Trade with Theblueberrybull

“Hey batter batter, hey batter batter, hey batter batter SWING!”

The players chuckled as Frankie Peterson struck out.  Again.  But no one was so
amused as Joey Palermo, who had to clutch his ribs for his guffawing.  Several
of the other players turned mild glares on him.  Joey was a baseball fiend.  Day
and night, he could be found practicing his fastballs against his own fence.  
And he was good.  So good, in fact, that he found it hilarious when someone else
did poorly.  Not something generally smiled upon by his peers.

It wasn’t that he meant any harm, of course.  His friends knew he had a good
heart and wasn’t meaning anything by his constant teasing.  It was other people
who didn’t know him well that generally got confused.  After all, with his tan,
muscular built stuffed beneath a tight white muscle shirt, a gold chain, and
slicked-back black hair, Joey looked more like a cover boy Greaser or Jock than
nice kid.

Which was exactly the misconception Frankie got as the teams ambled off the
field and into their dressing rooms.

“Hey,” Joey called, jogging up to the nerd and patting him hard on the back.  
Frankie frowned and readjusted his glasses, which had come askew.

“Yes?”

“I just wanted to say that you weren’t bad today,” Joey said, still grinning.
“Why, you almost did as well as my sister!”

Joey’s sister Lizabell was also a baseball fiend, and rather good.  But even so,
the insult stood that he had just accused Frankie of playing like a girl.  At
Frankie’s unamused glare, Joey burst into laughter again, hugging his sides as
the nerd stalked off the field, muttering under his breath.

“Hey, Joey,” a voice called.  Joey turned to see his friend, Kyle, heading for
him, his face a mask of concern. “Maybe you shouldn’t pick on Frankie like
that.”

“What’s wrong?” Joey laughed. “I’m just teasing.  He knows that.”

“Not everybody does, Joey,” Kyle warned. “And you’ve been picking on Frankie an
awful lot lately.”

“Aw, that’s an exaggeration.”

“Last week you made fun of him for being so skinny, showing off your muscles.”

“Teasing.”

“And said he’s be better off if he just got fat, then he could pretend he had
muscles underneath.”

“Well…”

“He stalked off the field, insisting that if you took your own advice, life
would be easier for everyone.  And then when you said he was catching
butterflies with his bat, and then the time you said that the ball wasn’t going
to kill him, so he might as well not run away from it.”

“Okay,” Joey sighed. “I guess I’m being a bit harsh.  Still, it’s not like I
mean anything.  Frankie’s a good kid, and that’s just how I like to hang out
with people.”

“Well, what if he started making fun of your English grades?”

“Hey!  I’m not all that bad at English.”

“And Frankie’s not all that bad at baseball.”

Joey paused, frowning as he glanced at the team still retreating for the locker
room.  Frankie had already run off.  He sighed.

“Okay, I hear you,” Joey admit. “I’ll apologize to him tomorrow before
practice.”

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Joey had no time to apologize, however.

He barreled into the locker room, panting heavily.  Halfway to the field, his
car had decided to break down.  Leaving Lizabell to deal with it when the tow
truck arrived, he had run all the way.

“Palermo!” Coach growled, peeking his head in to see Joey leaning against the
lockers, gasping for breath.

“Sorry… coach…” Joey panted. “Car…. Broke down.  Ran…. All… the way… be out
soon…”

“Right, right,” the coach grunted, scowling. “Well, get out there soon.  
Peterson says he’s got an upset stomach, and he’s gonna hang in here a while.  
We can’t afford to be set back two players.”

Joey watched as the coach left, still muttering to himself, and groaned.  He was
exhausted, and as much as he loved baseball, he doubted he would really be able
to get his head in the game today.

He began opening his locker, trying to focus on the combo with trembling fingers
when he heard footsteps.  He turned to see Frankie striding in more proudly than
ever, showing no signs of an upset stomach at all.  Was the scamp trying to pull
the wool over Coach’s eyes to get out of a practice?  Well, it was rather hot
outside.

“Hey, Joey,” Frankie said, grinning.  Joey furrowed his brows, frowning.  
Frankie had never been so friendly before.  What gave?

“Uh, hey Frankie,” he replied uncertainly. “What’s up?”

“With me?  Oh, nothing.  You on the other hand, geez.  You look about five kinds
of dehydrated.”

“Yeah,” Joey sighed, leaning his head against his open locker. “Hungry, too.  I
had to skip breakfast.”

“Oh, well,” Frankie said smugly, suddenly standing up straight and pulling a
foreign article out of his pocket.

Joey eyed it curiously.  It looked to be a small square of gum, wrapped in old
fashioned blue paper covered with superfluous, flowing script.  Definitely a
brand he’d never seen before.

“I suppose I won’t be needing this as much as you, then,” Frankie said, tossing
the gum, which Joey caught eagerly.

“Hey, thanks Frankie,” he said, hurriedly unwrapping the blue gum and stuffing
it in his mouth.  Frankie chuckled.

“Just be sure to swallow it before practice.  You know how Coach is about
chewing gum.”

“Yeah,” Joey laughed. “He’s just like my old choir teach- oh, wow!”

The flavor hit him like an anvil.  For a moment, he was stunned.  Blueberry gum,
which he had never heard of, with such intense flavor that he would have thought
he was eating actual fresh blueberries.  For a moment, he forgot all his other
senses, completely focused on the taste that had filled his mouth.  It was
incredible!

“What is it?” Frankie asked a little too eagerly.  Joey moaned, smiling as he
enjoyed the taste.

“This is the most incredible stuff I’ve ever had… where did you get it,
Frankie?”

“Oh you know.  Around.”

Joey would have pressed his teammate for further information, but couldn’t think
much around the taste.  Remarkable!  He didn’t even USE words like remarkable!

The hunger and dehydration had already ebbed severely, as though he had just
gorged himself on fruit.  But he couldn’t stop chewing.  The gum was just too
good!  Now all he really had to worry About was being too full to play the game well!

“Hey, Coach is probably going to call you out, soon,” Frankie said suddenly,
startling Joey out of his euphoria.  “You’d probably better swallow that stuff
so you can get out there.”

Joey sighed.  He was reluctant to stop chewing, but swallowing would probably be
a good deal easier than trying to somehow spit it out.  He gulped, feeling the
blueberry-tasting lump slide down his throat, where he lost all feeling of it.  
The taste in his mouth, however, didn’t fade.  Frankie leaned against the
locker, his eyes alight with a wicked gleam that matched the smirk on his lips.

“That was pretty amazing stuff, Frankie,” Joey said, stretching his suddenly
stiff muscles. “You have to tell me where you got it.”

But Frankie wasn’t listening.  Instead, his face melted into an expression of
staged shock and he pointed at Joey with a gasp.

“Joey, l-look at you!” he stuttered.  Joey, puzzled, looked down at himself, and
gasped equally.  A pale lavender sheen had crept onto his once perfectly tan
skin.  He lifted up a hand, looking it over, and started in shock to see it
darkening into a deep indigo.

“What’s happening to-hic-me?” he jumped slightly at the hiccup, suddenly feeling
bloated.  The taste hadn’t lessened one bit.  He hiccuped twice more, perturbed
as the bloated feeling intensified.  He tried holding his breath, placing his
hands on his head.

“Hic…hic…hic…”

The sheer fullness that centered in his gut was growing horribly uncomfortable.  
He groaned and placed his hands on his abdomen, shocked to discover his once
tight stomach had grown rounder and puffier.

“What the-hic”

He gasped, feeling his stomach actually puff out more beneath his fingers, which
sent him into a new wave of hiccups.  Each spasm of his diaphragm send his
stomach out another millimeter, then another centimeter.

“Wow, the gum must have caught in your espohagus,” Frankie remarked calmly.
“Every hiccup is probably causing more juice to flow down into your stomach and
intestines.”

“How do you-hic-ugh…”  Joey groaned as this hiccup pushed his stomach out a
noticeable inch.  The rounded belly had become more obvious beneath his white
body shirt, through which his indigo skin was clearly visible.

“Do you want me to get you some water?” Frankie suggested thoughtfully.  Joey
moaned (and hiccuped) as his stomach grew tauter and rounder.

“N-no –hic- I’m so full I –hic, hic- don’t think that –hic- would be such a good
–hic- idea.”

And it was true.  With every hiccup, he could actually feel the juice pumping
into his gut.  As appealing as the idea of stopping the hiccups was, he couldn’t
imagine consciously eating or drinking anything.

“Ugh, I’m so –hic- full,” Joey groaned, leaning back against the lockers and
massaging his belly, which had begun peeking our the bottom of his shirt.  He
was afraid to look down, but he already knew how it probably looked.  He’d seen
pregnant women before.

He hiccuped again, and the shirt slid up above his belly button.  It was getting
heavier and heavier.  Joey’s legs shook with the effort of holding the bulk up.  
He slid his hands underneath, trying to support his girth with his arms.  More
hiccups.  He could only just wrap his arms around it now.

“We’d better get you out of here, man," Frankie said suddenly. "Want to make
sure you can fit through the door.  You don't want to get stuck, do you?"

Joey glanced up, struggling to how back a hiccup.

"How big am I gonna -hic- get?"

"I don't know," Frankie replied, a little too quickly.  He took Joey's arm and
began to steer him toward the door.  In a few steps, Joey was already struggling
to catch his breath.  It was hard to breathe when he was so full and fat.

He took up a waddling gait, hurrying awkwardly for the door, hiccuping the whole
way.  Each hiccup made movement even more impossible, but there was nothing he
could do about it.

"W-Wait," he gasped as they neared the door. "I need to... catch my...
breath..."

He let go of his stomach to lean his arms against the wall, breathing heavily.  
His back ached from the effort of supporting his girth, and he hated the feeling
of his belly, so huge now, fitting between his thoughs.  He hurriedly closed his
legs together, if nothing else for the sake of modesty.

"At least your hiccups stopped," Frankie remarked wryly.  Joey glanced up,
realizing that Frankie was right.  Relief flooded through him and he sighed.

"Yeah, but how am I gonna get rid of this?"

He gestured helplessly toward his stomach.

Frankie pondered this very seriously for several moments.

“Well, seeing as you’re filled with juice…”

“Wait!” Joey interrupted.  Awkwardly, he shifted around for a better view of his
teammate. “How do you know this is juice?”

Frankie seemed momentarily stunned, but shook it off.

“Just a guess.  But since it’s juice, we’ll probably have to juice you.  If we
can.”

Joey gulped uncomfortably, deciding not to push whatever Frankie meant.  
Besides, the sooner he got out of the locker room, the sooner he could get help.  
It was strange, though, that Frankie didn’t run to get it right when Joey had
started turning blue.

Joey stood, prepared to waddle forward when he felt something odd.  Like a
continuous, odd gush flowing.

His thighs pressed together tightly.  Panicked, he tried to hold them there, but
despite his efforts, they began pushing out against each other, widening his
stance.  He couldn’t see them, but he could feel them inflating, as his stomach
had, barely fitting within the boundaries of his jeans.

“Wh-what now?” he gasped.  Frankie leaned against the wall calmly.

“Well, this is just a guess,” he supplied. “But suppose the hiccups in your
esophagus sent the juice flowing into your stomach?  Well, now that it’s there,
it can start flowing out more.”

Joey groaned as hit pants began to pinch uncomfortably around his thighs as they
filled fuller and fuller.  Even his backside was flowing out, his hips
attempting to flare but for the restraining waist size he had once sported.

“You’d better get out of the locker room,” Frankie said. “Before you’re too
big.”

“Too… big…” Joey gasped.  The larger stomach must have meant more room for
butterflies in his stomach, because he had never felt so anxious.

Slowly, now with his steadily expanding lower body to contend with, he waddled
toward the door, one ponderous step at a time.  Just as he was slipping through
the frame, though, he paused as realization is him.

His hips brushed both sides of the doorframe.

“Come on, get out there!” Frankie snapped, giving Joey a sport push in the back.  
Joey stumbled forward, suddenly realizing that had Frankie not pushed him, he
would probably have been stuck in the doorframe.  Maybe indefinitely.

When he reached the middle of the hall, he stopped, gasping for air.

“C-can’t go… further,” he panted. “T-t-too… full…”

“That’s okay,” Frankie said cheerfully, coming up to pat his shoulder. “ At
least now you’re in a position where I can help you.”

Joey would have said ‘thanks’, had the steady tightening of his pants not been a
factor in taking away his breath.  He groaned, fumbling under his massive belly
to unbutton them.  That was when he noticed how huge his fingers were.

Joey choked, bringing one hand up to view.  His once normal fingers were not fat
sausages in a fatter arm.  He grimaced, half from horror, half from the painful
tightening of his clothes.

Bang!

Relief flooded through him as the button shot off like a bullet, allowing some
of his breath to return.  Inhaling quickly, he turned to Frankie, suddenly aware
that the nerd was still watching with a strange bemusement.

“Frankie,” he said seriously, brows furrowing on his dark indigo face. “Tell me
what’s going on.  What’s happening to me?  How big am I gonna get?”

“You ever seen Willie Wonka?”  Frankie asked offhandedly.  The butterflies
returned tenfold, some flittering up into his chest.  Frankie must have seen
this in Joey’s face, because he grinned and chuckled. “Just look at the
expresion on that fat face of yours!”

Joey sputtered, bringing his inflating hands up to feel his face.  Sure enough,
his cheeks has poofed out slightly, not enough for him to notice on his own.  
Frankie seemed momentarily pleased before returning to the topic at hand.

“Well, you’ll be bigger than the old version.  A lot bigger.  But not quite as
big as the new one.  Do you get what I’m saying?”

“YOU!” Joey yelled angrily. “You’re doing this as some kind of sick revenge
plot."

"good job," Frankie chuckled. "I didn't even have to say it myself.  You're not
a dumb as you look, blueberry boy."

Joey scowled, infuriated as he balled his fat hands into fists.

“Why you little-I’m gonna pound your dork face in till you see out of the back
of your head!”

Angrily, he made to stamp forward, momentarily forgetting the nature of his
predicament.  He could barely lift his foot off the ground, and when he tried,
it only caused the juice within him to slosh and splash loudly.  He wobbled
uncertainly, waving his arms until two seemingly miniscule hands caught his
side, steadying him.  Instinctively, Joey tried to turn to face Frankie, to beat
the snot out of him, but found that he could no longer move.

“Be patient,” Frankie said irritably, taking a few steps back. “This will all be
over soon.  Making a fuss isn’t going to help you or anything.  Though it is
pretty funny to see the blueberry boy wobble.”

Joey groaned in humiliation, but there was nothing he could do.  A series of
rips and snaps sounded as, little by little, his jeans began to coma apart at
the seams, no longer capable of holding in his massive legs.

His muscle shirt, which had long since rolled up over his stomach, was now
stretched tightly and uncomfortably from armpit to armpit.  Awkwardly, he tried
to remove it with arms that grew rounder and more conelike by the second.  
Frankie came in and helped to pull the shirt over his head, but hurried off to a
safe distance of about five feet before Joey could hit him.

Joey’s backside had also begun to round out, easing the weight on his front, but
doing nothing to alleviate the humiliation of his situation.  His legs were now
nothing more than conelike knees, his arms fat and nearly horizontal to his
almost spherical body.

He began to notice that the hall, large as it was, was becoming uncomfortably
small, the ceiling seeming to get lower and lower.  Not only was he getting
rounder, he was getting taller, too!

When he felt his crotch touch the floor, it all came out.  He couldn’t just wait
here for Frankie to enact whatever sick revenge he had in mind (if there was
anything sicker than this!)  How could he trust the guy to really juice him in
the end!?  For all Joey knew, Frankie could have a safety pin in his pocket
right now.

Grunting and flapping his arms, he tried to shift forward and move.  Frankie
only laughed at his efforts, but Joey refused to give up.  Every second he could
see his belly expanding further, his arms growing smaller, his legs shrinking.  
He couldn’t waste any time.

With a terrific lurch, Joey managed to move his bloated form… but it was nothing
more than an embarrassing roll onto his stomach.  Juice sloshed and gushed
uncomfortably inside him, like small waves, causing his body to rock violently.

To his dismay, he found that his limbs held no hope of touching the ground.  
Even his head was hovering several feet above the stone floor, and inching
farther away by the second.

An uncomfortably pat on his bare back alerted him to Frankie’s presence.

“You know, that’s really useless,” the nerd explained. “You can’t exactly move
on your own anymore.  Kinda sad for the baseball star, isn’t it?”

Joey moaned in despair.  Frankie patted his back harder this time, causing some
pressure to well up in Joey’s bloated stomach.

“Amazing… I don’t know what to compare you to.  I’d say a balloon, but your skin
is way too tight this way.  Never thought human skin was so elastic and touch at
the same time.  You really do feel like a blueberry, skin, juice, even smell and
all.  Except much, much more fragile.”

Frankie began tapping his fingers on Joey’s back, causing the pressure to gurgle
and intensify.  Joey swallowed, focusing only on a chip in the paint on the
cement floor.

“What, nothing to say?  Maybe your insides have started turning into blueberry
flesh.  I wouldn’t know, I didn’t make the gum.  Wish I could find out.”

Joey gulped, and suddenly the pressure exploded from his mouth.

“BEEEEEEEEELCH!”

Joey gasped for air, a slight leak of blueberry juice falling from his mouth.  
Frankie leaned down, examining it.

“Well, what do you know.  You can juice yourself.  Hope you know how to control
your belches, blueberry boy.”

Frankie grinned and turned to walk away, leaving Joey, poor and inflating, along
in the hallway.

“N-no, wait!” he called.  Frankie paused and turned around, a wicked smirk in
place.

“Ah, so you need me?”

Joey sighed and dropped his head.  He didn’t need to go on beckoning Frankie,
though, for he returned.  Almost instantly, Joey felt himself being rolled back
into a position he would have once called “On his feet”

Those very feet, he noticed disdainfully, dangled above the floor, nothing more
than fat nubs from his ankles down.

His arms, also, were useless but for his wrists outward.  It was hopeless.  
Frankie had won.

Joey watched in semi-morbid fascination as his inflating body engulfed what was
left of his limbs, save for fat hands and feet.  Surely this was it.  Now if
only Frankie would get this juice out of him…

But that wasn’t the end.  The juice continued to flow, now rising up into his
shoulders, puffing them out further.  His neck thickened, becoming one with the
rest of his body.  Joey tried to calm his breathing as he felt his shoulders
pressing up into his jaw.

Next, the juice flowed into his face.  Before it had been but a sample, a taste
of juice to help his cheeks to match the rest of his fat body.  Now, his lips
plumped, his nose fattened, his cheeks puffed out as extremely as a chipmunk’s.  
Joey whimpered softly as they began to press up into his lower eyelids, making
vision difficult.

“Well, you look good and round,” Frankie mocked. “What say we roll you out.”

“P-pweeze…” Joey blubbered, his voice muffled by his cheeks and shoulders.
“Pw-pw-mmph… mmm”

“What was that?  You’re not ready.  You’re a daring one, Joey, how big to you
want to get?”

“Pw…aw cwn bwee-mmph pmmph  mm-mmm!  Mmph!”

“Well, I’m gonna roll you out,” Frankie said.  Joey assumed he was shrugging,
though he couldn’t see through his fat cheeks.  He felt hands on his swollen
side toppling him over and rolling him steadily across the concrete floor.  
Nausea welled up in his stomach, and he wished desperately to throw up.  Maybe
that would get rid of some of the juice.

He felt the doors swing open by his side and bright sunlight filtered down.

Joey grimaced (though expression was hard with his swollen face) at the shocked gasps and murmurs that exploded around the field at his ghastly appearance.

"Frankie, what happened?"

"Joey?  Joey?  Holy cow!"

"I don't know!" Frankie cried in false shock, patting Joey's swollen side. "I just found him this way."

"That's not right."

"You were in there when he got here."

"You must have seen what happened!"

"MMPH!" Joey blubbered. "Mmm-mm-mmph!"

"What's wrong?"

"Why can't he talk?"

"The juice has filled him too tight," Frankie explained. "He's too swollen to say anything."

There was a brief pause, before more outraged yells.

"Yeah?  And how do you know that for certain, Frankie?"

"I thought you had no idea."

Frankie had begun to panic, feebly defending himself, but for all his acting before Joey, he had no defense against an outraged baseball team.

"You jerk!  He was going to apologize to you, but he got here too late to do it."

"Geez, if this is your revenge for a little namecalling, you're over the top, Frankie."

"I-I'm sorry," Frankie stumbled, genuine guilt seeping into his voice. "I didn't realize... wait, I know how to juice him.  But it's going to be messy."

"How do we do that?"

"I say you should do it yourself, you idiot!"

"No, think of poor Joey."

"Okay, Team!" the coach's voice suddenly boomed. "Play together, work together.  We're going to help our teammate out."

Joey tried to sigh in relief, but couldn't through his puffy cheeks.

"First, boys, we roll him to the football field.  That'll teach coach Burmann to insult my sport..."

"But Coach, won't they know it was us?"

"How would they know?  Blueberry juice and baseball aren't regularly affiliated things, you know."

Joey felt hands press gently against him, rolling him across the soft grass, down the hill (very carefully) and into the middle of what he assumed to be the football field.  Coach shouted directions, and the team shifted around, people surrounding him in a big circle.

"Ready?  One, two..."

Every pair of hands suddenly pressed against his skin.

"Three!"

And pushed.  An intense pressure welled up inside of him, making his ears ring.  For a moment, Joey feared he would pop.  Then, a torrent of blueberry juice rushed out his mouth, dripped from his nose, leaked from his ears, his eyes, even his very pores.

The pressure stopped, and already Joey could feel himself returning to normal.

"One, two, three!"

.........................................................

When Joey was at a very human side again, and no longer capable of being juiced by others, he took it upon himself to press down on his stomach and cough up the last of the juice.  It was rather embarrassing to sit, drenched in blueberry juice, clad only in his too-big underwear in the middle of a blueberry-juice drenched football field, but he was just glad to be back to normal.

Unfortunately, though, no one could locate the gum amidst the lake of blueberry Juice.  Joey was fine with it, though.  He never wanted to see that gum again.

They all hit the showers before a belated practice was to begin again.  Joey borrowed clothes from a slight boy named Jason.  Coach wouldn't allow him to practice right away, for despite his recent superhydration, Joey was rather white and shaky.

He sat out the first half of practice, watching with a strange new respect for Frankie, who really did play better.

He didn't plan to cross the nerd again.

Coach let him take part in the second half of practice, and though his performance was a little down, he was glad to play the game again.  Seemingly without any lingering effects.

As they wandered off the field, though, sweating and laughing, Kyle stopped in his tracks, staring wide-eyed at Joey.

"What?" Joey demanded, still rather self conscious.

"Y-your nose," Kyle choked. "It's turning blue."

"Blue as a blueberry," Frankie gasped, a complete not-what-I-planned look etched on his face.