I.

Helga Exford looked at the infant in her arms. Her smile was faint with exhaustion, but her eyes held all the love and excitement she was unable to show otherwise.

“I love you,” whispered her husband, gazing with pride at their new son, and it wasn’t clear if the sentiment was aimed at the boy or the mother.

Helga accepted it as hers, raised her gaze and told the large, handsome man beside the bed that she was glad he’d given her a son.

William laughed without changing the direction of his glance, nodding. “In the old days, that would have been what the man said.”

“Well, now we know better, don’t we.” Her voice had gotten somewhat fainter. She really needed to get some sleep – twenty-six hours of labor was almost too much. Understandable, though, she thought through a haze. After all, the child had been weighed at eleven pounds, nine ounces and was a full twenty-three inches long. Big boy….

“Mr. Exford?”

He turned to see the nurse giving him a significant stare. “Oh. Guess she needs to rest, yes?”

“Yes. You can come back later. We’ll be placing the baby in the Nursery now, and you can observe him any time you want.” She was referring to the gigantic room filled with an alarming number of cribs, a huge picture window at one end where parents and relatives could look in on the newborns.

William Exford frowned. “How do I know you won’t mix him up with someone else’s baby?”

Her look changed to one of patient understanding. “Here – watch what I do.” She reached down and lifted the large infant from his mother’s chest; she’d fallen asleep several moments earlier and was snoring gently. “This is how we avoid mix-ups.” The nurse carried the baby to a crib set up near the bed, placed him gently into it, and opened a drawer in the small table beside it. She took out a large blue label and a black marker. “Have you decided on a name?”

“We have – after my wife’s father. Erik.” He spelled it for her.

The woman printed “Erik Exford” in large letters on the label, peeled it from its backing, and affixed it to what looked like an index card with a hole in one end. “Now, we do this.” She pulled a blue ribbon from her pocket, threaded it through the hole, and tied the label around the baby’s left ankle. “That doesn’t come off until you take him home. Okay?”

Satisfied, William nodded.

“Good! We’ll see you later, Mr. Exford, and congratulations!” She picked up the baby again, who had remained quiet throughout all of these proceedings, and carried him out.

William went to the bed, gave his wife a quick kiss on the forehead, and left. As he headed for the hospital cafeteria for a snack, he started dreaming about his son, what he would look like as he grew, what he’d be when he became a man…ah, the pride of fatherhood. He gave a little skip, then looked around to make sure no one had seen him, cleared his throat, and continued on his way.

 

*******

 

“Are you sure you want these?” The Cafeteria worker raised an eyebrow, her spatula pointed at the large tray of french fries looking an unhealthy shade of red under the heat lamps.

“I’m sure.”

“You know, you could have some broccoli instead. Or a piece of fruit.”

“Fruit is carbs. Fries are carbs. What’s the difference?”

“Well, broccoli, then.” She was honestly trying to help.

“I hate broccoli. Besides, you guys dump a bunch of imitation butter all over it, so I’ll have a lot of fatty greens. Great choice. I’ll take the fries.”

The woman sighed, shaking her head, and served up the allotted helping, dumping them unhappily on the boy’s plate next to what the menu board claimed to be meatloaf, but even she had her doubts about that one. “Here you go.” She lifted his plate to the glass shelf over the serving area and he put it on his tray. “You know, Erik, I’m not trying to embarrass you – I’m worried, is all.”

“Yeah, me, too. But thanks.” He gave her a half-smile and slid the tray further down to the drink section.

“Hey, there, Chubby-Wubby,” whispered a female voice next to him.

He didn’t bother to look. He knew the voice too well. Martina Casman, the school’s resident self-proclaimed Queen of Hotness, was a young lady who seemed to live for those exquisite moments when she could deliver scathing, sarcastic nastiness to anyone who didn’t look like a young supermodel. Which was just about everybody except her.

As he filled his cup with ice, she put a hand on his free arm. “Have they widened the doors for you at home yet?”

He sighed and moved the cup under the cola dispenser.

“What’s wrong, Butter-Butt? Too much fat in your throat so you can’t speak?”

He wondered briefly what would happen if he “accidentally” tossed the soda into her face. Would it be worth the momentary hilarity of seeing her in a state of gasping outrage? Nah. Not really. Because one of her mindless boy-toys would beat the living crap out of him later, or whatever crap was left after someone else beat him up just for the heck of it. Looked like he’d have to opt for confusing her into silence. “Martina,” he said as he began sidling past her, “the discussion of panniculus should be relegated exclusively to those not suffering from faecal encephalopathy syndrome. Know what I mean?” He gave her a pleasant smile and took off.

Several long minutes passed before Martina could figure out that it was okay to try thinking again, during which time she stood, mouth hanging open, and stared at her retreating classmate’s ample back.

Erik managed to get to his usual table before being overcome by the giggles. Using huge words was his only means of self-defense at this point.

“So, what did you say this time and who did you say it to?” asked Bruno, one of three others who shared their lunch period with Erik. He hadn’t seen what happened, but knew Erik well enough to recognize the source of that other boy’s amusement.

Erik told him, and all four promptly went hysterical.

“What do you think she’ll do?” Harvey, a bespectacled boy whose own poundage rivaled Erik’s, glanced around to see if Martina was anywhere in sight.

Erik shrugged. “Who knows? Who cares? For sure, though, she won’t be able to repeat what I said to anyone.”

That brought on a new wave of laughter. “She’s totally stupid!” choked the fourth member of their little group, a girl named Sissy. She was so skinny, she had to wear children’s clothes, and her black-framed glasses made her thin face look insect-like.

And then, as if they were all struck by the same thought, they fell silent. The thought, of course, was that stupid or not, Martina was beautiful and popular, and none of them could ever hope to claim to be either.

As he munched on his fries, Erik thought about his parents, about the way his mother had gone from a lovely Swedish model to a morbidly obese housewife over the course of only fourteen years. Apparently, giving birth to him had damaged something and she’d been unable to have any more children. This had brought about a deep depression, coped with by binge eating, and over-indulging her only child with sweets, unhealthy snacks, fat-laden (if incredibly delicious) suppers and before-bed yummies. Her manic behavior had eventually brought his father to the brink of his own brand of despair, one in which alcohol – beer, specifically – was all he lived for. Erik, blissfully unaware of the wrong-headedness of his parents’ behaviors, had grown up fairly happy, his only misery coming from his peers who apparently had nothing better to do than make constant fun of his weight and nerdy intelligence.

He knew that part of his problem, if one could honestly call it that, was his love of reading. This was not exactly an athletic pursuit, nor were any of his other pursuits, which included playing video games and making his own comic books. He might have become a classic artist at some point, but enjoyed animé and comic art much more. At fourteen, he was already extremely good at it, but never showed his work to anyone, fearing it would become yet one more source of ridicule by his peer group. He certainly didn’t trust his friends, either, since they felt the need to brag loudly about things everyone else thought were incredibly dumb. No, he didn’t need them broadcasting the fact that he drew superheroes and monsters all the time. His other love – mathematics – was no secret, though, since it was something constantly useful and had even given him moments of enjoyment when the meat-head elements in his age group would ask for help with their homework.

“Hey!”

Startled, Eric almost choked on a fry. He looked up, eyes watering, to see Martina standing beside the table looking furious.

“I don’t know what you said to me, but it better not have been anything gross or obscene.”

He took a swig of soda to send what was left of the greasy potato product on its way down his esophagus. “Just honest,” he croaked.

She frowned. “What does that mean?”

“Uh, honest. You know, real, true, factual, non-falacious…”

“I’m going to smack you stupid with my purse, Erik Exford!”

He gave her a crazy look. “What are you – two years old? Please go away. I’m not bothering you – don’t bother me.”

“Uh-huh. Uh-huh. We’ll see.”

“Cryptic to the last,” Harvey muttered, watching her flounce off and enjoying the sway of her hips more than he’d ever admit out loud.

“Not really.” Eric finished his food and stood up, grabbing his tray.

“What do you mean?” asked Harvey, joining him, the other two rising also.

“I mean, Harve, that when she says, ‘we’ll see,’ she’s basically saying she’s going to go lie to one of her football friends about me, and I’ll be going home with a black eye – or worse.” His sense of doom and gloom was rapidly heading for an all-time low.

Ah, life in the Fat Lane…

 

*******

Denying the accusation had been worthless, naturally. Picking himself up off the sidewalk, Erik pulled a tissue from his pocket, held it over his bleeding nostrils, and put his head back. His attacker this time had been Taylor Kroll, or Kaylor the Troll as Eric preferred to call him. He was the football team’s star quarterback, an exalted position that made it almost an honor to have been punched by him.

“Dot!” grated Erik, unable to make the “n” sound with his nose all clogged up with blood. The football star was now added to Erik’s list entitled, Classmates Who Have Introduced Me To Their Fists, and to date, Taylor was the most popular. How awesome.

“Oh, Erik, honey!” his mother exclaimed ten minutes later. She would have had to be completely blind not to see the bruise on her son’s chin and the drying blood on his upper lip. “Who hurt you, baby?”

He glared, unable to stop himself. He knew she loved him and was sincere and all that, but dang! “I’b dot a baby!” he replied, unreasonably furious. “And dever mihd who did it! I’b fide!”

“What’s going on in here?” William, who had taken an early retirement – fifteen years early – entered the kitchen wiping one hand on the stained wife-beater undershirt stretched tightly over his beer-distended belly. Welfare could buy a lot of unnecessary comfort these days.

“Some horrible person has hurt our son, that’s what!” Helga, a spatula raised in one hand, her blonde hair in long braids on either side of her round cheeks, looked like she was about to burst out in a Wagnerian aria.

“Why?”

Erik rolled his eyes. He loved his parents. He really did. But… “We’ll talk about it later.” He repositioned his backpack on his shoulder and went downstairs to his room – yup, he had the quintessential geek-child-in-the-basement setup. And he loved it. This was the one truly bright spot in his day, the moment when he could escape to his “cave” and be totally himself without anyone to criticize what that meant.

After changing into something less blood-stained, he went to his laptop which he’d set on an old metal desk his father had brought home several years earlier to replace the the rickety wooden one Erik had been using. He got online and checked his emails, almost none of which were personal. A lot from art supply companies, gaming stores and internet gaming suppliers. One or two book clubs, mostly science-fiction, and a store that sold old-fashioned, hard-to-find food items. As he moved the mouse to open this last email, his gaze rested on his hand.

His fat hand. Fingers like sausages. Pudgy and annoyingly large. His mother told him that he was like a big, fluffy puppy (oh, how he hated that description). She said his oversized extremities meant he would one day be very tall. He thought about this for a second.

“Yeah, or just very badly-proportioned,” he then muttered nasally in continued disgust at the way his hand was swallowing the mouse. After fuming over this for a few moments more, he impulsively deleted the email. “That’s it! I’b over it! Erik the Round, Erik the Fat, Erik Extralarge, Erik the Derrick, Chubby-Wubby Wexxie…doh bore!”

He meant it, too. Determined suddenly to break whatever cycle had begun when his appearance on the planet had changed his parents into caricatures of who they should have been, he decided to research ways to change who and what he was. Starting with his weight, of course. No more fantasy for a while. No more snacking on garbage, either. His Sweet Tooth was being extracted immediately, by heaven, and he was going to take control of his own destiny! A destiny in which he could finally fit through the door, as it were. A destiny in which no one would feel compelled to tell him to eat broccoli, or in which his ass was too big to fit in the roller-coaster seat! A destiny wherein he could go on vacation and not have his parents pay for two plane seats just for him (assuming they could ever afford plane tickets).

He knew this would take some time, but now that he’d set his mind to it, nothing was going to stop him.

“Erik! I bought you some Little Cutie Snacks – the chocolate-covered marshmallow ones! Come up and get them, dear!” came his mother’s voice from the top of the basement stairs.

Yeah, well, almost nothing…

II.

They’d lost the house. Helga had developed some medical problems associated with her eating habits (severe gall stones, one huge kidney stone, and a near-fatal blockage of one of her arteries), which took every penny they had remaining from before William’s “retirement” (the construction company had to fire him finally, unable to justify his coming in on time but drunk every day without fail). Government assistance had only handled so much, and in the end, they had to sell the house.

Erik was actually okay with this. It meant a chance to start over, to correct some of the social mistakes he’d made. Mostly, though, it represented a chance to go someplace where his past was an unknown quantity, which meant no preconceived prejudice or expectations. He was still obese, having only begun exercizing and dieting in earnest two months earlier. But he had, in fact, lost several pounds and was getting stronger. Slowly, yes, but inexorably.

His few friends expressed regret at his going, but he knew they’d pretty much forget about him before too many months had passed – just as he’d probably forget them to some degree.

Helga was devastated. That house had been her husband’s wedding gift. She’d cared for it almost as tenderly and well as she’d cared for her little family, and now it was going to belong to someone else. She was nearly inconsolable, her crying jags only interrupted when she’d take a bite of something. Actually, she didn’t really do all that much crying as she went through eighteen boxes of candy in two days.

William, on the other hand, was mortified, plain and simple. He began to see how foolishly he’d behaved to bring his family to this, and for nearly a week after putting the house on the market, he’d hardly touched his beer. But then he decided he’d had enough self-recrimination, told himself there was nothing he could do, so why risk becoming as depressed as his wife, and started drinking again in earnest.

At least he was an amiable drunk.

Several states north, they found a reasonably-priced home in a trailer park. The doctor bills would probably never get paid off, so they used the proceeds from the house to purchase the trailer and pay a year in advance for the lot rental. Only some of their furniture fit in this smaller structure, which meant having a garage sale. The profits from that went toward bills and moving costs, and on a hot, sticky Saturday in June, they moved out.

To Erik’s utter astonishment, he found himself thriving in this new environment. The school he attended there was filled with the obese, the poor, and the geeky. He was practically in paradise, and almost rescinded his decision to get healthy and slim. The fact that he didn’t, had everything to do with their new home – it was so small, avoiding one another was impossible. One evening he came out of his closet-sized room to find his father snoring loudly in his chair, the TV still on. Erik started to cover him with the crocheted throw his mother kept draped across the back of the sofa, and then stopped, staring at this man who according to the wedding and other early photos was once tall, strong and handsome. Now he was gross. Overweight in all the wrong places, his face badly-shaved, his dark hair greasy and streaked with yellow-grey strands, his fingernails broken and dirty. Was this how he himself would look one day? Erik wondered, shuddering at the idea.

Little Cutie Snacks indeed! He tossed the coverlet over the sleeping man and went into the teensy kitchen. There, he pulled the offending snack items from the narrow cupboard and took the stack outside to the community dumpster. “I love my dad,” he grumbled, “but I am not him. I won’t be, either.” He tossed the boxes in, ignoring the little voice in his head wailing over their loss, and went back inside.

“What were you doing?” asked his mother who had appeared from somewhere on the other side of the trailer.

He took a deep breath. Poor mom, he thought. She deserves better than this. “I’m taking care of us,” he said. “Love you.” He bent down and kissed her on the forehead, realizing as he did that he was already taller than she, and went back to his room. Who said a geek couldn’t be healthy and buff? Not yet, but some day…

That “some day” took its sweet time, but he never gave up trying. He got through the rest of high school without trauma – he’d even managed a date for his Senior Prom. His graduation saw him giving the Valedictorian speech, and his parents were so proud, they showed up at the ceremony looking like a normal, if quite large, happy couple.

A month later, he was getting ready to go take his road test. He had saved some of his money from the job he’d gotten at a local convenience store two years earlier and with which he’d be buying his neighbor’s old Chevy later that week. Erik was now eighteen, and having earned a full-ride scholarship to the local university, he’d need a car to get there when classes began at Summer’s end. Between school, work, and taking care of his parents without them realizing he was doing so, he’d had no time to pursue his drivers’ license until now. He had passed the written test two days ago, and wanted to finish the process as soon as he could. Once that was done, he could get a second job and maybe some of their bigger bills could finally get paid off.

Helga’s health hadn’t gotten any worse, but William was struggling. He’d gotten so big, he could barely get out of his chair now. The doctor had told him his liver was pretty much on the way out, and that he seriously needed to quit drinking. The likelihood of that ever happening was the opposite of what he was - slim. He’d justified his poor health and habits by declaring, “At least I don’t smoke!”

As if that took care of everything…

The Exfords had made a place for themselves in the trailer community over the years, which meant they had a network of friends always nearby and willing to help whenever either Helga or William had a flare-up of health problems. Everyone liked Erik, who had never neglected the well-mannered upbringing his parents had afforded him. They had perhaps failed him in other ways, but at least he had been able to develop good social skills. These were the result equally of his parents’ input and his own efforts to stop saying and doing all the wrong things at the wrong time.

“Be back later!” he said, opening the screen door.

“Good luck!” his father called from the livingroom. “Don’t run over the DMV guy!”

“Yyyeah…” He rolled his eyes and went out.

The DMV was only several blocks away, and he got there in plenty of time for his appointment. As usual, the place was overflowing. Among the sweating throng were two or three guys from school and a couple of girls who had befriended him over the past couple of years. He went to the desk to give them his name and was told the test instructor would call him in a few minutes.

“Erik, hey, man!”

“Rick.” He put out a hand.

Rick Edgemon, a fellow-senior, shook it and grinned. “Road test?”

“Yup. You?”

“Nah. Did that last year. I finally got a car yesterday, though, and need to get a replacement license.”

“Uh, - ?”

“Yeah, lost it somewhere. Probably at the game last week.” Rick was referring to the baseball game he and Erik had attended to watch his little brother play.

“Did you make an appointment?”

“Nope. Stupid, right? I’ve already been here for two hours, and probably won’t get out for another three. You?”

Erik nodded. “Wonder if they’ll ever get air-conditioning in here.”

“Who knows? Most of our tax money goes into government pockets. Hey, you going to the gym later?”

“Much later. Once I get this test over with, I have to go home and do some yard-work.” Four years ago, Eric never would have believed he would one day use the words “I” and “yard-work” in the same sentence. “Then I’ll help my mom with supper, and after that, yeah. You?”

“I suppose I could wait – I hate going by myself, mainly because I give up after like thirty minutes.” Rick wasn’t exactly out of shape, but he was far from where he wanted to be. “I could walk over there with you.”

“Okay.” The gym was right on the other side of the trailer park, which meant only about five minute’s walking distance. “I have my kick-boxing class tomorrow and should do some practicing for it.”

“Don’t you have a tournament coming up or something?”

“Yup. I really don’t like those things, but…”

“What’re you talking about, Erik? You won last year! I mean, you totally owned the challenger!”

Great, he thought. I’m good at kicking people. Dammit, I want to be a game programmer, not freaking Jet Li. “Right. Doesn’t mean I really like it, though. It’s exercise. That’s all.

"Whatever.”

A voice on the loud-speaker called, “Erik Exford to the test area, please.”

“Gotta go.” He gave the other boy a light punch on the arm and went out.

That night, as he was heading home from the gym – he’d passed the road test easily – he thought about the upcoming tournament and how much he would rather be involved in an on-line game tournament instead. Nothing like –

“That’s him!”

He turned quickly, the tone of voice making it unmistakable that the “him” was, well, him. Three shapes, silhouetted by the streetlamp behind them, rushed toward him. He could see enough to know they weren’t after him to invite him out for a drink. Well, fine.

It was over in a matter of minutes. Erik shook his stinging right hand, his left one still fisted, ready, in case one of his attackers was stupid enough to get up. “What the hell was that for?” he demanded, angry.

No answer. One of them was cradling his arm, another his head, and third…oh. He was unconscious. Ah, well.

“Next time you want to show how brave you are, try one at a time!” He’d abandoned his multi-syllabic three-dollar-word defense a long time ago, mostly because he no longer needed it. At that moment, however, he was tempted to toss a few choice phrases their way, just because he could. But…no, not worth it. “Oh, and leave me the hell alone.” Pretty sure they wouldn’t try anything else, he turned away and continued toward home.

“Oh, honey, what happened?” asked his horrified mother as she stared at his bloodied knuckles ten minutes later.

Erik chuckled and went to the sink to rinse them off, ducking to avoid the overhead light fixture. “Nothing I couldn’t handle, Mom.” He dried his hand with a paper towel, not wanting to stain one of her cloth ones, and leaned down to kiss the top of her head. “Gotta get up early for work. Good night.”

 

III.

University. As a word, it was impressive. As a campus, this University was even more so. Located right outside a small town in the Northeastern part of the country, it was the local seat of higher learning. Because of its reputation for turning out successful, sometimes famous, graduates, it also attracted a student population that hailed from every State and all parts of the globe.

Most students never even knew about some of its sections, never entered a large portion of its massive buildings, while others made a point of visiting all of it at some point or another during their four-year stay. Divided into focused areas, the University had several buildings for each discipline – the Arts, Business, Sports, Science, History and Social Studies, Computer Studies, Mathematics – and a world-famous football stadium. The professors, mostly the older ones, travelled its walkways on golf carts; with the distances between one section and the next being considerable, the students rarely walked. They jogged, ran, power-walked, roller-bladed.

The worst part of the school year was the beginning when the majority of students had no idea where they were going or how to get there. By late fall, though, things would have settled into a kind of rushed routine. Fraternity and Sorority initiations were over, class schedules finalized, and everyone knew, more or less, how to get where they had to go. By that time, too, friendships had been formed or were established, something that was true of animosities as well.

Football season was the hallmark of the first semester, and if the team was doing well, its members were automatically the University’s heroes. Not surprising, really, since the sport paid most of the bills. The spring semester saw the baseball team shine, but some of the athletic students never set so much as a toe inside the stadium. The sport of choice for those students was among the many others offered – karate in all its forms, track and field, hockey (both ice and field), boxing, wrestling, gymnastics, and the less common ones like golf, archery and fencing.

Every once in a while, a new student would come along who defied all of the established expectations. In this particular year, that student was a young man who everyone thought should be on the exalted football team, but whose interests lay elsewhere. He was a computer science major, a well-spoken, often friendly sort who scared the daylights out of anyone who didn’t know him. At six-foot-seven, the handsome giant with a lean, powerful build and piercing gray-green eyes could intimidate a roomful of people merely by entering it. The way he held himself, his total disregard for the envious and sometimes antagonistic stares from the other young men, made it pretty clear that he was fearless, capable, self-confident – basically everything all the guys wished they could be. The girls found him fascinating, desirable, and were instinctively drawn to his raw strength (not that all of them were willing to admit this).

He was known simply as Kex. No one dared call him anything else, nor had the courage to ask him about his odd name. Not to his face, anyway. That might have had something to do with his membership on the kick-boxing team, and rumors that he had single-handedly won every competition in that sport without much effort. But there was another reason. His intellect. A math major made the mistake one day of flinging a condescending remark at him, figuring Kex wouldn’t get it. A few minutes later, having been treated to a response filled with words he didn’t understand, the foolish young man had excused himself, vowing never to underestimate Kex again.

Every member of the football team knew Kex, or at least knew about him, and more than one had tried unsuccessfully to convince the formidable freshman to go out for the team. He seemed to have some kind of aversion to the whole idea of football, which baffled the players and their coach greatly.

“Maybe he got run over by a football team when when he was a kid,” suggested one of the new players who, in fact, had never met the subject of their speculations. “I mean, come on! If this guy is the size you say he is, what could possibly be his reason not to play? And what the hell kind of name is ‘Kex’ anyway?”

“It’s my name.”

The deep, quiet response had come from somewhere overhead, it seemed, and the young man gulped before turning around. He was hardly short, so it was disconcerting to find himself staring not at a face or into a pair of eyes, but rather at the upper part of a chest. And if the way the shirt covering this chest was any indication, it was a very well-muscled one, too. Several words came to mind in that instant, but the only ones that came out were, “Sorry, dude.” He forced himself to raise his glance and now was looking at face that was strongly attractive – high cheekbones, nicely-sculpted jawline, slightly cleft chin, and eyes that bore into his with an intensity he felt was a little unwarranted.

“I’m sure you are,” said the giant.

"Look, I, uh, right. Never heard one like it, that’s all. Don’t be offended, okay?”

“Offended?” Kex shook his head, sighing. “I can’t be bothered being offended. Not by something stupid like that.”

“Hey, Kex,” said one of the team members to whom the new boy had been speaking. “What’s up?”

"Not much. Just wanted to give this to Jake.” He held out a sheaf of papers toward one of the other boys.

They were in the Student Union, and the one named Jake got up from the deeply-cushioned chair in which he’d draped himself and took the papers. “Thanks, man. This’ll help a lot.”

Another boy stood also and peered over his friend’s shoulder at the papers. “What’s that?”

“Cheat codes.”

“For football?”

They all regarded the one who’d wondered about Kex’s name, their stares disbelieving.

“What are you – a ditz? Football? Really?” This from a boy named Randy, one of the team’s finest players. “Kex is a computer genius – these are codes to one of his games.”

Not sure if he liked the description, Kex rolled his eyes. “Anyway,” he said, “let me know how they work out. I’m about positive I’ve gotten rid of the glitches, but if gameplay isn’t smooth, it won’t matter.”

“Cool. Thanks, Kex. By the way…” Jake draped an arm over the shoulders of the first boy. “This is Taylor Kroll, our latest wannabe quarterback. Taylor, this is Kex, in case you hadn’t figured it out.” He grinned.

Kaylor the Troll. I know. “Nice to meet you.” Kex put out a hand, which completely swallowed the other boy’s when they shook. “Good luck on the team.”

“Uh, thanks…Kex.”

“Gotta go – Jake, call me.”

“You got it. Thanks again!”

When the frightening student had gone, Taylor collapsed onto a nearby sofa, clearly shaken. He was also somewhat confused. “That guy is a computer geek?” he asked no one in particular.

“Yup. He’s also a kick-boxing champion, and writes comic books.”

“Really!” Taylor had known a boy in high school who was into the whole computer thing, a total geek who was one of the fattest, ugliest little toads he’d ever met. His pathetically small group of friends were the same way, so this – a nerd with looks, personality and strength – was a whole new experience for him. “Is he any good?”

“Yes to all of the above. Come to think of it, one of his characters in his Viking Lord series has a name that’s kinda the reverse of yours,” said Randy, grabbing the top sheet of paper from Jake.

“What?”

“Yeah. He’s one of the bad guys – a total creep with the I.Q. of a shoelace!” Randy laughed. “Kaylor, I think he calls the guy. He’s some kind of troll.” He shrugged and asked Jake if he could borrow the codes later.

Because of their interest in the stack of cheat codes, none of them noticed that Taylor had turned an odd shade of gray. For while nothing about Kex had looked familiar, there was no mistaking the name of that comic-book character. One of the beatings Taylor had administered to his geeky classmate had been punishment for a name one of his friends had called him – Kaylor the Troll. The kid, Harvey Something-Or-Other, had avoided a pounding by giving up the author of the insult: Erik Exford. It really didn’t take a whole lot of mental gymnastics to put together the end of the fat boy’s first name and the beginning of his last. k…Ex…Kex. Damn. “Aw, shit!” The worst part of it was that obviously, Erik hadn’t forgotten. And now….

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I’m, uh, yeah, I’m not feeling well.” Taylor got up and left the Student Union quickly, casting terrified glances here and there in case Erik was anywhere around, maybe even waiting for him.

Because if the former Erik the Round had it in for him, he was toast.

 

*******

“What in the world are you laughing at?” asked Rianna, a pretty freshman who sat next to Kex in Social Sciences.

He shot her a quick glance, hoping his open display of amusement wouldn’t make people think he’d lost his mind. “Tell you later,” he hissed, nodding toward the teacher who thus far hadn’t noticed anything.

She shrugged and began twiddling with her pen. At least she’d gotten a “later” from him. Most of the time, he acted like he had no time for girls, and at first, she’d wondered about his sexual preferences. But she’d cornered him outside the gym one afternoon, and despite feeling overwhelmed by his size, she’d leaned up and kissed him on the mouth just to see what he’d do.

What he did was kiss her back. In fact, she felt like she was melting and didn’t want him to stop. What she didn’t realize was that if they hadn’t been in such a public place, he probably wouldn’t have. After that, he’d asked her out for coffee, and they’d gone to the movies a couple of times. But there was this odd sense of reserve, almost a shyness that everything else about him contradicted. Girls from every grade were attracted to him, despite some of them being two or three years older, making Rianna wonder how many of them he was actually seeing. Besides her, of course.

Kex wrestled with his sense of humor for a few minutes before finally getting it fully under control. After the unexpected meeting with his former enemy, he had wondered how long – if ever – it would take Taylor to figure things out. If he did, though, it would be fun to see how the realization would affect him. It was the idea of the quarterback trying to beat him up again that had caused the silent laughter – that idiot was so far out of his league at this point, it was –

“Kex? Are you paying attention?”

Uh-oh. “Um, no, sir. Sorry. Did you ask me something?” He gave the teacher a weak smile.

“See? Now that kind of honesty I can appreciate. I’m not happy about him daydreaming in class, but at least he didn’t try and lie about it.”

“What did I miss?”

“Well, my affable giant, I was trying to get one of you to tell me why heirarchies exist in societies where class is a non-issue.”

Kex nodded. He had no idea. “Oh.”

The teacher sighed. “Go back to sleep. Read Chapter Seven at some point and give me an answer in the next class.”

“Yes, sir.” Now the smile Kex gave him was a grateful one. As fascinating as Social Science was, he had other things to think about at the moment, but it occurred to him that he might be able to use some of what the man was talking about in his next installment of Viking Lord.

During his first week at the University, he’d picked up a copy of the school newspaper and noticed a few comic strips. None of them impressed him one way or the other, but they gave him the inspiration to go speak with the editor about his own work. He’d been creating Viking Lord comics since his sophomore year of high school, and by now it was a fully-developed story, the illustrations complex and numerous. Why not try and publish it in this forum first, see what kind of response it got? Unlike high school, the University was populated by people of diverse enough backgrounds that a good percentage of them would most likely enjoy his work rather than ridicule it.

He had brought a few episodes to the copy editor, and had been promptly accepted as their new contributor to the entertainment section. Within days he was hearing students and faculty alike talking about the new comics in the paper, praising the artwork and discussing the storyline with enthusiasm. He was shocked. Pleased, but shocked. It was actually through this medium that his new name came about.

He didn’t like the clumsy way “Erik Exford” looked and sounded, and tried to come up with something more…appropriate. He said his name out loud several times and wrote it several more next to the title of the first story. First he wrote it the regular way, then in all caps, and finally, without spaces. The progression went from Erik Exford to ERIK EXFORD and finally ERIKEXFORD. From there, he’d played with the letters, and considered “Ford,” “Erex,” “Erx,” “Exfo,” “Exfor,” and “Kord.” None of them worked for him. And then, for no other reason than that he hadn’t tried it yet, he wrote, “KEX.” He liked it. He put it on the comic strip and submitted it. And within that aforementioned number of days, people were wondering out loud who this Kex guy was.

By now no one was calling him anything else, and for the most part, didn’t know or remember that he’d ever even had another name. He also began embedding it in his programs, happy with its ease of use in that context. He was endlessly amazed as well at how much his schoolmates liked odd names like his. He even discovered that many students had nicknames invented by others, and which everyone enjoyed saying. He supposed they thought it sounded cool or something.

An obnoxious noise he recognized as the period bell intruded on his thoughts and he got up.

“Were you listening at all?” asked Rianna, walking out with him.

“Nope. Probably not a good thing.”

“So what were you laughing at earlier?”

He shook his head, trying not to look at her too often. She was, in his humble opinion, the most beautiful girl he’d ever met, and he was fighting the urge to fall hopelessly in love with her. He never could decide if it was that first kiss, or the fact that she’d started it that won him over. “A little bit of my past showed up today,” he said. “Some guy who used to beat the crap out of me all the time.”

“You’re kidding! Who could possibly do that?”

He grinned. “I wasn’t always this size, you know.”

“Geez, I hope not. Your poor mother!”

It took him a second…he got it and laughed, his already pleasant features transforming into something irresistible. “She tells me I was pretty freakin’ big for a baby, but yeah – not like this.” He looked down at himself. He’d finally gotten used to the vast distance between his eyes and his feet.

“Okay, but – what did you look like?”

The smile faded. “Gross. I was horribly overweight, short, and had huge hands and feet – I looked like something out of a B movie.”

She sensed he wasn’t comfortable talking about that part of his life, at the same time realizing that this was probably the source of that bizarre shyness she’d detected. “Well, you sure aren’t gross now.”

“I had to work very hard at it, though. Went on a strict diet and joined the gym, took up kick-boxing and stopped vegging out in front of the computer so much.”

“Yet you’re majoring in it.”

He nodded. “I figured out a way to use my laptop while standing up. Once I had that going, I’d do all my work while pacing around the basement.” He uttered a quiet snort. “What a dweeb.”

“Hey, Kex!” a chorus of female voices said as he passed a group of cheerleaders holding some kind of meeting on the lawn to his left.

He offered them a wave and a smile. “Anyhow, I met the guy today, and he had no idea who I was.”

“Is that what you were laughing about?”

“No. More at what he might do if he ever finds out. And don’t ask me to explain that.”

She grinned. “Okay, chief.”

They had reached the part of the path where they would go off in opposite directions. He turned to look at her finally, planning to say a non-committal good-bye, but was met with a fierce kiss. He almost groaned as his body instantly reacted. He wasn’t a virgin any more, having tossed that away during his junior year of high school, but that wasn’t making things any better. Worse, in fact. God, how he wanted to…

She pulled back, practically panting. “Can I see you later?”

He swallowed, unable to speak, and nodded. He automatically lowered his books to cover his extremely obvious reaction to her attentions and tried – unsuccessfully – not to stare at her nipples, which were doing an imitation of – 

“I’ll meet you at the Union about eight?”

Another nod.

“Good.” She turned and hurried away down the path.

He closed his eyes so he wouldn’t see the provocative sway of her backside. He had to stop this. He had to get to class. He had to have sex.

“Kex?”

He nearly shrieked. “What?” This was turning out to be one hell of a day.

“Are you coming to the meeting tomorrow?”

Meeting. He had a meeting? What meeting? Oh! That meeting! Yeah! The one with a roomful of computer programmers like himself, and no sex. Right! “Er, yeah.”

“Okay. Just wanted to make sure you hadn’t forgotten.” The club’s President, Jeremy, gave him a quick smile and a salute, and wandered away.

I need to sit down, he told himself, determined to push away all thoughts of what Rianna might have in mind for that night. They’d been out together a few times, it was true, but had never done anything more than kiss and touch. He wasn’t sure if she wanted any more than that, but was beginning to think she did, and now he really had to go sit down.

 

IV.

Rules were rules, and they’d been broken. Well, one of them, anyway. The one that said No Boys in the Girl’s Dorm After Ten O’Clock. Rules like that didn’t exist in the Sorority Houses, but Rianna didn’t live in one of those. As a freshman, she had to wait until she’d proven herself to be a good Little Sister, and her final acceptance into Beta Sigma House wouldn’t happen until right before Winter Break.

So she’d broken the rules, and there was no denying it. Not that she really cared one way or the other. Especially not on this particular morning as she lay curled against the rippling muscles of her Viking. He’d told her only his mother came from that part of the world, but his physique declared loudly whose genes were dominant.

The sun had been up for at least twenty minutes, but she was in no hurry to join it. Instead, she stared at the young man who had literally rocked her world the night before, this massive yet incredibly gentle young man whose size, it turned out, was consistent everywhere. She grinned, shivering, and draped an arm over his broad chest. He’d taken his time, making sure he wasn’t hurting her, and in the end had given her more pleasure than she’d ever dreamed possible. How easy it would be to fall in love with him! she thought, kissing one of his ribs, not yet ready to admit that maybe she already had.

Kex made the deep, rumbling sound of someone having a lovely dream, and slowly opened his eyes.

“Morning,” she whispered.

“Am I still here?”

“Er, yeah.” She giggled quietly. “Thought I’d never wear you out, but you finally fell asleep.”

He gave her a crooked smile. “Sorry.”

“For what? That was…you’re incredible!”

He looked genuinely surprised by her words and sat up. “And you’re incredibly kind.” He stifled a yawn behind one hand. “Mmm. Shower.”

“Good idea. May I join you?”

He replied by sliding out of bed, turning, and picking her up. “Why not?”

She suddenly hoped they’d do more than wash...by the time they were able to get dressed, it was almost noon, and Rianna told him to wait while she checked the hallway to see if she could sneak him back out without being seen.

Everyone seemed to be elsewhere, so she headed quickly back to her room, but right as she was about to open the door, the one across the hall opened. “Crap,” she muttered and turned around.

“Ri!” exclaimed the girl who had come out.

“Marty!”

“Uh, was it my imagination, or did I hear some…activity in there last night?”

“Activity?”

“Oh, come on, Ri. I’m not that stupid. You think I don’t recognize the sounds of wild sex when I hear them?”

I’m sure you do, sweetheart – more than most. “Wild sex, is it?”

“Yes. Aw, come on – you can tell me.”

“And then you’ll tell everyone else, including the staff, and I’ll get kicked out, right?”

“Aha! So you did have a guy in there!”

“Never said that. Later, Marty.” Rianna opened her door, planning to enter swiftly and shut it behind her before her nosy dorm-mate could get close enough to see…

Too late. The moment she pushed the door open, Marty pounced. She shoved past Rianna and flung herself into the room, fully expecting to find some pathetic-looking guy covering himself with her sheets. What she found was the delicious Kex, naked and glorious, staring down at her with one eyebrow raised.

Marty gasped, her eyes unable to choose what to stare at. She’d never actually met him, but had seen him from time to time, and had heard plenty; nothing she was seeing made liars out of those who had talked about him. Not only were they not exaggerating, they hadn’t given him nearly enough credit for…oh, lord.

“Is there a problem?” he asked, his look only mildly inquisitive. Inside, however, something else entirely was going on. He knew this girl. Hadn’t thought about her for at least four years, either, yet here she was. What was this – Old Home Week? Holy crap – Martina Casman! And she was staring at him, at his…yeah. Right. Of course, the look she was giving him was anything but derisive, not even in the same solar system as the scathing glares he’d gotten from her back then. Nope. She actually looked like she wanted to push him down on the bed and, and, and, uh, that.

“No problem,” she squeaked, blissfully unaware of his identity – and the turmoil in his mind.

“You have no plans to tell anyone about this, then, I assume.” Great. Now he was attempting a Jedi mind-trick. And strangely enough, it seemed to be working.

“N-no! I – I don’t plan to tell anyone. Honestly.”

He took a step closer, suddenly enjoying her extreme discomfort. He leaned down, putting his mouth next to her ear. “You have no idea how grateful I’ll be,” he breathed, and saw goosebumps rise on her neck. Oh, this was awesome!

“I – okay.” Her voice had become very tiny, and she looked like she was about to pass out.

Unable to resist, he gave her ear a small kiss and straightened. “Thank you.”

Martina, or Marty as she was now known, turned stiffly and left, arms straight down at her sides, making her look like a weird robot of some kind. Back out in the hall, she grabbed Rianna by the shoulders and said, “Oh my God! Oh…my…God!” Then she let go and ran back to her room, slamming the door and locking it.

“Now that was strange.” Rianna chuckled and went back into her room, where she found Kex in the process of getting dressed. “What did you do to her?”

He shrugged. “Not much. I asked her not to tell anyone, and then I kissed her ear.”

“You what?!”

“It’s okay, Rianna. Believe it or not, I know her, too. Remember that football player I told you about yesterday, the one who used to give me a hard time? Well, Martina was the bitch he dated, and any time she needed to be amused, she’d lie to him about me just to get him to beat me up.”

“Martina…that’s her real name? I don’t like her, by the way, and never did. So…why did you do that?”

“She walked in before I could put any clothes on, and was obviously in major freak-out mode when she saw me, so I decided to freak her out even more. It worked, I think.” He gave her a huge grin and pulled his shirt over his head. “And you have nothing to worry about, if that’s what you’re doing.”

“Maybe just a little.”

He pulled her to him and held her close for a few minutes. Rianna was actually quite tall herself, but she still only came up to a spot several inches below his shoulders.

“We better go,” she said into his chest, reluctant to actually move.

“I suppose.” One arm still holding her, he reached over with the other and picked up his backpack. Then he kissed the top of her head. “I’m ready.”

Somehow, she managed to get him out of the dorm without getting caught. It had occurred to her that if anyone saw them, she could always claim they were on their way in, not out, but she wasn’t any good at lying, and she’d never heard Kex say anything but the truth.

It was Saturday, and neither of them had anything pressing to do other than that meeting he had later in the evening. They decided finally to find someplace quiet and talk. Nothing more. Kex was finally admitting that he had already fallen for this sweet, smart, sexy and kind-hearted young lady. What else to do, then, except open up to her and see how she’d feel about him afterward.

They grabbed some coffee and a few pieces of fruit from the Cafeteria, which they took to a wide grassy part of the campus that was peppered with stately trees, many of them still wearing the neon colors of autumn. As they relaxed against one of them, he told her about his family. About where he’d grown up and how his parents had raised him. About what he had eventually realized about them and his inadvertent part in who they’d become. About his miserable school life that was offset by all the positives – his parents’ love, the worlds he’d discovered in books, the world of the internet, his own love of programming and drawing. And he told her about how his father’s alcoholism had brought them to the place where they’d had to sell the house and move, and were still living in the old if well-tended double-wide they’d purchased four years ago in the large trailer park less than a mile away.

Then he told her his real name, and having said all he was going to, waited for her response.

She was silent for a few minutes, but then she shifted around to face him more fully and put a hand to the side of his face. “Why did you tell me all that?”

“Because of how I feel about you.”

She pulled herself up to her knees, leaned forward, and kissed him. “I love you, Kex, and if that freaks you out or chases you away, at least I’ll know I was honest with you.”

He was freaked out, all right. Freaked out that she felt like that, and – “You do?”

“Yup.”

He kissed her between the eyes and pulled her close, holding her as tightly as he could without breaking any bones. “I love you, too, Rianna,” he whispered into her hair. He meant it, too.

They stayed that way for a long while, Rianna changing position only a little to make herself more comfortable. Overhead, the leaves sighed in a dancing breeze as a number of them released their final, tenuous hold and fluttered to the ground.

“If you hurt me, I’ll tell everyone your real name!”

Kex looked up. Standing there, looking comically scared, was Taylor.

“Why would I hurt you? Do you really think you’re worth any of my attention? Grow up, Taylor. Oh, and go away.”

Rianna looked up over her shoulder at Kex. “That him?”

“Yup.”

Taylor’s fright was joined by a hissy-fit brand of outrage. “Hey! What did you tell her about me?”

“Excuse me a second,” he muttered to Rianna, and disentangled himself from her embrace. He stood slowly, watching with satisfaction as Taylor’s head went back by degrees so he could look up at him.

“If you hit me – ack!”

Chuckling, Kex had reached out, grabbed the front of Taylor’s shirt, and lifted him easily off the ground until they were at eye-level. “Don’t flatter yourself, little man. This is the last time I’ll say it – go away. You mean nothing to me.” He opened his hand and his former attacker fell back onto the grass.

Eyes huge with fright, Taylor scrambled to his feet and ran off.

Behind him, Kex heard Rianna sigh loudly and he turned.

“My hero,” she said through a big grin. She ran to him, put her hands on his shoulders, and jumped up, straddling him with her strong legs. She gave him a deep kiss, then laughed as he spun around, his hands pressing her closer.

“My princess,” he said when he could breathe again.

 

*******

“This is why I had to make sure you’d be here tonight,” said Jeremy, looking very pleased with himself.

Kex was still too stunned to speak. The “meeting” had not, as he’d thought, been the usual weekly programmer get-together, but rather an introduction between him and the owner of one of the most prestigious computer-game companies in the nation. Jeremy had sent him a few examples of Kex’s work – both the formulated games and the artwork – and the man had been so impressed, he’d written back to say he wanted to meet this talented young man.

“If you don’t mind,” said the man, whose name was Jonas Lee, “I’d like to see more examples of your games, maybe a few story-boards and sketches. Would that be okay?”

“I – sure.” Why, though?

As if reading the young man’s mind, Jonas added, “I’d like to discuss the possibility of hiring you, actually, but I’ll need more examples to show the team. I assume everything has been copyrighted and well-documented as being yours, yes?”

Numb with disbelief, Kex nodded.

“Good. I want you to feel confident about showing me your work. Too much piracy in the business, if you ask me. Now, if we decide to offer you a job, would you take it? We could work around your school schedule, of course.”

Kex found his voice at last and said, “What would this job entail?”

“You doing what you seem to do best, mainly. Developing game programs based on your own story-lines, and using your artwork as the basis of the visuals. You’d have a team of artists and programmers, too, people well-versed in CG and such.” He smiled. “You would of course be paid.” And then he told Kex how much.

He thought about all those hospital bills that were still outstanding, about all the new ones his father’s failing health were generating, and realized that with his first paycheck, they’d all be erased. “Could I get all that in writing?”

Jonas laughed. “Wouldn’t do it any other way, Kex. I have a feeling your work will make us more popular and bring in more capital than everything we’ve done to date. I’m not about to let some legal faux-pas get in the way of that!”

Yes, and I’m bigger than you, Kex thought, almost laughing as well. But he didn’t. This was serious stuff and he’d have to be very careful, move slowly. The man was essentially promising not to steal his work and ideas, but he didn’t know this guy at all. Words meant nothing anymore, sadly. “So you’ll give me an actual contract to look at?”

“Sure. You might want to get a lawyer, though, since legal jargon is nothing like computer-speak.”

Kex didn’t bother telling the man that he understood “legal jargon” quite well. “Fine – you can email it, I guess, but I’d like a hard copy, too.”

Jonas agreed, and in the end, their meeting turned out to be the beginning of something neither could have ever imagined.

V.

It never occurred to Kex to be embarrassed about where he lived – realistic about how others might see it, but nothing more. He had a home that was neat, well-cared-for, and lived in by good people. He also had good neighbors and had been very happy there, even though he was eventually too big to fit in his own bedroom properly. But so what? At least he had a bedroom, something he knew too many people in the world did not.

He was still driving the Chevy he’d bought during the summer before college began, but had gotten it a fresh coat of paint, detailed the interior to within an inch of its mechanical life, and had a friend of his who was a natural with engines give that part of it a major overhaul. What had entered his life as a noisy green rust-bucket was now a classic-looking cherry-red cream-puff that hummed along with almost the same efficiency as its much newer counterparts.

Rianna loved it. She said it was like him – unique and full of character. So while he really didn’t need it to drive the extremely short distance between the campus and the trailer park, he nonethless picked her up in it from her dorm on the day before Winter Break to bring her home with him to meet his parents. They hadn’t gotten formally engaged, but marriage had definitely been a frequent topic between them, and he felt it was time Helga and William made her aquaintance.

Helga was immediately delighted. “What a beautiful young lady you are!” she exclaimed after giving the girl a warm hug at the door. “Please come in!” The woman stepped back, waving expansively toward the livingroom. Then, as Rianna went past her, she threw her arms around her son’s waist and squeezed him tightly, holding back tears.

“Uh, Mom, I was just here about twenty minutes ago…”

“I know, sweetheart, but now I’ve met your lovely girlfriend, and I’m so happy for you!”

He laughed and squeezed her back – carefully. “Thanks. Let’s go see how Dad is handling this.”

They went into the livingroom to find Mr. Exford standing unsteadily and shaking hands with Rianna. He rarely got up, his weight making it a dangerous undertaking, but apparently felt it was worth the risk for this occasion.

“Erik!” the man exclaimed as his wife and son entered. “She’s exquisite!”

“She’s a lot more than that, Dad,” said Kex, smiling.

Rianna turned and immediately bit back an urge to laugh. The love of her life was unable to stand completely upright without his head hitting the ceiling, and his slightly hunched stance made her think of Gandalf trying to maneuver the diminutive confines of Bilbo’s hobbit hole.

“You’ll be joining us for dinner, of course, yes?” asked Helga.

“Kex told me you’d invited me to eat with you, so yes. And thank you very much.”

Helga clucked her tongue. “You know, I can’t get used to that nickname, but apparently it’s all he uses these days.”

“It’s convenient,” said the giant formerly known as Erik. “Oh, I talked to the doctor earlier,” he told his father who had managed to lower himself back onto the sofa without hurting himself. “Said you’re now third on the list.” He had been working for the gaming company for over two months, and had paid off every last overdue bill. In addition, he’d gotten his father put on the list for a new liver, and only hoped the man could hold out until one became available.

“Guess that means I have to get more serious about losing weight.” William actually looked a bit glum about this.

“Yes, you do. I’ll help you, you know. After all, I had to go through all that myself, remember.”

“Ah!” Helga got up and waddled over to a low table under the only window in the room and took out a large photo album.

“You’ve got to be joking,” Kex muttered. “I thought this only happened in silly chick-flicks.”

Rianna snorted and smacked his arm. “Goof-ball.”

He kissed her.

“Okay, you two!” William chuckled and waggled a finger at them.

“Rianna, dear, I think you’ll appreciate this. Here’s a picture of Erik in Middle School.” She held out the open album, one finger jabbing at a photo in a pocket half-way down the page.

The girl stared, open-mouthed. “That’s you? Oh, wow! How much did you weigh?”

Kex rolled his eyes. “God. I had to be at least three hundred and fifty, and only about five-foot-three or four.”

“How long did it take you to lose all that?”

He sat back, having taken a seat next to his father, and did some calculations. “Hmm. Forever.”

“Kex!”

“Sorry. Yeah, well, about two months into my diet and exercise routine, I had only lost maybe fifty pounds, but the summer between my fifteenth and sixteenth birthdays, I started to get taller.”

“Did he ever!” Helga shook her head. “It was the most amazing thing! You’d think I’d started putting ‘Miracle-Gro’ in his food or something! How many inches did he grow that year, Will?”

“Eight or nine, I’d say. The next year, he sprouted up another four or five, and by the time he was eighteen, he was too tall to walk in the door.”

“Ha.” Something had struck Kex as he listened and he said, “Dang. I went from needing the doors widened to needing them raised. Nothing like being normal!”

“No, it was nothing like being normal!” William grinned.

“Thank goodness.” Rianna, who was sitting beside Helga on the loveseat adjacent to the sofa, gave his hand a squeeze. “You turned out perfect.”

Maybe that was the moment that Mr. and Mrs. Exford simultaneously fell in love with Rianna. Maybe not. But regardless, from that day forward they treated her as if she’d been born into the family.

Things went rather differently, however, when Kex was introduced to Rianna’s parents. They lived in Florida, and since they were seemingly too important and busy to come up to the Northeast to meet their daughter’s love interest, Kex bought plane tickets so they could visit them over the holidays.

South Beach was elegant in its own way, but completely lacking when it came to the kind of festive atmosphere he’d always associated with Thanksgiving and Christmas. Palm trees with twinkling, colorful lights were still palm trees. The weather, too, was somewhat disconcerting for him. Eighty degrees in December? Really?

Mr. and Mrs. Moore, Rianna’s parents, lived in a gated community of mansions. Most of them were stucco with Spanish tile roofs, and all of them were as close together as the trailers in the less-than-high-class “gated” community in which Kex lived. Quentin Moore was a lawyer, while his wife, Jenna, was a volunteer at one of the many local retirement homes. She donated three hours a day to helping the librarian there re-shelve books the residents had borrowed and returned.

All of this Rianna explained as they rode to the house in an airport limo. “You probably won’t like them very much.”

“Why not? Aren’t they nice people?” He honestly didn’t give a hoot if they were wealthy or not, and in fact admired those who had done well in life. The way a person behaved toward others was all that really mattered to him.

“No.”

Well, that shattered his hopes. “For real?”

“My father is mean and my mother is a snob.”

“How did you turn out so well?”

She smiled. “My grandparents raised me for the most part. Mom and Dad were too busy traveling the world in an effort to impress the real moneyed class to have time to deal with a child. I also believe I was an accident.”

He turned toward her and took her by the shoulders. “No you weren’t. You’re the most valuable human being I’ve ever met, as well as the most golden-hearted, generous, loving person I know, and that was no accident.” He wondered now if this part of her past was why she’d never spoken of it. Seemed they both had things in their lives that may or may not have gone down well with the other.

She stared, fighting a sudden wave of emotion, then flung her arms around his neck. “I love you,” she whispered fiercely. “I love you, I love you, I love you!”

Okay, he thought. This wasn’t right. How dare anyone make this amazing girl unaware of her own worth! “And I love you, Ri.” He kissed the top of her head and held her close for a while. But curiosity got the better of him and he eventually pulled away. “How, exactly, is your father mean?”

“I – I think he wanted a son, and was so disappointed…he used to hit me a lot and yell. Mom told him to be careful not to leave marks because of what people would think, and I’m pretty sure that’s the only reason she ever got angry with him for hurting me.” She frowned and looked away. “I also think that’s why my grandmother tried to get me away from them.”

“Abusing you wasn’t reason enough for her to succeed?”

“She couldn’t prove it.”

They fell silent after this, and for the remainder of the ride, Kex had to decide whether or not he was going to let her parents know that he was aware of their treatment of Rianna, or let it go for the time being. One thing was sure, though – no way was she going to spend any of her vacation time alone with them.

“Here we go,” said the limo driver some time later. “Should I let you out here, or do you want me to drive you in?”

Rianna told him the code, which he punched into a keypad to their left, and the wide, wrought-iron gates swung slowly open.

The house was exactly as Rianna had described it, although Kex honestly thought it looked an awful lot like all the others around it. In this context, it certainly was nothing special. He got out and went around to her side to open her door. Then he paid the driver, took their suitcases from the trunk, and carried them up the main walkway.

A woman in a maid’s uniform opened the door (apparently, Rianna couldn’t simply walk into her own house). She stared up at Kex for several moments before acknowledging the girl at his side. “Oh! Miss Rianna! Please – your parents are waiting in the game room.” She stepped back, giving Kex a shy smile.

“Thanks, Milly. This is Kex, by the way.” She took his arm, and without waiting for the maid to respond, told him to leave the suitcases there and tugged him through the huge foyer toward a hallway leading somewhere into the back of the house.

“What - ”

“I want to get this over with,” she said quietly, her expression unhappy.

When they entered the game room a minute or so later, Kex discovered that “game” referred not to chess, pool, or any kind of actual gameplay, but to big game. Lions. Rhinocerous. Deer. Their severed, stuffed heads were mounted on all four walls of the large room, while smaller beasts had gone from jungle to taxidermist to the Moore’s display cabinets and tables. He was mildly horrified, but not really surprised.

“Rianna, darling!” exclaimed the tall, willowy woman who had risen from a wingback chair when they came in. “How delightful to see you again!” She came over and gave the girl a quick peck on the cheek, and forgot about her a moment later her in her eagerness to check out the young man looming at her side. “And you must be, er, Rex, is it?”

Keeping his face expressionless, he said, “Kex.” No need to say more, really.

“Indeed! And what kind of name is that, I wonder? Did your mother invent it?” She gave a slight, condescending laugh.

“No, I did.”

“Did you! Why ever would you do something like that?”

“Now, Jenna, don’t embarrass the boy,” said a man’s voice.

And for the first time, Kex allowed himself to look at Mr. Moore. He was a large man, athletically large, unlike Kex’s father. His hands were well-manicured but big, strong, square, and capable of serious damage…

“I’m Quentin,” he said, putting out one of those hands for Kex to shake.

He almost ignored it, but swallowed his feelings of extreme dislike for Rianna’s sake. It was with considerable satisfaction, then, that he realized his own hand was bigger and could easily crush the bones of this bully. “How do you do, sir.”

“So who are your people, dear?” The falsely aristocratic Jenna was speaking again.

“My people?”

“Yes. Your people. Who are they? What’s your family name?” Now she sounded exasperated.

“Exford.”

“Ah! British, then?”

“My father’s family is, yes.”

“I see.” She seemed to thaw a tiny bit. “And your mother’s?”

“From Norway.” Why was any of this important? he wondered.

“Well, er, Kex, I understand you live near the University. Is it a nice community?”

“It’s lovely, really.” He knew how to play her game, having encountered a number of individuals like her since his employment with the gaming company. All they were interested in was sounding like they were far more important than they actually were, and used “code words” with each other to imply false realities about themselves.

“Well, then, I look forward to meeting them some day!”

No you don’t, you stupid hag. “I’m sure you’ll find them interesting.”

“So! Drink?” Mr. Moore had gone to a side table covered with cut crystal – a decanter and several different kinds of glasses.

“Just water, please.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Nothing else? It’s not like you have to drive.”

A test. That’s what this was. Kex put his head to one side, considering. He towered over this man, and since he knew he could consume vast quantities of alcohol without any side-effects more serious than a weird tendency to tell bad jokes, he finally nodded. “Scotch and water, then.” Unlike his father, he didn’t like the taste of alcohol that much, and absolutely detested beer.

“That’s better!” The man poured out two drinks and handed one to Kex. “After you’ve had a sip or two, I’d like you to tell me your intentions toward my daughter.” He laughed a hearty and totally insincere laugh. “This is two-hundred-year-old Scotch, by the way. Hope you like it.”

Kex took a sip and found it smoother than he’d have expected, but still awful-tasting. “Very nice.” He took another sip and added, “I intend to take care of your daughter, sir. I love her very much and God help anyone who hurts her in any way.” He smiled and took a third sip, thoroughly enjoying the way Mr. Moore’s smile tried to slide off his face.

“How chivalrous!” Mrs. Moore sounded now like she was purring, grossing Kex out completely.

“No, ma’am. Just proper. She deserves no less.” More code. To his surprise, the woman didn’t seem to get what he was doing, because she began to look less and less arrogant and more and more welcoming.

Rianna’s father, on the other hand, had begun to look vaguely terrified.

Oh, yes, this was going to be a very interesting visit…

 

*******

They got through the next two days with only one incident, about which Kex and Quentin alone would ever know. The man had invited his daughter’s guest to his gun room, which seemed to the young man to be an over-the-top obvious attempt at intimidation. Claiming he wanted to show off his collection of game-hunting firearms, the man made sure no one else would be joining them there, and shut the door.

“Well, now!” he began. “Have you ever gone hunting?”

“No, sir. Never had any interest in it.”

“Every boy should give it a try at least once, you know. Even if it’s just taking down a deer.” He chuckled and went to the massive, glass-fronted gun cabinet taking up most of one wall in the vast, beautifully appointed room. He opened it with a key he’d taken from his trouser pocket, then stared at the display of rifles and other large weapons arranged there.

Kex wanted to ask him why he bothered looking at everything like that when the damn doors were clear glass, for one thing, and since he had to know already every single firearm in there. But he knew the answer – the man was trying to be impressive, but now all Kex wanted to do was laugh.

“Ah. Here we go.”

Right – like you suddenly discovered that one… “Sir?”

Quentin took out a rifle with a large scope mounted on its barrel and stepped away from the cabinet. “This baby can take down an elephant,” he said, giving the thing a loving stare. He shifted his gaze to Kex. “Take down a man even more easily, wouldn’t you say?” An angry glint had appeared in his eyes, as it were. He was showing his true feelings for some reason, his intention apparently to chase Kex off somehow.

It didn’t work. Kex took a step closer and said, “Not if the man can get it away from you first.”

“No one is that quick, Kex. No one - ” Whatever else he was going to say got swallowed by a gasp as the formidable young man in front of him suddenly moved faster than he would have expected someone that size could move.

When Kex stopped moving, he was holding the rifle. “I’m sorry – what?”

Quentin gulped. “I…well! Heh! Looks like you had the element of surprise on your side, eh?”

“Not really. You see, sir, not everyone who’s big is necessarily slow. But in this case, I think the anomalistic, psychopathetic predeliction to induce recreancy and trepidity by gasconating about your contrivances of violent dispatch is less a function of excogitation and more a matter of self-preservatory instinct.” He shrugged and returned the rifle to the cabinet. “Honestly, though, one would have to be of a saxicolous predisposition not to know that. See you at lunch?”

Short of murdering Kex in his sleep, Quentin was unable to think of any way to one-up the impressive youth his daughter had chosen to accompany her, and for the remainder of the visit, he sought and found exactly the right number of excuses to be elsewhere to make it impossible to spend any further time in Kex’s presence.

It was hardly surprising, then, that when Kex and Rianna got married the following year, the man developed a sudden conference in Grenada and simply couldn’t attend the wedding.

 

Impressum

Tag der Veröffentlichung: 26.06.2012

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