She stared down at her tiny boyfriend, who was once again sitting on the edge of the sweetener container, his bike lent against it further down. The lycra stretched over his muscles. She couldn't believe he was so small. She sat back in her chair.
"So the picture you posted was when you were bigger. Why did you get smaller?"
"His idea. He wanted more shots, he wanted me smaller. I went along with it."
"Oh," she responded, doing her best to sound motherly "and if he told you to jump off a bridge?"
"Depends." Scott replied, smiling.
"On?"
"Is there a bungee cord?"
Mary couldn't contain herself any longer and let out a little laugh.
"There is one thing..." Scott said with a little hesitation
"Yes?"
"I'm... A little stuck at the moment."
"Stuck?"
"The boson ray is out of power. The battery needs to be recharged." Answered Brian.
"So Scott is stuck until it recharges?"
"Yeah. Four hours or so."
She nodded. "So let's order some lunch, then once we're done we can decide what to do."
Scott looked up at his love and knew she had already decided what was going to happen.

They ordered and ate quickly, Scott eating some small pieces of Mary's salad. Matt continued to talk about how pleased he was with the morning's photos. Scott found it funny that they were continuing as though his current size was the most natural thing in the world. A couple of other patrons did point, stare or gasp, but the group ignored them and finished their meal.
"So who has plans this afternoon?" Asked Mary
"I want to start working on these shots" said Matt. The others nodded, it was basically what they had expected.
"Charge the machine. I've got some things to work on, but nothing pressing." Said Brian.
"I'm taking a break this afternoon," said Mary, "so Scott, who do you want to go with."
Scott turned to Brian. "As much fun as an afternoon with you might be, Brian, Mary is much prettier."
And that was that.  Brian handed Mary Scott's phone, wallet and keys, and suggested Mary allow Scott to climb onto her palm.
"I'll text you when the battery is charged. If I don't hear from you by lunch tomorrow I will call. I don't care if you want to stay small for a while, I just want to know you're OK."
"We'll at least text you." Said Scott. And with that Brian and Matt headed to their house while Scott and Mary headed to hers.

*  *  *  *

Scott sat in his girlfriends palm, his bike lay next to him. He couldn't help notice the contrast between her hand and Brian's. Brian's hand had been about 2 metres in either direction, whereas Mary's hand was probably only six feet across. Brian's hand seemed thicker than Mary's was, and her fingers were more like 30cm across. Her palm seemed smoother, with less deep lines on her palms, and her skin was softer.

They arrived at her car and she pulled her key from her pocket, opening the door and climbing in while keeping the hand holding Scott remarkably still.
"Now," said Mary, "Where do we put you?"
Scott glanced about. He had a few ideas about where he wanted to go, but they probably weren't a good idea while Mary was driving, and there was plenty of time for that sort of thing. His next goal was the National Championships, so his day-to-day focus was training. If he could do that shrunk, then he could stay small for weeks. How they'd feel about that, though, was another matter.
"Cup holder?" Suggested Scott
Mary reached down and pulled the empty water bottle out of the cup holder, tossing it into the foot well of the passenger seat. She brought her other hand down, and Scott climbed off it onto the console, pulling the bike behind him before standing and lifting it onto his shoulder. He then took a small jump down into the cup holder, where he put the bike down again and sat with his back against one side.

Mary nodded, put the key in the ignition, pulled on her seat belt and started the car. As she pulled out into traffic she spoke again.
"So why did you do it?"
"Do what? Let them shrink me?"
"Yeah. Or at least shrink you this small and leave you stuck."
"Well they grew me first. Four times bigger, but I didn't like it much."
Mary paused, imagined her boyfriend huge. He was a pretty big guy already, at that size he would be pretty intimidating.
"Why not?"
"I just felt like I needed to be really careful, that a small move could really hurt someone."
"Fair enough."
"Anyhow this woman, our waitress actually, suggested having fun with someone that big."
"The waitress was at Matt's shoot?"
"Just walking by with her dog."
Mary nodded while she turned the steering wheel.
"So Matt wanted to shrink me for his other shots. First a quarter and then an eighth.  It was much more fun than being big. Like this I feel light, like I can move fast. And it's a bit exciting. And a bit scary."
"Adrenalin junkie."
"Sure," agreed Scott, "but also the waitress put ideas into my head. And I thought how great you'd look to me from this perspective, and that's something I wanted to see."
"And how do I look?"
"Unbelievable. Huge, gorgeous." Scott took a breath "Fantastic."
"OK, but those photos you posted had you much bigger than you are now."
"Ah, so you did see them. I hoped so."
"Yep."
"So one eighth was Matt's original plan, but then he came up with more ideas and wanted me smaller. I thought 'what the hell'."
"And Brian wasn't paying attention to the battery?"
"No, he was. Matt couldn't get the shot he wanted, so he shrank. Then he thought of another idea, and we needed to shrink the bike. That was where we were going to run out of power. I volunteered to stay small so Matt could finish."
"Why?"
"Because he would have insisted on doing it tomorrow, or whatever. And I'm having fun being small. And we had arranged to meet you by then, and I really wanted to be with you like this. What about you... You saw the pictures, you got the messages."
"The idea of holding you in my hand like Brian did was quite attractive."
"Did it live up to expectations?"
"Kind of. I was expecting you to be bigger. But I think we could make up for it soon. We're here."
"Your house?"
"Yeah, Kate is away for another couple of days, so we have the place to ourselves."

Mary switched off the ignition, and took the keys out. Scott stood, lifted his bike onto his shoulder and, placing one hand on the console, leapt and pushed himself out of the cup holder. Mary brought her hand down and he climbed on. Getting out of the car, she walked to the door, unlocked it and entered the small house. Once inside she crossed the lounge room to the bench diving the kitchen from the lounge and placed her hand onto it.
"Climb out." She said. Scott complied, and stood on the bench, marveling at the house. "I'll be right back."

He looked around. Now he was in a familiar place he could really comprehend the scale change. The bench was 50 metres long and 15 metres across. The apparently smooth surface was looking slightly warn and rough. The room itself had taken on cathedral like proportions, while house sized cabinets hung on the kitchen wall. Looking out further he could see the floor over 20 metres below.

Mary reappeared and approached the bench, she placed an empty box of extra-long matches on the bench.
"I thought you could put your bike and shoes in here, we can put them somewhere safe."
"Good idea." agreed Scott, who listed his bike into the box, and removed his cleated riding shoes and socks, putting them in after. Mary then took the box and placed it on top of the fridge.
"One more thing," said Mary kneeling down and resting her chin on the bench top. "Come over here."
"Selfie?" Scott asked, walking towards her giant head.
"Yep."
She held her phone at arms reach, using the front facing camera they could see themselves on the screen. The camera fired, there picture frozen for a second on the screen.
"Now," she said, holding out her hand again, "climb in."
Scott obliged, and she rose her hand away from the table.  He said in the middle of her palm, feet down, knees up, leaning backwards slightly, supporting himself with his arms behind.  She raised the phone, this time using the rear camera, and Scott heard the click.
"Not many people can say they've litterally had their boyfriends in the palm of their hands."
Scott laughed, "Yeah, that's true." 
She held him there while she operated her phone with the other hand.  He heard his phone alert from another room, and figured he'd just been tagged.  She put the phone down on the bench and turned her focus back to him.
"So, my little action figure sized boyfriend, what do I do with you?"