Little Miss Iron Body (Part 7)

The embrace Susie had pulled Kris into shortly after his discovery of her “hoard” had remained unbroken for the better part of a half-hour. Well almost, the pair had separated just long enough to allow Kris to pull Susie’s blanket from her lap and up and around both himself and his lover.

Every few minutes the dragoness attempted to speak, and every few minutes she would fail to produce anything more then a few incomprehensible syllables. Occasionally, Susie would bury her face into Kris’s cover wrapped shoulder and wipe a fresh crop of tears from her eyes. Most of the time though, the only noise to be heard was the sound of flesh moving against scale as Kris rubbed comforting circles against Susie’s back.

“She needs to let it out.” Kris thought to himself as he continued to comfort his morose lover. “But she can’t or won’t and I don’t know why or what to do. Maybe its being so close to all that junk under her bed. If she were away from her ‘hoard,’ maybe she could open up and come clean about whatever it is she’s been hiding? Come clean…wait!” Kris sat up and pulled Susie along with him as best he could.

“Hey! W-where are you going? W-what are you doing? You promised you’d stay until I…until I told you everything!” Susie spat the words like an elder dragon would spit fire.

“We’re going to the bathroom.” Kris responded as he urged Susie to follow him.

“Wha?” Is all Susie could say as she looked dumbfounded at Kris.

"To take a bath.” Kris clarified after he realized how his last statement could be interpreted.

"O-okay.” Susie replied as she got to her feet. The dragoness brought the blanket along with her as she stood and wrapped it tightly around herself.

"Cold?” Kris asked Susie as he looked upon her blanket-covered form.

"N-no, just uh...” Susie sputtered. She always covered herself up. To her, wrapping the blanket around herself was as normal and natural a thing to do as breathing.

“Oh yeah, it is just you and me here. And well, I guess you don’t exactly hate what I got going on, do you?” Susie’s reply while sheepish had also been sincere. Kris noticed that for the first time since he had discovered Susie’s “hoard,” a small but genuine smile had worked its way onto the dragoness’s face.

“Hate is the exact opposite of what I feel about what you ‘got going on.’” Kris replied as he smiled at Susie. The human then reached out and grasped the dragoness’s hand in his own and began walking her towards the bedroom door.

Halfway across the room, Kris heard a fluttering noise come from behind him. He turned to see Susie standing behind him completely naked, the blanket she had been wearing was now in a heap at her feet.

“What?!” Susie barked a she placed her hands on her thick hips and knitted her brows together. “I’m not cold, the bathroom is small, and I don’t want my favorite blanket getting all wet and moldy. Besides… its not like you haven’t seen everything already, huh freak?”

Kris responded with a warm chuckle and a dumb grin.

Seeing the way Kris was looking at her, Susie blushed. “Sorry for snapping at you dude.” She said as one hand fiddled with the palm of the other.

Before Susie could continue, Kris pulled her out of the bedroom, down the hall, and into the bathroom. Once there, he plugged the tub, turned on the taps, and adjusted them to a high but pleasant temp.

When the water was just right and halfway filled the tub, Kris closed the taps and gestured for Susie to get in. She did so without hesitation. The dragoness seated herself in the middle of the tub. “Front or back?” Kris asked Susie.

“Huh?” Susie asked as Kris knelt down on the bath mat outside the tub.

“Do you want me in front of you or behind you?” Kris replied in an attempt to clarify.

“Uh…” Susie droned as she tried to think of an answer. Sensing it would take her a minute, Kris rose to his feet and grabbed a pair of towels and a handful of wash cloths from the bathroom’s linen closet. Upon his return to the side of the tub, Susie gave Kris an embarrassed smile and whispered a one-word answer. “Behind.”

Kris suppressed an eyebrow from raising. He had been sure that after the show Susie had made of when he had pulled her into his lap back in the bedroom that she would have opted for him to sit in front of her. Not like he was going to complain though. Kris nodded in affirmation of Susie’s choice and seated himself behind her in the tub.

After Kris had settled himself in, he wrapped his arms between Susie’s breasts and belly. He then slowly and gently guided her back against his chest. He held her that way until he felt Susie relax against him. Kris then removed one arm from around his lover, grabbed one of the wash cloths he had retrieved from the linen closet, and began rubbing a bar of soap against it. As he worked up a good lather, he whispered to Susie, “Ready when you are.”

Kris felt Susie take a sharp inhale that seemed deep enough to pop a lung. Susie did not breath as Kris removed the soap from the rag nor when he placed the cloth around her neck and shoulders. The human began to massage the soapy fabric against Susie’s tense muscles until they relaxed and Susie released her breath.

Kris kept up his role as a masseuse until he saw Susie crane her head back towards him. The look of fear in her eyes was unmistakable. Kris stopped his rubbing, bent his neck forward and placed a gentle kiss on Susie’s cheek.

The barest hint of a smile pulled as Susie’s lips as she turned her head forward. She took in another deep breath, much slower then the one before, and released it with a sigh. “You still not gonna leave until I’m all done, right?” Susie asked Kris.

“Never.” Kris said as he resumed rubbing the cloth against Susie’s neck and shoulders.

“Thanks.” That single word is all Susie said before she began her tale in earnest. “Alright, so it all started right around when I turned 14. A few days before my birthday I woke up late, real late, like missed-half-of-school late. Which was weird, cause back then mom always had time to make sure I was up for school, you know? Anyway, I go downstairs to see mom sitting at the kitchen table. She had her head down in her arm on the table and she was crying. I hadn’t seen mom cry before then. In fact, I didn’t really think adults cried tell I saw her like that.

“’Mom?’ I asked as I put my hand on her back. I guess she didn’t hear me till then cause she jumped up, like I scared her. She made one of those ugly snorts you make when you’ve really been bawling and wiped at her eyes. They were all puffy and the way she held herself was all crumpled up. Not like mom at all. Seeing her look so raw, that’s when I knew shit was really fucked.”

“It took her a few seconds but she looked me dead in the eyes and she asked me... you know what she asked me, freak?”

“What?” Kris replied.

“She asked, ‘How are you, honey?’ Like she hadn’t been crying like that for hours. I didn’t answer her question, I just asked ‘What’s going on?’ At first mom looked like she wasn’t gonna say anything. Then she kinda collapsed down onto me and just kept saying ‘I’m sorry Susie, I’m so, so, so sorry.’”

“We hugged for a while and then she stood back up, took my hand, and tugged me into the living room. She sat down on the couch and pulled me down next to her. She held me like I was a little kid sick with a fever, head in her lap, stroking my hair, everything...That’s when-that’s when she told me d-dad... dad was gone and wasn’t coming back.”

Susie went silent. Kris felt her back hitch as she took in a shuddering breath. He dropped the cloth and wrapped his arms around her. The two sat like that until Susie’s breathing evened out.

“Me and mom spent the rest of the day and most of that week crying. I wasn’t crying cause I was sad about him being gone, I was crying cause mom was so upset. Me and dad, we were never super close. Not like you and your old man. Until then, I never thought of him as a bad dude, more like he was... just kind of there, I don’t know? Never have been good with mushy stuff.”

“As for mom, I got the idea that she wasn’t really sad but mad. Like she thought dad was skipping out on his responsibilities, which he was, is, whatever. Before he left, mom and dad got along but they were never you know, lovey dovey or anything.

“So both mom and me really moped hard for a while. Mom tried to give me a nice birthday but neither of us were really feeling it. Hell, I think we each took one bite of the cake she made and then threw it out. Eventually my funk broke and I was just kinda meh for a long time.”

Kris had a hard time picturing kind, pervy-joke cracking Susanne mad. He figured that it was not a sight he would ever want to see. As he ruminated on what an elder dragon spurned would look like, he worked a freshly soaped cloth up and down Susie’s back.

“With dad gone, we just had mom’s pay check. Her being a ‘gas-station grunt’ and barely getting her high-school diploma meant she didn't have a lot of options. I only ever saw her totally crack once, well twice-ish. She’d worked like three weeks straight but in exchange got a whole weekend off. She had planned for us to hangout all day, watch movies, get a pizza; all that good stuff! I guess someone called in, got fired, or whatever at the last minute and so she had to go in. One thing led to another and that’s why we have that big dent in the wall next to the TV.”

“That last part happened right after dad left…Pretty soon, mom and I both got used to her working for weeks straight while also picking up as much overtime as possible.”

“It might sound really weird, but I think your mom and mine are a lot alike, you know that?”

“How exactly?” Kris stammered in response as he racked his brain trying to think of how Susanne and Toriel were alike.

“They both like being moms for starters.” Susie responded a bit more harshly then she intended. She took a moment to remind herself that Kris had never known Susanne before all the shit hit the fan and she had to go full worker-bee mode. She knew it was not the human’s fault for not seeing the similarities between their mothers. “And they both do a lot for their kids…sometimes way too much for way longer then they should.” This latter comparison Susie made much more calmly then the previous one.

For a moment, the air around the lovers hung heavy with more than steam. “Sorry Susie, I should have just stayed quiet.” Kris said as he put a hand on the dragoness’s shoulder.

“Its okay, I have kinda dropped a lot of bombshells on you today.” Susie responded as she reached up and squeezed the hand on her shoulder.

“Don’t worry about is Sus.” Kris replied through an embarrassed smile. “Not to interrupt but before you start again, want to turn around so I can get your legs?”

“Yeah.” Susie replied as she slid herself around. A bit of squirming later and Kris was holding Susie’s left leg and gently massaging her calf. In response, Susie began to sink lower into the tub, the calming nature of the bath and massage helping prepare her to tell the next part of her story.

“So as I said, before dad left, mom did a lot for us. I can’t think of a time I ever had to cook and aside from picking up my room, raking leafs, or shoveling snow; I rarely had to do chores. So when mom got super busy at the gas station, she didn’t have time to do much or really any of that stuff. I picked up cleaning pretty quick and sorta got the hang of laundry.

“Cooking though, yeah not really my strong suit, at all. “Kinda funny when you think about it.” Susie said through a sad huff of laughter. “A f-fa...girl like me not being able to cook anything more advanced then frozen shit. I mean mom tried to teach me a couple times but eventually the fear of flames or food poisoning won out and so she just started stalking the freezer with the stuff you saw under my…earlier.”

“The second time Mom cracked was on a Friday night right after getting home from a really long late shift. It wasn’t like when she smashed the wall though. I remember her getting home, grabbing a six pack from the fridge and sitting down at the kitchen table. She shotgunned the first can before I got halfway to her. I took one look at her face and decided it was time for bed.”

“Anyway, Saturday comes along and I don’t see her all morning. ‘No big deal’ I thought, ‘must be at work and left early.’ Nope, I finally heard her leave her room at noon and go into the bathroom. About half an hour later I heard the toilet flush and mom go back to bed. I was worried when I went to sleep that night, I thought maybe mom had finally snapped. I thought maybe this was gonna be the new normal.”

“Sunday morning roles in and I hear a knock at my bedroom door. Its mom, she asks me to come downstairs cause she made breakfast. I bolt down there cause a homemade breakfast sounded way better then cereal for the millionth time.”

“When I got to the kitchen my eyes bugged outta my head. She had made a huge spread, like a whole fucking feast!” We spent the whole day eating and talking.” A big smile lit up Susie’s face as she described the scene to Kris. “Right before I went to bed, I told her how awesome the day was and that it was great having breakfast with her. I guess that’s when she started her whole ‘Dragon’s Hoard Style Breakfast’ thing.” From then on, she’d go all out on a big breakfast whenever she had a weekend morning off.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s when my thinking about food started to get all fucked up. I would love every minute of just getting to spend time with mom and have a home cooked meal. I guess my brain just started thinking being happy equaled eating a lot…Ain’t that fucked up?”

Susie stared at Kris. The look on her face made it clear she expected a response. “Not in the slightest.” Was all Kris said as he began to wash Susie’s other leg.

“Thanks.” Susie said with a sigh as she sat back and enjoyed his working her over. She would have liked to stay like that for a lot longer but she knew she had to keep going with her story.

“With dad gone and mom always working there wasn’t really anyone around me at home. I never really had friends, so school was pretty lonely too but nothing out of the ordinary. I could deal with it. You know, lone wolf and all that cool stuff!” This last line Susie said through an edgy smirk.

“But then, the rumors started. About dad, about why he left, about mom, about me. I could deal with the stuff about dad. I could even deal with the stuff people were saying about me. What really got me though, what made me sick was the way people talked about mom. They made it sound like she did something wrong, like it was her fault dad left, like she was a whore or something chasing other guys. She’s not like that. Not. At. All!”

Susie had begun to thrash about as she concluded the latest part of her story. So much so that a decent amount of bath water had slopped over the edge of the tub and on to the waiting bath mat.

“I know Susie, I know.” Kris whispered as he placed his hands reassuringly on Susie’s soft thighs. He would have gone in for a hug but their current positioning made that impossible. “Scoot back here for a second and lets get some more hot water running?”

Susie did not say anything as she turned around and moved her back towards Kris’s front. However, it became clear to Kris by the way Susie’s breathing had evened out that she had calmed. After Susie had re-positioned herself, Kris turned on the tap and hot water flowed forth, refilling the tub to its previous level. “Before you get comfy, wanna dip your head underwater so I can start washing your hair?” Kris asked Susie.

“Why not?” Susie thought as she shrugged and dunked her head beneath the water. It took the ends of her long mane a few seconds to catch up to the rest of her head. Eventually though, they too submerged and a few seconds later, Susie brought her head back above the water line. She slumped forward a bit and let her hair fall across her back so that Kris could reach it. Once she felt the human working shampoo into her locks, Susie resumed her tale.

“The day I finally snapped was when Noelle’s bitch sister, Dess, said something. I don’t remember exactly what she said about mom but I do remember where she said it. We were right in the middle of the cafeteria at the ketchup pump station. I remember turning around, looking her dead in the eye, and then slugging her in her big, dumb, red-glowing nose.”

“After that, your mom stepped in before I could cause any real carnage. I guess that’s when I got into the whole bully thing. All it took was a few people stuffed into lockers and a ‘toothy smile’ or two and people stopped talking shit about mom and me…They saw me and they shut up. I guess it was nice, for a while anyway. Then Dess decided to get revenge.”

“It was a few weeks after I decked Dess. She must have been seething over it the whole time or maybe it was because I TPed Noelle’s antlers and her big sister instincts kicked in. Either way, school was over for the day and I had just gotten out to the parking lot. There she was, waiting for me. She was holding a bat. I had never really hurt-hurt anyone before aside from when I punched Dess. So when I saw that bat... I was actually scared. She walked up to me and started in on how I was a jerk and blah, blah, blah…I tuned her out. Until she said, ‘No wonder your dad ran off and your mom works so much, they both must want to be away from you as much as possible.’”

“That stung, that stung real bad. Before she could keep going, I charged her. She side stepped me just before I could clock her and brought the bat across my cheek. I just about shit my pants as I waited for my brain to come exploding out of my head. When that didn’t happen, I opened my eyes and saw that the bat was bent from where it hit me. It was a wiffle bat…My cheek stung but that was it. I remember stomping towards her, I was ready to eat her face off. Then she said, ‘G-go ahead. I bett when Undyne arrests you no one will care, I bet everyone here will be happy and your mom will be able to relax rather than have to work her ass off to support a rotten bitch like you...”

“I ran home before I heard the rest of what she said. When I got there, I walked around back, slumped against the door, and cried. I think it was the first time I cried since right after dad left. I cried until the sun began to set and I kept crying until I felt totally empty. So. Damn. Empty. I think Dess could have hit me square in the jaw with a real bat then and I wouldn’t have felt it.”

“That empty feeling really scared me. I wanted to, no, needed to get rid of it right then or I felt like I was gonna turn into a black hole and suck myself in. I felt myself get up and go inside. It was really weird, I knew I was moving but it felt like someone else was doing all the work. You ever feel like that Kris?”

Kris’s nodded response was far more enthusiastic then he had intended.

“You okay?” Susie asked as she gave Kris a concerned look.

“Yeah, sorry. Just was making sure I got all the shampoo out of your hair is all.” Kris muttered. “You’re all good.”

“Kay.” Susie responded as the concern on her face lessened. “So I was walking around the house kinda lost like. I felt like when you get up from the couch and then sit back down cause you forgot what you were getting up for. I did that for what felt like hours. I wandered room to room not doing anything accept leaving once I got there. Then I finally went into the kitchen. The second I walked in, my eyes went right to the freezer and my stomach felt like it was an empty pit.

“I kinda remember prepping dinner but doing it in overdrive. I pulled out every pan we had and then just started grabbing random bags and boxes out of the freezer. I didn’t care what it was. I just needed food, and a lot of it, in me asap. At least that was what I kept thinking, what I kept hearing in my head really. ‘Eat and you will feel better’ or ‘it will be like when you get to have breakfast with mom.’ I hated thinking that last one...”

“After that, things got hazy. I remember it was sunset when I started ‘cooking.’ The next thing I knew, I was on the couch and it was dark out. I think I ate like three days worth of food in like two hours. I felt like I was gonna spew but some part of my brain wouldn’t let me. It kept telling me what a waste it would be to be sick, cause of how much all that crap cost and how much mom had to work to pay for it. If I did barf, I would be ‘a rotten bitch’ just like Dess said.”

“I spent the next few hours just laying on the couch hurting. After a while I felt like I could move again. My belly really ached but I could get up without feeling sick. That’s when I realized if I left the kitchen the way it was, mom would see, and well after the day I had, I wasn’t feeling up to being grilled by her. So I hid the evidence. Some in the garbage cans around the neighborhood and some, uh like you saw, under my bed. It worked out and I was able to get to my room just before mom got home. I faked being asleep when she came to say good night and by the morning, aside from not being hungry for breakfast I felt fine.”

“I thought that it was just a one time freak out, a one time thing. I was wrong, I was really fucking wrong.” Susie said this last part through a heavy sniff as she fought back tears she was surprised she still had. “Cause it happened again and then again and it just kept happening. At first it was rare, really big things would make me b-b-binge. Like one time Mom and me got in this big fight and after she left for work I went at it. But then I’d do it over little things like a bad grade, someone giving me the stink eye at school, or I would think of something dumb I did or thought I did and…that was enough to trigger it.”

“After eating so much of that frozen crap so often, I started to get pudgy. So on top of feeling bad for mom working so much, hearing those shitty rumors about mom and dad, and terrifying people by looking at them; I could add being the chubby girl to the list of reasons why my life sucked. So like the big, dumb dope I am, I just kept doing it; cause it made me feel better and filled in the empty feeling.”

“At least it did for a while. Then I had to do it just to feel normal. And after a while, I did it just because I needed to do it. Add that in with mom’s weekend breakfasts and it’s pretty easy to see how I got so f-f-f-fat...” Susie paused and took a minute to calm down.

“A few years went by like that. They sucked but what could I do. Then one day when I was walking home from school, I saw Jockington and Catti together at ICE-E’S P”E”ZZA. They were sitting next to one another, talking. Then they scooted closer and uh, kissed. I left then cause I didn’t wanna be a creep. After that it seemed like everyone was pairing up.”

“A part of me was jealous cause I just never dreamed I would have a shot at that; especially with someone cool, nice, and uh well you know...you like, freak.” Susie blushed as she stammered the last few words. “I thought I was always going to be the ‘big’ bully with the ‘floozy’ mom and the ‘deadbeat’ dad that got scared off by us. I was just always gonna be alone. I’m betting that by now you can guess what I did with all those feelings, huh?” Kris nodded in response to Susie’s question as Susie placed her hand on her belly for emphasis.

“Things stayed shitty even after mom got a promotion. She was so happy when she told me about it. ‘We can do Dragon’s Hoard Style Breakfast every weekend! Won’t that be great, honey!’ She was jumping up and down and everything when she told me. A part of me loved it but another part of me knew it was just gonna fatten me up worse than I already was. I knew that someday my jacket wasn’t gonna cut it and eventually everyone would know how I looked and that would pretty much seal any chance I had with getting with anyone.”

“And then.” Susie’s tone lightened slightly. “I got to class late one early fall day. Alphys was pairing everyone up for some dumb project. She ran out of chalk and...I guess you know the rest, huh? Anyway, that’s why you're now in a tub with a lard-ass dragon crushing you.”

“So now you know how fucked up I really am...Guess you can go now. I told you everything and you stayed like you promised you would. Hell I’m kinda shocked you lasted all the way through.”

There was quiet then, the only sound was the light splash of water as it lapped against the pair. The dragoness began to turn towards the human. She wanted to see his reaction to her latest revelation and to be able to look upon his face up close. She figured it might be her last chance. She could only hope that he would keep what all she had told him quiet. But she had not sworn him to secrecy so what could she do if he said anything? She could not bring herself to hurt him, or even threaten him. Not now anyway, not after everything they had been through, that they had together.

“He knows everything now.” She thought as she worked up the courage to stare her lover in the eyes. “He’ll leave now that he knows I am not just a fatty but fucking nuts too.” Yet when she met Kris’s silent gaze, it was not disgust, loathing, or pity that Susie saw on his face, but understanding.

Kris brought his arms around Susie and took each of her hands in his as best he could. He drew soothing circles around her knuckles and cooed comforting words to her. Susie shut her eyes tight and drank in the calmness surrounding them both. For the first time in almost four and a half years, around one person at least, Susie felt like there was no heavy secrets chained to her. No lies robbing her of thoughts and breath. She felt light and she felt free. She removed her hands from Kris’s hold and slid them to the human’s wrists. Susie then wrapped the human’s arms around her middle as tight as she could and settled her head against his chest. She heard the relaxing beat of his heart and closed her eyes taking solace and comfort in the embrace of her lover.

They stayed like that until the bath water began to cool. “So uh...anything to say, freak?” Susie whispered to Kris.