I awoke slowly and unevenly from my sleep, just like I had on so many other days these past two months. Above me was the familiar lid of the familiar box, the box I’d been carried around in by doctors and nurses, as though I were a rodent in a laboratory. I hated it whenever I was put in the box, but there was no way for me to break free: I was trapped until someone came to release me. I wondered who it would be this time, but as I stared up through the transparent lid, something seemed different. The ceiling far above me was unfamiliar, and the light outside was much less harsh than the usual hospital lighting. Then I remembered the events of yesterday and I figured it out.

Rachel must’ve come for me. I felt glad I was asleep when she first saw me. Her reaction would’ve been too hard for me to watch. Did she scream, cry, faint, throw up…or simply turn around and leave the room in shock or disgust? Not that last one, obviously, since here I was – if indeed this was her home. I stood up and began pounding on the lid of the box, calling her name as loudly as I could.

A pair of giant thumbs appeared on either end of the box and I felt it being lifted up and carried, which would have freaked me out completely if I hadn’t been so used to it by now. I heard a sound of someone sitting down on a couch, magnified many times by my hearing, which was now much more sensitive. Then the lid of the box was unclasped and lifted away. I sat down and tilted my head up, and when I saw her I gasped loudly.

Yes, it was Rachel, my beautiful girlfriend – or at least her gigantic face looking down on me. I hadn’t seen her since the day before the accident, but she still looked the same. Her big green eyes stared down at me, brimming with anxiety, and her delicate red lips seemed frozen, as if she’d started saying a word but couldn’t finish it. I could see she’d been crying a lot, even though her eyes were dry now. Her long auburn hair fell down around the sides of her face, forming a curtain that blocked my view of the outside world. I could only look up at her in stupefaction.

“Sam…” she whispered. “Oh Sam, you…you’re awake.”

She seemed at a loss for words, just as I was. Her voice was now many times louder to my ears than it had always been, but I had grown used to this as well during my two-month stay at the hospital and it didn’t upset me as much as it had during my first couple of weeks at this size.

“Hi Rachel!” I said to her, remembering to speak loudly so that she could hear me. “I’m guessing you took me home to your place, right?”

“Yes…I mean, where else would I take you?” she said, smiling faintly. “Sam…are you all right? I wasn’t sure, ‘cause you were supposed to wake up hours ago. Maybe you were just tired, but it’s been eighteen hours since I brought you here.”

“Do I look all right to you?” I asked.

“I don’t know, I suppose so. I mean, apart from the…you know.”

“The fact that I’m three inches tall? Is that what you were going to say, Rachel?”

“Sam…Sam, what are we going to do? I don’t know…” She covered her eyes with her hand and began to sob quietly.

I had no idea what we were going to do, and I began to regret my decision to let Rachel take me home with her. While I was still at the hospital, she could at least have gone on with her life in some way, oblivious to my condition. Now that she knew the truth, her life had been turned upside-down. I knew we could never go back to what our relationship had been like, not while I was stuck like this. She had already waited two months for me to return to her life, and now that I was back in it, it had just made things worse for her. I felt angry with myself for my decision.

“Rachel…you need to take me back to the hospital,” I said firmly, hoping she could hear me. “Listen, I’ve made a mistake, telling you the truth. I don’t want you to keep me here in this box, feeding me and taking care of me like I’m some kind of pet. Take me back and forget about me!”

She looked down at me with shock.

“Sam…you don’t mean that, do you? I’ve waited two months for you! Every day I thought they’d call me and tell me you were gone, but I couldn’t stop thinking about you! You can’t just tell me to forget about you, Sam…I love you!”

“I love you too, baby, but…God, just look at me! I’m three inches tall, for God’s sake! I’m standing in a box you’re holding in your fucking hand and I can’t even kiss you or hug you or touch you, ‘cause you’re the size of a fucking building to me!”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to…here, I’ll take you out, just hold on!”

She dipped her hand into the box and before I could take cover, five enormous fingers were encircling me. I felt so threatened, so afraid of being crushed by her fingers, that I screamed and lashed out with both arms. She quickly withdrew her hand and looked down at me with a confused expression.

“Sam, I didn’t want to hurt you! I just wanted to touch you, like you asked me to!”

“Well, I don’t want you to, and I’m sorry I asked!” I yelled up at her. She was so huge and overwhelming to me, but when I saw her cower as I screamed at her, it actually made me feel better. I felt rather guilty: I knew she’d done nothing to deserve my anger, but I could think of no other way to make myself feel superior to her.

“Take me back right now, Rachel!” I kept on shouting at her. “I know you don’t want me like this, so take me back to that place and go back to your life. At least you can still do that, while I…”

I sat down again and looked down at my legs, hoping she’d listen to me, but not really caring if she didn’t. I wished I could go back to sleep, just so I didn’t have to deal with any of this right now.

“Are you out of your mind?” she said, becoming angry herself. “Sam, I only just got you back in my life! You’ve been awake for not even fifteen minutes! I can’t believe you’re behaving like this! Look, I know this is hard for you, but you didn’t even give me a chance! You didn’t give us a chance! Don’t you think you deserve that? Don’t you even care about me, about our relationship, anymore?”

I stayed silent, watching her face grow larger as she lifted the box higher.

“I love you, Sam!” she cried out. “How can you even think that I…? God, if I felt I couldn’t still love you when you’re this little, I would’ve left you at the fucking hospital! You can’t seriously be telling me that you’d rather stay there and be treated like some kind of lab rat, instead of staying here with the woman who loves you! I only wanted us to talk things through, and figure out how we were going to make this work, but you don’t even want to do that…”

The sobs came again, louder and harder than before. I was shaken off my feet as she slammed the box down on the table in front of her. Then she got up and left, and for a fleeting moment I saw her colossal figure tower above me and it felt like I was looking up at a moving building. The doctors and nurses back at the hospital had been equally gigantic, but they were all strangers to me, while this was the woman I was in love with…if I still was in love with her.

I heard a door slam shut in the distance. I knew it was the door to her bedroom, and that it was in fact only a few short yards away, but this once-familiar place, this little house of hers, now felt like a vast and frightening cavern. Vast and frightening…that was how Rachel herself appeared to me now. I couldn’t even begin to think how a relationship with her could still be possible now. Every woman expected certain things from her partner, none of which I felt I could provide when I was no larger than one of her fingers. It had been lonely and friendless for me in that hospital room, but I preferred it over being kept by my girlfriend because she felt sorry for me, and being dependent on her for every little thing.

I was reminded of that dependency when I began to feel hungry and thirsty. Rachel was still in her bedroom, though I could no longer hear her crying. My box was placed on top of the coffee table in the sitting area of the combined living room and kitchen. A monstrous sofa loomed in front of me, while a vast television screen stood 200 feet behind me. In the far distance behind the sofa, I could see the little dining table in the kitchen section, and the counters and cupboards behind it, all of them completely unreachable to me now. Even if I could make my safely down to the floor forty feet below me, I’d never be able to climb high enough to reach something to eat, nor was I strong enough to open a tap and get water. I could only sit helplessly in my stupid little box and wait for her to come back – there was no way in hell I was going to call out for her, like a baby crying for its mother.

Many hours later, when the afternoon was almost over, she came back for me. I’d climbed out of my box, partly to walk around  and stretch my legs, partly because I had to take a leak. This I did by standing on the edge of the table: I figured I was now so small, she’d never notice the miniature puddle I made on the carpet below. I felt rather ashamed behaving like this, but I was hardly in the best mood at that moment, and with each hour that passed I just grew more and more miserable. I ran back to my box when I heard her approach and only just managed to climb back in when she appeared above me again.

She gave me just a brief glance before picking up my box and heading on to the kitchen, and she didn’t speak a word to me. I felt even more ashamed than before and wondered whether or not I should apologize to her. In the end I decided it would be best to do so. There was no need for any further outbursts from either of us, I thought. When she put my box down on the kitchen counter, I was ready to apologize, but she didn’t stay for another talk. She merely gathered up a few bits of food – bread, cheese and a small piece of an apple – and dropped them into my box, along with a little plastic jar lid containing some water. My fears had come true: she was already treating me like a pet on my first day back with her.

“Rachel, I…” I began, but she interrupted me immediately.

“I don’t want to talk right now, Sam,” she said. “I’m tired and I’m upset, and I honestly can’t deal with any more of your childish behaviour today, so I’m going to bed early.”

“What? Childish behaviour? Listen, Rachel, I didn’t ask for any of this, okay? I’m sorry I yelled at you earlier, but you’ve got to understand…”

“No Sam, I’m done! We can talk again tomorrow, okay? Just go to sleep, and then we’ll decide what to do with you tomorrow. Good night, Sam.”

“Rachel, come on! You’re being unreasonable! Rachel, don’t leave me in this fucking box! Come on!...”

It was no use. She walked away with tremendous speed, leaving me alone in the huge, empty, silent living room. It was getting dark now and I began to grow afraid. I felt completely cut off from the world, trapped in this little plastic box and at the mercy of the first creature – insect, spider, whatever – that happened to come my way. I ate my food and drank the water she’d given me, but I had no desire to go to sleep: I’d done more than enough of that these past few weeks. Soon it was properly dark, and completely quiet except for the wind blowing in the leaves outside and the hum of the distant refrigerator. The only light came from a little battery charger plugged into the wall behind the kettle, containing a couple of batteries. I got out of my box and walked over to it, avoiding looking up at the massive appliances and cupboards that rose above me, and which all seemed to mock me and my littleness.

Did I even count as a human being anymore, I wondered? Did Rachel still see me as one? Of course she’d say she did, were I to ask her, but how could I be sure? I had no idea if she still truly loved me, or if she would stay faithful to me until I was cured. What if I could never be cured? She’d just throw me away in the trash, like I was one of the kitchen appliances that surrounded me, no difference at all. I walked up to the edge of the counter and looked down. The floor was sixty feet below me and I knew I’d die if I jumped. Did I want to jump?

I didn’t. Even though my life had completely gone to shit, I had no desire to kill myself. That would only lead to Rachel finding my body in the morning, causing her yet more grief and misery. I stood on the edge and looked down for what must’ve been hours, but in the end I decided I had to do something else: I had to leave. Walking over to the battery charger, I found a small pencil and some loose scraps of paper lying in a tray beneath it. Rachel must sometimes use these to write notes, shopping lists, things like that. I tried to pick up the two-inch-long stub of a pencil. It was like lifting a moderately-sized log, but it wasn’t too heavy for me to write with. The dim light was just enough for me to see by and, with some effort on my part, I wrote her a little note.

“Dear Rachel. I’ve decided to leave you and make my own way out there. I’ve no idea what’ll happen to me, but this was my choice, so please don’t come after me. Find someone else you can love and be with and forget about me. Sam.”

I had to struggle to keep myself from crying, something I’d also done more than enough of the last few weeks. But only a week ago, I’d prepared myself for the possibility of never seeing her or anyone else I cared for ever again, so this feeling wasn’t new to me. After writing the note, I walked all the way to the edge of the counter nearest the front door. I found what I was looking for: an electric cable leading down from the microwave to a socket near the floor. The cable was about five inches in diameter from my perspective, so I could grab hold of it and lower myself down. Despite my small size, I was still in pretty good shape and I ‘d kept up exercising at the hospital during the first few weeks I was there, when I still had faith that a cure was near at hand. I climbed down almost fifty feet until I reached the plug, from where I still had another fifteen feet to reach the floor. Taking a deep breath, I jumped down and landed on the cold, hard tiled floor.

I took a moment to catch my breath and rub my aching feet, but I was soon on the move again. Down here on the floor, it was very cold and the slight draft that blew from underneath the front door made it worse. I was also barefoot and wearing nothing but a flimsy makeshift hospital gown. I began to run in the direction of the door, which was around the kitchen corner and at the end of a short hallway. It was almost completely dark, but my fear of the shadows was temporarily forgotten in the urgency of the moment. Besides, I could see light coming from underneath the door and I knew that once I was outside there’d be street lights and other light sources by which I could see.

The front door was an immense wooden cliff, 150 or more feet high. I got down on my belly, wincing at the cold of the tiled floor as it hit me across my chest. One part of the door’s bottom was a little worn and a small crack had formed, barely large enough for me to crawl through. But crawl through it I did, tearing a section of my gown and giving me a few painful scratches on my back and legs in the process. I had made it outside the house on my own, and it felt like a tremendous accomplishment. The little brick path that led from her front door across the yard and to the sidewalk now lay before me. I began to walk forward, glad I could see my way by the light of the streetlamps that shone through the leaves of the trees ahead. The sky was overcast and a strong wind was beginning to blow. I began to run faster, hoping to warm up with the exercise. The bricks beneath my feet were rough and uneven and I tripped more than a few times, but I kept going.

Suddenly, the whole sky lit up with a flash and a massive boom sounded from above. I had been so preoccupied with escaping, I hadn’t noticed that a storm had been building up and was about to break. A sudden gust of wind carried me off my feet and flung me forward. I landed on my back near the front gate, which made me cry out in pain and most likely left some nasty bruises all over my body. For the first time, I began to regret my decision to leave. But I couldn’t turn back. Not just because doing so would be all but confirming that I couldn’t survive on my own without Rachel’s help, but also because of the wind. Maybe it wasn’t that strong of a breeze to a normal-sized person, but it felt like a hurricane to me and it was impossible for me to walk against it. I was forced back and pushed underneath the little gate and onto the sidewalk. Here the wind was a little calmer, but it didn’t help me much, since just as I managed to get back on my feet again, the rain began to fall.

At first only a few scattered drops, each the size of my fist, fell around me, only hitting me occasionally. But another burst of lightning and peal of thunder came, and suddenly the storm had arrived. The rain came down like an entire ocean upon me and I ran for the nearest cover. Unfortunately, there were very few safe places for me now. The street was almost deserted this time of night, with only an occasional monstrous car zooming by, which always sent a wall of water in my direction that threw me back and down onto the hard ground surface. Eventually I found it impossible to keep moving, and I fell down in despair as the gusts of rain and the water flowing across the sidewalk carried me along, like a leaf in a river.

“Oh God, I’m going to die,” I thought, while struggling to keep breathing. “I’m not gonna make it. Oh Rachel, I’m so sorry!”

I began to cry, both from the pain and because of my terrible choice. Living in a tiny box like a pet rodent was far from a great life, but I preferred it over drowning on a sidewalk. My only hope of survival lay in the fact that storms such as this one usually didn’t last long – but whether or not I could stay alive until it was over…

By the luckiest chance I was blown against a twig which lay in my path. Just a little twig that had fallen from a tree…but it was almost a tree in its own right compared to me, and I grabbed on with all the strength I had left. The raindrops slammed down on my exposed body, each impact almost feeling like that of a brick dropped on me, but I didn’t let go. I could feel that the twig was itself being blown along, and a few minutes later it was pushed into the groove at the edge of the road, where the greater volume of flowing water pushed it along at what felt like lightning speed to me.

I realized too late in how horrific a situation I now was. Of course, all the water along the side of the road was flowing towards a storm drain. The little twig that was my salvation was also being swept along towards it and if I kept holding on, I’d disappear down the drain, possibly drowning in the process. If I let go of the twig, I’d fall into the raging waters beneath me and probably drown before I reached the drain. It really made no difference what I did, but I kept holding on, unable to let go after spending this much effort trying to stay alive. The drain was only a few yards away now, a gaping, bottomless black hole where no-one would ever find me if I were to fall down, a fate that was getting closer by the second.

I closed my eyes and waited for the end, too worn out to think, spending what little strength I had left in clutching onto the twig. When I was just seconds away from certain death, I was granted a brief respite. The twig bumped into a pebble that was lying in the gutter and got caught on it, and for a few moments I had a glimmer of hope. But looking around me made me lose that hope just as quickly. There was no way I’d be able to swim to safety, the flowing stream of water was too fast and too powerful. If the rain let up before the twig broke loose, I just might live. If not, then it was all over.