The Dudley Diaries

Chapter 4: Venomous Poison

The teasing Dudley endured in the weeks following Richard Simmons' unexpected visit had been relentless. Derek Chase had a ball doing Richard Simmons imitations. More than once Dudley had been forced, at fist-point, to do twenty sit-ups.

Richard Simmons didn't actually come to school to work with him every day. No, during that initial meeting, after Dudley came to, it was made clear that Richard himself would not be overseeing Dudley's daily weight loss regimen. He would only come in for occasional photo ops every six months.

"I have assigned you a personal trainer from my very own private stock," said Richard.

"Private stock?" Dudley asked, confused.

Richard responded enthusiastically, "Oh, it's a new business venture of mine, Dudley. It is Dudley, right?"

Dudley nodded.

"Right. Well, as you are unfortunately unaware, I am generally considered a celebrity weight loss guru. Not to celebrities, per se. But my work has made me a celebrity. I am very good at what I do; my success rate is absolutely phenomenal. Only a very small percent of my charges fall off the Twinkie bandwagon." He gave a very self-satisfied smile.

"What is your success rate?" asked Dudley.

"Oh, eighty percent give or take a few...dozen. Numbers are all subjective anyway. Point is: it's not my responsibility to get the weight down. That's your job. I just provide my own special brand of motivation." Richard looked thoughtfully at Dudley, frowning slightly. "Now, I'm not trying to pass the buck, but I'm not a fat amulet either. It's just that, when people hear my name, they hear a promise. It's a name people have come to trust to deliver the goods. Do you understand the gist of what I'm saying?"

Dudley shrugged.

"There's no trickery, no gimmicks, no magic tricks involved. I can't just whip out a wand and say, 'ta da' and there you are, eighty pounds lighter."

Dudley winced involuntarily. Richard's gestures reminded him of Harry. "You're not a fairy?" he asked.

"Er, right. Yet you'd be surprised to see just how many people think that! You can't sweat to the oldies for an hour, knock back a triple chocolate milkshake and then expect to lose weight. Miracles don't happen by themselves. So back to what I was saying. I was so successful with my video series and deal-a-meal plan, I decided to expand. I started Richard Simmons International. I hawk all sorts of weight loss products, ranging from dietary supplements to personal trainers who specialize in the morbidly obese. The personal trainers were just recently implemented under a subsidiary of RSI, called The Miracle Network. The byline is so cute. They work miracles, you see, one fat cell at a time."

"So you are a fairy?"

Richard sighed. "Well, that's certainly one way of looking at it. I merely serve the public; they want miracles, so I give 'em miracles. But I'll tell ya one thing: the real miracle will be if anyone can afford one! So thank your lucky stars, Dudley, because you are getting a personal trainer free of charge."

"I feel so blessed," Dudley said, trying not to sound truculent.

Richard smiled and outlined Dudley's daily workout regimen, which would begin promptly at seven in the morning with his personal trainer. Dudley nodded dumbly at everything, but was privately overwhelmed by the list of exercises he would eventually have to master. He then skimmed the list of forbidden foods and wanted to cry.

The next morning, Dudley lay deep beneath his blankets and wished the ominous knocking on his door was just a nightmare. But it wasn't--it was much, much worse. He was greeted by a big, bulky man with a bleached crew cut and a dog tag. "I am Vlad," the man said. He sounded like Arnold Schwarzenegger. His chiseled chest puffed out at Dudley menacingly.

"Er, okay. Mind if I get dressed first?"

Vlad shook his head. Actually, his neck muscles were so tight his whole upper torso shook back and forth. "NO, Dud Lee, we are already running late. Come as you are."

So Dudley was forced to jog up and down the halls of the school for fifteen minutes in his pajamas. Unfortunately, a few of his classmates were up and about early and saw him doing jumping jacks in the dining hall. Someone mentioned a Richter scale. Vlad was so busy barking orders he didn't hear anything. Dudley's face went purple with rage, but he did nothing.

This general scenario continued for days. After a particularly brutal Sunday morning, Dudley decided he'd had quite enough. He stomped back to his room and, in a fit of rage, threw his pillow across the room and knocked a tin of Slim-Fast to the floor. He went over and picked up the tin. He opened it and ground some of the powder between his thumb and forefinger. He couldn't imagine such stuff ever making a delicious shake.

**************

Dudley tried not to fall asleep at his desk Monday morning. After Vlad put him through the paces, he hadn't the energy to go back to bed, so he got ready for class instead.

He was the first one to Geometry, and the classroom was empty save Mrs. Mullarky putting problems up on the board. "Good morning, Mr. Dursley," she said, not bothering to turn around and face him. "You're early."

He watched her finish writing a long equation on the chalkboard. He said, "I haven't had much sleep lately."

Mrs. Mullarky nodded absentmindedly and began to draw an isosceles triangle. "Mmmm. I know what you mean."

Dudley pulled a notebook out of his book bag and thumbed through it for his homework. It was nestled between a list of new ghetto phrases he was trying to memorize and a rap he was writing. He pulled out the Ebonics vocabulary list and studied it. His eyelids drooped so heavily, the words swam on the page before him. He couldn't tell what was "dope" from what was "whack".

His concentration was broken by the sound of his name. It was Mrs. Mullarky. "Dudley! Have you had breakfast yet?" she asked. She was sitting at her desk, eating an apple. Dudley's stomach gave an instinctive rumble.

"Er, yes. I had a sausage." He'd had to sneak one behind Vlad's back; Vlad only allowed him two slices of toast and half a grapefruit every morning. Disgusting stuff, Dudley thought, not even a smidgeon of jam. Nazi.

"Oh, that's good," Mrs. Mullarky said. "I must confess; I have insomnia. My doctor prescribed a sleeping pill, and it works, but it leaves me rather peckish in the morning. Have you had a sleeping problem for very long, Dudley?"

"Just for the past week or so," Dudley responded dryly.

Mrs. Mullarky continued, "Perhaps you should schedule an appointment with your family doctor and explain the situation. There's nothing worse than not having a good night's sleep."

"I guess I could do that."

"Yes, I don't know what I'd do without my sleeping pills. They're the only thing that separates me from being a zombie." She chuckled and patted her purse, which lay on her desk. A few minutes of silence followed, interrupted only by the sound of Mrs. Mullarky finishing her apple. After a bit, she checked her watch and started. "Oh! The copier must be finished now. I have to collect some worksheets for class. I'll just pop out for a minute."

Dudley nodded and watched her go. He looked up at the clock. Fifteen more minutes 'til class began. He looked at her purse. While staring at it, he fancied himself sleeping in his warm dorm bed. Normally, he would only just be getting up out of bed, and would be racing to get dressed as quickly as possible. Then he thought of Vlad, who imperiously woke him up every morning to torture him. He remembered his anger over the whole thing, which only resulted in a spilled tin of Slim Fast. He stared hard at his teacher's purse, and an idea shot into his head.

Brilliant! He thought, as he snuck up to her desk. He rummaged through her purse until he found a bottle of pills. He nipped five tablets and deftly slipped them into his pocket and the bottle back into her bag.

Just then, four students walked into the classroom and looked at him curiously. Nonchalantly, Dudley made his way back to his seat and pretended to read his textbook until Mrs. Mullarky returned.

**************

Tuesday morning arrived, bright and optimistic. Dudley was already up and waiting when Vlad arrived.

"Good," Vlad said appreciatively, "you are beginning to take your exercises seriously, Dud Lee."

Dudley nodded. "I really do want to lose weight now. So I was wondering what you think about Slim Fast? My mum got them for me." Dudley held up a glass of the thick, lukewarm chocolate stuff he'd made from taking extra cartons of milk with his dinner the night before.

Vlad took the glass and sniffed it suspiciously. "Nothing can substitute regular exercise and a well-balanced, nutritious diet," he said firmly.

"But that is what Slim Fast says it does," Dudley persisted.

Vlad studied the drink like a mad scientist critiquing a new potion. "I have heard of this drink mix. You have to exercise regularly and eat balanced meals in order for it to work. But you have to do that to lose weight in any case, so why take it at all? Besides, it is not filling." With one slurp, Vlad drank the whole glass. "See, an hour from now I will be hungry again, so it fails as an energy drink. And according to the instructions, you cannot have another shake until lunch. No, Dud Lee, if you want to take weight loss seriously, you cannot rely on gimmicks. But if you want a healthy energy drink, I will bring you some of my very own tomorrow morning. I will give you the recipe."

Dudley's eyes looked downcast. Vlad had gulped the entire shake and didn't show any signs of sleepiness. "Oh, all right, I guess. What's in it?" Dudley asked, his voice full of defeat.

"Raw eggs and wheat germ, mainly." Dudley tried not to gag at the thought. "But now is not the time to discuss it; now is the time to exercise!"

**************

Vlad did begin to act strangely, though. He sat through the entire indoor workout instead of joining Dudley or standing in front of him, barking orders. He tried to keep his legs crossed and his front covered at all times with anything he could find: a jacket, a book, tables, poles, water fountains, the backside of highly reluctant cows when the workout moved to the field outside. By the end of Dudley's workout, Vlad jogged to the back of the school, where he finally succumbed and began humping a tree.

Dudley backed away from his red-faced, puffing instructor slowly, wondering what the hell he'd put in the shake.

In the Geometry classroom, Mrs. Mullarky was cleaning out her purse before classes began and pulled out a bottle of pills. "My my my," she murmured to herself, blushing, "my husband will be happy I finally found his medication."