"Kit Reed - The Last Big Sin" - читать интересную книгу автора (Reed Kit)

The Last Big Sin
by Kit Reed
—Sylphania, AZ, June 3, 200-

Look what I was promised, see what I got. Toxic puce coveralls so the locals can pick you right off if
you run; nobody walks free from this place until they're saved. Oh, yeah, the fluffy beach towel, like this
was ever a beach. Flip-flops, and that's it, and for this I am paying through the nose. Welcome to
Sylphania, the Reverend Earl's high ticket desert spa, I sold short to buy in here, and what do I get?
Rusty trailer at the perimeter, a few yards off from the abandoned sweat lodge and dog years away from
the clubhouse where the Reverend Earl and his special anointed chosen ripple their abs in the Jacuzzi or
flex their pecs in the cloverleaf pool between takes. They get wraparound shades and gourmet lunches
and bathrobes with the logo in gold for they are the stars, and fat boy here, a.k.a. me? My chances of
scoring a walk-on in the 24/7 evangelical infomercial? Pretty much nil. It is the genius of the Reverend's
establishment. The clubhouse is heaven—the Afterfat—and we the converts are somewhere south of
purgatory, because only the buff and perfect enter there. Success, the Reverend Earl preaches. Success
through sacrifice.

I started this journal because it's gonna be a while. If I tank here I do the exposé: networks, life story to
Imagine, the works. Even strip searches won't find this trusty PDA; when you're my size no matter how
much you lose, there are folds.

At inspections the Reverend gravely assesses me. Not worthy. Again.

I stand there shivering. "I lost the weight."

Icy, he is icy. "Some."

"Most of it."

He pinches more than an inch. "There's flab." That glacial blue glare is killing me.

"I'm dying here." I am a mess. I am ashamed. I will do anything to please him. "I will do better."

"Yes." Ice crystals glitter in the air between us. "You will."

Now on TV the Reverend comes on all warm and loving, preaching from the crystal cathedral on a
perpetual loop. When he talks the talk the man is hot—hotter than early Billy Graham and the Reverend
Al Sharpton and Tony Robbins put together; he is the last great persuader, and just when you're off
guard he sticks in the knife: "Look at yourself," and you do. He goes on, "You're disgusting," and you
blush. Then when you are shaking with shame and guilt Reverend Earl exhorts you, "You don't have to
be that way!" while a heavenly choir of emaciated angels hums backup and digital clouds skate across the
sky behind the great glass arch; fix on those polar eyes and, zot, you are mesmerized. Hours later the
Reverend Earl and his choir hit high C as the sun comes up via satellite relay beamed into every living
room and trust me, your heart swells and you believe! Next comes the testimony of the converted, stories
a lot like yours, even though the Reverend's gaudy converts look nothing like you. They step up to the
mike like Ghosts of Christmas Future, I would do anything to be that thin. They were never this fat …
you think, but they were. One by one the chosen testify. And the Before pictures: wow. Fatter than you!

Like certain religions, the system is built on guilt.