I swiped the eraser over the last bit of marker, making the whiteboard as clean as it would get until the next day.  When I set the eraser back in its tray, I heard two soft raps come from the doorway.  My eyes turned toward the sound and easily spotted the senior filling the entryway almost from top to bottom.  “You wanted to see me, Mr. Thompson?” she asked in a sweet yet strong voice.

“Yes, come in,” I answered, gesturing toward her with an open palm.  She stepped into the room and I continued, “You know why I asked you to come by after class, right Jessica?”

“Yeah, I think so,” she replied, keeping the same unbothered demeanor.  Jessica is what most high school boys dreamt about – long, golden hair done in a loose braid, piercing blue eyes, and a soft, round face.  Her skin was light but not pallid, and her body was tight and fit.  She was even a cheerleader, and since it was Friday she wore her uniform to school, so our white school’s emblem was stretched across the chest of her green dress, the hem of which barely went halfway down her thighs, with bright, unblemished white sneakers and ankle socks on her feet.  “It’s about my grades, isn’t it?”

“I’m afraid so, yes,” I told her.  “Please, have a seat.”  I pointed toward the desk next to my chair, but she gave it a quick glance and turned back to me, flicking her braid with the movement.

“Thanks, but I prefer to stand,” Jessica replied, fixing me with a gaze.  A smirk tugged at her pink lips and she began striding toward me, accentuating each step.  “Especially with you, Mr. Thompson.”  She stopped one tile away from me, leaving me to stare at her collar bone.  One thing that made her stand out from the other girls her age was her more than six feet of height – much above that, and I really could not tell a difference.  Her hands rested on her waist and she looked down at me, her smirk spreading.  “Now, what’s this about my grades?”

I craned my neck to look up at her, focusing on her brilliant blue eyes.  This was the main reason I had originally applied to teach elementary school: even at just over five feet, it was unlikely one of them would outgrow me, let alone tower over me like Jessica.  Over the past couple years, however, I had become used to it.  She was far from the first student – though probably the first girl – to try and physically intimidate me for favors, and she wouldn’t be the last, either.  “Frankly, they show a supreme lack of effort,” I told her, not wavering under her gaze.  “You’ve been hovering in the low C range for the past few months, and today’s quiz brings you down to a D.  You know what that means for you starting next week, don’t you?”

“Yeah, academic probation.”  For someone on the brink of failing, Jessica sounded very nonchalant about the situation.

“Meaning you won’t be part of your squad’s cheer routine until you can get your grades back up,” I elaborated.  She was proving very difficult to read, and to be safe I decided to soften the blow.  “Look, Jessica, you’re a very bright young woman, and all the other teachers can do nothing but rave about how hard a worker you are.  So why do you choose to slack off in my class?”

She reached up and grabbed her braid with one hand, then began stroking it with the other.  “History’s just so boring!” Jessica exclaimed, contorting her face into an exaggerated pout.  “At least, your lectures are.  You just talk for an hour and give us worksheets!  I like something that keeps me more involved.”  Her body leaned forward, but instead of imparting any emphasis to me it just proved her head could completely fit over mine, which was evident to anyone with working eyes.

“It’s not about interest,” I replied, unmoved by what I guessed was a strange mixture of attempted intimidation and seduction, “it’s about respect.  You should treat all subjects – and teachers – with the respect they deserve.  You might even end up learning that you enjoy it.”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Thompson.”  She had lowered her voice so that it was more like a teasing purr.  Jessica took a step forward until she was practically standing on top of me, trapping me between the wall and her large frame.  “I didn’t know it was so personal for you.”  One of her fingertips came to rest below my chin, locking my eyes into her entrancing blue gaze.  “Is there anything I can do to make it up to you?”

Despite her hypnotizing eyes, I knew if I even hinted that I knew what she was getting at I could get in huge trouble, possibly even fired.  “Aside from giving me the same effort you give the other teachers, not really.”  My best course of action would be to keep my answers short and to the point.  She was not the first student to try this routine, either.

“Really?  There’s nothing else I can do?”  She was laying it on thick, so I simply shook my head.  Something about those eyes kept my attention, though.  “Not even if I were to…”  Jessica trailed off, biting her bottom lip.  All she had to do was explicitly say what she was hinting at and I could tell her to cut it out.

“Grow you back to your original height?”  Her eyes flared when she said that, giving off an ethereal blue glow, and her words took on a powerful resonance that made them bounce around in my head.  In that instant she rapidly shot up in height, seeming to grow one, maybe two feet.  She peered down at me, her eyes just barely visible over her breasts but no less radiant.  Casually she placed her hands on my shoulders, but her light grip was still enough to keep me from getting away.

“So how about it, Mr. Thompson?” Jessica asked after a few seconds of silence.  Somehow her voice seemed a touch deeper and more powerful while her eyes maintained their ensorcelling power.  “All you have to do is give me a passing grade, and no one will ever have to know that, for a few brief seconds, I turned you into a dwarf.”

“I don’t think that –“

“But if you don’t,” Jessica interrupted, “come Monday, all the other students will see you in all of your four-foot glory.  I’m sure you’re used to me and some of the other students looming over you with how small you are normally, but what about the others?  Do you think you could deal with every single student in this school, even the freshmen, towering over you?  All you’ve got to do is climb up into your chair and boost my grades and this’ll just be our little secret.”

I took a moment to clench my jaw and steel my resolve.  “I’ve never been ashamed of my height,” I began, “even though I can’t use it as a weapon like you do.  It’ll take more than a little trick and some threats to get me to go along with this.  I’ll make you a counter-offer: how about you leave right now, and I won’t tell the principal about your attempted academic dishonesty?”

Jessica put a hand on her mouth to stifle a giggle.  “Sorry, your voice is just a bit squeaky,” she explained, holding her thumb and index finger a short distance apart.  “Hm, a bit.”  She regained her composure and focused down at me more intensely than before.  “That gives me an idea.  And don’t worry – this one will be much easier to keep between us.”

Her eyes radiated the blue glow again, much more powerful this time, and she began leaning down toward me.  Without thinking I retreated, keeping the distance between us the same while I looked for an escape.  The light grew in intensity until it overwhelmed my senses and all I could see was that overbearing, blue-white floodlight.  There were no shadows or hues, just the blinding light washing over my body.

As suddenly as it came the light receded, and I looked around to get my bearings.  I was standing on a broad, flat white plain, with flecks of black and gray breaking up the monotony of the texture, along with ditches every hundred or so feet.  In the far distance I saw a low mound, about my height, which was somehow able to support a tremendous metal spire that went higher than I could see.  When I broadened my focus I saw there were dozens of similar structures, and even further away, floating against an immense cliffside that reached the sky, I spied… a bookshelf?

Thunder crackled above me, as though the sky itself were demanding my attention by clearing its throat.  Another, longer rumble followed, that sounded remarkably similar to speech.  It took my brain a second to process it, but it sounded like a colossal voice booming “Up here, Mr. Thompson.”  There was no way.  She couldn’t have.

Curiosity got the best of me, even though I knew this was a trick.  My eyes began slowly craning upwards until I spied two enormous, cream-colored pillars at the edge of my vision, bowed outward like calves.  The towers had a pair of matching protrusions toward me before getting vastly wider the further up my gaze went, until reaching a point where a green and white curtain covered them, and they continued to an all-white ceiling.  The further up I looked the harder it became to deny.  Next was a flat, sheer green cliff, with a wide bulge near the top where I could see the bottom half of our distorted school’s logo in white.  I forced myself to keep going until I reached a pair of familiar blue eyes with a curtain of blond hair, their powerful glow subdued and replaced by mirth.

“Hi.”  That time I saw her lips move with it, and I had to accept what had happened.  With that single rumbling syllable I was thrown into a panic, looking every which way to see what the hell was happening.  My eyes dropped back to my level and I looked to the side, where I saw a tremendous white sneaker, larger than my house, propping up the gigantic leg of the woman standing over me.  “What’s up, Mr. Thompson?” Jessica asked, her tremulous voice unable to hide her giggle.  As though in a frenzy my eyes darted around, taking things in and barely registering them.  Her ankle, almost 25 feet high, and her legs that went up for hundreds of feet.  “Besides me, of course.”  The laugh that followed was a terrifying sound, chilling me to the bone and making my stomach churn.

Finally, my fight or flight reflex kicked in, and I chose flight – how could I possibly fight someone thousands of times my size, anyway?  I darted toward the door, moving as fast as my tiny legs could carry me.  A gargantuan scoff came from on high and the great white behemoth shot forward, making an ear-piercing squeal as it came to a halt in my path.  Unable to stop in time I ran headlong into it, and the springy rubber knocked me back onto the tile.

“I thought this was just going to be between us?” Jessica chided, doing her best to act offended.  “Unless you want the other students to see you like this?  I can call some of my squad mates, or just send them a picture if you’re really that eager to show off your new size.”  I was unable to respond, still agog at how suddenly everything had changed and just how immense it was now.

“I can’t have you getting squished before you change my grades, though,” Jessica declared, “so you’ll have to come with me.  You understand, right?”  I understood so little of what was going on, and black spots were starting to appear at the corners of my vision from hyperventilating.  “Let me just pick you up off the floor and we can get down to business.”  She began leaning over toward me, and the experience overwhelmed me.  The sight of a titanic blond cheerleader reaching down for me, her hand poised like a claw to pluck me off the ground, was simply too much, and when her hand engulfed me I lost consciousness.

I awoke to the shrill squeak of colossal metal joints long in need of some oiling, and my eyes fluttered open.  The squeak was replaced by a tremendous crash that left my ears ringing, accompanied by a strong gust of wind and the ground trembling.  A moment later the squealing returned, and I looked up to see Jessica swing one titanic leg over the other so one foot dangled around ankle height for her, looming almost directly over me like a sword of Damocles.

Slowly I regained control over my limbs and forced myself to stand up, all while Jessica impatiently swung her enormous foot in the air.  Small flecks of dirt fell from between the treads, bursting on the tile, and I jumped back to avoid getting struck in the head by one.  I hopped away, retreating until I was no longer beneath her shadow and at risk of being concussed by a miniscule amount of dirt.

When I was back in the light I stopped, but a quick glance up made me wish I had stayed.  Jessica’s tremendous, smooth, cream-colored legs drew my eyes upward despite the gigantic white shoe rocking back and forth, threatening to come down on me at any time.  Between her kneecaps, like it was a specially selected viewpoint, I saw her looking down at me, arms crossed under her chest, like a bored goddess in judgment.  Her eyes bored into me and I froze as though she had compelled me to do so.

“Welcome back, Mr. Thompson,” she rumbled, gazing scornfully at me on the ground at her feet.  “Hm, ‘Mr. Thompson,’” Jessica repeated, “that sounds a little formal for someone the size of an insect, don’t you think?”  A smile broke her stony demeanor, and she continued, “I think I’ll call you Mr. Tiny, okay?  Maybe just Tiny for short – you’re familiar with short, right?”  She arched an eyebrow mockingly.

“No!” I protested.  “That’s not okay!  I am your teacher, and Mr. Thompson is the proper name and form of address you will call me by!”

The air around me crackled with the sound of Jessica’s booming laughter.  She clutched her stomach and leaned forward, slamming her dangling foot into the ground with a powerful slam which dominated the air for a moment before her laughter took over again.  The titanic cheerleader leaned forward, forcing herself to stay in the chair while laughter wracked her body. 

“Your voice!” she finally managed between peals of laughter, “It’s so small!”  Jessica was overcome by hysterical laughter again until she forced herself to say, “It’s squeaky, like a mouse!”  Several more booming ha’s rang out before she added “’Squeak squeak squeak,’ that’s how you sound!”  Tears began forming in the corners of her eyes from laughing so hard.  “And you’re- you’re trying to tell me what to do!”  Large tears of laughter began rolling down her cheeks and she leaned further forward, struggling to contain herself.  “I could squash you without thinking, and you- you think you’re in charge!”

Finally she leaned forward too far, throwing herself out of the chair.  Her knees hit the tile with a crash, sending shockwaves through the ground, and before they could settle her palms slammed onto the ground astride me with tremendous impact.  Up close her laughter was amplified, and each peal made my insides quiver.  Beneath the gargantuan cheerleader I was powerless, and could only look up at her and hope she stopped laughing at me sooner rather than later.

Jessica’s fit of hysterical laughter lasted another thirty seconds or so, with tears dropping off her face and landing on either side of me, splashing me with salty droplets.  Loud, wheezing heaves signaled the end, and she wiped one last tear away with a hand.  She took a deep breath to compose herself then exhaled it, assaulting me with her swelteringly hot yet amazingly fresh breath.  “So, Mr. Tiny,” she began, “ready to change my grade yet?  I think I’ve earned an A now.”

“Keep dreaming!” I protested.  Jessica bit her lip to keep from another round of boisterous laughter, though I could see her smile fighting against it.  “What’re you going to do, step on me if I don’t?”

“Oh, Mr. Tiny, you’ve got it all wrong!” Jessica replied, acting offended.  “I would never smash you! …on purpose, that is.”  She paused to give me a big smile, her white teeth glistening with saliva.  “Accidents happen after all, and you are basically a bug to me.  I can do things to you much worse than the quick release of being stomped on, anyway, and if worse comes to worst I can just leave you like this all weekend.  You’ll be singing a different tune Monday morning, I’m sure.”

“You wouldn’t,” I shot back defiantly.

She smiled again and held a hand up.  “I was hoping you’d be stubborn,” she declared.  “I really do like earning my grades, it’s so much more fun and rewarding.”  In a flash her hand rushed down at me, and before I knew it I was trapped under a ceiling of the broad flesh of her palm.  Jessica’s fingers swung shut, barreling me off my feet and into the air.  They secured me against the warm, soft skin of her hand, clenching me tight enough to make an indentation.  With everything plunged into darkness I was thrown into utter chaos when she raised her hand again, causing my stomach to drop and my eyes to water from the forces.

After a turbulent rush she unfurled her fingers, releasing me from her grasp, though I was hardly free.  Jessica was holding me a few inches from her face, just far enough away that her enormous eyes could both peer down at me contemptuously, and with her hand cupped I was at the bottom of a deep basin.  “My, my, my, Mr. Tiny,” she teased, “looks like I’ve got you in the palm of my hand, don’t I?”  She chuckled at her joke before adding, “You could say that about most men in this school too, but it’s much more literal for you.”

She paused, waiting for me to shout something at her, but I didn’t want to give her the satisfaction of hearing my voice.  “Fair enough,” she boomed, breaking the silence, “I’ll have you under my thumb soon enough.”  I saw her cheeks perk up with a grin, but I kept my stoic demeanor.  There was no way she’d be able to go through with anything she had threatened: despite my low opinion of her from class, I didn’t believe she was a sadist.

“Mr. Tiny.”  Jessica let the roaring syllables of her new name for me resonate in my ears a moment.  “Did you know the digestion process actually begins long before food reaches the stomach?”  No.  She wouldn’t.  “I guess it technically begins when you cut your food up, but you’re already bite-sized so that’s not really relevant.”  She began lowering her hand until her soft, pink lips loomed over me.  “Saliva starts breaking food down, making it easier to chew, swallow, and digest.”  My eyes bugged out.  This couldn’t be happening.  “Here, I’ll prove it to you!”

Her jaw opened, and I saw the broad, bumpy tongue gated behind her perfect teeth.  “No, wait!” I began to plead, but before I could get any more out her hand swung up like a catapult, launching me into her mouth when it slammed into her chin.  I sailed between her teeth, screaming the whole time, until I landed on the spongy surface of her tongue.  Upon impact I sank into it, and Jessica snapped it to the roof of her mouth, holding me in place.  A soft pop echoed throughout the chamber when her lips snapped shut, plunging me into absolute darkness.

Jessica began running her tongue back and forth, making a sickening schlurp as it conformed to my body.  Every few seconds there was a loud smack when she dropped her tongue slightly, then she would slam me back against her palate.  A low, rumbling hum escaped her throat, and a chill ran down my spine when I realized not only did she enjoy my flavor, she was savoring it.  Her tongue slowly slithered beneath me, alternating with a rush of air while she sucked on my miniscule body.

It did not take much of this for me to become completely drenched in her saliva and have my clothes saturated with it.  I clenched my eyes shut to keep the liquid from getting onto them – not that they were doing much in the pitch black, anyway.  My skin burned, lightly at first, as the weak acid began to eat away at the upper layer of it.  Tingling overtook my body, and I gritted my teeth to keep from crying out as it became more intense.

Suddenly Jessica’s tongue rolled back, sending me sliding forward over the tip.  I rolled off the edge and landed with a splat in the middle of her frenulum.  Before I could get any footing her tongue slammed back down atop me, driving me further into the soft tissue.  Another series of staccato quakes came from her throat, no doubt her chuckling at her dominance over me, and her tongue flattened over me.  Surrounded by soft and spongy tissue, my only option was to be further overwhelmed and engulfed by the pocket.  The tingling gave way to burning, and I wanted her to either chew or swallow me just so it would end.

A loud squelch assaulted my ears and the pressure above me abruptly disappeared.  A large, straight object poked at me until it found my back, then pressed me down into the supple tissue around me.  Moments later a second probe hooked around, covering my entire chest, and the two digits gingerly pinched my body.  Grotesque noises filled the air while she withdrew me from being trapped in her frenulum, and the soft tissue snapped when I was pulled away.

The short trip was disorienting, but I was in enough pain that the movement barely registered.  Cool air – at least, cooler than the inside of Jessica’s mouth – washed over my body, soothing my skin even as it continued to be burned by her saliva.  I wiped the liquid from around my eyes so I could open them again and was greeted by the overbearing sight of her lips pulled back in a smile.

“Enjoy your tongue bath, Mr. Tiny?” she mocked, each syllable bringing a fresh gust of hot air over my weakened body.  All I could do in response was shudder and moan, and my ears winced at her single, loud cackle.  “Wow, I was messing with you but it sounds like you really did like it, almost as much as I liked sucking on you!  If you’re good, maybe I’ll let you go down the water slide later, hm?”

My brief stint in Jessica’s mouth proved I was no match for her, and I was ready to give in to her meager demands.  “Okay, I yield,” I admitted.  “Just grow me back and-“

“Let’s get you dried off so you don’t keep getting pre-digested,” she boomed, cutting me off.  “I don’t seem to have any beach towels in your size though…”

“There’s a roll of paper towels on my desk,” I told her.  “Just tear one off, it should be plenty.”

“No, I don’t see any of those,” she replied, not even taking her piercing eyes off me.  “I think I have an idea that’ll do in a pinch, though.”

“I can see it though, it’s right over your shoul –“

“I think,” Jessica aggressively butted in, drowning me out, “that you should start leaving the decisions to big people like me, okay Mr. Tiny?  With how stubborn you are you might end up being this size for a while, and most people won’t be as understanding as I am.”

“But I’m ready to –“

“Stop talking my ear off and relax!” Jessica interrupted again.  “If you just let me do my thing, you’ll be warm and dry in no time.  So shut up.”  Slowly she began lowering me along her chest, keeping me pinched tightly between her thumb and forefinger.  I craned my neck back further and further as I descended, her eyes still drawing mine.  Most likely she was going to dry me off with her skirt; that ought to sufficiently humiliate me for her.

Instead of feeling the coarse fabric of her cheerleading skirt when she set me down, I was treated to the softness of rose petals and the smoothness of satin.  Jessica’s fingers let go of me, and I was finally allowed to sprawl out, making a small indentation on the ground.  Compared to the agony of being inside her mouth, this was heaven.  I spread myself as much as I could on the silky, cream-colored ground, letting the burning saliva run off me.  She stared down at me relaxing, and though it seemed like she was barely suppressing a smirk I paid it no mind.  Nothing would steal the joy of this moment from me.

“Now just lie very still,” Jessica cooed, her voice making the ground beneath me vibrate in a shockingly pleasant way, “and I’ll have you good to go in no time.”  The earth continued quivering, giving way to unseen forces, yet finally prevailing with a sudden, victorious surge.  Before my cushioning could settle, however, a mammoth platform rose just to my left, the same color and consistency of where I laid.  Her enigmatic smirk broadened as the platform rose, soon casting me in its shadow.

By the time I realized what was happening it was too late.  Jessica’s other thigh cleared the one I laid on and began rotating so that it would line up with me.  No matter how much I wanted to get up and run I couldn’t: there was simply no time, and my body was too worn out from the tribulations dealt to it by her tongue.  All I could do was watch while her thigh descended upon me, dominating my vision until I could see every minute detail of the skin above me.

Jessica set her leg down, trapping me beneath it.  Immediately the temperature spiked from being trapped between her thighs, and the excess heat had nowhere to go.  Despite the saliva sticking to me I began sweating, and the pressure from being smushed between her legs only added to the discomfort.  Too late I realized that when her legs came together they pushed out all the air, leaving me nothing but the skin of her hamstring to fill my mouth when I tried to inhale.

I squirmed futilely between her legs, trying to get free, but the immense weights trapping me made it a struggle to even move.  “Stop, Mr. Tiny, that tickles,” Jessica protested, accompanied by a giggle.  Ironically, whenever she spoke a wave of pleasant vibrations ran over my body, making me forget why I was even trying to get free.  “Just relax and my pretty little legs will get that bad saliva off you in no time.”

With how her voice was stimulating my body I was not even concerned about the lack of air.  Slowly Jessica began sliding her leg forward, pushing me along with it, though I felt my body compress from the increased pressure.  After I had been driven forward a few inches she pulled it back, dragging me along with her leg through the thin trail of saliva my passage had left behind.  I wanted to cry out but had nothing to do it with, and found myself little more than a slave to the vast movements of the gigantic cheerleader all around me.  Glistening spots appeared at the edge of my vision, their outlines obvious in the light-starved environment between her thighs, and I felt that I was going to suffocate as she shoved me forward for another round.

I began to feel light-headed, and an unbearable lightness overtook my being.  When I was on my last vestiges of consciousness I felt a strong, massive force grip my legs, and I was peeled off the bottom of Jessica’s thigh.  My body swung downward just enough that my hair brushed against her other leg, and tumultuous g-forces seized my body while she raised me up again.  Between the onrush of cool air and being able to breathe again, however, I was in a state of bliss that could only tangentially be attributed to hypoxia.

Jessica dangled me upside-down in front of her face for a moment, allowing her eyes to bore into me before booming, “So, Mr. Tiny.  Have I earned an A in your class yet, or do I need to do more extra credit?”

It took me a second to remember what she was talking about.  She was just gigantic, right?  “Yes, you have!” I cried, caving to her demands.  “I’ll give you whatever grade you want, just grow me back and stop tormenting me!”

Jessica smirked, as though I had said something funny.  “But if I grow you back, how do I know you’ll do it?” she asked.  “Just tell me your username and password and I’ll do it for you, then I’ll grow you back.”

She had me over a barrel, and I had no desire to spend time under her thumb.  “Okay, fine, you win.”  I gave her my login information, which she typed in with her free hand, keeping me dangling with the other.  Several minutes passed while she navigated the various menus and changed her scores, swinging me back and forth every now and then to remind me who was in charge.

When she was done Jessica turned her entrancing blue eyes back to me.  “Well, Mr. Tiny, you’ll be glad to know that I now have an A plus in your course,” she declared, “which I think we’ll both agree I earned fair and square.”  As though in a trance I nodded, agreeing with her.  “And I’ll maintain it for the rest of the semester, right?  I’d hate for anything to happen to you if I didn’t, Mr. Tiny.”

“Yes, you’re good for the whole semester,” I agreed, my head throbbing from the blood rushing to it.  “You’ve more than earned your grade.  Can you grow me back now?”

She touched her other index finger to her lips while she thought.  “Actually, no, I won’t,” she decided.  “After all, what’s to stop you from changing it all back once I do?”

“You have my login information,” I reminded her.  “All you have to do is change it back.  Not that you would have to, of course, since I wouldn’t even consider it.”

“And what’s to stop you from changing that?” she shot back, suddenly very concerned about her grades.  “You’ve been very stubborn tonight, and I’m not sure I can trust you.”

“Couldn’t you just do this again, then?” I asked, hoping to convince her to leave me be.  “I assure you, I have no intention of changing your grades back, you’ve earned what you have right now.”

“I could, but why should I have to?” Jessica retorted mercurially.  “You haven’t even been tiny for thirty minutes, and you were blacked out most of that time.  I’d hate to have to make you a bug again just because you forgot my lesson.”

“No, Jessica, you really don’t –“

Her eyes darted away from me to the clock on my desk.  “If I leave soon, I can make it to the game just in time.”  She paused briefly while she turned her enchanting eyes back to me.  “Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you at a game my whole time in this school.  Why don’t you come with me and root for the home team with the cheer squad?”  The corners of her mouth pulled upward.  “You really don’t have a choice.”  Jessica lowered me back toward her legs, and I regretted ever asking her to stop by.

When I passed the hem of her skirt, she tauntingly boomed, “And it’s not like a little school spirit ever hurt anyone.”

A single strip of white athletic tape held me against the smooth, warm wall of Jessica’s inner thigh, positioned so that just my head poked out above it.  Every time her right foot hit the ground I felt the impact go up through my bones, shaking my insides while the muscle on her thigh bounced from it.  It was nighttime so only a small amount of light filtered through her skirt, allowing me to follow a mole the size of my head as her other enormous thigh swung back and forth in front of me.  The lights drew attention to her stark white sneakers, glistening in the light, with only three green slashes breaking the radiant surface.

The trip over had hardly been pleasant, either.  Jessica initially had my mouth covered by the tape as well, and I had to fight with only my head and neck to get loose so I could breathe freely.  Her first step made it feel like I was having a heart attack, and it took the whole length of a hallway for me to grow accustomed to the incessant pounding and rumbling.  I thought there would be some reprieve when she got in her car, but that was just a different type of torment.  Pressed between two powerful thighs with nowhere to go, I could only bear the sudden temperature increase, as well as the subtle movement of her foot on the pedals grinding me back and forth.  Then when she got out, I had to adjust to the punishing effects of her gait all over again.

The black asphalt beneath gave way to red, shredded rubber crossed by white lines every step which gave me vertigo as they rushed past my view.  Jessica finally came to a stop, and I could see the toes of two more pairs of white sneakers at the edge of her skirt’s hem.  She brought her legs together, smushing me between her strong thighs.

“Where have you been?” someone bellowed at Jessica, her voice muffled by the tons of flesh between us.  “The game starts in, like, two minutes, we’ve already done all our warm-ups!”

“Yeah, I know,” Jessica apologized.  Her voice rippled through her body, washing over mine in an unexpectedly pleasant way.  It’s just.  Mr. Thompson wanted to see me after school, and you know how he can be, you know?” 

“Yeah, we know.”  Despite the insulating layers I picked up on the knowing tone in the reply.  What did these girls think of me?  “Think you’ll be good without a warmup?”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine,” Jessica reassured them.  “I mostly just join the warmups as a formality these days.”

“Well then, take your spot, the game’s about to start.”  Jessica stepped off, freeing me from my fleshy enclosure, and walked until she was by herself.  The worst thing was, she was right: I hadn’t been to a school football game my whole time as a teacher, so I had no idea what to expect.  Some sort of routine?  Maybe some splits?  Whatever was coming, I was suddenly very glad for the tape pinning me to her thigh and had the utmost faith in its ability to hold me in place.

A loud shot rang out in the distance, and I realized too late that was the start of the game.  G-forces seized me when Jessica threw her whole body into action, swinging her legs over her head so that she was upside down.  For a brief moment I saw the night sky then it was back to rubber, accompanied by a ferocious thud that sent tremors through me.  As she pushed her body forward to another backflip I scarcely had time to brace myself, and I felt the adhesive on the tape weaken.  While it was refreshing to be able to move again, the lack of a strong tether to the gigantic moving body I was attached to was concerning.

When the tumultuous forces of another backflip tore at me I felt myself thrown against the loosening tape, pulling it a smidge further off me while blood flow shifted from my feet to my head again.  My body struggled to normalize the pressure while Jessica was in motion, but the solid impact of her landing on both feet brought it all back to center, with another slight tear at the tape keeping me comparatively safe.  Her muscles were already tensing for another flip, and I hoped that I would be lucky enough for this to be the last one.

Keeping with the theme of the night, I was not that lucky.  Momentum carried Jessica’s body into several more flips, straining the already-weakened adhesive a little more each time.  My teeth rattled each time her heels struck, and did not even have time to stop before they hit again.  The constant shift between the dark night sky and red track did no favors for my sense of stability either, and I felt myself growing dizzy by the fifth flip.  In addition to that I was being thrown between the tape in front of me and muscle behind, leaving me constantly dazed.

For the finale Jessica clutched her thighs together, driving me into the skin opposite me and further disrupting my sense of orientation.  They came apart slightly before the terrific impact, pulling me along with the soft skin as it moved away.  Her feet slammed down on the rubber, and I felt a tremendous force jerking me along with it.  The frayed and weakened tape holding me against her thigh could no longer hold, and I was sent plummeting to the ground.

There was a deafening tear when the tape gave way, and I found myself in a freefall.  In an instant I flew the rest of the length of Jessica’s thigh, past her knees, and along her solidly developed calves.  Almost without noticing I flew by her ankles and shoes, landing on the solid rubber beneath her.  There was no doubt in my mind that, had I been slightly larger or the ground a little harder, I would have splattered on impact.  Instead I was only slightly bruised and forced to watch while Jessica posed for the cheering crowd.

Vibrations rumbled through the ground, and I was met with dismay when I turned my head to see what was causing it.  The entire cheer squad was swarming around Jessica – of course she was the captain – and I could feel them getting ready for something as a unit.  With all this attention coming my way, I resolved to remain as still as possible to keep it from turning directly toward me.

Two seconds into the routine, I realized that would be impossible.  Amidst the incomprehensible cheering – the voices of a dozen giantesses all merged together as a terrifying roar – they all lifted up their foot to bring it back down as a stomp.  I ended up right in the path of Jessica’s shoe, and only a quick roll to the side save me from getting smashed beneath it.  She brought her other foot up, and just before the enormous concentric circles of her rubber sole smashed me I jumped backwards, narrowly evading the toe of her titanic shoe.  Shockwaves ran through the ground, and my joints were powerless to do anything but make myself fall backward while they proceeded with their choreography.

It was difficult to tell the passage of time while I laid prone on the ground.  Hours might have passed, or more likely minutes while the team of cheerleaders did their routine.  Throughout the whole thing my attention was drawn to Jessica.  Not out of any preference, of course, but because she was the one looming over me at that time, and I needed to make sure she didn’t step on me.  Several times I had to jump to the side, as though she were aiming to just barely catch me beneath her destructive feet and give me enough time to evade it.

Once their dance was done, I allowed myself to collapse onto the rubber.  Somehow I had managed to avoid Jessica stomping on me for several minutes, and I felt like I should take a much-needed break.  While the cheerleaders retreated I gasped for air, knowing that I would need it when they came back so I could keep dodging certain death.  If I were lucky, I could escape to the edge of the track and wait it out until Jessica decided I’d had enough at the end and came to get me.

“Uh, what’s that?”  The voice cut through everything else, not only due to its sheer power but because it was clearly about me.  Two sets of legs diverted toward me, and though I desperately craved fresh, cool air, I tried to get my breathing back under control.

“Idunno.  Looks like a weird bug though, doesn’t it?” came another booming voice from the other set of long, powerful legs.  They both chatted while cautiously approaching me, swapping tales of big bugs they had crushed recently.  Apparently I was far from the largest, but definitely the strangest looking of all the insects they had exterminated in the past couple of months.

A pair of titanesses strolled up to me, their white shoes shining brightly in the game light.  I looked up at them in desperation, trying to at least get a name for my potential killers.  To my left was Naoko, an otherwise reserved but very popular Asian student, and on my right was Aubrey, an incredibly social brunette who did her best to stay off my dysfunctional list. Though they were both fairly good students, I saw no mercy in them while they looked down at me with complete contempt, not even recognizing me as human.

Aubrey’s quad twitched to bring up her leg, but before she could get very far a surprising voice of reason called out.  “Now hold up!” Jessica called out, a head taller than the others as she came into view.  “This bug’s not hurting anyone, is he?”  The two that were primed to smash me a second ago stopped, idly shuffling their feet.  “And we’re outside, right?”  Jessica pushed her way through the other two titanic women so that she could stand astride me.  “This bug lives outside!  How would you feel if someone came into your house and stomped on you, huh?”  Out of all the people to defend my right to live, I never would have expected her.

The other two began to back off while Jessica asserted her control.  “Now, for safe keeping, I’m going to put this bug on our bench,” she declared, squatting in front of me.  I looked up and saw her deceptively soft, round face framed between her knees while she continued, “And I expect to be able to find it after the game, okay?”  Her hand descended toward me amid grumbled from the rest of the cheerleaders.  Her statement was not popular, but they knew they had to abide by it.

Jessica’s thumb and forefinger settled around me, then closed in so that they pinched around my torso.  The world blurred past me while she picked me up, then my stomach sank as she stood to her full, impressive height.  She leaned in close, so that the only thing I could see were her pink lips, and whispered, “You owe me big for this one, Mr. Tiny.  If not for me you’d just be some red mess on the bottom of their shoes.”  I gulped, wondering what else she could possibly demand of me.  I already knew she could shrink me to the size of an ant, what more leverage did she need?

 She lowered me to her chest and walked toward her squad’s metal bench, keeping me steady during her long strides.  Each second Jessica held me like this tugged at my nerves as I expected her to squeeze her fingers together and cruelly exterminate me.  The fact that she was being uncharacteristically considerate of me only made it worse.  Any moment I expected her to swing back to her demanding and sadistic ways, and all I could do was wait.

Gently Jessica lowered me the rest of the way, crouching slightly so that my feet touched the bench before releasing me.  Her fingers opened and she stood, taking a moment to relish looming over me.  I stared back up at her, my eyes quickly tracing the route from the bottom of her knees over her tight uniform and to the enchanting blue eyes staring at me from her smug face.  “Now, don’t go anywhere, Mr. Tiny,” she commanded with a booming voice.  “Or else.”  There it was again.  I realized that if she crushed me, she would only be depriving herself of future opportunities to torment me.

Thankfully I was unbothered for most of the game except by the small earthquakes generated by the cheer squad every few minutes.  I paid very little attention to the game, since football had never particularly interested me, and I was not going to start now.  My attention was preoccupied by the dozen or so titanesses a few feet away from me.  They were a much greater threat to me, and even though Jessica had told me to stay where I was, if I saw one of them sitting on me I was not going to put the whims of a capricious high school senior ahead of my life.

Jessica acted very territorial, almost protective, toward me.  Several times she walked by me, close enough to brush against the bench, giving me a long wink while the metal trembled from her light contact.  Whenever the cheer squad took a break she rushed to the bench so she could claim her spot, slamming her butt down with a crash mere inches from me.  She never once acknowledged I was there and did her best to act casual, but I could tell from the way she carried herself that she was beaming with pride and a feeling of abject superiority with how she towered over me, actively acting like I was negligible.  Half the times the fabric of her skirt landed on top of me and I was not strong enough to push it off, and I suspected she did it on purpose.

The one exception came toward the end of the game – apparently our team was doing rather well, so the cheerleaders were left to their own devices.  Jessica was off chatting with their coach, and I was unexpectedly cast in a long shadow.  I pulled my gaze away from Jessica to the more immediate matter and saw four powerful thighs in front of me.  After a gulp I looked up at the two gigantic women standing in front of me.  To my right was Naoko’s dark eyes, and on the left Aubrey’s emerald eyes stared down at me.  Their expressions seemed to be a mix of curiosity and mirth, like they did not quite know what to make of me.

“So this is Jessica’s favorite bug,” Aubrey declared.  Her low, rumbling voice surprised me, since I was used to her sweet, perky voice when I called on her.  “Didn’t even know she collected them.  I wonder what’s so special about it?”

“No clue,” Naoko replied.  Her low, powerful voice made my innards tremble, a vast departure from her normally demure tone.  “It sure is weird looking, though.”

“Yeah, it is,” Aubrey agreed.  She took a moment to look me over from a distance and continued, “Looks like it’s only got four legs and stands upright, almost like a person.  Certainly never heard of a bug like that.”

“I know, right?” Naoko answered.  “She might’ve discovered a new species.”  The pair suddenly knelt to get a closer look, and the two monolithic women suddenly dropping startled me.  I stumbled backward while my mind adjusted to the abrupt change of scenery, and when I recovered they were practically on top of me.  Their enormous faces loomed over me, and from the sparkle in their eyes I got the distinct feeling that they were ready to pounce.

They considered me for a moment, their eyes darting between me and each other.  Aubrey was the first to break the silence.  “It even kind of looks like a person,” she proclaimed, leaning forward slightly.  This close, and with my unique vantage point, I could see all of the tiny pores concealed beneath her makeup along with the darker flecks in her deep green eyes.  “Definitely feel like this is something new.”

“That’s because I am a person!” I shouted, desperate to get recognized.  “Don’t you recognize me?  I’m Mr. Thompson, your history teacher!  You’ve been looking at me every day for months!  You’re six inches away from me, you have to realize I’m a person!”

A few merciful seconds of silence followed my outcry, and I hoped that they were trying to process what I had said.  “Pretty annoying call, though,” Naoko stated.  She had not understood a word.  “It’s high-pitched like a squeak toy, but loud like a cicada.  They’re probably unheard-of because people kill them before they can be reported!”

“What?  No!” I protested.  “Just think about it for a few seconds!  Give it a bit of time to sink in and you’ll realize what I’m saying!”

“Yeah, I can see that,” Aubrey agreed.  “This one is super annoying.  If it’s typical of the others they would’ve been squished after a few minutes, tops.”

“So why haven’t we squished this one?”  Naoko’s question rang in my ears.  I never would have imagined that one of my best, sweetest students would contemplate killing me, but then again I never figured a slacker would, or could, make me an inch tall.

“You know, that’s a good question.”  Aubrey sent two resounding ripples through the metal when she set her elbows down, accompanied by tremendous clangs.  She leaned forward until her pointed chin was directly above me, and she could glare down at me with full contempt.  “Are we really afraid of what Jessica will do to us if we just crush it?”

“That’s a good point,” Naoko chimed in, leaning in as well with similar effects.  Before I could recover from the impact she intoned, “Personally, I think bugs are gross, and squishing them outside just means we don’t have to deal with them inside.  And I don’t want to have to deal with this one a second longer than I have to if it’s going to keep sounding like this.”

The two paused to look at each other.  “So, you want to do it, or should I?” Aubrey asked.

Naoko had already raised her hand.  “It’d be my pleasure.”  I looked at the broad, open palm above me, poised to strike and snuff me out, her long fingers all stretched out.  Never in my life did I consider it ending this way, but getting smashed by one of my students would at least be a unique way to go out.

To my surprise in several ways, I was relieved to see Jessica sidle up behind them.  Even Naoko’s tremendous hand could not block the monolithic woman behind her.  She cleared her throat, and Naoko halted her swing before it could serious imperil me.  “I’m glad you’re having fun with my bug,” she declared, “but I’m going to take it home now that the game’s over.”

The pair shot back up, and I was dazed again with the sudden landscape change.  It simply did not make sense that something so large could move so fast.

“It’s over?” Aubrey asked.  Apparently she had been so engrossed with me that she did not notice the passage of time – ironic, then, that she never noticed I was a human being.

“Yeah, for a couple of minutes,” Jessica confirmed.  She leaned her tremendous form so it parted the pair in front of me, then seized me with her thumb and forefinger.  “And I’ll be taking my new find back with me.”  She plucked me off the bench as though I were nothing, then cradled me inside her free, open palm.

“You’re coming to the after party though, right?” Naoko asked, as though Jessica’s timely intervention had not stopped her from committing murder.

“Yeah, of course I’ll be there!” Jessica answered, cradling me between her hands.  “I’ve just got to get this little guy back home first.”  When she said ‘this little guy’ she made her voice condescendingly sweet, like she was talking to a puppy, and brought her face close enough to nuzzle me.  Then she turned away from the pair, swinging my insides enough to make me nauseated, and strolled away from them.

When she was out of earshot she harshly whispered, “That’s two you owe me, Mr. Tiny, and don’t think I won’t remind you of your debts.”  Again, I was perplexed: what else could she possibly demand from me, and how could this be more compelling than the knowledge that she could make me like a bug to her at any moment?

I did not voice my concerns, however, since I figured it was unwise to challenge someone thousands of times your size.  Instead I enjoyed the relatively calm ride between her fingers, protected from the outside world by her other hand.  When she got back to her car she dropped me onto the seat between her thighs; part of no longer seeing me as human included not seeing me as a man.  Her car’s acceleration sent me tumbling into her skirt, but before I collided with her panties she took a hard turn, throwing me into her thigh.  The whole ride continued like that, tossing me back and forth like nothing from her simple movements.

When she finally stopped I was pushed forward, just emerging from inside her skirt.  Jessica reached down and gripped me much more firmly than before, causing my shoulders to pop.  She raised me to her face, close enough that one eye dominated my vision and was, in itself, enough to impart judgment.  “Have fun in there, Mr. Tiny?” she asked with a smirk.  “Don’t think I haven’t caught you looking at me.”  I was perplexed: the only reason my gaze had lingered on her before was because she almost took pride in not doing my quizzes until the last minute and I hoped to impart some sense of shame into her.

Her fingers curled around me, trapping me in the warm, fleshy prison of her fist.  It felt like she was exaggerating her arm swing while she clenched me so that my insides felt like they were being tossed about even more.  I did not cry out for help or plea for mercy, because what would be the point?  She was clearly having her fun, and could simply act like she did not hear me later.

Finally, I felt a solid impact through her fingers, and her hand opened to deposit me on the familiar tile floor.  Jessica stood up, taking another opportunity to tower over me for the sake of it while she glared down at me.  I looked back up at her helplessly, from the toes of her Adidas sneakers to her blue eyes emanating power.

The glow from Jessica’s eyes surged, and in a moment she had halved in height.  She was finally giving me back my size.  It was a slower process than when she shrank me, but regardless of how long it took I was glad to no longer be able to disappear under foot.  When the process finally stopped my eyes were about level with the top of her breasts.

“You promised to give me back my original size,” I challenged.  “I’m a few inches short.”

Jessica chuckled and patted my head.  “You’re more than a few inches short, Mr. Tiny,” she replied, “but I also took some as payment.  One to remind you of what I can do, and two for the debts you owe me from not getting smashed.”  She took a step forward, bumping into me hard enough to shove me back.  “Do you have a problem with that?”

“No, I don’t,” I answered.  Nothing I could say would sway her, so I simply submitted to my lot.  From now on, one of my students would essentially be in charge of my life.

She smiled and leaned in, touching her nose to mine so that we were at some definition of eye to eye.  “Good.  Now, I’m going to get drunk with my friends, and you probably need to readjust your car’s chair and buy some new pants.”  Jessica stood back up to her tremendous height and wiggled her fingers at me to wave goodbye.  “Ta-ta, Mr. Tiny!  I’ll see you on Monday.”  With that she spun on her heel and left.

I waited a few minutes, expecting her to come back and deliver some bon mot.  When it became clear she was gone for good I went back to my desk, pulled out my phone and keys, and left, hitting the light switch before I closed the door.  This was about to become a very interesting, unpleasant semester.

Several months passed, and the trauma of spending a night the size of an insect and nearly getting squished remained just as strong as immediately after it happened.  Every day in my class Jessica would find some reason to stand next to me and leer down, a constant reminder of what she had taken from me, as though I would ever forget.  Each night I had nightmares of her as a giantess.  Sometimes she shrank me as she had before, others she could stride over buildings, but they all ended the same way – a quick, grisly death under her shoe.

I did my best to hide the toll she had taken on me, both mentally and physically.  No therapist would believe my story, of course, since the idea of a person shrinking was ridiculous outside the realm of fairy tales and fantasy books, so I was left to deal with it on my own.  The three inches she stole from me turned out to be very important – now I was without question the shortest person in the school, even looking up to freshmen I passed in the hallway.  For a couple of weeks I tried to hide it by spending most of my time sitting, but the jig was up when a 5’1” girl noticed she had a small height advantage over me.  Once word got out students would go out of their way to stand as close as they could and feel they towered over me.  Every time they did, whether she was an inch taller or someone monstrously tall like Jessica, my imagination ran wild, and I saw them as though I were an inch tall again.

A couple weeks after winter semester began, I stayed late to input grades from the first test.  Although our deal was only for the first semester, I figured it would be prudent to give Jessica a 100 despite handing in the test several minutes late and covered in doodles.  At the very least, it would get her out of this school and as far away from me as possible so I could begin the healing process.  I looked down the list of assignments and considered just filling in 100s for her right now, but that would raise a few eyebrows in case of an audit.  The school board would use Occam’s razor even if I could bring myself to tell them I did it because I was afraid she’d shrink me small enough to fit in her mouth again. 

Someone rapped loudly on my door, jerking me out of the spiraling worst-case scenario I had running through my head.  Startled, I turned toward the sound, and let out a quiet groan when I saw Jessica’s blond head ducking through the doorway.  “Hello, Mr. Tiny!” she declared when her whole long body finally crossed the threshold.  “It’s me, Jessica!  Your favorite student!”

“Hi, Jessica,” I replied, much less enthusiastically.  “Is there something I can help you with?”

She giggled a bit before answering.  “You can get out of your chair and come see me, you little doofus!”  Jessica twirled a lock of hair around her finger while she spoke.  It was straight and loose, down past her shoulders, and several loose strands clung to her tight, black, long-sleeve shirt.  Even though they were against the school dress code she wore black yoga pants, and everyone either did not care or lacked the courage to call her on it.  Her pair of tremendous, light brown Ugg boots stretched from one tile onto the next.

“No thanks, I’m fine sitting,” I said.  “Last I checked, your legs worked fine.”

“I really think you should come over here,” Jessica insisted, lowering her voice.  “And don’t do anything sly, like rolling your chair over here.  I need you to stand and face me.”

I relented and stood, dragging myself out of my chair.  If I continued refusing, Jessica would just walk over and pull me out anyway, and that would be the least of it if she had to ask me three times.  Dragging my feet only seemed to make her enjoy it more, and she was practically beaming when I came to a stop a foot in front of her.  “Closer.”  Reluctantly I took a half-step forward.  “Closer,” she repeated impatiently, her voice full of venom.  Carefully I shuffled toward her until my eyelashes touched her shirt, making sure I did not shove my face into her breasts.

“My eyes are up here, Mr. Tiny.”  Stuck between two unpleasant situations I took the one that was less likely to get a complaint filed against me and looked up.  I had to crane my neck all the way back, and from her expression I could tell that Jessica was loving towering over me even more than usual.  Something swirled inside her blue eyes that made me feel uncomfortable.  “So?  What do you think?”

“About what?”  The only thing that was even a little different was her silver hoop earrings which I could only notice up close.

“Aw, you don’t even notice?”  Jessica sounded dejected.  “I guess it really has been too long since we’ve done this.  Or,” a mischievous smirk crossed her face and her eyes began to faintly glow, “you’re just so small that everyone over like five-eight is just generically ‘tall’ to you.”  She paused, waiting for me to say something while her eyes grew marginally brighter.  At last she was unable to contain herself and exclaimed, “I grew two inches over winter break!”

I was decidedly non-plussed.  She had definitely seemed taller since coming back – my eyes were now right at her chest level – but it had hardly registered amid everyone else clamoring to show off how much taller they were than me.  Besides, I didn’t think being tall was much of an accomplishment.  “Did you stay thirty minutes after school just to show me that?”

“You’re just jealous that you didn’t grow,” she teased, “and you’re going to be five foot nothing for the rest of your life.  But no, I do have something else.”  Her eyes became even brighter, standing out amid her cream skin.  “You need to write a letter of recommendation for me for colleges.”

“I do?”  I challenged.  When I tried to take a step back she clapped a hand on my shoulder, keeping me in place.

“Yeah.  You do.”  Her eyes became more intense, and I found myself unable to look away from them despite strongly wanting to.

“Why should I?” I persisted.  “Surely any other of your teachers would be better.  They’ve seen you put forth real effort over the past year and have nothing but good things to say about you, while you’ve done nothing but turn in weird doodles and blank pages to me for the whole year.  You should ask one of them.”

“I’m not asking them,” Jessica growled, her eyes reaching a pitch, “I’m telling you.  You owe me two favors, Mr. Tiny, and we have a deal.”

I was getting tired of being pushed around by a high schooler even if she was over a foot taller than me, and to make it worse other students were starting to follow her example.  It was time to stand my ground.  “You already collected those favors when you took two inches from me,” I told her.  “And our deal was for grades, not letters of recommendation.”

“Then I’m altering the deal.”  Jessica’s eyes seemed to engulf me, and my knees began to shake.  “It seems like you’ve forgotten just what I can do, and it’s time you got a reminder.”  This time, I had gone too far.  I tried to get away, but she kept me exactly where I was.  The ethereal blue light from her eyes expanded to overwhelm me and crackled with small bolts of lightning.

After several seconds of overwhelming my senses the light receded, and to my surprise nothing had changed.  My relief, however, was short lived.  “You need to act more appropriate for your size,” Jessica intoned, her voice like rumbling thunder in my ears.  It lingered, repeating over and over, and as it did so she began to grow in my vision.  She shrank me slower this time, apparently taking delight from watching me dwindle, but in a second I was looking up at her waist.  A second later I had been reduced past her powerful thighs and gazed up at her knees, then her boots were taller than me.  When I was even with the sole of her boot she finally stopped.  “That means do what someone says if they can step on you.”

Though I had lived this nightmare daily for months, experiencing it again was no less terrifying than the first time.  I desperately wanted to tear my eyes away from the towering young woman standing astride me so I could run and hide under my desk, but I felt compelled to keep staring up at her, awestruck.  She seemed to know this and looked down at me smugly, placing her hands on her hips to enhance the image of power.

“Not so big when you’re not so big, are you, Mr. Tiny?” Jessica boomed, taunting me.  She began tapping one of her enormous boots on the ground, sending regular thuds and quakes through the ground.  “Now.”  As though she were earnestly thinking it over she cupped her round chin.  “What should I do with this bug at my feet who thinks it’s a teacher?”

“Grow me back so I can write you that letter of recommendation?” I offered.  “I’ve learned my lesson, I promise.”

Jessica let out a loud, booming laugh, then cut it short.  “Nice try, but I’d like it if you showed me more respect than that,” she chided.  “All I have to do is move my foot six inches and you go squish.”  To drive her point home she began tapping her foot harder, practically slamming it into the ground so that the tremors weakened my already shaking knees.  “Any other ideas?”

“Um.”  Her smile flared at the sound of my miniscule voice.  “You log into my computer and I tell you what to write?”  She was clearly not going to undo this until she got that letter, come hell or high water.

“I like that more,” Jessica replied with a sly grin, “but it sounds like you’re trying to minimize your time minimized.  But you do have a good point: how can you write me a recommendation when you barely know anything about me?”  My jaw dropped, and I knew that this would not end well.  “You should spend the rest of the day with me!  You know, really get to know me, one on one.”

“Oh, Jessica, you really don’t need to –“

“No, I insist!” she roared, cutting me off.  “It’s no trouble for me, really.  You don’t look like you eat much, and besides, it’ll be fun!  We can watch study together, watch movies, then stay up late so I can tell you what to write for me and you can tell me scary stories about trying to teach students who can smash you on accident.”

“Well, it wouldn’t be appropriate…”

Jessica’s loud, piercing cackle cut me off.  “Appropriate?” she repeated.  “You’re smaller than my thumb!  What do you think will happen, huh?”  She let that settle for a moment before continuing.  “What’s the matter, worried you might end up liking me?”

“Did you forget the most important thing, Mr. Tiny?  You don’t have a choice.”  I stood frozen, looking up at Jessica in shock while she crouched in front of me, her legs extending well over my head.  When she got settled, she positioned herself so that she could look at me between her knees, her thighs framing her face.  An enormous hand snaked between her legs, completely relaxed and fingers extended.  When it reached her ankles it suddenly flipped up, and I could see every line and contour on her palm, no matter how small.  She held her palm there, poised to strike, while she watched me curiously.  Maybe she expected me to make a break for it, but I was still too entranced by her eyes to turn away.

Jessica finally struck, and her hand easily overwhelmed me.  For a brief instant her fingers stretched over me and her palm continued its rapid advance, threatening to pound me into the tile.  Just before it made contact it stopped and her fingers swept inward, scooping me off the ground.  She pressed me against her palm before readjusting her fingers, holding me securely in the middle of her fist.  The heat became intense very quickly, and the only light was two pinpricks poking in from either side.

I did not pass out on the spot like the first time, since this was a common event in my nightmares.  Regardless, I wished I had.  The intense forces as Jessica carelessly picked me up off the ground made my stomach turn, and I saw stars on the edge of my vision.  The ride came to an abrupt stop, making my stomach lurch the other way, and her fingers uncurled.  Momentarily the light shocked me and I rushed to shield my eyes.  When it subsided, I was greeted by a pair of piercing blue eyes and a vast field of creamy white skin.

“Still with me, Mr. Tiny?”  She seemed to enjoy calling me that even more when I was shrunken.  Her voice made my innards shake and I instinctively tried to back away, only to get blocked by the rest of her palm raised behind me.  “I’ll take that as a yes.”  Trying to focus on any one feature of hers was too much, so I decided to simply look at her left eye.

“I didn’t want to waste time reviving you when we got back to my house.”  At least her priorities were in order.  I could not escape her hand without dashing myself to bits on the floor below, so I was trapped.  “We better get moving.”  Her fingers curled back over me, encasing me in darkness.  There was a quick jolt while she moved her hand to her side, then I was absent any sensation aside from heat and some slight jostling while she walked.

Jessica kept me clutched in her fist for thirty minutes by my reckoning, though it may have been several hours as far as I knew.  Throughout the ordeal I heard her get into and drive her car, then unlock and go through her door.  I heard her feet thudding on the stairs, accompanied by vibrations running throughout my body and some slight wiggling within her hand.  She did a surprisingly good job of keeping me steady, and the main discomfort was the power of her movement passing through me.

Finally, even the slightest hint of movement stopped, and I felt my stomach drop as I was raised too quickly for comfort.  My body surged forward with the sudden stop, and I waited for what was to come next.  Jessica must have felt my trepidation, since her fingers peeled away from me slowly, letting the feeling of mystery linger.  The whorls of her fingerprints receded, and I was subjected to the sudden influx of light.

My eyes quickly adjusted, and again my attention was grabbed by two piercing blue eyes.  They seemed to dance as they looked over me.  “Hi again, Mr. Tiny!” Jessica proclaimed, making my insides quake.  “Welcome to my house!  I mean, I doubt you’ll see more of it than my room, but it’s still my house!”  She leaned in to somehow make me feel even smaller while her eyes were directly over me.  “So what do you think?”

I looked to the sides, and all I could see were white walls.  Above me, the only thing was Jessica herself, bearing down on me aggressively.  “It’s very…you,” I managed.  I knew well enough not to offend someone who held me in their palm.

“Thank you!” Jessica boomed.  “I decorated it myself!”  She twitched her fingers, making me wiggle along with them.  “Are you excited to spend this time with me?”

The world turned sideways when she turned her hand, dumping me out of her grip.  I slid along her palm until landing on her sheets, buffeted by her mattress.  I looked around, trying to take in my surroundings.   A massive white bedspread stretched hundreds of feet in each direction, with a black wooden ridge for the footboard and rolling, soft white hills for pillows.  My attention was quickly drawn back to Jessica however, her eager blue eyes looming over me while she gazed at me expectantly.

“I asked you a question, Mr. Tiny,” she chided.

“If I say no, will you let me leave?” I asked.

“Sure!” she exclaimed loud enough to blow back my hair.  “I just won’t grow you back.  So, which are you more excited for: spending time with me, or trying to teach while the size of a bug?”

I sighed in defeat.  “Then I guess I’m pumped to hang out with you!” I said, trying to fake enthusiasm.  At the very least Jessica probably wouldn’t kill me, and I couldn’t say the same for all my students unaware of my predicament.

She clapped her hands together in joy, making a terrific boom that I vainly covered my ears against.  “I knew you were, you just didn’t want to admit it,” she said.  Suddenly she stood, bowling me over when she bumped the mattress with her thighs, forcing me to gaze up at her titanic body towering over me.  Jessica made a show of turning around, and I had to look up at her round, fit butt looming above.

Slowly the black tower began collapsing, and I could only watch while Jessica’s posterior descended toward me.  Her tight yoga pants fought against it while it strained within the material, forming it perfectly to each cheek.  It was almost perfectly centered on me, leaving my prone form in the crack, which might give me just enough leeway to not be smashed beneath her tremendous rear.  I took a deep breath, anticipating a fight for my life against her butt.

At the last moment it shot backward, though the lowest point of each buttock grazed me as it passed over.  Jessica’s butt impacted the mattress hard, making a large crater beneath her weight that I sank into.  On either side of me two enormous black walls stretched to the precipice, bowing toward the center when her thighs flattened.  I looked up the black cliff face behind me and saw a small, self-satisfied smirk on her face.  If the whole night was going to be her having fun like this with me, maybe I should have taken the chance to leave when it was offered.

She leaned forward so that her body filled the sky above me and lifted one of her legs, making the mattress raise slightly along with it.  Springs creaked while she reached down, then were drowned out by an overwhelming crash and shockwave that reached me even on the bed.  The ground was thrown into turmoil by Jessica’s leg setting back down, then raised her other one.  Events repeated, and I was tossed into her thigh by the more violent impact.

Jessica suddenly raised her legs, and I was tossed about helplessly while the mattress adjusted to the shift in weight.  They crashed down behind me, hitting with such force that I the tremors in my teeth.  The pillows crunched beneath her body, and all I could do was wait for the platform she had stranded me on to stop shaking so violently while hoping to not get thrown off the edge.

Finally, the mattress returned to peace, and I could risk standing again.  Jessica’s vast body nearly stretched from one end of the bed to the other, from her back propped against the headboard to her white-socked feet sticking in the air like spires.  She had a book propped open on her lap and a pencil in her right hand, and I recognized that as the school’s calculus textbook.  To my surprise she was fairly engrossed in the book’s material, her blue eyes darting along the pages while her pencil made the occasional mark in a notebook on her other side.  I could not recall seeing her so much as crack a book for my class, let alone focus on it as intently as she was now.

“I hope you don’t mind, Mr. Tiny,” Jessica began, keeping her eyes on the book, “but I’ve got a bit of homework to finish up before we can get to the fun part.  You understand, right?” 

“About how long is this going to take?” I asked.

“Aw, is someone impatient?” she teased.  “Don’t worry, it shouldn’t be too long.”

“No, I just don’t have anything to do,” I replied.  “I left my phone in my desk and everything’s too big to do anything with, I’m wondering how long I’ll have to be bored.”

“My mother always says that only boring people are bored,” Jessica chided.  “Look around you, don’t you have any imagination or sense of wonder?  You have a unique opportunity to experience the world from a bug’s eye view, why don’t you go explore my room or something?”

“I’m a… a little worried about getting lost or trapped under something,” I sheepishly admitted.  “It’s weird to say, but I feel safer up here with you.”

Jessica cracked a smile.  “I appreciate the vote of confidence,” she said.  “For what it’s worth, I’d have to be an idiot to let anything serious happen to you before you write me that letter.”  Of course, her concern for my safety was completely self-interested.  “Tell you what: if you’re that hard-up for something to do, you can climb up here and help me study.  That ought to pass the time.”

“Oh, math was never my strongest subject,” I told her.  “I’d probably just slow you down if I tried to help.”

She glanced away from the book to me and cocked a blond eyebrow.  “Really?  That’s interesting, because it’s my best subject.  Do you mean to tell me that I’m stronger and smarter than you are?”

“That’s not really fair to say, there are many -“

“It’s okay to admit it, Mr. Tiny!” Jessica boomed.  “I am exceptionally skilled and talented, and you’re, well, you.  Most people are vastly inferior to me, you just look the part much better right now.”  I had no retort for that, so I just went silent and let her get back to studying.

Several minutes later she turned her attention back to me and scoffed.  “Are you going to climb up here or not?” she demanded.  I shrugged: climbing one of my students seemed indecent at best and rife with opportunities for something to go wrong.  “Look, if you’re just going to stand there like a bump on a log staring at me I’ll have to put you somewhere else, it’s distracting.”

“Fine with me,” I answered.

Jessica smirked.  “We’ll see if you still think that in a few minutes.”  The mattress groaned as she shifted her weight, and before I knew it her hand was bearing down upon me.  I could not even shy away before two digits clamped around me hard enough to knock the breath out of my lungs, and she plucked me off her bedspread as though I weighed nothing.  Futilely I kicked my legs in the air while she lifted me in her vice grip.  Another great creak rang out when she leaned to the side, carrying me over the edge of the mattress.

I looked down and gasped when I saw the fur-lined opening of one of her Uggs directly beneath me.  When I was positioned directly over the hole Jessica showed no hesitation in opening her fingers, dropping me from her grasp.  In less than a second I plummeted into the waiting boot, my landing softened by the padded sole inside.  All I could see if her was a shock of blond hair just beyond the rim which quickly retreated, accompanied by a cry from her mattress as she settled back down.

“Have fun in there!” Jessica called before going back to studying.  “I’m sure it’s much more pleasant than climbing me.”  The first time I tried to inhale I coughed.  The atmosphere was oppressive and dominated by the overwhelming scent of sweaty foot.  Every time I breathed was like taking a whiff from between her toes.  Her smell must have seeped into the soft material lining the boot, saturating it as she walked around throughout the day.  It was strong enough to make my eyes water to the point I had to dry them on the tail of my shirt.

When I could finally see, it was like being trapped in a well decorated during the 70s.  The small amount of light coming through the hole above me provided ample illumination where I stood but sharply dropped off as it traveled the length of the boot, until it barely lit the toe section at all.  Its lining was like white shag carpeting all around, even on the ceiling, that came up to my waist.  Trapped in the enormous, white tube with the worst smell I had ever experienced enveloping me, I felt slightly dizzy as I tried to get myself oriented atop her insole.

There was no way I was going to patiently wait for her to finish her homework while trapped in what was essentially a gas chamber.  I walked toward the rear side of the boot, struggling to fight my way through the thick wool that had been compressed by Jessica’s heel.  Every step was an ordeal, and I had to limit my breaths to short gasps to keep from choking on the air.  It took several minutes for me to walk the couple of inches to the wall, forcing my legs to push through the resistance.

When I reached the base of the boot’s shaft I looked up the curved, wooly cliff, and estimated it to be forty or fifty feet tall to me.  The last time I had climbed anything was a ten-foot chain link fence years ago, and that had been unpleasant enough.  I reached forward to grab on to the lining, and my hand sank into the white fibers, accompanied by a viscous oil.  At first I recoiled from the disgusting tactile sensation, but I gritted my teeth and shoved my hand back in.  Unpleasant though it may be, it was the only way to keep from spending what could be hours in this dank, smelly pit all by myself.

I grabbed onto the wool in my hands and jumped, trying to hoist myself up and begin the long climb ahead of me.  My foot snagged on a fiber, however, and I was jerked back onto the sole.  Involuntarily I winced at the pain and hoped that it wouldn’t make this any more difficult than it was already going to be.  Carefully I pulled my legs out of the lining along the insole, not wanting to strain anything if I got caught again, and pushed myself up.  Steeling myself, I plunged my hands into the lining again and prepared to begin the climb in earnest.

Making any progress at all was difficult.  Wool was far from an ideal climbing surface, and the thin, oil-like substance that coated it made it even harder to grip.  Every time I wanted to move one of my limbs I had to navigate it through a tangled mess of fibers, leaving me to rely on only a single arm to keep me from falling away.  To make matters worse, my feet were actively making the ascent worse.  They got almost no support from the lining, so I had to dig them in until they practically reached the boot’s exterior, and they repeatedly got caught in the material when I tried to pull them out.  After only an inch or two I was already sweating, making matters even worse.

When I crossed the halfway point my muscles were burning from the sudden and intense physical activity.  Every time I moved was a new, light jolt of pain that I knew I would be feeling for weeks to come.  Finally, almost inevitably, I messed up.  My sweaty fingers slid along a clump of wool I had grabbed onto, and I was unable to fasten my grip around it.  I fell backward, and the jolt when my body stopped jerked my other arm out.  Without anything to keep me close my feet lost their grip as well, and I once again dropped onto the soft, padded lining of the insole.

I laid there for several minutes, trying to catch my breath without breathing too deeply and gagging on the smell.  The loud, dull thud of a textbook slamming shut came from the outside world, and I surprisingly felt relief that I would soon be the focus of Jessica’s attention.  “Oh Mr. Tiny!” her tremendous voice called out.  “I’m ready to have fun with you now!”  If it meant getting out of this dank pit, I would submit to whatever weird games she had in store for me.

Her mattress screamed when she shifted her weight on it to come fish me out, and two blue eyes flanked by blond waterfalls came into view.  Jessica let out a short laugh and declared, “Aw, you look so cute in there!  Cute as a bug, really.  I almost don’t want to pull you out.”  The tremendous face above me was blocked by her hand, fingers outstretched as it descended toward me.  Lighting was reduced to a few small slivers that managed to get between her fingers as she grabbed the boot’s rim, then complete darkness when she squeezed it shut.

I was roughly tossed into the boot’s wall when she picked it up, and I felt my stomach turning from the forces.  Fortunately, it was a brief trip, and I came to a stop in the indentation from Jessica’s heel.  Light flooded into the cavern, and I saw an open, cream-colored palm set against a black backdrop waiting for me.  She upturned the boot and I was sent tumbling up the shaft, rolling along the wool so fast it did not have a chance to snag me.  At the top I was unceremoniously dumped into the middle of her hand, where I rolled one more time before coming to a complete stop.

A tremendous finger the size of a tree trunk pressed into the soft skin beside me, and with a slight push from her fingertip Jessica rolled me onto my back.  She was studying me with an intense gaze and smiling broadly, revealing a wall of gigantic teeth.  “So, how was it?” she smugly boomed.  There was another dull crash when she dropped the boot back on the floor.  “Any more fun than climbing me would’ve been?”  I groaned and she jabbed me with the finger, making me double over.  “You know I hate asking you questions more than once.”

“It was unpleasant,” I finally managed.  “I probably would’ve enjoyed climbing on you more just for the fresh air.”

“See, was that so hard?” Jessica’s voice rumbled.  “Now maybe you’ll think twice before not doing what I say.”  She poked me again, just a light prod this time, as though she were merely asserting her dominance.  “The question is, though, what am I going to do with you?”

“Get that letter written so you can grow me back and get me out of your hair?” I offered.

Jessica replied by nudging me with her fingertip and giggling.  “You sound like a broken record.  Let’s have some fun!”  Her thumb swung in from the side and clamped around my body along with her forefinger.  “I think I have just the game for us to play, too.”

No matter what, I expected it to be just another means for her to torment me.  “What is it?” I asked, fully knowing that we would be playing regardless.

Jessica held me up to her face, turning me over as though she were inspecting me before answering.  “Let’s play tag, but with a twist.  You can run around to your little heart’s desire, but I can only take one step at a time.  Sound fair?”

Hardly.  Her legs were several hundred feet long to me and could catch me easily.  Still, her mind was clearly made up, and she would not listen to any ideas from me.  “Sure, sounds good to me,” I lied.  “Where are we playing?”

“In my room, obviously!” Jessica answered, laughing.  “I can’t have my parents watching me chasing nothing around the floor, they’d think I was having a fit.  Oh, and by the way.”  She gave me a firm tap with her finger that felt like my whole body got punched.  “You’re it.”  With a slight flick of her wrist she tossed me away, releasing me at the apex of the movement.  I spun head over feet in a lazy arc, sailing over her gigantic body and just clearing the footboard to land on the soft carpet below.  After a bounce I came to a stop, thankfully with nothing broken, and stood back up.

One question immediately presented itself: if I was ‘it,’ how was I going to tag Jessica?  I’d have to climb up onto her bed, and after my recent experience with climbing I doubted I could manage.  She gratefully addressed my concern before I could voice it, and the bed groaned when she moved her body.  Two loud crashes followed, along with earthquakes, and I saw the top of her blond locks peek from behind her bed.

“Catch me if you can, Mr. Tiny!” she called, and I started toward her.  My legs sank up to their knees in the carpet, meaning I had to high step over the fibers to get anywhere.  It was surprisingly easier to navigate than the lining of her boots, however, and felt like child’s play after that ordeal.  Progress was slow, and it took me about a minute to go a foot, but at least I did not feel like I was trapped.

After a few minutes I turned the corner of Jessica’s bed and saw her standing at the far side, waiting for me with her hands on her hips.  I felt her gaze on me as I approached, her blue eyes following my path toward her.  As I drew closer to the titaness I passed a row of her colossal shoes arrayed along the side of her bed.  Along with the Uggs I had been trapped in earlier, there were some simple but stylish black flats, red hi-top Converse that had seen better days, her cheerleading shoes, and for some reason pair of shiny black pumps.  Why the tallest girl in school owned a pair of high heels was beyond me, but I knew better than to question women’s fashion.  It was impossible not to notice, as I walked by each shoe, that I was looking up at the toes for each one, and in the case of the flats could walk beneath the toe without even ducking my head.

I was only a few steps away from Jessica’s foot and started to think she had forgotten to do anything about me while bemused by watching me cross the carpet.  Suddenly her foot raised, and I helplessly watched her sole fly over me, just out of reach.  She set it down with a boom a good distance behind me and giggled.  “Almost got me!”

With a groan I turned and ran toward her other foot, aiming for the middle.  Again she waited for me to get close, but before I could reasonably touch her foot she took a step forward, leaving me in the dust.  “Not quite!” she boomed, and I turned to face her.  With one step, she was a few feet and several minutes of walking away from me.  I began to doubt I’d be able to overcome her extreme advantage in this.

As I got closer to her again, she did not turn around to follow me.  Maybe she realized this was drastically unfair, and was giving me a chance?  Regardless of her reasons it would be dangerous for me not to play along with her, so I kept my slow and steady pace toward her foot.  With each step I expected her to spin around and simply step away from me, but the gigantic young woman remained staid in her position.  Not wanting to overthink it I focused on the task at hand, though I suspected the whole thing was a trap.

At last I was at the base of the great tower of Jessica, gazing up at her enormous socked heel.  With each second that passed I expected her to lift it up and drag it over me so she should smash me, but everything remained perfectly in place.  Finally, after some hesitation, I reached forward and tapped her foot.  “You’re it!” I declared, hoping she had even felt me.

“Oh, you got me!” Jessica said, feigning surprise.  “Don’t worry, I’ll let you get out from under me before chasing you down.”  I expected that meant several more minutes of running ahead of me, but she slightly lifted her heel and dragged her foot along the carpet beside me, creating an inescapable cacophony.  When her toes were past me she moved them back in front of me and began digging her big toe into the carpet.  She flicked her toes up with the force of a fright train, slamming it into me while kicking her foot up into the air.  I was sent flying in a low arc and landed several feet away from her, sore but no worse for the wear.

I quickly got back to my feet, and Jessica was already advancing toward me.  Her long, ponderous steps shook the ground when they landed, throwing me off-balance as I tried to dash into hiding.  The closest and most obvious spot was under her bed, of course, so I made a beeline to get there.  Jessica took another slow step toward me, closing half the distance left, and I realized it was futile to even try.  Even so, I could not stop moving, and kept sprinting to get past her footboard.

With one more step Jessica’s foot crashed down in front of me, blocking my way with a solid wall of white.  The force stopped me almost immediately, and I felt my legs turn to jelly from the vibrations.  I turned to go the other way, but Jessica merely pivoted the foot on its heel, swinging it over me before slamming it back down into the ground with a boom.  Once again I tried to go back the other way, trying to evade her foot for as long as possible.

Jessica had other ideas.  She raised her foot again and rotated it, stopping when the vast expanse of her sole was directly over me.  Mercilessly she brought it down, slamming her foot on top of me.  Effortlessly she had pinned me beneath her sole, and no matter how much I struggled against it I was powerless to make it so much as budge.  Vibrations from her chuckling ran all the way through her body and over mine, giving me a disgustingly pleasurable sensation.

“You’re it,” she boomed, leaving her foot atop me.  I fought to breathe amid the much too familiar stench of her foot, but the sheer weight pressing down on me made it difficult to draw breath.  Jessica pressed down harder, increasing the pressure on me, and I became worried that she was really going to smash me.  Desperately I thrashed harder, futilely fighting against her foot when I could not even move my arms.  The clean, white fabric of her sock crawled into my mouth when I screamed for help, and white spots appeared at the edge of my vision.  If she did not crush me, she was going to suffocate me.

Thankfully she relented, and after several minutes picked her foot up off me.  Unfortunately, I was stuck to her sole, and subjected to intense g-forces while she swung her leg around.  After a brief rush she stopped, and I heard her laugh again.  “Look at you, Mr. Tiny!” Jessica roared in between laughter.  “Squashed like a bug and stuck to my foot!  I didn’t think a game of tag would be too intense for you, but it looks like it is.”

I groaned when she pinched me with her fingers, then peeled me off her sole.  By some miracle I did not have any cracked ribs or broken bones, but whatever pride I had left was deeply wounded.  The world whirled around me as she lifted me to her face, but I was too light-headed from nearly suffocating to feel anything else too strongly.  “Just as well, that took longer than I expected and it’s about time we got that letter written.”

Jessica carried me over to her desk, however instead of setting me down next to her keyboard she dropped me into her lap.  While the computer came out of sleep mode she brought her long legs up so she could cross them in the chair, penning me in again.  I looked up past her enormous, rounded heels to the gigantic cliff face towering above me until I saw the blue light cast from her monitor on her face.  “So,” she began, turning her piercing gaze down to me between her thighs, “for what reasons do you recommend me to a college?”

All I had to do was rephrase everything she had done to me as something positive instead of unthinkable torture perpetrated by a spoiled brat who simply did not want to study for a class that was uninteresting to her.  According to the letter I was going to endorse, she was a diligent and hard-working student, focused on whatever tasks came her way.  She knew how to use her advantages to stand above her peers and was willing to do whatever it took to succeed.  Without a doubt she was one of my brightest students but was not reluctant to have her playful side come out when she wanted.  When it was over, I had written perhaps the most glowing letter of recommendation I ever had for a student, all under the threat of getting crushed by the student I was recommending.

“There!” Jessica declared, hitting save for the last time.  “Now, was that so hard?”  She looked down at me smugly, like I hadn’t offered to do it several times since she shrank me.

“I guess not,” I admitted.  “Can you grow me back now?”

Jessica tapped her chin then looked at a clock.  “Hm, I don’t think I should,” she declared.  “What would people say if they saw you leaving my house in the middle of the night?  Your reputation would be ruined.  You should stay with me tonight, and I’ll get you back to school early.”

“What do you mean, stay with you?” I asked, not wanting to jump to conclusions.  “Seems like that could be just as bad.”

“Oh don’t worry, you won’t be sleeping in bed with me,” Jessica replied with a laugh.  “I’ve got a place just for you.”  Her hand came toward me, and I had nowhere to move when she pinched me between her thumb and forefinger again.  My world raced when she stood, causing my insides to drop from inertia, and I bounced in her grip when she stepped off.  It only took a handful of strides for her to cover ground that had taken me ten minutes, and in no time we were in front of her night stand.

With her free hand, Jessica reached down and picked up a small glass jar from the top.  She raised it until it was directly beneath it, then let me go.  I dropped into the glass vessel, falling on my face when I landed.  “Welcome to your room for the night!”  She sounded almost sickeningly sweet as her voice echoed off the rounded surface holding me.  “Sorry I didn’t have time to get a bed set up for you, but you’ll manage, right?  Bugs can sleep just about anywhere, I think.”  Jessica took a second to stare at me inside the jar, face distorted by the glass so that it seemed to wrap around me, before lowering me down onto her nightstand.

The titaness walked away and hit the lights.  “Good night, Mr. Tiny!” she declared as the room was plunged into darkness.  Rustling sounds rebounded off the glass surface as she undressed and crawled into bed, and I laid down on my cold floor.  Although it was remarkably uncomfortable, I was exhausted after being tormented and abused for the past several hours, and drifted off to sleep before Jessica’s roaring snoozing could keep me up.

  * * * 

I woke up to loud, piercing tapping rebounding through my small glass room.  I opened my eyes and saw Jessica’s face looming over me, dominating my view even more thanks to distortion from the glass.  “Wake up, Mr. Tiny!” she boomed.  “We’re going to be late!”  The world trembled as she swiped a hand over the jar, snatching it in her grip.  The force of her movement threw me against the wall as she dashed while holding me, then I was tossed against the opposite wall when she came to a sudden stop.

The jar dropped rapidly when she knelt, and I slid along the smooth glass while she rotated it upside down.  The wide open maw of her flat came into view, and I desperately looked for something to grab onto.  Unfortunately, the glass was flawless even to someone of my size, and Jessica poured me into her shoe.  I landed roughly in the middle of her beige insole, and she cast a shadow over me when she stood back to her full height, tossing the jar onto her bed.

“Well, we’re not going to be that late,” Jessica admitted.  She had taken the time to finish getting ready before waking me, and was wearing a pair of black stockings with a black skirt, white blouse, and dark brown corduroy jacket.  “In fact, we’re going to be a good deal early.”  Carefully she slid her foot into the shoe beside the one I laid in, then worked her fingers in behind her heel to pull it on tight.  “I just wanted to get you back in place and normal-sized before other students come looking for you.”

Before I could say anything she began sliding her foot into her other shoe, and my eyes bulged as I saw it approach.  In no time at all the black-stockinged foot eclipsed my view of everything, her toes passing over me followed by her sole dominating my vision.  It began slanting downward as she inserted her toes on the far edge, and I braced for impact.  The elastic rim stretched around her foot as it set down, squishing me against the insole.  I cried out when she pulled it onto her heel, tightening the shoe so her foot pressed down on me harder.  Luckily, I had landed near her instep, or I would have doubtlessly been smashed under the ball of her foot.

One step was all it took for me to doubt that was luck at all.  The immense weight atop me became even heavier for an instant when her other leg moved, then I was subjected to horrific forces when the heel beside me raised.  I was squeezed between the inertia of the foot’s movement and the foot itself holding me firmly in place while it sailed through the air, my whole body pinned against her insole.  My stomach turned when her foot flipped, and rumbling vibrations ran the whole length of her foot when her heel set down.  A second wave, much worse than the first, came when she swung the rest of her foot down, making my very bones shake and tears well in my eyes, then the whole process began again.

Each step Jessica took with me trapped in her shoe was torture.  Before I could recover from one the next had begun in a cycle that seemed to never end.  It only took three strides for me to reach a point beyond pain, where I could no longer differentiate between which horrific part of the cycle I had just experienced and which was next.  The inexorable pounding of her gait made me wish that she would just apply a little more pressure with the next step and squish me just so the living hell she was putting me through would end.

There was a small reprieve while Jessica drove herself to school, and I was in her left shoe so there was no risk of being splattered between her foot and the pedals.  It was over seemingly as soon as it had begun, though, and I did not have nearly enough time to recover.  Once again I was subjected to the agony of her merely walking, feeling myself brought near to death with each step only for the shore of release to recede a moment later.  The sound and feeling of her foot slapping against the pavement drilled itself into my head, and I was sure to be traumatized by it until my dying moment.

Finally, after what seemed like days of sharing Jessica’s shoe with her foot, she came to a stop.  Slowly she slid her foot out of her flat, and I instantly felt an immense amount of relief.  Unbeknownst to me, during the voyage I had become doused with sweat, and my tiny body was stuck to the nylon stretched over Jessica’s foot.  She let out a light chuckle then pinched me with her fingers, peeling me off the bottom of her foot.  Instead of taunting me she simply set me down on the tile and got to work putting her shoe back on.

For several seconds we stared at each other silently, her piercing blue eyes seeming to challenge me as I gazed up at the colossus towering over me.  Finally, I became impatient.  “Well?” I shouted.  “Aren’t you going to grow me back?”

Jessica smiled.  “I probably should, right?” she asked.  “I mean, it’d be pretty hard for you to teach if you’re the size of a bug, and it was part of our deal.”  She took a second to tap her chin as if in thought.  “Then again, I’ve already changed the deal once, and it’s not like you’d be able to do anything if I didn’t.”

My eyes widened and I felt my face go flush.  “What?” I protested.  “You can’t be serious!  You –“

“Relax!” Jessica boomed over me.  “I’m just messing with you!  Part of the reason you recommended me is that I like having fun, right?  Just stand still and you’ll be big enough to teach in no time.”

Gradually the world around me became smaller, and Jessica seemed less a gargantuan threat to my very existence and merely a gigantic menace.  However, my growth unexpectedly stopped when I was still several inches below her waist and my vision was even below her crotch.  “Where’s the rest of it?” I implored, looking up at her.  Though she could no longer step on me, she still towered over me.

“That’s all you’re getting,” she replied, smirking.  “Three feet seems about right to me.  Maybe next time you’ll think twice about telling me no, hm?”

“But people will notice!” I protested.  “Don’t you think people will wonder why I’m suddenly two feet shorter?”

“Yeah, probably,” Jessica smugly answered.  “What’ll they do about it, though?  It’s not like I’m going around telling people that I shrank you, and no one would ever guess that anyway.  I’m betting the Mandela Effect will kick in and people will convince themselves you’ve been this tall the whole time.”  She tapped me in the stomach with the toe of a shoe that could cover my entire torso.  “Anyway, I’m off to calculus.  See you later Mr. Tiny!”  My tormentor spun on her heels, making her skirt whirl in the breeze, and left through the open door, slapping her feet on the tile with each step.

When she was gone, I let out a deep sigh.  This was my life now, apparently, and I would have to get used to it.  I climbed into my chair and raised it so that I could reach the keyboard, and found that my legs dangled a good bit off the floor now.  No matter what, I would not be able to cover this up for any amount of time.  After another sigh, I logged in and got ready to start the day.

The rest of the year was difficult.  My students immediately noticed, and some of the more sympathetic ones even asked what happened.  I had to come up with a lie about some accident in the school lab so they wouldn’t ask any further: I doubted anyone would believe what really happened, and if they did Jessica would come to me for revenge.  Besides, I could not bear the thought of what a madhouse my classroom would become if it got out that one of my students had such an enormous influence on me, to say nothing of how my professional reputation might suffer.

Even without complete anarchy breaking out, I lost control over my classes within a couple of days.  I could no longer stand behind the podium during lectures without a stepladder, and my alternate solution of pacing back and forth in front was far from ideal.  Since I was about as tall as their desks only the students in the first row could even see me, and the rest felt free to speak whenever they wanted, whether I was talking or not, and I gave up trying to curb that quickly.  This brought along with it rampant cheating: since I could not see the top of their desks and no other staff members wanted to help, even the previously diligent students began to slack off.

As for the rest of the staff, none of them seemed to care.  They had always known me as “the short teacher,” and simply accepted this as a deepening of my role.  There was no attempt to make accommodations, nor even talk with me about what happened.  When word of my explanation reached the chemistry teacher, she simply shrugged and said that it sounded likely.  Without opening a formal investigation into it I did not see any way to draw more attention to my situation, not that I wanted to in the first place, and no school authority would seriously investigate a story about a student shrinking a teacher. 

Worst of all, Jessica was right.  Once the small amount of excitement regarding my reduction in size died down, even the few students who were concerned began to see it as funny.  They were taller than me while sitting, and some of them would make a point of looking down as I walked past while they were at their desks.  Some of them, particularly the shorter students who marveled that I was only waist-high to them, made a point of standing when they spoke to me.  I heard them talking among themselves about how amazing it felt to tower over someone like they did me.

Jessica and her crew, however, were the worst about it.  They made a point to stand on either side of me and talk over my head, as though I weren’t there at all, often about me.  When I tried to get their attention so they’d move they would step in even closer, making me feel even smaller between them, until I finally had to duck out of the situation entirely.  If they wanted to talk to me in particular, even just rattle off prattling nonsense to make themselves feel better, they waited until they found me in a corner or against a wall, using their imposing bodies to block my escape.  Remarkably, as an adult I found myself bullied by high schoolers.

When the school year ended, I was overjoyed.  The problems that cropped up this year could be headed off at the start of the next, and I could feel like a decent teacher again.  It was expected that all faculty members would attend graduation, and I sent the RSVP that I would be going with relish.  Not only did I want to support the few students who hadn’t turned against me, but I needed to see Jessica walk across the stage.  It was the only way to be sure she officially graduated and would be out of my life from then on.

On the day of the event, I made my way to the faculty section and found my seat.  They had graciously provided me with an aisle spot so that I would be able to see the proceedings and not be wedged between two of my colleagues towering over me, one of the few accommodations they made for me.  I climbed into the chair and turned around, kicking my feet idly while I watched the ceremony.

The night was unexciting, a bog-standard graduation like the dozen or so others I had attended.  We clapped politely for each student as they crossed, either out of decorum or joy to see them moving on, and some families in the audience got way to excited when they heard their child’s name.  When they called for Jessica, however, I nearly clapped my hands raw as she strode across the stage in her black gown and yellow honor’s sash.  This would be the last time I’d ever have to see her, and I no longer had to live in fear of reprisal from a spoiled girl.

When it was over I rushed to get out of the stadium and back to my car, satisfied that I could get some sense of normally back in my life.  Unfortunately, every aisle and walkway was clogged by people giving congratulations or a last embrace before going their separate ways, and I got bogged down trying to weave between the sea of legs in front of me.  I could not force my way through the throng of people all around me, so I simply had to wait for some of them to clear out.

Finally, when I was able to move, I walked as quickly as I could for the exit amid the small stream of remaining people.  Before I reached it, a large hand gripped my shoulder and yanked me to the side, throwing me into a massive pair of legs.  The hand kept me from falling backward, and when the impact’s daze faded I looked up to see who had accosted me.  Standing over me, peering down at me with piercing blue eyes that stood out amid the night sky and her black gown, was Jessica.

“Hey there, Mr. Tiny!”  She spoke quietly, but even with the noise still coming from behind us I could hear her clearly.

“Hi, Jessica,” I replied.  “Congratulations on graduating with honors, you certainly earned it.”  I hoped my lack of enthusiasm would deter her from lingering so I could get back home and start forgetting about her.

“Thank you!” she exclaimed, kneeling so she could look me in the eyes more easily.  No such luck.  “I really do owe a lot of my success to you, if you hadn’t given me another chance, I might not have graduated at all.”  If that was how she wanted to view it, I was not about to correct her.  “Come on, give your favorite student a hug in congratulations!”

“No, really, I –“  Before I could finish my protest two strong arms had already wrapped around me and Jessica pulled me tightly against herself.  I did not resist, since if anything that would only encourage her.  Instead I simply went limp, letting her squeeze me as tightly as she wanted.  It was her night, after all.

After fifteen seconds she finally released me, and I staggered away from her.  She stood back to her full height and looked down at me again, a mischievous smirk on her face.  Her blue irises were starting to swirl again, and despite the uneasy feeling in my stomach I could not turn away.  “You know,” she began, the light from her eyes getting brighter, “my parents got a hotel tonight so I could have a party, and you would be more than welcome.”

“Thanks for the invitation,” I started, “but I’ve got a lot of reading to catch up on.  You understand, right?”

“C’mon, it’ll be fun!” Jessica pouted.  I felt compelled to meet her gaze as she spoke, almost as though it were a hypnotic suggestion.  “We managed to get a keg and everything, and my parents ‘forgot’ to lock the liquor cabinet.  Besides, it’ll just be me, you, and my friends…”  She bit her lower lip and brushed a lock of hair behind her ear, as though she were trying to seduce me.

“I really shouldn’t,” I insisted, though below the surface I desperately wanted to accept.  “The implications for my career alone if I were seen there would be catastrophic.”

Jessica laughed, and the light from her eyes reached a pitch.  “You’re so funny, Mr. Tiny,” she declared.  “You’re assuming anyone would even know you’re there.”

“Jessica, I really don’t want to go.”  I knew all too well what was coming, though I kept myself in denial.  “Is there any way you could give me a pass, just this once, considering how much I’ve helped you this year?”

She smiled, and I lost myself in the vortex of her eyes.  “Are you forgetting our first and most important rule?”  I did not need to give an answer, she simply gave a quick nod and finished, “You really don’t have a choice.”  All day I had been terrified and waiting for her to do something like this, and if I had managed to sneak out I might have been able to avoid it.

Gradually her impressive height increased while I stared up at her, helpless to do anything.  She must have been practicing shrinking people so she could maximize her enjoyment watching her quarry dwindle, since it took me several seconds to reach her knees.  All the same, it felt like my feet were stuck in a thousand pounds of concrete, since I was rooted in place.  My view slid down along her shins while she looked at me smugly, eyes still radiating a powerful energy, then I descended below her ankles.  Soon I was looking up at her pumps, then the toe of her nearest shoe, while individual blades of grass blocked my view of the titaness.

“I’ve got some more bad news for you,” she boomed, making a show of patting her thighs.  “I don’t have any pockets in this thing, so I’ll have to get you back to my house in a somewhat less conventional manner.”  She slipped a foot out of one of her pumps and set it down beside me, squashing down the grass beneath it.  I looked up at the foot encased in flesh-toned nylon beside me aghast at what she had clearly planned.

“Wait, Jessica, stop!” I cried.  “There has to be some other way you can get me there!”  Just that morning I had woken up drenched in sweat from a nightmare about riding in her shoe.  I would do anything if it meant not having to experience that again.

Jessica laughed again at my protests.  “You’re so cute, Mr. Tiny,” she declared.  “You think I pick these things based on what’s best rather than what’s most fun for me.”  She began kneeling and I turned the other way, her spell over me broken.  Being lost on this field for the rest of my life was better than being jammed into her shoe again.  I sprinted away from the gigantic young woman trying to claim ownership of me, weaving between blades of grass as I went.  Hopefully she would have trouble tracking me amid all the greenery and I would be allowed to finish out my days tiny but free of her torment.

The grass above me parted, and whatever meager hopes I had were dashed.  Her hand came crashing through the forest, and a moment later her fingers were clamped around my body.  My tiny legs pumped uselessly in the air after she plucked me up from the ground, and I felt her rumbling chuckle while I tried in vain to resist her.  She had begun pulling me back toward herself before I finally caught on, letting my body go limp in her grasp.

Jessica dangled me above her open pump, letting me squirm in her grip for a moment.  “Now, I don’t want to hear a single word of complaint about this later,” she boomed, grinning.  “There are dozens of guys and girls at school who’d love for me to step on them, and you’re getting it without even asking.  Really, you should be thanking me for this.”  Her fingers opened, dropping me into her shoe, and I flailed for the whole brief descent.  I landed in the middle of her insole and rolled down the incline, coming to a stop in the indentations left by her toes.

Through the top of her shoe I could see her already standing again, and I knew I had very little time to get somewhere safe.  Jessica’s enormous foot slid into her shoe, blocking off any chance I had of going back up the ramp, and her gigantic, nylon-clad toes drew closer.  I looked around in a panic for somewhere to go, but all around me I only saw the black leather of her pump’s toe and her own tremendous toes sliding toward me.  Desperate for any chance, I backed away from the toes coming toward me, going deeper into the leather cavern provided by her shoe.

All light was squelched from my vision when her foot slid into place, but I had managed to avoid sliding beneath her toes.  I pressed myself as deep as I could into the point of her shoe, hoping to maintain some measure of autonomy.  When she swung around I was pushed even further into it, centripetal force treating me like its plaything, and my bones quaked when she set her foot back down.  The leather contorted around her foot while she prepared to step off, and I reacted to each new crease with a cringe.

When Jessica stepped with the shoe I was trapped inside I was thrown out from the point I had taken refuge in and tossed against her big toe in front of me.  It pitched upward, sending me tumbling down to her sole, before it came swinging down with tremendous force.  My limbs went limp from the powerful impact of her foot hitting the ground, and I looked for any way to minimize the next one.  Unfortunately, I heard another series of creaks while she got ready for another stride, and I had no time to brace myself.

The next time I was thrown up by her foot I grasped desperately for anything to hold on to, so long as it would stop me from being tossed around like nothing.  Almost by sheer luck I managed to hook one of my arms in one of the strands of nylon pulled tight against her toe, keeping me from being thrown against the ceiling.  Her foot rushed back down, and I was able to slip my other arm into the same part of the mesh.  It hit with tremendous force that made my insides jump, but at least I had taken some modicum of control of my situation.

For the rest of my trek inside Jessica’s shoe I did not relax, convinced that my firm grip keeping me tight against her toe was the only thing saving me from being thrown about like nothing.  Even when the churning forces of her gait receded while she was driving I did not relent, since I knew it would start again sooner or later.  Sure enough, mere seconds after her engine turned off I was thrown about inside the toe of her shoe again, the only thing keeping me steady among the incessant pounding from her heels the tight grip I’d maintained on her stockings.

Finally, after what seemed like hours of torment at Jessica’s feet, including a trip up the stairs, it was at an end.  She began sliding her foot out of the shoe and I let go of the nylon mesh I had been clinging to, hoping to get a break.  Her foot slid out the rest of the way, leaving me alone at the base of her pump.  Jessica towered over me as I rested inside her shoe, but her powerful blue-eyed gaze still managed to find me immediately.

“Aw, is Mr. Tiny all tuckered out?” she teased, puckering her lips down at me.  “That’s fair.  I’ll give you a bit of time to recover while I get ready.”  Jessica took a moment to smirk at me before continuing, “You’ll need all the energy you can get to make it through this.”  She stomped out of view, her enormous feet slapping the ground with tremendous quakes, and I was left to imagine what horrors this party could possibly hold for me.

For the next thirty minutes or so I was left unmolested aside from the occasional quake rolling through the floor to make my innards vibrate.  Every so often I would see a cap of blond hair over the shoe’s ridge, and I would brace myself for whatever Jessica was about to subject me to.  There was barely enough time to recover, though my breath finally steadied and my system’s adrenaline returned to normal.  The only thing that occupied my mind was trying to guess what, exactly she had in store for me.  It must be some new torment.

My world shook with two powerful impacts, about ten seconds apart, and I figured this was finally it.  Moments later, Jessica stepped fully into my view.  She flashed a cocky smile down at me trapped in her footwear and asked, “Miss me?”

Jessica looked like a different person.  She had curled her hair so it fell in golden ringlets over her shoulders, and dark eyeliner made her hypnotizing eyes stand out even more.  A long-sleeve green and white plaid shirt hung loosely over her tremendous frame, opened to show a red, low-cut shirt beneath.  Acid-washed denim jeans had been practically painted on her long legs, with the bottoms tucked into the enormous pair of red Converse I had seen in her room.  It was some sort of chic grunge aesthetic that worked for her, though I might have thought differently were I not at her feet.

She crouched in front of me, making her jeans wrinkle, and leaned forward so that she loomed over me.  “I think it’s time to let you in on why you’re here,” Jessica boomed, reaching a hand into her shoe.  Two digits settled around me, and she gingerly plucked me off the insole.  My stomach dropped during her meteoric rise back to her full height, but compared to the time in her shoe it was nothing.  Carefully she positioned me between her eyes and gave me a brief stare-down. “I have one more deal for you, Mr. Tiny.”  This close I could feel the warmth from her breath and the power of each syllable.  “If you make it through this party, I’ll give you back all your height.  If not, well, you’ll be beyond my help anyway.  So, what do you say?”

My gaze darted between the two blue irises focused intently on me, looking for some sort of hint as to what was going on beneath the surface.  “Let me guess: I don’t really have a choice, do I?” I retorted.  By now I had figured out how things worked with her.

“Of course you have a choice!”  Jessica sounded shocked, like she had not put me in the same situation several times before.  “If you say no, you’ll still go to the party, but you’ll get to stay bug-sized afterward.  Not a bad deal, if you ask me.  You could stay with me and be my little bug boy at college!”

“I’ll take the deal,” I blurted.  There was absolutely no way I was going to be her pet or whatever she thought until she got bored of me.  “Where do you want to pick me up after?”

“Don’t worry,” Jessica answered with a chuckle.  “If there’s anything left of you, I’ll find it.”  Slowly she lowered me away from her face and used her free hand to hold open her breast pocket.  Her fingers opened and I fell into the opening, the shirt curved so it pushed me against her breast.  She gave me a wink from high up and gave the pocket a reassuring pat, then the world began swaying with her gait.  With the ample cushioning, it was much better up here than the hell of her shoe.

The turbulent shaking as she ran down the stairs changed the placid perception of my perch a little, but once that was over things returned to their normal, calm state.  I wondered why she had dropped me in her pocket at all: it was much more her style to grab me in a fist and toss me where it would be least convenient.  After a few moments, however, it dawned on me.  Nobody was here yet.  Apparently she thought it would not be fair to have me out and about when it was just the two of us.

A loud, rhythmic pounding rang out, and I felt Jessica gasp.  “They’re here!” she exclaimed, walking to answer the door.  “Hope you’re ready down there.”  The door opened with a creak, and Jessica greeted her guests.  “Hey guys, booze is in the kitchen and food’s on the way!” she announced.  The bustling of footfalls, clicks, and shuffling that answered her indicated that there were more guests than I had expected.  Of course she had this many friends, or at least this many people wanted to party with her.  Most of the faces were a blur through the pocket opening, but I distinctly spotted Naoko and Aubrey near the front.

When the crowd had passed, Jessica leaned on the door to close it and slid two digits into her pocket to retrieve me.  After a bit of probing her long fingers managed to snatch me between their tips, and I was lifted out.  She looked down at me haughtily, flicked a curl behind her shoulder, and boomed, “See you later.  Maybe.”  Her voice sent a chill running down my spine, and I realized for the first time that she no longer had any compelling reason to keep me alive.

Jessica knelt down on one knee and lowered me to the tile, pressing me as flat as she could without risking harm.  She positioned her fingers on either side of me so they formed a V, and slightly drew her hand back.  With a great caterwaul she threw her hand forward, ejecting me from between her fingers and sending me sliding across the floor.  A finger clipped my feet before I could get clear, causing me to spin wildly during the slide.  I screamed involuntarily, the only option with my trajectory so thoroughly out of control.

Friction ground me to a stop, but not before I had been thoroughly disoriented.  I had no idea where I was or how far I had gone, or where the crowd of imminent threats to my life was.  Lying on the ground and thinking about it, however, was not going to get me answers.  Warily I got to my feet, still dizzy, and stumbled into a rubber wall.  Annoyed, I staggered back and looked for a way around.  The obstacle was only a little taller than me so it would not be too difficult to climb, but the bright red fabric made me think twice.  My eyes continued upward, and amid a tangle of thick white rope I spotted a sign sticking out that read “VANS.”

Quickly my gaze snapped as far up as it could go, and I gasped.  I was at the base of a colossal leg propping up a gigantic young woman who, as of now, had no idea I was there.  The light reflected off her smooth-shaven, slightly tanned skin from her ankle to the dark blue shorts that came halfway down her thighs.  She leaned forward on the kitchen’s center island, focused on making herself a drink, and I looked for somewhere to scurry off to before she noticed me.

Unfortunately, we were not alone.  The ground shuddered and I heard a loud crack, and I snapped my head to see a shiny black pump coming around the corner.  Its twin came just a moment later, creating another crash and sending me staggering again.  They brought with them a pair of shapely legs, but before I could check who they belonged to the first shoe picked back up and began gliding through the air on a course straight for me.  I watched helplessly as the flat, brown sole soared over my head, knowing that I would not be able to escape from beneath it.  The tall, narrow tower of her heel struck the ground with the force of an explosion, making my ears ring.  She swung the rest of her foot down, slamming it against the tile just beyond me.  My body was assaulted by the sound and force of her step, but at least I had not been crushed.

Leather creaked as it compressed and folded, and the titanic shoe stepped from on top of me just as quickly as it had come.  Its arrival left me dazed, and I looked around blankly in shock.  She had come out of nowhere and just missed smashing me by a matter of inches, all without knowing it.  I did not know how many more lurked behind the great mesa near me or just out of sight, and I had to be lucky every time.

Ice churning in liquid snapped me back to reality, and I looked up to see the unknown titaness in Vans stirring her drink.  Staying on the floor was the worst choice I could make here, but if she walked away I would be out of options.  I gathered whatever resolve came with being scared out of your wits and dashed forward, then leapt onto the rubber rim.  My hands gripped the top and feet kicked at the wall, pushing me upward.  Quickly I clambered onto the shoe and ran up the gentle slope toward the laces.  The pillar of her leg shifted slightly, and I dove for the nearest lace.

My arms wrapped around the broad white ribbon, and I locked my hands on my elbows just when the shoe slanted upward, swinging me toward the heel.  I came to a rest just when her heel lifted, swinging me forward again toward the wrinkling canvas.  While she stepped forward I dangled off the side of her shoe, desperately clinging to the lace as my feet swung back toward her heel.  Her heel setting down made me jolt, followed by a much more intense bounce when her toes slammed down.  Through it all my arms remained linked, and I gripped them tighter to make sure they stayed secure.

The experience of being a tassel was unpleasant, and the skin on my arms was rubbed raw by the near-constant grinding by the rope.  Several times I tried to slip my body into the next lace up, but the non-stop churning of her foot made that impossible.  I was left with no option but to flop helpless against her shoe with each step, my grip getting more tenuous with every stride.  Sooner or later my hold would break, and I would be in a worse situation than when I started.

I passed by several pairs of shoes and ankles on my trip, but not once did I hear anyone take notice of me.  Even the young woman I clung to for dear life had no idea I was riding on her foot.  If I was lucky, she could take me somewhere relatively safe so I could hop off and ride out the rest of the party in safe, uncrushed solitude.

When her legs took us between the coffee table and couch, I allowed my spirits to rise.  This was perfect!  As soon as she stopped I could let go and scamper underneath the couch, where it would be impossible for me to be accidentally stepped on.  Then all I had to do was endure the hours of boredom, loud pounding, and small earthquakes until the party died down, and this nightmare would be over.

The giantess slowed and turned her feet sideways, so they pointed toward the table, and I readied myself to dismount.  Her shins moved slightly forward when she sat.  All I had to do was wait for that last little bit of movement to subside and I had it made.  Unfortunately, things did not go as planned.  She rocked her legs again before I could let go, and I found myself rocketed upward as she drew her feet onto the couch.  Carefully she tucked her heels under her butt, then leaned against the arm to get comfortable.  At least it looked like she would be here for a while.

For a while it was just her on the couch, occasionally sipping her drink or checking her phone.  I took the opportunity to study what I could see of her and see if I could determine who had unknowingly given me a ride.  Light skin, blue eyes, long brown hair… that could be dozens of students in the senior class alone.  There was a handful of students I had seen from such a low angle before, and she was not any of them.  For the moment, I resolved to simply rejoice in finding safe haven and catch my breath, fearing that it would end at any second.

She began idly fiddling with the bow of her shoelaces with her fingers, flopping the loops back and forth, and looked down at her feet.  I still could not get a good look at her face, but from her immediate recoil and grimace I figured she had seen me.  Her hand withdrew and slapped against her calf, then she brushed it along her leg toward me.  The instant before impact I let go, letting myself be pushed off her shoe rather than getting my arms broken or worse.  Tremendous fingers slammed into me, lifting me off the canvas and sending me flying away from her.  My body bounced off one of the cushions and kept going until finally I ran into the opposite arm and rebounded, coming to a rest in the middle of the seat.

The seated titaness eyed me suspiciously, wondering whether she should move in for the kill or if I was just a bit of grime.  As long as her gaze was locked on me I remained perfectly still, not wanting to draw further attention.  When she went back to her phone I could dive between the cushions or make a run for the edge.  Either way, I would not be at further risk of her wrath.

“What’re you doing over here by yourself?” a voice called out, drawing my attention.  The top of two toned calves came into view beneath a hot pink skirt flowing like a tent, cinched at the top by a broad, black leather belt.  A billowing, cream-colored silk blouse was tucked into the skirt, and though most of her face was blocked by her shoulder I could see straight, medium-length black hair cut into a bob and dark, burning eyes.  Thin yet sinewy arms held a red Solo cup with both hands, her narrow fingers curled around the plastic.

“Waiting for you, Naoko,” the giantess on the couch slyly replied, giving the cushion beside her a quick pat.  “Go ahead and have a seat.”

“Don’t mind if I do.”  To my horror Naoko turned around in front of me and ran a hand along the back of her thighs, gathering up her skirt against her legs.  She had missed an opportunity to smash me before, now she was going to finish the job and didn’t even know it.  Her knees bent, sending her butt on a plummeting course directly on top of me.  My eyes darted around, but there was no way I’d be able to clear the landing zone before it hit.  I looked up at the round bottom descending, its shape accentuated by the skirt pulled tight against it to the point that I could differentiate the cheeks.  Instinctively I raised my hands to protect myself, though they would be like toothpicks trying to brace against a hurricane.

The gigantic ass crashed down on me, squeezing my body between it and the couch cushion.  To my surprise I was not instantly obliterated, though I felt my bones creaking under the weight.  My breaths were short and haggard, and could do little more than squirm under the pressure.  Each time I made the slightest bit of movement, Naoko responded by driving her butt into the cushion, trying to grind out whatever impurity was causing her discomfort.  I cried out in pain when she did, feeling my body conform more to the curvature of her rear, and soon there would be no more left to give.

Abruptly the weight smushing me vanished, and I immediately took the deepest breath I could.  A shiny patent leather pump joined me on the couch beneath her, turned on its side.  Naoko sat back down, bracing her shoe against her butt to keep herself from being annoyed by me.  She had unknowingly saved me – ironic, because she was also unknowingly killing me. 

Though it hurt like hell, I had to get out from beneath Naoko before she readjusted and smushed me beneath her ass again.  Once I struggled to my feet, I was practically doubled over from clutching my ribs, and could only move at a shuffle.  Necessity and adrenaline drove me onward, but all I wanted to do was collapse.  As I staggered past, I noticed that the flat, brown sole of Naoko’s shoe looked incredibly familiar, and realized she had nearly stepped on me earlier, too.  A voice whispered in my mind that, clearly, it was fate to die by her, but I pushed it out.

The cap created by Naoko’s heel held long enough for me to get out of her shadow and back into the dim light of the party.  She and the mysterious, Vans-wearing giantess were still talking, but seemed focused enough on each other that they would not notice me limping between them.

“Yeah, I think I sat on something weird,” Naoko said.  “It felt like something was, I don’t know, squirming under my butt.”

“Squirming?” the giantess on the other end of the couch repeated.  “I brushed a weird looking bug off my shoe earlier, might’ve been that.”

“Could’ve been,” Naoko agreed.  “You know Jessica collects exotic bugs or something like that, right?”

“Really?”

“Yeah!” Naoko answered eagerly.  “I had no idea either until she stopped me and Aubrey from killing this one weird bug at a game once.  It was so annoying, just constantly squeaking or something, but she took it for herself.”

“You two talking shit about me?” a new voice bellowed.

“Aubrey!” shouted the titaness who had been here longer excitedly, then slapped the cushion I was on.  I staggered toward it from the sudden blow, but no one seemed to notice.  “Have a seat!”

“Yeah, join us!” Naoko chimed in.  “We were just talking about that super weird bug or something we saw once, we’d never poop talk you.”

A third colossus came into view, her brown hair done in tight curls and skin tanned to a medium brown.  The frills of her hot pink shirt waved with each movement, and she looked like she had been poured into her dark blue jeans.  Her green eyes scanned the open seat for filth and found only one piece of debris – me.  Aubrey’s sudden appearance had taken me by surprise, and I was still shambling forward when she glanced down.

The monolithic young woman leaned over, throwing her shadow onto me, and placed her hand sideways at the back of the cushion.  With no remorse she dragged it swiftly back toward herself, catching me with the edge of her palm.  I was knocked forward and shoved along by the irresistible force of her hand, catching a nasty rug burn in the process.  When I was at the edge Aubrey flicked her wrist for one last swipe, launching me off the couch.

Aubrey’s raw power propelled me up and away, far from the base of the couch where I had hoped to land.  I sailed over the glass coffee table in front of the couch, easily clearing its top and all of the decorations on it and continued onward.  It was impossible to guess where I was going to land, but at this rate splattered against the wall was the most likely candidate.

The timely intervention of another unknown giantess saved me from such a grisly fate, and I collided head-on with the soft, warm surface of a thigh.  For a moment I was stuck to it, but as the ripples from my impact dispersed I began sliding downward.  Desperately I scratched at the skin for any handhold to stop my fall, but it was too smooth and I found nothing to grab on to.  Just when I slid off her thigh, however, she staggered toward me, and I resumed the slide down her calf.  My descent continued until I blew past her ankle and wedged against the heel of her trainer, buried up to my shoulders between the shoe and her foot.

By now the party had been going for quite some time, and this giantess was clearly inebriated.  For every two short steps forward she took she wobbled to the side for one, trying to keep herself on a relatively straight path.  While her unsteady feet fought to maintain stability, I had plenty of time to dig myself out of my predicament, kicking up against the shoe’s interior until my arms were free.  Once there I simply waited, waist-deep in her shoe, for the perfect opportunity to climb out.

For once, I did not have to wait long.  She stumbled forward several more times, eventually catching herself on the kitchen’s central island for stability.  While she regained her composure I abandoned ship, hopping over the edge of her shoe so that I dangled from her ankle.  Then I let myself drop onto the rubber and foam composite by the heel, thankful for a soft landing for once, and from there hopped off onto the tile.  The drunk giantess walked away from me, leaning heavily on the island for support, and I breathed a sigh of relief.

Like many things in my situation, my relief died quickly.  A series of loudening slaps of rubber against tile drew my attention, and I looked to see the brown diamond pattern of a pair of Converse unsteadily striding toward me.  The dingy, bright red hi-tops supported a pair of acid washed denim pillars.  That, combined with the exceptionally long stride despite some coordination issues, meant that this had to be Jessica.

The entire party seemed to fade away while she came toward me.  There was no noise aside from the steady beat of her shoes smacking against the tile, and the only tremors I felt were from her footsteps.  Colors coming from her were more vibrant, and everything else seemed dim in comparison.  It was such a distracting effect that I didn’t even notice she was only one stride away from me until it was too late, and she was already stepping forward with her last step.

Fortunately, that was just where she had decided to stop.  Jessica’s left shoe planted itself right in front of me, close enough that I could feel the air pushed out by it, and its impact on the ground was like the most powerful earthquake any person had ever felt.  The crash was more intense than anything I had ever heard before, seeming to ring in my ears for seconds afterward.  As I experienced the totality of Jessica’s presence as a giantess as never before, I wondered if this was part of the hypnotic effect she had on me.

I was face to face with the black stripe running along her rubber sole, and I craned my neck back to view as much of her as I could.  Bright red canvas did not even start until after twice my height in faded white rubber, and from there it was some ways to go still until the crinkled, peeling circle with the All-Star logo.  A column of acid washed denim formed perfectly to her calf and thigh, as though there were anything left to imagine, and she had rolled up the sleeves of her loose shirt to her elbow.  Her blond curls subtly bounced while she mixed another drink, a movement that would be imperceptible to anyone much larger than my size.

“Hey, Jessica!” I shouted up to her, but there was no sign of acknowledgment.  “Down here, by your shoe!  It’s Mr. Tiny!”  I hated that she had me even referring to myself as that now, but it was the only way she would acknowledge me.  Still nothing.  “Jessica, please, down here!” I pleaded.  “Just pick me up, I give up, you win!  You can keep me as your pet or whatever, just get me out of here!”  She took a long pull off her drink and lowered the cup back to her waist.  “Jessica?”

The shoe in front of me lifted, and I watched in horror as it pivoted toward me.  Brown rubber diamonds quickly blocked out everything else, the worn sole dominating the entirety of my vision.  My heart sank, and I knew this would be the end: my luck had run out.  There would be no cushion to give me a few extra millimeters of allowance, no thigh to save me, no shoe to climb onto.  Jessica had said that she would never crush me on purpose, and those words ended up ringing exactly true.

The enormous Converse swung down toward me, and while I would like to say I met death bravely, I cowered as far away from it as I could, hoping from a miracle.  None came.  An instant later the rubber sole slammed into me, forcing me to the ground, and the force of that alone threatened to demolish my body.  Millions of pounds of former cheerleader compressed me against the tile, and though the agony was profound I did not have time to scream.  A split second before my body burst into a messy red splotch split between Jessica’s shoe and the tile, I heard a crash like the end of the world had come and felt a quake strong enough to tear the earth apart, then nothingness.  She had squished me like the bug she always said I was, entirely on accident.

When Jessica woke up the next morning, the only thing out of order to her was her pounding hangover.  She barely even remembered the party the night before, and there was bound to be a mess waiting for her.  That could wait until after noon, though: the Roomba would clean up any dirt her guests had left behind and make the floor look good as new again.

Before going on a walk later that day Jessica pulled her old, comfortable Converse on, hoping for a nice stroll.  She’d heard the rain coming down all day and it had finally let up, leaving a clean smell in the air and damp sidewalks with the occasional puddle.  It was a great way to clear her head and piece together some things that had happened the night before.  Unbeknownst to her, a red smear, the only remains of her history teacher, were washed off during her walk, leaving her soles clean, if a little worn.  She did not even think about him until they announced him as a missing person on the news two nights later, and that was the last of it.  Jessica never worried about him again, though she never forgot her first “Mr. Tiny.”