The next morning I woke up early, slipping into my usual routine that meant that I didn’t have to walk all the way to the kitchen. Without my mother’s helping hand in the mornings, I’d have had to climb down what I like to call heartbreak hill (or in my case heartbreak stairs) and let’s just say indoor rock climbing isn’t the nicest way to spend one’s morning. When I was younger I busied myself by working out different ways in which I could get around easier, like hang gliders and parachutes, but after I got caught in mum’s line of fire while vacuuming trying out a new invention, I solemnly swore never to tempt my own fate again. I’ve always had this weird phobia of the old vacuum cleaner.

Still half asleep, I rolled out of bed and meandered over to my closet, which was a cute little thing I bought at my favourite shop in the world, ‘Johnson and Son’s Dollhouse’ last year, when my clothes collection exceeded the limits of a lunchbox container. Sifting briefly through my various shirts, shorts and jeans, I selected a simple red tee and ¾ length tracksuit pants off a wire coat hanger and yanked them on. My hair was a lost cause as per usual, so I ran my fingers through it to get some of the major knots out, before tying it up with a small peg, like I’d seen ‘Arrietty’ do, in my childhood favourite movie, The Borrowers. Of course I looked nothing like the actual movie character, with my chocolate brown hair, bright green eyes and knobbly appearance, but I’ve never bothered much with looks. I haven’t really had anyone to impress before aside from Mum and max… until today.

My cousin, Gabby would be arriving at ten, and according to the wristwatch strung up on the far wall of my bookshelf bedroom next to an IPod Touch, that was sooner rather than later. As if on cue, Mum yawned, having just gotten out of bed. I watched patiently from my usual perch atop my bookshelf as she went about her own morning routine, which involved freshening up and throwing on her dressing gown. Within minutes, we were both ready to start the day.  

“Morning.” I called, as she stepped out of the bathroom, her hair a mess of wet blonde curls. I looked nothing like my mother, who resembled Max in almost every way. According to mum, I had my father’s chocolaty hair and green eyes… but he’s long gone now. Mum knelt down before me and held out her left hand, whilst checking her watch with the other.

“Good Morning Amy.” She replied wearily as I stepped on, only to scramble to her shoulder as she stood to her full height. I winced slightly as the usual wave of vertigo from the sudden change in altitude dulled my senses. Composing myself, I threaded my hands through her knitted dressing gown as she descended the stairs I so nearly had to tackle myself. When we reached the kitchen, I slipped off mum’s shoulder and landed on the bench, dive rolling to absorb the impact of the fall.

My body is used to wild, physically exerting stunts like that, having grown up too small to access things the normal way. For instance, in order to get from room to room, I’ve trained myself to use what few advantages I have over everyone else to their limit, one of which being the amount of gravity actually enacting on me. See, any normal person would only be able to jump about forty to one hundred centimetres into the air, give or take, but since gravity doesn’t affect my smaller body mass as significantly, I’m able to perform tasks which proportionally defy the laws of physics. Take leaping for instance. While a normal sized sixteen year old girl could cover about three metres in one leap, I could cover triple that. There are limits of course, which have never actually fazed me, like the fact that I would still die if I fell the scaled equivalent of one hundred stories, but being the resourceful person I am, I’ve found other ways to get around those barriers.

Mum rubbed her eyes and busied herself in making a jug of coffee for the two of us. It had been discovered around two years ago that with the caffeinated goodness fuelling my system I actually had a hope in going through an entire day without sleeping. On my opinion, coffee is the true reason why I even bother getting up in the mornings. It’s addictive.

 I walked over to the fruit bowl, which at my size could serve as the length and width of a house. Mentally scaling the height of its rim, I took a small run up and lunged upwards, landing in a crouch. I teetered on the edge of the bowl for a moment, before yanking a football sized grape off the bunch and dropping back onto the bench. I nibbled on the rubbery skin having taken a seat with my back propped up against the bowl, and waited for mum to make our coffee.

Between bites, I heard Max sprint downstairs. The kitchen bench I sat atop vibrated a little as he hit the wooden floor hard with bus sized sneaker clad feet.

“Morning.” He said to both of us, coming to a stop at the fridge. I rolled my eyes, knowing he’d probably spent the last minute or so getting himself ready for school, which started in less than half an hour. It made me wonder whether or not I’d slip into that routine when I finally started grade eleven in the coming term.

 “Morning.” I replied with a yawn, as he slammed a plastic cutting board down beside me to make a sandwich. I tried not to flinch at the turmoil the noise brought to my ears.

“I’m late for the bus.” Max mumbled more to himself than anyone as he spread peanut butter and jam on the sandwich. He fumbled with his school bag for a good minute or so before shoving the makeshift breakfast in his mouth and making for the front door.

 “Have a good day!” Mum called as he left.

We were silent for a while after that, which gave me time to swallow my last chunk of syrupy grape and lick my lips. “What’s on your agenda today?” Mum finally asked, filling me a thimble full of coffee.

I shrugged absentmindedly. “I don’t know. I guess I’ll just hang around until Gabby arrives.” I said.

Mum’s jaw dropped. “Shit! She’s coming today?”

“That’s what you told me…” I replied, sipping at my coffee.

“Damn it!” She hissed, skulling her own drink and glancing at the clock hanging on our wall. “It’s already nine. I’ve still got to bake cookies, get dressed, make lunch, clean the house…”

I listened to her blabbering as we go back upstairs from my usual perch on her shoulder. As she dropped me off at my bookshelf, I expelled a sigh of relief. At least I’d get an hour to compose myself before I’d meet one of my cousins to the first time in my life.

As it turned out, my hour of ‘me time’ was short lived. Gabby arrived at nine-thirty, earlier than expected. I laughed to myself as Mum swore under her breath from the bathroom, frantically doing up her hair and crashing downstairs again but my face fell almost as soon as she’d left.

I hadn’t hitched a ride down myself.

“Just great, Amy.” I muttered sourly, sliding off the bottom row of my bookshelf and landing in a roll on the thick carpet floor. Each tuft of wool reached my ankles. “It’s going to take me so freaking long to get down there…”

Now deflated, I trudged across the carpet with my arms crossed. “At least she’s left the bedroom door open.” I muttered to myself, squeezing through the two centimetre wide gap and entering the colossal hallway. My eyes flicker boringly over each piece of towering furniture, their size completely normal to my five inch tall wired brain. And it’s true, in a way that I know no different to living at my scale. Let’s not forget who was shrunk hours after actually living.

It took me four minutes, jogging, to reach the stairs. I tried to catch a glimpse of my cousin as she was ushered into the kitchen for a few of mum’s famous choc chip cookies, but almost comically, I was too short to see her. Grumbling under my breath, I perched at the edge of the first stair. The first drop was always the biggest, on my opinion. I leant back onto the balls of my feet for a split second, before springing forward, leaping down to the first stair. With practiced movements, I absorbed the impact of the jump with one leg, before using the momentum to drop to the next one. By the time I’d reached the bottom, my leg muscles ached from the constant strain and it was almost too much of a hassle to trek the last few metres into the kitchen. It was lucky for me that aside from the staircase, our house is pretty small.

Nearing my destination, I could already hear mum talking. I sprinted the rest of the distance to the kitchen and peeked around the corner of the doorway, thoughts buzzing. The tile floor stretched out before me like an ocean, and the bench loomed a full metre above, but I was still able to get a glimpse of the mum, who was sitting down with Gabby. I smiled to myself. From what my diminutive height allowed me to see, my cousin was beautiful, even with her back turned to face my mother. She was quite short (not that I’m one to judge, of course!) with straight blonde hair that curled in around her ears. Her skin was the same pasty white shade as my own, and she wore a simple red shirt and knee length jeans. Judging by the mouth-watering smell filling my nostrils, mum had already put out a plate of her cookies and was smiling and chatting to Gabby. I leant against the wall to listen in.

“It’s really lovely to see you, Gabby!” Mum gushed. “We haven’t had the chance to catch up with your family; at least not since Amy was born.”

From my angle, I couldn’t get a glimpse of her face, but I was sure that Gabby smiled in response. “I’m really excited to meet Amy, Aunt Leebeck.” She said, reaching for a cookie. “There was a boy, Marcus, in eighth grade who’d had Shrignakemia as a child. He was really nice!”

Mum lit up almost instantly, and I could sense the uneasiness about the topic of my meeting her draining away. Gabby’s words got to me, though. I had no idea there was another kid my size way out in Kingaroy, my town, let alone the rest of Australia. Automatically, I was bubbling with the anticipation of actually meeting him.

Mum seemed to be on the same wavelength and asked: “Really? Does he still go to St Agathas?”

Gabby’s face fell and in an instant I could tell that this conversation had just taken a turn for the worst. My cousin’s throat tenses as she swallows her bite of cookie. “Marcus was… he was…”

Gabby sniffled a little and my stomach dropped.

“…he was…”

She sighed.

“Marcus was killed. Three terms into high school. His family moved away six months later.”

“I see.” My mother said, her eyes filled with sorrow. I felt the colour drain from my face as I envisioned the boy, Marcus, my size and going through high school so early into his life. I pictured him smiling with friends and telling jokes. I pictured him attending classes, raising his hand to answer a question. I pictured someone not looking what was on the ground as they walked between class and smashing his fragile body to pulp.

And then I winced, knowing that the two of us are on the same boat, his sunken and mine barely keeping above water…

“Where are Amy and Max?” Gabby asked, breaking the silence left from my mother’s words. Her voice was quivering, after mentioning poor Marcus.

Mum was quick to reply. “Max is at school right now- it’s his last day so he’ll be home for the rest of your stay. Amy’s just…” Her eyes widened, probably realising she’d left me in her room. I couldn’t help but smile smugly at the reaction, despite the previous topic of their conversation chilling me. “Upstairs.” Mum finished, pursing her lips

Realizing I should probably intervene before mum went to get me, I sighed under my breath and cleared my throat.  “Actually, I’m right here, mum.” I interrupted, stepping out into the open and folding my arms across my chest awkwardly.

Obviously hearing me, Gabby turned around. Her eyes skimmed over mum in confusion for a moment and then finally settled on me, as I stood in the centre of the kitchen doorway. I felt my cheeks heat up as she met my gaze. I watched her swallow tightly in surprise.

“Oh… hey!” She whispered, half in shock. I drew in a long, agonizing breath and waited for her to continue…

****

“Thomas.” Marcus called from the birdcage, his voice weak from exhaustion but firm enough for me to catch. I didn’t answer, instead focussing on the soccer magazine I was reading.

“I know you can hear me.” My tiny captive’s voice dropped a little in volume. I heard him sniffle as he paced around the birdcage.

“Don’t ignore me.” Marcus yelled out again, growing angry. Irritated with his racket, I gave in and turned my head to the left to face his prison, which sat atop a stool opposite my bed. The five inch tall boy stood propped up against the bars, his skin white and pasty and eyes framed with purple bags. His ice blue eyes were hard as they bore into my own. Marcus was becoming a ghost; his only lifeblood being the flittering hope he’d always had, that I’d realise my mistakes and free him from his version of hell. I singed that a few months later.

“What.” I snapped, not in the mood for conversation.

Marcus’s eyes narrowed at the harshness of my words but he replied anyway, having gotten my attention. “How is my brother?” He asked tightly.

I didn’t speak for a long while after that question, not knowing how to phrase my response. Finally, I let out a sigh and shifted a little on my bed to get a better look at my old friend, starving and borderline insane as he stood inside the cage he’d spent the previous year locked in. He deserved to know what I was about to confess. Despite the wrongs he and the other shrunken had done in the past.

“Your brother left six months ago.” I told him. “I don’t know where he moved to.”

Marcus didn’t speak to me again after that, but for hours on end whispered the one word that to this day still sends pity coursing through me.

“Cameron…”

“Huh…?” I jolted awake, startled by the memory of two years ago.

“Got something to share, Mr Ryan?” My history teacher, Ms Smith asked instantly, her mouth set in a firm line. “Why don’t you tell the class about the dreams you were having?”

I lowered my head angrily, cheeks beginning to redden. My heart raced uncontrollably from the painful memory I’d just relived.

“No thanks, Miss.” I muttered to the teacher, as she commenced the remainder of our final lesson before the holidays kicked in.