She looked much the same when she came by my apartment to pick me up, except her skin now radiated with a sunny blush. It must have been the St Palma sun doing favors for her constitution…alternatively; she was enjoying the honeymoon phase of her relationship with new boyfriend Grant.
Seeing her again made feelings swell up inside me, and not altogether pleasant. A vague feeling of loss; something like the rushing deflation of spent energy trying to chase a train gradually receding into the distance, and heavy finality hanging over my head; the realization I needed to stop running. She was gorgeous as always but there was an invisible membrane separating us; creating an uncanny sense of unreality, like she was from another era, or time, or even universe, forever only a visitor in mine, and would inevitably have to return to her own.
She kissed me on the cheek unselfconsciously, drenching me in flowery perfume, and then swept me into her car.
Our destination today was a fitness studio with a mirror running along one wall and windows along the other. Mats were laid out on the floor. When she carried me inside, it was empty apart from Larissa, who was going around pulling shades down over all the windows until the whole room was dim.
As we stared from across the floor, she went to the side of the room and clicked on a switch. Strips along the ceiling lit up, and judging from the heat pulsing out against the top of my head, they functioned as heat lamps. In the dim, wooden studio, the heated light gave the room a candlelit appearance.
Larissa came over and stood before us, wearing booty shorts and an athletic crop-top. Her face lit up and she held her hands out in a friendly gesture like she was going to hug me, though her arm span was manifestly gargantuan.
“THERE’S MY POCKET POWERHOUSE! HOW YA DOING, LITTLE BUDDY?”
“Hi, Larissa,” I said, genially. “And this is my fiancée, Natalie.”
“UHHH…MIGHT HAVE THAT MIXED UP,” Natalie said.
I slapped a hand to my face, shaking my head urgently.
“I definitely have that mixed up. Natalie’s m-my friend. She’s the chaperone I told you about.”
Realizing the error, the trainer laughed.
“JERRY WAS JUST A BEANPOLE BEFORE HE STARTED SEEING ME,” she said with mock self-importance, “NOW LOOK AT HIM.”
“I used to be six foot, too,” I shot back, “but she made me do too many overhead weights. Now look at me.”
Larissa laughed and crouched with her hands on her thighs, bringing her face close to mine.
“THAT’S WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU DON’T STRETCH BEFORE A WORKOUT, PONYBOY.” She punctuated this retort by tapping my nose with her little finger. Then she straightened and took a position on a mat before us.
The world gave a faint back and forth rocking as Natalie shifted on her feet, and her soft grip tightened in an unconscious squeeze for a fraction of a second. I sensed she was nervous or uncomfortable, though I didn’t know why. Maybe the banter; she’d never been comfortable poking fun at my size. Particularly since it was the front on which she’d initially rejected me. It was one aspect of her where I sensed slight friction between us, slight incongruity, even though – to me – the rest of her was buttery smooth.
“OKAY, POSITION!” Larissa said, and then, “OH, NO MATS IN YOUR SIZE, JERRY,” her brow scrunched in thought, “UNLESS YOU WANT TO USE A MOUSEPAD—?”
This time it didn’t sound like a retort, but a legitimate proposal. There were three mats, one for each of us, all normal sized. From my position suspended at Natalie’s chest level, peering down at my mat, which I could have used as a long jump track.
Toes scrunching on the mat as she restlessly waited for my answer, the side of Larissa’s mouth quirked faintly as she added:
“—OR MY SOCK?”
Her sneakers and socks were up against the wall at the side of the room. It was early morning and she can’t have worn them long, but the warmth of the day made me question whether her socks would be laundry fresh.
Before I could reply, Natalie’s voice beat against the top of my head.
“YOU’RE NOT REALLY THINKING OF DOING THIS ON THE FLOOR, ARE YOU?”
Her thumb rolled across my shoulders, giving me an impromptu massage. In the wall-high mirror across the room (the studio doubled for dance classes) I saw my tiny head poking out from her fingers, the comparatively large thumb supporting my back, sweeping back and forth behind the nape of my neck, making the muscles in my neck bulge slightly. Seeing myself dwarfed in people’s hands – warm, soft hands that were massaging me at the same time – still caught me off guard. From my point of view, I was not small, but other people were huge. The mirror dissipated that illusion; it was me that was the wrong size, and getting contained and molded around by powerful fingers like a tiny human shaped piece of dough.
I looked up at her reflection in the mirror quizzically, as she ignored the mirror and stared down at the top of my head with a look of concern.
“Why not?”
“WELL…” she started awkwardly, “…IT'S A LONG WAY DOWN, THAT'S ALL.”
I laughed.
“You realized?”
When I’d lived with her, she usually carried me around from place to place, and lowered me onto elevated surfaces of furniture, such as her bed or desk, or couch. She’d been uncomfortable about me making transits across the floor, and would quickly scoop me up and ask me where I was headed. I hadn’t complained at the time; it was an excuse for physical contact with her, but I only got free run of her house while she was at work or university.
Meanwhile, Larissa had strode over to her sneakers, plucked up a white ankle-high running sock, and lay it down upon the mat set out for me, smoothing it flat with a palm.
“NO DRAMAS, THIS IS A FLOOR-BASED ACTIVITY. "She said brightly. “HOP ON AND WE’LL GET STARTED!”
She patted the sock as if I was a puppy she was training, and I wondered if she’d seen Alpha, but then remembered it hadn’t been released yet.
Once she had stepped back, Natalie crouched and the soles of my bare feet were gently placed down on the downy surface of the cotton sock. Then, Natalie’s huge form extended upwards again, I saw this in the mirror, one side of her mouth was pulled as if in thought; her reflection suggested she regretted raising the issue.
Satisfied, Larissa stood with her hands on her hips, apprehending us both.
“ALRIGHT! WE’RE DOING SOMETHING A LITTLE STEAMY TODAY: ‘HOT YOGA.’
Natalie turned to stare down at me.
“YOU NEVER TOLD ME YOU DID BIKRAM!”
I shrugged.
“No one told me, either.”
I didn’t even know what Bikram was.
Natalie eyed Larissa warily.
“YOU’RE NOT GOING TO STAND ON US, ARE YOU?”
Larissa let out a knowing laugh.
“WHAT, YOU DON’T WANT TO PLAY PEOPLE TRAMPOLINE?” she joked. “NONE OF THAT INTENSE STUFF WITH ME. I’D BE TERRIFIED OF HURTING YOU.”
Her eye then cast over me, hesitating.
“OH, BUT JERRY? YEAH, I’M GONNA WALK ALL OVER HIM. STAND ON HIM LIKE A TRICK RIDER. LOOK AT THAT MUSCLE TONE. HE MIGHT NOT BE NORMAL SIZE, BUT I THINK HE CAN TAKE IT.”
She gave me an inconspicuous wink.
“’NORMAL SIZE’,” Natalie repeated. “IS THAT CORRECT? IS THAT…PC?” She looked at me for clarification.
“Doesn’t bother me.”
Maybe I still had a crush on Natalie, but it didn’t mean her impulse to rush in and ‘bubble wrap’ and ‘quarantine’ the scene of offence to my stature wasn’t irritating sometimes, embarrassing, even if it was well-intentioned. Could a girl be a ‘white knight’? A ‘white princess’?
Larissa instructed us through a number of initial warm-up standing poses which required more balance than flexibility. Then we proceeded to a pose where we had our legs stretched straight out, and had to push our faces down against our knees. Being a practitioner in her spare time, Natalie had no problem with this, but I began to struggle.
Since first shrinking I’d been incredibly flexible, but it seemed an after-effect of the medical procedure was to steal some of my athletic flexibility in exchange for firmer, tighter muscles. My chest was so beefed up, and my ribcage like a tiny musclebound barrel, and at some thirty-degree angle I began to feel the muscles pull and protest against any further extension.
The next pose was something called ‘the rabbit’. Belying the name, the pose was not nearly as cute and cuddly. It required curling up into a ball, with head down, except you had to keep a gap between your chest and legs, bowing and stretching the spine. And my spine was buried under straps of tense beef. Larissa had to apply the pressure of fingertips against my butt to get my hips to lift properly, and slide a finger below my midsection, to support my chest from caving down against my legs.
Then we completed something called ‘the camel’, which required balancing on the haunches while bending backwards – basically a reverse rabbit. Again, my tensed back refused to stretch generously enough to complete the pose properly and Larissa had to place a finger against my chest to work my spine backwards, massaging my muscles to tease them out. I began to wonder if she felt like she was posing a doll.
All of the studio fans were kept off and the windows wide open to maintain the conditions of typical ‘hot yoga’ practice. In the heat, sweat was rolling down my sides, and my heart was hammering like piston. Earlier that morning, I’d run out of milk to make oatmeal for breakfast, and too lazy to call Raf, I just substituted the milk with Kolade to create some chimeric carbonated cereal. Now it felt like I’d poured ten cups of coffee into the oatmeal instead.
Sweat was beginning to roll in lines down the womens’ smooth bare legs, and at my height, the scents’ of perspiration were inescapable.
“JERRY, MIND IF I TRY SOMETHING?” Larissa asked suddenly.
She was crouching over me, smooth golden calves tense, and a faint sheen of perspiration glittered over her skin. The row of her shiny toenails stared me in the face.
“What?”
“OH, JUST THINKING OF USING AS YOU A LITTLE EXAMPLE,” she replied with keen anticipation. As she rocked forward on the balls of her feet, the lengths of her tanned toes flexed . “YOUR BODY IS A COMPLETE DIAGRAM OF MUSCLE ANATOMY, I HAVE TO SHOW YOU OFF.”
“Okay.” I wasn’t sure what she intended, but figured it couldn’t hurt.
Then she was manually coaxing my body into some kind of pose like I was play-doh. She rolled my limbs in the sockets to the edge of their limits, flipped me onto my front, kept me pressed there, my face against the sock. The cotton fibers emanated the odor of Larissa’s foot directly into my nose, and worse, she inadvertently had my face pressed like that with the effortless application of pressure against my shoulders and one finger resting atop the back of my head. She meant no harm: the odor must have been indiscernible to either woman, even up close, but my size and delicate, sensitive smell made me an attuned radar for trace odors that were undetectable to normal sized people. And I was too embarrassed to point it out, so I endured in silence.
Still, my muscles began to ache. I grunted, my cheek pressed into the mat; I could see myself in the wall-high mirror across the room, a tiny human pretzel glued to the floor by the unhurried pressure of Larissa’s fingertips which were working and manipulating my limbs with fascination, trying to stretch me and test my pliability. She took my hips firmly, while keeping my shoulders pinned beneath her other hand, and began to tug and manipulate my spine. Vertebrae groaned and popped as her fingerpads roamed my spine, pushing and kneading out the muscles.
“A LITTLE BURN IS GOOD,” she reassured, “BUT IT SHOULDN’T HURT.”
Warmth seeped back into my limbs as they were relaxed again, and blood tingled back into my extremities. I started getting to my feet, but Larissa’s fingers were speedier, suddenly rippling around me, flipping me onto the mat again, and holding me there, the warm fingerpads seeming to walk up my body to keep it in position. The sock odor seeped back into my nostrils; the tang of sweat and rich scent of dank insulated flesh. Lying forwards with my head pressed down against the sock, and the weight of her hand against me, I was at rest while my limbs were plucked and stretched for demonstration, and Larissa vocally marvelled at what a perfectly tiny model of human form I was, as the earlier energy drink kept my head immersed in a pulsation of excited blood wavering in my ears. I started to feel faint and closed my eyes, counting mentally until the feeling subsided.
Larissa began tugging at my elbows, rolling my shoulders, asking me to use my feet and back to push against her while she had my arms. My tendons started to twitch in an uncoordinated, ineffective way, and she settled me again, pushing firmly on my back to prevent me hurting myself.
“THIS NEXT ONE MIGHT BE TOUGH EVEN FOR YOU, HERCULES,” Larissa said. “YOU’RE SO TIGHT AND I WANT TO LOOSEN YOU UP, SO WE’RE GOING TO BRING IN A LITTLE MEDITATIONAL TRICK. IMAGINE YOU’RE A MAGIC CARPET, AND I’M GOING FOR A RIDE ON YOU, BUT YOU’RE SO LIGHT AND FLEXIBLE IT’S NO SWEAT.”
Her fingertips danced over the muscles of my back, tapping in places.
“LUCKY YOU’RE SO TINY, OTHERWISE I’D BE RIGHT UP THERE,” she stroked around my shoulder blades, allowing my muscles to depress and support the weight of her pushing fingertips, “ONE FOOT ON EACH RHOMBOID, TO HELP YOU MEDITATE. DON’T WORRY ABOUT IT,” she rocked back on her heels, lifting one hand to rest on her thigh while the other traced up and down the span of my spine as if to rub in my unimpressive length, “YOU’RE NO CARPET, BUT THERE’S DEFINITELY ENOUGH HERE FOR A TOE PAD, MAYBE.”
She took my legs and began trying to bend them back over my head, and I had to suppress a gasp. This required some manual dexterity from both of us, and the pressure of her determined fingertips squashed my lungs a little, which were grasping for oxygen. Natalie asked a question and Larissa answered, keeping me locked in position, the pressure up on my body and chest, disallowing me to shift even an inch. My diaphragm had turned into a cinch and wouldn’t expand, more air was slipping out of my lungs, but it didn’t worry me; I could hold my breath for eight minutes. Plus I didn’t want to alarm the women. Embarrassing to call myself out for suffocating under the gentle pressure of a thumb. And in front of Natalie.
I waited patiently.
Keeping up the pressure on my back, Larissa began idly rotating and stretching my limbs, but, distracted by what she was saying, she was putting too much pressure on my chest. My lungs were starting to get tight now; it must have been five or six minutes.
I strained against the pressure below my shoulderblades and a fingertip settled down against the back of my head, gently pushing my face into the mat, trying to keep me in the pose.
Finally the force eased up as Larissa called for the next pose. I jumped up to my feet again to catch my breath before she could manipulate me once more.
The pressure of holding the pose caused a cramp or a strain in my chest, preventing my lungs from properly expanding. They trembled and burned for air. A wave of tiredness swept over me.
“Don’t stop,” I said, slurring, “I just need to rest…”
Then sounds became an unintelligible tremolo. A fuzzy feeling was rapidly climbing up from my toes, towards my head. I was dropping, dropping, and then my front hit the mat and pressed there. Larissa gave a halting shout and Natalie shrieked. Then sounds faded out altogether and darkness swallowed everything.
...
—What seemed like only a moment later, I was launched back into the world, wide eyed and gasping for breath. My eyelids fluttered weakly, letting in vague snapshots of painful light, almost immediately shutting again.
Below, the foamy yoga mat, and the sock was gone. The world seemed to tip back and forth sickly, as if I was on a boat. And no sound except for an oceanic roaring. My face was sultry and wet like I’d overstayed in a sauna, the rest of my body clammy, but dry. There was a sweet, oily substance coating my lips. It tasted like lip gloss. For some reason my windpipe ached, all the way down into my lungs, like it had undergone an intense yoga stretch of its own.
I tried to open my eyes again, but only for an instant; the visual world tilted nauseatingly, tiny spots of color burst in front of my eyes. I shuttered them until I was seeing the world through a dim horizontal bar below my eyelashes.
There were two pairs of blue eyes peering down at me in concern. Vision steadying a little, the eyes blended into a pair of gigantic faces hovered low, their magnified features blocking out everything: Larissa, her wavy blonde hair spilled forward over her bare shoulders, and thin rogue braid dangling over my head like a rope. Higher, the tight black spandex-covered shelf of her chest, and tan midsection divided into the faint grid of her abs, tensed as she hunched over me. Natalie’s slightly darker hair pulled back in a ponytail, and porcelain skin and smaller, leaner frame, sweat now darkening the pits and neck of her tight pale t-shirt, and beginning to run in tiny rivulets down from her temples.
Both women were kneeling on the yoga mat, staring down at me with alarm. I caught their lips moving as if in speech, but there was just the roaring, as if on a beachline.
They reared back, speaking to each other. Someone shifted, making the yoga mat jerk. Drops of sticky saline pattered onto my brow, running down the sides of my head, and trickled in under my eyelashes, making my eyes sting. Sweat, but I couldn’t tell whose. I wanted to rub my eyes but my muscles trembled like jelly.
Oh no, I realized with a dropping sense of shame, I passed out. And in front of Natalie. How embarrassing. It didn’t occur to me to be any more concerned than for my ego. Maybe I could still put my acting skills to use playing it off like I’d tripped, or better; I’d been meditating so intensely they’d confused my transcendental fugue for unconsciousness.
I swallowed the lump in my throat, and was just about to apologize for their superfluous concern, when Larissa’s tanned face raced down to me at supersonic speed, so fast it was a blue and her plush pink lips parted as they swallowed my entire world. Fruity-tasting lip gloss smeared onto my tongue as the lips latched around my face and created a tight rubbery seal, blocking out all sight.
A jet of warm air was propelled onto my face, blowing my lips wide open and started pumping what felt like a torrential storm of air straight down my windpipe into my lungs. The ache in my windpipe flared up again as it was forced to expand with the dense cubic volume of this warm torrential influx, my lungs flaps in and out like sails. An overflow of air was shunted aside, pushed down my esophagus and inflating my stomach to near bursting point.
Then the air was sucked back again, and I wanted to scream as my lungs felt like they were going to turn inside out and get vacuumed out of my body.
An instant later, the process reversed again and more air was roaring into my body, filling me up like a balloon. I felt like I was trying to breathe through a plane propeller on full blast. This cyclonic process repeated several times, before the moist lips broke their seal over my face and rose swiftly back into the air.
The world was spinning madly around my head as my body tried vainly to process all this rapid gas exchange. My eyelids flickered with exhaustion as the great shadowy masses loomed high over me, shifting restlessly as they examined my condition. I was completely limp, stunned.
But it was not over.
A large object slammed down upon my chest, rose up a little, and then slammed back down. And again, and again. It felt like a full grown person was jumping up and down on my chest. And hurt just as much.
My blurry vision focused just enough to see the giant fingers – pointer and middle finger – tanned and sheathed in black fingerless spandex gloves, belonged to Larissa, and in the process of trying to palpate my ribcage for CPR, albeit painfully. Each finger battered with pinpoint precision at a tiny target on my bare chest, around my sternum. My chest cavity clenched in and out rapidly under the pressure driven by the massive flesh battering rams, so incredibly strong, and yet, paradoxically slender, feminine, and trying to do its utmost to keep me alive.
Tears of pure helplessness sprung into my eyes and my throat choked up as I watched the blunt fingertips fly over my head, angle slightly to ensure the fingerpads made contact with my chest. A tiny mercy; I could scarcely imagine how much more painful it would have been if the tips of the nails were making contact instead.
My heart skipped a beat as those massive fingertips oriented down again, racing towards my helpless supine bare chest with increasing speed. It seemed like the steel bar of a triggered mousetrap was flipping down at my breastbone. Then they struck my chest, pushing down sharply.
My eyelids fluttered in shock, the air shot out of my lungs with a whoosh. My ribs buckled and creaked inward. The fingers were rising into the air again…
I tried to make a sound but the larynx in my strained, over-stretched throat flapped uselessly. By the feel of it, I was in for a world of bruises tomorrow.
The fingers drove down again into my chest. There was a snapping sound as at least one of my ribs gave in to one of the many tremendous strikes, breaking like a wafer. The world seemed to perform a revolution around a point on the ceiling. I wheezed in terror as pain jolted through my chest.
Neither girl noticed or ignored it. The fingers carried on methodically, driving down again and again against my sternum. Every blow sent pain spasming through my torso. Cold chills wracked my limbs even in the warm, balmy air. I was conscious now, but felt too conscious. The unconsciousness was peaceful compared to this.
I opened my mouth to yell out when the giant face came flying back down at me, Larissa’s huge glossed lips zoomed in and once again wrapping securely around my face like a nozzle, and once again sending billowing gasps of air into my aching, screaming body.
With my newly shattered rib, this was pure agony. With each blast of air, my lungs bulged, flexing my broken ribs outward, sending ripples of staggering pain throughout my chest. I felt like I was going to puke.
Finally, the ocean soundtrack diminished and from the other side of Larissa’s head, came Natalie’s voice, rapid and quaking:
“—PLEASE WAKE UP, IF YOU CAN HEAR ME, JERRY, CAN YOU—”
The heavy mass of wet flesh relented, lifted off my face, letting me get some air in. I was trembling. There was a warm glob of saliva trapped in the back of my throat, which I quickly had to swallow before I could get much air in. I had a weird feeling it wasn’t mine – maybe because I couldn’t possibly have produced such a thick copious amount so quickly.
Larissa leaned over me, with one tanned, tree-trunklike arm held straight on either side of me. I went to say something just as Larissa turned her head back down to me, and without warning, the blonde’s head plunged over my body as she went to press her ear against my chest – practically covering it – while burying me alive under a soft pile of strawlike hair. Seeking to clear my face, I weakly fanned my arms through the silky strands like an explorer attempting to part bamboo shoots. The enormous head held lightly just upon my chest for a moment, balancing without applying pressure, as she listened and timed my heartbeat, keeping me positively dwarfed under her head and drowning in her hair.
Satisfied, her head finally lifted back into the sky, revealing the room again. Her keen eyes observed me for a moment longer, then her limbs flexed powerfully as she lifted herself up onto her feet, but remained crouched. She wiped her brow, brushing the wavy locks of her long hair out of her face.
I rolled over, clutching my side and feeling fractured bone protest at the touch. My breaths came short and painful, but I was breathing. The wood studio floor spanned around the yoga mat like an ocean around an island, but at least the world wasn’t tipping back and forth anymore, it was level and my vision was clear.
Now Natalie’s hand reached down over my face, the thumb planting itself against my forehead and swiping around my temples, gently wiping away the sweat and moisture. Her hand was even more delicate than Larissa’s, and her pale skin was lightly flushed.
Larissa seemed to grow towards the ceiling as she stood up, took shaky steps back. Her height over me, lying on the ground looking straight up, was dizzying, so I looked away, but was still too weak to move, and afraid to stress my ribs.
“DUDE,” she said, stunned. “I THINK YOU JUST GOT PULLED BACK FROM THE DEAD!” Her stadium-voice thrummed in my eardrums. She observed me staidly. “YOU NEED TO GO TO THE HOSPITAL. STAT!”
Natalie shifted onto her feet, her tone tight and driven with worry:
“AGREED. I’LL TAKE HIM.”
“I’m fine,” I groaned.
“NO, BUDDY,” Larissa exclaimed. “THAT WASN’T ‘FINE’. THAT WAS SOMETHING ELSE.”
She bent over me, shadowing me, her soft finger extended in front of my face to give my chest a perfunctory, reassuring tap – accidentally igniting rib pain.
“I KNOW I’M SO HOT I’VE GOT YOU SWOONING,” she said matter-of-factly. “BUT GET YOURSELF CHECKED OUT BEFORE YOU ASK ME OUT, OKAY?”
*
I sat in my underwear on the patient bed while the doctor examined me, taking my blood pressure with a tiny cuff, listening to my heart with the oversized stethoscope. I’d just had an X-ray down the hall and was waiting for the results to come back. My chest flared up with pain every time I sucked in a breath, not helped by the doctor’s cold fingers exploring my ribcage to identify my pain, trying to keep his giant, stubby fingers from applying too much pressure to my delicate organs and shattered bones.
Natalie sat to the side of the room, in the consult chair, explaining what had happened to the doctor – I winced inwardly as she specified it was a strenuous course of yoga, couldn’t she have lied and said we were mountain climbing? – but the doctor didn’t react, until she explained I’d been unconscious and seemed to not be breathing for at least six minutes, then I realized why she and Larissa had been so worried. Neither of them were aware I could hold my breath for eight minutes.
The doctor shone a penlight into my eyes, having to rely on a magnifying glass to make out my pupils and check my reflexes and awareness were fine. From my position on the other side of the magnifying glass, his face appeared to be blown up – as if he needed to appear any bigger to me. Finally, the X-ray results came back, confirming his diagnosis of rib fracture from the CPR. At Natalie’s blanched expression, he explained calmly:
“SOMETIMES IT HAPPENS. AND JERRY IS SO REMARKABLY SMALL, IT WAS PROBABLY INEVITABLE. I COMMEND THE TRAINER FOR ATTEMPTING SUCH A DELICATE PROCEDURE, AND OBVIOUSLY IT PAID OFF.”
He gave me some aspirin. It turned out I’d suffered a minor heart attack. He also filled me in a a prescription for pain relief – per tiny dosage – for my rib fracture.
“REST,” he emphasized, “DON’T OVERDO THE PHYSICAL EXERTION, AND YOU SHOULD BE FINE IN ABOUT A MONTH.”
But I wanted to get back to work as soon as possible.
I countered:
“But my metabolism. My file says my body heals itself more efficiently since I was miniaturized.”
“YES,” he considered, “THAT PROMOTES FASTER REPAIR OF THE BODY’S TISSUES AND BONES. BUT ALL THE SAME, TAKE IT SLOW. WHATEVER IS WRITTEN IN YOUR FILE IS AN INFORMED SUGGESTION, NOT A CAST-IRON DIRECTIVE. MEDICAL SCIENCE DOESN’T FULLY UNDERSTAND YOU YET. THIS IS NOT A MEDICAL OPINION, BUT A LITTLE GUY LIKE YOU SHOULD BE ON THE END OF A SAFETY HARNESS.”
While he wrote up a prescription for pain relief, I queried him about the Roburfortis I was on, as if that could have made my bones break more easily. He didn’t know what it was and had to look it up.
“IF ANYTHING, IT SHOULD STRENGTHEN YOUR BONES,” he remarked. “NOTICE ANY DIFFERENCE SINCE YOU STARTED TAKING IT?”
“That depends. Have I grown at all in the last few months?” I asked.
He pulled out a tape measure and stretched it out beside me as I lay supine, drawing myself up tall as much as possible in spite of my rib pain.
“THE TAPE DOESN’T LIE,” he said, comparing the result to the height recorded in my medical record. That meant no.
“ONE MORE REASON TO TAKE IT SLOW. THIS MEDICATION CAN AFFECT YOUR CARDIOVASCULAR SYSTEM. A BIG INJURY; MUSCLE TEAR, CUT, COULD LOSE A LOT OF BLOOD AND IT COULD BE LIGHTS OUT FOR GOOD NEXT TIME.”
The end of a towel came out of nowhere, flapping over my head and trapping me in a dark terry-cloth lined pouch. Natalie had scooped me up off the bed with the utmost caution, unwilling to even touch me, allowing me a generous pocket inside the towel, enabling her to carry me without exerting any pressure on my ache-riddled body.
She left me on her car’s passenger seat while she redeemed my prescriptions at a local pharmacy. Once the pain reliever kicked in, it settled my pain down to the occasional sharp twinge. Shifting gingerly within the towel pouch, I was able to poke my head out for a view of the oversized car interior, and, across the humungous gear stick, the skint tight surface of Natalie’s yoga pant clothed hip.
She was driving back to my apartment, the car seat jiggled beneath me as the wheels trundled rapidly over the road. My phone lay on the seat next to me. I inwardly debating on what to text Jennifer – if anything. Natalie said:
“IF YOU WERE MY BOYFRIEND, YOU WOULDN’T BE UP HERE ON YOUR OWN. I COULDN’T LET YOU.”
I didn’t look up from the phone.
“My girlfriend and I figure it out.”
“GREAT,” she said, but there was a twinge of doubt in her voice, “AND NOTHING ON YOUR GIRLFRIEND – fiancée I MEAN – IT’S YOU. I GET DIZZY JUST CONTEMPLATING IT; HOW YOU CHOREOGRAPH ALL THIS AND KEEP YOURSELF SAFE.”
“Good planning and I can eliminate most risks.”
She went on:
“THIS IS GOING TO HAPPEN AGAIN IF YOU KEEP COMPARING YOURSELF TO – HOW YOU PUT IT – ‘NORMAL SIZED’ PEOPLE.”
As much as I resented her ‘bubble-wrap’ rhetoric, I empathized with it – painfully – as well. It wasn’t difficult to imagine a normal-sized me advising a tiny, wilful Jennifer not to take so many impulsive risks because one day she was going to get hurt, and feeling crushed with the inevitable prospect of it. But, try as I might, I never imagined myself in the ‘Jennifer’ position, being told off for my risk-taking. I had never been a risk-taker growing up. Maybe living together had made our personalities start to bleed into each other. Or maybe it went one way; her bigger, dominant, more headstrong personality was quashing my submissive one, and transforming me into a tiny, unquestioning clone.
Mistaking my silence for disgruntled disagreement, Natalie’s tone softened as she went on:
“OKAY, I CARE,” she said, voice weirdly exasperated as if being called out for wrongdoing. She was staring intently at the street ahead, but also not seeing it, looking past it, “AND – NO OFFENCE TO ANYONE – BUT FROM WHAT YOU’VE LET ON ABOUT YOUR fiancée, YIKES, I WORRY. EVEN THOUGH I KNOW IT’S NONE OF MY BUSINESS. YOU GUYS ARE BRAVER THAN I AM.”
“It’s my height.”
“IT’S NOT. IF GRANT WAS ON CARDIO MEDICATION, SAME THING. WISH YOU’D TOLD ME; THERE ARE GENTLER YOGAS, YOU KNOW.”
“It’s not cardio medication. And it sounds like it’s not even doing anything.”
“IT’S THE DISTANCE THING, TOO, AND IT’S ME AND MY INSECURITIES. BUT YOU’RE FRAGILE AND IT’S FREAKY – DON’T THINK I’M BEING CONTROVERSIAL FOR SAYING THAT. I STILL FEEL HORRIBLE I LEFT YOU WITH THAT GIRL…”
I shook my head and said swiftly:
“I asked you to.”
She didn’t reply at first. Then, after a beat:
“AND HERE’S THE FUNNY THING, JERRY, IN SOME WAY, I…” she paused, made a disgruntled sound, and started again.
“YOUR DATING PROFILE; THERE WAS AN EXPERIMENT GOING ON IN MY HEAD. IF YOU WERE SITTING RIGHT HERE, ‘NORMAL SIZE’ – THAT PHRASE AGAIN, BUT WHAT ELSE DO I CALL IT? –…I WONDER IF I’D WISH IT WAS ME AT THE ALTAR WITH YOU.”
My chest pulled in until I could feel my heart thudding painfully.
“Right…” I said slowly. “But…?”
She sighed.
“THERE I’D BE TRYING SO HARD TO KEEP YOU OUT OF DANGER, I’M NOT EVEN SURE WHAT KIND OF TOGETHERNESS WE’D HAVE LEFT OVER. ROMANCE NEEDS SPONTANEITY…”
“So it is my height.”
"SEE..." she bit her lip in thought, "...UM. NO – IT’S STUPID. REALLY, REALLY STUPID. IF YOU WERE TALLER THAN ME, IT MIGHT BE OBVIOUS."
What she’d said took a second to get through.
"What would be obvious?"
"I…LIKE TO BE THE PRETTY ONE IN A RELATIONSHIP.” Then, as if hearing herself, she giggled self-consciously before she could help it, or possibly to soften the blow.
All I could think was, God, I love the sound of her voice. When she sounded light and cheerful and carefree it was like she was about to start laughing and say ‘Oh who cares? Let’s get icecream!’ Just hearing her talk was like therapy, even if I didn’t like what she was saying. That was how goo-goo headed my crush on her made me. And probably the fuzzying sedative effects of the medication were kicking in.
My brow scrunched, realizing what she’d just said.
"I’m pretty.”
"JERRY!" she said in a 'oh, come now!' kind of way, "UM, YES!" She giggled again, her cheeks even growing slightly pink. Then she giggled.
“OH MY GOD, I CAN’T BELIEVE I SAID THAT! TELL ME I’M NOT THE FIRST PERSON WHO’S EVER SAID THAT!”
I took a deep breath.
“What do mean ‘pretty’, exactly?”
"YOUR EYES. YOUR EYELASHES..." she waved a hand, laughing. "I DON'T KNOW!”
She changed the subject.
"WHERE I WOULD FIT WITH YOU...? MAYBE...NOWHERE?"
"That's not..." I began, but couldn't conclude what I meant.
“IT’S ACADEMIC,” she said, still self-conscious. “YOU’RE A SOON-TO-BE-HAPPILY-MARRIED MAN AND I AM A SOON-TO-BE-HAPPILY-ATTENDING-YOUR-WEDDING UM…PERSON.”
“You’re a little more than just a ‘person’ to me,” I ventured.
“I…FEEL LIKE YOUR BABYSITTER SOMETIMES.”
She somehow found new and creative ways to shock my ego. Her dulcet, earnest innocence made it somehow even more painful than if she’d closed the door outright with a glare. Her smiles and laughter, and voice brimming with love.
God, I really am a masochist, I thought. Surely only a masochist would continue to chase her like this, hoping for a little something more than she was offering.
The car rolled up outside my apartment and she bundled me up in the towel and carefully carried me inside.
“IT’S CUTE,” she said approvingly, glancing around the confined spaces, then cast me a bashful look. “SORRY…”
I shrugged a shoulder, trying not to move too much.
“It is.”
I was placed down to rest on my bed, and she curling the sheet over me somewhat maternally. Then she paused. Her profile unfocused. I blinked, pushing back the oncoming sedation.
“Thanks for taking me home,” I said.
“NO MORE STUNTS. YOU’RE GOING TO GIVE ME A HEART ATTACK.”
I reached up, beckoning with my hand for her to come closer.
“WHAT?” she said shyly, getting low.
I was on my feet, approaching her face to kiss her. She ducked, and then pet my hair as her great form rose above the bed again.
“CATCH YOU SOME OTHER TIME, JERRY.” She moved to the door. The car pulled away.
She’d left my phone nearby. I pulled it towards me and rang Larissa, letting her know I was fine, but she instructed me to get some sleep as I was slurring my words. I pushed the phone aside, and my eyelids began to droop with medication-induced fatigue…