Vinyl Scratch regarded the small restaurant in front of her with a look of curiosity. Having traveled to bars and clubs all over Equestria, she had thought she'd known about all the different foods and culinary scenes that the country had to offer, whether it be from within Equestria or from far-off exotic lands. But this particular food? This she hadn't heard of before.
On the sign above the restaurant door, a single word was printed in neat block capitals: "POUTINE". Vinyl was pretty sure that was Prench, but she couldn't for the life of her figure out what it was supposed to mean. Was it the name of a food? A pony? A place, perhaps?
After a moment's pondering, Vinyl decided that the best thing to do would be to simply head inside and see just what this mysterious "poutine" stuff was. As she stepped inside the restaurant, the first thing that hit her was the ambiance. The interior was not very large, with room for maybe fifteen or twenty diners, but it looked very cosy and homey -- all wooden panelling and checked table cloths. It had the same sort of feel you'd expect to get at a loving relative's house. A faint smell of fried potato and cheese permeated the air. Behind the bar-style counter was a single russet-coloured mare, who raised her head at the sound of the door opening and gave Vinyl a friendly smile.
"Ah, good afternoon!" she said. Immediately, Vinyl picked up on her accent -- she was from Vanhoover, or at least she had been. "My name is Steller Jay, but everypony just calls me Jay. How can I help you?"
"Hey," Vinyl replied. "I was just wondering if you could tell me who or what 'poo-tyne' is? I've never even heard of that before today."
"It's pronounced 'pooteen', actually," Jay corrected. It wasn't done in a condescending tone, though, more in the tone of a friend sharing their knowledge with another close friend. "And I'm not surprised you haven't heard of it -- seems that hardly anypony in this part of the country has. It's a pretty big hit back in Vanhoover, though."
"Uh-huh. So, what is it, exactly?" Vinyl prompted.
"Well, basically, it's Prench fries with gravy and cheese curds on top. Not complicated at all, but it's absolutely sublime." Jay said this with the conviction of somepony who had clearly grown up with this food and would be damned if she would hear a word spoken against it.
Vinyl blinked. "Prench fries with cheese and gravy?" she repeated.
"That's right," Jay nodded. "It might not sound too appetising, but believe me, it tastes like nothing you've ever tasted before. I can give you a small plate to try now, if you want -- on the house, of course."
Vinyl pondered this for a moment, then nodded. "Okay then, you've twisted my foreleg. Let's see how it is."
"Excellent!" Jay beamed. "Just give me two minutes and I'll have it right out."
With that, Jay vanished through the swing door behind her. After a couple of minutes, she re-emerged carrying a steaming plate of poutine. "Here we are, then." She set the plate down on the bar, then looked at Vinyl with an almost unnervingly eager expression.
Vinyl took a moment to look at the plate. It certainly didn't look like the best food in the world to her. It looked like... well, like fries, gravy and cheese. Still, Vinyl didn't want to offend, and she was never one to pass up free food. So, lifting the plastic fork provided with her telekinesis, she skewered a few fries with a couple of curds limply attached and took a mouthful.
Instantly, a cacophony of flavour filled the young mare's mouth as a triumphant orchestral tune spontaneously started playing in her head. The delicious tastes of the poutine were running rampant over her tongue -- the fresh crispness of the fries, the mouth-watering savouriness of the gravy, the teeth-squeaking tang of the cheese, all combined to form the perfect amalgam of deliciousness. From the very first bite, Vinyl was hooked. She proceeded to wolf the rest of the plate down, face turned toward the heavens and eyes squeezed shut in rapture.
"I take it you enjoyed that?" Jay chuckled, once Vinyl had finished off the plate.
"Enjoyed it?" Vinyl repeated incredulously. "That was one of the best things I've ever tasted! How has it not caught on outside of Vanhoover yet?!"
Jay shrugged. "Beats me. Cultural differences, maybe? I dunno. You know, if you want some more, it's only five bits per plate."
Vinyl looked uncomfortable. She knew full well that she only had two bits in her saddlebags at the moment, having spent most of them on a new set of surround-sound bass speakers that afternoon. On the other hoof, she needed more of that stuff. It was calling out to her from the kitchen even as she stood there. She gave Jay a hopeful look.
"Do you take credit?"
As it turned out, Jay was happy to take credit for Vinyl's food, and before long Vinyl found herself seated at one of the restaurant's tables with a second plate of poutine before her. Wasting no time, she immediately stabbed her fork at the plate and took in another mouthful. Once more, she was washed away on a tide of flavourful euphoria. As she chewed, she wondered idly just how the ponies of Vanhoover had managed to concoct such a delicious dish in the first place. Was it part of a wider plot to enslave the entire population of Equestria and assert total dominance over the land? If so, then that was a future that Vinyl could certainly live with.
The second plate vanished down Vinyl's gullet and into her stomach almost as fast as the first one had. She debated getting another plate, but eventually decided against it. She was starting to feel a bit overfed as it was, and besides, she didn't trust herself not to end up running up a ridiculously high debt with Jay. So, she got up and headed a little sluggishly towards the door.
"Well, Jay," she said, craning her neck around as she put a hoof on the door, "I think you've just made a regular out of me."
Jay laughed. "I'm glad to hear it," she replied, as Vinyl walked out with a satisfied smile and a slightly distended tummy. "See you around!"
It had been about three weeks since Vinyl had first visited Jay's restaurant, and true to her word, she had become a regular customer of the place, being unable to get enough of Jay's poutine. Out of all the days that had passed since they first met, Jay could only recall one or two in which Vinyl hadn't made an appearance at her restaurant. She had other customers, of course, but none came in nearly as frequently as Vinyl Scratch.
Perhaps not surprisingly, the calorie count in each plate of poutine Jay made was starting to show on Vinyl's figure. A polite pony might have said that Vinyl was well padded; a less polite one might have said she was getting tubby. What was undeniably true was that she was definitely softer and rounder than she used to be. Her belly and plot both had a slight but noticeable bounce to them now, and her neck was starting to look a little chubby, as were her cheeks. Vinyl wasn't exactly fat, but she was definitely fuller-figured than she used to be.
A pang of concern went through Jay as she watched Vinyl tuck in to yet another plate of poutine. She knew full well that her recipe for poutine had a pretty high calorie count. Was it her fault that Vinyl was putting on that weight? Then Jay shook her head and told herself not to be ridiculous. Vinyl had eaten that poutine of her own free will -- she hadn't forced it down anypony's throat. And besides, Vinyl was a grown mare and more than capable of making her own decisions. It was none of Jay's business what she chose to eat, and if Vinyl wanted to spend her money at her restaurant, who was Jay to complain?
"I don't know how you do it, Jay," Vinyl beamed, setting down a pile of coins on the counter as she licked a small drop of gravy from her upper lip. "That poutine of yours just seems to get better every time you eat it."
Jay smiled at the compliment. "Just my Vanhooverite upbringing, I suppose," she replied as she placed the coins into the cash register. "Will there be anything else, Vinyl?"
Vinyl shook her head as she suppressed a burp. "Whoof, no thanks. I'm running a little late as it is. I'll see you around."
"I'm sure you will," Jay mumbled to herself as she waved goodbye to Vinyl, again noting how her plot bounced slightly as she walked out the door. Again, that pang of concern hit her, and again she brushed it off. "It's none of my business," she told herself.
Jay kept telling herself that in the days and weeks that followed. She kept telling herself that as Vinyl's weight gain became more and more apparent. She kept telling herself that as she noticed all the signs of Vinyl's overindulgence -- how her walk had become more of a waddle, how her breathing sounded a bit more laboured than it used to, how she sometimes struggled to raise herself to her hooves after she was done eating, and most of all, how she was undeniably getting fatter, her weight becoming more obvious with every passing week. Every time, Jay brushed off the concern she felt as silly and irrelevant. Deep down, though, she knew that Vinyl couldn't carry on like this forever. Sooner or later, something would have to give.
Finally, after almost three months of Vinyl gorging herself on poutine on a daily basis, intervention arrived in the form of a friend.
Octavia Melody was walking through town and trying to ignore the light drizzle pattering on her head. As she rounded a corner, she saw an extremely large pair of butt cheeks wobble into view ahead of her. She shook her head in a small, private gesture of disdain. Some ponies just had no clue how to look after their bodies. Then the pony attached to the cheeks turned around, and it was all Octavia could do to keep herself from fainting on the spot.
It was Vinyl -- but it wasn't the Vinyl Octavia knew. This Vinyl had metamorphosed into a blubbery, clinically obese blob of a pony. Her massive gut and plot wobbled with every lumbering step she took, her once so slim and trim barrel now weighed down with massive flabby rolls of fat. Her thighs were as wide as Octavia's entire plot, and attached to those thighs was a plot that looked like it was the size of a mattress for a small foal. Vinyl had a full double chin, with a third more than halfway formed, and her cheeks and jowls were both plumped up with yet more quivering fat. Vinyl was breathing heavily as she raised her head and noticed Octavia.
"Oh hey, Tavi. Long time... no see," she wheezed, her cheeks and chins wobbling as she spoke.
Too aghast to speak, Octavia simply gaped at her friend before she stammered out a response.
"Vinyl, w-what happened to you?"
"What? You mean my..." Vinyl paused to draw in a deep gasp of air. "What I've been up to?" she finished.
"What you've been up to? Vinyl, you look like you're about to collapse at any moment!" Octavia said in a tight voice. "What have you been eating?"
"Poutine," Vinyl answered, drooling a little as she said it. "Sweet, succulent poutine..." Her eyes glazed over and she smiled vacantly at the thought of it.
Octavia's mind raced. Poutine? That food from Vanhoover? She'd tried it once while she was there to perform in a concert, but she'd never... "Vinyl, where did you get poutine from?"
"Little restaurant... on Farrier Street," Vinyl said between heavy breaths, pointing a flabby foreleg in the right direction. "Just got... back from there... actually. Owner's my friend. Her name's Jay, she... does awesome poutine..."
Octavia blinked, then steeled herself. "Can you take me there?" she asked.
It took a while with Vinyl's slow, lumbering movement, but they eventually made it to the restaurant. Octavia told Vinyl to wait outside, then walked in through the restaurant door.
"Excuse me," she asked the pony behind the counter, "are you Jay?"
"I'm Steller Jay, yes," Jay replied. "Can I help you, ma'am?"
"I certainly hope so. My name is Octavia Melody. I'm a friend of Vinyl Scratch?"
Upon hearing Vinyl's name, Jay's face suddenly bore a look of worry. "Oh dear," she said. "Is... is she alright?"
"Well... not really," Octavia said, rolling her eyes slightly. "I saw her just now, looking like she was about to collapse under her own weight. I asked her what had happened to her, and she said she'd been getting food from you."
Jay lowered her head. "Yes..." she mumbled. "She's been eating... eating a lot of poutine. An inordinate amount, actually. I could see that she was gaining weight, obviously, but I didn't step in, because I didn't think it was any of my business. She's been eating here daily for three months or so now, and my poutine is rather high in calories, so..."
Octavia nodded slowly. "Well, Miss Jay," she said, "I think it might be prudent to cut her off now, don't you?"
Jay nodded. "I suppose you're right," she said. "Miss Melody, I'm really sorry about this. I-I should have said something to her, but I..."
"Please, don't blame yourself," Octavia said consolingly. "Vinyl's the one with the self-control problem, not you. I'm can help her lose some of that weight, but I highly doubt she'll ever be coming back here. If she does, I'd like you to refuse her service. It's for her own good. Thank you, Miss Jay."
With that, Octavia turned and walked out the door, leaving Steller Jay biting her lip and holding back tears.
A few weeks later, Octavia and Vinyl had just finished one of their exercise routines. Octavia was pleased to see that Vinyl was making very good progress. She was still pretty heavy-set, but she no longer looked like she was about to have a coronary. Octavia let Vinyl catch her breath before she spoke.
"By the way," she said brightly, "I saw Jay the other day."
"Yeah?" Vinyl replied, as she wiped a bead of sweat from her brow.
Octavia nodded. "She said that she's planning on putting calorie counts on a sign outside her restaurant. Apparently, she doesn't want anypony else getting carried away like you did."
"Gee, I'm flattered," Vinyl snarked. "Well, it doesn't matter, because I'm never going near any of that damn poutine again. I've decided I rather like being able to climb stairs."
Octavia laughed. "At least some good came out of it, then," she teased, as she went to get her friend a water bottle. Vinyl might have had to do it the hard way, but she had learned a valuable lesson in self-control. And for that, Octavia was grateful.
END
Author's Note
