Good Luck, Fatty

room and notice that I don’t recognize a soul.
    “We’ve got a gift table,” Tom says, pointing the way to an elaborately festooned octagonal stand in the corner.
    I squeeze sideways toward the drop spot, rubbing knees with an elderly lady tethered to an oxygen tank, a worried look pressed into her brow as a cloud of smoke drifts by. “Excuse me,” I say. Most of the time my size isn’t much of an issue, but in tight spaces, I immediately start wishing I was Heidi Klum.
    I arrange Hush Puppy’s present atop the small pile, and Tom runs my jacket to some mysterious holding area. When he returns, the compact bundle of fur (otherwise known as the dog) is hot on the trail of his black-and-gray Vans. “Come on,” he says, gesturing toward the kitchen. “Everyone’s out here.”
    I steal a final glance around the living room, noting that the old folks have been relegated to second-class citizenship. Then again, some of them look so frail they probably don’t mind. I follow Tom, waving and smiling to his great-aunts and grandparents as we go.
    Unlike the living room, the kitchen is crammed with people. Smoking, laughing, drinking people. And music, food, and…kids. That’s what strikes me as strange: so many little ones jumping and running and crashing about.
    My life with Orv and Denise (and Gramp, while he was alive), has left some holes in my experience of family. If I have any extended relations on Duncan’s side, I don’t know about them. Orv is Marie’s nephew, and Gramp was her father. I’m pretty much a loner.  
    I press myself into a spot between the dishwasher and the refrigerator, just to get out of the fray. “Want something to eat?” Tom says, as if he’s sensing my growing claustrophobia. “We’ve got Swedish meatballs, macaroni and cheese…” He gives the island a one-eyed squint. “…and potato salad, I think.”
    “Sure,” I say. “A small plate is fine.” I didn’t get this big by being particular about what I eat, a quality that will serve me well should there ever be a disaster that disrupts the food supply. Sardines? Beets? Pickled eggs? No problem.
    While Tom loads a couple of Styrofoam plates with buffet fare, I dodge the eager hands and arms of thirsty partiers, a number of three-liter bottles of soda pop stashed on the counter behind me. During a break in the action, I swivel around and pour a cup of ginger ale for me and an orange soda for Tom.
    “My dad says ‘hi,’ ” Tom tells me when he shows back up with our dinner. “Wilma’s, uh…”
    Drunk? I feel like saying, because it’s the God’s honest truth. I’ve only seen someone so intoxicated in the movies (and in an anti-drunk driving video the middle school showed us during an eighth-grade assembly, but I’m pretty sure that guy was an actor too). “Can we go somewhere?” I ask. Fat people get overheated quickly, especially around so many other bodies.
    A few steps from the kitchen is the glorious basement door, which Tom motions toward with his head. Our hands are full—mine with the pop and his with the food—so he drags his forearm over the knob to twist it open, then elbows the door ajar. A girl of about ten, with ringlet curls and a crimson velvet dress, gives us the hairy eyeball as we slip downstairs.
    Tom sets the plates on a coffee table and takes the drinks from me, so I can sink into the sofa without making a sloshy mess. “How come we’re the only ones down here?” I ask, surprised at the basement’s tranquility given the cacophony above.
    He chuckles, passes me a plate of food. “My cousin, Annabelle… She broke one of Wilma’s favorite Hummels last year. It was a rare one too. Cost her like two-hundred bucks. She was pissed. ”
    “So…?”
    “Well, now the kids are banned. No more ‘horsing around’ in the basement,” he tells me with a mischievous grin.
    I want to horse around with him right now. “That’s too bad,” I say, trying my hand at a little suggestive flirting.
    We nibble through the meatballs and mac ‘n cheese, me trying my darndest to come off as ladylike despite our lack of simple accoutrements like napkins. “This is good,” I say about the pasta, which dissolves on my tongue like a gooey fondue. “Is it homemade?”
    He nods. “Yup. My uncle’s new wife owns a catering company.” He has a step-aunt? It seems like the men in his family are unlucky in love.
    I try to eat slower, just so I don’t finish before him, but it’s no use; my jaw