TF (merging)

“No,” said Simon.

“Wait, don’t say no yet,” Paul said.

Simon thought he already had, but he listened to his friend anyway.

“Just an hour,” Paul pleaded. “You come to the restaurant, you eat, you make small talk with Britta’s roommate, and then you can leave. Just do me a favour here, okay? Plus, it’s an Indian restaurant. You love Indian food, right?”

“Um, not really,” Simon said. Somewhere in his head a voice was screaming GIRLS! STRANGERS!! RUN AWAY! Nervously he pushed his glasses back up his nose. “I don’t understand why you need someone else at your date anyway.”

“Because Britta doesn’t want Tiff to be left out.”

“Tiff?”

“Tiffany.”

Women named after upmarket jewellers were a bad sign, Simon thought. “What’s she like?”

“Quiet. Funny. Good sense of humour. Pretty. Beautiful. Or so I’m told. I haven’t actually met her.” Paul hesitated. “So, will you do it? Be my plus one on my date with Britta? Come on, man. I really like this girl. This could be the one.”

Simon sighed inwardly. There was no way he was going to get out of this one. “Okay, I’ll come.”

“Great!” Paul grinned. “I owe you one, man.”

“Actually, you owe me about five. Not that I’m counting …”

“Ah, it’ll all even out in the end. Besides, how bad could it be?”

*

It was really, really bad.

Simon had taken the train to the nearest station. Naturally it had been late, and he’d run from the station to the restaurant. There Paul had introduced him to Tiffany and Britta. The latter was friendly enough, but Tiffany had looked at him like she’d just found him on the bottom of his shoe.

“What do you do?” she’d asked with a grimace.

“Uh, I’m in IT.”

He could see her estimation of him sink right through the floor.

She was a tight-lipped girl with an expensive blonde dye job and she was a total snob.

Dinner was a disaster. Paul enthusiastically ordered all the spiciest things on the menu. Spicy food repeated on Simon something awful and he was soon trying to hold in some very big burps. Worse, Paul and Britta were totally all goggly-eyes with each other. Britta was giggling and laughing and hanging on to Paul’s every word. It had to be love. I mean, this was Paul, a nice guy but hardly an Oscar Wilde.

Tiffany picked at her plate and scowled. “I can’t eat this. Do they do salads here?”

Paul and Britta ignored her. “I don’t think so,” Simon said.

There was dead silence for a minute. Simon struggled to think of some small talk.

“So, you seen Deadpool yet?” he said as brightly as possible.

Tiffany looked blankly at him. “What’s that?”

“A superhero movie. An X-Men offshoot. Marvel Comics? You know?”

“I only watch romcoms.”

More silence. Simon looked at his watch. They’d been there barely 40 minutes, but he’d had enough. “Well!” he announced. “Look at the time! Gotta get going! Big day at work tomorrow.” He pulled his wallet out.

Paul didn’t even look away from Britta. “Don’t worry about it. See ya.”

“Bye!” said Britta.

Well, looked like this date was going just fine. Simon stood up and turned to leave.

A tug at his hoodie sleeve. “Wait!” Tiffany hissed. “Where are you going?”

“Uh, home?” Simon said, confused.

“You’re supposed to give me a lift home! I came here with Britta and she’s obviously not driving back to the apartment. Paul said you’d drive me home!”

Oh hell. “Uh, I actually took the train here.”

Tiffany just looked at him with a frown that threatened to knit her eyebrows together.

Simon sighed. “We’ll flag down a taxi outside.”

*

Half an hour later they were marching down the street, still trying to find a taxi. Tiffany kept up a non-stop monologue on the merits of the suburb, the street, various taxi companies and most of all Simon himself. And by merits, she meant the lack thereof.

“I can’t believe I gave up watching The Bachelor to come here! It’ll be fun, Britta said. Paul’s friend is bound to be nice, she said. And instead I wind up traipsing down a road in the middle of nowhere with a … a … a geek!”

Standing right here, Simon thought. Again he cursed himself for, once again, helping Paul out.

“Are you eventually going to find a taxi and get me home, or are we just going to walk there?”

“I’m trying.”

“You said it.”

Simon wished the ground would open up and swallow him whole.

And oddly enough, that’s exactly what happened.

It started with a jagged crack that suddenly ran across the road, widening rapidly and cleaving the path in two.

The path where Simon was just about to take a step.

He tottered for a second, then disappeared into the hole.

Simon landed heavily … somewhere. The impact knocked the wind out of him for a second. Stunned, he rolled over.

Where Tiffany, who’d also fallen down the hole, landed on him. Or, not so much on him, as … into him.

The two bodies bloated out together like pouring custard, before bouncing back into one shape. One very big shape.

The hole, as it turned out, wasn’t that big after all. The figure got his feet and found himself looking out at the night sky.

“Holy craparoni!” he gasped. “What the freakin’ freak was that? Why am I in a goddamned hole? Okay, first order of business, gettin’ out.” He reached up and grabbed the rim of the hole. Firmly digging in, he began to pull himself out, finally hoisting himself out of the crack.

“Well, that was easy enough. With these biceps, anyway …” He flexed his impressively huge muscles, then did a double take. “Woah! Check me out! I’m stacked! I guess all those sessions at the gym paid off ,.. wait … what sessions at the gym?! What gym? Who the h-e-double hockey sticks am I?”

The hulking figure shambled over to a shop window. Behind him, the crack in the road grew smaller and finally fused itself together.

“Okay, I’m …” Huge! About seven feet tall, heavily muscled, totally bald, with a big cleft in his chin, and a jaw that ran for several blocks. He ran his hand over his biceps. “Not bad, not bad at all. Pretty damned handsome, if I say so myself. My … self? What’s my name?”

Somewhere in his head names swam up. Simon and … Tiffany? No, wait, he couldn’t be both Simon and Tiffany. He had to be …

Simony!

No, hang on, that was a dumb name. A better name would be …

“Pete!” he decided. “Yeah! I like the sound of that! Big Boy Pete! Full-time bruiser, ain’t no loser.” Pete chuckled to himself. A couple of kids walking by looked at him strangely. He stared back and they hurriedly strode on.

“Yeah, keep on walkin’, ya mutts,” he mumbled. Jeez, why was it so difficult to remember anything? Like where he was, or how he’d got there, or how to get home …

“Home!” he exclaimed. “Yeah, I better get home. Been a big night. Lots to do tomorrow … probably. Plus, I’m missin’ The Bachelor! Wait, what’s that?”

By some odd miracle, at that point a vacant taxi turned around the corner. Pete lurched forward, waved his hand, and the taxi stopped right next to him.

The driver stared. “You sure you’re gonna fit into my taxi, buddy?”

“Sure! Probably. Mostly.” Pete’s huge fist closed around the front door handle. “You’ll probably be better off in the back,” the driver said hurriedly.

“Huh? Oh, yeah.” It was tight but he squeezed in.

“Where to?”

And just like that, an address came right out of his mouth.



Luckily, Pete found a wallet in his pocket with cash. Oddly, there was a small purse in his other pocket. He paid the taxi off and stared up at the apartment building. Number four, right? Instinctively he reached into his pocket again and came up with a set of keys.

The flights of stairs were long but hell, he could do with a little exercise. With his bulging calve muscles he practically ran up them. He opened the door to number four and stepped inside, flicking on the light switch.

Okay, this all seemed familiar, somehow. Living room, bedroom with stack of comics by the bed, kitchenette, bathroom …

Bathroom! Yeah, there was a growing sensation down there that meant but one thing. Taking his place before the toilet, he unzipped his pants.

“Woah now!”

Something flopped out. Okay, more like rolled out. Now that impressed even him.

Taking himself in hand, Pete aimed the … the beast … at the toilet. After a minute (okay, more like five minutes) he’d emptied his bladder. It had no noticeable effect on the size of … the hose of horror.

Pete looked down at it and grinned. Had he always been this big? Wait, just how big was he? He remembered there’d been a full-length mirror in the bedroom.

Standing in front of the mirror, Pete flexed again. He liked the way his biceps bulged out. He admired his reflection. Nice chin! Nice head! He particularly liked the way it seemed to be joined straight onto his shoulders, so thick was his neck.

He shrugged off the nondescript hoodie he wore, then shrugged off his even more nondescript T-shirt. (Oddly enough, when they were off they seemed much smaller.) Now there was a pair of pecs! He stood, twitching first one nipple, then the other. He admired the smooth hairless plains of his chest, and the rippling six-pack of his abdomen. His navel looked as chiselled as the cleft of his chin.

Okay, he was built, but that was all a sideshow to the main event. He pulled off his shoes, then sat on the bed to remove his pants. A few more admiring glances at his reflection, and he pulled down his undies.

Woah!

WOAH!

W-O-FREAKIN’-A-H AND A SILENT Q!!!

He could barely get his fist around it. And oh my Goddess, it was growing.

Images flashed through his head. Baseball bats. Industrial piping. Firehoses.

And man, they were nothing on him.

And under it … grapefruit! Rockmelon! Watermelon!

He couldn’t help it, he stared grinning at his equipment. Experimentally he gave the sack a swing.

He was so turned on. He was turning himself on. Slowly his fist reached down again. He positioned himself on the bed.

And as Pete stared at his muscled form in the mirror, he took himself in hand.

So good …

Fireworks! More fireworks! It was the freakin’ Fourth of July!!!

Pete groaned.

Tiffany groaned.

Simon groaned.

Wait, what?

Simon shot up on the bed. “Oh my God!” Had it all been a dream?

Oh. No, it hadn’t.

Man, that was gonna take a lot of cleaning up.

“Man, that’s gonna take a lot of cleaning up,” said a woman’s voice.

Tiffany pulled herself up and covered her breasts. Simon turned slowly towards her. He opened his mouth to … apologise? Explain? Scream his head off? All three? Slowly he closed his mouth again and stared.

Tiffany stared back. There was a lot of staring in general. Then both of them lost it.

They howled with laughter for several minutes before shuddering to a stop.

“So …” Tiffany started.

“What the hell was that?” Simon finished.

A little more staring, industrial size this time.

“It was …”

“It was definitely …”

Stare stare starey mcstare.

“… Fun?”

Stare staring stares.

“Definitely fun.” And Tiffany grinned.

Funny, she didn’t seem quite so snobby now. Of course, it was hard to be snobby when you were both naked.

“So … how did we do that?”

“I have no idea. But … maybe if we touched each other?”

“Maybe.”

Simon held out his hand. Slowly Tiffany held out her own and they pushed their palms together.

Nothing.

“Maybe we have to … want to become Pete?”

“Okay, let’s try thinking about him when we do it.”

Tiffany held out her hand. Simon gently reached out and touched it.

With a lurch their bodies gulped each other up, twisting into a new form.

Pete sprang out of the bed. “Woo and goddamn hoo! I got it now! I’m two folks … making one big folk! One,” he said, glancing into the mirror again, “really freaking big folk!

Something tickled in his brain and he sighed.

“Oh, don’t worry, you guys, I’ll let you out again. But you two had better play nicely with each other, okay? Simon, learn how to treat a lady. And Tiffany, don’t be such a snob. I ain’t. Hey, I’m thinkin’ regular get-togethers, once or twice a week, if ya know what I mean. Right here — I gotta feeling Britta and Paul are gonna be usin’ your apartment. Oh, and Simon, get some brews in, okay? And renew your gym membership.

“Okay, okay, I know you two wanna get to bed — and Tiffany, you might as well stay the night, it’s late.”

Now, how did he separate himself the last time.

Pete grinned. Oh yeah, that’s right …

And looking into the mirror, he could see he was ready to go again.

This was going to be really fun.