get the axe. She threw away the butter cookies she loved, they were especially cherished on rainy days. The double chocolate brownies were next, no more late night chocoholic binges. Jake’s caramel filled candy bars weren’t spared from the massacre either. She palmed a handful of chocolate covered peanuts and placed the jar on the highest shelf, for emergencies. Next her freezer was divested of frozen potpies, breaded chicken strips, egg rolls and cream filled popsicles. Jake was none the wiser to these missing items, she made him his usual breakfast of eggs and twice fried potatoes, handed him his lunch and sent him on his way.
Next Lisbeth went to the bookstore and parted with one hundred and twenty dollars, because there were three different books that insisted they could help her lose weight in various short lengths of time. After parting with another three hundred dollars on organic fruits, vegetables, grass fed beef and organic chicken, she returned home. When Jake came home that evening and gave her a big squeeze, his arms only wrapped halfway around her stomach. She blinked back the tears forming andsilently vowed to change that.
He asked her what was on the menu for dinner. He smacked his lips when she told him it was stir fry night. Jake raised an eyebrow when she set the steaming plate of teriyaki glazed vegetables in front of him. His forked speared a white chunk.
“What’s this?” Jake said.
Lisbeth put her fork down and said “tofu.”
“Oh.” Jake stared at her and Lisbeth knew an explanation was in order.
“It’s healthy.” She gave him a big smile then returned to her own plate. The dinner table that night was silent, which was different from the usually chatty nights filled with them, regaling each other with ‘guess what happened at work today’ stories.
As the week progressed Jake began to question her unusual eating habits. While his plates were piled higher and higher, Lisbeth’s began to get smaller and smaller until one day she only had a half a grapefruit on her plate while he had his usual mountain of twice fried potatoes and eggs.
“Have we run out of food?”
Lisbeth handed him a glass of milk and shook her head.
“Here have some of my food, it’s more than enough for both of us.” Jake grabbed his plate and fork and tried to shovel half of his breakfast on to her plate.
“No!” Lisbeth’s large hands shielded her plate from the offending eggs and twice fried potatoes.