Growing into the Job, Post 610: Outreach: Thanksgiving (Charity) (Patreon)

By the time Ned finally made it inside the Northwood Community Center, he had already spent twenty-three dollars on gas, fifty dollars on a fundraiser ticket, and nearly forty-five minutes standing in a line that wrapped halfway around the building. Even though Buzzcut had told him he smelled like cat pee last night, he hadn’t showered. Maybe he should have. 

Because this thing was not at all what Buzzcut had described.

Outside, really pretty young female volunteers hurried between rows of parked cars carrying cardboard trays stacked with bottled water and coffee for people still waiting in the chilly misty rain. The cold didn’t seem to bother the tall women wearing only jeans or leggings and their matching blue, really-tight Far Horizons shirts. Orange traffic cones had long since surrendered to reality: police cruisers now directed a slow procession of SUVs, church vans, pickup trucks, and minivans into whatever patch of asphalt remained. Every few minutes another family appeared from somewhere down the block, umbrellas bobbing through the intermittent November drizzle, asking one another if this was really the end of the line.

Ned shuffled forward another three feet as the crowd compressed inside the entrance. Warm air washed over him, carrying with it the smell of roasted turkey, fresh bread, cinnamon, coffee, and gravy - with the masses here, they’d need enough to feed a small football stadium. Underneath, there was something also cooling and fresh and calming, like peppermint and cucumber blended with a touch of green tea and aloe vera. And then somewhere even farther inside the scents would change and children were laughing. Somebody already had started singing along with the Christmas music drifting quietly through the ceiling speakers despite Thanksgiving not even being over yet.

A little girl wearing a puffy purple coat tugged excitedly on her mother’s sleeve. “Mom! I can see the balloons!” she squealed. 

“They’re decorations, honey,” the mom acknowledged. 

“They’re really big,” the girl stated. 

Huh huh, Ned chuckled to himself, Big Balloons. 

Ned looked up. Orange and gold balloons did, actually, float near the ceiling above long banners thanking local businesses, churches, and community organizations for supporting the fundraiser. Construction-paper leaves hung from fishing line. Deeper inside, folding tables stretched almost the entire length of the gymnasium, already crowded with people eating, talking, laughing, lingering over pie and coffee as though they had nowhere else they needed to be today.

He had expected maybe a hundred people. There had to be…what, between this room and the other one they just opened up and all the people outside-

Eight hundred? Like, nine hundred?

A lot.

The line snaked through portable stanchions toward the serving tables at the far end of the room, where volunteers in matching shirts - and, yes, really big boobs - moved with surprising efficiency. Every time a space opened, another dozen people flowed forward to fill it.

Somebody behind him whistled softly, an old guy.  “We’ve lived in Northwood twenty years,” he murmured to his wife, “Never seen this place this full.”

His wife smiled. “And they’re still letting people in.”

“They’re still coming. Why?” the old man wondered. His wife could only smile. 

Ned frowned. Yeah, exactly - why? It’s just turkey. Turkey wasn’t worth waiting an hour for.

Near the entrance, a local television crew had carved out a little island of open space with cables and light stands. A young, busty reporter with a heart-shaped face, humidity-frizzed chestnut curls and a fitted red coat smiled toward her cameraman while someone powdered her forehead beneath an umbrella and an umbrella-sized studio light.

Ned noticed the camera guy wasn’t Derek. Good. Derek shouldn’t know I’m here. 

The reporter lady waited for a producer’s cue. Three. Two. Her practiced smile brightened- 

“This is Cassie McClain coming to you live from the Northwood Community Center,” she announced, microphone already raised, “What organizers expected to be a modest Thanksgiving fundraiser has turned into one of the largest holiday charity events New Corinth has seen in years.”

She stepped aside, gesturing toward the sea of people behind her.

“Attendance estimates have now passed one thousand guests, with families continuing to arrive, shuttled in from nearby churches throughout the morning.”

A thousand? Ned blinked.

The reporter turned toward a gray-haired woman balancing a to-go plate with a slice of pumpkin pie.

“Ma’am, what brought you out today?” the reporter asked, big hazel eyes wide with interest...

The woman laughed, looking almost embarrassed to suddenly find herself on television. “Oh…I don’t know. I saw that young girl from Far Horizons on the TV a while back...”

“The office manager? Melissa Monroe?”

“Yes I suppose,” The woman smiled to herself, “She just seemed…nice.”

Cassie nodded encouragingly. “So you came because she was here?”

“I guess I did.” Another laugh. “It sounds silly when you say it out loud.”

The cameraman, not Derek, shifted, a bit nervously. 

“It doesn’t sound silly at all,” the reporter smiled. 

Ned found himself looking past the cameras, only dimly aware of the conversations bubbling around him:

“I’m totally here to see HER.” “Me and my dad and brother and uncle are here because my mom’s away on business and nobody else can cook.” “I’m here because I got nowhere else to be. And also for the tits.”

The news interview continued as Ned, in line, edged forward.

Volunteers moved through the crowd carrying coffee urns and baskets of dinner rolls, offering them to people still waiting. Ned grabbed one. A pair of pretty brunettes had  started entertaining children with construction-paper pilgrim hats. Two elderly women waved over a group of Far Horizons employees just to thank them for organizing everything.

Nobody seemed impatient. Nobody seemed angry. To Ned it felt wrong.

Uh, well, not wrong exactly, he thought to himself, sniffing something in the air, something nice, Just…weird.

Buzzcut had called this a publicity stunt. ‘Some rich medical company buying good headlines’, he’d said. Looking around, though, Ned was having trouble figuring out where the publicity ended and the Thanksgiving began. 

The people helping out certainly did not look like they were there just for television cameras. A little farther ahead in line, a young father crouched to wipe something off his son’s chin while apologizing profusely to a busty volunteer, who only laughed and handed him extra napkins. Near one wall, three women from what looked like the same church or synagogue had pulled two strangers into their conversation.

It was noisy and crowded and chaotic and normally Ned didn’t like that sort of thing it made him sweaty and Buzzcut would say smell more like cat piss yet somehow today even with all the people it was kinda, I dunno, comfortable.

Ned rubbed his poorly shaven cheek and shifted his weight - and there was a lot of it - from one foot to the other.

“Do you want another roll, sweetie?” came a female voice, from a female face that was only a few inches away from his. Ned was tall, a big boy, and this blonde was kinda almost nearly his height. Her nametag, a sticker on her bigger-than-big chest, said ‘KATIE’...

Suddenly nervous - she was so pretty - Ned grunted thanks, took a second roll from Katie’s aluminum tray, and turned away. Meanwhile, he had committed her chest to memory but failed to notice a strange intelligence in her eyes.

“You’re welcome, hun,” Katie said, and moved on. She smiled exactly the same way at the next guy in line. Then the woman behind him. Then the little kid who didn’t want a roll he wanted a cookie.

Huh. 

The line moved another few steps. Ned moved with it and took a deep breath of the nice-smelling air. Whatever all these people had come here looking for,  they seemed to be finding it.

Ned took another bite of the dinner roll. Probably bought at Big Y. It was warm. Good. Not as good as mom’s, but really good. 

One of the tall pretty volunteers - this one with red hair and a really nice butt - was directing people toward whichever of the two dining rooms happened to have open seats, smiling like she’d had nothing better to do on Thanksgiving than tell strangers where to sit. Someone called her Julia. 

“Six at that table!” “Need another chair over here!” “Sir? Watch the little guy.”

The crowd somehow obeyed without anybody really giving orders. People just kinda helped. A man in a Bears sweatshirt stood to let an elderly couple have his spot at the table. Two teenage girls moved three folding chairs each across the room before anyone asked. A little girl dropped a plastic fork and somebody she’d never met handed her another one, almost before it even hit the floor.

Weird. Ned had been to gaming conventions before. Gun shows. County fairs. Crowds usually sucked. This one didn’t.

The line rounded one final corner. For the first time, Ned could actually see the serving tables, where they were giving out food. There were a lot of them, with turkey and ham and mashed potatoes and stuffing. And green beans and sweet potatoes and more dinner rolls. Pies. Cranberry sauce that looked kinda weird. 

Ned frowned. Didn’t they say there’s more than a thousand people here already?  Somewhere behind the buffet, women in aprons disappeared through swinging kitchen doors carrying empty trays and emerged moments later with full ones. How is there still so much food?

He remembered some story about fish from Sunday school. 

Maybe they’d rented refrigerated trucks. Probably.

His eyes drifted farther down the line. That was when he saw her. It took him a second to realize why everyone ahead kept slowing down. They weren’t waiting for food. They were waiting for her.

He recognized her in a second. From the files Buzzcut had let him see. And, uh, from other places. Those folders on his computer.

The weight in his coat pocket felt suddenly heavier. 

Melissa Monroe stood near the center of the buffet behind an enormous stainless-steel serving tray full of turkey, short sleeves of a blue Far Horizons volunteer shirt showing off shapely but powerful arms and a white apron that looked almost comically undersized on someone her height. Even from here she towered over everyone around her, the top of her head visible above nearly the entire crowd.

Jesus. Buzzcut had said she’d gotten bigger again. He wasn’t kidding.

TV flattened people. Even pictures online, her Instagram pictures, the stuff on GirlTube. They flattened everything.

In person, she was enormous. Tall in the way old oak trees were tall.  And certainly not flat. 

Those balloons had nothing on her. Ned could barely look away. Tits. He loved tits. All the volunteers here had big tits, but her? With her size? Oh my god. He had to try to stop looking at her tits. 

But he couldn’t tear his eyes away from her body. Though also still unmistakably feminine, her shoulders seemed broader than Ned remembered seeing, her waist even narrower, and every movement carried a kind of effortless confidence that made her size seem both completely natural and completely like something out of a comic book. Raven hair with molten highlights spilled over one shoulder in a loose wave, catching the warm light spilling down from the gymnasium ceiling.

He watched her laugh. 

Not politely: actually laughing. A little girl had apparently informed her, with tremendous seriousness, that she intended to eat four slices of pumpkin pie.

“Four?” Melissa had asked.

The girl nodded proudly. “I’ve been practicing.”

The towering woman covered her mouth, trying not to laugh. “I believe you.” She laid an extra slice on her tray. “Come back for the next two, but only if your mom says it’s okay.”

The girl put a fist into the air, a show of strength. Melissa laughed.  The people nearby laughed with her, not because the joke had been especially funny, but because it was Melissa. .

The line shuffled forward. Ned still found himself watching her. She never hurried anyone.

An older woman reached the front. Instead of immediately serving her, Melissa tilted her head. “Mrs. Bridgers?”

The woman blinked. “You remember?”

“Of course I remember!” Melissa beamed, “From your visit with us last month. You were wearing a purple scarf!”

Now she laughed. “I was!”

“I liked it!” Melissa beamed. Then her expression fell to one of concern. “You poor thing. How’s your cough?”

“Oh, it’s much better!” the old woman replied.

“You told me your granddaughter was interviewing for nursing school,” Melissa said, looking down at the much smaller woman.

Mrs. Bridger’s eyes lit up. “She got in!”

“Oh!” Melissa clapped once, genuinely excited. “That’s wonderful! Have her send us something, like a resume - maybe she can do, like, an internship!”

For the next twenty seconds the line simply waited as the two women chatted. Nobody complained. Nobody sighed. Nobody looked annoyed. In the meanwhile Mrs. Bridgers had produced three wallet-sized photographs with the speed of a grandmother who had clearly been waiting for exactly this opportunity. Melissa looked at every one, asked questions. Even remembered the granddaughter’s name. 

When Mrs. Bridgers finally moved on, she looked lighter somehow.

Ned was confused. Did people usually act like this? All…nice?

Melissa also apparently knew the next person in line: the guy who’d, she’d noticed, been stealing glances of her chest the minute he got through the door. Most guys, honestly, did the same thing. But this guy was special. A crook came to her smile, extra dimples.

“Mr. Carothers!” 

Her old teacher from high school Biology. He greeted her, a bit sheepishly, and exchanged some awkward pleasantries. 

“How did you know I was going to be here?” she asked him, “Do you follow me online?” She knew full well he did. Lots of guys from her past did. And most reacted the way he was doing right now when confronted on it - by getting even more sheepish. She kissed him on the forehead, giving him a quick chance to look again at her chest, and sent him on his way with a full plate - and an extra cookie. 

The woman behind him in line stepped forward smiling. And then the next family. And the next. 

“My husband is never going to believe this,” gushed a middle-aged Asian lady. 

“His comments on my interview were so nice,” Melissa gushed back, “Tell him I’m going to be on Channel 5 again next week!”

The woman wandered away smiling down at her plate as though she’d forgotten she was carrying it.

Ned stared. What the hell? Nobody remembered that kind of stuff. Not about randos. Not this many randos. It’s like they’re not randos to her. 

Ahead of him, another family reached the front. Two pre-teen girls immediately abandoned all interest in their phones, or food. They were looking up. Way up. One whispered something to the other.

Melissa leaned down - down and down - until she was nearly eye level with them. “What’re you two talking about?”

The one girl hid behind her friend. The other one swallowed.

“I…”

“It’s okay,” Melissa assured her, gently. 

“…you’re really pretty.”

Melissa blinked. “Oh!” then laughed in obvious surprise that sounded honest. She let a faint blush touch her cheeks. “Well…thank you! You’re very pretty too. Both of you.”

The girls were speechless. 

“Want a selfie?” Melissa asked.

“YES!!” both squealed in unison. 

She asked for the first (braver) girl's phone and in a practiced move snapped a picture of the three of them, together.  

“Have a nice, big dinner - eat a lot! - then go home and get taller,” Melissa told them, handing them back the phone, “Happy Thanksgiving!”

“HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!”

The girls hurried away, one clutching her phone like a priceless treasure. The woman with them, probably a mom, mouthed Melissa a wordless ‘thank you!!’ and moved on. Melissa watched them go, smiling to herself before turning immediately to the next person in line. 

Ned noticed: those girls and the mom didn’t even get any food from Melissa. He shook his large head. He didn’t know the word for the feeling he was having right now.  ‘Incredulous’, it would have been, if he had the vocabulary. He had expected someone acting like a politician, or maybe a movie star, somebody performing kindness because cameras happened to be watching. Instead, Melissa Monroe behaved this way, apparently, even when the cameras weren’t pointed at her.

He was getting closer to her in line, and the weight in his coat pocket felt heavier again. He put his hand in there with it, to feel its warmth. It was not as comforting as he’d hoped it’d be. 

He overheard more conversations: “I saw her on television last week.” “My daughter wanted to meet her.” “She seems nice.” An older veteran in a faded Marine Corps cap shrugged to the woman beside him. “Honestly, I don’t know why I came…but I’m glad I did.”

Ned took another breath of the sweetness in the air. There was even more of it, now. Vanilla, warm and nostalgic. Toasted almond, and faint citrus, with a subtle undertone of clean linen. Something in it reminded him of a favorite childhood blanket. Then he overheard Melissa again, cheerful. 

"Since you're back there..." she called over one shoulder. She was speaking to someone behind her, but her voice carried strangely into the room. "...would you be a dear and tie my apron tighter for me, honey? It keeps slipping."

Something - a man's voice, maybe? Unheard by most - came from somewhere behind her.

Ned craned his fat neck. For a second he couldn't actually see what was happening. Then Melissa, standing straight, straighter, gathered the loose fabric of the apron against her sides while unseen hands caught the strings behind her back.

Ned’s eyes began to go wide, as the impact of her dramatic hourglass began to draw the attention of the room.

She wants people to see her waist, he found himself realizing, because it’s so tiny.

"There?" The man’s voice from behind her. Small.

"A little tighter..." she urged.

The apron drew in another inch at her sides. Ned gasped, in a wheeze. Perhaps someone like Buzzcut, who took pills to quiet down his, uh, urges, could have looked away. Ned couldn’t. Except for his high blood pressure and ADHD meds, Ned didn’t take any pills.

"A little tighter..."

All eyes on me, her body seemed to be saying. She was giving them all, if just for the moment, the opportunity to stare. Permission.

h-holy shit she’s built

Ned was nearly shaking.

and she wants everyone to know it

"Okay - perfect," Melissa said brightly. "Much better. Thank you." The apron was snatched around her waist. She gave the knot an experimental tug, then smoothed the front of the apron with both hands. The white fabric now hugged her lines as closely as her volunteer shirt, cinching at an impossibly narrow waist before flaring dramatically over her hips and emphasizing an impossible bust. It was practical, yes, maybe, keeping the apron from shifting as she worked. But it was also well-thought-out theater for the entire crowd, and the effect was almost unfair. Standing behind the buffet beneath the warm lights of the community center, she somehow looked simultaneously like the girl next door and the sort of woman artists built statues around.

Or maybe the goddess herself.

She thinks we can’t do anything but look at her. Maybe that thought redoubled Ned’s resolve. He may actually have gasped before, but now he gasped again as - is that a man? -  stepped from behind her. 

Ned blinked. For one utterly disorienting second, he wondered if a child had wandered behind the serving line by mistake. 

Is that-??

That’s - what do they call him?? - Dr J - !?!

That was Dr. J!

She looked down to thank him, smiling warmly, and the top of his head didn't even come close to her shoulder like the Far Horizon women did. He barely reached the bottom of Melissa’s ribs.

No. Lower. He wasn’t even waist-high to her!

Holy fart!!

Ned's overcome brain, which struggled with basic arithmetic or comparing apples to oranges, was nearly short-circuited trying to process this comparison. The woman he'd come here for stood over seven feet tall. That much he was prepared for. But the man - the one who would have the last one in the chamber, after the other five were spent - stood...what? Three and a half feet? Maybe a little more? Not much! 

He was fucking short!

They looked less like coworkers than a mother standing beside her elementary-school-aged son. What the hell happened to him?? Buzzcut had called him brainwashed. The forums called him a traitor. Nobody had mentioned...this.

The poor sap wore the same blue Far Horizons volunteer shirt as everyone else, though even in XXS on him it looked almost comically oversized.. A little white apron wrapped around his waist, already marked with gravy and a fresh smear of cranberry sauce across one side.

Melissa still looked down at him. There was a sparkle in her eyes. Had Ned been a more sensitive young man, he would have seen it as love. 

She turned back to a tray of carved turkey. Dr. J turned toward an enormous (well, enormous to him) aluminum tray of stuffing.

Ned watched as the little doctor wrapped both hands around the handles, braced himself, and carefully carried it across the serving line with the practiced determination of somebody who had long since accepted that everything in the world had become inconveniently large. He watched as Melissa glanced over at him and asked: “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” he answered, adjusting his grip before smiling. “I just keep forgetting how…ooof…heavy stuffing is.” 

She laughed - not at him, but with him.

A little girl tugged gently on Dr. J’s apron. “Mister?”

The doctor turned immediately. The two saw almost eye-to-eye.  “Yes, ma’am?” 

“My mashed potatoes touched my carrots.”

Dr. J looked down at the plate with exaggerated concern. “Oh...” He rubbed thoughtfully at his chin. “That is a pretty serious development.”

The girl nodded. “What do we do?”

Melissa was watching with a wry smile, her dimples like carved stone.

“I think...” Dr. J lowered his voice conspiratorially. “...the carrots are probably very happy about it. They told me earlier they were looking for some new friends.”

The little girl considered that. “Potatoes? For friends?”

Dr. J nodded. 

“Okay,” agreed the kid. 

“Problem solved.”

The girl scampered back toward her family. Ned had watched all this, only dimly aware of his worldview slowly crumbling beneath him as Dr. J smiled to himself before grabbing a roll of paper towels almost as tall as his torso to clean a puddle of spilled gravy from the floor before anyone could slip. Then he was helping an elderly woman steady two plates almost as large as his own chest. Then carrying coffee. Then gathering empty trays. Then standing on a small folding step stool tucked behind the buffet so he could reach the stack of clean serving platters himself. 

Gosh it smells good in here, Ned marveled, Not just food. Girls. 

Once in a while, one of the Far Horizons volunteers would ask Dr. J if he needed help. Sometimes he did. And he never went too far from Melissa’s watchful gaze; even Ned could see that. But he never stopped moving - and he looked happy, actually happy. Not trapped, or frightened, or even humiliated, but happy. Even Ned could see that too, and it unsettled him more than anything he'd seen all morning.

Ned put his hand in his pocket to feel the steel and remind himself of the reality of it. Six in the chamber, he reminded himself. Five for her. One for him. The thought no longer landed with the certainty it had an hour ago. The sixth would be, like Buzzcut had said, ‘the mercy shot’. Now…

Just then, farther down the serving line, somebody sampled the cranberry sauce - in a tray different from the rest - asking who made it. Without missing a beat, every Far Horizons woman within earshot pointed in exactly the same direction.

Melissa looked up, delighted. “Oh! That was me!”

A tiny silence settled over the buffet. Melissa remained blissfully unaware. “I want to feed the world,” she was saying, to the next person in line, another suburban sap - a dad, twin daughters - with his eyes planted squarely on Melissa’s chest. 

“You are feeding the world,” one of the volunteers replied, a tall, pretty, vaguely Jewish woman with nice boobs that had just shown up from some back room with a clipboard and a phone. 

A drop-dead gorgeous bottle blonde with a vicious manicure that had been standing alongside Melissa quipped back. “Yet you look like you’re going to be leaving hungry,” she drawled, “right, dude?”

That got the twin-dad’s attention, pulling it away from Melissa’s tits. He stammered something as the blonde plopped some cranberry sauce onto his plate and shooed him away. 

“Less salt next time,” Amelia, the blonde, said to Melissa, spooning the cranberry sauce onto the next plates anyway and figuring they could reach for an extra sip of coffee after each bite, “I’ll tell Lexi to put that on her spreadsheet.”

People would simply smile, and somehow, the room seemed warmer for it. The line continued to creep forward. Melissa resumed serving turkey and stuffing as though there was nothing unusual about taking your $50 Thanksgiving meal from a seven-foot tall budding demigoddess with knockers the size of watermelons. Ned crept forward in the line, too, increasingly hungry and considering that he had arrived believing this was a publicity stunt. That is what Buzzcut would have called it: some rich-girl clinic handing out free turkey so Melissa Monroe can get on television. And: it’s not even free! They say money is all getting donated to some woman’s charity - Buzzcut said it’s probably all being funneled somewhere else, like political campaigns or to get all the girls that work there more plastic surgery.

The girl with the clipboard tucked under her arm and - Ned couldn’t help but notice - squashing her big left breast was standing just to Melissa’s left, quietly redirecting volunteers with what looked like practiced ease. She pulled a sheet of paper out of her clipboard, a new pen from behind her ear, and handed them both to another woman - tall, long dark hair, also great tits - when someone called out to her. “Need another tray of stuffing on Table Three.” The darker-haired girl huffed but ticked off a checkmark on the paper. “Coffee’s getting low in the west room.” Another checkmark, and the dark-hair girl shook her head. “Can somebody grab two more high chairs? Jesus - sorry for my language - can we pl-?”

Three other volunteers answered at once. “Got it, Randi.”

Meanwhile Melissa Monroe continued serving. “Turkey?”

“Yes, please,” they would answer. Another plate, another smile, another child or person or family she’d touched. Without seeming to think about it, Melissa tilted her head.

“So…” She looked at the young mother standing in front of her. “What are you thankful for?”

The woman blinked. “My boys,” she answered, without too much thought. She reached back and rested a hand on each son’s shoulder. One was probably middle school age, the other maybe older. “They’ve had a rough year.”

Melissa nodded softly. “They look like good boys. They listen to you?”

“They are. And they do.”

She smiled down at them, then looked back at the mom. “Take care of your men.” Melissa handed each of them an extra cookie, and the line moved.

Next.

“What’re you thankful for?” Melissa asked an elderly woman.

“My little sister. She’s right over there.” The woman pointed across the dining hall. “Ninety-three years old.”

Melissa looked. Across the room, another woman lifted her coffee cup in greeting. Melissa waved enthusiastically. 

Next. “What are you thankful for?” A college student adjusted her backpack, thankful that she’s doing so well in school. 

Next. Another suburban dad, thankful he still has a job. Layoffs were tough this year, at the factory.. 

Next. A pale, kinda sweaty guy that looked like he’d used every ounce of courage to make eye contact with her. Thankful she was here. 

Melissa laughed, blessed him with a smile he’d probably take to his grave. 

The rhythm continued. Turkey, ham, stuffing, questions, answers. People rarely hesitated. Something about Melissa made the question feel less like small talk and more like permission to answer honestly, maybe a confession.

One volunteer from the community admitted she was thankful she’d finally been able to quit smoking. One of the Coronado women paused longer than most when Melissa took to asking her - “What are you thankful for, sweetie?” 

“Purpose,” the tall, strong woman answered. She’d stepped off a bus a couple weeks ago but still Randi didn’t know her name. “I’m working towards a goal now.”

To that, Melissa smiled, maybe a little too blissfully. Now that she’d started, she began asking the other volunteers what they were thankful for. Randi and Amelia, of course, were predictably less than earnest: whiskey, and that she hadn’t broken a nail in more than a month, respectively. Other girls answered with more heartfelt thanks - for the new job, for their new family, for their new health. Melissa tried to get to each and every one; even Lexi wasn’t spared. Melissa glanced sideways at her while handing another dinner roll to a little girl.

“What about you, Lex?” the towering, gorgeous brunette asked, “What’re you thankful for?”

Lexi looked up from her clipboard. “Me?” She thought for only a second, and beamed a practiced smile. “Growth, Far Horizons,” she answered, “I love how big we’re getting.”

Melissa tilted her head, already pleased.

Lexi smiled. “I’m thankful we’re building something people want,” she added.

Melissa considered that. “I like that.”

The room hummed around them as plates clinked, coffee was poured and children darted between folding tables. Somewhere near the back, someone had started playing quiet piano arrangements of old hymns through the community center speakers; it seemed appropriate. Rain continued tapping gently against the high windows, making the warmth inside feel even cozier by comparison.

Ned found himself realizing something unexpected. This was…nice. That thought made him uncomfortable, seeing what he was here to do.

The line advanced again. A small, middle-aged woman with purple hair and an old “Marlee for Pres” t-shirt accepted her plate, looked up at Melissa, and smiled. She commented that Melissa had been asking everybody else - “But what about you?”

Melissa blinked, put her hand to her chest. “What am I thankful for?”

The woman nodded, looking up at the Amazon expectantly as she opened her mouth, looking for the words. Atypical for her, nothing came out. She laughed. “I wasn’t ready for that!”

Several people nearby chuckled. Lexi looked over immediately. “I think that’s an excellent question!” she said, already taking mental notes.

Someone farther back in the line, some rando, called out: “We wanna know!”

Someone else: “Yeah!”

Laughter rippled through the nearby tables.

“Speech!”

Melissa narrowed her eyes, pointed the serving spoon at Lexi. “You planned this!”

“I absolutely did not!” Lexi laughed. Though a news camera had found its way into the room. 

Other voices joined in. “Yeah!” “Melissa!” “Tell us!”

Within seconds the request spread through the room in the effortless way cheerful things sometimes did.

“Speech! Speech! Speech!”

Even Dr. J looked up from where he was balancing a fresh tray of rolls, one eyebrow raised as he waited to see what she’d do - which was cover her face for a second.

“Oh no…” Melissa laughed again. “You guys…” She looked at Lexi. “This is your fault.” She looked at Dr. J. “Probably yours too.” 

Lexi held up both hands innocently. The small man just laughed and denied eberything. 

Melissa shook her head. Even just the mane of hers, that shampoo-commercial hair was entrancing, Ned noticed. Still smiling, she drew a slow, deliberate breath. For just a heartbeat she rested both hands lightly against the edge of the serving table as though gathering herself.

Then, almost unconsciously, she straightened.

With little piggy eyes that became wider and wider and wider, Ned - along with everyone else nearby - watched the movement happen: her shoulders eased back. As she stood to her full height - already extraordinary, and now somehow seeming even taller than before - the white apron settled smooth and taut over her shirt and enormous chest, drawing in again at her impossibly narrow waist before flaring over powerful hips. It looked like she was remembering the way to stand, maybe the way her mother had taught her years ago.

Except now she was no girl. She was a woman so impossibly tall and magnificently beautiful that the simple gesture seemed to change the entire room. People stopped talking. Conversations faded, not because anyone had asked them to, but because attention gravitated toward her, seemingly as naturally as falling leaves towards the ground. But - was it natural? Or was something else at work? Even the children grew quieter.

Melissa looked around, blinking once as though only just realizing everyone was watching.

“Oh…” She laughed softly, though it carried to the corners of the room, “I had something much more organized in my head about thirty seconds ago.”

The room laughed with her. Not loudly, but expectantly, a laugh people shared with someone they already liked.

“So…” she continued, looking almost embarrassed, “…I guess I’m thankful for all of you.” Her eyes wandered across the crowded gymnasium: the volunteers, the church groups, the shelter workers, the groups of bosomy teen girls from the local high school, families she’d never met. People still standing patiently in line to meet her.

She noticed the hundreds of faces waiting for her to continue speaking - not impatiently, but hopefully - and something inside her seemed to settle even further. Her shoulders eased back further, her smile widened, and she let it become brilliant. It was as though she had continued remembering where she belonged: with everyone looking at her. ..

“We didn’t have to spend today here, right?” she said, as she shrugged, and a little smile crossed her face, “We all had somewhere else we could’ve been. But we, like, came anyway, to help. To donate. To give.”

Something in the room shifted. Ned couldn’t have explained it. It wasn’t applause, it wasn’t excitement. It felt more like recognition, and an energy that was emerging from the crowd and flowing towards the front, towards her..

“Asking people to become their best selves sounds…,” Melissa continued, “…y’know, like this really big thing.” She laughed at herself again. “But maybe it isn’t.”

She looked toward one of the volunteers helping an elderly woman find a chair, and then to Julia, who had acquired a mop and was cleaning up a spilled drink. “Maybe it’s just helping somebody sit down. Or cleaning up somebody else’s mess. Or remembering somebody’s name, and something they told you because…because they mattered enough to remember.”

Out in the crowd, Mrs. Bridgers quietly wiped at one eye. Ned didn’t see that; Melissa did.

“I think,” she continued slowly, “people spend, like, a lot of time wondering where they belong.”

Her gaze drifted over the room, and Ned again missed that she wasn’t looking at the crowd anymore, but was somehow looking into it.

“And maybe,” she hesitated, “maybe everybody deserves a place where someone is genuinely happy they showed up. A place like this. Or a place like Far Horizons.”

Melissa paused, surprised by how completely the room had gone quiet. Silence had settled over the large gymnasium. Not an awkward or weird silence, but a comfortable one, the silence that existed around campfires. Or inside old churches just before someone began singing.

She didn't rush to fill the silence.

Eventually, Melissa smiled again. “I don’t know,” she offered, “I just want people to leave here feeling a little more hopeful than when they walked in.” She spread one hand toward the packed community center. “I want people to eat.” She spread the other hand out now as well. ““I want people to smile. To laugh.”

Was it on command? Because people laughed.

“I want people to know where their place is.” I know where that place is.  “And if we can build more spaces that feel like this, like Far Horizons…” She paused, searching for the right words. “…where we look after each other…” And I can watch over you ““…where nobody has to wonder whether they belong…” though they know who they belong to “…then I think we’d be building something worth being thankful for.”

She fell quiet.

That was a speech, right? Ned thought. But there was no dramatic finish, no marketing slogan, no raised fist or anybody yelling. Not like Buzzcut would’ve done. Melissa simply smiled when she finished, almost shyly, as though she’d said more than she’d intended.

For several heartbeats, no one moved. Ned found himself looking around, now, instead of at Melissa. The expressions unsettled him. People weren’t merely smiling, they were looking at her the way people looked at someone who had somehow put words to something they’d been feeling for years without ever being able to name. Ned was right there with them. The weight in his pocket felt too heavy. The air smelled great.

Then an elderly woman reached across the table and squeezed her daughter’s hand. One volunteer quietly nodded to herself. A little girl in the front of the line looked up at Melissa with complete, uncomplicated admiration. Near the back of the room, someone began clapping.

Then another. Then another.

Within seconds the entire gymnasium was on its feet, applauding. Calling her name. Not because the speech had been eloquent, or political, but because, somehow, it had felt personal to every person in the room.

Lexi wasn't watching Melissa anymore. Neither was Randi. They were both watching the audience. Lexi had spent years studying engagement; Randi just knew people. Neither had ever seen anything like this.

The people in the crowd, though, saw found family, chosen family, a community. They saw some far horizon where this came to be. 

Eventually the crowd began to settle, people returned to their seats, and the line to fill plates began to move again. Ned, now, was right at the front, in this line that he’d been in for a half hour. He’d noticed how Melissa remembered names, remembered stories, asked questions and actually listened. Meanwhile he’d watched people gravitating toward her, people smiling when she smiled, people lingering after conversations, people bringing friends over. And he started realizing this wasn’t normal. And nicer than he thought. She made people feel seen.

He couldn’t, though, shake the feeling that he’d just watched the beginning of something - he wasn’t sure what - and it was kind of exciting…but that frightened him. That uncertainty - what was he supposed to do now?? - frightened him more than certainty would have.

Ned thought he’d be able to drift through the crowd, wait until she was close, and become the man who stopped Melissa Monroe. He reached in, felt the pistol in his pocket, kept his hand there. He cocked it. He imagined history. He imagined redemption after his failed bomb, the one that fizzled out impotently at her enormous marble feet. He imagined Buzzcut finally respecting him. He’d rehearsed it all in his head

But Ned suddenly understood something Buzzcut never had. People weren't following Melissa because they were forced. They wanted to.

“So, what do you want, honey?”

Ned blinked.

The line had moved without him noticing. Somehow all the people ahead of him had come and gone, and now there was nobody left between himself and the serving table.

Melissa Monroe smiled down at him.

Up close, she was even larger. Larger than he expected. And way, way prettier.

The photographs had never captured it. Television certainly hadn't. She wasn't simply tall. She wasn’t simply beautiful. She occupied space differently than other people did. She gave off energy differently than other people did. Standing behind the buffet, framed by autumn decorations and stainless-steel serving trays, she somehow managed to look both impossibly powerful, gut-wrenchingly gorgeous and completely approachable at the same time.

Ned shivered, and then for one ridiculous instant, he wondered how somebody that big could possibly remember to duck through ordinary doorways. His hand remained buried in his coat pocket, wrapped around cold steel. When you’re standing close enough to smell the turkey and hear children laughing, violence doesn't sound nearly as simple as it did on an internet forum.

But beside her was Dr. J. Five for her. One for him.

Melissa waited. She didn't rush him.

"You look like somebody who could use a little extra," she finally said, with kindhearted compassion. “So tell me, hun,” she continued, serving tongs in hand, ready to give the overgrown boy with the pistol in his pocket anything he needed, “What do you want?”

Ned had only one answer he could think of, the only word he’d speak to anyone all day here at the Far Horizons charity event.

What do I want? he asked himself, I…I…I want…

“...Mommy.”

She smiled, big and brilliant and warm, and knew immediately he wouldn’t do it. 

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