Chapter 1

Scott Carey, now a mere four inches tall, sprawled across the dollhouse couch, its cracked plastic seams digging into his frail, sweat-dampened skin. The couch’s faded floral fabric, a garish pink, smelled faintly of mildew, a reminder of the damp basement where the dollhouse had languished before Louise dragged it upstairs for him. The ceiling loomed above, its peeling paint a distant, mottled sky, mocking his fall from the man who once cast a towering shadow over their clapboard home. He shut his eyes, the air thick with dust motes swirling in the lamplight, haunted by memories of his old life—before the mist, before the shrinking, before the whiskey-soaked rages that left Louise bruised and silent, her eyes averted at the dinner table.

Their marriage had been a battlefield, fought in the cramped rooms of their two-story house. Scott’s drunken fists had painted Louise’s skin with purples and blues, marks she hid beneath long-sleeved blouses and brittle smiles for neighbors, her coworkers at the insurance office, and her sister, who’d stopped visiting after Scott’s last outburst. Rehab had dulled the violence for a fleeting year, their fragile truce marked by quiet dinners and cautious touches, until that day on the boat. A strange mist had enveloped him during a fishing trip on Lake Waban, its oily sheen clinging to his skin, burning faintly as it seeped into his pores. His arms prickled, his vision blurred, and a faint hum buzzed in his skull for days. Then his body began to compress, as if squeezed by an unseen vise, his six-foot frame dwindling inch by inch. With each lost inch, his old demons clawed back. Whiskey bottles piled up in the garage, their amber glow a siren call, and the abuse—sharp words, sharper blows—returned. Louise endured, her silence a fortress, her hands trembling as she bandaged her own bruises, until his shrinking stripped away his dominance, leaving him a shadow of the man he’d been.

The shift came when he was twenty-four inches tall, barely reaching Louise’s knee. Scott raised his hand, the old rage surging, aiming for her thigh as she stood in their kitchen, chopping carrots for a stew that smelled of thyme and regret. But Louise’s fingers seized his wrist, her grip iron, her manicured nails—painted a soft coral—drawing a pinprick of blood that stung his shrunken skin. She shoved him to the linoleum, its cold, cracked surface biting his back, and pinned his chest with her nylon-clad foot, the sheer fabric warm and faintly scented with lavender lotion. His lungs burned, each breath a struggle, as her shadow swallowed him, the kitchen’s fluorescent light haloing her dark hair. “Look at you,” she spat, her voice venomous, her lips trembling with years of buried pain. “Pathetic. My toe could end you now.” Scott thrashed, his fists pounding her foot, the nylon slick against his knuckles, but dread coiled in his gut, a sickening weight. Her eyes gleamed—anger, triumph, or both—as she towered above, her skirt swaying like a storm cloud. The man who’d ruled their home was gone, replaced by a fragile thing at her mercy, his power reduced to a fading echo.

Now, Louise prepared for an overnight business trip to Chicago, her first escape since Scott’s shrinking forced her back to work at the insurance office. Their finances had crumbled as he withered, the mortgage on their aging house a noose tightening with each unpaid bill. She craved one night free of his shrill taunts, delivered from the dollhouse’s tiny porch, his voice a mosquito’s whine piercing the quiet. Deep down, she imagined him shrinking to nothing, a speck lost in the carpet’s weave, this nightmare dissolving into memory. Yet guilt gnawed at her—hadn’t she vowed to love him, in sickness and in health, even as he became less than human? Her wedding ring, still worn despite the dents from his fists, glinted as she packed, a reminder of promises fraying like the house’s worn curtains. Scott insisted he could manage alone, his pride a brittle shield, but Louise, unconvinced, had asked her coworker Linda to stay. Linda’s agreement came with a strange eagerness, her smile too sharp in the office break room, her fingers twitching as if itching to toy with something breakable, a gleam in her eyes Louise couldn’t place.

Louise grabbed her overnight bag, a scuffed leather satchel stuffed with a change of clothes and a dog-eared novel, the clock on the mantel ticking down to Linda’s arrival. The living room felt vast, its high ceilings and sagging bookshelves dwarfing the dollhouse where Scott hid, its plastic facade a cruel parody of their home. Her footsteps thundered on the hardwood, each step rattling the dollhouse’s flimsy walls, sending tremors through Scott’s tiny bones. The air carried the faint scent of lemon polish, a futile attempt to mask the house’s musty decay. “Scott?” she called, her voice a low boom, echoing off the walls adorned with faded family photos—Scott at six feet, Louise smiling, their past a taunt. No answer. She sighed, irritation flaring, her fingers tightening around the bag’s strap. “Scott, I’m leaving.”

He dragged himself from the couch, his bare feet sinking into the couch’s coarse fabric, and stepped through the dollhouse’s door, heart pounding under her towering gaze. The carpet’s worn pile loomed around him like a forest, its fibers scratching his shins, dust choking his tiny lungs. Louise loomed above, her black patent heels as tall as he was, their glossy surfaces reflecting his diminished form, distorted like a funhouse mirror. Her sheer pantyhose shimmered, catching the lamplight, vanishing beneath a black-and-white checkered miniskirt that swayed with her slightest movement. Her blouse, a crisp white, hugged her frame, a silver necklace glinting at her throat—a gift from Scott in better days, now a bitter relic. “Linda’s coming,” she said, her tone clipped, her lips pursed as she adjusted her watch, its ticking a faint metronome in the silence. “Don’t get yourself stepped on.” As she turned, the doorbell pierced the quiet, a sharp chime that made Scott flinch, heralding Linda’s arrival.

Scott’s jaw tightened, old venom rising, fueled by the whiskey he’d sipped from a thimble hidden in the dollhouse’s kitchen. “Business trip? Dressed like that, you’re asking for it,” he spat, his tiny fists clenched, the words echoing the days he’d struck her for wearing anything that caught another man’s eye. Louise’s eyes blazed, a storm brewing in their hazel depths. She dropped her bag, the thud quaking the carpet, sending a shockwave through Scott’s frail frame. “What’s wrong with my outfit?” she hissed, stepping closer, her heel sinking into the carpet’s fibers, the faint creak of her shoe leather audible to his heightened senses. “I work to keep us alive, and all you do is spit venom. Sometimes I want to crush you.”

“Try it,” Scott snapped, his voice cracking, defiance masking the fear clawing his chest. “End this.” Louise raised her foot, the sole looming like a guillotine, its tread flecked with dirt from the driveway, a speck of gravel glinting like a cruel eye. Scott flinched, his pulse hammering, his shrunken muscles tensing as the air grew heavy with her lavender scent. But a knock at the door froze her, the sound sharp as a gunshot. “Your babysitter’s here,” she said, her voice ice, her foot lowering with deliberate slowness, brushing the carpet near the dollhouse, sending a puff of dust into Scott’s face. She stormed off, each step a deliberate tremor shaking the dollhouse, the floorboards groaning under her weight. Scott’s throat burned with an apology he couldn’t voice, the words sour as the whiskey on his breath. She’d looked beautiful, he admitted, jealousy twisting his frail heart, frail as a sparrow’s. He pictured her with another man in Boston, himself a speck crushed under a careless heel, his body a smear too small to mourn.

The front door creaked open, Louise’s “Hello!” warm but brittle, masking the fight’s aftershocks. Scott tensed, expecting a frumpy coworker, perhaps the mousy receptionist from Louise’s office. Instead, a statuesque blonde stepped into view, her blue eyes piercing through the living room’s dim light. Linda’s black minidress hugged her curves, suntan pantyhose glinting like liquid gold, her five-inch stilettos revealing red-painted toes, each nail a perfect crescent. Her heels gleamed like polished blades, dwarfing Scott’s four-inch frame, their sharp points denting the hardwood with each step.

“Well, hello,” Linda purred, her voice a velvet blade, her smile predatory as she crossed the threshold, her perfume—a sharp floral note—cutting through the room’s musty air. “You’re just so… tiny.” Her fingers twitched, red nails catching the lamplight, as if aching to pluck him from his fragile refuge. Scott’s chest tightened, his shrunken heart racing, picturing those stilettos descending, his body bursting beneath their weight, a smear on the polished floor.

Louise nudged him with her pump’s tip—a light tap for her, but it sent him sprawling across the carpet, its fibers scraping his shrunken skin, leaving faint red welts. She smirked, her lips curling with a mix of contempt and amusement. “Say hello, Scott.” He swallowed a curse, righted his tattered loincloth, its threads fraying from weeks of wear, and muttered, “Nice to meet you, Linda,” his voice thick with dread, barely audible over the ticking mantel clock.

Linda crouched slightly, her minidress stretching, her red nails glinting as if ready to snatch him. “I’m late,” Louise said, grabbing her bag, her fingers brushing the necklace, a fleeting touch that stirred a pang of guilt. “Behave, Scott.” To Linda, she added, “Call if you need me,” her voice sharp, betraying her unease.

“Oh, Scott’s in good hands,” Linda replied, her stiletto tapping the floor, sending a tremor through the dollhouse’s walls, a faint crack splitting its plastic porch. Louise glanced at Linda’s hands—elegant, with slender fingers and crimson nails—and pictured Scott cradled in them, those fingers tightening until his fragile body snapped. A flicker of jealousy surged, echoing the resentment she’d buried when Scott’s shrinking began, mingled with fear for what she was leaving behind. “I hope I’m not making a mistake,” she murmured, her hand lingering on the doorknob, the cold metal grounding her as she shut the door with a heavy thud.