🍛 Wednesday weigh-in: Taking up space

Hey everyone 👋

And Happy Easter🐥🐰!

Little WIP pic and character concept for you this week. Or, more accurately, one half of a WIP pic (see below).

Allow me to introduce Courtney. Like the pic, her background and even her name are a work in progress out. But I get the sense that she's a failed footballer's wife - which is to say she married a footballer who never quite made it (provisionally named Liam).

Courtney is early-mid thirties while Liam has just passed forty. They have two young children.

Looking at Courtney's Instagram, you would think her life was picture perfect - all sweet family outings and gushing heart-emojied posts about her wonderful husband.

In reality, she and Liam despise one another - each bitter that they never made it and blaming the other for their failure. Both have both had affairs and have a relationship akin to a modern version of Roald Dahl's Twits. Liam has gambling problem which he blames on Courtney's compulsive spending, while Courtney blames Liam's gambling problem for the stress eating and weight gain that "requires" her to spend compulsively on new clothes (though as her dress sense here suggests, she is somewhat in denial about just how much weight she's piled on).

Here we have a rather drunk Courtney in one of those open-late curry houses, and looking, at least in one sense, somewhat overdressed for it. I guess the food at whatever party she attended wasn't substantial enough.

The finished pic will include some comic-style dialogue which will explain the "taking up space" angle. It will also expand to the right to feature, as Courtney's partner in poppadomination, one of my existing characters. I won't say who, but she's no stranger to doubling down on dinner.

Hope you enjoy. I've got several scenes and half-baked short stories in mind for Courtney, so let me know if she's a character you'd like to see more of!

All the best for Easter, and try not to eat those eggs all in one go, ladies 😜

Hal x