Guillaume stroked his goatee and looked at the Polaroids and his sketches. An idea began to form in his head. He placed his largest stretched canvas on his easel and stood back, thinking.
Guillaume informed Jace that it was going well, but that he never let his subjects see the painting until it was completed. He told Jace he would call when it was done. So they waited a few days.
Unlike Jace, whose parents seemed unable to cut him off from financial support, Tom's folks had stopped giving him handouts once he graduated from college. Fortunately Jace let him stay for free in a guest bedroom at the beach house, which saved him a shit-ton of money, but he still needed to cover his other living expenses. Most recently, he had landed a soul-deadening gig at a call center which bored him comatose but gave him some dignity when he was out on the town, not always having to rely on Jace to pick up the check. Jace, however, felt bored alone.
When he awoke at 10:00 AM the third day of that week, he noticed that he had gotten himself a little pudge on what had just been a hard, flat stomach. Putting it down to a temporary bloat, he didn't think much more about it.
The next week, though, as Tom was working, he woke up to his alarm like every other morning, but when he threw his covers back to get out of bed he noticed that his stomach was protruding a lot more than usual. His clothes felt constricting and he could feel that he was
sinking into the bed a little. Jake got out of bed and stretched, worried, but not too worried. It was probably
just from eating too much at dinner after all.
He got out of bed and plodded to the bathroom, rubbing his eyes to try and wake up. He shut the door behind him and stood at the sink to check his face before getting into the shower. It took a second to register, but it was pretty evident. His face was thicker and rounder. His cheeks were fuller, his chin softer... Something was seriously off.
Could he be getting fat? With his lifestyle, he wasn't exactly surprised, but he'd figured that he wouldn't let himself go until he was so old it didn't matter anyway. He could not explain the tightness in all of his shirts - were his shoulders getting broader?
In the evenings, as they were lounging around the house, Tom could swear that Jace was checking himself out in the mirror more often than usual, worry on his face. Tom could understand why, as Jace appeared to be packing on pounds of fat. Jace must not have been doing much during the day, save perhaps eating and drinking beer. What had long been a perfect swimmer’s body was growing fatter and more solid, his firm pecs softening to faint moobs, his gut beginning to swell out over his hips a little. Tom didn't exactly find Jace's increasing BMI a thrill, but he also noticed a little thing one night on Jace's head. "Sit still,", he told Jace, the latter turning his head around so his two new chins were visible. "Why?" The question was unexpectedly imperative, startling Tom enough to make him freeze. Was Jace's voice growing deeper? "I just... just sit still for a moment, will you?" Jace's deep, icy blue eyes pierced him dead to the ground, but he didn't focus on them. He reached over to Jace's scalp, jerking and plucking a hair off his head. "Ow! The fuck did you do that for?"
Tom handed him the hair. It was silver, not dark blonde. Jace stared at it, his eyes widening. "Fuck." Reaching for his head, he stopped a moment as a conspicious sound was heard - a rip.
He turned around for Tom to see. Jace's jeans had ripped in the ass from the simple motion of him sitting up in the couch, his white boxer-briefs showing through. "Well," he said, "guess we're going shopping tomorrow."