by Fred Aceves
“I told them no,” Miguel says as the Culler High page pops up automatically. “I know you wouldn’t take steroids.”
I enter the username that keeps me anonymous: popcornboy.
Rob says, “I told them I haven’t seen you all summer.”
My heart thumps faster as the app loads, the blue TT logo doing a spin.
Then it’s me on the screen. A picture of me walking down the hall today. What the fuck?
My eyes fix on the words below: Bitchslap David is on steroids.
538 likes.
“Don’t look at that app,” Enzo says.
I scroll through the comments, one by one, as rage in me rises and overflows so much that it fills up the room. All day people have been smiling in my face while talking trash behind my back. I imagine them laughing, saying out loud what they’ve written here.
What an idiot
fake ass muscles
I have a look around the lunchroom, disoriented for a second. Then everything feels familiar. Too familiar. This is the place I’ve always known. Full of assholes since I was a freshman. All these years I’ve been below them, which they’ve reminded me of every day with the teasing and taunting. With their kicks and shoves.
And now that I’m above them they want to drag me down to their level? Or even worse, shove me below them all over again? Fuck these anonymous cowards.
How I’d love to know which one wrote each particular comment.
Yep, obviously on steroids
i’m assuming bitchslap had a micro penis so i guess it disappeared now
There’s no doubt among Culler High students that I’m on steroids.
The few comments on how great I look don’t make me feel better. I’m in full panic mode right now.
“That app is trash,” Rob says. “That’s why it has that word in the name.”
I hold the phone in both hands, unable to stop reading. If I let go of it I swear I’ll end up flipping this fucking table over. I wanted to leave Bitchslap David behind me, but is Steroid David any better?
Nobody is stupid enough to call me that to my face, but that’s not the respect I’ve always wanted. That’s just fear.
A long comment catches my eye. It has 438 likes so far.
u can get bigger muscles with steroids but nothing u do will delete the video or unbitchslap ur stupid face. ur 4ever bitchslap david
The username is rikky2002.
“I’ll kill him,” I say, looking over at his table. He’s gone. His two friends are eating by themselves.
“Hey, Bitchslap,” I hear him call out.
Ricky is in front of the vending machine two tables away.
The rage closing in on me makes me want to get up. But a hand presses down on my shoulder.
“You’ll get suspended,” Miguel says. “Mr. Trevors is by the exit. Plus the security cameras.”
A silence has fallen around me and I can feel people watching.
“Do you have a dollar I can borrow?” Ricky asks, all fake polite and smiling.
“Not for you,” I say as calm as I can.
My fists are clenching but I got this. I can control my rage. Save it for a few more hours, until school lets out. The roids have made me lose my cool twice before, so I’ll listen to friends, the voices of reason.
“No dollar?” Ricky asks. “Must have spent it all on your fake muscles. Too bad that taking steroids doesn’t make you less of a bitch.”
I’m up now, a fireball of rage heading his way. My hips bump against people’s backs and chairs.
Ricky stays put as I come up on him. I zero in on his face and cock my fist back. Then let it go as hard as I can.
Glass shatters into the vending machine. The few shards clinging to the top, swinging, fall and crumble onto the floor.
Hundreds of chairs scratch against the floor as kids get on their feet, the whole lunchroom buzzing with excitement. I turn to my left, where Ricky squares up, fists framing his face. Like a boxing bell just rang.
I let out a fast hard left. Straight through the air because Ricky is gone. I turn to my left again. There he is. I swing a right. He ducks under it like a pro and pops up again.
This guy knows what he’s doing. Like I care. I’ve got power and strength, so fuck the boxing.
I can take a punch or two as I charge at him. Once I get him on the ground I’ll pound him with my fists as hard as I can.
I rush forward and heave myself on Ricky, my arms wide open. As I bring my arms together to grab him my face gets smashed. With the second smash my face jerks to the side. My body twists and my vision blurs.
With another punch everything goes dark around me and the floor disappears.
Among the steady roar of excitement in the lunchroom, distinct voices swirl above me.
Ricky: “I didn’t do nothing!”
Miguel: “Dude, wake up! Come on!”
Mr. Trevors: “Everybody get back!”
I open my eyes to see the faces of my friends and some curious onlookers. I sit up.
Three teachers have closed in on Ricky, about ten feet away. I push myself up with Miguel’s help and check myself for blood. Nothing from my nose. I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand and there’s a smudge of dark red.
“Your lip is busted,” Miguel says.
“To the nurse’s office, young man,” Mr. Trevors says, holding me by the back of the elbow.
“I’m fine.” I jerk my arm away to get his hand off me.
The whole lunchroom is watching, their laughter swarming. Though no phones are allowed, I’m pretty sure at least one person snuck theirs out to capture some of what just went down.
Even if the whole world doesn’t see this one, I’ve been humiliated again. Part of me wishes I were still out on the floor, unaware of what’s going on.
“Let’s go,” Mr. Trevors says, the soft worry gone from his voice. “To the nurse and then to the principal’s office.”
It’s so ridiculous, this chump trying to tell me what to do. I don’t wanna be here. Not just now but in general. Who needs Culler High? Who needs this bullshit?
“Let’s go to the nurse,” Mr. Trevors repeats more forcefully, and makes a move toward me.
“Get your fucking hands off me,” I tell him.
I walk the other way, down the aisle toward the rear exit. People call out to me. Only a few of their words reach me clearly.
“You got knocked the fuck out.”
“Hey, Bitchslap, what happened?”
My mistake was coming back to this place. I’m so done with high school. I walk out the back, Mr. Trevors following a few steps behind.
“You’re not going anywhere,” he says.
I cross the parking lot, glancing back only once to make sure nobody’s following. Faces are in the lunchroom window and two teachers stand in the doorway, watching me make my escape.
Find somebody else to entertain you from now on, assholes. This is the last you’ll ever see of me.
23
TWO WEEKS LATER I’m sitting in a rickety desk in history class, jotting down today’s homework—the pages to read, the questions to answer. Though we have shorter classes at Franklin Adult School, and get out earlier—at noon—we gotta make up for that with more homework.
It’s the same amount of work, when I think about it, the same number of hours per day spent on school. So why is this so fucking depressing? Sure, I have no friends here, but do I need some from seven a.m. to noon?
No way. It’s enough that everybody leaves me alone.
Not that they recognize me. There’s no video of the punch that laid me out on the lunchroom floor. Even if there were, it would be a typical knockout video—not an epically hilarious one like the first video.
I wanted to quit high school completely, but Alpha put his foot down and said I’m finishing. That the personal trainer degree I want requires a diploma. He even called up Launch and asked him to help me register. At forty-two, Launch can pass for my dad. The school administr
ator called him by his name, Mateo, and I called him “Dad,” feeling weirder about it every time I did. Not just because bigmouthed and crazy Launch would make a terrible dad. It was because I hadn’t heard myself say that word for a while.
I remember what it meant. I remembered my own dad and how I love him and miss him and really should make things right.
Just as soon as I’m back to my regular size. I can’t let anybody who knew me bigger see me smaller, especially my dad, who will feel like he was right and I was wrong about using steroids. So I’ve been trying not to think about Dad and Gaby.
Anyway, with thoughts about Culler High outta the way, I am more focused on my goal of becoming a YouTuber. Natural Nathan will be turning twenty soon—no longer a teen bodybuilder, so I plan to guide the new generation.
By next summer I’ll have done three more gear cycles. That and my continued dedication will give me the best teen physique on YouTube. A year after that I’ll be a certified trainer and pulling in hundreds of thousands of subscribers. No longer focused on teens but everybody in the fitness world.
To think I was focused on wowing Culler High. I’ve taken on a bigger dream now—to wow the entire world.
“Read all of unit four,” the teacher says with the same monotone as always. “Answer all the exercises at the end, and use complete sentences. Are there any questions?”
I don’t have any, and probably wouldn’t ask them if I did. He’s harsh, Mr. Alexander, like all the teachers here. I guess because they don’t have to put up with anything. There’s no getting sent to the principal’s office for messing around. They’ll just kick you out of the school.
And you can walk right out that door whenever you want to.
“It’s too much homework, Mr. Alexander,” the blond pregnant girl in the front row says. “I gotta do homework for other classes too.”
“This is adult school,” he reminds us. “In the real world you can’t tell your boss it’s too much work. You just do it.”
There are a few girls at the school, about half of which are moms or soon-to-be moms. You notice them arriving late to the first class, studying harder than the others, and leaving in a hurry, as if they have something way more important to do.
When the bell rings we get up, all thirty or so of us, without the excited chatter of regular high school. I head out quickly—in order to reach the 53 bus two blocks away by 12:10. Miss that and I have to wait another hour.
The halls are full of guys who got kicked outta traditional high schools. Guys suspended one too many times or fresh outta juvie. Guys with a quiet desperation who either don’t make eye contact or stare at you for too long.
“Where you going, baby?” a guy asks the girl hugging textbooks against her chest. “Where you going so fast?”
“To get away from you.”
“Fuck you, then, bitch.”
The guy with knuckle tattoos is at his spot outside, leaning against the side wall of the entrance, lighting a cigarette. He blows the smoke straight ahead, onto anybody going down the wide steps. He checks out the girls, sure, but he seems to be mostly staring down the guys, hoping somebody meets that stare.
I feel like he stares me down harder, maybe because he has something to prove and I’m the biggest guy here. I never look back. Me trying to get big was all about avoiding fights.
Besides, being bigger than someone doesn’t mean I can take them in a fight. I’ve learned that lesson.
I get off the bus on my stop and see the new Iron Life sign, light gray with black letters, that’s brought in so many new members. It mentions we’re right behind the Laundromat.
My mood doesn’t improve when I step inside. Even though this is my favorite place. Even though it’s chest and tris day, my favorite workout. Lately, workouts do the opposite of giving me an ego boost like they used to. I’m lifting less weight all the time and have barely enough energy to survive them, even with the help of my pre-workout energy drink.
Without that extra testosterone, my energy is down in general. All damn day.
I wave to Keith, the part-time trainer who’s chatting up a cute girl working with green dumbbells. As usual, there are less than a half dozen people here between noon and one.
In the locker room I take off my regular clothes and make the mistake of looking into a mirror.
You’re so small. Four stick limbs stuck onto a stick torso. Unacceptable. Pathetic.
My mind isn’t playing tricks on me anymore. I’ve lost three pounds already.
I change into gym clothes and head out. Alpha comes out of his office.
“Time to grind, bro,” he says. “What’s with that face?”
“I don’t have much energy, and I already know I’m not going to lift as much as last time.”
I miss the excitement I felt all summer just before hitting the weights, the intense desire to get to it and beat my previous lifts. I miss the small victory after every set.
“Are you sure that depression isn’t a side effect of going off gear?” I ask him.
“You aren’t gaining lots of mass as before, and you’ll be losing some soon,” he says. “That’s the reason you’re all sad. It’s all in your head. Ride out the off-cycle for a few weeks and focus on the upcoming cycle,” he says.
“And the lower testosterone? I mean, how do I know if I’m already producing my natural testosterone again?”
“If your balls have filled out again, they are probably—”
“Probably?” My balls do look normal, but it’s not like I can be sure. I should’ve taken a before pic of them too. “What do you mean probably?”
“Patience, bro. Waiting out the off-cycle isn’t easy for anybody.”
After warming up on the bench press I set up the same weight as last week. You got this, I tell myself, but I don’t believe it. I doubt I will even do the same amount as last time—ten reps.
I start pushing out the reps and counting. At the sixth rep, my body knows I can’t do another. I rack the weight and feel more depressed than ever.
By two o’clock I’m at the reception desk. Nobody but Jake hitting the weights and Susan, a new member, walking at a moderate pace on the treadmill.
My mood is a little better only because I’ll be making some money in the next hour, when James comes by to pick up the gear I have for him.
Evenings are busy with lots of members working out and some people trickling in to ask about memberships, which I sell them. So I ask my gear clients to come by in the early afternoons.
Done with the reading and questions of history class, I get busy with my advanced algebra homework. The automatic discipline I used to have for homework is gone. I gotta push myself to open the book and get to it. Once I’m doing it, like now, I tell myself to focus.
Maybe I do have depression. Just because Alpha and the others guys say they don’t get the side effect doesn’t mean I can’t.
The bell on the door jingles and here comes the USF student James, skinny as a rail and carrying a shopping bag—he follows instructions well.
“I didn’t even know this place was here,” he says, setting the bag on the reception desk.
“We’re here, bro,” I say, trying to summon some excitement. Whether I’m helping out on the floor or receiving people at reception, I gotta be upbeat. “We got all the equipment you need and are less expensive than Snap Fitness.”
I’ve done the same with my three other clients. When they come to pick up their gear, I take the opportunity to sell them a membership. More money for me. They’ve said they might sign up just as soon as their membership at their current gym runs out.
I take James’s shopping bag. I open it to discover an empty bottle of Gatorade and weightlifting gloves. This nonsense he took to Snap Fitness is only one reason I knew he was a potential client.
What I did to start selling was, I got a free three-day pass at Snap Fitness, and a free five-day pass at CrossTrain Gym.
Alpha told me what two types of guys to look ou
t for.
First, there are people like me. Guys who go hardcore, have that determination and power in every rep. Between sets they’re checking themselves out in the mirror, oblivious to everything in the world except for that image in front of them.
Devon, a senior at Rivera High, and Mark, a thirty-one-year-old manager at Panera by the mall, are both in this category.
The second kind of potential users are like James. Guys who think bullshit like Gatorade and gloves matter. Guys who drift into the gym as if lost, no plan of action or workout in mind. They wander from one easy-to-use machine to another—never getting the full range of motion in exercises. Between sets they look at their phones or at the TV.
“These are both orals,” I tell James, dropping D-bol and Trenbolone into the shopping bag. This chump is scared of needles. The bag is for discretion. I hand it back to him. He takes it just like he gave it to me—completely chill.
The other guys didn’t follow instructions too well. They strolled in all cool, but once I handed over the bag they got twitchy and paranoid, looked from side to side. Like I just handed them crack in front of a police station.
“Don’t forget to train hard and eat big like I told you,” I say. “You give everything to your gains, and they’ll give everything to you.”
About an hour later, I’m done with homework and reading about ways to boost testosterone naturally. I have to do whatever I can to get out of this depressive slump.
Get plenty of sleep.
Not a problem for me. I’m sleeping more hours than usual. Sometimes I even take a nap during the day.
Get more vitamin D, preferably through sunlight.
Okay, I could do that. Lay out in the backyard.
Reduce stress with exercise.
The only stress I have is that I’m not producing enough testosterone. And when I exercise, and lift less than I did the time before, it stresses me out even more.
And here comes more stress. Rogelio is crossing the parking lot. I haven’t seen him since the movie theater. I remember he used to work out in the late morning, and that’s when I’m at school. I’m feeling nervous, wondering if he’ll be all chatty. All I remember is that he warned me against taking steroids.