I Wish He'd Go Away

[tekuno]

I came up with this idea, and since it was going to be a short story anyway, I just wrote it out. I have been working on those drawings I promised elsewhere, but even cruddy drawings like mine take a relatively long time, whereas I finished this in about an hour.

*****

I Wish He'd Go Away

It was a weird year.

The weirdness commenced when I got a housemate. I didn't really want or need a housemate -- my finances were fine, better than they had been in years, in fact -- but my Uncle Jim more or less told me I had to. I didn't want to cause problems with what little family I had left, so I cleared my office stuff out of the spare bedroom and waited for the arrival.

Uncle Jim's letter was light on details: "He's a great guy, and about your age. You'll be friends in no time." I couldn't remember whether I had actually come out to Uncle Jim or not, so that last sentence could mean anything -- and Uncle Jim was almost impossible to get hold of on short notice. So I was expecting another run-of-the-mill unmotivated and blase late-20-something when I opened the door.

"Yo, dude! I'm your new tenant, name's Mike."

Mike was breathtaking. Just for a start, he was tall -- really tall. I'm not a good judge of heights, but he had to duck coming in, and I knew the front door was 80 inches tall because I had had to put in a new screen door when I bought the house. Mike was also, well, huge. Every muscle on his body was gigantic and vascular -- and a lot of them were exposed; he was wearing short shorts, a tank-top, and sandals, and apparently nothing else because I could see the tip of his cock poking out of the bottom of one leg of his shorts, and it was as huge as the rest of him. (A run-on sentence, but Mike inspired that kind of... enthusiasm in me.) Mike tossed his huge bag onto his bed, stretched a bit, making his huge muscles bulge even more obscenely, and then announced he was going to go look for a local gym to join, and walked out for the rest of the day.

In the days that followed, I tried hard not to stare at Mike. It was difficult, in no small part because Mike was so big that when he was in the room he seemed to be everywhere in the room. But also Mike sent me delirious with desire. He wasn't just enormously sexy in a casual, easygoing way, but he was everything I wanted to be, as well. He was what I had dreamed of being as a child, before my height topped out at 5' 9" and working out turned out to be a lot more effort than I was willing to put in. I spent several days jacking off to the mere thought of him while he was at the gym.

Until, inevitably, he forgot something and came back to the house ten minutes later, catching me in the act. Of course, guys masturbate, and it might have been possible to pass off my session as having nothing to do with him, except that the reason I didn't hear the front door open was because I was moaning his name, loudly enough to be heard from the living room.

Mike pushed his way into my bedroom and looked down at me with a lazy smile. "You think I look good, do you?"

I could only nod in humiliation and hope Mike wasn't a homophobe, because even if I hadn't been lying supine with my pants down Mike could obviously have murdered me in a fight. To my astonishment, Mike's grin grew broader; he pulled off his shirt and started to flex, right there at the foot of my bed.

What followed was the erotic equivalent of winning the lottery. Mike went from "tenant" to "live-in boyfriend". He was perfect in just about every way. He demonstrated the many advantages of his gigantic size and strength in bed -- backed up with genitals which would have seemed unnecessarily huge on a porn star. He was polite, and friendly, and clean, and never seemed to get in the way when I needed to do anything, but was always ready for intimacy when I desired it.

The one downside was his insistance that I begin working out again. I really didn't want to do that -- but I couldn't afford to give Mike the slightest reason to back out of our relationship. We were a mismatch -- but a mismatch in my favor, and I was willing to do almost anything to avoid jeopardizing it. I would lie on the sofa, Mike's arms massaging our muscles, while at his insistence I researched exercise routines and nutrition on my laptop. It wasn't long before I knew as much about those subjects as Mike himself, and he rewarded me appropriately.

Of course, not everyone has Mike's genetic gifts -- and, unfortunately, that included me. Mike constantly encouraged me, spotted me at the gym, massaged my aching limbs, helped me make shopping lists... but he couldn't make my muscles grow. I felt increasingly frustrated as the months passed and the gap between Mike, the paragon of masculinity, and me, the weak little average guy, grew wider and wider. I was still struggling to do 5 reps while Mike had doubled his bench press and put 2 inches on his arms and chest. He was better than a male model when he arrived, but in the first 9 months of his tenancy, Mike's appearance went from "bodybuilder" to "superhero" and then some. He bulged with power, and when we walked into a room, I sometimes noticed strangers take a step back just from the overflowing virility of his body.

Whenever I would point out the difference between us, Mike would just laugh, and tousle my hair -- or fondle me, if we were in bed. "Don't worry about it, champ. You'll see results someday." Of course, I was seeing results -- my body had burned away most of its fat, and I looked lean and fit and healthy, if you saw me on my own. Put me next to Mike, though, and I looked like an anemic late-blooming high schooler. And since I was with Mike so much of the time, it only served to emphasize my condition.

I started to obsess over my body. People at work started to give me funny looks as I did stretches in the hallway and wolfed down high-protein food in the cafeteria. I tried not to bore anyone, but in my head I was running through workout routines, searching for ways to optimize them even more. I spent my breaks cruising through bodybuilding forums looking for workout and nutrition tips, and every day I practically ran out the door on my way to the gym.

Mike kept me off drugs, though. Sometimes I was approached by guys in the locker room who would tell me they saw how much effort I was putting in, and would ask if I'd like something to make those workouts more effective...? Mike would just stand behind them, flexing his enormous arms to make his point: he didn't need drugs to reach his size, just hard work and good nutrition, and I didn't need them either. I turned the various dealers down, reluctantly.

Still, I was constantly searching for an edge -- some way I could stimulate my growth to something approaching Mike's godlike levels. He never seemed to slow down in any way; as we neared the anniversary of his arrival, he taped his arms at an astounding 28 inches, and started using over 700 pounds for reps on the bench press. His upper body was phenomenal, unbelievable, astounding -- when he went through a workout, all other activity in the gym ceased as everyone stared.

It also seemed as though his cock had grown. When questioned about it, he just gave me his usual grin and said he didn't know for sure, but if it wasn't growing then at least I never got used to its size. Finally I made a point of measuring it one day, for future reference, and it was a whopping 8 inches around, erect, and somewhere around 14 inches long.

Mike's increasing perfection made me more and more nervous -- how long would it be before he met someone else who was closer to his own level? I had begun to notice some minuscule growth recently, when my focus had become so dedicated -- perhaps I was one of those people who really needed strong mental focus to achieve results?

The very day that Mike had been with me for one year, I was researching mental focus routines during lunch. And before I knew what I was doing, I was looking at a forum discussion on hypnosis.

Hypnosis! Why hadn't I thought about that before?

...no, really, why hadn't I thought about that before? Hypnosis was an obvious route to investigate. I should have thought of it months earlier, if only as a topic for research. It was... odd.

In fact, suddenly a lot of things seemed odd. I felt clumsy and strange; it was like the sensation of putting on someone else's really strong glasses, only for all my senses. Or maybe a fever, minus the fever. I would have to ask Mike about hypnosis as a training method when I got home, he'd know all about it. If it didn't work, he'd just give me that grin and shake his head, I could almost see him doing it already...

...no, actually, I couldn't. The harder I tried to picture Mike's face, the less I could remember it. Throughout the afternoon, I tried desperately to remember Mike's face, and found I couldn't so much as remember the color of his hair or the sound of his voice.

I was panicking so much that I stayed well beyond the end of the day. When I finally noticed that the office was darkened, I thought I was alone -- but I was wrong.

Marcus was watching me from the edge of the light thrown by my screen, looking timid. I hadn't really spent any time with Marcus -- or anyone else from the office -- in a year, but before Mike had arrived and driven everyone else out of my head, I had actually had kind of a crush on Marcus. He was one of those slim-but-muscular black men you see now and again, and he had a beautiful face, with large eyes framed by sheer cheekbones. More than once, before Mike anyway, I had wondered why Marcus wasn't a male model.

When he noticed that I had noticed him, he stepped a little closer, looking nervous.

"What's up, Marcus? Are you the one locking up tonight? Sorry, let me shut this down and we can get out of here."

"No! No! ...I mean, I am the one locking up, but... um..."

Sudden, Marcus leaned forward and started kissing me, while he reached around and massaged my back. I was shocked -- but I have to admit it was pleasant. Mike hadn't done anything like this... or had he?

Finally Marcus pulled back, looking like a bomb squad member who isn't sure whether he was supposed to cut the red wire or the blue one.

"Um... sorry. You're just... Jesus, you're so sexy!"

"Huh?"

"No, really, man, I've been watching you all year, and you're fucking huge now!"

"What? I'm a little weakling. I've been trying to build up some muscle, but I haven't had any success at all."

Marcus gave me a look, and a laugh.

"Seriously! Look!" I pulled out the tape measure I had in my desk. (Vanity, vanity!) I wrapped it around my arm and flexed. "See? 15 inches."

"Dude, that looks like a fucking 29 to me."

I looked at my arm. My vision blurred. Suddenly my arm no longer looked like a noodle; it was huge and muscular, and the tape was indeed pulled nearly all the way to 29 inches. I blinked. Something funny was happening, and no mistake. Suddenly, my chair and my desk were too small for me.

"Marcus, can I call you later? Something weird is happening, and I need to check something."

"But can we get together?"

I was torn. Marcus was the hottest guy in my life outside of Mike. Would Mike be okay sharing me as a sexual partner? ...had Mike ever been my sexual partner? I couldn't remember ever having actually had sex with him.

"Yeah, probably. Look, give me your number and I'll call you in a couple of hours, okay?"

I grabbed my stuff and headed out. My head was whirling, and I banged it on the door as I walked out. Were the door frames at work always that low? I squeezed into my car -- was it always this small? -- and drove home. There were no lights in any of the windows. I ducked through the door and called out "Mike?"

There was no response. The spare bedroom was empty; Mike's stuff was nowhere to be seen. The bed was made, and a thin layer of dust covered everything.

Trembling, I searched the house. There was no sign anywhere that Mike had ever been there. Even worse, there was nowhere Mike could have been. All the places where I remembered him having left a mark turned out to be nonexistent at best; my supplements took up the entire shelf where I remembered Mike's filling up half the space; the shower caddy was completely filled by my shampoo, soap, and shaving equipment, with no space where I remembered Mike's stuff residing; Mike's cell phone -- I couldn't remember the number, or find it in my own -- had always been charging at an outlet which no longer seemed to exist.

I sat down shakily and tried to remember anything, anything at all, about Mike. What did he do for a living? Who was he? He had come to me on the orders of Uncle Jim -- but now that I thought about it, I couldn't even remember an Uncle Jim. Was Uncle Jim my Dad's brother, or my Mom's? And where did he live, anyway?

I had a sudden inspiration: the letter! Mike had arrived after I received a note from Uncle Jim, so if I found the note, I could find out about Uncle Jim, at least.

I headed down to the basement, where my "office" had been moved last year, and where I had hardly spent any time at all ever since. I turned on the desk lamp and realized that I was no longer panicking.

I was going to dig through my papers looking for the letter, but instead I calmly sat down and turned on the computer. When it finished booting, I opened a file on the desktop labelled "Thesis". A window opened up, and I began to read somebody's doctoral thesis:

Hypnosis, Super-Hypnosis, and Psychosomatic Suggestion

Victoria Claire Lee-Pudsley

Doctor -- at least, so I presume -- Lee-Pudsley opined thus: hypnosis permitted the conscious mind to be temporarily suspended and -- via the mechanism known as post-hypnotic suggestion -- instructions to be given which would bypass the consciousness and be carried out. This process was, however, imperfect and often failed in usual ways. This, according to the doctor, was because the hypnotic trance was merely an imperfect technique, discovered by accident, and not a fully-realized state of being. By means of experimentation, the doctor had discovered a further state beyond mere hypnosis. This she called "super-hypnosis". She had not fully explored it yet, but in the super-hypnotic state, the psychosomatic mind-body link was heightened; she reported success at inducing and eliminating various minor medical conditions through orders given to super-hypnotic subjects...

Without my meaning to do so, my hand closed the window, and opened a new file. It was an audio recording, and I started it playing. I recognized my own voice coming out of the computer's speakers.

"Hello, self. I presume, if you are hearing this file, that you can no longer deny the differences between reality and your perceptions. In a few minutes, you will remember everything, and be able to report to the doctor about the success or failure of the attempt. Just keep calm. As you listen to these instructions, which I am about to embed using a super-hypnotic trance, you will remember everything...

"Tomorrow, you will believe that you have received a note from a relative named 'Uncle Jim' warning you of the arrival of a tenant. You will clear out the spare bedroom for this tenant, named 'Mike', and you will believe this man to arrive two days later. You will perceive the imaginary 'Mike' to be the physical embodiment of all your goals and desires, and imagine yourself to enter a romantic relationship with 'Mike'. Meanwhile, you will begin a fitness kick, beginning a gym membership and working out obsessively. Your body will react impossibly well to these workouts, and you will not only grow even bigger than your initial envisioning of 'Mike' but will also take on enhanced physical characteristics which working out would not normally cause, such as larger genitals and increased height. You will always imagine that you have not changed, and that all improvements are made to 'Mike'. You will never address 'Mike' in public or give any other sign to any third party that you believe 'Mike' exists. When you are presented with definite evidence that you are not as small as you believe, you will come back and review these instructions and regain your memories. Until then, you will forget that you were ever hypnotized, and will refrain from any attempt to tinker with hypnosis. Even after you regain your memories, though, you will continue to get bigger and stronger. You will now awaken from the trance."

Of course! That explained it all! I got up from the desk and walked to the bathroom, ducking through the doorframe, and flipped on the lights. I gave myself a lazy, confident smile; my now-handsome face was perched atop a seven-foot body, and every muscle was huge, and hard, and full. Just looking at my magnificent physique made me hard -- and my 15-inch cock tore through my pants to slap against my abs.

Soon I would have to write to the doctor, and tell her that the experiment was successful... but first...

Marcus snuggled his face into my massive pecs. The sex had been fantastic -- well worth waiting for. And although I made Marcus look tiny, he was really a tremendously sexy guy.

He ran a hand along one of the striations on my chest, and sighed. "Fuck, you're so huge now. I wish I could get big like you."

I looked over at the computer. Super-Hypnosis and Psychosomatic Suggestion? "Actually, Marcus, I have an idea..."

[2bored]

Amazing story. I will comment more later when I've sorted out my thoughts. Wow!

[convolution]

Great (hot) little meme
What would happen if we could override our self image and behaviour with new preconceptions?

Thanks.

[Mdlftr]

Well done! Self motivated muscle growth through hypnosis! Good writing!

[tekuno]

On the assurance of a chat partner that it wasn't totally obvious (nobody asked, so I thought...):

The other day upon the stair,
I met a man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today.
I wish, I wish he'd go away.

[manlion]

Yeah, wasn't sure where the title came from. Even *with* the poem, which I (vaguely) recognize, I don't get the context of the title. Seems sorta inverse of the story.

[tekuno]

Originally Posted by manlion

Yeah, wasn't sure where the title came from. Even *with* the poem, which I (vaguely) recognize, I don't get the context of the title. Seems sorta inverse of the story.

"Mike" is a man who isn't there. (So is Uncle Jim, really.) Although technically the narrator never wishes for him to go away, if he really knew what was going on, he would do so -- "Mike" is purely a motivational tool, and actually stands in the way of the narrator's happiness by keeping him from forming any real relationships. (That said: if I could make a kind of Faustian bargain to have a year-long hallucinatory relationship which would not only make me incredibly muscular but also taller and better-hung, with no obvious negative physical side effects, at the cost of keeping me isolated in reality, I would accept so fast that it would violate general relativity.)

The poem is an old piece of nonsense verse (although not as old as I thought, according to Wikipedia).

Mad magazine once suggested an alternate last line: "I think he's with the CIA".

[GlamRockCowboy]

Actually, instead of "psychosomatic" suggestion, I believe "SUBLIMINAL" suggestion is the term you might have had in mind. It certainly would be more in line with the use of hypnosis; in fact, it would be a SUPPLEMENT to it, just as protein powder is used as a supplement to the food we eat as a part of our training regimens. Think about it! <G>

[tekuno]

Originally Posted by GlamRockCowboy

Actually, instead of "psychosomatic" suggestion, I believe "SUBLIMINAL" suggestion is the term you might have had in mind. It certainly would be more in line with the use of hypnosis; in fact, it would be a SUPPLEMENT to it, just as protein powder is used as a supplement to the food we eat as a part of our training regimens. Think about it! <G>

Nope; things which are "subliminal" are submitted to your senses in the ordinary way but fall below the threshold of your consciousness' ability to notice them. (That's what "subliminal" means -- the Latin roots actually translate literally to "below threshold".) The narrator isn't failing to notice things which are there, he's "noticing" things which aren't there as a result of post-hypnotic suggestion.

"Psychosomatic", on the other hand, is a term usually used for physical things which are caused or exacerbated by your state of mind. (The roots are Greek, and mean "mind" and "body".) (Well, okay, really the Greek root is really more like "soul" than "mind", but since consciousness, memory, and personality are all purely linked to the physical brain, there's no such thing as a soul and we can use the modern meaning instead.) The narrator not only hypnotized himself into training -- which wouldn't be particularly psychosomatic in the usual meaning of the word -- but actually managed to significantly increase his height and the size of his penis, neither of which can be changed to that degree by exercise. (You can increase your height a bit, particularly if you start off with bad posture, but not to the extent of going from 5' 9", as he describes himself at the beginning, to having to duck through 80" -- 6' 8" -- doorframes.)

On the one hand, there's no particular reason why the basic hypothesis described in the story -- that hypnosis isn't as deep of a trance as the brain can sustain -- has to be dismissed outright. On the other, though, there's fairly good -- though circumstantial -- evidence to show that your height isn't under your brain's control to any significant extent; if it were, then there would almost certainly be some cases in history of people who were brain damaged and started to grow (or shrink, I suppose) and that hasn't happened. There have been people who have lost their ability to feel pain, or had it dampened, and have been able to make fuller use of their muscles, so to a certain extent the schtick about being able to gain super strength is true -- but you feel pain precisely because your body is hitting damage thresholds, so anyone who did that on purpose would be asking for debilitating injuries.