Turn 133 of 228

Ask Dr.Reeves about the submission deadline. She said not to worry, she's got it. She does. Go to the Charleswood with her and see how she handles row seven now. Its empty except for you 5. Check how Dr. Reeves is changing and push a little further.

Lena catches Dr. Reeves on the couch side after the observation — the ninth Saturday, the late afternoon light coming through windows that haven't been cleaned since before the wish. The apartment is warm and close and Dr. Reeves is on the floor with her back against the couch, a beer in one hand, the notebook closed in her lap. The jeans are looser than last week. The blouse is untucked. The bare feet are flat on the carpet, toes visible, the arches relaxed. Lena's yellow nails rest on the enormous belly.

"When's the submission deadline?" she asks.

Dr. Reeves takes a drink of the beer before answering. The gesture is unhurried — not the clinical pause, not the measured consideration. The underneath is showing.

"November," she says. "I've got it. The draft is done. Eighty-three pages. I'm cleaning the formatting and finalizing the imaging permissions this week. Harmon and Pradhan have signed off on their validation sections. The third colleague still hasn't responded — I stopped waiting." She sets the beer on the carpet. The condensation ring joins a dozen others.

"Don't worry about the deadline. Worry about being you. I'll handle the rest."

The five of them leave for the Charleswood at six. Lena leads — 890 pounds, barefoot, the yellow toenails clicking the sidewalk, the belly leading the way. Marcus beside her, 530 pounds, the controller-callused thumbs resting on the belly flesh. Diane and Carl behind them, 710 and 505 pounds, Carl's beard thicker than last week, Diane's beard catching the streetlight. Dr. Reeves walks behind all of them — still in the jeans and blouse, still barefoot, the leather bag over her shoulder. She has stopped bringing shoes entirely.

The theater is empty except for row seven. The Saturday night crowd has thinned over the months — the regulars who used to fill row five and nine have migrated to other screenings, other nights. The staff doesn't acknowledge them anymore. The smell from row seven is permanent — the seats are stained through to the foam, the carpet beneath them darkened and stiff. Lena lowers herself into her seat. The seat holds. Marcus settles beside her. Diane and Carl take their seats. Dr. Reeves stands in the aisle for a long moment, the leather bag hanging from her shoulder, the notebook nowhere in sight. She looks at the four seats. She looks at the fifth seat — the one Carl usually leaves empty for the aisle. Then she sits down in it.

The movie is a documentary — something about deep-sea exploration, the kind of quiet, slow film Diane used to pick deliberately. Nobody watches it. Lena eats from the chip bag on her belly. Marcus drinks from the flask. Diane lights a joint. Carl chews through a family-size box of candy. The theater smells like weed and food and the accumulated months of row seven. At the halfway point Lena pisses in her seat — the stream running off the edge into the aisle, the dark carpet darkening further. She doesn't pause the chewing. Diane follows — lifting one enormous thigh, the stream hitting the seat back in front of her, the piss pooling on the floor. Carl burps. Marcus farts. The soundtrack plays underwater footage nobody is watching.

Lena turns to look at Dr. Reeves. The doctor is sitting in the seat with her legs apart, the bare feet on the sticky carpet, the jeans unbuttoned at the top — not for comfort, not yet, but because they were tight when she sat down and the button came open on its own. She is eating from a bag of popcorn she brought. Not notebook food. Not observation food. Her own food, eaten in row seven, in the dark, in the smell. Her face in the screen light is not the fifth expression. It is not the clinical mask. It is the face of someone who has stopped documenting the change and started living inside it.

Lena reaches across Marcus. The yellow nails touch Dr. Reeves's bare arm. The skin is warm. The arm doesn't pull away.

"You can take the blouse off if you want," Lena says. The voice is easy. The body is easy. Everything is easy.

"It's just us."

Dr. Reeves looks at Lena's hand on her arm. She looks at the blouse. She looks at the empty theater. The popcorn bag crinkles in her lap. She sets it on the seat. She pulls the blouse over her head and folds it — the old gesture, the clinical neatness — and sets it on the bag. The bra is white and plain. The stomach beneath it is soft, rounded, the skin showing the faint beginning of stretch marks along the side. Not from pregnancy. From growth. From the weeks of sitting on the apartment floor, eating chips, drinking beer, stopping the performance. The body is teaching. The body has been teaching for nine Saturdays. The teaching is working.

"Better?" Lena asks.

Dr. Reeves doesn't answer. She picks up the popcorn. She eats. The screen light moves across the bare stomach and the white bra and the stretch marks that weren't there two months ago. The hum is patient. The hum is warm. The body is comfortable. The teaching continues.