Chapter 25: Crashing Down
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Zoe sat alone at the table. The evening had changed gears from award ceremony to drinks and dancing. The mood had changed to one almost like a nightclub. People were pairing up and moving off in groups for a night that was clearly heading towards debauchery. Looking around she saw that everyone she had been sitting with had gone. In previous years she had been the focus of attention all night, but that seemed so long ago and as if it had all happened to a different person.
"Excuse me madam, I have something for you"
Zoe looked around, her head spinning slightly from all the booze. One of the waitresses was standing next to her, holding a small, gift wrapped box.
The waitress leant forward and placed the box in front of Zoe on the table. Zoe caught sight of the waitress's full bust through her tight, white blouse. "She's a DD cup!" chuckled the voices. The waitress, who was all of 18 or 19 stood and waited expectantly by Zoe's side, almost as if she had been asked to.
The box was pink and glossy and wrapped in a black, satin bow. Zoe pulled the ribbon open and took the lid off the box. A layer of pearlesceant tissue paper was next. Beneath that was a bra.
Her eyes wide, Zoe gently took the bra out of the box by its straps. It was white and quite plain other than for a small, pink bow between the cups. And it was clearly a small cup size. Almost without thinking, Zoe looked at the bra label. It was a 34B.
"What the hell is this?" muttered Zoe. A chill went up Zoe's back as she suddenly saw herself wearing the bra. The voices chuckled. "No... no... no..." murmured Zoe.
Looking back in the box she saw a folded piece of paper. She picked it up and saw it had a handwritten, anonymous note:
"A present from us. We thought you'd find it useful. You'll be needing it soon enough".
Zoe felt her anger rise. She turned to face the waitress.
"Who told you to bring this over?!" she spat out, her words slurring. "Tell me!"
The waitress looked shocked at the level of venom from Zoe. Shaking she pointed to a table on the other side of the dancefloor. "The three women sitting over there"
Looking across the room in the semi darkness it took a while for Zoe's eyes to focus. The fog of the booze she had drunk didn't help.
Waving at Zoe from across the room, smiling wickedly, were Rachel, Amy and Chloe.
The booze always made Zoe angry - she was a bad drunk - and before thinking twice she marched over to the table, not spotting the cameras and smartphones held by people who had sensed that a scandal was about to break.
"Oh hi Zoe" said Rachel, a smirk passing across her lips "are you OK? You seem a little.... deflated"
"Poor Zoe" chimed in Amy "you must feel flat after losing your crown to Michelle"
"Fuck you!" raged Zoe "what is this?!" She threw the 34B and bra and box down on the table. A crowd had gathered around, all eagerly catching the scene on their smartphones.
"It's a bra, Zoe" said Rachel, mockingly.
"It was just a little present from us" added Chloe
"Yes, just a little thing from us" said Rachel, reaching for a set of photographs in her bag. She placed them out on the table in front of her. They were of Zoe's disastrous, recent and unpublished photoshoot. The Zoe in those shots looked awkward and terrified in front of the camera. Caught in the headlights, her confidence had evaporated along with her bra size. "These have been going round" added Rachel "And I hear that someone sent a set to Playhouse magazine"
"Oh god, please... no" muttered Zoe.
"Well we've all noticed that you seem to be getting smaller and smaller", said Rachel, "so we thought we'd help"
"Are you all fucking happy now?" sobbed Zoe. She grabbed one of the photos and started drunkenly ranting at the gathered crowd.
"Hey everyone!" she yelled. "My boobs have shrunk! My boobs have shrunk!" she thrust the photo in front of someone with a smartphone "Look! They're definitely smaller! That's all I was to you all, wasn't it? A bra size! And know I've lost it, I'm on the fucking scrapheap!"
Rachel, Chloe and Amy all giggled. Zoe's eyes were drawn to their plump jiggling cleavages.
"Oh poor you" said Rachel, smiling as she looked down and coolly rolled her shoulders forward to make her cleavage bulge to the delight of the watching men "it must be so awful for you to have your boobs shrink so dramatically when the three of us have grown"
"No....no.... that can't be true" said Zoe, the tears welling in her eyes
"It is" said Rachel. "I've gone up a cup size, Chloe and Amy have gone up two"
"And being busty and slim makes you so special and so important" beamed Amy, cupping her much fuller breasts
Zoe had started to weep. She was on the ropes and Rachel moved in for the kill.
"We all remember how awful you were to us. None of us forget." snarled Rachel "What was it you used to tell us?" Rachel reached up and squeezed one of Zoe's deflated breasts. "I remember.... you said 'Size matters'. You're finding that out the hard way, aren't you Zoe? Those big boobs were your career and now you no longer have the size you don't matter to anyone anymore".
[to be continued....]