Buzz! Buzz! Buzz!

“Ugah! So loud!”

“Zzzz…”

Buzz! Buzz! Buzz!

“Lori, your alarm!”

“Zzzzzzzz……………”

“Damnit, she can’t hear me.”

Living at 3” tall while I was at home took some getting used to. Being 24 times smaller made mornings so much more different than just waking up and getting going. Because my original room was now Alice’s, I was now staying in my sister’s room in a doll house underneath her desk. 

“Well, I guess I’m awake now,” I tried to tune out the all-encompassing alarm clock ringing by putting on my headphones and blasting some music. I was a little thankful that I had Lori shrink some of my things along with me. It was a pain to reach for the desk from the bed, though. 

Why? Unfortunately, because we didn’t have a doll house in the apartment originally, Lori and I had to search for one to buy. The only ones we could find locally were standard barbie dollhouses. Those weren’t even 1:12 scale. They were 1:6 scale. Because I was twenty four times smaller, that meant even the dollhouse furniture was huge to me. Everything was four times bigger.

“Damn… my back. Plastic hurts,” I rubbed my back as I literally hopped off of the doll bed and hobbled over to my backpack where my clothes were. We didn’t prioritize shrinking too many other things for the first night because we hoped there wouldn’t be a need for it, but it seemed there had to be. As I got changed, I realized I was going to have to note now what I think I needed. “I’ll let Lori know we’ll have to shrink my mattress too for tomorrow night.”

Besides the mattress, some more clothes would definitely be useful. My phone’s charge was also low, sadly, because there was no way there would be any electricity in a dollhouse. Since there was an outlet nearby, I considered if not shrinking my phone would be an option.

“Oh boy, the door knob…,” In any case, after finishing changing, I realized when I got to the door that even that was out of my reach. Even if I tried jumping, I wouldn’t reach it at my comparative height. It took a moment for my still-half asleep self to remember that this was a dollhouse, though. “Wait, what am I thinking?”

There was another way out. The dollhouse had one wall missing so that kids could play with their dolls more easily. For privacy’s sake, I asked Lori to face that missing wall against the action wall. There was a one inch gap between the dollhouse and it, so my tiny body could easily squeeze out. I trekked out from underneath Lori’s desk where I saw my sister was sitting up on her bed, her eyes still closed and her light brown hair sticking out in every direction.

“Ugugh…” she was mumbling but not moving.

“Heh, bad with mornings as ever,” I smirked. Lori usually fixed herself up before she left her room, so I hadn’t seen her so disheveled in years.

Considering she was now awake, I was about to go get Lori’s attention but was beaten to the punch by a knock on the door.

Knock! Knock!

“Lori, are you awake?” It was Alice.

“Mgah? Yawwwn~! Alice?” my sister let out a long yawn as she stretched her arms out. She tried rubbing the sand out of her eyes, but still kept them closed as she adjusted the strap of her tank top.

“Sorry if I woke you up… Um, this is embarrassing, but I can’t figure out the toilet.”

Lori understood immediately. We didn’t have a generic toilet like most households. “Hm…? Oh, the washlet? I guess ours is a bit complicated… Yawwwwwn~! Okay. Just let me get up!”

I watched as my sister pushed herself off the bed and started walking to the door. Although I said ‘watched’, I also got involved. I realized too little too late that I was in my big sister’s way. In two steps, her half-asleep self crossed the room towards me. I started to turn and run while calling out to her. “Wait Lor-”

Stomp!

In an instant, I was buried underneath my sister’s barefoot. The ball of her foot pressed down onto my back. My body was slammed into the carpet by the hundreds of tons of her relative body weight.

“Uwoah!”

But it wasn’t over. Lori was still walking to the door. When she lifted her foot, I was rapidly yanked upwards. My 3 inch body was stuck to her foot. I watched the floor get further and further away as if I were rising up in an elevator.

Then, just as quickly as it had gone up, Lori’s foot fell down again. She had taken another step. I kissed the carpeted floor of her room once again - even harder this time.

And then again. And then again until Lori got to the door to unlock and open it for Alice.

“Yaaaaaawn~! Morning, Alice. Did you sleep well? Was the mattress too hard?” I heard my sleepy sister ask.

“I’m not used to things yet but it wasn’t too bad.”

“That’s good to hear. Hope you have a good time here without your mom around. You’ve got to enjoy college life as much as you can, girl. Remy and I will support you all the way.”

“Speak of which… Um, is Remy okay? He’s probably had the worst sleep between all of us.”

“Hm? Oh, I’m not sure. We got a dollhouse for him to get his own privacy, so I hope the furniture in it was good enough for him, but I don’t know if he’s even awake yet.”

Lori pointed to where the dollhouse was under her desk for Alice to see. As she did, her foot turned, grinding me into the carpet further but also finally releasing half of my body from being underneath her.

“Mgrk… Gwah! Gah! ”I groaned as I gasped for air. I was uninjured but at the same time physically exhausted from the stomps. I wasn’t good with roller coaster riders either so I was a little nauseous from the rapid rising and falling of my big sister walking.

“Huh? Did I just hear som- Remy?!” Alice was the first to hear me. She looked down at her feet to see me pinned under Lori’s foot. “Lori! R-Remy is- He’s under you!” 

“Huh?” Lori  lifted her foot one more time. Because half of my body was still stuck to her, I was whipped through the air as Lori pulled it up so she could look at it.

“Uwah!” I let out a yelp as the world became a speedy blur around me.

When my sister stopped, the momentum added to my body finally freed me from sticking to her feet, but, because I was now up in the air, I quickly had to grab something as I felt gravity start to pull me down. I clung onto toes bigger than my head desperately to not fall off.

“Whoa. How long have you been under there, Remy?” Lori was surprised but also impressed at the same time. “My bad. I didn’t feel you at all.”

“Y-Your senses sure are dull in the mornings, Sis,” I groaned, struggling to hang on. I shouted up at her. “Now can you let me down slowly? I feel like I’ve been flattened into paper enough times this morning.”

“Are you okay, Remy?” Alice was concerned.

“He seems to have plenty of energy at least,” Lori chuckled. My sass told her that I was fine.

“Mpff!” To make sure I wouldn’t actually lose my grip, Lori used her finger to push me between her toes which she used to hold me in place. She did as I had asked and lowered her foot back down to the floor slowly. Only when her foot was flat on the ground did she spread her toes, allowing me to stumble out from between them, falling to my knees in between her feet and Alice’s.

Both girls looked down at me from up above - Alice with worry and Lori only after she got the last piece of sand out of her eyes.

“Uh… Good morning, Remy?” Alice was courteous enough to greet me even in this situation. She clearly didn’t know what else to say.

“Yeah… Hah… Morning.”

With those words, the day began with me having already gotten stepped on. Alice led Lori out of the room so my sister could show her how the washlet worked. Just as Alice was going to have to learn about using the things around our house, I was going to have to learn how to avoid trouble at my new size. Hopefully Lori would learn to be more attentive and careful too, but I somehow doubted that.

In any case, I was now well aware that mornings at this size were guaranteed to be rough.