I kept running, my brain overloaded with adrenaline and fear, and tried to leap between the oversized high heels directly in front of me. There was a gap between them; if I could just –

The towering figure above seemed to bend over – for one fear-blinding second I thought she was tripping over me and I was destined to be squished under a collapsing breast or stomach – but the ‘fall’ was too controlled and transformed into a graceful crouch. The giant black shadow of an outstretched hand came parasoling over my head, and I watched it, stunned into stillness, too late realizing the hand was not looking to stabilize itself flat against the floor, but looking to unloosen me from the floor.

The hand disappeared over and behind my head before there came a pinching at the back of my waistband – pulling painfully tight around my groin – and my upper body dropping forward as I was yanked up into the air by the back of my pants. As the air whooshed and bass beat thumped, my waistband pulled so tight around my lower belly that I couldn’t breathe properly. My arms waved around as I dangled, seeing the floor rapidly descending, and the dark bodies continued to dance all around, like a forest of wavering trees, no one having noticed me.

The air whizzed past, more long, flexible objects hooked around my shoulders, pinning my arms to my torso. Still wet from the tipped glass of iced water, I almost slipped through the sweaty flesh, but the hand responded immediately; tensing even more around my torso, compressing it inwards, making me gasp for oxygen into my increasingly squashed torso. My diaphragm fought against the increasing cinch of pressure; I took rapid, small breaths, trying to expand my lungs as much as possible. If the fist continued to tense, it could easily snap my bones. I couldn’t thrash against it, and trying to scream, only a tiny whimper escaped, muffled by the blasting club music.

The world tilted around until I was looking straight up at the face of a girl; her face shadowed in the dim light, the unseen eyes must have been locked on me, as mine were locked onto hers.

The fingers surrounding me then loosened slightly to allow a firm object to start working away into my chest; I tucked my chin in, peering down vaguely to see the tip of a giant thumb kneading up and down against my ribcage, powerfully enough to make my ribs groan and shift around.

The ironing motion of the thumb drove the fingernail a little too deeply into my gut, connecting painfully with the curving bands that were my bottom ribs. In the giant girl's urgency to rub my chest – maybe to calm me down – she apparently did not appreciate the potential strength in just her fingertips compared to my puny anatomy. My bottom ribs were accidentally being leveraged up by the probing thumbnail, making me fear for an immediate bone fracture any second.

I gave a yip. The thumb halted, resting on my solar plexus, and I inwardly sighed in relief, and my head tilted back to apprehend my captor. Lasers had been wandering all around the room and for an instant, gleamed in her eyes and sent me a flash of her twisted, triumphant grin and in an instant I was sickened with fear. My legs began to paddle pathetically in the air, my arms trapped against my sides beneath her sweaty palm flesh. My throat ripped with a hoarse scream.

One huge thumb humped over my chest and settled heavily on my mouth, preventing me from screaming anymore.

“SHHH,” she murmured conspiratorially, her voice galloping with exhilaration. “DON’T TELL ANYONE.”

Her other hand had slipped down to her handbag, surreptitiously working the zip and holding the widening slit open, while sending me inexorably towards the gaping black threshold, past which point I would be zipped up again and lost from view, and no one would know I was trapped in there.

Or, almost no one.

Out from the darkness there was a feminine growl:

“STOP THAT.”

A hand clamped around the girl’s wrist, jerking me away from the open bag.

“UHHH, EXCUSE ME?!” the girl yelped, glaring up into the face of her intervener.

“YOU WILL LET HIM GO. THIS INSTANT.”

“WHAT, LIKE YOU OWN HIM?” she scoffed, with her free hand trying to yank the zip shut again, and then anxiously fix her hair.

“AND WHO ARE YOU?” the other woman, the intervener, demanded.

“I AM…” the girl huffed as if reluctant to provide a name, “…I AM OVER THIS! UGH. LAY-TERRRR!”

I was dumped, almost upside down, onto a soft palm incensed with complex, expensive perfume, as the girl swished around and stalked off through the crowd. As I sat up on the palm, the fingers of another identically fragranced hand curled around me, tanned and elegant, with French manicured nails. My Kolade coked up heart skipped with lust before I could stop it. The fingers arranged around my ribcage to hold me firmly in the palm, while the thumb gently hooked around my head.

Then I was being drawn in to a black cocktail dress. I was cradled against the soft dress fabric covering a wall of taut belly, with the inside fingers cupped around my other side. The abdominal wall expanded against me with each inhalation as I was pressed against it. With each of my own inhalations I got a head full of perfume. The ruffled fabric whispered and tickled against my cheek as body heat radiated against my somewhat squashed front.

The world started swaying in gentle motion over the floor, not in time with the music and the dancers, but an assured gait that was now heading away from the music. From beneath the thumbpad semi-obscuring my vision there were glimpses of tall dark bodies passing on either side. My keeper moved strategically amidst the throngs, pressing me against her dress to shield me from attention, while the thumbpad idly padded over my face, continually blotting my vision, while tilting my jaw, compelling my head to face her, or, away from people, or softly planting itself over my features and holding there until people had passed by.

In a moment of pause in a patch of shadowy floor, I was lifted up the lithe torso of the woman to stop just above her strapless bust, sheltered at her neck, where her perfume was the most intense. She tilted her head down close to my face like I was a phone she was about to speak into, while her dusky eyes continued to wander the crowds, Alizarin-painted lips pursed and betraying nothing. There was nowhere else to look, I was walled in by the the extensive physical landscape of the woman’s poised face, framed by a silky curtain of dark hair like a glossy waterfall at midnight.

In the cool air, her alcohol-spiced breath warmed my shoulders and neck. Panic prickled along the nape of my neck. I wriggled to try and free myself of her grip, but her fingers closed in, giving my midsection a small but commanding pinch, extinguishing all my efforts to escape.

“MI SPIACE, DOLCEZZA,” came a low murmur right in my ear, as the thumb affectionately stroked my jawline. “LOOK AT ME PAWING YOUR FACE LIKE THIS. IT'S AN EXTRA MEASURE OF ANONYMITY FOR YOUR BENEFIT. YOU ARE, AFTER ALL, INCONVENIENTLY EYE-CATCHING, DON’T YOU THINK?”

As we moved through another crowd and people hemmed in from both sides, I tried to shift my head out from the thumb to see if anyone had noticed me, though the lack of surprised exclamations already told me they hadn’t. The fingers responded to my squirming, tightening their grip, while the thumb began to stroke up and down my face as if in reassurance, sometimes gently scratching at my scalp.

"SILLY LITTLE MAN," she intoned, barely audible, "YOU CANNOT BE TRUSTED TO KEEP YOURSELF OUT OF TROUBLE…”

At the end of the floor, we ascended the small set of stairs up to another area, one I hadn’t been to yet. Dim lit, raised area off to the side, with a view of the central floor without being in the thick of it. In the corner of this floorspace, there was a corner booth and a lone young woman sitting on the banquette, watching us approach. Her light hair was tied back and she was wearing sandal heels and a champagne colored dress; the light, peaceful color emerging out of the dim lighting like a reprieve on my eyes, or maybe it just distracted me enough from the person holding me. She had bright, curious eyes and a friendly smirk. There were a couple of cocktails on the table, and a small paper cup of French fries with dipping sauce.

The girl leaned forward, relaxed, stretching both arms over the table, her eyes tracking me as I was brought closer.

“WHAT DO YOU HAVE THERE, SAM?” the girl said with a small, puzzled smile up at my keeper. “LOOKS LIKE A LITTLE PERSON.”

As the girl’s curious eyes dropped back down to me, her smile dampened while her eyes widened.

“OH MY GOD, IT IS A LITTLE PERSON.”

“HE HAS A NAME,” came the response, composed but not unfriendly, “AND I BELIEVE HE WOULD PREFER IF YOU WERE TO USE IT. THIS IS MR MOUSSEAU.”

“ISN’T THAT JERRY MOUSSEAU?”

My feet came down onto the firm table surface as the tanned fingers uncurled, while I stood shakily for a second, and the banquette rustled as the seat directly behind me was taken up, at a right angle from the other girl.

“No. His twin brother,” I said.

“PLEASED TO MEET YOU, WHICHEVER MOUSSEAU YOU ARE,” the girl played along. “DARCY.” And one of her hands came sliding over the table towards me.

“UHM, HOW DO WE DO THIS…?” she said, extending her fingertips as if to shake my hand. Instead, I bent and planted a kiss on the reflective nail dome, which elicited an impressed smile from the girl, as she said:

“OH. A TRUE GENTLEMAN.”

“JERRY IS VERY MUCH THE GENTLEMAN,” the poised voice conceded behind me, as a finger brushed my back and began rubbing between my shoulder blades.

“SO, SAM…YOU NEVER TOLD ME YOU KNEW JERRY…!” the girl exclaimed in surprise, looking between me and up above my head. “HOW DO YOU GUYS KNOW EACH OTHER?”

No one said anything for a second. The finger at my back hesitated, curling so the knuckle rested against my spine.

“Mutual work acquaintances,” I said, shifting my weight on my feet, putting my hands into my pockets. “I did a modelling shoot and we bumped into each other.”

The fingerpad made a firm smoothing motion over my left shoulder, like a hand giving my shoulder a reassuring squeeze. Then it went back to rubbing my backbone.

“OH,” Darcy went on, as if uninterrupted, and leaned over the table towards me, “SAMANTHA AND I ALSO MET THROUGH WORK. A WORK FUNCTION.”

She took Samantha’s other hand across the table and squeezed it, and I said:

“You guys are dating?”

“THAT IS CORRECT,” Darcy replied coyly. "HOW ABOUT YOU?” she said, pulling a fry out of the pile, dipping it in sauce and eating it. “IN A RELATIONSHIP?”

“Yeah. I’m engaged.”

“OH, CONGRATULATIONS!”

Samantha said nothing.

A huge forefinger – Darcy’s – extended into my face to gently prod my chest, coincidently where my tattoo was. 

“YOU’RE TOO CUTE TO BE SINGLE,” she decided aloud.

Looking away for a moment, Darcy shifted in her seat, folding her arms over the table while leaning towards me eagerly:

“I DON’T WANT TO SEEM LIKE SOME CRAZY ANNOYING FAN,” she said with an anxious smile, “BUT COULD I, YOU KNOW, POSSIBLY GET YOUR AUTOGRAPH?”

“Sure,” I said, grateful for the distraction.

She whipped a pen and notepad out of her handbag, tearing a blank page off and placing it on the table in front of me, and then, with some hesitation, put sliding the pen into my awaiting hands. I stood it up on its tip and gripped it like a flagpole.

“SORRY,” she said, “I DON’T HAVE A SMALLER PEN.”

“It’s fine,” I said, holding the pen a bit like a shovel and dragging it over the paper. I wrote out a short, personalized inscription before signing my name.

“HEY, JERRY…!” Raf’s voice cut through the room, and then he was striding up to the table, letting out a sound like his chest collapsed in relief. “LOOKING ALL OVER FOR YOU, MAN!”

“I’m sorry, buddy,” I said, presenting the pen and autograph back to Darcy. “I lost my phone.”

But he pulled it out of his pocket and held it up, clamped between his fingertips:

“NAH, MAN, I GOT IT. IT WAS ON CLYDE.”

His eyes flicked over the two women as if only just noticing them.

“WHOA, UH…DID I JUST WALK IN ON SOMETHING?”

“We’re just talking,” I said quickly.

“OH,” he sounded relieved. “JUST CHECKING IF WE’RE COOL TO HEAD OUT, BRO, BUT YOU LOOK LIKE YOU’RE—”

“No, I…” I began, dusting my sweating palms off on my thighs, “…I guess I should probably be getting out of here right about now…”

The vinyl banquette emitted a low sound as Samantha shifted forward, before a finger smoothly angled around my waist and held there. Her accented burr vibrated behind my head; as if she had hunched over me.

“I WOULD CARE FOR A CHAT WITH YOU FIRST, JERRY...”

And then, in afterthought, the finger stroked my belly as if to soften the gesture.

“…IF THAT’S ALRIGHT WITH YOU, OF COURSE.”

I placed my palms down on the finger, which was surprisingly warm and accruing a sheen of perspiration on the inside of the joints. It made me wonder if she was as anxious as I felt. I twisted around and looked up warily. It seemed as though my memory had cheated me: she was more disquietingly beautiful than I had recalled. Her head was turned down, dark eyes examining me with interest.

Then I looked across at Raf, who was staring at Samantha.

“Maybe I’ll hang back for now.”

“I WILL TAKE CHARGE OF HIS TRANSPORT A LITTLE LATER ON,” Samantha offered to Raf, while her fingers squeezed my neck in a massaging way.

“WELL, IF THESE LADIES HAVE GOT YOU ALL COVERED,” Raf said down to me, shuffling awkwardly on his feet, “I’MM’A ROLL OUT.”

He gave me a wink.

“Sure. See you, Raf.”

He put my phone on the table, saluted me goodbye, and went back down the steps onto the central floor, heading towards the club’s exit.

Darcy took another fry and coated it in dip.

“SO, JERRY, HOW DO YOU LIKE THIS PLACE, ANYWAY?” she asked me, casting a brief look out towards the dancefloor where Raf had last been seen. Her smirk returned as her head turned back to me. “YOU SEE THOSE GIRLS UP ON THE PODIUMS? LIKE A GO-GO BAR.”

“Think I’ll check out a smaller club next time.” I rubbed my sweaty hands together. “Does anyone have a hand wipe?”

Samantha removed a sanitizing wipe from her handbag and gave it to me.

“SHE KEEPS A WHOLE STASH OF SUPPLIES IN THERE,” Darcy commented.

I also knew this from personal experience.

The wet wipe was a tiny folded up square, but unfolded, was to me more like a towel, damp with ethanol antibacterial. I began to run it over my hands, and then my bare arms and face, as well as the back of my neck. The women were silent, watching me. Then—

“JERRY…” Darcy said suddenly.

I looked up from the wet wipe to see her smiling down at me, shyly.

“…UM…IF YOU’RE LOOKING FOR A SEAT, YOU COULD ALWAYS SIT IN MY HAND. IT’S FREE RIGHT NOW,” she waggled her fingers, adding eagerly: “NO RESERVED SIGN, SEE? I WOULD HURRY BEFORE SOMEONE ELSE TAKES IT.”

She held her hand open, palm up against the table as I wandered over – her smile becoming less shy and more pronounced – and climbed onto the platform of soft, crease-lined skin, stretching my legs out and resting my arm along her cocked thumb, nail coated in ruby red polish. She giggled as my fingers and heels dug against her flesh, it must have tickled.

“LET’S GET A PHOTO, THE THREE OF US!” she said. “GET IN, GET IN!” she said, sliding up against Samantha.

Sitting in Darcy’s palm, I was lifted up just under the women’s faces as Samantha took the photo with her phone. The women shifted and rustled on the seat and I sensed them exchange looks and conspiratorial gestures behind my head, but before I could turn my head to see what they were doing, I had the instantaneous impression that my head was about to get crushed between compacting walls; as both women came in swiftly, one on either side, their sultry lips ensconcing my tiny head in a moist smooching embrace. It was captured in photo, and snatching Samantha’s phone for review, Darcy laughed bashfully; my face was so perfectly enclosed between the lush padding of their combined lips that it looked like they were kissing each other just above my headless body.

As Samantha put her phone down again, and I self-consciously wiped the mask of saliva and lipstick and lipgloss off my features, Darcy gently lifted her hand, and me, up and down in experimental fashion.

“I’VE NEVER HELD A BODYBUILDER IN ONE HAND.” Then to me: “HE’S SO LIGHT!”

“AND VERY STRONG,” Samantha muttered in earnest.

“I’m not a bodybuilder,” I frowned, trying to visualize what my body used to look like before I’d shrunk, and disturbed that I couldn’t. “I just work out.”

Darcy laughed and shook her head as if she didn’t believe me.

“NO, I WORK OUT. YOU’RE A MINIATURE MUSCLE MAN!”

Her other hand swept in close, fingers extending towards me with hesitation.

“CAN I HAVE A LITTLE FEEL, THERE?”

“Sure,” I said, holding out my arms.

Her fingertip began probing around my shoulder muscle, and giving my bicep a small pinch between forefinger and thumb. Before I could react, one of her fingers smoothly rolled over my chest so she could inspect my pecs.

“OH, IS THAT A TATTOO?” she cooed. “THAT IS JUST GORGEOUS – SAM, LOOK AT HIS CHEST!”

Samantha hunched down and stroked a thumbnail over my pec to pull it taut, her brow narrowing as she read the little brand. As she did this, I could feel one of Darcy’s fingertips now probing around my back muscles with interest, and tracing my ribs with a nail.

Then she grinned down at me:

 “NICE INK WORK. IS ‘J.S.T’ YOUR…LET ME GUESS, FIANCEE?”

“Yeah, that’s right.”

“I HOPE SO, OTHERWISE THAT WOULD BE A LITTLE EMBARRASSING.” Then she sighed as if reminiscence, and said innocently: “BUT WE ALL MAKE MISTAKES WHEN WE’RE IN LOVE, DON’T WE?”

I avoided all eye contact for a moment.

Darcy then challenged me to a wrestling competition between my arm and the pinky finger of her free hand. I won, so she switched to her thumb, and then I lost. Samantha watched with amusement, and then, satisfied I was being supervised, slid out from the table, and turning back to us, said:

“CARE FOR SOMETHING FROM THE BAR? I’M JUST GETTING A DRINK MYSELF.”

“NO, THANK YOU, SAM,” Darcy replied, raising her half-finished cocktail for a sip. “I’M STILL TAKING MY TIME, HERE.”

Samantha’s eyes then fell upon me. When I was silent, she said, businesslike:

“HAVE SOMETHING. I WON’T INSIST THAT YOU DRIVE ME HOME.”

“Anything with whiskey,” I relented.

She melted into the dark crowds.

Darcy started dipping french fries again, while I sat in her other hand, slumped against her thumb, letting my body rest from all the running earlier.

“YOU’RE SUPER CHILL,” she observed out loud, mid-fry. “I SEE HOW YOU AND SAM CLICKED. SHE DOESN’T TALK MUCH EITHER.”

“You guys come here often?” I said, lazily watching each fry in turn get withdrawn, dipped in sauce, and taken up to her mouth to be mulched.

“HONESTLY, THIS IS NOT OUR SCENE,” she replied, “BUT SHE WANTED TO, SO…” Glancing around, she shrugged.

“Well,” I said, “she’s full of surprises.”

“YEAH,” she chuckled, and then, hesitating for a moment, lowered her voice. "SHE MIGHT SEEM TOTALLY MODEST AND, LIKE, THIS PERFECTLY PROPER GIRL," then, wiggling her eyebrows at me, "BUT SHE'S SAVAGE IN BED."

"I'll take your word for it."

"DON'T SAY ANYTHING; SHE'D BE MORTIFIED IF SHE KNEW I SAID THAT."

"I would never.”

In gratitude, she squirmed her finger under my chin to tickle me, and accidentally painting the underside of my jaw with the French fry grease coating her fingertip.

“OH,” she giggled, slightly tipsy, “I’M GETTING MY FINGERPRINTS ALL OVER YOU. HERE, LET ME—” She took the wet wipe from earlier and passed a corner of it around my face to wipe the grease off.

“I’m glad she’s found someone—” I said, once the wet wipe had stopped blotting around my face.

“AHEM, I AM NOT JUST ‘SOMEONE.’” A fingernail jabbed into my ribs, catching me off guard. I staggered on my feet and into the soft inside of a cupped hand that had quickly swept around me to catch me again.

“Of course not.”

“I’M ONLY TEASING,” she grinned, leaning forward and snatching up another fry. “SORRY. PLEASE CONTINUE.”

“She’s found someone who brings the good parts out.”

Darcy was quiet, distracting herself with the dip before looking at me again.

“YOU THINK SO?”

“I hope so.“

“I HOPE SO, TOO…” Darcy looked away, considering her words, “…YOU’VE KNOWN HER LONG?”

“I wouldn’t say long, but we were close…” then, to deflect suspicion about the past tense, quickly corrected myself: “—I mean, are close.” That didn’t sound right either, but too late, I’d said it.

Fumbling for words, I went on:

“I mean, she’s very delicate and you have to treat her carefully…or else, big trouble.” Then words failed completely and I clamped my jaw shut until my thoughts stopped babbling.

“Don’t say anything to her,” I mumbled, “or—”

“SHE’D BE MORTIFIED?” Darcy raised an eyebrow, “WELL, I THINK IF SHE KNEW YOU FELT THAT WAY, SHE WOULD JUST MELT.”

“No, I’d be mortified.”

“BUT IT’S SO SWEET,” she insisted. “YOU’RE LIKE HER LITTLE GUARD DOG, JUST MAKING SURE I TREAT HER LIKE A LADY OTHERWISE YOU’LL COME AFTER ME.”

She looked away with a small smile.

“I COULD TELL YOU GUYS WERE TIGHT EVEN BEFORE YOU SAID ANYTHING. SAM DOESN’T LET HER SOFT SIDE SHOW. BUT SHE’S ALL OVER YOU LIKE YOU’RE HER FAVORITE BABY COUSIN.”

That struck me dumb. Darcy seemed to sense my awkwardness and dropped the subject. To smooth over the quiet, she offered me a French fry, and then giggled as I tried to bite into it like a corn cob.

“WATCH AND LEARN, SMALL FRY,” she said, taking a small handful and ate them in one mouthful, over my head, just to tease me.