"See ya later man."
Brett parted ways with his friend Marco who was TAing in the guidance counselor's office for third period. Friday was dragging.
On his way out, he saw a list posted on the bulletin board that he hadn't seen before - each teacher in the school had a handful of lines underneath them, with the text at the top reading "VOLUNTEER SIGN-UP FOR SHRINK DISCIPLINARY CERTIFICATION"
Brett briefly paused and felt his heart leap a little bit. Normally they had plenty of real criminals, or at least kids from juvie, to do that with, right? He had known that the discipline was getting stricter, maybe they weren't finding as many bad apples?


Shrinking of humans was first part of correctional institutions, and now part of some school districts, particularly those which had previously had problems with discipline. The technology was deemed safe over the past few years after being experimented with in laboratories for a decade before. Educational administrators grasped upon it as a way to reduce the logistical challenges of overcrowded schools, but parents generally balked when their students had to be shrunk regularly for class. They worried about the safety. There was ultimately a compromise made - teachers would only shrink students as punishment for their actions or for emergencies, such as stopping fights. In practice, at Westwood High School, it meant that disrespecting a teacher could get you shrunk and then placed in an unpleasant place. It might be a box at the front of the class so that others could see you and laugh at your expense, or it might be inside a desk drawer, or if you pissed her off, maybe a mini desk under the teacher's desk where she could slip off her shoes and harrass you with her feet.

But now they wanted volunteers for certification? He saw that the teacher would be empowered to offer extra credit on satisfactory completion of volunteer work, but it was vague enough that he didn't know what to expect there. Could it really be enough of an incentive to motivate anyone except those who had some kink to be shrunken? Brett reckoned not, and was therefore heartened that at least some other students put their names down. He wasn't going to be the only one.
It wasn't to be taken lightly. He knew that the training for certification would be the most intense part. "Detention of a shrunken student on the person of the teacher" was taught during certification - and the district did not adequately elaborate what this meant. He knew that it required real people to be shrunken and handled, and typically the district made do with younger men sentenced to community service. Rumor had it that a teacher would place you in their shoes, if not in other places.

Brett swallowed and looked around the office furtively. He did not want it to be seen that he was about to put his name down. This would be seen as profoundly lame; you didn't want a reputation as a brown-noser in Westwood.
There were some students who had joked that they'd enjoy being shrunk and picked up by some of the hotter teachers. Ms. Issakinen, a giggly Finnish knockout in her late 20s, unsurprisingly had some names under hers. Some students were also perhaps drawn to those with gentle, bubbly personalities. One name under Mrs. Gomez, the Spanish teacher, even though she was a plump woman pushing middle age, but she would certainly never hurt anyone and probably was just taking the certification because she had to.
But he was drawn toward the imposing demeanor of Ms. Olivier, an intense, tall and heavyset Haitian woman who taught 9th grade English. There was a slight warmth in him as he thought of her big feet propped up on her desk during a lazy day towards the end of 9th grade, and he had asked her before what her shoe size was. She looked amused and then quietly said size 13, which he already knew was very large for a woman. But Ms. Olivier was a private woman who probably never would have even dignified the question with an answer if he'd been an 11th grader like he was now. As a 9th grader, he'd still been a little bit of an innocent clown and she had been kindly to him, belying her reputation of being cold as ice to students who displeased her.

He signed his name under Ms. Olivier, heart pounding at this point. Then turned and lunged out of the office.
At the end of the day, after the Principal had announced on the PA how much extra credit it was worth to sign up, he saw a handful of students at the entrance to the office talking to other students, who were quietly but urgently warning the other students that it would involve being shoved into a shoe. Most of the kids asked to have their names removed; the laughter of other students who couldn't believe they'd volunteered helped seal the deal. The counselor came out and admonished the jokers, then excused all the students. Then he took down the sign-up sheet down and said that the registrations were closed.

He had no idea how many slots had been filled. For all he knew, he could be the only one left.