove only one of my ovaries. She assures me that there are women in their forties who have endometriosis and are also missing one ovary who have still gotten pregnant. So if you fall into this category and do not have the energy to be a parent (like me), use birth control, for God’s sake!

  And always remember that on the path to happiness, sometimes there are unexpected twists and turns . . . but that doesn’t mean they aren’t the perfect twists and turns for you.

  5. When will Heather be back?

  Soon! Look for Heather in Size 12 Is the New Black in 2013.

  Heather and Cooper can finally afford the wedding of their dreams . . . but it looks like that dream has a good chance of becoming a nightmare, and not just because, on the advice of her perky new boss, Heather’s hired a wedding planner, and that wedding planner has turned out to be . . . well, less than reliable.

  That’s because he’s missing and feared dead!

  Heather doesn’t have time to solve a missing-person case right now, not with seven hundred freshmen checking into Fischer Hall, hundreds of guests RSVPing to her wedding reception, and one out-of-towner who simply showed up without an invitation at all: Heather’s long lost mother.

  But with a runaway wedding planner to track down, a groom who’s just about ready to call the whole thing off, and a residence hall to assistant direct, a mother-and-bride reunion is the last thing Heather wants—especially since there’s a new RA who’s doling out a lot more than advice to the incoming freshmen, which could mean that instead of wedding bells, Heather might be hearing wedding bullets . . .

  Read on

  Want More?

  Keep reading to see where it all began.

  Size 12 Is Not Fat

  A Heather Wells Mystery

  by Meg Cabot

  Every time I see you

  I get a Sugar Rush

  You’re like candy

  You give me a Sugar Rush

  Don’t tell me stay on my diet

  You have simply got to try it

  Sugar Rush

  “Sugar Rush”

  Performed by Heather Wells

  Written by Valdez/Caputo

  From the album Sugar Rush

  Cartwright Records

  “UM, HELLO. Is anyone out there?” The girl in the dressing room next to mine has a voice like a chipmunk. “Hello?”

  Exactly like a chipmunk.

  I hear a sales clerk come over, his key chain clinking musically. “Yes, ma’am? Can I help you?”

  “Yeah.” The girl’s disembodied— but still chipmunklike—voice floats over the partition between our cubicles. “Do you guys have these jeans in anything smaller than a size zero?”

  I pause, one leg in and one leg out of the jeans I am squeezing myself into. Whoa. Is it just me, or was that really existential? Because what’s smaller than a size zero? Negative something, right?

  Okay, so it’s been a while since sixth grade math. But I do remember there was this number line, with a zero in the middle, and—

  “Because,” Less Than Zero/Chipmunk Voice is explaining to the sales clerk, “normally I’m a size two. But these zeros are completely baggy on me. Which is weird. I know I didn’t lose weight since the last time I came in here.”

  Less Than Zero has a point, I realize as I pull up the jeans I’m trying on. I can’t remember the last time I could fit into a size 8.Well, okay, I can. But it’s not a period from my past that I particularly relish.

  What gives? Normally I wear 12s . . . but I tried on the 12s, and I was swimming in them. Same with the 10s. Which is weird, because I haven’t exactly been on any kind of diet lately—unless you count the Splenda I had in my latte at breakfast this morning.

  But I’m sure the bagel with cream cheese and bacon I had with it pretty much canceled out the Splenda.

  And it’s not exactly like I’ve been to the gym recently. Not that I don’t exercise, of course. I just don’t do it, you know, in the gym. Because you can burn just as many calories walking as you can running. So why run? I figured out a long time ago that a walk to Murray’s Cheese Shop on Bleecker to see what kind of sandwich they have on special for lunch takes ten minutes.

  And a walk from Murray’s over to Betsey Johnson on Wooster to see what’s on sale (love her stretch velvet!): another ten minutes.

  And a walk from Betsey’s over to Dean & Deluca on Broadway for an after-lunch cappuccino and to see if they have those chocolate-covered orange peels I like so much: another ten minutes.

  And so on, until before you know it, you’ve done a full sixty minutes of exercise. Who says it’s hard to comply with the government’s new fitness recommendations? If I can do it, anyone can.

  But could all of that walking have caused me to drop two whole sizes since the last time I shopped for jeans? I know I’ve been cutting my daily fat intake by about half since I replaced the Hershey’s Kisses in the candy jar on my desk with free condoms from the student health center. But still.

  “Well, ma’am,” the sales clerk is saying to Less Than Zero. “These jeans are stretch fit. That means that you’ve g
ot to try two sizes lower than your true size.”

  “What?” Less Than Zero sounds confused.

  I don’t blame her. I feel the same way. It’s like number lines all over again.

  “What I mean is,” the sales clerk says, patiently, “if you normally wear a size four, in stretch jeans, you would wear a size zero.”

  “Why don’t you just put the real sizes on them, then?” Less Than Zero—quite sensibly, I think—asks. “Like if a zero is a really a four, why don’t you just label it a four?”

  “It’s called vanity sizing,” the sales clerk says, dropping his voice.

  “What sizing?” Less Than Zero asks, dropping her voice, too. At least, as much as a chipmunk can drop her voice.

  “You know.” The sales clerk is whispering to Less Than Zero. But I can still hear him. “The larger customers like it when they can fit into an eight. But they’re really a twelve, of course. See?”

  Wait. What?

  I fling open the door to my dressing room before I stop to think.

  “I’m a size twelve,” I hear myself saying to the sales clerk. Who looks startled. Understandably, I guess. But still. “What’s wrong with being a size twelve?”

  “Nothing!” cries the sales clerk, looking panicky. “Nothing at all. I just meant—”

  “Are you saying size twelve is fat?” I ask him. “No,” the sales clerk insists. “You misunderstood me. I meant—”

  “Because size twelve is the size of the average American woman,” I point out to him. I know this because I just read it in People magazine. “Are you saying that instead of being average, we’re all fat?”

  “No,” the sales clerk says. “No, that’s not what I meant at all. I—”

  The door to the dressing room next to mine opens, and I see the owner of the chipmunk voice for the first time. She’s the same age as the kids I work with. She doesn’t just sound like a chipmunk, I realize. She kind of looks like one, too. You know. Cute. Perky. Small enough to fit in a normal-sized girl’s pocket.