chapter 1

Claire started to regret coming about twenty minutes after she’d arrived. She’d dressed herself with trepidation, finally settling on some casually patriotic blue jeans, a white t-shirt, and red flannel - which, she had to admit, fit her slim body rather well. But the party was humid and warm, and everyone else was wearing shorts, and soon she’d tied her flannel around her waist and rolled her jeans up to her thigh. She nursed a plastic cup of some sort of alcohol in her hands, taking a small sip, wincing at the taste. There were so many others here, too. Claire had imagined something smaller, quieter, more akin to the Independence Day hangouts she’d had with her high school friends way back in her podunk hometown, where they’d fired off packs of bottle rockets with boys out on the delta and drank beer on the trampoline. But this wasn’t the backwoods that she was familiar with. This was a college city, proper, and it seemed like half the population was crammed into the house, spilling over the banister rails and lined up against the walls, under the Christmas lights that had either been left up six months too late or put up six months too early.

Worst of all, she hadn’t even seen Rory.

Really, he was the reason that she had come at all. Her entire freshman year had been a series of failed attempts to make connections beyond the nebulous study group she’d been an on-off part of. So, of course, she had partially succeeded in convincing herself that she was going because this was finally going to be the night she’d force herself to be sociable. But that facade had fallen away, slowly but surely, as she made her first trip around the party.

First, Claire went up the stairs, then back down, and then out onto the lawn, where a mob of people swarmed under strings of paper lanterns. She’d gone through the side garden, the smell of marijuana lingering in the air, and finally back into the kitchen, and unless Rory had been, inconveniently, moving around the opposite end of the party, he was definitely not here. Even in the crowd, he would be clearly recognized. Claire didn’t know his exact measurements, but his mountainous form must’ve stood 6’4”, over a foot taller than her own petite frame. And, she thought to herself with a flutter in her chest - he probably weighed over six hundred pounds.

Or, at least, definitely a good deal more than when he’d first waddled heavily into the first of two biology classes they shared. Claire had arrived early – the day before, she’d confused herself into being ten minutes late for another class, and was dead set on not repeating her error – and had taken a window seat directly opposite the door. So, naturally, she’d had a magnificent view of Rory’s massive gut swaying from side to side as he hefted his way across the floor. She’d also had the magnificent luck of having somehow deterred all other students from taking the seat next to her, and, in a moment that seemed to last forever, watched the enormous man approach and point at the seat next to her. Not taken? Claire’s brain froze, mesmerized by the doughy, rolly belly in front of her that was straining the buttons on his clean, new shirt.

Somehow, she’d managed to nod, and he had slowly lowered his massive rear into the chair, huffing and puffing from the exertion, belly spreading over his thighs. He seemed to tower above her, blocking out the harsh fluorescent ceiling lights with his torso, and suddenly, Claire had never felt so small. He’d leaned away from her to dig into his backpack, and his shirt came untucked on the side, exposing a roll of fat. When he rose back up, he didn’t seem to notice the untucked fabric, and his bulging side forced it up even further. Claire’s heartbeat quickened, unable to take her eyes off the wide patch of exposed skin. She imagined pressing her hand into it, feeling it sink into his immensity. She imagined lifting the shirt, watching it slide out from under that massive belly, all of the flab outlined under the strained cotton being freed.

From that moment on, she’d been obsessed.

Truthfully, Claire had always had a thing for bigger guys, a budding fascination with size that started when she was quite young. It was an attraction that she had kept tightly under wraps, doing everything she could to conceal it. As Claire grew older, she had a few casual flings with some of the other boys at her high school; a tall, lanky basketball player with smooth skin, a long-haired who worked at the grocery store and was constantly stoned, a French exchange student in her senior year. But none of them had been able to really satisfy her, no matter how hard she tried, and she wasn’t sure how to accept that she was increasingly only into much, much fatter men.

For the rest of the day, the image of Rory’s exposed fat side floated about her brain like an incessant fog. Two days later, he’d shown up again in another class – different shirt, same waddle. He’d recognized Claire and made his way over to the once again empty seat next to her, and hefted his prodigious body down. For the first two weeks, they didn’t say a word to each other in either class. There was only the space shared between them, occupied mostly by Rory. They were not difficult classes, and Claire frequently allowed her attention to wander from the whiteboard and towards the large, bulky figure beside her.

There was a lot to look at. The way he overfilled the seat, his soft upper back spilling over the edge. The way his shirt would tuck itself into his rolls, outlining them clearly; a vast landscape running all the way from front to back. The way his unshaven stubble framed his double chin as it rose and fell against his chest with each breath. Claire tried not to look too obviously, but at the same time, she never truly felt as if she was getting used to his sheer size. Every time he sat down, he was huge, and every time he stood up with a grunt, he seemed to be even bigger.

One day, during a lecture break, Rory had dropped his pencil. It rolled off his desk, bounced off his thigh, and landed on the floor between them. Claire had hesitated just long enough to realize that she shouldn’t delay, and started to bend to pick it up. Rory was already slouched over, his tubby hands grasping in the air, but his belly was in the way. Claire reached past him, picked up the pencil, and held it out. He smiled, a little embarrassed.

“Thanks”, he said, catching his breath. Claire smiled back.

“No problem.”

His voice was low, but not gruff – a voice that was undeniably fat, dull around the edges. Bassy. He went back to scrawling notes onto his paper, then sat back and sighed, tugging on his shirt. He spread his thighs as his muscles relaxed, his belly sinking into his lap, and seemed to not notice how much of his body was pressed up against the much smaller woman beside him.

“It’s warm in here, huh?” said Rory, wiping a bead of sweat from his brow. His breaths were shallow and strained, and Claire contemplated how much effort it must have taken for him to even walk to class.

Claire nodded, swallowing. “A little bit.”

“I mean, maybe it’s just me. I’ve got all this, you know…” Rory sheepishly indicated at his heft. “Insulation.”

“No, I get it,” she replied, laughing nervously. “Big guys get warm a lot faster.”

“It’s good in winter, actually, but summers can be brutal.”

“That’s what pools are for, aren’t they?”

His face lit up, and he smiled at her. “Oh, yeah, definitely. Wish we had a pool at this place, swimming is so good. Hey, I’m Rory, by the way.” He stuck out a fat paw, and Claire wrapped her fingers around his. His hand encompassed hers completely, and she felt tingles running along her spine.

“Claire.”

Rory opened his mouth as if he were about to say something else, but he turned away as the professor dimmed the lights, and the class went silent.