“Well. I think these will do very nicely,” Roberta said with shopping bag in one hand and her shrunken son in the other. “Now was that really so tortuous?”

            Kyle grunted. His chin bowed again.

            “Hey. Earth to Kyle. C’mon, dear, we’ve talked about this. You don’t have to like it, but you’ve got to pick up a few manners at least through all of this. Now please look at me when I speak to you, all right?”

            Sure enough, Kyle looked up, though that probably had something to do with his mother’s thumb nudging him upside the head for encouragement.

            Again Roberta had to hide a half-smirk. A month ago she would’ve never found the courage to speak to her strapping young brat of a child like this. Now, it was coming as easily as songs in the shower. This R&R program really was making improvements, and not just in Kyle himself.

            “It wasn’t so tortuous,” he grumbled.

            “There’s the sarcastic little boy I know and love,” Roberta sighed. He really was cute when he was angry which, incidentally, was quite often now at his new shrunken stature. “Now, back in your little playpen you go, while I get us over to the boy’s clothing. I heard there’s a new display specifically for individuals in… semi-regular reduced states.”

            “Mom, for God’s sa-” Kyle protested, but he was thrust too quickly between his parent’s baggy breasts to get the words out. Plus he had Roberta’s fingers pinched around his head and neck, making vocal recourse difficult. His mouth squished awkwardly along the nearest warm, musky rounded wall of tit flesh. Practically spitting up with disgust, Kyle settled himself as best he could in his tight nesting quarters, and prepared for the usual steady slide lower in the woman’s expansive brassiere.

            Roberta bustled through the sifting department store crowds, hunting for the specialized shrunken boy clothing display. Sure enough, she found it roughly where the newspaper advertisement hinted: an appropriately small set of racks near the back of the room, but brightly colored and prominently announced by arrows and block letters above saying “MEN’S R&R WEAR.”

            “Oh, isn’t this is just dear,” Roberta squealed as she took in the miniature shelves and carousels containing clothing made for young men at varying degrees of reduction. Easing her son out of the narrow shaft between her clamped breasts, the woman held him aloft so Kyle could get an eyeful of his attire prospects.

            “It’s okay,” he said.

            “Always Mr. Negative, aren’t you?” Roberta flicked through some tiny sweaters. “How about these shirts? The color goes great with your eyes.”

            “Uh, okay.”

            “Oh, and these little pleated pants? These might be just what you need for when your disciplinary hearing comes up in a few months, honey. You’d look smart, I think. Dashing and smart.” Roberta was plucking miniature shirts now by the handful and piling them on the gangplank of her fingers.

            “Whatever you say,” he shrugged, clearly not even looking at his mother’s suggestions for more than a blink. No matter where his Roberta’s probing fingers pointed his six-inch body, he at least had the minor resistance of ignorance still available to him.

            Roberta, meanwhile, couldn’t remember having such a blast selecting clothes in years. Not even shopping for herself was anywhere near this fun, which tended to be a somewhat limiting affair given the added heft she carried in her midsection and rear end. The Plus-Size rack was her constant and drab companion.

            This, though, was more akin to dressing up an expensive designer doll. Roberta supposed she would’ve found great joy as a child in choosing the best outfit for shrunken house-incarcerates. Her son was giving her that little mid-life pleasure now.

            “I guess this is a good start, don’t you think?” Roberta asked Kyle as she palmed at least a dozen papery outfits in her opposite hand.

            “We’re getting all of those?”

            “What? No, do I look like I’m made of money, sweetie? We’re going to have you try them all on and see which ones are the winners.”

            “All of them? C’mon, Mom, I-” Kyle breezed, but caught sight of his parent’s raised eyebrow and death glare. He quickly hushed.

            “That’s better. Now let’s find us a changing room.” Roberta made for the nearest set of booths down a wood-paneled side hall and picked out an unoccupied stall. Ignoring the somewhat unflattering sight of herself in the adjoining mirror, the woman set Kyle down on the side tabletop, along with the tiny chromed heap of her chosen outfits.

            “Well?” she murmured, crossing her arms and taking a seat on the thin stool beside.

            “Well, what?”

            “Aren’t you going to try them on?”

            “Not… in front of you,” he muttered.

            “Honey, what’s the difference? I can turn my head to the side if it bothers you, but I want to make sure we keep this moving along. I thought you were the one who was eager to get home, right?”

            “Yeah, I am. But Mom, this is a little too much,” he said. He shook his head, nudging the pile of clothes with his miniature shoe, and backed away. “I’ll try them on, okay? I’m cooperating. But not if you’re sitting in here.”

            Roberta stopped short of rolling her eyes. A deep breath, then the slow exhale. She was the adult here. She was the mother. And she had some serious mothering to do, it seemed.

            “Kyle, darling,” she said with a forced smile through gritted teeth. “Please, do me a favor, and strip down so you can try on the clothes.”

            The six-inch young man blinked in bleary disbelief at the woman he’d so easily wrapped around his finger for the last eighteen years. Just because she could rescramble his size at will didn’t make her his owner. This was still America, after all. He shoved up his lower lip, squinted at Roberta, and shrugged.

            “No,” he balked.

            “So be it.”

            Roberta’s fingers were as swift as they were precise. In one easy swoop, she had her designer-doll-sized son gripped back in her palm. Manicured nails traced the small of his back beneath his shirt. Her broad thumb scoured up the front of her boy’s tiny washboard abs; instinctively, the woman felt a soft rush of goosebumps tickle up her spine.

            “Jesus, Mom. What are you doing? You can’t just-”

            “Actually, legally, I can, and I will do this, Kyle. I gave you multiple chances first to do it yourself like a big boy.”

            “Okay, FINE! If you’re gonna make such a huge deal out of- stop it! If you’re going to do this, then put me down, and I’ll do it myself now!”

            The woman halted for an instant in her mission. Her fingers were now thoroughly entangled in her teenage son’s shirt, his miniature legs windmilling uselessly in an attempt to fend off her wrists with his puny kicks. She nibbled her lip. Maybe it was enough that he saw his errors and took ownership, even if it took a try or two first?

            Somehow, though, Roberta had a sneaking mother’s intuition cloying at the back of her scalp. She needed to set a precedent. And, in this particular case, she was already halfway there. Shrugging just as callously as her son had before his little rebellion, she hooked her finger up against Kyle’s chest and slipped his garment right over his head, leaving him shirtless in her hand.

            “Geez, Mom. This is ridiculous. I guarantee you, nobody else on the R&R crap is getting treated like this.”

            Roberta ignored the half-naked boy in her fist. She turned her gaze to the pile of clothes she’d collected, sorting and separating them on the table surface with her pinky fingernail, but in reality, she was just buying time. The unique sensation of gripping a body as toned and chiseled as Kyle’s, son or not, in her warm palm was too enticing of a guilty pleasure to skip. His impressively cut abdomen, his bulging miniature arms and delts; his tiny little chest rising and falling with increasing concern against his mother’s thick fingers.

            “This nice little button-up will be a good starter. Here, let’s see how it fits,” Roberta said pleasantly. She opened her hand, allowing her son just enough reach to slide his arms into the sleeves, though of course she didn’t allow him to fold the flaps together alone; her burly fingers easily bullied his busy shrunken hands aside.

            “I can do it, Mom. See, I’m doing it?”

            “I see, Kyle. Very good.”

            Next came the pants. The boy was a little more resigned to his embarrassing fate as Roberta’s fingernail crested its way down his beltline, even if he went more rigid in her grasp. Inch by inch the diminutive denim legs came away, courtesy of her giant fingers, leaving Kyle in his boxers. Once again, Roberta returned to her patient selection process while she cradled her pantsless child.

            This taut, hot little organism was alive in her hand, and right now, Roberta was legally allowed to continue gripping him for as long as she was content to do so.

            The clarification of that fact in the woman’s head, even if she’d known it all along, sent a few extra endorphins shooting to her brain’s pleasure center. Why did no one tell her this whole disciplinary program shindig was going to be so much fun?

            “All right, I suppose you’ve earned back your right to change yourself, dear. Just remember what a privilege this was in the future, unless you enjoy having your poor mother wait on you hand and foot like your servant.” True to her word, Roberta set Kyle back on the low tabletop beside the pile. Then, rummaging through her own shopping bag, she reproduced the crimson underwear from inside and ripped away the tags with obvious intent.