“...Hmhmhm~!” light humming mixed with the sounds of running water that Saturday morning.  Early Saturdays were lazy mornings at our apartment. After all, it was the weekend. It felt good to rest up and do things with a slow, relaxed pace after a fun Friday night. That was why, while Alice was enjoying her shower, Lori was sprawled out on the living room carpet with me.

“So how is it?”

“Ngrh! Well, it’s easier to climb up than the ladders, but it’s a bit too big even for something you made.”

“I agree. It’s neater than Alice’s, but it’s still too clunky for the living room. I guess we should just put these away. I thought it’d give you some more mobility around the house, but you need too many pieces to get you up a chair.”

“Maybe you can just make one that goes up to the button on the machine. Then I don’t have to ask you guys to grow me back all the time.”

“Heh. That wouldn’t work since you have to be on the platform at the same time you hit the switch. You’ll just have to keep tapping at our feet to remind us when you need to leave the house, Remy. Ngh~!”

Wham!

“W-Whoa!”

My sister stretched recklessly, accidentally kicking the lego staircase she had built for me to climb up to coffee table height. I jumped off just in time before the entire staircase turned 90 degrees from the impact, but that didn’t stop me from falling. My heart jumped into my throat as I fell down onto the pillow below - having discovered what it would feel like to jump off a collapsing building like in action movies. Sadly, I still wasn’t able to avoid Lori’s feet. She had kicked both of her bare feet onto the same pillow that was my safety net. I was flanked to my left and right by her ankles and her left foot’s shadow fell over me.

Yawn!

“Damn, I seriously need that coffee right around now.”

“You’re tired? With all of the adrenaline in my system, I’m wide awake now,” I continued the conversation, having gotten used to being thrown around my big sister’s bare feet.

Early Saturday mornings were days everyone at our apartment typically slept in, but that morning, unlike Alice who had woken up well rested, Lori and I had bags under our eyes. I had a bit more energy than my sister because I was getting my blood flowing climbing the staircase she had built, but we were both waiting for the coffee pot to chime that it was ready.

Why were we so tired? The answer was simple.

We hadn’t slept at all.

“Hm…? Oh, finally. My program’s finished compiling,” Lori turned her head to the laptop that was right next to her while she was sprawled all over the carpet. “Aaaand, that’s not right. It’s not an error but the test variable I put in never went up… Oh! Is that line of code where I screwed up? … Darn, it was. Okay. Let’s try this again.”

“Gonna run it for another hour?”

“No choice. The battery on this old laptop sucks too, so I guess I’m stuck here all morning too,” she sighed. She hated using the laptop her lab gave her, but it was the only one with the programs and applications she needed on it. “Thanks for joining me in passing the time all night, Bro.”

“It’s the weekend, so I had nothing better to do,” sounding humble to make myself look good wasn’t as effective when I was holding my nose. The weight of her feet caused the pillow to sink, so I stumbled trying to make my way off of it and ended up falling onto the ball of right foot. “Gwoah!”

Lori turned her attention to her laptop which required her to roll over. Unfortunately for me, I couldn't get away as her feet bowled over me when she flipped over from lying on her back to lying on her side. I was smothered into the pillow by the weight of her right heel.

“Mgff! Lori!”

“Ah, sorry about that Rem- Gyak!”

“Mgrk!”

To both of our dismay, Lori flipping over had gotten the ethernet cable twisted around her leg. When she tried to get off of me, she suddenly got jerked back by the tension. Her heel had only gotten off of me before slamming right back down.

“… Oops. My bad,” Lori apologized. “I didn’t even realize it was around my leg. Maybe I need a nap after all this.”

“Maybe I’ll join you. I think that knocked the wind out of me enough to tire me out too…” I groaned. When Lori rolled over onto her stomach to get her foot off of me, I was pulled along with it. I was free from being smothered but I was plastered on her heel still due to the sweat and had to make an effort to push myself off.

We had stayed up all night chatting, playing board games, and watching videos on Lori’s tablet to keep ourselves preoccupied and awake while her computer program was compiling. While Lori’s project had nothing to do with me, I simply decided to hang out together with her to keep her company through the night.

We were both dead tired now in any case. I knew my sister was drifting off because she didn’t react at all as I crawled my way up her bare leg towards her black cotton shorts. Normally, her muscles would’ve tensed slightly, and I would’ve felt it at my scale. She didn’t react until I crawled up her shorts onto her left butt cheek. The ground beneath me jerked when she clenched her ass.

“Hey, what are you doing there?” 

“Just getting as far away from your feet as possible, so I won’t get stepped on again.”

“Heh, I thought you said you were tired. Seems like you have plenty of energy to me, Remy.”

“Moving keeps me awake. Here I go!” I answered, sliding down the slope of her butt onto her back. 

“Hey, I can’t move if you’re on my back! You’ll fall again if I turn or get up,” my sister frowned. She did realize something though as I walked around on her black tank top which was just a bit thicker than her shorts. “Oh wow. I can hardly feel you at all through my shirt.”

“Wasn’t that obvious from the start? I’m so light, I’m not even capable of massages. It’s super hard to feel me.”

“Well, yes. That’s why I’ve been going barefoot so often. Gotta make it easier to know I step on you,” she replied, “It just caught me off guard since I could definitely feel you slide down my ass there.”

“It was kind of fun,” I laughed.

“You… No comment,” my sister found it difficult to respond to my words. She must’ve been flustered because she chose to change the subject. I saw her head turn in the direction of the bathroom. I could hear the squeaking off the shower faucet as the sound of running water stopped. Alice must have finished her morning shower. “Do you think Alice has ever pulled an all nighter?”

“I don’t think so. I think she sleeps the most out of all of us,” I thought of how many hours each of us slept on average. “Unlike you and me, she has a pretty responsible sleep schedule.”

“A bit too responsible. She should definitely have more fun and go out more. She’s got to break a few rules and laws while she’s living here.”

“I think breaking the law would be going a bit too far, Lori,” I chuckled, knowing she was just joking. Still, I did agree with her. Alice usually just went straight home after her classes were over. The only times she went out was whenever she was invited by her friend, Nikki. And when she did, she usually contacted us to let us know even though she didn’t need to. “But you’re right. It couldn’t hurt for her to loosen up some more…”

“I wonder what’d she do that’d be considered irresponsible…” Lori mumbled. 

“As long as she’s responsible enough to stop toying with me.” I knew that such a thing was becoming impossible to demand now that Alice had gotten so used to my small size, but I still wanted that to happen.

“I don’t think that’s happening anytime s…oon….”

“Lori?” My sister’s voice drifted off. I couldn’t tell why she didn’t respond to me, so I had to get around her body to see her face.

It took me another minute before I finally got over to my sister’s shoulder.  I slid down her arm so that she could see that I was finally off her back. I had to walk even further before I could turn around and see her face. My sister’s chin was on her head and her eyelids were drooping. She was falling asleep. The exhaustion was getting to her.

Ring. Ring.

“...Huh? Hello…? Nikki?” We heard the loud ringing of Alice’s phone on maximum volume on the opposite end of the bathroom door. Someone had called her. Apparently, it was her friend, Nikki.

“Oh? That’s rare. A call this early?” Lori rubbed her eyes, trying her best to remain awake.

“Sounds like she’s going out to meet her friend.”

When it came to Alice’s time outside of the house, Lori and I didn’t really know too much outside of whatever Alice told us. We were all adults, including Alice, so we didn’t keep an eye on every single detail of her life like her mother wanted to do. We wanted her to have the freedom she never had so she could do whatever she wanted.

“... What-?! Already ... A-Ah! Sorry, Nikki… I fell asleep last night… I forgot to ask them. I’ll go ask them now…”

Creak!

“...Lori!”

“Huh? Alice?” Lori’s eyes widened when she looked up after our cousin left the bathroom.

Stomp!

“Whoa!”

Splash!

“Gak!”

Alice opened up the bathroom door clad in only her pink camisole and her white panties. The dozens of meters of distance (from my perspective) were crossed in just four steps. Because I had gotten in front of Lori earlier, I nearly got stepped on by a pair of still wet, fresh from the shower, feet. Even then, though, I couldn’t evade the drops of water that were still clinging and dripping off of Alice’s body. A droplet fell from her wet blonde hair and onto my head like a bucket of water, physically forcing me awake.

Lori was also forced awake, although from the mental shock instead. It gave her enough adrenaline to rush to cover me with her hands to prevent me from looking at our scantily clad cousin.

“Alice, Remy’s here!” Lori’s palm covered me in shadow. Both of us were surprised because she had gotten out of the bath in her underwear.

“... Huh? Oh, he is…” Alice didn’t show any signs of embarrassment or shock when she noticed me. Was it fine for her to not be concerned about me seeing her in her underwear? Apparently, it was because she paid it no mind and refocused the conversation immediately. “No, that’s perfect… Lori… Remy… Can I ask for a favor?”

“Huh? Sure? What is it?” Lori was confused, but it wasn’t often for our cousin to actually make a request of us. She agreed almost reflexively.

“Can my friend Nikki come over…?”

It was a simple request, but Alice’s eyes were burning with determination when she looked at my sister.

“Remy?” Lori tilted her palm ever so slightly so that she could glance down at me while still preventing me from seeing Alice. From the look in her eyes, she had already made her decision, but she wanted my confirmation as well.

“You already know what I think, Sis.” Of course, us siblings were of the same mind when it came to Alice.

“Then sure.”

We honestly didn’t care about permission. When you live on your own, you could invite your friends over anytime you wanted, but Alice had never had that luxury. With how her mother was, I doubted if any of her friends ever visited her house back then. The fact that Alice thought she had to ask us permission was evidence of that. It didn’t feel right to deny her.

“Eh?” Although we had agreed to her request, Alice was shocked. “… Is it really okay? What about Remy…?”

“Well, we’re not really keeping his shrinking a secret,” Lori answered calmly. She picked herself off the floor just a little, giving me a clear view of her breasts which were pressing into the carpet and the cleavage line that was bigger than I was tall. “A lot of people on campus know about the tech our lab’s been studying after all. I mean, I guess I don’t want your friend to touch the machine just in case it gets broken, but that’s on the same level as asking guests to not enter private rooms. Right, Remy?”

“Uh… Yeah,” it took me a second to regain my composure while looking straight at my sister’s cavernous cleavage. “It’s fine to invite people over. This house is just as much yours as it is ours.”

“It’s no problem on our end, so don’t hold back just because you’re worried about us, Alice,” Lori assured our cousin. “If you don’t want us around while she’s here, the two of us can just leave the house or hole up in my room too. That’d probably be safer for Remy too.”

Lori’s glance reminded me of the incident that happened weeks ago. “Right, being trapped in a boot during your study session with her was kind of rough.”

“Ah… I forgot about that…” Unlike me who had tried to block that experience out of my memory, Alice’s intonation told me that she had actually forgotten about it.

If she wanted her friend to come over, we’d have to prepare. It wouldn’t be safe for a shrunken guy to be around a stranger. Being 3 inches tall in the presence of my own sister and cousin who had grown accustomed to it was dangerous enough. Even if she was Alice’s friend, there was no telling how Nikki would react to me.

“But yeah, we should probably get things ready before she comes then. When is she coming, Alice?”

“Um… About that…”

Ding! Dong!

“Hey, Alice! It’s Nikki! I’m here!”

The moment I asked that question, the chime of the door bell called our attention. It was still only 9 in the morning on a Saturday, so it was rather early for all of us. Alice’s face turned red when Lori turned her gaze back to her.

“Sorry… I should’ve told you yesterday but I forgot before I fell asleep… She already got off the bus when I asked. Please don’t get mad at me…”

We weren’t mad at her, but a little earlier of a warning would have definitely been appreciated. 

“Well, I guess she’s being a lot more irresponsible like we wanted.”