The customs agent, who looked like a younger recruit, gave Ixchel's passport a glance over. Then he gave her a lengthy glance-over.
Chel gave him a bright, chubby smile, inwardly screaming every foul word she knew in five languages (two of them made up by James Cameron for Avatar and the makers of the Call of Cthulhu RPG). This wasn't the first time this scenario played out but by hell or high-water it would be the last time for the indefinite future. When Ixchel got home she would not be traveling out of the country for ANY reason whatsoever. Excluding when Super Nintendo World got built in Japan.
Not that she would be fitting in many rides...
After all, it wasn't as if her paperwork was out of order. She had her passport and her work visa was clearly laid out. She'd had limited chances to make day trips into El Paso or New Mexico because Texas was literally right there over the river. If the development team had placed more emphasis on their actual jobs rather than an excuse to party over the border Chel would not have found herself in this exact situation with alarming reoccurrence.
See, working in Mexico for only a year left little reason to have her passport updated. And while Ciudad Juárez had a decrease in crime that had attracted business opportunities like the venture that Chel had been on, the state of vittles had not improved. Mexico frequently towed the line with the USA for obesity rates. For the doughy mixed race programmer, with an already sedentary job and an increased case of stress, it had nearly been a death sentence.
So of course she now had eyebrows raised at every security checkpoint when her identification said she was supposed to be around a hundred and ten pounds lighter. Compared to the little picture in her passport, Chel's belly had broadened considerably, a rolling ball of fat now in two rolls, with her breasts not too far behind. She forced herself to wear one of the cheap brassieres she'd needed in a pinch, desperate for American delicates to help with her added jugs. It didn't help that her rump and hips had rounded out as well, her thighs fleshy and packed with cellulite.
Sure, Ixchel had access to her guilty pleasures with real Mexican cuisine, but also the junk made for tourists and a lack of organic, healthy options she usually had at home to help curb her weight. They put sugar in everything over here! The brief border crossings over the past year punctuated reminders of just how fat she had gotten at each stage of her weight gain. Another "highlight" to a dismal year she didn't need. Video calls with the girls of 8422 Fordham Ave had become sparse as of late, limited to only the neck up, so only her growing double chin was commented on.
And while she had done her best to avoid family, that didn't stop one branch from finding her out and forcing an extended weeklong visit over Mexico's Independence day that had been a week heavy on the red beans and chalupas. Everyone on the data team teased her about her increasingly zaftig figure as well. She'd had to stand the ridicule of getting called "chinita" because of her vaguely Asian looks, no matter the number of times she'd insisted the other half of her genetics came from South Korea, not China!
And the potshots of "chinita gordita" followed not long after.
Really, the impact on her health and diet had been horrible, what with Chel being just several inches from needing to purchase a second seat for herself on the plane if her hips accumulated any more fat cells. She missed home, she missed the girls, and she missed her gaming group. And if she was destined to be a fat slob, let it be at a place with a higher quality foodstuff (well, relatively speaking) and on-demand streaming that didn't cost an arm and a leg. Land of the free, home of the brave, apple pie and all that.
God, if only she was more fluent with her Korean, she fancied she would have preferred a year abroad working out of that satellite office. Although her foodie tendencies may not have necessarily left her that much smaller...
Back to the immediacy of her travels, the agent regain his composure. "Anything to declare?"
Ixchel would have told him that she had nothing to declare besides the fact she was desperate for a new wardrobe, what with a suitcase stuffed with her formerly fitting clothes and a hastily required wardrobe, being too practical and sentimental to see her old clothes go to waste, maybe of some of the other girls could use them, although fuck import costs she'd just wait until she flew back home, because of how she'd gained over a hundred pounds in a years time of fruitless work, leaving her to travel through the airport in a floral print mumu and sneakers...
Yeah, she could have said all that but she didn't want to be seen as a basket case nor detained further. So she only brought up the souvenirs and a snack she was finishing as she adjusted her glasses.
Finally passed that checkpoint, the newly 270lb + Ixchel waddled towards the last chance to grab a coffee and pastry, even though she had promised herself to hold out until her exchange, because darn it she was tired of all the looks at the disparity of her increased poundage, she was tired of standing and above all else, she was hungry.
Chel bit her lip, unsure of what the full effect of her tipping the scales from sorta chubby to really fat would have on her Durant cousins, or Uma. That would be for later, of course...
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