All of a sudden, Vinnie stood up and said, “Here’s were we get off.” He put his tee shirt back on and we got off the bus. We were on a busy street in a really seedy neighborhood. “Follow me, dweeb,” he said. “I gotta buy some supplements before I work out.” We walked a few blocks to a health food store. When Vinnie walked in, the clerk said “Hi Vinnie,” so I guess he was a regular customer. He turned to me and said, “How much you got?” I looked at him with a blank look on my face. He grabbed my arm again and squeezed hard. “Doncha got ears, dweeb? How much ya got on ya?” Suddenly realizing what he was talking about, I opened my wallet and looked. “I’ve got 23 dollars,” I said. Vinnie grabbed my wallet and took out the money. “OK, dweeb,” he said. “Here’s a dollar for the bus ride home. The rest is mine. I gotta buy some supplements.” I knew it was pointless to argue with Vinnie. He always got what he wanted and never took no for an answer. So I just took the dollar and put it back in my wallet.

Vinnie went through the store picking out supplements. He seemed to know exactly what he wanted. The total came to $21.75, so he had done some pretty good math. He put the change in his pocket and walked out the door. I followed like a lap dog. We walked about six blocks into a neighborhood with little wooden houses on very small pieces of property. Most of the houses looked pretty run down. Finally he turned into the driveway of a small white house that really needed paint. The yard was overgrown with weeds and there were some old car parts lying around. Vinnie took a key from his pocket and opened the door. There was nobody home. “My dad’s in prison and my mom works two jobs, so she really gets home late,” said Vinnie. “I’m pretty much on my own.” I just nodded, still trying to get my mind around the fact that his dad was in prison.

“Come on down to my room, dweeb. I’m going to change into my workout shorts.” I followed Vinnie into a small room that was barely big enough for a single bed, a beat up old dresser and a chair. Clothes were strewn about everywhere and several pair of sneakers were scattered on the floor. The room smelled like sweaty clothes, kind of like the locker room of a gym where jocks left their sweaty clothes in the lockers after a hard workout. The walls were completely covered with pictures of big bodybuilders from muscle magazines, except there were also some drawings of huge muscle men and muscle monsters that had obviously been drawn by Vinnie. Sometimes these huge, muscular beings were beating up an enemy and the enemy was always getting totally thrashed. “Nice artwork,” I said. “Yeah,” said Vinnie. “This is what I’m going to look like one day.” He pointed to a drawing of an extremely muscular, vicious-looking young man with black hair cut short on the sides that looked just like Vinnie’s. The muscleman was holding up two other guys, one in each hand. They were obviously dead, having been beaten to death by the muscleman. “I’m going to be so big and strong I’ll be able to kick anybody’s ass I want.” Vinnie sounded dead serious, and I knew he was.

Vinnie stripped off his tee shirt and stood right in front of me. “I’m making pretty good progress, don’t you think, dweeb?” I looked at his amazing muscles and nodded my head. Then Vinnie took off his long black shorts and his shoes. He was now wearing only some boxer shorts. For the first time I could see his quads and they were spectacular. Big, thick and cut to shreds. Then, nonchalantly, Vinnie pulled off his boxer shorts and stood facing me. He smiled as I stared at his body. He was a real man, all right. Vinnie was a total stud from head to toe. “You like what you see, dweeb? I think you do,” said Vinnie. Then he pulled some red nylon shorts off the floor and put them on. He didn’t put on any underwear or a jock strap. Just a pair of very short red nylon shorts. I guess those were his workout shorts. He stood in front of me with just his red shorts on and flexed his abs. His tan, eight-pack washboard looked as hard as granite. “Time to go mix up some supplements,” he said.

We went into the kitchen and Vinnie put the supplements we bought on the counter. He got a gallon of milk out of the refrigerator and poured almost a quart into the blender. Then he put some powder from two of the cans into the blender and turned it on. “This will give me lots of power and energy for my chest workout. Some protein too. Gotta eat lots of protein.” He turned off the blender, lifted the glass container by the handle and started drinking the liquid right from the blender container. “Hey, Vinnie, can I have some?” I said. “I didn’t have any lunch, remember?” I was starving, and here this big musclekid, who had eaten four lunches just a few hours ago, was gulping down even more food. “Shit, no, dweeb,” said Vinnie. “This stuff is for real men building real muscle. You’re just a wimp. It would be totally wasted on you. So stop complaining and just be glad I haven’t already beat the shit out of you.” He gulped down the rest of the thick liquid and let out a big burp. “Here, you can have a glass of milk. That’s all a dweeb like you deserves.” He poured a small glass of milk and handed it to me.

“O.K., dweeb. Time to go pump some heavy iron.” I gulped down the glass of milk and followed Vinnie out the back door of the house. There was a garage next to the house. Vinnie opened the door to the garage and we walked in. I was flabbergasted. Inside the garage was a complete bodybuilding gym. There was a bench with an Olympic weight bar and lots of plates, ranging from 5 to 45 pounds. There were pulleys, a chinning bar, some parallel bar dip bars, a squat rack, a leg press machine, and lots more equipment that I didn’t even know existed. There were barbells and dumbbells in various poundages. The dumbbells ranged from 10 pounds all the way up to 200 pounds. Now I knew Vinnie was strong, but I didn’t think he was using 200-pound dumbbells. One of the walls was covered by a mirror and there was a wrestling mat right in front of the mirror. The other walls were covered with more pictures of big bodybuilders and some drawings by Vinnie of huge muscle monsters. “These weights belong to my dad,” said Vinnie. “He’s in prison now but he’ll be out soon. Some punk in a bar got in his way and he beat ‘em into a pulp. My dad don’t take no shit from anybody but he can sure dish it out. The punk had six broken bones and spent a week in the hospital. My dad got busted for assault and battery. He’s doing 9 months and he’s already served six. He says prison’s actually a blast ‘cause he’s the biggest, strongest and baddest dude in there and he can just make other prisoners do what he wants. He gets all the food, supplements and other stuff he wants ‘cause if the little dweeb prisoners don’t get it for him he just beats their ass. Even the guards give him things ‘cause they don’t want to get on his bad side. The prison has a great weight room and my dad rules the place and the whole prison for that matter. He’s 5’11” and weighs 285 pounds and its all solid muscle. He says he’s gotten even bigger and stronger since he’s been in prison ‘cause all he does is lift and eat – and beat people up. My dad says I’m built even bigger than he was at my age. I can hardly wait to get as big and strong as he is, even bigger and stronger! Here, I’ll show you a picture of my dad.”

We walked over to a wall and Vinnie pointed to a picture of a huge, young muscleman and a kid. I immediately recognized the kid as Vinnie. He was obviously quite a bit younger than he is now but he was still very muscular. “That’s me and my dad,”said Vinnie. That picture was taken when I was still 11 years old, just before my 12th birthday. Not too shabby for an 11-year old, huh?” I looked at Vinnie’s muscular 11-year old body and nodded my head. He looked more muscular at 11 than most 14 year olds. “I’ve been lifting weights with my dad since I was eight. I just turned 13 a month ago, so I guess this picture is a little over a year old. Since then, I’ve gained 4 inches in height and 35 pounds of muscle. I’ve really been putting on the muscle in the last six months. I can bench press 100 pounds more than I did just six months ago. I weigh 125 now and I’m gaining weight every month. At the end of the summer I’ll be two inches taller and 20 pounds heavier. I know ‘cause I’m getting taller, heavier and stronger every month. There’s no stopping me as long as I keep lifting heavy weights and eating lots of good food.” I couldn’t believe that Vinnie had turned 13 only a month ago. My god, I thought to myself, he’s four months younger than me!

Vinnie’s dad was one of the biggest bodybuilders I’d even seen. He had black hair and tan skin, just like Vinnie, and huge, defined muscles. His shoulders were wide and his hips were narrow, just like his son. He was very good looking, but in a rugged, brutal way. He looked young. To me he looked too young to be Vinnie’s father. “How old is your father?” I asked. “He looks pretty young.” “Yeah, he’s only 28. He was only 14 when he knocked up my mom. My mom was 16. A real stud, huh? He was very mature for his age, as they say.” “Just like you, Vinnie,” I said, looking at his incredible 13-year old muscle body. Vinnie smiled at the compliment. “They didn’t get an abortion because they’re Catholic. So they had me. We’re Italian. Italians like to kick ass.”

Vinnie walked over to the bench. “I’m gonna do bench presses first,” he said. “I’m gonna warm up with a light weight and I’m gonna keep adding weight each set until it gets really heavy. Your job as spotter is to help me finish the last two or three reps with the heavy weights so I can push at maximum force and finish the set. It’s those last killer reps that really build big muscles. But don’t help too much – my muscles gotta do most of the work. Don’t fuck it up.” I didn’t quite understand what he was talking about but I was a fast learner, I thought. “Put a 45 on your side,” ordered Vinnie as he easily picked up one of the big plates and put it on his side of the bar. I reached down and tried to pick up a big plate but couldn’t do it. It was too heavy and awkward for me to lift off the floor. Vinnie looked at me and laughed. “Jesus, dweeb, you’re even weaker than I thought. You’re a total loser.” He came over and lifted the plate off the floor with one hand and put it on the bar. “This is just a warmup,” said Vinnie. “You don’t need to spot with this.” Vinnie got on the bench under the bar. He lifted the bar off the rack, pumped out 15 easy reps and crashed the bar back onto the rack. As he pushed the weight up and down, his pecs bulged under his thin, tan skin. They started to pump up with blood. The individual fibers of muscle were pushing against his tan skin. After his set, Vinnie jumped off the bench and stretched his arms. “I feel really strong today,” he said. “How much weight was that?” I asked. “One hundred thirty-five pounds,” he said. “Its 10 pounds more than I weigh, but its only a warmup weight for me.” A warmup weight of more than his bodyweight! I remembered when I went to a friend’s house. He had a little weight set and I tried to bench press. I could only lift 30 pounds. Vinnie had just lifted more than four times my maximum and he was just warming up!

“Hey Vinnie, can I lift too?” I asked. “Fuck, no, dweeb,” said Vinnie. “I don’t rest much between sets so there won’t be time for you to lift. Besides, you’re just a wimp and wimps can’t build any muscle. These weights only build muscle on real men like me and my dad. You’re just going to be weak for the rest of your life, while I’m gonna get bigger and stronger every day. That’s just the way it is, dweeb, so you better get used to it. You’re a wimp and I’m a real man. Just be glad you can be my spotter. Put on a another 25 pounds, dweeb. I’m gonna lift some heavy iron.” I managed to pick up the 25-pound plate and put it on the bar. Vinnie put his plate on. Now the bar weighed 185 pounds. Vinnie got under it and pumped out 10 reps with even, deliberate speed. He didn’t need my spot. This weight didn’t seem heavy to him. As he pressed up the weight again and again, his pecs started to get red from all the blood surging through the muscle fiber. All the muscles of his upper body were getting pumped – his shoulders, his arms, his traps, his neck, even his lats seemed to be pumping up. Vinnie jumped off the bench and flexed his muscles in the mirror. They looked so massive and hard. Oh how I wished that I could touch those big, hard muscles. After about 30 seconds of rest, Vinnie ordered me to put another 20 pounds on my side of the bar and he put 20 on his side. Now we were up to 225. Jesus, I thought, this is an incredible weight for a 13 year old to be bench pressing. “O.K., dweeb. I might need a little help with a spot on the last couple of reps. You know what to do.” I really didn’t, but I was going to try. Vinnie started pressing up the heavy bar. The first six reps were pretty steady, but he started slowing down at rep seven and seemed to be struggling at his eighth rep. I had my hands under the bar and started lifting it up. The bar started moving rapidly upwards. “Hey, lighten up, dweeb,” Vinnie yelled. “You’re making it too easy. My muscles gotta do most of the work. Make it hard. Make it real hard.” So for the last two reps, I barely lifted the bar while Vinnie strained with all his might to push it up to the top. His face was red and veins were pulsating in his forehead. His pecs were like huge, raw pieces of beef with striations cutting deep into the bulging muscle. Big veins were coursing through his neck, which was bulging. His delts had exploded on his shoulders with hard fibers and big veins clearly visible under his thin, tan skin. His triceps were popping out from his arms and his forearms were writhing like snakes. This kid was giving everything he had to lift that big, heavy, piece of iron. Finally Vinnie finished ten grueling reps and slammed the bar onto the rack. His pecs – his whole upper body - looked incredibly pumped. Sweat beaded up on his skin and started dripping off.

“That was great!” he roared. “I feel like a fuckin’ animal.” He turned to me and hit a most muscular pose. His muscles looked phenomenal. I thought he would have been exhausted from that set, but he seemed amazingly energized. Huge amounts of adrenaline and testosterone must have been shooting through his veins. “Put on another 10 pounds, dweeb. I feel as strong as a fucking bull.” The bar was now loaded to 245 pounds. This was almost twice Vinnie’s bodyweight. It was also more than eight times what I could lift. Vinnie was eight times stronger than me. One of his arms was four times stronger than both of my arms. I couldn’t comprehend how a kid four months younger than me could be this strong. After no more than a minute, he got under the bar and pumped up a total of six reps. I had to spot him for the last three reps, but I had learned to apply the absolute minimum amount of force so Vinnie’s muscles had to really strain with all their might to press up those last reps. By now his chest and arms were totally engorged with blood and his muscles were ballooning. I had never seen muscle like that in my life. Oh how I wished I could touch them, but I was too scared that Vinnie might punch me out if I tried to. “Fuck I feel strong!” yelled Vinnie. “You make me feel real strong, ya know that, dweeb? I could only do one rep with that weight last week, and now I did six.” I smiled. I was glad I could make Vinnie feel strong. Vinnie was really getting loud and aggressive. “Put on another five pounds, dweeb. That will make it 255. That’s 10 more pounds than I did last week. I’m a fucking superman!” “That’s more than twice your bodyweight, Vinnie,” I said. “You are a fucking superman. I can’t believe you’re so strong.” “Believe it, dweeb. I’m fucking strong and I’m going to get a lot stronger,” yelled Vinnie as he got under the 255 pound bar.

Vinnie pressed up the first rep with only his own muscle power. He did two more slow and painful reps with just a little help from me. His pecs and every muscle of his upper body were totally pumped and hard as rock. His skin was a brownish red color and veins were crossing every inch. The fibers of muscle in his pecs looked like hard steel cords. At the end of the third rep he smashed the weight into the rack and jumped off the bench. “You’re lookin’ at a fuckin’ musclestud!” he yelled. He walked over to the mirror. “Come over here, dweeb,” he said. I walked over and stood right next to Vinnie’s big, pumped muscular body. “Strip to your shorts, dweeb,” he ordered. I looked at him blankly. Vinnie bumped his big, hot sweaty chest into my little chest and squeezed my arm real hard. “Doncha got ears, dweeb,” he said. “I said strip to your shorts!” I ripped off my shirt and took off my pants and shoes. I stood next to Vinnie in my boxer shorts. Vinnie and I both looked in the mirror and compared our two bodies. My body looked so frail and little compared to Vinnie’s totally muscular physique. Vinnie was covered with sweat and his muscles just glowed with power. He looked absolutely radiant standing there in nothing but his red nylon workout shorts. He was sweating so much that the shorts were clinging to his legs and his firm, round musclebutt.

We were about the same height, but that was the only thing that was the same about us. His body was big, buff and tan. My body was skinny, wimpy and white. As we stood side by side I could see that his shoulders were almost a foot wider than mine, yet his hips were actually narrower than mine. His thighs looked like oak trees compared to my little sticks. He flexed his quads and the muscles tightened at his command into huge slabs of shredded beef. His waist was small – smaller than mine – and his abs looked incredible. A corrugated eight-pack of living, pulsating steel. He flexed his abs and the ridges became deeper and even harder. ThenVinnie flexed his arms. I decided to flex mine too, just to compare with Vinnie. Omigod, I said to myself. What a contrast between strength and weakness. Vinnie’s 14-inch biceps bulged like steel-hard baseballs. My flabby little 10-inch biceps didn’t even make a bump on my arms. Vinnie did a lat spread and I tried to do the same. Vinnie’s lats flared out like big wings of thick muscle. I didn’t have any lats at all. Then Vinnie flexed his pecs and pushed out his big chest. Those pecs that had just finished six grueling sets of bench presses, working up to more than twice his bodyweight, were totally pumped and engorged with blood and just bulged out from his chest with striated fibers of hard muscle. His nipples were totally erect and his pec muscles were so big that they forced his nipples to point a little downward. “Look at your little chicken chest compared to mine,” yelled Vinnie. “Look at all the fucking muscle I got.” He flexed his pecs and pushed out his chest even further. Jesus, it was huge. “You dig my muscles, don’t you dweeb? You wish you had a body like this, don’t you dweeb? You wish you had fuckin’ big, strong muscles that can kick anybody’s ass any time they fuckin’ want.” Vinnie looked down at my shorts and saw the big bulge in front. That bulge had been there since the first minute I laid eyes on Vinnie. “Yeah, dweeb” said Vinnie. “I can see you dig my muscles. Here, feel how big and hard my pecs are after those fuckin’ killer bench presses.” Vinnie flexed his pecs and pushed them right into my chest. I reached up and put my hands around the hot, hard, bulging slabs of muscle. My head started spinning as I took in the size and hardness of Vinnie’s pecs. I had never felt anything like that in my life. I didn’t know human flesh could get that hard.

“Jesus, Vinnie,” I said. “Your pecs are the biggest, hardest living things I have ever felt. You’re a fucking stud, Vinnie.” Vinnie looked at me and kind of sneered. “You’re fuckin’ right, dweeb. My muscles are fuckin’ big, hard and strong. They’re so strong they can kick anybody’s ass, including yours! I feel pumped and strong and like a fuckin’ stud. Go ahead, dweeb. You seem to be enjoying this. Go ahead and feel the rest of my big muscles. I kinda like having you digging my body like this.” Well, I didn’t need any more encouragement. I thought I had died and gone to heaven. I literally attacked Vinnie with my hands and fingers, feeling every one of his big, buff muscles. I felt his thick, wide delts, his bulging traps, his pumped, blood-engorged pecs, his huge, rippling arms, his flaring, slab-like lats, his flat, hard, corrugated abs, his solid, round butt, his big, oak tree thighs and his diamond shaped steel hard calves. Vinnie flexed each muscle for me as I took in its size and power. We were yelling at each other. I was yelling at Vinnie as I felt his muscles, telling him how big and strong his muscles were and what a stud he was. Vinnie yelled back at me, agreeing with everything I said and telling me how great it felt to be so big, so muscular, so strong and telling me how I wasn’t shit compared to him. “Feel my biceps,dweeb”said Vinnie. “Feel how fuckin’ big and round and hard they are. See how much bigger and stronger they are than your pathetic pieces of flab.” He flexed his arms proudly and I wrapped my fingers around the huge balls of muscle. They were so big I could only get my fingers part way around the bulging muscle. I tried to squeeze his rippling biceps but they were hard as rocks and I couldn’t make the slightest dent in the corded muscle fibers. “My god, Vinnie, your biceps are the biggest, strongest things I’ve ever seen. They’re incredible.” Vinnie kind of sneered at me. “Fuckin’ right, dweeb. I got the biggest, strongest biceps of any kid in this whole fuckin’ city. I can beat up anyone I want. I don’t take shit from nobody.” He looked at me with kind of an evil look in his eyes.

“Get on your knees, dweeb. Get on your knees in front of me.” I got down on my knees in front of Vinnie’s huge, muscular body and looked up. His red shorts were clinging to his skin and the rest of him was covered with sweat. His muscles were rippling. “Ya know dweeb, I’m so strong I could take you out with just one punch to the gut. You’re nothing compared to me. I could crush you like a bug.” I started trembling because I knew that he was absolutely right. Vinnie’s body was raging with testosterone and adrenaline and he was really aggressive. He made a fist with his right hand and pulled it back as if he were about to deliver a devastating punch. I trembled even more. “Look at the mirror, dweeb,” said Vinnie. “Does that picture look familiar?” I looked at the mirror and immediately recognized the drawing that Vinnie had made that morning. There was the little dweeb kneeling in front of the big muscle stud who had his huge, muscular arm pulled back ready to smash the little dweeb into oblivion. Vinnie smiled. “See, dweeb. What I drew in that picture came true. Pretty cool, huh,?”

I was still trembling. I still didn’t know if Vinnie was going to hit me. I was totally at the mercy of this big, muscular 13-year old kid who bragged that he liked to beat up kids just for fun. But to my relief, Vinnie unclenched his fist. Then he tackled me with his big arms and pushed me to the mat. He started wrestling with me, pushing my arms into various holds and twisting my legs. But to my surprise, he never pushed hard enough to hurt me. He was just playing, toying with me. “You’re really weak, ya know that, dweeb?” he said. He wrapped his arm around my neck and flexed his bicep. The big, hard ball of muscle forced its way into my neck, cutting off the air in my windpipe. “Is my big bicep hurting your scrawny little neck, dweeb?” I nodded my head as Vinnie tightened his bicep even more. If he had wanted to he could have crushed my windpipe with his big, hard bicep. “I’ll bet your little bicep couldn’t do shit to my neck. Look how muscular and strong it is.” He released my neck and moved his thick, tan neck right in front of my eyes. He flexed his neck and traps. The muscles bulged at his command. No way would my mushy biceps make an impact on that muscular neck. He pinned both of my arms above my head with his right hand. “Try to get up dweeb. Oh, you can’t? Is my one arm stronger than both of your arms? Yeah, I guess it is. Like five times stronger!” He dropped his big body right on top of mine. His pumped muscles totally enveloped my little frame. He was so hot and sweaty and his muscles were so hard. I could feel them bulging and pushing into my body. He moved his armpit right on top of my face and pressed it down on my nose. “Smell that sweat, dweeb. That’s the sweat a real man makes when he lifts big, heavy weights. I bet you never made sweat like that before, did you dweeb? You wimps just can’t work out hard enough to make sweat like that. But I’m a fuckin’ real man, I lift fuckin’ big, heavy weights, and I make lots of real man sweat!”

Vinnie sat up on my stomach and flexed his chest. “Enough of this fucking around, dweeb. I gotta finish my chest workout. I’m going to work these fucking muscles until they feel like their going to explode.” Vinnie got up and took a big drink of water. He then proceeded to do four sets of incline dumbbell presses, four sets of decline dumbbell presses, four sets of dumbbell flyes, four sets of dumbbell pullovers and four sets of parallel bar dips with weights. For each of these exercises, he started off with a “light” weight for him and worked up to incredibly heavy poundages. He was using dumbbells that were so heavy I couldn’t even pick them up off the floor. As with the bench presses, I helped him with the last few reps of his heavy sets. For the parallel bar dips, he strapped a belt around his hips and attached it to a dumbbell, which he then hoisted along with his own bodyweight in doing the dips. I was just dumbfounded at how strong he was doing these dips. He started with a 30 pound dumbbell for 10 reps and worked up to a 60 pound dumbbell for three reps. For the last two reps, I placed my hands on his narrow hips and helped him up ever so slightly. Vinnie’s pecs, triceps and delts did most of the work. I remembered how he had cranked out 25 dips at school. God, I thought to myself, those were just like child’s play for Vinnie’s big muscles, which were so strong they could do dips with his own weight plus 60 pounds.

After every set, Vinnie stood in front of the mirror and let me feel his rippling muscles. This was the most pleasurable hour and a half I had ever had in my life. Being able to watch Vinnie pump those incredibly heavy weights and being able to see and feel his bulging muscles was like a dream come true. During this whole time, we kept talking to each other about his body – about how big he was, how strong he was, how I wasn’t shit compared to him, how he could kick anybody’s ass he wanted. Vinnie really had an attitude. He sure wasn’t humble, and he loved talking about his big muscles. And so did I!

After he finished his chest workout, Vinnie worked out his abs. He worked out his abs every day. He said he had naturally cut and muscular abs, so he didn’t need to work on them too much. He didn’t want them to get too big. He liked his waist to be really small and shredded. I said I totally agreed, as I rubbed my hand across his hard washboard of muscle. He did 100 crunches and 100 hanging leg lifts. He let me put my hand on his abs as he cranked out the reps. The muscles undulated and flexed under his paper-thin skin as they lifted his body up and down. When he had finished, I put both of my hands on the hard muscle and pressed in with my fingers. It felt like I was pressing on a wall of bricks.

Vinnie’s workout lasted about two hours. He had done a total of 26 brutal sets of exercises for his pecs and 2 sets of 100 reps each for his abs. At the end of the workout, his pecs and abs – really all the muscles of his upper body - were so pumped and hard that I thought the muscle was just going to burst out of his skin. Vinnie said that he felt a great burn in his muscles and that he knew his pecs would be bigger and stronger for his chest workout next week.

“Time to go home to your mommy and daddy, dweeb,” he said. I put on my clothes and shoes. Vinnie just stood there in his red shorts, flexing his chest once in awhile. “Ya know dweeb, you’re a pretty good spotter. You make me feel real strong when I lift. I think I’m going to keep you around. Now here’s the deal. I work out chest on Mondays and legs on Fridays. I use really heavy weights for chest and legs, so you gotta be here to spot those days. Tuesday is arms, Wednesday is shoulders, and Thursday is back. You don’t have to be here those days but you can if you want to. I can always use a little help with those last few heavy reps. So, tomorrow is arm day. Are you going to be here or not?’ Vinnie started curling his arms up and down. I looked at his big, hard, bulging biceps and knew what my answer had to be. “I’ll be here,” I said. Vinnie smiled.

I walked out the garage door towards the street, clutching my dollar for bus fare in my hand. I looked back at Vinnie standing in the doorway in his red shorts. He smiled and flexed his pecs and abs at me. “See ya at school tomorrow, dweeb,” he said. “Don’t forget to bring an extra big lunch if you want to eat anything.” I turned back towards the street and started walking. I thought about how my life had been totally changed in the last seven hours, the seven hours since Vinnie the transfer student arrived at our school. •