Fulda stood, finally giving me a welcome relief from the heat and pressure between her thighs.  She had tucked me into the garter of her stocking for the flight, gambling once more that she could intimidate her way past any airport security personnel who wanted to look up her skirt.  Fortunately, that was not necessary, and I was able to rest comfortably against her warm, smooth thigh.  Her choice of a light, airy skirt was as much for my benefit as it was for hers.  I would be able to breathe comfortably while her legs stayed cool and dry, not drenching me in a deluge of sweat.

She pulled her luggage down from the overhead compartment, stooping over slightly so that she wouldn’t bang her head on the ceiling.  The elastic from her garter held me upright and secure, pressing on me hard enough that I made a small dimple in her thigh.  During the brief wait to deplane she slightly spread her legs and brought them back together, idle fidgeting to anyone else that we both understood as a full-body embrace.  When her feet finally started shuffling forward I let my body relax so the strong, steady vibrations from her steps would massage me.

A series of text messages rolled in, making Fulda’s purse vibrate like a beehive.  She read them to me as we walked through the terminal.  Her mother was waiting for us in the terminal, and Akane was still more than willing to host us – obviously, since she was only living there while the remaining shrunken people got sent back to their families.  Despite all her reassurances, I was nervous about meeting Fulda’s mother.  Would she accept her daughter marrying someone who could fit inside her palm?  How would she even react to Fulda pulling her mom’s future son-in-law out from beneath her skirt?

Nervous or not, there was no avoiding it.  To keep my mind busy I counted Fulda’s steps, the powerful impacts making it easy to keep track of them.  Inside her skirt was surprisingly calm aside from my constantly moving surroundings, which I had become accustomed to a long time ago.  Much of the airport’s ambient noise was filtered out by the fabric, and most of what got through was absorbed by her skin.  In a strange way it was relaxing, and her smooth, steady movements helped calm the anxiety I had about everything coming up over the next couple of days.

“Fulda!  There you are!” a woman’s voice called over the din.  Now it was only a matter of waiting for Fulda to reveal me.  The ride stopped, then a powerful force collided with the colossus I was strapped to.  Fulda staggered backward before she could stop herself, and the front of her skirt bowed inward.  It figured that her mom must be huge too – she had to be, if she could so much as budge her.  I could only see her feet, but they were nearly as large as Fulda’s and secured in black leather flats with a gold buckle which probably cost more a month’s rent for most people.

“Mom!” Fulda exclaimed, returning the hug.  “I’m so glad you could make it!  It’s been too long since we actually, you know, saw each other.”

“Oh, I know,” her mom replied, “but I understand.  With me always traveling for business, and you working so hard at your job, it’s a wonder we can even find a few hours a week to talk on the phone!  There’s no way I’d miss your wedding though, even if it was such short notice.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry about that.”  Fulda had stepped away and was now holding her mom at forearm’s length.  “But when it came to setting a date, my fiancé and I talked it over and it tomorrow was just so perfect!  We couldn’t want to wait a year, so here we are!”

“It was just such a surprise, I didn’t even know you were dating anyone!  When do I get to meet him?  I thought he was flying in with you.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll bring him out in a few minutes,” Fulda said.  She began walking again, and the tiles’ colored diamond pattern blurred from the swift movement of her long strides.  As usual, she had found a way to tell the bizarre truth about us without arousing any suspicion.  While walking she continued, “He can be kind of easy to miss though, and likes to stay to the shadows.  I’m warning you though, he’s not like most other guys.”

“I knew he wouldn’t be, Fulda.  You always marched to the beat of your own drum, and only someone as unique as you would be a match.”  She sounded sweet at least, and I could scarcely believe she had raised a monster like Gina even though she had been absent for most of her teenage years.  Still, I fully expected her to do some impressive mental gymnastics to backpedal when she saw me.  Her expectations were probably focused on an eccentric artist or musician, not someone who crawled into a thimble while her daughter went swimming.

Fulda didn’t say anything, though she let out a quiet grunt when she hefted her bag off the carousel.  It crashed onto the floor, and the handle clicked into position when she started walking.  She had packed for a week, not including her wedding dress, to cover our honeymoon afterward.  I had no idea where we would be going; she played her cards very close to her chest regarding that.  My own baggage had been stuffed inside one of her shoes, but it could not have weighed more than a few grams and wherever we were going, I did not expect anyone to care what I wore.  All eyes would be on her regardless, even if I were not smaller than her big toe.

We walked outside, and her skirt was no longer able to filter out the environment’s noise.  I was suddenly hit by the loud, diverse sounds of an urban environment for the first time in years, and my head swam trying to cope with it.  Dozens of indistinct voices clamored over each other before being drowned out by squealing brakes and car engines.  In an attempt to center myself I looked down at Fulda’s shoes, but that just made the feeling of vertigo stronger.  My body was torn between being sick and passing out, and I was immensely glad Fulda seemed to know where she was going.

A car door opening drowned out all other sounds, and the world spun while Fulda practically folded herself in half to get in.  When she came to a stop I was sideways, and her legs were stretched far enough out that they almost reached the seat on the other side.  Apparently, her mom had rented a limo for the occasion – or owned one.  Another set of legs crossed over Fulda’s at the ankles, continuing past what I could see.  Exactly what I expected from the matriarch of a family of leggy giantesses.

“So,” her mom began, “now that we’re away from prying ears, why don’t you tell me a bit about my future son-in-law so I know what to expect?”

“One sec,” Fulda replied.  “My stockings are bunching up.”  This is it, I thought, and took a deep breath.  Best case, she would absolutely love me.  Worst, she’d smash me in Fulda’s hand.  While the tanned fingers crawled up her thigh toward me my mind focused on the latter.  I wanted to tell Fulda I had changed my mind and wanted to put this off until right before the ceremony, but I had neither the time nor opportunity.  Her thumb and forefinger seized my body and slid me out from her stocking, then pressed me into her palm.  She kept her grip loose while she carried me out, and I barely even noticed I was moving until her hand came to a sudden stop.

“Ta-dah!” Fulda proudly proclaimed, uncurling her fingers.  “Here he is, the man I’m marrying!”

Fulda’s mom leaned in until her nose touched her hand.  Her eyes, the same bright, icy color as Fulda’s, were wide in shock while she studied me.  They had the same large, rounded nose too, and cold breezes from her flaring nostrils hit me every couple of seconds.  Round, dark sunglasses on her forehead held her peroxide blond bangs out of her face, and her skin had a slight olive tone to it.  She looked surprisingly good for her age, with only a few shallow crow’s feet around her eyes and some deep laugh lines.

“Is this a joke?” she asked.  “He’s so small!”  Worst case, then.  If I was lucky, I wouldn’t even see her hand coming down to flatten me.  Unexpectedly she squinted and began moving her head so she could look at me from different angles.  Ponderous sounds came from her throat while she did so, like she was appraising me.  Finally, she returned to controlling my entire forward perspective and proclaimed, “Handsome, though.  Looks pretty fit too, despite his size, and you must get on great with him if he’s made it this far.  What’s your name, little guy?”  She paused and looked at Fulda, “Does he mind if I call him that?”

Fulda chuckled, making her hand shake.  “Well, he prefers his name, but I call him that all the time.”

I told her my name and her eyes widened again, as though she were surprised I could speak despite asking me a question.  “I’m glad to finally meet you, Ms. Stein.”

“Oh, please!” she started, then broke into laughter.  “You can call me Janine!  ‘Ms. Stein’ is so formal, like we’re at a business meeting.  We’re family!  Or at least, we will be soon.”  She paused to clear her throat.  “Funnily enough – and Fulda probably already told you about it – she dated someone with your same name in high school.”

“It’s funnier than you think,” Fulda broke in.  “This is him!  You never met him then since you were in Germany the whole time we were together then, but we reconnected a while ago and it just… clicked, you know?”

Janine smiled, glancing between me and her daughter.  “Some things are just meant to be, even if you don’t know it at the time,” she stated.  “It’s even more impressive since, well, he’s still alive!  You wouldn’t think someone so small would live an hour, let alone years.  It really must have been meant to be if he made it back to you.”  She didn’t need to know what had happened in the meantime, and neither of us were eager to fill her in.

“Yeah, I just didn’t realize what I had back then,” Fulda said, “but I knew how special he was when he came back.  He’s smart, sweet, caring, funny… everything you could want in a man, and it’s all concentrated in one tiny little package!  I might actually adore him even more than he adores me, if you can believe it.”

“Well, if he makes you happy, that’s enough for me.”  Janine finally stopped scrutinizing me and leaned back in her seat.  “It’s not easy for tall women like us to find someone so great, and I would know as someone six-and-a-half feet tall.  A lot of men were scared of me, but your dad… Well, let’s just say I understand why you’re marrying someone so much smaller than you.”  She looked at me with a warm smile, and Fulda pulled me back beneath her chin.

Not long after the car pulled to a stop, and they both looked out the tinted windows in confusion.  Slowly, as though they expected a trap, they opened the doors and got out, and Fulda held me closer to her chest.  As they got closer, I could tell more clearly what was wrong.  The house was massive, over a hundred feet tall, and there were fragments of wooden fences where it crossed over onto other lots.  There was an impractically large door at the top of the stoop, its knob far out of even Fulda’s reach, with a smaller, much more reasonable door at the bottom.  They approached it cautiously, sensing something was deeply wrong with this picture.

“I remember our house being big,” Janine began, “and we had some changes made to accommodate us, but this seems excessive.”

“No, it was never quite this… gigantic,” Fulda replied.  Compared to whomever the door was built for she would only have been a few inches tall, and I never remembered her climbing a ladder to get into her own house.  “But it’s still our house, so we might as well see what’s up.”  Without saying anything I knew we shared the same concern, and she surreptitiously concealed me.  Her hand tipped over, dumping me onto her chest, and I tumbled into her cleavage.  Halfway down her massive breasts finally put up enough friction to stop me, and I was held in suspension inside her bra.

Janine stepped up to the door inset within the gigantic one and slid her key in, and to her surprise the lock turned with it.  They walked through, the main door acting as a foyer, and entered the house.  The shoe rack in the actual foyer drove the bizarre scale home, with each pair of sneakers and flats on the bottom row almost reaching their shoulders.  Further in, they saw a couch and chairs much too large for any person to use, with a more reasonably sized couch almost slipping into the gap beneath the enormous one.

The door swung shut while the two inched further into what was supposed to be their home.  “This must be how your fiancé feels all the time,” Janine remarked, staring up a leg of the coffee table.

“I was just thinking that,” Fulda replied as she ran her shoe through a grouted ditch.  Her voice’s vibrations triggered physical pleasure inside me, helping to offset the feeling of dread.  The longer we lingered, the more likely it was that something awful would happen.  “Let’s get out of here, we can stay at a hotel.  This is too damn weird.”

“But you just got here!” boomed a voice from the top of the stairs.  It was intimately familiar to me, and I was the only person alive who had heard it in full force.  I would never forget the primal terror that accompanied its terrible rumbling.  A crash rang out from the stairs, followed by the creak of wood straining under a great weight and another crash seconds later.  Fulda dashed for the door, throwing me around inside her shirt, but was unable to get the door open.  Despite her great strength she could not do more than budge it no matter how hard she strained.

“Come on, my so-called ‘big’ sister, stay for a bit.  I haven’t talked to you in months!”  The strikes became louder, and I could feel the impacts despite my substantial ballast.  “Why don’t you take a seat on the couch and we can have a little heart to heart?”  At last the thundering booms stopped, but that hardly meant the situation was better.

“My, Gina, you’ve… grown so big,” was all Janine could manage when she gazed up at her towering daughter.  She and Fulda were not quite halfway to her knees if they stood at their tallest.

“Oh, uh, hey mom,” Gina stammered.  “I didn’t expect you to come, too.”

“Of course I came!” Janine exclaimed.  “I’m not going to miss one of my daughters getting married!”

“I don’t see why not,” Gina shot back, “you’ve missed everything else we’ve done for the past seven years.”

“Look, I know I wasn’t the best mother,” Janine began, “but I had to make sacrifices – big ones – to provide for the three of you once your father was gone.  Did you ever want for anything, other than attention?  All you had to do was swipe that card and everything would be provided for on my dime.  I didn’t miss things because I wasn’t interested, I did it so you wouldn’t have to miss out on anything.”

“We can talk about this later.”  Gina had apparently not expected that.  “Tomorrow is Fulda’s big day, and I think we should talk about her and her future husband!  Where is he, anyway?”

“He’s out running a few errands, making sure everything’s ready to go for tomorrow,” Fulda blurted.  “He might not get in until really late, like after midnight, so you’ll have to wait until tomorrow to meet him.”

“Well then, I really look forward to meeting him there,” Gina said.  She intentionally stepped over Fulda and bypassed her mom, then plopped down onto the couch.  Her hand rapidly slapped the seat in the same manner you would invite a pet.  “Come on, sit next to me and tell me all about him!  Last time I talked to you, you were complaining about how you thought you’d never find the right guy.  This must have been quite the whirlwind romance!”  More insistently she patted her fingers on the couch beside her, beckoning Fulda to come sit.

 “No thanks, I really prefer to stand,” Fulda declined.

“But you shouldn’t have to!” Gina rejoined.  “Come on, you deserve to take a load off after your trip.  You’ll feel better, trust me.”  Fulda hesitated, and Gina jabbed at the real issue.  “If you’re worried you’re not big enough to sit next to your little sister, I can help you out.  Really, it’d be no trouble at all for me to bring you up here.”  Gina hadn’t lost her mastery of throwing shade while appearing extremely polite.

Fulda was between a rock and a hard place, and everyone knew it.  I felt her reluctantly move toward Gina’s voice, knowing that if I so much as peeked out it would be the end for both of us –Janine too, if Gina were feeling particularly wrathful.  My fiancé came to a stop and leapt upward, making my insides drop as she did, and grabbed onto the ridge running along the midpoint of the cushion.  She dug her fingers in to keep from falling and kicked at the couch’s base, climbing onto it.  When she finally reached the mesa’s summit she sat down, letting her legs dangle off the ledge.

“Wow!” Gina exclaimed.  “I didn’t think you’d make it!  But you still look uncomfortable.  I really feel like I’d be failing as a host if I didn’t insist you lean all the way back.”  Before Fulda could object, Gina’s hand swooped down and laid over Fulda, then swept her backwards.  With as little effort as possible she drove Fulda where she wanted, shoving her to the very back of the cushion.

“Should I get up there too?” Janine asked.  She meant well, but only a handful of people understood the power struggle playing out on the couch.

“Oh, mom, you can go wherever you want!” Gina responded.  “I’m hosting, but you own the place.  If you want to talk with us, I guess the smaller couch by my right heel is most convenient for you, but by no means should you be constrained to that.”  Janine, still bewildered by feeling like an infant in her own home, took a seat on the recommended couch and tried not to think about how Gina’s shoe was now taller than her.

“Now that we’re all comfortable,” Gina began, “why don’t you tell us about your fiancé?  Like, how did you meet him?  How long have you been together?  What makes him special enough to spend the rest of your life with?”  I could tell that Gina was trying to lure Fulda into a logical trap, but she was used to bullying people physically.  Fulda had merged that with bullying them mentally years ago and was leagues ahead of her.

“Believe it or not, all three are related!” Fulda replied.  “I dated him for six months senior year of high school – you met him then, I remember! – but we broke up before college.  We started talking again about five months ago, and I just remembered everything that was so great about him then, and he’s still so sweet!  Honestly, if he hadn’t asked me I would’ve asked him at the same time, that’s how in sync we are.  He gets me like no one else does, and it always feels like we’re on the same page.”

“That sounds really impressive,” Gina started, “especially since you didn’t even talk to him for what five, six years before reconnecting?  You both could have changed a lot in that time in ways you wouldn’t even find out for years.”

“I don’t think so,” Fulda dissented.  “I checked in on him pretty regularly, and he at least thought about me a lot too.  He didn’t really have any social media of his own, but he popped up a lot on it, and he told me that I was on his mind a lot.  When we reconnected, it was like we picked up right where we left off, more or less.  He tried dating other people, so did I, but no one ever seemed like they were ‘the one’ to either of us.”

“But if you’re so perfect, why did you break up at the end of high school?” Gina asked.  “Seems to me like you would have stayed together if you were such a great match, or at least gone to the same college.  Did he even go to college?”  She was flailing for some advantage, and I knew Fulda picked up on it too.

“You must have noticed this in your own class, now that you’re getting closer to graduation,” Fulda began.  An expert jab, since Gina hadn’t attended a class in five months.  “Your friends are pairing off, splitting up, doing all sorts of arrangements, because they don’t know what their future holds!  Maybe they’ll meet the absolute perfect person for themselves at college, maybe they’ll have trouble relating to anyone there as much as they did in high school.  It’s all about comparing nostalgia and real experiences, and… you know what?  You’ll probably find out for yourself, because if it doesn’t happen for you it’ll probably happen to one of your friends.”  Neither of them seemed particularly keen to address that I was technically a high school dropout, and instead focused on properties that weren’t related to me being shrunk.

“Hey, mom?” Gina started, completely redirecting the conversation.  “Would you mind giving the kitchen and dining room a once-over real quick?  The reception’s going to be here tomorrow, and I want to make sure everything’s in good shape.”

“Sure, honey!” Janine replied, and sprung up from her seat.  She walked away, one relatively tiny step at a time, until she began looking around the dining room in earnest.  After her initial hesitation, we all knew that sending Janine away was merely a cover for her own axe to grind with Fulda.

Sure enough, Gina pounced as soon as Janine was out of earshot.  She grabbed Fulda in a single swipe and wrapped her fingers around her tight enough to pin her arms.  The movement of two tremendous women was enough to make me dizzy, though I recovered shortly after Gina settled to having Fulda under her judgmental gaze.

“You may have outplayed me by bringing our mom along,” Gina hissed, “but it won’t save you forever.  I’m going to get my boyfriend back because we are meant to be together while you become an old maid.  I know your wedding is supposed to be tomorrow, and I’m going to make sure it doesn’t happen.”

“Bring it, bitch” Fulda retorted.  “We both know you wouldn’t dare fuck with me just because you’re jealous.  So, do your worst and see what happens.  I can see three steps ahead of you, and I have a contingency for any bullshit you come up with.”

“Do you now?”  Gina sounded unbearably smug.  “Because if mom weren’t here, I would’ve juiced you and looked through the pulp for my boyfriend the minute you walked through the door.  All bets are off tomorrow though.”  Gina gave her sister a quick squeeze then dropped Fulda onto her knee, a simple way to remind her who was really in charge.  Fulda landed on her feet but stumbled forward and flipped onto her back to avoid smashing me when she fell.  Before she could get up Gina placed a finger on her stomach, holding her still on her thigh.

Fulda struggled to push the gigantic finger off, but the strength disparity between them was too great.  Gina was so much stronger than her due to sheer dint of her size, and even if she could move the finger all Gina had to do was apply more pressure.  It was a losing battle, and though she fought it valiantly even Fulda’s great strength would not last much longer.  The blond titaness chuckled at her easy victory, a terrifying rumble that made the world shake.

“No matter what you do, you can’t stop me,” Gina proclaimed, pressing down harder on Fulda’s stomach.  My fiancé folded in half from the sudden surge in pressure, and Gina continued, “Tomorrow I’ll be even bigger, stronger, and more determined to get him back.  But you can avoid whatever horrible fate I have in store for you and very public humiliation if you just give him to me now.”

“He’s a person, you lunatic,” Fulda confidently shot back, “not some piece of jewelry to be passed back and forth as we please.  You’ll have to take him by force, and I’m going to make you pay dearly for the attempt.”

“I doubt you will, but I hope you try,” Gina replied smugly.  “Watching you struggle against me, too small to even push away my finger, has been the highlight of my year.  It’ll be so much sweeter tomorrow.”  She grabbed Fulda again and gave her a rough shake, making her head and feet flail wildly.  With a flick of her wrist she tossed her sister aside, and Fulda bounced on the leather before sliding to stop.

Fulda was slow to get back up, and she let out a long, pained groan while she forced herself to stand.  Gina watched her like a cat studying her prey, poised to strike at any moment.  Fortunately, for now she was content to simply menace her, and Fulda’s walk to the front of the couch was uninterrupted.  She sat and let her legs dangle over the side, and gradually slid her body off the edge.  For a split second she was in freefall, and her landing forced me down to the bottom of her bra.

“Ready to head out, mom?” Fulda called toward the kitchen.  Gina had crossed one leg over the other and consciously dangled a foot over Fulda’s head, rocking it back and forth in the air.  She was sending a clear message that, even though she wouldn’t, she could smash her sister at any time without issue.

“Yeah, everything looks good for the reception,” Janine answered.  She walked around the toe of Gina’s shoe and stood in front of Fulda.  “We should probably go make sure the temple’s ready to host us too before they close.”

“You’re already leaving?” Gina asked.  “But you just got here!  You could at least wait for the groom before you go.”

“He’s a big boy, he’ll be fine,” Fulda insisted.  Everyone knew that was a blatant lie, but no one could admit they knew it.  “I’ll see you there tomorrow, ‘kay?  I’ll make sure they save a row just for you.”

“I’m looking forward to it so much!”  Gina’s enthusiasm over a chance to ruin her family’s life was ghoulish, but unsurprising.  “I’ll get the door for you since, well, I don’t think you can reach the handle.”  She slammed her foot to the floor as close to Fulda as she could and got up, nearly taking Fulda’s head off as she stepped over on the way to the door.  We rushed to keep up with her even though it was impossible, and she had to hold the door for nearly a minute for us to leave.

Once we were safely back in the car, Fulda reached in and dug me out from beneath her breasts.  She gave me a quick stream of cold breath from her mouth to help cool me down, then placed me on her knee.  I took a seat and grabbed onto the nylon under me to help stay still, and the car got moving.

“We cannot stay there tonight,” Fulda announced.  “I know it’s your house and you were looking forward to sleeping in your own bed for once, but Gina has totally lost her mind.  I’m not even sure about having the reception there, the whole thing is off-putting.”

“I completely agree,” Janine replied.  “Everything’s so big, I just felt tiny.  It was awful.”  She realized what she said immediately after the words were out of her mouth and looked at me, embarrassed.  “Sorry, I didn’t mean…”

“No, it’s fine,” I said, and decided not to dwell on it.  “Is there anywhere else we can stay?  If nothing else, we can grab a hotel room.”

“I think Anni still lives here,” Fulda answered.  “She’s a teacher at one of the schools.  I’m sure she’ll let us crash there for the night, she’s going to the wedding and all, especially if we explain what’s going on to her.”  Hearing no objections, she passed the address to the driver and cupped a hand around me in case I fell off.

It wasn’t a long drive, and when we arrived Fulda plucked me from her leg between two fingers.  She and Janine briskly walked up the path to Anni’s house while I was held just below shoulder level.  Fulda rapped her knuckles on the door three times, and after a few seconds of disorganized noise from behind it the door opened.  Anni stood in the doorway with her long, brown hair disheveled and looked down at the three of us with her soft brown eyes, then smiled.  There were only a handful of women alive taller than Fulda and Anni was one of them, measuring a full foot more.  As far as I knew her gigantic size was totally natural, but I could never be positive with Fulda’s circle of friends.

“Fulda!” Anni exclaimed upon recognizing her friend.  “What’re you doing here?  I didn’t expect to see you until tomorrow!”

“Something’s off with the house,” Fulda said, not wanting to explain the situation, “let’s just say I’m not a fan of what Gina’s done with the place.  Can we crash here for the night?”

“Yeah, of course!” Anni replied, stepping out of the doorway.  “Sorry it’s kind of a mess, I wasn’t expecting company.”  We went inside and followed her to the living room which was, as she said, in some disarray.  The furniture wasn’t built for giants, though, so we could live with it.  “First, sleeping arrangements.  I’ll take the couch, Fulda can have my bed, Janine the guest bed, and this little guy,” she pointed at me and grinned, “can have a bed made for him anywhere, isn’t that right?  Just say what and where, and you’ve got it.”

“You really don’t need to…” Fulda began, but Anni cut her off.

“Girl, you are getting married tomorrow.  You need beauty rest, a place to get all dolled up, and most importantly, somewhere you and the groom won’t see each other before the ceremony.  I can survive on the couch for one night, and then take him to the temple with me tomorrow when I go.  I’ll even make sure he looks just as perfect as you’re going to.”

“Well, if you insist,” Fulda reluctantly agreed.

“I do, and if you push me I’ll make you,” Anni said.  “Now come on, put that cutie down somewhere and I’ll help you bring in your bags.”  Fulda looked around for a moment before setting me down on the dark blue couch, then the three of them went to grab their luggage.