Powerful spongy flesh and muscles threaten to crush my very being. A sauna-like sea of sweat and grime is all around me. I am Mom’s insole... Just like I knew she wanted.
I am smashed. Crushed. Her weight suddenly shifts to and fro, sending a steady stream of burning pain coursing through my body. She lifts her foot just a bit… and I rise along with it, stuck to the doughy, soft flesh of her sweaty foot. And this allows me just a moment. Just a moment to fill my lungs. Then the pressure increases as her full unimaginable weight stands upon me once again.
And she starts walking… again. The heat… the pressure… the feeling of her massive foot flesh as it starts engulfing, encasing, and pressing my tiny naked body... such torment. I cry, losing my tears in her sweat soaked foot-flesh... Her massive, sweaty foot is a thousand times larger than me. In her entirety… she’s standing atop of me, balanced, and unimaginably huge. Now mom has the laws of physics as on her side, and she knows it. The smell of her rubbery shoe is mixing with my dreamy mind. Confusing me.
…Sometimes my mind floats back to school, to Anna, or the car ride home, or to Ms. Pattie...
…but…
...I’m…
I can’t move. I can’t breathe. NO! I’M IN MOM’S SHOE! God, NO! Why won’t this end? Why won’t this just end! Her foot rises. Her foot falls. BOOM! Her foot rises. Her foot falls. BOOM! Her foot rises. Her foot falls. BOOM! Each step she takes drives me closer and closer to unconsciousness. Usually I can figure out where she is or what she’s doing. I can’t today. And at times I again forget that I’m in my Mom’s shoe at all… I’ll start thinking I’m still trapped under Anna’s massive sole, or forget what’s going on entirely. But I eventually pick up on the subtle differences and I remember I’m back underneath my mother.
…
…
…
…Wait. Wait. I’ve been unconscious… and I have no idea for how long. I’m crushed. Still underneath her.
“But Mom!” I hear my little sister’s muffled voice ring from high above, outside my prison.
“I already told you, you’re going to have to wait until tomorrow,” I hear Mom reply, shifting her weight to and fro upon me again. Mom, GET OFF ME! GET OFF OF ME! My ribs and arm scream in pain. I feel sick.
“But I’m so BOOOORED!” I hear Wendy whine.
“Well go back in the house and make your dad play with you,” Mom’s muffled voice replies. So we’re outside.
Yes, Mom’s feet are extra sweaty. Mom must be gardening, that’s the only time she’s outside standing for an extended period of time. We must be right outside of the shrubs and bushes in front of the house... At least that’s my best guess. I try to imagine the giant world around me… I wish so badly to see it again. Will I even survive the rest of this month? It’s never been this intense.
“Why can’t I just play with Alisa?” I hear Wendy continue.
“Honey, I’m sorry, but she’s got to spend some time with me to learn her lesson,” Mom replies. God. The crushing pressure of Mom’s feet… the steamy smell of her rubbery sneakers… I must have… something… besides this awful, twisted existence under Mom’s crushing foot! I begin to struggle, crying, clawing in the pain for any way out of this.
Suddenly with a quick stomp I’m flattened so hard that I regret ever moving in the first place. God. She really knows how to make it hurt. ...Fighting is useless... my pitiful struggles… are so pathetic...
...
...
“I’ll let you play with her tomorrow, okay sweetie?” Mom finishes.
…
…
…
I suddenly awaken, as I feel cool air rushing in all around me. Finally. Finally.
But… I’m still stuck to the sole of her foot as I find myself lifting up and out of the dark, dank prison of my mother’s sneaker. I’m bombarded by bright light, and as my eyes adjust, I see my beautiful mother’s brown locks of hair dangling down over me as she looks me over. The giant, sweaty sole of her foot is my horizon, and she wiggles her massive toes at the edge of it, as she loves to do, smirking and watching me move along with the doughy, sweaty flesh.
At this point I can’t move at all, as my tiny broken body courses with burning pain throughout my ribs, and my broken, completely limp arm. I feel tears streaming down my cheeks. I look up at my mother’s god-like face… not even a hint of sympathy. Her massive eyes focus intently on me as she examines the damage she has done. I’m now involuntarily gasping in the air around me. It still smells like Mom’s foot and sneaker, but I don’t care.
“Hi there!” she smiles. “How'd you like being squished under my big smelly foot all day?” she adds, her massive white teeth filling my vision as she grins. She’s clearly in the thick of it. Tears fill my vision, making things blurry. “Thought I'd let you out for just a second, since you have a phone call.” The next thing I see, Mom’s cellphone comes into my vision from out of sight. It then gets larger and larger, the ear speaker filling my sky. Mom’s mouth leans in. “She can hear you now,” she says, but not to me.
“Toe-jam!” Anna’s voice rings from the speaker above me, above the horizon of my Mom’s sweaty foot. I feel myself already mentally shutting down just hearing the sound of her voice. “I was thinking we could go to the mall when you get out of trouble…” she continues. “I need to buy some new boots,” she laughs, “you can help me pick some out, then I’ll take you out to eat, or something. Alright?”
Of course, I can’t reply. But Mom pulls the phone back up to her ear. “She’ll see you in a few weeks then,” she adds, glancing down at me. “She’s very lucky to have a friend like you,” she adds, almost as an afterthought, then after a moment ends the conversation with a polite “bye,” before she turns the phone off and puts it in her pocket.
She looks at me again, from an angle, not head on. I can't read her. “Well Alisa, guess there’s some light at the end of the tunnel for you after all,” Mom says quickly, as I find myself plummeting back down toward her sneaker. I whimper.
------------------
I awaken, sitting on the couch in the living room. I remember Mom's foot crashing down on me for the thousandth and ten-thousandth time after being put back in her shoe. I remember... from under her foot I heard her cooking dinner... I also heard the faint voices of Wendy and my father in the distance. They sounded like a perfectly happy family... laughing... bickering... perfectly content without me. That was last night, because I see morning sunlight cutting through the window on the right side of the room.
My ribs are still on fire… and my right arm still dangles limply from my side. Broken. And I’m stuck this way. I try to sit up, but my ribs quickly tell me it’s not worth it. Besides, the couch cushions are large and fluffy. I feel myself sinking down into them, and it feels quite nice. Yeah… Maybe I’ll just sit here for a while… it’s so nice…
But where is everyone? The television has been left on, and I find myself zoning-in on it. Some group of women are sitting around discussing some political matter that I actually have no interest in, but I find myself focusing on it anyway. After several minutes pass, I hear the front door open. Footsteps are running my way. As Wendy’s grinning face comes into view, I suddenly realize that I’m not completely unshrunken.
Wendy is bigger than I am. I’m the size of a child.
“Hiiii!” Wendy grins, as she plops down on the couch to my left, practically on top of me, causing me to lurch in pain. But her large happy face fills my vision. It occurs to me that the clothes I’m wearing… a purple T-shirt and jeans… are a bit baggy on me and must belong to Wendy.
But Wendy… Mom’s violet jewel is now around her neck. “…Hi Wendy,” I say, cautiously. I’m already imagining being smashed underneath her giant sweaty feet as she plays in the yard.
“I missed you SO MUCH!” she says, as her arms wrap around me. I’m taken off guard, and it hurts my ribs as her warm arms squeeze me, but I feel a calming, warm feeling wash over that I haven’t felt in a long time. Her arms release me, and I find myself fighting back the recent memories as I look into her large, happy blue eyes.
“Wendy!” I hear my father’s booming voice call from the next room. I shudder…I know what’s coming. “Your sister is still grounded, put her in your shoe now,” he commands.
“But Dad!” Wendy calls back, annoyed. “I’m gonna do it, I just wanna play with her a little before I do,” she adds. Dad doesn’t respond. I look Wendy in the eyes, then glance at the door behind us.
“…will you take me… outside to play?” I whisper in her ear.
…
…
…
After I hobble a few steps towards the back door, it becomes clear that walking myself isn’t an option.
And so I find myself being carried toward the woods, with my skinny, shrunken left arm wrapped around Wendy’s neck, and her larger, normal-sized arms hold my bottom firmly keeping me from falling. I have to whimper occasionally as Wendy’s pace causes my ribs a jolt, but in my mind it’s a small price to pay for the trip. It’s so pretty outside. I can’t begin to describe how good the fresh air smells. But looking up over the trees, I can see the nearby custody tower, looming a bit in the distance. We're pretty close to it... I can even feel a light tingling sensation all over my body, we're so close. Thankfully I know we'll move away from it a bit before we reach our destination.
I know where we’re headed… Wendy’s tree house a little way farther into the woods. I find my mouth watering at the prospect of eating the lunch that Wendy holds in a pack in her left hand – peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, with drinks packed along too. This is one of the only times EVER I’ve been even slightly glad to be shrunken. I’m small, so the food will be huge to me! I'm absolutely ravenous.
The trip up the rope ladder proves to be a little more difficult than simply walking, and I’m forced to hang on to Wendy’s neck with my working arm as she releases her hold on my bottom. Thankfully, it doesn’t take her long at all to scale the height of the ladder, and then we’re in her tree house.
“Lunch time!” Wendy grins, as she lets me down. I struggle to stand up on my own, but I find myself hobbling over to one of the stools that sit on at the small table at the center of the room. Despite this, I can’t quit grinning as Wendy tosses my lunch out of her pack: a bag filled with my sandwich, some chips, and a soda.
“…It looks so good,” I say, as Wendy takes her lunch and sits down across from me. I try to take my time, but as I open the plastic baggy containing my sandwich, the scent of it is too much to resist. And the sandwich is difficult to hold at this size with one hand. It’s HUGE to me, heavy even!
“You were hungry, huh?” Wendy giggles, as I find my mouth covered in jelly as I struggle to get the huge sandwich to my face with one arm. After I get a few bites, I drop it to the table and cram some chips in my mouth, along with a huge gulp of the giant soda I have to grip carefully with my left hand to keep from dropping.
“…Yeah… it’s all SO good,” I grin. Wendy’s blue eyes shine with pride. “Did you fix this for us?” I add. She nods sheepishly, proudly. “That’s… awesome, you’re a good lunch-fixer,” I add. She smiles back happily and takes another bite of her own sandwich. After all I’ve been through, demoted to toe-jam and foot-crud… stomped and walked upon like I’m absolutely nothing…
…maybe… sisterly bonds are stronger than Mom and Anna’s brutal crushing feet.
…
…
Lunch goes splendidly, and we soon find ourselves lounging around the tree house listening to Wendy’s radio. My arm and ribs are throbbing in pain, but I try to ignore it.
“Are you ready to go in my shoe?” Wendy suddenly asks with a grin. I’m actually confused for a moment. Is she really giving me a choice in the matter? I look at my dark-haired little sister, lounging in the lawn-chair across from me with her shoes off, her white cotton socks moving as she wiggles her stubby toes from within.
Am I ready to be flattened under my giant kid sister's sweaty soles like a bug?
“You’ll get in trouble if you don’t, right?” I say, feeling the blood rush from my veins. I want to run away, but I know it’ll do no good. And I love my kid sister. I don’t want her to get in trouble.
With that, she hops up and walks over to me, sticking her large grinning face in mine. The violet jewel dangles from her neck, which she takes and holds between her thumb and forefinger, as her face turns into what can only be classified as a huge, bratty little sister grin. “You are grounded... after all...” she giggles. And with that, my brief escape from this hell is over.
With a twist of the jewel, everything goes black.
...