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Story Notes:

Story title is "The Lake in the Lady." I put "the" at the end, to force a better alphabetical listing.

This will be novel length and have a few plot threads linked by the theme of fiction writers.

Story includes both 20 to 99 ft genre and shrink 1 to 12 inch genre.

Tarquin lived with his foster mother in a pleasant home in London. He was seven years old, going on eight, when he was riding the bus home from school one sunny afternoon. An older girl got onto the bus and sat next to him. After a few more blocks, she took a book out of her bag.

“Would you like to have this?” she asked, “I got it in a lucky dip at the school fair, and I don’t like it much. It was donated by a book shop near the school. Maybe a younger boy might like it more. It’s about a young boy.”

“Thank you,” said Tarquin, “I wish I had something I could give you.”

“You don’t need to give me anything,” said the girl, “You can just take the book. I have to get off now.”

He watched her pull the cord and walk to the front of the bus, as the driver brought the vehicle to a halt. Tarquin watched her go, and she waved to him from the footpath. He waved back, to thank her again for the book, and then put it into his bag. Reading in a car or bus made his stomach feel ill. So he would save it until he got home.

When he had his chance, he went into his room and began to read the book. It was called ‘The Boy’s New Friend’ and was written by a lady named Leanne Commons. As Tarquin got into the storyline, he read of a boy named Dillon, who had a number of unusual and scientifically unprecedented adventures.

About half way through the book, Tarquin became more interested as he read the latest turn of events:

One day, Dillon was walking in the Dew Forest when he came to a tunnel in the earth which was large enough for him to walk through. He went inside and saw that it was lit up by some unusual glowing rocks in the earth. He walked through the tunnel for twenty minutes, and then saw some sunlight shining into the tunnel in front of him.

Dillon knew that he was coming to the end of the tunnel. He found that he had to walk up a little slope, so that he could get out of the tunnel. It was then that he remembered how he had needed to walk down a little when he had first entered the tunnel.

Dillon walked up the small slope and stepped out into a patch of the largest lettuces he had ever seen. They were each as big as the largest room in his house. Dillon liked lettuce, but not on its own. It needed to be mixed into a salad or a sandwich or a hamburger, for him to be able to enjoy it.

Dillon began walking through the patch, making his way around the lettuces, until he heard some footsteps, and looked around. He could not see anyone, and the footsteps sounded as though they were walking on hard concrete ground or brick or rock surfaces. Yet he could see none at all.

Despite his confusion, the footsteps were definitely becoming nearer. So they sounded louder to him. When he was sure of the direction, he began walking around the lettuces towards the sound, so that he could meet whoever was with him in the lettuce patch.

After he had passed three more lettuces, he saw a concrete surface ahead, and then saw two shoes stepping into view. Each shoe was longer than the largest of the lettuces. He looked up and saw the bottom of two legs, and then a dress which reached high up into the air to meet the neck of a giant lady. He looked up further and saw that she had a long neck and a head that was at least as large as the largest lettuce he’d seen.

The woman reached down and lifted Tarquin high into the air. As he looked around, while she started walking, he saw that the giant lettuce patch was part of a large garden on a huge estate that seemed to be in the middle of a giant district of lakes and valleys and hills. It reminded him very much of the English Lake District that he had visited once on a school excursion. Yet this one could not be in England, for it was gigantically proportioned, like the woman herself.

The lady did not say anything, but walked towards a beautiful immense house, opened a door, entered and came to a quaint old kitchen. As the boy looked on, he saw the lady lift a large dish down from the shelf and place it on the bench with her free hand.

The next thing that happened was sudden and unexpected. The lady lowered the hand which held him into the dish, set him down, released her grip, withdrew her hand, picked up the dish with one hand, carried it to the oven, opened the over door with her other hand, and placed the dish inside. She closed the oven door, turned a switch from the outside, and walked away.

Dillon could only make the most logical guess at this lady’s plans for him. She was cooking him without even a word of introduction, after which she would undoubtedly be preparing to eat him. What other explanation could there be?

He waited for her to come back, and felt the warmth of the oven affecting him as she approached the door and opened it. She took the dish out and carried him to a table in the garden and sat down. He looked up at this enormous woman and wondered how the tunnel had brought him there, and what to do next.

“Hello, I’m Dillon!” he called, “You must be very hungry, Miss Giant.”

“I do seem to be getting that way,” she said, in a polite friendly voice, “I had a nice breakfast, but that was a few hours ago. I was going to pick one of my lettuces and make a salad, but I’m sure you’ll be much nicer. Salads are alright, but it’s nice to have something really tasty, when one can find a little boy like you, isn’t it?”

“How do you know I’ll be tasty?” asked Dillon.

“My widowed mother lives in the nearby meadow with my younger sister,” said the lady, “Mother’s eaten a few little boys, and she always tells me how tasty that you all are. You’ll be the first one I’ve had.”

“Has your sister eaten anyone yet?” asked Dillon.

“Farra? Well- oh! How thoughtless of me. You introduced yourself, and I never told you my name. I’ll tell you all of our names, so that it’s easier to talk about each of us without confusing you. My mother is Mrs Waye. My little sister is Farra, and I’m Merri. But to answer your question, Farra did find a little boy one day. She was luckier than me. She asked him if she could eat him, and  the boy said no. So she let him go, but Mother caught him in the garden shortly afterwards and cooked him and ate him for her dinner.”

“Does Farra always ask the boys first?”

“Yes she does.”

“Why don’t you ask?”

“Well I don’t really see the need. It’s been nice to meet you, little boy,” she said, raising him above her mouth, and leaning back a little.

She opened her mouth wide and put out her tongue. She always found it easier to put the food onto her tongue if it wasn’t in her mouth.

“I like talking to you,” said Dillon, who had truly found something very pleasant about her voice and her manner, “Can I please be your friend and talk to you some more?”

“Well then I’d have to make something else for lunch,” said Merri, “I suppose you could be my little friend for a while, “Perhaps I’ll eat you another day.”

Dillon and Merri talked for a while and got to know each other, and then Merri began to feel more than usually hungry.

“I think I’d better go and pick that lettuce after all now,” she said, and walked out along the path, with Dillon resting on her shoulder. When she saw a nice ripe lettuce that took her fancy, Merri leaned over to pick it, and Dillon fell off her shoulder and landed on another lettuce, and then slid down the side, and fell onto the ground, to land just beside the tunnel.

“I’d better be getting home,” he said, and went into the tunnel, “Thank you for being my friend, Miss Merri!”

“And just like that he’s gone,” thought Merri, “I do hope he’ll come back some time.”

Maybe Dillon will go back and visit Merri sometime, and maybe Merri will eat him for a nice tasty lunch, or perhaps a delicious dinner. What do you think?

 

The chapter ended there, and the rest of the book went on to tell about the other adventures that Dillon had. Tarquin read faster and faster, hoping to get to the next exciting chapter about the three giant ladies, but he eventually reached the end of the book. Leanne Commons had not made any mention of the giantesses after asking her question. Maybe she wanted the readers to answer the question.

Tarquin looked on the back inside cover’s dust jacket leaf, and saw the most beautiful photograph of Leanne Commons. Yet he had no idea how to contact her. He hadn’t even bought the book himself. She was an established author, and he was just a little boy.

He began to imagine himself in the story as Dillon, with Leanne Commons as the beautiful giantess Merri. He thought of writing a sequel story himself. He could never write a whole novel like an adult could, but maybe a short story which returned Dillon to the giant lettuce patch and the clutches of Merri or to the sister or the mother would be the answer. Tarquin thought for a while and then he had his idea. Dillon would discover a fork in the tunnel, that he’d walked past in the dark the last time. He would find that it led to Mrs Waye’s garden. No matter which giantess he was thinking of, he visualized Leanne’s beautiful face, especially her smiling mouth in the photograph, as being the face of the giantess concerned. Leanne’s story had awakened in Tarquin the strong desire to be considered as a possible meal for Leanne herself, if it were only possible to find Leanne, and for that matter, for Leanne to be a giantess who was thinking about eating him.

 

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