At first I thought I knew him. Then I didnât. Over by the computers was this big, red-headed guy. Upper school at least. He shaved. In fact, he needed a shave.
There was something else you really noticed about him. He was wearing Huckley dress code like anybody else. But it was six sizes too small for him. His shoulders were busting out of his blazer. His big wrists hung way down from his sleeves. His pants stopped a foot from the floor. He swallowed, and the collar button on his shirt cut loose and flew over his Huckley tie.
I was still being strangled, but it wasnât Daryl. It was my shirt. My collar button popped too. We both watched the buttons roll around the floor.
âWhoââ we both said, except it wasnât my voice.
âAaron?â I said in my dadâs voice.
He blinked, and they were still Aaronâs eyes, pink and dazed.
We were both twice our size and trapped in our dress code. I could get my tie loose, but my pants were cutting me in half. Aaron winced and stooped down to untie his shoes. His pants made a ripping sound. He eased out of his shoes, and feet popped out. They couldnât be Aaronâs feet. They were about size eleven. Thereâs always a hole in his sock. A huge toe with a thorny nail poked through.
I couldnât bend over without snapping every stitch of my clothes, but I could kick out of my shoes. Then my feet sort of sprang to life, and they were as big as Aaronâs, maybe bigger.
âLook at you,â we said.
âWho are we?â we said.
âWhat have we done?â Aaron smacked his forehead.
I didnât know. I couldnât think. I scratched my chin. I needed a shave. And another thing, we were tall. Aaron was five ten, easy, and I was looking down at him. I was so tall that when I looked down, I got dizzy.
Aaronâs stubbly face fell into his big hands. âNo,â he said, âno, no, no, no.â
âWhat happened, Aaron? You know. You have a theory.â I couldnât get used to my voice. It was like my dad was sitting on my tongue, talking out of my mouth.
âEmotional Component,â he said, âtoo close to the keyboard.â
âBut my mind was a blank,â I said.
âNot when we were going to lunch,â he said. âThen we were really worried about Darylâs peer group, right? What did we both want at that moment?â
âI donât know,â I said. âDidnât we just want them off our case?â
âGo with that thought.â
âOh. We both wished we were bigger than they are. And older. We wanted to beââ
âThatâs it,â Aaron said. âWe had the same thought at the same time. We wanted to be upper-school size. We wanted to be seniors.â
The sacred word seniors hung in the air. My dress code was binding me bad.
The bell rang, and lunch was over.
âAaron, how are we going to explain this? I wouldnât know you if I met you on the street. Weâre a couple of complete strangers. How can we go to History like this? How can we go home? This isnât the Hamptons. We canât just take a train.â
âNo,â he said, âbut itâs the same principle, except instead of Ophelia and Heather, itâs us. Our need combined spontaneously with my formula. That virus in it made it so interactive, itâs almost infectious. Iâm thinking radioactivity. Iâm thinkingââ
âAaron, shut up.â
He thought for a minute. A big new vein in his forehead pulsed. Then, making senior gestures with his ham-sized hand, he said, âHereâs the plan: Forget about History class. We couldnât pass ourselves off as us. Anyway, look how weâre dressed. Weâre ridiculous. We wait till the bell rings again. Then we give it another ten minutes. Then we make a break for the upper-school locker room. After theyâve changed for P.E., weâll get into their lockers and take