Not-so-Little Red
I
Red was in a jam. Or, more literally, a jamb. The young woman—whom no one called Little Red anymore—was trapped in the window in her mother‘s cottage that led to her bedroom. The dilemma was entirely of Red’s own making. As a young woman several years into adulthood, she should’ve been out in the village, looking for a marriage match or learning a trade. She might even have moved in with her beloved grandmother, who lived somewhat deeper in the Wood, helping her out with this and that, slyly assisting her in her old age. But alas, Red was not an ambitious woman. She preferred sleeping to working, preferred sitting to walking, and preferred snacking to nearly everything else.
As a girl, Red had accompanied her mother on visits to her grandmother’s cabin. They brought food and treats, as it was quite a journey from the cabin all the way into the village. When Red grew old enough to venture into the Wood by herself, she took up the weekly trips on her own. Red’s grandmother, being a kind and nurturing old woman, shared much of her daughter’s cooking and baking with her granddaughter.
Over time, Red began helping herself to the basket’s goodies during the long walk. Eventually, she found there weren’t enough sweets and snacks to last the entire trek, and she stopped visiting her grandmother altogether. She’d walk just far enough into the Wood to reach a nice clearing just out of her mother’s earshot. There, she’d feast on her basket of treats until its entire contents were emptied between her lips and the buttons on her dress strained across her tummy while she napped in the dappled sun.
One day, Red’s mother got wise to her larcenous lunches, putting her on a strict diet of carrots and water. So distraught and deprived was Red that she attempted to flee her mother’s tyranny through her bedroom window. Unfortunately, having fed herself so well on her grandmother’s baskets—and the plentiful meals her mother used to make—Red’s hips and bottom were far too voluminous for her eager egress.
It was this sorry state in which the Wolf found Red. Her mother having left her to suffer the consequences of her excesses, Red pleaded with Wolf for help. But Wolf, who from time to time made a meal of human flesh, saw great potential in Red. She was already far from deserving of the epithet “Little,” and if she had the appetite which her plentitude suggested, Wolf suspected it would take scant effort at all to fatten her up properly.
Red could not fit outside, and Wolf made a convincing enough performance for her to believe she couldn’t squeeze back the way she’d come. Thus lodged, Red resolved to follow her mother’s advice and diet her way to freedom. Surely it would only take a few days, perhaps a week, of starving herself on carrots and water to slim down enough to slip back into her bedroom. But Wolf, and Red’s own irrepressible appetite, had other ideas.
Before Wolf had even returned from inside the house, Red was begging him to bring her something to eat. When she finished both her mother’s omelette and a small cake Wolf found in the fridge, Red was still ravenous. Wolf grinned as he fled the return of Red’s mother—this was going to be easier than he’d hoped. Soon enough, Red would carry enough meat to feed him for a week, perhaps longer.
From that day on, Wolf raided shops and houses, hauling a steady supply of pilfered food to his flourishing future feast. Whenever Red’s mother was away, Wolf delivered full meals and a sack of treats kept hidden from sight while he was away, in case he was late returning. Or if Red got hungry. Or felt a bit peckish. Or was simply bored.
Red’s willpower was as weak as her gullibility was strong. Wolf brought larger and larger meals, encouraging Red’s delusions by congratulating her on how much was left over. Any day now, Red would be trim enough to escape that window. She’d run all the way to her grandmother’s cabin, where she’d be doted on and fed proper meals. After all, she was still on her mother’s carrot and water diet—Wolf’s snacks were trifles to take the edge off, a nibble or three to keep her from going mad with hunger.
Of course, Red did not slim down. Under Wolf’s attentive pampering, her insatiable stomach augmented her dimensions until even she could no longer deny it. She hardened her resolve, promising herself to only eat a few bites of whatever Wolf brought her next.
Once again, it took only a few tempting words from Wolf and a whiff of chocolate for Red’s willpower to crumple like the cookie she shoved into her mouth whole. Red’s mother had gotten desperate, omitting even the carrots from her meals. But Wolf was there every day, with delicious food, comforting words, warm touches on her heavy belly, and assurances that she could always start her diet tomorrow.
***
The days became weeks, with Red growing ever more constricted and constrained by her shrinking bedroom window. Wolf continued to bring her gorgeous, redolent meals, and her desperation to be free faded to the faintest whisper against the thunderous roar of her appetite. Sure, being stuck in a window wasn’t ideal, but what was a mild inconvenience like immobility when she had Wolf?
Wolf, who brought her more food than she could eat for every meal! Okay, technically, the meals seemed to get less fulfilling by the day…
He also brought treats to fill her hidden bag; she had snacks within reach every waking moment! Granted, the bag was always empty before he returned, so she fell asleep hungry more and more often…
But it was fine, she was fine! So what if she was stuck? So what if the window seemed to squeeze tighter each morning? So what if her tummy and bosom were getting so big she sometimes felt grass tickling at her belly button? So what if her mother looked at her with increasing bewilderment by the day?
One morning, Red woke to find her side of the cottage surrounded by a tall fence.
“What the…?”
“Good. You’re awake.”
Red’s mother stood outside the fence with her arms crossed. The posture showed a somewhat softer figure than Red remembered, a fuller bosom and rounder tummy. While nothing to compare with the size of her daughter, she clearly hadn’t deprived herself of Red’s share of her cooking and baking.
“Mom, what is this!?” Red demanded.
“It’s for your own good.”
“What?? That’s what you said about the carrots and water, and you haven’t even given me that for weeks! Do you want your daughter to starve?”
Her mother laughed derisively. “What nonsense. Anyone with eyes can see that you aren’t starving. Why, you’re gaining weight faster than ever!”
“But mom… Where did this fence even come from?”
“The woodcutter built it while you were asleep.”
“You called the woodcutter over here? Why didn’t you just have him cut me out??”
“Fah. So you can go waddling into the Wood and get eaten by the Big Bad Wolf? No, Red. People don’t get fatter just by breathing. You’ve been getting food from somewhere, and I’m putting a stop to it.”
“But I have to eat something!”
Her mother smirked. She produced a key from the neckline of her dress and unlocked the gate. She set a tray in front of Red: a plate of carrots and a glass of water. “There. You’re not going to starve, so spare me your histrionics.”
Though determined to hold onto her outrage, Red thought of Wolf and all the delicious goodies he couldn’t get to her now. Fat tears welled in her eyes, and she sniffled despite herself.
Locking the gate and dropping the key into her bosom, Red’s mother said, not unkindly, “You’ll thank me, someday.”
After her mother left for work, Red heard Wolf rustle through the tall grass at the edge of the Wood. The plate in front of her was empty—the thought of never tasting another pie or roast chicken again had distressed her so that she’d gnawed away every last bland carrot through her tears.
“Oh no, Red, what’s wrong?” Wolf dragged his sacks with Red’s breakfast and snacks up to the fence, poking his snout between the slats. Only then did he seem to notice the newly constructed barrier between himself and his beneficiary. “What’s this then?”
“Mom put it up so she can starve me!” Red cried.
“Seriously? Has she gone completely mad?”
“Well, sniff, she did give me some gross old carrots…”
This was a disaster. Wolf could already imagine the rich, marbled flesh he’d worked so hard to grow melting away as Red withered in this gaol. She’d be all alone, in the depths of boredom and despair. He’d never be able to visit her, or talk with her, or see the happy smiles on her pretty face as she stuffed it with food. Red’s mother had gone too far this time. This aggression could not stand.
“Maybe I can climb it.”
Wolf clamped his bags in his jaw and rushed at the fence. He leapt as high as he could, scrabbling at the cedar planks with his claws. Far short of the crest, gravity caught up with him, and he slid to the dirt.
“It’s too high!” Red wailed.
“Maybe…” Wolf dropped the sacks and tried again. He got a few inches higher, but it wasn’t enough.
“Well, what good is me getting over if I have to leave your food behind?” Wolf mused.
“It’s no use! I’m going to starve to death!” Red shuddered with sobs; her breasts heaved and her belly quaked. Her wails nearly drowned out the faint creaking of the wall and window engirdling her.
Wolf grabbed one of the sacks and spun, swinging it in several circles before flinging it at the fence. It flew higher than either of his attempts to jump, but at the last moment, the burlap snagged on the pointed tip of a cedar picket. The bag twisted upside-down, hanging for a few moments until its knot came undone. A shower of roasted chicken, blocks of cheese, muffins, apple pies, and more crashed to the ground. A bottle of milk collided with a jug of cider, forming a muddy puddle that spread under the fence, still well out of Red’s reach.
“NOOoooo!!!”
Red’s caturwauling reached a fever pitch. She ranted and babbled incoherently, slamming her fists and flailing her tree trunk legs inside the house. The creaking grew louder. Bits of the window frame splintered and cracked, sending wooden shards in a spray around Red’s love handles. Her body shook and heaved. Belly, hips, bottom, every part of her had been pampered and fed until she’d grown well beyond what the simple structure could bear. Framing snapped, siding split, and Red’s overfed form tumbled out in an avalanche of building materials.
“Holy…” Wolf breathed.
Red rolled onto her fat-swaddled knees, her breasts wobbling toward the ground as she lay propped on her belly. She worked one foot under her, then the other, slowly hoisting herself upright.
“You’re…” Wolf hadn’t seen Red’s lower half since he first found her stuck, months ago. Her upper half had become his dearest companion: all magnificent breasts, sumptuous arms, and glorious, capacious belly—to say nothing of her plump, perfect face. But now… Now he saw thighs like oaks, lavish hips, and a rump more bounteous than he could have imagined. Even her calves were larger than her thighs had been, hiding all but her toes in perfect plushness.
“You’re b—”
“I’m free!” Red cheered. “But… But I’m still…”
She lumbered toward the fence. Wolf felt tremors in the ground with each of Red’s heavy footfalls. Her jubilance crashed back to despair within two steps. “I’m still trapped!”
Fresh tears welled in Red’s eyes as she grabbed the tall fence. Her bounteous body heaved as she pulled and pushed against the barrier in frustration. “Now I’ll never get out!”
Of course, what Red lacked in physical fitness, she more than made up for in well-fed mass. The fence’s posts shifted the second time she rocked back. At the third, the ground around them bulged and cracked. Oblivious to the efficacy of her tantrum, Red threw herself at the fence, and even the freshly constructed edifice was no match for her bulk.
Rails snapped, pickets shattered, and posts were felled in eruptions of dirt as Red bowled down the barricade. Her rotund body rolled to Wolf’s waiting feet, where he helped her right herself.
“Yipee, I’m free!” Red whooped, grabbing Wolf into a tight hug as she spun with glee.
Wolf had given Red many friendly touches since they’d met. Feeling the progress of her plumping body kept him motivated to skulk and scour the area for her feed. But he’d never been pressed against her like this. His torso sank into her belly, his head buried between her breasts, her plush arms squeezing him close. Wolf felt surrounded on all sides by her, and it was glorious. He couldn’t wait to taste her.
Their celebration was cut short by a powerful rumble of Red’s stomach. Wolf dropped to his feet with a sheepish grin, taking in the scattered contents of Red’s breakfast.
“Some of it’s still good!” She said, bending to reach a meat pie wrapped in paper.
Seeing her struggle—after taking a beat to appreciate what the movement did to her bottom—Wolf gathered the meat pie and handed it to her.
Red dropped to her well-padded rump and gobbled the pie with moans of delight. “It’s so much nicer eating like this.”
Wolf collected anything unspoiled from the ground, happy to be feeding his precious pet once again. Within minutes, however, nothing worth eating remained, and Red was eyeing the second bag.
“We might as well open this, too,” Wolf said. “After all you’ve been through this morning.”
Wolf’s words seemed to remind Red of her situation, even as she stuffed a proffered muffin into her mouth. “What am I going to do when Mom gets back?”
Wolf had a solution which would suit him perfectly, but he didn’t want to overplay his hand.
“I could go stay with Grandma…”
“Doesn’t your grandmother live deep in the Wood?”
“It’s not that far to walk.”
Wolf bit back a remark on Red’s current walking pace. “Isn’t that the first place your mother would come looking?”
“True…” Red munched a donut while drumming her fingers on the swell of her belly. “And Grandma’s cabin is kind of small…”
“Well,” Wolf began, with feigned nonchalance, “I guess you could hide at my place until you figure something out…”
Red realized suddenly that she was talking to The Wolf. The “Big, Bad” Wolf. Surely he was luring her to his den for nefarious reasons. He wanted to eat her, and this was his chance.
On the other hand, Wolf had been nothing but kind and helpful the whole time she’d known him. He talked to her, he brought her yummy food, and fixed the bench in her room so she’d be comfortable. He even rubbed her tummy when she got a bit greedy and gobbled up too much food.
Wolf wasn’t a monster. He was her friend. Maybe her only friend. More of a friend than her mean old mom, that’s for sure. Red reached out her eager fingers, only to find Wolf holding the snack bag upside down, nothing but crumbs tumbling out. Red’s lower lip quivered as fresh tears began forming.
“Did I mention…” Wolf said slowly. “That there’s more food in my cave?”
“There is??”
“Sure. I can’t carry it all in one trip, after all.”
Red heaved herself to her chubby feet. “Let’s go.”