Okay, you want to know the truth? I'm terrified.
In just a week, a formal custody hearing will be held to determine where I'm going to spend the next couple of years. As far as the public is concerned, the battle is between my mother and my father. But in actuality, the combatants are SPECTRUM and GenetiTech Labs.
SPECTRUM is where I lived from infancy until about two months ago. My mother was ill-equipped for the travails of raising a son no bigger than her finger, so when SPECTRUM approached her with a deal, she accepted it eagerly. I have no regrets with regards to this - when my mother's infrequent visits stopped altogether at age five, the folks at SPECTRUM became my family. They've never treated me with anything other than kindness and respect, something I always took for granted until just recently.
GenetiTech Labs is SPECTRUM's chief rival. This company has been the subject of a number of unsettling rumors, many of which I have come to believe over the past two months. They were the one's that convinced my father to sue for custody, and it was their attorneys that got me remanded into the Dalton's custody until the formal hearing could take place.
My father, Paul Dalton, has struck some kind of deal with GenetiTech. I'm not sure of the specifics, but I do know that, once I'm relegated into his custody, the Daltons will move with me to Midland, where GenetiTech is based. I'll spend every day in the laboratories of GenetiTech, being subjected to cruel experiments at the hands of Dr. Taylor, all under the cold, pitiless eye of Rachel Foster. And every night, I'll return home to the Dalton's, where Naomi will no doubt take great delight in tormenting me for all the grief I've caused her.
Which is why I'm terrified. For the past two months, I've been too preoccupied to even give the upcoming hearing much thought. I mean, when I was fleeing for my life from Cheryl and her unbalanced daughter Kim, the issue of my custody seemed abstract and unimportant.
But now, I've had more time to think. Last Wednesday, I struck a deal with Rachel - something akin to making a bargain with the devil, to be sure. I promised her that I would behave myself during the hearing and not go out of my way to make things difficult. In return, she promised me three things: she would convince Naomi to leave me alone until after the hearing, she would arrange for an end to Nicole's vicious and arbitrary grounding, and she would allow me one supervised visit with Suzy.
And now that I'm no longer being forced to shower with Naomi, or spend my days with her and her boss Linda at the beauty shop, the bleakness of my situation hangs over me like a miasma. My bravado melts with each passing day. Right now, the only thing that gives me a glimmer of hope is the memory of Alan Mackey and the promise he made to me.
"We're going to get you back, Ray. I swear to God, I'll do whatever it takes to get you back."
I wasn't privy to the conversation Rachel had with the Daltons on Wednesday night, but she obviously managed to put the fear of God into them. After she left, Naomi knelt outside my aquarium and told me that I would no longer be going to work with her. Instead, I would remain here at home with Debbie and Nicole. She tried to play it off like it was her decision, but I could tell she was rather unhappy about the whole thing.
Unfortunately, I don't think Naomi was quite as convincing as Rachel when she explained things to her sister. As soon as she left for work on Thursday morning, Debbie came over to the aquarium and stood there, grinning down at me.
Debbie looks a lot like her sister, although she lacks the scowl that seems permanently etched into Naomi's features. She's pretty, in a frail and waifish way. On this particular morning, her bleached hair was hanging long and loose over her shoulders. She was wearing a pink cropped t-shirt and white shorts that showed off her tan midriff and legs. She wasn't wearing as much makeup as usual, and her face was refreshingly free of bruises, which I guess meant her boyfriend Walt had recently been on his best behavior.
Debbie's hard to read, and she has always been a bit mercurial where I'm concerned. Sometimes she's playful, sometimes she's mean, but usually she seems content to just leave me alone. Unfortunately, it didn't look like I was going to get off that easy on Thursday.
I was sitting on the edge of my sponge bed in the aquarium, staring nervously through the glass wall at her feet. She was wearing flip-flops to show off her new pedicure, and she would wiggle her toes playfully when she was sure I was watching.
"Hey, little guy," she said sweetly, still looking down at me. "Guess what I got done last night!"
I made a show of admiring her smooth, pink toenails through the side of the aquarium. I craned my neck up to look into her blue eyes. "They're very nice," I told her.
"You think so?" she said. "You should see them up close." With a wicked grin, she reached down and snatched me up out of the aquarium.
"Hey, you can't do this!" I shouted, staring into her gigantic, smirking face. "You're not supposed to pick me up without permission!"
"Yeah, Naomi told me," Debbie said. She tickled my stomach with a long fingernail, also pink. "So, how'd you work that little deal with my sister, anyway? Did you blackmail her again?"
She carried me into the living room and plopped down on the couch. "Is Naomi having another affair, or did you get something even better on her this time?"
She effortlessly peeled my clothes off, despite my frantic struggles. "Don't wear yourself out," she told me. "Save some of that squirming for later." She grabbed my kicking leg between her finger and thumb and dangled me upside down.
Impotent with rage, I watched as she slid her foot from her sandal and brought it up to rest on the edge of the coffee table. Her smile grew downright vicious as she slowly lowered me towards her foot. Her toes flexed anxiously, spreading in anticipation as I grew nearer...
The phone rang, and Debbie swore under her breath. She tucked me between her toes and clenched them together, holding me tight. "Don't go anywhere," she told me playfully as she reached for the portable.
"Dalton residence," she said in a cheerful voice. "Can I..." Her voice trailed off, and that infuriating smile on her face faltered. "Who is this?" Her eyes narrowed suspiciously and she glared down at me. "You're full of shit, whoever you are," she said. "You really expect me to..."
She stopped speaking and glanced down at her chest, at the three red points of laser light that had suddenly appeared just over her heart. With a terrified squeal, she relaxed her grip on me and shook her foot, letting me fall to the wooden surface of the coffee table.
"He's not hurt or anything," she said, her voice shaking. She was so scared, she almost sounded like a little girl. "We were only..." After a couple of seconds, the red points vanished. She let out a quivering breath and switched off the phone. Without a word, she scooped me and my discarded clothes up in her palm and carried me back to the aquarium. She then walked over to the window and peered nervously through the curtains.
Ever since she was threatened by that unidentified, modular voice on the phone, Debbie has left me alone. In fact, she keeps her distance from the aquarium and leaves it to Nicole to feed me and change my water. Nicole, I should add, is quite grateful to me because, once again, I managed to get her ungrounded.
So now it's Monday, just seven days until my hearing commences. After lunch today, Nicole invited me to play in her room with her, and I accepted because I was ready to get out of that damned aquarium for a while. She gently picked me up and carried me to her room. As we were leaving, I peered from her cupped hands at Debbie, who was watching in horror and glancing nervously at the window.
She needn't have worried. Apparently whoever was watching the house had been well briefed on the situation. Nicole was exempt from the hands-off rule, at least for the time being.
We've been in Nicole's room for a couple of hours now, on her bed. She sits with her back against the headboard, her knees bent and her bare feet to either side of me, flat on the rumpled bedspread. She looks down at me, watching me pace back and forth.
"Rachel says the custody hearing is a lock," I tell Nicole, stopping to peer up into her wide, brown eyes. "I think GenetiTech bribed a judge or something."
"I don't want you to go to GenetiTech," Nicole says, frowning suddenly. "And I don't want you to go back to SPECTRUM, either. I just want you to stay here."
"I know, sweetheart," I tell her, petting her big toe with the palm of my hand. Her toes flex slightly at my touch. She wants to play with me, to feel me wiggle against the bottom of her foot or in between her toes. I know there's no malice in it - to her, it's just a fun little game. But she knows I'm not in the mood, so she restrains herself. God knows, it's more than Naomi or any of her idiot friends were ever willing to do.
"We could try and sneak you over to Suzy's again," Nicole says to me. She smiles a little sheepishly and adds, "I promise, I'd really do it this time."
"It's no good," I tell her. "They're watching Suzy too carefully. It wouldn't work. In fact, I doubt it would have worked if we'd gone through with it the first time."
"It's not fair," Nicole sighs. "No matter what, they're going to take you away from me."
"It's not as bad as all that," I say, with more optimism than I feel. "If the Daltons get custody of me, I'll still live with you guys. I'll just have to go to GenetiTech every day, just like going to school. And if my mom gets custody, I'll still come and see you."
"Really?" Nicole says, a small smile creeping across her sad features. "You think she'll let you?"
"Of course," I tell her. "Why wouldn't she?"
Nicole shrugs. "I don't know. I guess because I'm not really your sister or anything."
I stroke her toe again, just above the nail. "As far as I'm concerned, you are."
Her toes clench together, pressing down against the mattress. "That tickles," she snorts.
"Oh yeah? How about this?" I throw myself onto her toes and begin tickling her mercilessly between them. She lets out a happy squeal as she shakes me loose and gently lowers her bare foot on top of me. She giggles with sheer delight as I struggle playfully beneath her warm, soft sole. And as she peers down at me, I can't help but smile back.
It's the first time I've enjoyed myself in days, which of course is the universe's cue to piss on my head. The door to Nicole's room opens and Debbie pokes her head in. Nicole guiltily jerks her foot off of me, leaving me lying on my back.
"You're supposed to knock," she admonishes her aunt.
"Your parents are home," Debbie says nervously. "And that Rachel woman. I think something's wrong."
"...traumatic experience for all involved," says the African-American gentleman with impeccable hair and a charming smile. "But not to worry... Sister Mary Agnes is fine, and the alligator is expected to make a full recovery."
The perky blonde behind the desk laughs... well, perkily. "Thank you, Brandon," she says, then turns to face the camera. On the screen behind her, the picture of Louise holding me over the candle is displayed alone with the caption "It's a Small World After All."
"Move over, Bat Boy," the blonde chirps. "There's a new kid on the tabloid block, and inquiring minds are desperate to discover if this tiny teen is real, or just a little joke. For more on the story, here is Brenda Benoit."
A quick cut to some footage from the old movie "The Incredible Shrinking Man," in which the shrunken protagonist is being chased by a giant cat. A woman's voice, nasal and Northeastern, speaks over the footage. "They say that size doesn't matter, but one young man has been causing quite a stir this past month. And when it comes to Raymond Miller, size is all that does matter."
Cut to the picture from the National Mirror, of me as a baby lying in my mother's palm. Some horrible country song called "Little Bitty" plays quietly in the background as Brenda Benoit continues her fingernails-on-blackboard narrative. "Raymond Miller was born in January of 1986 to Dallas woman Cathy Miller. Miller, a waitress and part-time stripper, told reporters that she had no idea she was pregnant until just after her diminutive son was born..."
And so on. The piece basically features ever picture ever taken of me and published, and some conjecture about the nature of SPECTRUM's experiments on me. At one point, a digitally masked "insider" goes into lurid detail about grotesque experiments, then goes on to explain how the women at the lab would take turns taking me home each night. It's all lies, of course. It only takes me a couple of seconds to recognize the "insider" as Tony, the fat kid that took my picture at SPECTRUM and set this whole mess into action.
The annoying correspondent touches on Benny Doyle's story in the National Mirror that was retracted last month, suggesting that the entire story was fabricated by SPECTRUM in an ongoing campaign of deception and misinformation. Her theory is enhanced by the surprising news that Doyle shot and killed himself in his apartment a week ago. "The death was ruled a suicide," she says in a dark, conspiratorial tone.
The story finally closes with Brenda Benoit, who turns out to be an attractive but shrill woman with shoulder-length brown hair and large glasses, addressing the blonde anchor. "Other than the photographs and the testimonies, we have no hard evidence that Raymond Miller is anything other than a tiny figment of somebody's imagination. But just in case, I'd watch where I stepped."
The blonde anchor laughs as if Brenda Benoit is the most hilarious American since Mark Fucking Twain. "Oh, I will," she says. "Thanks, Brenda." She then turns back to the camera and says, "And thanks to all of you, for watching Inside Line..."
The picture freezes when Rachel hits the Stop button on the remote.
I'm standing on the coffee table, still staring in disbelief at the lurid account of my life on the screen. Paul and Naomi are sitting on the couch behind me, with Nicole squeezed in between them. For several seconds, nobody says a word.
Then Nicole breaks the silence with a giggle. "I can't believe Ray's on TV," she says. "That's so cool!"
Rachel looks at her coldly, then back at me. "It's going to air tomorrow night," she says. "We've tried to block the story, but unfortunately our people didn't get wind of it until it was too late."
"So?" Paul says. "Let it air. I'm tired of having to be so goddamned secretive all the time, anyway..."
"Secretive?" Rachel's icy veneer is shattered by a rare look of annoyance. "Everybody in this damn town seems to know about Ray!"
"We just told our closest friends," Naomi says defensively. "You said we..."
"It doesn't matter." Rachel sighs and regains her composure. "It was pretty much inevitable, I suppose. I was hoping to keep a lid on things until after the hearing. But there have been e-mails circulating ever since Doyle's article last month..."
"Did he really kill himself?" I ask, glaring at Rachel. It's not too difficult for me to imagine her blowing his brains out, then putting the gun in his dead hand.
Rachel just looks amused. "Yeah, he really did. We had nothing to do with that. Just dumb luck, I guess. Anyway, we've been fortunate in that most of the stories are decidedly anti-SPECTRUM. There are at least two separate online petitions calling for an end to Ray's torture, and an old GenetiTech e-mail is making the rounds again, only somebody changed it to refer to SPECTRUM. Right now, Ray is well on his way to becoming an urban legend."
Paul shrugs. "Like I said, so?"
"It's only a matter of time before somebody gets the facts straight, so we need to be proactive," Rachel says. "We're bound by non-disclosure until after the hearing, but the following week I'll arrange for a press conference with journalists a lot more credible than goddamn Brenda Benoit.
"You guys will go on TV and tell your story, about how you saved poor Ray from those Nazi bastards at SPECTRUM. We want everyone to see that Ray is safe and happy with his new family. And immediately after this story airs, GenetiTech will come forward and publicly offer you assistance in caring for Ray, educating him and meeting his special needs. That way, the entire deal is above board and, hopefully, beyond reproach."
"Sounds like you've got it all worked out," I say.
Rachel gives me a cold smile. "I'd say we're definitely ahead of the game."
Before she leaves, Rachel informs me that I'll be meeting with Suzy tomorrow afternoon at an undisclosed neutral location. She tells the Daltons that she'll be coming by to get me around 1:00, so make sure Debbie is aware.
I spend the better part of the evening, pacing around in my aquarium. Nicole is in her room, and I wish fervently that I was in there with her. When I'm playing with her, I can almost forget how terrified I am of what may come. But I know it's not going to happen tonight, not with Naomi and Paul sitting in the living room. Any time Nicole comes near me, Naomi barks at her and tells her to get away. And unfortunately, I forgot to account for that little loophole when I made my deal with Rachel.
Paul and Naomi sit and talk quietly, occasionally glancing in my direction. Are they nervous too? Paul's temper seems a bit short, and Naomi has been on edge... well, more on edge than usual. They've got their heart set on the GenetiTech deal going through, and I think they're nervous that something unexpected is going to happen. Which means Dad will have to keep his crappy job selling plumbing fixtures and Naomi will have to stay on at the Beau Monde Beauty Shop. They won't get the beautiful new house in Midland, or the sizeable weekly checks they've been promised.
I wonder if Rachel has threatened them with something further should the deal fall through. Naomi seems awfully nervous around her lately. Of course, that might just be because she thinks Paul is having an affair with her. She's been a bit paranoid since her own affair with Benny Doyle last month.
At last, Paul gets up to go to bed, leaving Naomi alone in the living room. She sits on the couch, smoking and watching Everybody Loves Raymond. She lets her sandal dangle absentmindedly, then slaps it against the bottom of her foot by flexing her toes.
I stand there with my cheek pressed against the cool glass, watching with morbid interest and remembering a time not long ago when the sight of her bare foot filled me, not with dread, but with nervous excitement. God, how I used to watch those toes with guilty fascination, and imagine myself grasped between them, or pinned beneath them. How could I have possibly known how miserably reality would prove to be?
But even now, images flit unbidden into my mind. I remember that first time, that frightening mixture of shame and pleasure, as she slid me between her toes and wiggled them until I came. That feeling of utter helplessness, of total surrender...
I feel myself growing hard and try to shake the thoughts from my head, but still the memories flood in. I remember running around on the floor between Naomi and Cheryl as they teased me ruthlessly with their feet. I remember the confused desire I experienced with Rachel, as she brought me to orgasm with cold detachment.
And, most painfully, I remember Suzy's beautiful pale green toenails and her long, perfect toes. That perfect night in her room...
An involuntary moan escapes from me as my erection becomes unbearable. My mind is swimming with frustration, worry, and guilty desire as I run over to my bed and throw myself on it. I masturbate frantically, hoping the act will purge the growing sense of shame and trepidation.
As I grind against the green sponge, the memories flash through my mind faster and faster. I'm squirming between Naomi's soapy toes in the shower... I'm clinging to Cheryl's toes as her bare foot depresses the accelerator... I'm staring, angry and helpless, as Naomi's sandaled foot stomps down on my little car, utterly destroying it... I'm squirming between Cheryl's toes, weak from the overwhelming smell of polish, as Naomi paints the nails pink... I'm trapped in Naomi's nylons, my back pressed against her foot, staring up into her angry, mocking face...
I hear her footsteps approaching and force myself to stop what I'm doing. My entire body tenses and revolts at the sudden cessation, and my breaths come in short, harsh gasps as I struggle to maintain control of my rebelling body.
"Having fun?" Naomi asks, her voice mocking and cruel. I can't look at her. I keep my face buried in the sponge, terrified at the prospect of looking over and seeing her feet through the glass of the aquarium. I can't bear the sight of those twitching toes right now...
"You thinking about your little girlfriend Suzy?" Naomi asks me. "Is that what you're thinking about right now?"
"Please just go away," I whisper weakly into my bed, knowing she can't hear me. I hear a soft thud outside the fish tank, the unmistakable sound of a sandal falling to the floor. Then the vibrating squeak of flesh rubbing against the aquarium wall. In my mind's eye, I can see her bare toes sliding up the glass and my body tenses. My erection is so tight that it hurts.
"Or are you thinking about Momma's pretty feet?" she asks in a surprisingly tender voice. My face is still buried, but I can feel the warmth of her immense foot as it comes nearer and nearer. I brace myself for the inevitable contact, and hardly even jump when I feel her enormous, leathery sole press down on top of me, mashing me deep into my bed.
"Go ahead, sweetie," she tells me, mashing down gently with her toes, then releasing. She does it again and again, moving me up and down against my sponge bed. I want so desperately to stop, but it's out of my hands now. I convulse madly as the violent orgasm erupts from me. My fists clench at the porous surface of my bed as I spasm again and again, my heart pounding in my ears.
"Good boy," she whispers. "Now roll over and kiss Momma's foot."
I'm too weak to move, but it doesn't matter. She rolls me over and presses her big toe into my face. I kiss it weakly with my eyes closed. I can't stand the thought of looking into her face right now.
At last, her foot lifts away from me. I lie there still as a corpse, silently praying that she'll leave me alone.
"Goodnight, sweetie," Naomi says. "If I were you, I wouldn't mention this to your friend Rachel." Her footsteps fade mercifully as she walks away.
Giantess World
Homunculus by Cayce