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He stared at the cover. The guy on the front was bulging in his tanned skin, a swollen, overstuffed package of biceps, triceps, pecs, and abs. To amplify the he-man look, he had a beautiful girl in a bright yellow bikini wrapped around him like a ribbon.

John had been reading up on weight lifters for years and had saved for months to buy a small iron set. He worked the metal six days a week. And had nothing to show for it. No matter how hard he pumped, or how desperately he wanted to get bigger, he hadn’t put on any muscle.

Part of the problem was his diet. Those Ensures were about all he could handle without getting sick, and they didn’t have a ton of calories in them. The trouble wasn’t just food-related, though. His genetics were a bitch. At the age of twenty-three, he was five feet, six inches tall, 102 pounds. He didn’t need to shave. Had no hair on his body. Had never had an erection.

Unmanly. Weak. Worst of all, unchanging. He’d been this size and this way for the past ten years.

The sameness of his existence wore him down, exhausted him, drained him. He’d lost hope he was ever going to turn into a man, and the acceptance of reality had aged him. He felt ancient in his little body, as if his head didn’t belong stuck atop the rest of him.

But he did get some relief. He loved going to sleep. In his dreams he saw himself fighting and he was strong, he was sure, he was…a man. At night, while his eyes were closed, he was fearsome with a dagger in his hand, a killer who did what he was so very good at for a noble reason. And he wasn’t alone in his work. He had the company of other men like himself, fighters and brothers, loyal to the death.

And in his visions, he made love to women, beautiful women who made strange sounds as he entered their bodies. Sometimes there were more than one with him, and he took them hard because they wanted it like that and that was what he wanted, too. His lovers would grab onto his back, scratching at his skin as they shuddered and bucked underneath his crashing hips. With roars of triumph, he would let himself go, his body contracting and spilling into the wet heat they offered him. And after he came, in shocking acts of depravity, he drank their blood and they drank from him and the wild frenzy left white sheets red. Finally, when the needs were spent and the fury and cravings were over, he held them gently and they looked up at him with glowing, adoring eyes. Peace and harmony came and were welcomed as benedictions.

Unfortunately, he kept waking up in the morning.

In real life, he couldn’t hope to defeat or defend anyone, not the way he was built. And he’d never even kissed a woman. Never had the chance. The opposite sex had two reactions to him: The older ones wanted to treat him like a child and the younger ones looked right through him. Both responses hurt, the former for underscoring his weakness, the latter for stealing any hope that he would find someone to care for.

Which was why he wanted a woman. He had this tremendous need to protect, to shelter, to guard. A calling with no conceivable outlet.

Besides, what woman would ever want him? He was so damned scrawny. His jeans hung off of his legs. His shirt pooled in the concave pit that ran between his ribs and his hips. His feet were the size of a ten-year-old boy’s.

John could feel the frustration building in him, but he didn’t know what he was getting upset about. Sure, he liked women. And he wanted to touch them because their skin seemed so delicate and they smelled good. But it wasn’t like he’d ever been aroused, even if he woke up in the middle of one of his dreams. He was a total freak. Suspended somewhere between male and female, neither one nor the other. A hermaphrodite without the odd equipment.

One thing was for sure, though. He definitely wasn’t into men. Enough of them had come after him over the years, pushing money or drugs or threats at him, trying to get him to blow them in bathrooms or cars. He’d always