Day #8 — SFD, with emphasis on the S

I am very tired today, so this may turn out to be a SSFD, if you know what I mean. The prompt today, as it will every day in January, comes from Lisa Romeo .

Prompt: Small, Medium, Large

She had never been small, at least not physically. Born at 9 pounds, 6 ounces, she was considered large for gestational age, being well above the 90th percentile for newborn girls. She started wearing adult clothes at nine — a medium — and had never worn anything smaller than an extra large since she hit puberty.

Her real name was Felicity, but every called her Cat, which always seemed more than a little ironic, given that she moved with the grace of a three-legged elephant, galumphing around and settling with a decided whomp whenever she sat down. Cat wasn't exactly fat, although she was by no means skinny. She was just big. Big and awkward and … not at all cat-like.

Those who knew her and loved her, at least theoretically, always offered the usual platitudes to her mother. "She has such a pretty face," Aunt Gert always said, repeatedly, at every family gathering. "Doesn't she have a pretty face?"

Cat thought: With a name like Gert, and those horse teeth, she really doesn't have a lot of room to talk.

Cat said: "Thank you, Aunt Gert."

Clothes were always a problem. Pants were too short, waists were too tight, boots never fit over the calves. The few times she was able to find something relatively pretty to wear for some occasion or other, she could never quite put the look together they way she had seen it in the store. The dress would sag, or the blouse would gap. Accessories always seemed too much on her. "Gilding the lily," her mother always said, taking off the scarf Cat had spent 20 minutes trying to tie.

Time: 10 minutes

Too much detail, I know, but what can you expect from a SSFD. Still, I can feel the character. Her slow burning fuse, her discomfort in her own skin and in the world around her. She may be worth getting to know better.