Aaron just stared up at her helplessly. It felt wrong, somehow, the way she was using him. Taking a deep breath, he began to massage her skin, less vigorously this time. The minutes passed quickly, and Aaron grew more and more accustomed to his new position. As he moved on to her toes he noticed that he was no longer exhausted like before. He took hold of her little toe, feeling it all over with his arms. He laid his head just beneath her toenail and stroked his cheek against it. Why he did so he could not tell, except that it felt good.

But she did not let him linger. With a flick of her finger she’d knocked him off, and he found himself lying on his back beneath her foot. She lowered it gradually, as if she were about to crush him. But she just rested her heel on the bed, and he had the whole bottom of her foot left to work on. He ran his fingers across the little ridges and valleys of her skin. To her it felt like a light tickle, and she withdrew her foot, laughing.

“You’re not that bad, you know,” she said, retrieving him from her bed. “I was going to let you go sometime, but now I think I’ll keep you around permanently. Just imagine all the things I could do with you!”

“K-k-k-keep me?” he stammered. “Y-you can’t k-k-keep me! I…I’m a human being, and…and…”

“Oh, shut up!” she interrupted. “I’m doing you a favour, so stop complaining! If you want to survive here, you’d better learn your place! And that place is at my feet!”

She dropped him back onto the bed and stood up. Aaron watched, disorientated, as the colossal girl went to a table near the wall and began to look for something. She was so big! She must have been able to crush, not only people, but houses as well, with her powerful feet. Presently she came back to sit on the bed. He tried to scamper away, but she pinned him beneath her toes.

“Where do you think you’re going?” she asked. “The real work hasn’t even started yet.”

In her hand Aaron could see a bottle nail polish as big as he was. Lila removed the cap and set the bottle down next to him. He peered inside and saw that it was full of purple fluid. As he wondered what was going to happen next she handed him a large, unwieldy brush.

“Get to work, slave! I want all ten nails painted before four o’clock. And if I hear another complaint…”

“I know, I know, you’ll punish me,” he answered wearily.

“Ah, looks like you’re catching on!” she said. “One more thing, Aaron: you’ll be standing between my toes while you work. That way I’ll be able to squeeze you every time you do a bad job.”

“Yes, my lady.”

With great effort he managed to dip the brush into the bottle, then pull it back out. The tip was covered with purple nail polish, and he struggled to keep it aloft. Lila moved her foot a little and caught him between her big and second toes. Aaron winced as they squeezed his waist tightly, trapping him. He lowered the tip of the brush and rested it on the smooth surface of her big toenail. Back and forth he moved the brush, until her nail was covered in a purple sheen. From Aaron’s close-up point of view it sparkled in the afternoon light.

“Wow, I’m pretty good!” he thought, and looked up at her face for confirmation. But she simply extracted him from between her toes, redipped the brush, and planted him between her next two toes. So he merely continued as he had before, working as carefully as he could, and hoped she would be pleased with the end result.

Over an hour later an exhausted Aaron found himself once more pinned beneath Lila’s toes. She was inspecting her polished nails, holding up one foot at a time. And, for once, she was genuinely impressed. The human had done an excellent job, better than she could have done herself. And this despite his lack of strength, and the fact that she was constantly pressing his body to hinder his movements. She couldn’t help but admire the tiny, panting, sweating figure lying stretched out on her bed. But then she realized how late it was, and quickly picked him up.

“Mom and Dad will be back at any moment,” she said urgently. “I’ve got to hide you now, Aaron. Just stay quiet, and when it’s safe I’ll take you out again.”

He wondered what she meant, but soon found out. She opened a little cupboard and took out a knitted sock. Into this she stuffed him, before rolling it up and putting it back in the cupboard. Aaron found himself in utter darkness, surrounded on all sides by dense, soft fabric. A familiar smell hung around him - the smell of her giant feet. He moved around a bit until he was sort of comfortable, and quickly fell asleep.

It was the fresh air that awoke him. All of a sudden he was lying on a soft, fleshy surface. He opened his eyes, and screamed when he saw two giant green orbs above him. A massive finger pressed down on his mouth and silenced him.

“Be quiet!” Lila whispered sharply. “Everyone’s asleep, but if you wake them, it’s all over. Here, look. I’ve brought you some food and water.”

She put him down on her pillow. Beside him stood a saucer with small amounts of bread, butter, meat and salad leaves on it. Next to it stood a thimble full of water. Aaron could barely contain his joy. He rushed over to the food and began to stuff it in his mouth. It was the first proper food he’d had in months. The water tasted pure and sweet, not at all like the foul water he’d been given while in prison. All the while Lila watched him in silence, as if she was waiting for him to finish. When he finally did, she gave a little cough to get his attention.

“Aaron…” she began, then hesitated slightly. “I’d like to ask you something. Where did you come from?”

“Uh…from the human lands, I guess…”

“Yes, I know that. What I meant was, where exactly did you live before you came here?”

He didn’t know why she was suddenly so interested in him, but he decided the best thing to do would be to tell the truth.

“I was in prison, my lady,” he answered. “I…I stole some food, and they threw me in jail, and there was an earthquake…”

“Prison? You were in prison?”

“Yes, my lady.”

She regarded him a moment before speaking again.

“Aaron, you know I said I was planning to let you go, but that I actually want to keep you? Well, I’ve thought about it a little, and I realized that it would be best to let you go after all. I really want to keep you, but that wouldn’t be right of me. What I made you do today, well, it was wrong, and I’m sorry. You’re not my slave, even though I treated you like one. However, if you were stuck in prison, perhaps me keeping you is not a bad idea after all. I’ll be eighteen in a week or so. Then I don’t have to live with my parents anymore - I could go and stay on my own somewhere, and I won’t have to hide you all the time. You see, I really enjoyed what you did today, the massage, everything. If you like, we could do it again.”

Aaron’s eyes widened. He couldn’t believe that the girl speaking to him was the same one who’d threatened to kill him earlier if he didn’t work hard enough. Could she really have had a change of heart? Looking around, at all the leftover food, at the enormous bedroom where he’d be staying, he really didn’t feel like seeing that dungeon again.

“My lady…” he began.

“Oh, please, no!” she interrupted. “Call me Lila, please! I don’t know what I was thinking when I came up with that title. I guess I’ve been reading too many stories lately.”

“Uh, okay…Lila,” he went on. “Um, well, you see, it’s…it’s…I don’t know. I’d like to stay, but…”

“Hey, look, I don’t want to rush you, so why don’t you think about it for a while, and then tell me tomorrow? It’s very late, anyway, and I have to go to school tomorrow morning.”

“Oh, uh, thanks,” he replied. It was all he could say at the moment. He had no idea whether or not he could trust her. But in his heart he felt that she really was sincere. She climbed into bed and lay her head beside him on the pillow.

“Good,” she said. “Now, if I may, I’d like to ask one more thing of you today. I’ve got this little itch on my right foot, and I was wondering if you’d scratch it for me.”

“Yes! Of course I…I mean, I’d love to!”

“Really? That’s so sweet of you, Aaron! Now go on, just follow my body until you reach my feet. And don’t touch anything else, okay? You haven’t earned it yet!”

He climbed down the side of the pillow and headed in underneath her blanket. On and on he crept, in the shadow of her colossal body. He wished he could touch her, feel her and caress her, but he didn’t dare disobey her orders. At last he reached the very tip of her legs. In front of him lay her enormous right foot. He began to scratch it, just like she asked. Though she could crush him simply by moving her foot towards him, he wasn’t afraid.

“I think I’ll like it here,” he thought as he massaged her skin between his fingers. “She’s not so bad, I guess. And she does have the most beautiful feet I’ve ever seen.”

Lila shifted a little in her sleep. Aaron could hear her muffled breathing, even from all the way down here. He stroked the surface of her foot one last time, before lying down just beyond the tips of her toes. A strange new world awaited him, and he decided to enjoy it as much as can.

The end.