Dr. Holland offered Michael Gray his hand.  “Welcome, Dr. Gray,” Holland said.  “Glad to have you aboard.”

“Glad to be here, sir,” Michael said.  “It’s a privilege to be working at a museum of this caliber.”

“Well, the curatorship you’ve been chosen for is a special case,” Holland said.  “this collection requires particular attention.”

Michael nodded.  “It’s unusual to have a collection of magical oddities in a museum.”

“Well, as you might have surmised, most aren’t real,” Holland said.

Michael turned his head at an angle.  “Most?” he said.  “You have something real here?  Or somethings?”

Holland patted Michael on the shoulder.  “One something, that we know of,” Holland said.  “But it’s a special item … and extremely special item.”

Holland took Michael back into the museum, and into the room where the magical oddities were displayed.  There were the usual items for such a collection: supposedly cursed gems, Egyptian items bearing magical inscriptions, rings that claimed to grant the wearer magical power.  Glancing around the room as he moved through, Michael saw nothing out of the ordinary, but that didn’t mean nothing was really magical.

“It’s not out here on public display,” Holland said.  “We felt that would be … in bad taste.”

“In bad taste?”  Michael repeated.  “Why is that?”

Holland raised a finger.  “You’ll see,” he said.

They crossed to a closet with an old door made of dark wood. The door had an old-style glass knob.  Holland unlocked the door and opened it.

Inside the closet, the shelves were empty save for one item.  It was an incredibly ornate music box.  It appeared to be European in origin, and several hundred years old.

“It’s exquisite,” Michael said.

“It’s more than that,” Holland said.  He carried the box to a table nearby.  Then he opened the box.

Michael gazed down in fascination.  There he saw her; a tiny ballerina, two inches high, magnificent and beautiful.  She was slim-waisted, with a nice curvature to her breasts and derriere.  Her jawline was soft, yet firm, her neck long and slim.  The delicate features of her face were so perfect, so lifelike.

“The carving is exquisite,” Michael said.

“It’s not carving,” Holland said.  He carefully wound the box, using an ornate key that was on the front.

The box began to play, and the dancer began to spin.  Then she stepped off the pedestal, still spinning.  She beamed up at Holland and Michael.  “Bon soir, Dr. Holland,” she said in a faint, yet lilting voice.

Michael gasped involuntarily.

Holland smiled, both to the dancer and at Michael’s reaction.  “Bon soir, Calandre,” Holland said.  “Calandre, this is Michael Gray, the new curator for this area of the museum.  Michael, this is Madamoiselle Calandre Marmion.”

Calandre curtsied.  “A pleasure to meet you, Michel,” she said, calling him by the French version of the name Michael.

“The pleasure is mine, Madamoiselle,” Michael said.

Calandre giggled like the young woman she appeared to be.  “Dr. Holland, you told me he was coming.  You didn’t tell me he was so beau, so bel.”

Michael looked at Holland, confused.  “Those are both French words for handsome,” Holland said.

Michael blushed slightly.  “Merci, Madamoiselle,” he said.

Calandre giggled again, and curtsied again.  “You are welcome, Michel.  And call me Calandre, please.  I see so few people that formalities are just uncalled for, especially from what I can gather of your culture.”

Then she glanced at the pedestal.  “The box is winding down,” she said sadly.  “I will see you soon, Michel, Dr. Holland.  Au revoir.”  Then she stepped onto the pedestal and resumed her dancing position, and became a figurine once again.

Michael looked at the box, then to Holland, then at the box again.  “Is that the magic?” he said.  “The figurine comes to life?”

“Not exactly,” Holland said.  “The figurine -- the woman -- comes back to life.”

Holland gave Michael a moment for that to sink in before he continued.  “You see, Calandre Marmion was a young French woman of some means who very much enjoyed her life, her wealth and her beauty.  That is, until the day when she inadvertently knocked over an old gypsy woman on the way to the ballet, and left the woman on the ground and laughed as the woman asked for help.  The woman cursed Calandre for her self-centeredness, trapping her in the music box, making her a ballerina like the one she wanted to see so badly that she left the old woman that night.”

“That’s awful,” Michael said.

“Yes, it is,” Holland said, “especially when you get to know Calandre.  What she did was done in the kind of self-centeredness that comes with being what we would call a teenager, but that term wasn’t known when she was cursed.  Now she can only come alive when the music box plays, and even then she must, in some way, shape or form, dance.  That narrow band of time is all her existence.”

Michael was staring at the box.  “The poor girl,” he said.  He looked at Holland.  “Isn’t there anything that can be done to help her?”

“No one’s found anything yet,” Holland said.  “But, I have to admit, we’re hoping you might be able to find something.”

“Why me?” Michael asked.

“I’ll let Calandre tell you, if that’s all right,” he said.

“Absolutely,” Michael said.  “And, by the way, I understand now why the box isn’t on display.”

Holland wound the key and explained to Calandre what he had told Michael.

Calandre nodded and turned to Michael  “Mon pere -- my father -- found the gypsy and demanded a cure for what had happened to me,” the tiny dancer said.  “ She answered with a single word: gris.  It’s French for gray.  In all these decades -- centuries now -- we’ve never found what she meant.  But Dr. Holland thought it might be you, Michel Gray.”

Michael took a deep breath.  “That’s a lot of responsibility,” he said.  “What if I fail?”

Calandre shrugged.  “Then I am no worse off than I am now,” she said.  “And at least I have a handsome man to flirt with at night.”  She smiled brightly.

Michael reached a finger down and gently caressed Calandre’s face.  “Now, how could I resist an offer like that?” he said.

Michael soon found himself spending more and more time with Calandre.  The rest of the collection required his attention, too, but he spent every moment he could with his tiny dancer.  Many a night he wound the box over and over again, being careful never to overwind it and risk trapping her as a figurine forever.  He tended to the box’s mechanism, using everything he could learn to make sure it kept functioning properly.  And, in the meantime, he searched for some sign of a cure for her, without success.

Michael found himself longing for the chance to do simple things with Calandre, like eating a meal or going to a movie … or the other things men and women do when they’re a couple.

Then, one night, as they were talking, Michael realized Calandre was sitting down.  “How can you do that?” he said.  “I thought you had to keep dancing when you were … free to move?”

Calandre smiled.  “Ah, Michel,” she said.  “The magic understands what you do not.  I am dancing right now.  I am dancing the dance of amour -- the dance of love -- with you, mon Michel.”

She reached up to him, and he lowered his hand.  She climbed upon it.  He lifted her to his face and she kissed him on the cheek. He realized she was crying, and then he realized he was too.

Michael had been working to learn some French.  “Je t’aime” he said.

Calandre’s smile widened.  “I love you, too,” she said.  She looked at the box.  “It’s winding down,” she said.  “I need to go back.”

Michael wound the key a few times.  “Not yet,” he said.

After the night shift was over and Calandre was back in the box, Michael went to Dr. Holland’s office.  Michael knocked on the door.  “Come in,” came Holland’s voice.

Michael opened the door.  “Doctor,” he said.  “I have an unusual request to make.”

“What is it?” Holland said.

“I’d like to take the music box home with me tomorrow night,” Michael said.

Holland nodded.  “Do you think it will help Calandre?”

“I think it might,” Michael said.

Holland nodded.  “Do it,” he said.  “It’s unlikely anyone will ask about it, or even notice, but, if they do, I’ll cover for you.  Our ‘calendar girl’ comes first.”

“Thank you,” Michael said.

That night, in his bedroom, Michael wound the key of the box.  Calandre came to life, and shouted joyfully, “Michel!”

Then she blushed.  Her surroundings outside the box were unfamiliar, but it was clearly a bedroom -- and Michael was naked.  “Quel est?” she said.

“You said the magic recognized us dancing the dance of love,” he said.  “Well, in our culture, something else is called dancing, something we can better do in here than the museum -- and it’s something I want to share with you as an act of our love.”

Tiny as her face was, Michael could make out a wave of mixed emotions dashing across Calandre’s face.

“If you don’t want to do it, we won’t,” he said.  “I won’t force you; for it to be an act of love, it needs to be your choice.”

Calandre’s left hand came to her mouth.  “No, I want to, my mon Michel,” she said.  “But this would be so … different than what I’ve dreamed of since I met you.”

“For me, too,” Michael said.  “But it’s still a way to share our love, if you wish.”

Calandre was smiling as tears streamed down her face.  She started to take off her clothes.  “Keep the box wound, mon amour,” she said.

Michael marveled.  The tiny, naked woman was even more beautiful than he had imagined.  He could see the minuscule fur around her private parts, and the tiny nipples, erect with exposure for what was almost certainly the first time in centuries.  Her breasts were even more magnificently shaped than he had imagined, and her backside would be the envy of any woman if she were normal sized.

Calandre put her hands over her ears.  “What’s wrong?” Michael asked.

Calandre laughed.  “Nothing, mon amour,” she said.  “At this size, I can hear the blood rushing to your penis.  To me, it’s like a waterfall, only it’s flowing up.”

Michael placed her beside his cock, which was growing rapidly in size as he gazed at his diminutive love.  He wound the box again.

With some difficulty, Calandre climbed atop the engorging penis.  She rapidly realized that Michael was actually large for a man in this area, which made her feel even smaller and more inadequate.

“Don’t be afraid,” Michael said.  “Just do whatever you think will feel good, for you and for me.  It’ll be fine.”

Calandre nodded.  She stretched out vertically along the huge member, rubbing her body against the area where she felt the greatest warmth and surging of fluids.

Michael moaned.  “I can feel your breasts,” he said.  “This is wonderful!”

“For me, too, mon Michel,” Calandre said.  She scooted, keeping her body tight to his cock, to the tip.  It was “drooling” slightly.  She grabbed the fluid on her hand and rubbed it around the tip of his penis.

Michael moaned again.  “That’s amazing!,” he said.  “How is it for you?”

Calandre had dipped her face into the fluid.  She came up, lip quivering.  “Wonderful!” she said.  “Better than I would have thought.”

She moved her pelvis up and positioned her vagina above the opening of Michael’s penis.  She wanted him to come now, so she could feel it inside her by the sheer force of his flow.

Then she felt it.  The tug of the box.  It was winding down, and there was no time for Michael to rewind it.

Calandre set her jaw.  She might not get what she wanted, but she was going to give her man what he wanted if she could.  She got to her feet and ran down his penis to the base, then threw herself down on it.  She remembered all she’d been taught in the art of love back in the day, and knew this would help him come.  Using every bit of force her trim, two-inch frame could muster she bounced hard, over and over.

Suddenly she felt and heard the roar of Michael’s fluids as he came.  What, to Calandre, seemed like gallons of cum flowed forth.  She ran back to the tip and threw herself onto the tip of his cock.  It was no longer surging with fluid, but semen was still com ing out.  She rubbed her private parts in it, pushing some in with her fingers, and moaned with pleasure.

Michael was looking down at her, beaming.  “That was so amazing!” he said.

Calandre laughed.  “Oui,” she said, “ It was.”

Suddenly Michael looked around.  “Calandre,” he said.  “The box has stopped.”

Her jaw dropped.  “Oui!” she said.

“And you’re still alive!”

“OUI!” Calandre shouted.  “Michel, you did it!”

Michael smiled.  “No,” he said.  “You did it, my love.”

Calandre shook her head.  “Je ne comprende pas,” she said.

“What you did, at the end,” Michael said.  “I could feel you trying to pleasure both of us, but then you must have realized the box was winding down.  You ran down to make sure I was pleasured, even if you weren’t.  You acted unselfishly, purely to make me happy, and that unselfish act broke the curse.”

Calandre’s left hand came to her mouth again.  “You did this on purpose, to break the curse!”

Michael shrugged.  “I was playing a hunch,” he said.  “But it was also something I really wanted to do, and something I hope we can do again.”

Calandre looked at herself.  “Michel,” she said.  “I’m still tiny.  I’m alive, but I’m not growing back to my old size.”

Michael caressed her cheek with his right index finger.  “I’m sorry,’ he said.

She grabbed his fingertip and kissed it.  “Don’t you dare apologize!” she said.  “I’m alive again -- really alive -- because of you.  And, if that means I live a life as a tiny woman, then I will, gladly, live whatever life I can with the man I love.”

Michael carefully lifted her atop his fingertip to his mouth and kissed her, covering her whole torso.  “You mean, I hope, with your husband, if you’ll have me.”

“OUI!  Oh, oui!”  Calandre said.  Then she pulled back slightly.  “But, mon Michel, it won’t exactly be a typical wedding; or, for that matter, marriage.”

“Whose is?” Michael said.  “Ours will just be a little more obvious than most, more pronounced.”

Calandre giggled.  “I can  hardly wait, Monsieur Gray,” she said.

“For some things, you don’t have to, Madame Gray,” he said.

Calandre heard the familiar roaring starting again behind her.  She grinned naughtily.  “Bon,” she said.  “I wouldn’t want to keep my husband waiting.”