I Lost 90 Pounds, Only to Find He Tried to Give Me Away novel · Chapter 1 of 32
Chapter 1: Free to a Good Home
The night before her first date, Callie gets screenshots of the boy she lost 90 pounds for giving her away in his guild chat; at the bonfire she reads his post aloud to his face, then finds a stranger at the clock tower who says he's the one who took the account.
I lost ninety pounds for a boy whose face I'd never seen.
Our first date was tomorrow night, at eight, under the clock tower.
The dress was hanging on the closet door of room 412.
Betsy was on her bed eating sour gummy worms and judging it.
"Green," she said. "Bold. He's going to faint."
"He's going to say something dumb and I'm going to laugh too hard."
"That's love, baby."
Her phone buzzed.
Then it buzzed again, and again, a dozen times in a row.
Betsy stopped chewing.
"It's my cousin," she said. "The one in that guild."
She went quiet in a way Betsy never goes quiet.
Then she sat down next to me and put the phone in my hand.
The first screenshot was from last October.
It was a photo of me at the county fair, in my mom's big red T-shirt, holding a funnel cake.
My mom had posted it on Facebook.
Under it, a message from ashfall.
"my gf lol. found her off a shipping label. she's a whole buffet"
Forty-one laughing faces under it.
I knew that username better than my own.
I'd said goodnight to it every night for a year.
The next screenshot was my own message, pasted into the chat.
"Goodnight, goodnight, okay really goodnight this time."
Under it he'd written, "she does this every night. kill me."
Then, from November: "told her I like girls who take care of themselves. watch her try."
I'd started the diet the week after that.
Nine hundred calories a day.
Five a.m. runs before my bakery shift, in the dark, in January.
I scrolled.
June ninth.
"Giving away my online gf. Free to a good home. 200 lbs, great personality lmao."
My fair photo again.
"New account, login in DMs, first come first served."
Someone answered, "dibs. set up a meetup and film it."
Someone else, "lmao I'm in."
Then ashfall again. "taken. have fun whoever lol."
That was it.
Somebody I'd never met had been holding my whole summer since June ninth.
His name was in the chat header, next to a picture of a blond boy on a boat.
Carver Satterfield.
At least that part was true.
Betsy took my hand.
"Callie. Say something."
I looked at the green dress.
"I'm still going," I said.
The bonfire was huge, a ring of freshmen around it, music from somebody's speaker.
Betsy walked half a step in front of me.
Her cousin pointed with his chin and then got lost in the crowd.
Carver was by the cornhole boards with a girl tucked under his arm.
I knew her too.
Sutton Kitteridge, the varsity shotcaller, who streams every night to eighty thousand people.
He was telling a story.
"So my catfish from last year goes here now," he said. "She thinks she has a date tonight. I gave her away to some guy in June."
The circle laughed.
Sutton laughed hardest. "Is she here? Point her out, I want to see."
"Babe, you can't miss her. She's like two of you."
That got a bigger laugh.
I walked into the middle of it.
Carver's eyes went down me and back up.
He smiled with all his teeth.
"Hey. You lost? I'm Carver."
"I know," I said.
"Have we met? I'd remember you."
"You wouldn't, actually."
I held up Betsy's phone and read his post out loud, slowly, so nobody missed a word.
"Giving away my online gf. Free to a good home. Two hundred pounds, great personality."
Nobody laughed this time.
"I'm swannsong," I said.
His smile stayed exactly where it was.
Sutton looked at me.
"Oh my God," she said. "Ozempic?"
"Nine hundred calories a day for ten months," I said. "For him."
A girl behind me said, "Jesus."
Carver found his voice. "Okay, that's not my fault. I never asked you to do anything."
"You told a chat full of strangers to watch me try."
"It was a joke."
"So was my address?"
The circle went dead quiet.
I turned to Sutton.
"Varsity tryouts are Thursday," I said. "I play support, and I call. I'll see you there."
She laughed, but it came out thin.
Betsy leaned in toward Carver.
"For the record, she was cute before. You're the buffet. Of bad decisions."
Then she grabbed my arm and walked me out of the light.
My hands didn't start shaking until we were past the library.
"You were incredible," Betsy said. "I'm going to throw up."
The clock tower said 8:04.
I wasn't going to look.
I looked anyway.
There was a boy standing under it in a gray Marlow Esports hoodie.
He was tall, with messy brown hair that needed a cut.
He was holding a lemon bar on a paper napkin, very carefully, with both hands.
Like it might go off.
The lemon bar joke was ours.
It started in July.
He saw me and didn't smile.
He looked like somebody about to be sentenced.
"Callie," he said.
I'd never heard his voice before.
It was lower than I'd imagined, and it shook.
"I'm not Carver," he said. "I'm Beck. He gave you away in June. I'm the one who took the account."
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