The Growth of Attraction

I first noticed the change in a girl named Claire from my Intro to Psych class.

She sat two rows ahead and three seats over. I knew this because I spent a lot of time not paying attention to Professor Hendricks and a lot of time looking at the back of Claire's head. She had this way of tucking her hair behind her ear when she was confused, which was most of the time. Cute, in an unassuming way. Nothing special, nothing loud.

Then one Tuesday in late September, she walked into the lecture hall and I almost didn't recognize her.

She was taller. Not dramatically, not cartoonishly, but definitely taller. Her jeans, which used to break at the ankle, now rode up above her shoes. Her shoulders seemed broader, her neck longer. The curve of her hips had a sharper angle beneath her sweater. And her bust, well. That was the thing everyone noticed, even the guys who pretended they weren't looking.

I was looking. I couldn't stop.

She sat down in the same seat and her posture was different. She sat up straighter, took up more space. When Professor Hendricks asked a question, she didn't tuck her hair. She raised her hand.

I spent the whole class trying to figure out if I was imagining it. By the time the bell rang, I had convinced myself I wasn't.

Claire stood up and I watched her walk out. She was easily two inches taller than she'd been three weeks ago. Her frame had filled out in ways that made my mouth go dry. She moved differently too. There was a looseness in her stride, a confidence that hadn't been there before. She caught me staring as she passed and she didn't look away. She smiled, slow and knowing, and I felt heat crawl up the back of my neck.

That was the first time I saw what the drug could do.

I didn't know what it was called then. Nobody did. It didn't have a brand name or a dealer's tag. It just existed, passed between hands in the dorms, whispered about in dining halls. Some people called it the Juice. Others called it Growth. The biology majors called it an unregulated endocrine disruptor with unknown long-term effects. The women taking it didn't seem to care about the long-term effects.

Word spread fast. A girl in the sorority across the street had taken it and grown four inches in six weeks. A track athlete had added two inches to her vertical leap and three inches to her height. A quiet theater major had suddenly become the most sought-after woman in her department, not because she was prettier but because she was bigger, louder, harder to ignore.

The changes weren't uniform. Some women grew fast, others slow. Some barely changed at all. But for the ones who did change, the pattern was consistent. Height came first, usually about ten percent. Then the lean muscle, the athletic reshaping of their bodies. Then the curves, more pronounced, more deliberate. And then, for some of them, the personality shift.

That was the part that scared people.

I didn't know Claire well enough to talk to her about it. We shared a class, exchanged occasional hellos, nothing more. But I watched her over the next few weeks and I saw the transformation unfold. She grew another inch, maybe two. Her face sharpened, her jaw becoming more defined, her cheekbones more prominent. She started wearing clothes that showed off her body instead of hiding it. Tight tops, fitted jeans, heels that made her even taller.

She was dating a guy named Derek by mid-October. Derek was a lacrosse player, six feet even, broad-shouldered and loud. He'd always gone for petite girls before. I saw them together at a party and he looked uncomfortable. Claire was almost as tall as him now, and she was wearing heels. She had to lean down to kiss him.

He didn't last long.

I heard the breakup story from a guy in my dorm. Derek had complained that Claire was "too much." Too tall, too confident, too demanding of attention. She'd laughed in his face, apparently. Told him he was exactly her size now, which was smaller than she'd thought.

That part might have been embellished. But I wanted to believe it.

By November, the campus had split into two camps. The first camp thought the drug was a miracle. These were mostly women, plus a handful of guys who were into the changes. The second camp thought it was a disaster. These were mostly guys who felt threatened, plus a few concerned professors and a lot of parents who'd heard rumors and were calling the dean's office.

I didn't know which camp I belonged to. I just knew I couldn't stop watching.

The thing about being 5'8" is that you get used to being average. Not short enough to be remarkable, not tall enough to stand out. You blend. You watch. You learn to read people because you're not the one they're looking at.

I'd been doing that my whole life. Watching my father drink himself into silence. Watching my mother shrink herself to fit his moods. Watching the popular kids at my high school perform their lives for an audience that didn't exist. I got good at seeing things other people missed.

So when the changes started happening, I saw them before anyone else did.

I saw the way a girl's shoulders would broaden just slightly, the way her collarbones would become more prominent, the way her walk would shift from hesitant to deliberate. I saw the small tells. The way she'd look at her reflection in a window and smile. The way she'd stand a little taller when she noticed someone staring. The way she'd touch her own body, tracing the new lines of her hips or shoulders, as if she was still getting used to them.

I saw it in the dining hall, in the library, in the hallways between classes. I saw it in the gym, where women who'd never touched a barbell were suddenly deadlifting their body weight. I saw it in the student center, where groups of girls would cluster together, comparing heights and swapping tips about which moisturizer worked best for growing skin.

The lotion thing was weird at first. But it made sense. If your body was expanding, your skin would stretch. You'd need something to keep it supple, to prevent the itch and the tightness. Some women swore by coconut oil. Others used expensive creams from specialty stores. A few just used whatever was cheapest. The drugstore by campus started stocking extra bottles of unscented lotion. They sold out every week.

I bought some once, just to see what it felt like. I told myself it was for my dry hands. It wasn't.

December came and the changes accelerated. A sophomore named Rachel in my English seminar grew five inches in three weeks. She'd been 5'4" at the start of the semester. By finals week, she was 5'9" and still going. Her voice dropped an octave. Her hands got bigger. She started wearing her hair in a high ponytail that made her look even taller, and she walked through campus like she owned it.

I sat behind her in seminar every Tuesday and Thursday. I watched her neck lengthen, her shoulders widen, her posture straighten. I watched the way other women looked at her with a mix of envy and admiration. I watched the way men looked at her with something closer to fear.

She dated a guy named Marcus for two weeks. Marcus was 6'2", a basketball player, confident in his height. But Rachel kept growing. By the end of their second week, she was looking him in the eye. By the end of the third, she was taller. Marcus stopped coming to the dining hall at the same time as her. I didn't blame him. I didn't respect him either.

The thing that struck me most wasn't the physical changes. It was the way the women carried themselves afterward. There was a looseness in their movements, a freedom that hadn't been there before. They laughed louder. They held eye contact longer. They didn't apologize for taking up space.

I wanted to know what that felt like.

I didn't take the drug. It wasn't for men, as far as anyone could tell. A few guys had tried it and gotten nothing but headaches and nausea. Whatever was in that formula, it only worked on women. Something about estrogen receptors, the biology majors said. Something about how the drug interacted with female endocrine systems in ways it couldn't with male ones.

So I stayed 5'8". I stayed average. I stayed in the background, watching.

But I started noticing something else. The women who changed, the ones who grew tall and confident and striking, they started noticing me back.

It happened first at a party in early December. I was standing against the wall, cup of cheap beer in hand, watching the crowd. A girl named Maya from my calculus class walked up to me. She'd changed about a month ago, grown from 5'6" to nearly 6'0". She was wearing heels that put her at eye level with the ceiling. She looked down at me and smiled.

"You're always watching," she said.

I didn't know what to say. I felt caught.

"It's okay," she said. "I like it. Most guys can't even look at me anymore."

"That's their loss," I said. It came out before I could stop it.

She laughed. It was a real laugh, not a polite one. "You're different."

"I don't know about that."

"You are." She stepped closer. She smelled like vanilla and something else, something sharp and clean. "You're not scared."

"I don't have anything to be scared of."

"Exactly." She looked at me for a long moment, then reached out and touched my shoulder. Her hand was warm. Her fingers wrapped around my arm and I felt the strength in them. "Most guys see a tall woman and they think about what it says about them. You just see a woman."

I didn't know how to respond to that. I still don't. But she kissed me that night, in the corner of the party while people danced around us. She had to bend down to do it. I didn't mind. I minded less than I thought I would.

We didn't sleep together. She had a boyfriend, some guy who was out of town for the weekend. But we talked for an hour after the kiss, leaning against the wall while the party swirled around us. She told me about the changes, what they felt like. The first week was the worst, she said. Her bones ached, her skin itched, she couldn't sleep because her body felt like it was rearranging itself. But after that, after the pain faded, there was this lightness. This sense of becoming.

"It's like I was always supposed to be this size," she said. "Like I was living in a body that was too small for me, and now I finally fit."

I thought about that for a long time after she left.

The second woman was a stranger. I saw her at the gym, late at night when almost no one else was there. She was tall, probably 6'2" in her bare feet, with the kind of physique that made you stop and stare. Broad shoulders, narrow waist, long legs that seemed to go on forever. She was doing pull-ups, her muscles bunching and releasing with each rep. I was on the bench press, trying not to stare.

She finished her set and walked over to me.

"Spot me?"

Her voice was low, almost husky. She had a face that was beautiful in a severe way, sharp cheekbones, strong jaw, eyes that seemed to see right through me.

"Sure."

I followed her to the squat rack. She loaded the bar with more weight than I could lift. Then she started squatting, deep and controlled, her thighs parallel to the ground, her back straight. I stood behind her, hands ready, watching the muscles in her shoulders and back flex with each rep.

After she finished, she turned to me. "You're Ethan, right?"

I nodded, surprised.

"I've seen you around. You're the guy who doesn't flinch."

"I don't know what that means."

"It means you look at us like we're people, not freaks." She wiped sweat from her forehead. "I'm Val."

"Nice to meet you, Val."

She smiled. It transformed her face, softened the sharp edges. "You want to grab a coffee sometime?"

I said yes. We had coffee the next day. She was 6'3" in her sneakers. I came up to her chin. She didn't seem to care. We talked for two hours about nothing and everything. She was a biology major, pre-med. She'd taken the drug because she wanted to see what her body was capable of. She'd gotten more than she bargained for.

"I didn't expect to keep growing," she said, stirring her coffee. "I thought it would stop after a month. But it's been three months and I'm still getting taller."

"Does that bother you?"

"No." She said it firmly. "I like it. I like being big. I like taking up space. I like walking into a room and having people notice me." She paused. "I just wish more people understood that I'm still me. I'm just a bigger version of me."

I understood that. I understood it better than she knew.

We dated for a few weeks. Nothing serious. She was busy with school, I was busy with my own life. But we spent nights together, tangled in her narrow dorm bed, her long limbs wrapped around me. She was gentle in a way that surprised me. She'd hold me close, her chin resting on top of my head, and I'd feel her breath on my hair. I'd never felt so small. I'd never felt so safe.

It ended when she transferred to a university across the country. She'd gotten a research opportunity she couldn't pass up. We said goodbye at the bus station. She hugged me and I disappeared into her arms.

"Take care of yourself, Ethan," she said.

"You too."

She kissed the top of my head and got on the bus. I watched it pull away and felt something settle in my chest. Not sadness, exactly. More like recognition. I knew what I wanted now. I knew what I was looking for.

The third woman was different. Her name was Sarah and she hadn't taken the drug. She was average height, average build, average everything. We met in a creative writing workshop and she was smart and funny and easy to talk to. We went on three dates. On the third date, she asked me what I thought about the drug.

"I don't know," I said. "I think it's interesting."

"Interesting." She frowned. "That's a diplomatic answer."

"What do you think?"

She was quiet for a moment. "I think it's changing everything. I think it's making women bigger and men smaller, and I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing."

"Why does it have to be one or the other?"

"Because that's how things work." She looked at me. "You're not threatened by it?"

"No."

"Not even a little?"

"No." I thought about Val, about Maya, about the way they'd looked at me like I was something rare. "I think it's nice. I think women deserve to feel big."

Sarah didn't understand. I could see it in her eyes. She was trying to fit my answer into a framework she already had, and it wasn't fitting. We went on a few more dates after that, but something had shifted. She kept waiting for me to show jealousy or insecurity. I never did. Eventually she stopped calling.

I didn't blame her. I didn't fit the mold either.

By the time winter break arrived, I'd accepted something about myself. I wasn't like other guys. I didn't need to be the tallest person in the room. I didn't need to be the strongest or the most dominant. I liked being looked down on. I liked the feeling of being wrapped in someone bigger than me. I liked the way tall women moved, confident and unapologetic, and I liked that they saw me as someone who could appreciate them without fear.

I went home for break and my mother asked if I was seeing anyone. I said no. She asked if I was happy. I said yes. She didn't believe me, but she let it go.

I spent the three weeks thinking about what I wanted. When I came back to campus in January, I had a plan. I was going to stop watching from the sidelines. I was going to stop being the guy who just observed. I was going to find a woman who was changing, who was growing, who was becoming something more than she'd been before. And I was going to see if she wanted me to be part of that becoming.

I didn't know how to do it. I didn't have a strategy. But I had hope, and that was more than I'd had before.

The first day of spring semester, I walked into the dining hall and saw a woman I'd never noticed before. She was tall, maybe 5'10", with dark hair pulled back in a messy bun. She was wearing a hoodie and sweatpants, no makeup, clearly not trying to impress anyone. She was sitting alone, reading a book, and she looked up when I walked past.

Our eyes met. She smiled.

I smiled back.

I kept walking, found a table, sat down. My heart was beating too fast. I forced myself to eat, to breathe, to act normal. When I looked up again, she was gone.

I didn't see her again for two weeks.

When I did, she was different. She'd grown. She was 6'0" now, maybe 6'1". Her hoodie was tighter across her shoulders. Her sweatpants were shorter. She walked into the dining hall like she owned it, her head high, her eyes scanning the room. She saw me and her face lit up.

She walked straight to my table.

"You're Ethan," she said. It wasn't a question.

"Yeah."

"I'm Lily." She sat down across from me without waiting for an invitation. "I've been looking for you."

"Why?"

"Because I heard you're not scared." She leaned forward, her elbows on the table. "I heard you like tall women."

I felt heat rise to my face. "I don't dislike them."

She laughed. It was a warm sound, rich and full. "That's the most honest answer I've gotten all week." She looked at me, really looked at me, and I felt seen in a way I hadn't felt before. "I'm going to keep growing. I don't know how tall I'll get. But I want someone who's going to be there for it. Someone who's not going to flinch."

"I don't flinch."

"I know." She smiled. "That's why I'm here."

She reached across the table and took my hand. Her fingers were long, her grip firm. She held my hand like it belonged to her, like she'd already decided I was hers.

I didn't pull away.

We talked for an hour. She told me about the drug, about the changes, about how she'd been 5'7" in September and now she was 6'1" and still going. She told me about the pain, the itching, the strange hunger that came with growth. She told me about the dreams she had, dreams where she was a giant, dreams where she could touch the ceiling, dreams where she looked down at the world and felt no fear.

"I'm not scared of what I'm becoming," she said. "I'm scared of being alone while I become it."

"You're not alone," I said.

She squeezed my hand.

That was three weeks ago. We've been together ever since. She's 6'3" now and still growing. Every morning she measures herself against the doorframe in my dorm room. Every morning she's a little taller. I mark the height with a pencil, watching the line creep up the wood.

I don't know how tall she'll get. I don't know what the drug will do to her in the long run. I don't know if there are consequences we haven't seen yet, side effects that haven't manifested, prices that haven't been paid.

But I know this: when she wraps her arms around me, I feel safe. When she looks down at me, I feel seen. When she kisses me, I have to stand on my tiptoes, and I don't mind. I don't mind at all.

She's becoming something new. And I'm becoming something new too. I'm becoming the man who doesn't look away.