Cure for the Common Universe by Christian McKay Heidicker Read Free Book Online Page A

again?”
    â€œYou can stitch for points if you’d like,” Fezzik said.
    The girls started to sew. The small kid kept his attention fixed on me.
    â€œMiles, they say the best kind of sponsor is one who has experienced the same addiction,” Fezzik continued, “or as I like to say, has gone on the same dangerous quests. I’m no different from you. I’ve experienced gamer regret. I’ve come out of a gaming haze and discovered the world had left me behind without any real connections or appreciable skills.”
    My dad had used similar words when trying to discipline me. But I knew I had enough “appreciable skills” to get by in life. I could build a computer from scratch. I could order underwear online. I could microwave Hot Pockets.
    Fezzik rested his elbows on his knees so that his eyes weremore level with mine. “No one loves a giant. Just like in fairy tales. I don’t know if people are worried I’m going to break them or what, but when you’re my size, no one invites you to things. No parties. No football games. No dates.”
    Something squeezed inside me. I may have complained about my looks and my luck with girls, but it would be nearly impossible to find love with a giant’s stats.
    â€œSo one day I gave up on it all,” he said. “I went to Costco with my savings and bought three shopping carts full of food. Then I shut myself up in my apartment with an Arcadia subscription.”
    My eye twitched. I hoped he didn’t notice.
    â€œI stayed there for six straight weeks, ordering an extra large supreme pizza every night, and spending every possible moment in Arcadia. I would’ve stayed longer, but then my sobering moment came. The thing that smoked me out of my cave. I’d been fighting the Click Clack God for four straight days—waiting for him to respawn again and again so I could get him to drop a pair of epic titanium cuff links—when I ran out of food. The fridge was empty. The cupboard was bare. I couldn’t afford pizza three times a day, so I needed another Costco run. But . . .” Fezzik gave a giant-size sigh. “When I tried to leave my apartment, I couldn’t fit out the front door.”
    My eyebrows leapt to the top of my forehead. Don’t laugh, don’t laugh, don’t laugh.
    Fezzik pinched up his shoulders like he was still trying to find a way out of that door. “I squeezed and squeezed untilI was afraid I might get stuck in the frame.” His shoulders released. “Finally I had to just . . . give up. I went and sat on my couch.” He shook his giant head, ashamed. “That moment hit me like a bucket of ice water. I didn’t want to be one of those people who had to be lifted through a hole in the ceiling by a crane after I died. So I sat there in my apartment for days, eating nothing, playing nothing, just staring at the wall until I lost enough weight to fit out my door again.”
    It was so quiet, I could hear the girls’ needles threading through cloth.
    â€œBUT—” Fezzik lifted his giant hands and let them fall with a big SLAP onto his lap. “That was another life. The Emperor is long behind me.”
    â€œWait,” I said. “You’re the Emperor ?”
    Fezzik blushed and tried to contain a smile.
    I nearly dropped to my knees before the most famous player ever to grace Arcadia . I looked around the circle.
    â€œYou guys are sitting in front of a god,” I said.
    â€œI doubt that,” the Asian girl said.
    The white-haired girl stared admiringly at Fezzik, but then quickly dropped her gaze when the Asian girl looked her way.
    â€œTell them!” I said to Fezzik. “Tell them what you did!”
    Fezzik waved his hands. “No, no. I left that life behind long ago.”
    The small kid next to me bounced in his chair. “Tell us, tell us, tell us, tell us, tell us!”
    â€œYes. God.