"Okay then," says Perry, "You'll be staying in room D1, with Brad. Come with me."
Perry holds the office door open for Matt to step through first. Just as Matt steps out into the hallway, he is slammed into by what seemed to be a moving mountain of meat and flab.
“Uuhh,” says Matt as he tried to stop himself from falling. He crashes back heavily beside the door as the moving mountain of meat stops and resolves itself into a very broad, very-fat-but-very-muscular boy three inches taller than Matt.
“Sorry,” says the boy, who’s wearing the biggest pair of nylon gym shorts Matt has ever seen, and an equally vast white nylon tank that hangs loosely around his sizeable belly. “I’m late for practice.”
“Well, if it isn’t Brad!” said Perry. “Brad, this is your new roomie, Matt.”
“Hi, Brad, I’m Matt. Practice?”
“Yeah, wrestling practice. It starts in three minutes, and coach gets mad if we’re late. Great to meet you though! I should be back in an hour - unless he sends us for lifting practice again.”
“OK.”
“Gotta go.”
Brad runs off, the pounding of his heavy footsteps making the old wooden floors groan and shake. Matt stares after him. Brad looked to be about a yard across the shoulders, and the gut that had bowled Matt over was no flat student wrestler’s six-pack but a great round gut, yet Brad had distinctly said ‘wrestling practice’. Matt wonders what other sports the school offers, as he and Perry walk down the hall to the stairs. You’d think a school that called itself “Obesity School for Boys” would at least have elevators, thinks Matt, but, no, stairs loom ahead.
As they pass a lighted display case with a series of trophies inside, Matt pauses. He reads an inscription on a trophy for champions in wrestling, and turns to Perry.
“So what teams does the school have?” he asks.
“Whatever guys are interested in,” Perry replies. “Wrestling, obviously - you’ve run into Brad - weightlifting, swimming, diving, football, sumo is big, and we’ve just started with caber tossing and other Scottish stuff.” He points out a series of tartan ribbons surrounding certificates for junior Scottish heavyweight events - and a team prize! “Our guys cleaned up at State last year.” Beside the Scottish certificates Matt sees a house cup inscribed for an eating competition.
“You really have eating competitions?” he asked, amazed.
“Sure!” replies Perry. “It’s something a lot of guys are good at! Look!” he adds, pointing out a series of individual cups for various eating competitions. “We have some fun awards too,” he adds, “like the ‘cannonball’ cup at Winterfest.”
Just past the display case, at the foot of the stairs, Matt and Perry pass a poster of a hugely fat wrestler with the caption ‘Think Big!’. “Wow,” says Matt, “this is all stuff fat guys can do.”
“Of course,” replies Perry, “this is OSB, after all. We’re all fat guys here!”
“What’s your sport?” asks Matt, sounding hopeful.
“Well, I’ve tried a number of things,” begins Perry, “and this year I’m on...
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