I always wished that I could be as fat as those kids that I see on TV. Sometimes, I wonder why I was born and raised skinny. I used to sit on the sofa in my Mum and Dad’s semi watching those American shows where everyone looked so fat and happy. Liverpool is not like LA. The people here don’t go to constant dinner parties, they don’t have eternally optimistic outlooks, they have more to worry about than the latest fashions and their waistlines. No one I know was ever given access to their parents credit card. I’d be lucky if I could beg a fiver from Mum or Dad just to go to the chippy.

That’s how I grew up; a lanky, scraggly, long-haired, scally, with bad B.O. and a nagging feeling that I was supposed to have been born somewhere else. The advent of the internet saved me. All of a sudden I was able to talk to people from all over the world. It took time, years in fact, to find the right person, the right chat room. I honestly didn’t even know if anyone else thought like me. That seems ridiculous now. Now that gainerism has gone mainstream. I guess it’s hard to explain to kids nowadays, but back then you really did feel like you were the only one. Laugh at me if you want but I wished that I had been born in Orange County. That I owned a famous guitar. Then I could have become a fat post-punk pop star.

The closest I ever got was seeing Bowling for Soup play at the O2 Academy in 2010, and they're not even post-punk. Though, they are all very fat, fatter than Good Charlotte. If I’d been born in LA, I could have got an annual pass to Disney and grown fat on slushies. I could have cut the line cos I needed one of those oversized seats. I could have been the chubby boy I’d always dreamed of; nicely plump and tan from the constant hazy sunshine. Not the greasy, wet, scouse streak of piss, that I used to be.

Joe is from Costa Mesa. At first we bonded over the fact that we both used to fancy the hell out of the boy who used to climb in through the window on Clarissa Explains It All. Sam or Stan I think his name was. He had messy, light brown, sticky up hair, and wore baggy skater t-shirts. With his typical Nickelodeon good looks he was perfect for fattening up. That’s how that conversation got started.

Joe wanted to feed me. I wanted to be fed. He called me his long-haired lover. I called him my sunshine daisy - because he had yellow skin and he’d soon be pushing them up. He was significantly older than me and had recently been diagnosed with fatty liver disease. That was back in 2012. He tried to hide it from me, claimed that he just had a tan, but it didn’t look like a tan. Anyhow, that’s why he was really happy to spend his money on me.

We would cam and he’d watch as I ate the Maccie’s that he’d bought me, or the Domino’s. He preferred it when I ate from American outlets. I guess it made him feel at home. I, of course, never complained. I’d sit naked in front of my laptop, the rain pouring down the boarded up window of my bedsit, eating burger after burger for him, dreaming that I was at In-N-Out, somewhere like San Clemente, or San Berdu, eating four times 4x4’s from their not so secret menu. He told me that he would fly me out, but he never did.

I stole his credit card details and used it to order more food. I even got a letter from the FBI. I’ve got it framed. It’s amazing how long that worked for.

Joe said that he loved me and made me call him Daddy. He would play Osmond’s songs and sing along while I consumed everything that my heart would allow till I was as big as any American.

Joe died in debt. His family in Costa Mesa hates me. I have yellow skin. The fattest guy from Bowling for Soup has just retired due to health problems. Something to do with his foot. Maybe he will have to have it off? I’ve still never had in and out. But, it was worth it. That’s what I tell myself. Bootle ain’t Huntington Beach. But it ain’t all that bad. There’s lots of fatties here now, as well. They’ve just got pastier skin.