Tell Me What You See

The Word

John felt sick as he allowed his eyes to read, re-read, and re-read yet again, the ominous black print leaping out at him from the very page of the newspaper he now grasped between shaking fingers. Somehow, word about a simple physical change had gotten out and the press, as usual, was on top of it. They'd found out as they often would, went public with it, and now as a lovely result, the world was on top of it, as well. Together, they all knew. They all knew what he'd become. What he was still becoming. What John Lennon truly and undeniably was. A monster. A horrible kind of monster, living a horrible kind of life. The worst kind of monster. The bane of his own existence. And worse, there wasn't a thing he could do about it. There wasn't a thing he could do to change this. To reverse its effects. To reverse its damage.

The choice in wording was cruel; the words themselves, taunting the targeted rhythm guitarist, as they commanded his reluctant attention; successfully fulfilling their goal of cramming his head with its slander. Over and over again, they worked together to scream out in black magnified letters, their shared message of menace; to unleash upon him, their hurtful emotion-seeking missiles of propaganda. "Fat Beatle..." John Lennon, the 'fat Beatle'. Fat. Fatty, fat, fat. Fat. Fat John. Only, it wasn't propaganda. Not quite. Propaganda were half truths. Misinformations... And he wasn't not fat... was he? Of course he wasn't. Not fat was a label for his band mates. Not fat was the complete opposite of what he saw of himself on a daily basis. The complete opposite of the discouraging mess that had claimed him for new identity. He knew already what the world thought of him whenever they took the time to scope him out. He didn't need a written broadcast to tell him. They saw the fat Beatle. The sorry sap that to them, was an elephant in size when compared to the likes of dainty Paul McCartney and no less than the size of a whale when compared with a bony George Harrison and a pint-sized Ringo Starr. Who was he kidding?

'You are fat, Lennon,' his mind freely stated, abruptly taking over his free-range thoughts without much invitation to do so,'A regular, soddin' ham. Look at y'trying to accept brutal reality in spite of yer bruised ego... It's no wonder Cyn hates the sight of ye'.' He could almost hear them laughing; the world. Not with him, as he would often lead them to doing with his sometimes childish antics and dry, often cynical-inspired way with words; but at him. At him. Laughing at him. For the first time in what seemed like a history of histories, the rhythm guitarist was succumbing rapidly and unwillingly to the laughingstock position. And not in a way that he had any control over.

Heaving a sigh, John finally freed his hands from the edge of the slandered mess and allowed the newspaper to tumble carelessly to the floor. Laugh at him, will they? He'd show them. He was John Lennon for chrissake. John the musician... the rhythm guitarist... the songwriter. He hadn't come all this way to be reduced in the blink of an eye to 'Fat Beatle: John Lennon... Fatty, fat, fat Beatle, John...' He was greater than that. And just as well, he could easily force himself to face and rise above anything and everything the world threw at him. Even a bit of extra... weight... and all traces of resulting humiliation...

With a bit of renewed willpower, the rhythm guitarist allowed his eyes to confirm the proposed truth about himself. He gazed down first at his tell-tale stomach, his hands automatically gravitating towards some of the intrusive rolls protruding out from beneath the snug waistline of his pants. They jiggled slightly at his touch, like a vengeance-filled gelatin. He gazed next at his betraying, pudgy hands, at how much his fingers had swelled over the course of this past year; a year that had been filled to the brim with ongoing stress, depression, overeating, and overdrinking. The results were unflattering. If he kept carrying on as he'd been, he'd soon have a hard time finding his dick beneath the layers of fat embalming what had once been his smooth and toned stomach. Never mind his dick, he'd never catch sight of his feet again! He was disgusting. Completely repulsive. How was it he had allowed himself to get so bloody carried away? How could he not have taken proper notice enough to stop this horrific transformation from becoming the norm? Regardless, he had seen enough. He didn't need to see anymore dead giveaways courtesy of his stupid body. He was a pig. End of story. It was no wonder, the press thought so. 'S'no wonder the world does, as well..." John murmured this last part aloud with ample dejection. Bloody fucking hell. There it was in black and white. It couldn't get much more realistic than that.