Ever since Keith shrunk himself, Marcie couldn't stop thinking about all the ways in which she wanted to kill him.

She loved Keith. Yes. But it'd just be so easy.

The feeling always hit her at the worst times, too. Like when he was mouthy.

"You got black beans again," Keith whined. "I thought we were 'going pinto.' Remember, how I said that, and it was really funny? Remember? Ah-haha-ha!"

Marcie's calm face loomed over Keith; ochre skin, short black hair, small nose, features shaped by her Chinese lineage, dark red lips turned down in a frown before she caught it. "Yes, I remember," Marcie said, schooling her voice to sweetness.

You little SHIT, she thought.

Keith was only four inches tall. He looked so small and puny sitting atop Marcie's palm. His form pressed down into her skin; he weighed nothing; he had no presence. The worst thing was his face: smug, sure of himself. How? Marcie thought. How could he be so sure, when he was so small, so weak? I'd be shaking, she ruminated, thinking of how big she must have looked from his perspective. The very thought of it made her shiver. Fantasizing about it got her off.

She studied him with her eyes, dark as walnuts. Even before he shrunk himself, Keith was pretty scrawny. Now he was downright pathetic. The pale little man was swaddled in a soft pinkish tissue with a rubber band around his waist, looking so pleased. Shrinking was his dumb idea. Now he didn't have to worry about anything: no job or bills or social or real-world demands. He was a leech. He was something that fed off of her, and gave her nothing in return. A helpless animal she was stuck caring for.

Marcie gazed cooly upon the tiny ghost-white man with rusty red hair and a big grin on his face. She imagined curling her hand so that he was held in place between her fingers and the heel of her palm. Then, with her other hand, she would pinch his head: two tanned fingers on either side of his pale face; fingernails bright orange. She loved imagining how he'd slowly look more and more worried, especially as she started to turn his head back and forth, teasingly. Then the same direction without stopping. He wouldn't be able to keep his head from turning, even as she felt him trying to resist the force she applied -- felt his little hands beating at her fingers. She would laugh and laugh as she twisted his head, hearing his squeaky screams, feeling each successive pop and crack as she went too far; only the barest effort more and his head would be all the way around; then complete its rotation to be facing front once more. He'd be limp and cross-eyed in her grip as she shook him, dangling him between her fingers from just his head and marveling at how his dead little face gawped up at her, neck grooved like a screw.

"Babe," Keith said, and Marcie blinked, looking once more at the tiny man. "I think it's time to send back those DVDs, too. I mean, we're never going to watch Demolition Man, right? Come on. It looks so silly."

"Yes, dear. Of course," Marcie said. It's ONLY my favorite movie, you, you little, you ungrateful, you...

Marcie slipped back into the theatre of her mind. This time she was imagining curling her fingers into a fist, and watching as Keith realized, too late, her intent to crush him. Again she'd start to laugh, her chuckles building and building as he realized he couldn't escape her fingers. She'd feel him squirming in panic inside her fist. But no -- no! -- it was too quick a death for him. Lazy little shit.

Marcie decided she'd drop him down to the floor instead, at her feet. He'd look so much smaller, and Marcie would slip off her sandal and press the pale sliver of him down under her brown foot. She'd watched in delight as he sputtered under her toes, recoiling from her scent. That'd only make Marcie want to smother him more, and she would wiggle her toes atop his fragile, frightened little head, using them to drum him into the ground. Maybe then she'd watch her movie, with the ungrateful, runty tiny under the sole of her foot, rubbing it around on top of him, then forgetting all about him and simply resting her heavy, immovable foot on top of Keith. Her breath caught as she imagined: after all those hours, she would lift her sole from him and see that he didn't move, covered in dust, and damp; smothered to death, the fragrance of her foot dominating his final breaths. His little face would be frozen in time, and Marcie would see all the betrayal and humiliation etched there.

"H-hey," Keith said, and Marcie blinked a few more times and focused on him. She could see that he looked a little scared, but as she watched him, he seemed to calm down.

"Yes, sweetie?"

Keith let out a relieved breath. He ran a little hand through his hair. "Well, if it's all right with you: I'm pretty hungry." And the little man leaned in with what he guessed to be a solicitous gesture. "What do you say we retire to the dinner table?"

"Yes," Marcie said, mechanically.

Her body moved through the suddenly empty void of the house. She saw none of it.

Her mind dived through dreamscapes.

Keith, squirming and screaming, held over a gurgling disposal. She would watch him fall, seeing him whack into the rim of the drain on his way down and hear how the machine's teeth would grind a few octaves lower, just for a few seconds, before returning to a higher pitch; successful digestion.

Keith, wailing and hugging her finger, dangled over the open lid of a humming blender; down below, a slush of bananas and milk and ice. "God, no!" Keith would scream, and Marcie would rotate her finger round and round, faster and faster, until he fell into the mixture. His body would swirl around and be sucked below, a burst of red and then it'd mix into the shake.

Keith, running, terrified, scrambling across the length of an ironing board. Marcie would hold her hot iron above him, giggling as she hovered it overhead no matter where he ran. He'd fall to his back and hold an arm over him imploringly, as if that would save him. Marcie would press the hot iron down onto him finally and hear his flesh sizzling beneath; his high, wild scream drowned by an angry burst of steam from the iron.

Keith was pathetic, and weak, and helpless. Marcie could just as well hold him up between her hands and watch all the little details of his body ripping in two as she pulled him apart, blood and guts falling out of him like a burst sack, a string of meat linking his halves until it snaps.

"M-M-Marcie!" Keith said with a wail.

Marcie looked down at Keith, gripped in her hand.

The little man was breathless. "The look on your face. I mean…"

"Shush," Marcie said.

She made dinner through an erotic haze. Keith was on her cutting board and she quickly thwackthwackthwack'd her knife across him, leaving him in bloody strips. He was dancing across little islands of onion and pepper covered in hot oil and sizzling garlic; one nudge from her and he fell into the pan with a yelp, skin starting to brown and crisp as he thrashed. While waiting for the pasta to boil she held him at the end of a set of tongs and amused herself as she dipped him in and out of the bubbling rapids; watching him writhe beneath the liquid and thrash and sputter above it; watching his skin wrinkle and bubble and boil off of him; watching him go slack between the tongs, his red, dripping little body going brown and dry.

"Marcie!" Keith shouted.

Marcie tightened her fingers a little around Keith, glaring at him; she realized what she was doing and softened her look, her grip. "What, baby?"

"Do I get any food, or what?"

"Of course!"

Oh, Marcie would take care of him. Keith screamed, and screamed, and screamed. He ran all around her plate as her fork chased him, loudly clacking as it sank through the steaming spaghetti, smeared red, and into the plate below. "Ah-ha-ha!" Marcie called out, triumphant, watching his little pink impromptu toga get sheared from him; the teeth of the fork left red angry trails down his back that weeped blood. Marcie swung the fork and knocked Keith over. She quickly twirled some pasta and then, as he rolled onto his back, heaving, in pain, she stabbed the prongs down through his middle. He screamed as it pierced his skin and pushed out the back of him, catching him between his rib and hip bones.

Marcie would then hold him up and admire him, like bug on a pin. Watching him twitch. Watching him be so utterly fucking helpless to protect himself from her, in the simplest of ways. She'd open wide and push him in, pulling the noodles off the fork with him. She'd push his little body around in the stringy ball and then slide him toward her cheek. He'd crunch, less and less, each time her molars came together.

Marcie blinked. It was quiet.

Keith was standing there, stone still, looking up at her from the edge of her plate. She looked at him and saw how she held her fork: she had it aimed down at him, and its teeth rested not too far away from where his little feet were.

"You were s-scraping your f-fork," Keith stammered. "Right n-next to m-m-m-me!"

In that moment, Marcie knew this could not go on. Not like this.

She held Keith up to her face and studied him. "I'm going to go get some wine, and my vibrator." She traced a finger down his chest and up under his tissue toga, moving her fingertip in gentle circles around his tiny, vulnerable cock. "And then you're going to be very quiet and help me get off, 'kay?"

She saw a change overtake his face, and bit her lip. Her hungry eyes stared into Keith's, who looked scared.

That's a start, Marcie thought.