Chapter 17

“Emma, honey…what choice do they have, really?” came Daniel’s soothing, yet slightly impatient voice as he did his best to cuddle her. They were both lying sideways on a huge pile of hay in Emma’s old family barn, with a piecemeal mass of comforters and blankets doing their best to cover Emma’s massive form. Away from the stunned and awkward silence of her family, Daniel had measured Emma a little earlier, and found that she was now a full 12-foot-6. 

“I just thought it’d be different,” mumbled Emma, who was curled up in a fetal position under the paltry blankets. “Look at me, sleeping out here like an animal.”

“Haha, we’re both out here sleeping like animals!” laughed Daniel, trying his best, as usual, to cheer her up. He kneaded his knuckles hard into the ample flesh of her left shoulder — at this point, he knew that Emma would only feel his efforts if he applied maximum pressure. 

“Did you see them just…staring at me at dinner?” Emma asked hollowly, staring off into the far dark corner of the barn, where the horses slept in their kennels. “It was like they didn’t even know me.” 

“Haha, but Emma,” chuckled Daniel, treading carefully through his gentle mirth, “You have to remember that all of this is…you know, super new to them. This is…like, the definition of uncharted territory.”

“I know,” muttered Emma. She felt strangely lucid, yet this lucidity wasn’t bringing her any kind of relief. Instead, it just made her feel like she was staring off into the endless void. 

“And, hahaha, I mean, did you really expect them not to have a reaction when you just…casually popped those apples in your mouth?” Daniel was making sure to balance his humor with a dose of reality; he knew that it was a delicate process, but he felt like he had been getting better at it recently.

“Huh?” asked Emma, still staring forward. “What are you talking about?”

“All those apples you ate,” he answered, leaning forward a little on his larger pile of hay so that he could get a good look at the huge side cheek of her face. “You were just popping them in your mouth, one after the other, eating them like they were…just…grapes.” 

“Hmmm, I guess I don’t remember too much of that,” murmured Emma. It was true — she had been too focused on how insanely tiny her family had looked. It was just too surreal, too much of a crazy reality to take in in one sitting. And so, for large parts of the meal, Emma had just been popping apples into her mouth, one after the other, chewing them absently and swallowing them down whole as she stared blankly down at her mom, dad, and sister. 

“You must’ve eaten about 15 or 20 of them,” chuckled Daniel. “Without even realizing it.” 

“Oh…now I’m remembering that they were a little tart, yes,” said Emma, sighing and adjusting her body slightly in the hay. As she did so, Daniel had to hang on to her left shoulder, to keep himself from sliding around as a result of her movement. “Guess I kinda just lost track of how much I was eating.” 

“Well…are you full now, at least?” asked Daniel hopefully. 

“Not really, no,” replied Emma bluntly, focusing on the wooden beams of the nearest kennel. “I know I ate all they had to offer, but…I could definitely keep eating for a while.”

“Oh,” responded Daniel, feeling crestfallen and sorry for her, and no small degree of discouragement. She had literally eaten up all the food in her family’s house without breaking a sweat: chicken, steak, vegetables, bread, ice cream, fruit…everything. Daniel had assured them that he would be paying for her food from then on out, but to hear that all of that hadn’t even filled her up was not welcome news. 

“W-well,” he continued after a pause, “Well maybe…I can pop out to the store now. I can get you some more — how about that? Here, I’ll go now.” He made to get up from his horizontal position as Emma’s “big spoon.” 

“No, Daniel,” muttered Emma, blinking at the same dark spot in the corner of the barn, “No, it’s ok. I’m fine. You don’t need to go.”

“No, no, I’ll go!” he responded with energy, feeling the pleasant momentum of the task starting to wash over him. “It’s no problem Emma, really. I’m happy to do it.” He jostled and pivoted his body against her huge, firm bulk, trying to get the proper foothold in the hay to jump down onto the ground. But he didn’t get the chance, because Emma’s huge right hand had suddenly come up out of nowhere and clamped down on his entire left shoulder, and much of his left torso. Daniel stopped trying to move, freezing in response to Emma’s emphatic gesture. He was amazed at how hot her palm felt…was she having another growth spurt?

“I want you to stay,” she said quietly, with a dull kind of emphatic energy in her voice. “I want you to stay here with me and spoon me and rub me and keep me company.”

“O-ok Emma, ok,” said Daniel, nodding vigorously as he felt her hand tighten a little against his shoulder and chest. 

“I don’t want to stay in this barn by myself,” Emma continued in that same strangely monotone voice. “I want my boyfriend to be with me.” 

“Ok, I won’t go, Emma, I won’t go,” Daniel insisted with genuine emphasis of his own. “You’re just…squeezing a little tight…is all.” 

“Squeezing?” asked Emma, suddenly flipping over on her back as she lifted Daniel up into the air with one hand. “I’m not squeezing! I’m just holding you here, to keep you from leaving me.” 

“I’m not…gonna leave you,” chuckled Daniel, suddenly getting nervous as Emma held him aloft above her. She was suddenly grinning up at him, and mischief played behind her eyes. 

“No?” continued Emma, blinking up at him as she turned her head sideways in the hay. “I’m not too big for you?”

“N-no, come on Emma, are you kidding?” laughed Daniel. The initial spike of nerves began to dissolve…maybe she was just being silly and flirty. It was certainly better than that awful monotone she had been talking in ever since they had started snuggling in the barn. 

“I don’t eat too much for you?” she persisted, arching her eyebrow up at him. “You aren’t turned off when you see me eat an entire house worth of food, and it doesn’t even fill me up?” 

“T-turn me off?” asked Daniel, a little puzzled. “Uh, heheh, no…no I don’t get turned off by that.”

“So…are you turned on right now?” asked Emma immediately in a low voice, turning her head to the opposite shoulder in the hay, eying him seductively. 

“I…uhhh..I wh-what?” was all Daniel could manage. For a few seconds, Emma didn’t move or change her expression — she was just lying there, holding Daniel above her with one hand, her eyes studying his face, going back and forth between his left eye and his right. Daniel began to worry about what was going to happen next.

“C’mon!” laughed Emma suddenly, her searching expression shifting abruptly back to her toothy flirtations. “When was the last time we did it, Daniel?” 

“D-did it?” he asked, trying in vain to catch up. 

“Had sex, Daniel!” she exclaimed, shaking his whole body slightly at the word “sex.” “When was the last time that we made love? I feel like it’s been foreverrrr.” 

“I, uhh…y-yeah, yeah it’s been awhile, I guess,” mumbled Daniel in response, staring down in confusion at his girlfriend. She was so pretty, with her red hair splayed all out in an elegantly disorganized frame around her head; the oil lamps in the corner highlighted the smooth firmness of her lovely features, and the slightly crinkled lines of her provocative smile. He blinked, and a substantial part of him did suddenly feel turned on…and there was internal stirrings in his groin. But he blinked again…something held him back. There was something in her smile…in her eyes…He didn’t feel safe. 

“A lonnnggg, longggg time,” cooed Emma, looking up at him and shaking her head back and forth in the hay, making it rustle, a kind of rustic serenade. “It isn’t good to go so long without fucking” 

Daniel opened his mouth to speak, but he found that he didn’t know how to address what Emma had just said. She had just been talking about “making love,” and now all of a sudden she had descended to just calling it “fucking.” It wasn’t like Emma to talk like that. His anxiety grew. 

“How about it, huh?” she drawled, and suddenly, she reached her other hand up and began fondling his crotch. Daniel drew in a sharp intake of breath as he felt his body freeze in response to this unexpected gesture. He was a little hard, but by no means did his physical arousal imply that he was in the mood to do anything. Emma, however, reacted quite differently. 

“Oooooh, I can feel that!” she moaned, squinting her eyes up at him in a display of aching arousal. “It feels goooood, Daniel. Let me see it.” 

“N-no, Emma…Emma come on,” he stammered, fidgeting in her grasp as he tried to squirm away from the advances of her huge hand. Her fingers were massive, and effortlessly pried his legs apart as they continued to feel him up. He felt her other hand tightening still further around his shoulder and upper diaphragm. 

“I wanna see it!” she chirped, licking her lips. There was a slightly manic look in her eyes now. Daniel started to panic, wondering what his options were. It occurred to him that he could always yell, and then maybe her family would hear and come running. He didn’t know why he was so afraid right now — he was attracted to her! And he loved her — of course he missed their intimate moments. But right now, in this moment, nothing felt right. It felt like he was standing on the precipice of a bad dream, and the lighting in the barn seemed to reflect that. The shadows seemed to deepen around him, and the dark lines along Emma’s features appeared more pronounced. He could see the dark sparkle in her eyes, and the thin film of moisture on her lips. He caught the gleaming shine of her teeth. 

“H-honey…babe, let’s just…l-let’s just cuddle some more, ok?” he chuckled, trying as hard as he could to laugh at the situation, and at himself, for being so scared. Emma didn’t seem to hear him at first, her eyes locked on his groin as she continued to fondle him through his pajamas. The seconds passed by, and she started to grin, biting her tongue as she prodded it into the inside of her cheek. Daniel felt himself starting to tense up even more, and despite the situation, he could feel himself getting harder. 

“Huh?” asked Emma suddenly, blinking and shifting her eyes back up to his face. “What did you say?” 

Daniel felt himself exhale in wonder. He didn’t know what to think right now — she looked so happy, and so pretty…so innocent, in this moment, and yet, just a few seconds before, everything had seemed completely different. Daniel knew that she wasn’t playing games with him; she was genuinely asking him what he had said, and…she just seemed to be completely unaware of the strange, shifting dynamics around them. He felt his heart melt for her. She was trying her best, she really was. 

“I…I j-just wanna cuddle you some more, Emma,” he finally managed to say. He shook his head down at her, blinking slowly and smiling. “I…just love you so much.”

“But…but you’re hard,” murmured Emma, blinking her eyes rapidly up at him. “Don’t you…don’t you want me to kiss it?” 

Daniel didn’t know why he had felt so afraid before; everything about her seemed soft and gentle now, and her last question had come out as almost childlike. He felt like he couldn’t possibly refuse her, even though he still just wanted this little episode to be over. 

“S-sure,” he said, laughing a little as he smiled. “It’s just that…heheh, I’m sorry Emma. It’s just a little awkward for me…you know…on the first night at your parents’ farm.”

Emma didn’t answer. Silently, she used her free hand to jostle down his pajamas, exposing his erect cock, which bounced up and down in the low barn light. Daniel hadn’t realized that he was that hard…or maybe it had just happened as a result of her exposing him. Either way, he shuddered slightly, suddenly allowing himself to feel the pleasure of her gaze. 

“You have a pretty penis,” Emma murmured, lowering him down to her mouth. As she brought him down, Emma could feel herself returning to the same kind of numb, dark, musing depression that she had felt when they had been snuggling earlier. For a couple minutes there, she had felt the stealthy, powerful flashes of pointed, erotic desire. But now that she was lowering Daniel towards her mouth, she couldn’t get it out of her head how small he was…all over. Against her will, her mind flashed back to months and months before…before all of this had started…it seemed centuries in the past…her hands grasping at the sheets in the bedroom, her flushed face upturned to the ceiling as she cried out in pleasure, surrendering to Daniel’s pounding cock…him grunting and panting in frantic pleasure as he thrust in and out of her, holding her out-splayed thighs with his hands, the sweat dripping down off his face and onto hers. His cock barely fit in her back then — she had loved how he stretched her, and held her down as he did so, over and over. 

But now…now his cock wasn’t much bigger than her pinkie finger. He had gotten so, so small, compared to her…she paused in her lowering, his cock twitching just above her lips. She knew that this was all her fault, that she was the one who had changed, not him…not him…Emma had to keep reminding herself of that, in an effort to avoid feeling resentful of Daniel for not being nearly big enough to satisfy her anymore. But reminding herself that she was a freak didn’t make her feel good. 

She realized, after a few seconds of dwelling in these negative feelings about herself, that Daniel had gotten even harder…she had been inadvertently blowing on his cock as she inhaled and exhaled. She tuned her ears to the moment, and could suddenly hear Daniel’s ragged breath above her, coming in little pants. A drop of precum that had been glistening on his tip suddenly dripped down onto her bottom lip. Emma blinked in surprise, feeling a twinge in her clit. 

“You’re so hard,” she whispered, tilting her head slightly to the side as she studied his cock with interest. Why not just enjoy the little moment they were having? Why did her brain need to torment her by going back to earlier memories? Why couldn’t they just have fun the way things were? Slowly, feeling more curious and exploratory than anything else, Emma lowered Daniel down a little more, until the tip of his cock was pressing slightly into the plushness of her lips. 

“Haaahhh…Emmmma,” he whispered, panting. He was so aroused…she could tell. Somewhere in her mind, she knew that he was more in the moment than she was — there was a strange kind of psychic distance that seemed to separate her from what was happening. But Emma didn’t care. It didn’t matter that she felt like a spectator, watching herself do things to him. Her throbbing clit reminded her that she was enjoying this moment as well, even if it wasn’t in the same way that she used to feel desire. ‘No more worrying, no more feeling sorry for yourself,’ she thought. ‘Daniel wants you soooo bad right now…give it to him.’ She had made up her mind to enjoy this night. 

Slowly, softly, as she blinked her eyelids gently up at him, Emma began kissing the head of Daniel’s cock with her big lips. Each kiss seemed to elicit another dab of precum, and soon, Emma could feel the stickiness of it stringing between her slightly parted lips. 

*Muah* *Muah* *Muah* *Muah* *Muah*

Her kisses were deliberate and slow, and searingly tender. Emma was surprised to discover that she enjoyed the feeling of Daniel’s little cock against her lips. It was…cute. Moments before, she had been silently bemoaning how he was way too small for her, but now, she was actually delighting in the way that it twitched and spasmed every time she touched it with her lips. Daniel’s ragged breathing, punctuated by helpless, exhaled moans that coincided with her lips’ touch, was the real thing that was getting her going, though. She loved how she was hardly doing anything, and yet eliciting such a powerful reaction. 

*Muah* *Muah* *muahmuahmuah*

She changed it up a bit, kissing the tip a few times in rapid succession, quick, sweet little kisses. 

“Hohh…hohhhhh…Emma…” whispered Daniel, his body tensing up even more.

“Hahaha,” laughed Emma softly, enjoying the feel of her breath overwhelming the small member at the entrance to her lips. “I’m barely even touching you.”

“It’s…it feels good,” was all Daniel could say. 

“Oh yeah?” asked Emma softly. She still felt like she was just watching all of this happen from a distance, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t enjoying herself. “You like it when I kiss your little cock like that, hmmm?”

“Yesss,” came Daniel’s reply, in an almost pained whisper. 

“You like it when I *muahhh* kiss it like *muahhhh* that?” She returned to the long, slow kisses. Daniel panted and hissed in response, squirming a little in her hands. But he wasn’t going anywhere, and she easily held him at bay to her lips. She kept it up for another half a minute or so, until she could feel Daniel’s whole body go rigid. He started to shake. 

“Are you about to cum?” she whispered.

“Y-yeah,” breathed Daniel. 

“Well let me just *muahmuahmuah* make it easy for you then,” purred Emma, switching again to her rapid kisses. 

*muahmuahmuahmuahmuahmuahmuah*

She puckered her lips and kissed the tip of Daniel’s titillated cock over and over, in rapid succession, making it a point to exaggerate the kissing sounds as she did so. She felt his little body spasm in her hands, and something warm suddenly splashed all over the outer part of her lips, coming in warm little bursts, over and over. 

“Ooooo,” she moaned, resisting the urge to giggle at the intensity of Daniel’s orgasm. She channeled her sudden inner humor by making funny little sounds with her cum-coated lips. 

“Abubububbub!” she intoned, shaking her head back and forth a little, teasing him further. “Abububububububub!” 

“HuhuhHuhuhHuh oh gah—oh gahd…Emma!” whined Daniel. His almost-pained tone, together with the intense spasms rifling through his little body, made Emma glance up into his face curiously. She had been amusing herself making silly noises blowing cum bubbles lips on his spent penis, but his hyperventilating, combined with the fact that he sounded like he was about to cry, made her look at his face. What she saw held her attention — held effortlessly aloft in her hands, Daniel’s eyes were squeezed shut, and his lips were pulled back from his teeth as he gasped in and out, in and out, clearly overwhelmed. Emma blinked a few times as she stared at him steadily, feeling nothing at first. A strange notion suddenly popped into her head: he was faking it…exaggerating it. There was no was that his reaction could be genuine. She had just…like, literally brushed his cock a few times with her lips, teasing it and kissing it. And this was how he responded!? 

Then, gradually, as she watched Daniel catch his breath, Emma came to realize that his behavior was as pure and authentic as could be. She really had done all that to him, without even trying. It was hard for her to believe, and yet the evidence was plain to see in her hands: the shaking, sweating, shivering body of her little boyfriend, recovering from what looked like the most intense orgasm of his life. 

“Heheh, ummm…just, uh, haha, take it easy,” she chuckled softly, rubbing his chest with her fingers as she lowered him down towards her breasts, holding him closely to her. She looked around the darkened barn again, the low light seeming to deepen the shadows around them. Somewhere off in the corner she could feel the horses stirring. Emma couldn’t help but smile — the situation was all so weird, so bizarre…and she still felt through it all a strange an unnatural distance, like she was just watching everything happen, rather than participating. But this disconnection was also shot through now with something warm; she had made Daniel cum harder than she had ever seen him cum…in the process of playing with him, she had effortlessly overwhelmed him. And Emma…well…she kind of liked it. At this point, in her mind, it was more of a fun little curiosity, a cute game of sorts. But a seed had been planted.

“Emma…that was…wow,” breathed Daniel, finally regaining the ability to speak. 

“Hah…yeah, I can see that,” she murmured to him. 

“I…I wanna return the favor,” said Daniel suddenly, and he made a motion to rouse himself up off Emma’s body in the hay. But Emma held him firmly to her, not allowing him to get up. 

“Nooooo….no, it’s ok,” she whispered. “I’m…I’m good for tonight, I think.” 

“You’re…you’re sure?” asked Daniel uncertainly, with a touch of disappointment in his voice. 

“Yeah,” whispered Emma flatly. “I think I, uh…got all I wanted for tonight, haha.” It was true. Right now, the last thing she wanted was to lie there, watching Daniel struggle in vain to get her off with his hands. She realized, after these words had come out of her mouth, that she had missed the opportunity to make them sound sexier. Had she made it sound like she hadn’t enjoyed it? But there she was again, overthinking everything. 

“Let’s just…go to sleep, alright?” she sighed out pleasantly, squeezing Daniel too her a bit tighter. 

“O-ok honey,” he agreed. Silence reigned for a few long moments.

“Uh, Emma?” came Daniel’s voice.

“Hmm?” she responded, her eyes closed.

“Uh…thanks for…for all that,” he muttered. Emma’s eyebrows furrowed slightly in the dark, her eyes still closed. He was thanking her for his orgasm? Why did it feel so tacky to her? She blew out a slight breath from her nose, unknowingly ruffling his whole head of hair beneath her. 

“Haha, go to sleep Daniel,” she whispered. She wasn’t going to engage her mind anymore…not tonight. 

The next few days seemed to inch by, bit by bit, with a surreal sense of clarity for Emma. In the past, when she had been growing so rapidly, everything around her had seemed hazy, like it wasn’t even real. But now that she was on her parents’ farm, and in the constant companionship of Daniel and her family, there was no running away from the obvious reality of her growth. Emma was growing, and it wasn’t slight, either. At this point, she was growing around 5 inches a day; her body filled out accordingly, adding more than twenty pounds for each inch that she grew. Her curvy, busty figure endured, and it wasn’t lost on Daniel and her family that her ass had gotten a bit larger, even in proportion to her already-colossal physique. Unlike previous spurts, like the one she had had at the Institute in front of Igor, Emma’s growth seemed to have steadied out, at least for the moment. She was thankful for this, since it at least allowed her to have semi-normal interactions with everyone without them losing their minds over her spurts like Igor had. 

‘Yeah, I don’t think they’d be able to handle watching a spurt like that,’ she thought to herself one morning a couple days later, staring down at Daisy and her parents as she absentmindedly tossed whole grapefruit and bananas into her mouth, peel and all, chewing them once and then swallowing them down. They were all sitting in a circle outside, eating breakfast, in an attempt at some normalizing, casual camaraderie. 

“Uhhh…Emma?” ventured Daisy, a little nervously, catching her younger sister’s eye. 

“Huh?” asked Emma, blinking blankly as she munched on the fruit. 

“Are you…? Everything alright there?” Daisy sounded uneasy. 

“Yeah, why?” Emma could feel herself making a real effort to push down her irritation. She was literally just sitting there, eating. It was too early to be cross-examined by her sister. 

“You were…you were just looking at me kinda weird…is all,” replied Daisy cautiously, with a touch of defensiveness in her voice. Emma refocused her eyes down on her sister. Was she serious!? Daisy had always been one to speak her mind, but now she was just pulling things out of thin air, surely. For a few long moments, Emma said nothing, continuing to toss fruit in her mouth as she looked down at Daisy. Emma could feel her parents’ guarded eyes on her as well, and she perceived, without turning her head, that Daniel had done the opposite, turning his gaze towards the pond. 

‘They’re all literally waiting to see what I’m gonna do,’ Emma realized with a start. ‘And they’re all so nervous.’ The feeling that sprang from this realization surprised her — instead of feeling her more customary barrage of irritation and shameful vulnerability, she actually felt…well, something else. Was it…power? They all seemed so tense…she was the only one who was relaxed and casual. She saw Daisy avert her eyes to her plate, where she restlessly picked at her grits and scrambled eggs with her fork. Emma saw that her father’s fork was paused above his own plate, and that her mother had actually put her fork down. Daniel wasn’t even eating. The air was tense. 

‘Geez, look at those silly little toothpicks they’re holding,’ said Emma to herself, not realizing that she was actually chuckling out loud. ‘They actually need those to eat!? Look at their plates…there’s barely any food on them at all! Their plates are like…like buttons or something!’ 

“What’s…um…what’s so funny, Em?” asked her mother in a bit of a shaky voice. The tone of Maisy’s voice made Emma check herself, although she was unable to wipe the smile off her face. 

“I…heheh…just, don’t worry about it,” said Emma, shaking her head a little as she chewed four whole grapefruit and two bananas at once. 

A couple days after, Emma was silently cursing her promise to help out her parents on the farm, in exchange for her staying there. In a moment of strange gaiety the day before, she had boasted that she could plow the main farm plot faster than her father’s tractor. 

“Are…are you sure, Em?” Jim had asked, staring up at her, not seeming to doubt her bluster for a moment. 

“Psssh are you kidding?” Emma had answered, flush with pride as she walked over to the tractor, bending down at the waist to lean on it sideways. Standing up straight, the tractor’s vertical exhaust pipe barely even reached her breasts. As she leaned her elbow against the roof, the tractor’s wheels sunk down visibly into the mud. “Which do you think looks more powerful, hmmmm?” 

‘This is ridiculous,’ she thought to herself darkly the next day, standing there with her father’s old heavy plow strapped to her shoulders. ‘How could I be such an idiot to suggest something like this?’ 

“Ok Em!” called her father from the other end of the long unplowed plot. “We’re all set!” 

“Right, dad!” she responded, sighing to herself. Her mother was watching anxiously from the side, as were Daniel and Daisy. Emma couldn’t help but notice that her sister and boyfriend were engaged in conversation…and it annoyed her. Daniel and Daisy had always had a good relationship, so their talking casually was nothing new. It was just that right now, in this moment, Emma had become aware of their interaction annoying her for the first time. Maybe they were standing too close to each other or something. 

‘Oh would you just cut it out?’ she spat at herself savagely. She kicked a little dirt behind her, and she felt the huge white sheet around her body expanding slightly with her movement. She was 14 feet tall now, and the massive sheet fit her quite well now, like a moderately tight toga. She suddenly became determined to put on a show…to make good on her boast. Gritting her teeth, she planted her feet, took a deep breath, and started lugging the plow forward. Except, well…she wasn’t “lugging” anything. The rich brown earth, which Emma had expected to be far tougher, felt like butter, as the sharpened steel plow cut through it effortlessly behind her. 

‘Oh wow!’ she laughed to herself. ‘Guess I was right…this is easy!’ 

Daniel and her family watched dumbfounded as she pulled the plow all the way down the acre-sized plot, reaching her father in under a minute. His mouth was hanging open as he gaped up at his gigantic daughter, who winked at him cockily, sticking her tongue into the side of her mouth. 

“Told ya, dad,” she smirked, turning the plow back around and going down the opposite direction. As she went back down the other way, she was heartened to see that her impressive physical display had put the conversation between Daniel and Daisy to bed. 

‘That’s right,’ she thought to herself, allowing a wave of smugness to wash warmly over her as she smiled at them. Less than ten minute later, the entire plot was plowed, and Emma was only breathing a bit heavily, wiping a thin sheen of sweat from her brow as she leaned once more against the defeated tractor.

“That…that was incredible, Em!” cried Jim as he ran over. He knew as well as anyone that it took an hour to plow that same acre with the tractor. 

“Remember the story of Paul Bunyan?” Emma asked the tractor directly, feeling positively giddy. “When the machine defeats the man in the end? Haha, not this story!” 

A little while later, however, Emma’s high spirits had fallen. Her body was aching more than usual, not from the exertion of the farm work, but rather from the telltale feeling in her bones that her growth was picking up, or about to erupt in a large spurt. Daniel had mentioned, quite sensibly, she knew, that it wasn’t a good idea for him to sleep with her in the barn when her body was aching like this. She could have a large spurt in her sleep, and crush him without even waking up. Emma knew that he was right, and sadly conceded to sleep in the barn by herself. But it left her feeling vulnerable and rotten all over again. To make her sister feel better, Daisy had come into the barn that night, and as Emma sat there on her piled of hay, Daisy sat on a much larger pile behind her and braided her long, red hair, just like she used to do years before. 

“Wow Em, your hair!” murmured Daisy, marveling at the huge spills of red that were like a long, luscious curtain. 

“Oh god, all the split ends…I know,” responded Emma. 

“What? No!” exclaimed Daisy, taking the long ropes of her little sister’s hair in her hands. “Your hair looks amazing! And it feels amazing too! I mean…whatever this whole growth thing is, it’s making your hair, like…it’s doing wonders for it, Em.” 

“Really?” asked Emma genuinely, trying to ignore how tiny her sister’s hands felt against her scalp. Without being able to see Daisy, it felt like a tiny child was braiding her hair. It felt weird, to have hands that small moving against her hair and scalp with such purpose. 

‘She’s an adult,’ Emma reminded herself. ‘She’s your older sister.’ 

“Yeah,” returned Daisy, having to use her shoulders to manage the long, thick braids. “It’s like…silver lining, right?”

Emma responded with silence. She wished that her sister hadn’t said that, since it reminded her, once again, of how normal people saw her condition. It wasn’t enviable in the least. 

“So…Daniel seems well,” Daisy remarked, clearly not comfortable with long silences. Emma felt another flash of irritation, even though she knew it was unfair. Daisy was just trying to make conversation, just like always. She was trying to help. 

“Yeah,” murmured Emma, staring off through the open barn door into the twinkling lights of her family’s farm house, where Emma had no doubt that Daniel was enjoying a respite from her. It made her so sad. She desperately wanted to be inside there with him. 

“I know all this can’t have been easy for you two,” Daisy continued, sifting the ropes of Emma’s braids to her shoulders, “But it really does seem like you’ve both handled it really well.”

“Does it seem like that?” asked Emma searchingly, turning her head slightly. 

“I…well yeah,” answered Daisy. “Like, you two are still…uhm…you’re still obviously in love and everything.”

Emma was silent. She got the sense that Daisy had just tiptoed around something that she had been about to say, but not said. 

“And…and I think it just goes to show,” Daisy kept going, “That if the feelings are there, you know, it doesn’t really matter what happens.” 

“Yeah, I feel that with him,” muttered Emma softly. “He’s been so kind to me…so loving…so patient…I really don’t deserve him.” 

“Oh, now!” exclaimed Daisy, halting her braiding for a moment. “Stop that kind of talk, Em! I don’t want to hear it!” 

Emma knew Daisy was being genuine, but she couldn’t get the sight of Daniel and Daisy talking earlier that day out of her head. They looked like…two normal people, just enjoying each other. Emma and Daniel could never look like that ever again. 

“You hear me?” persisted Daisy, tugging on one of Emma’s braids like a rope. 

“Heheh, yeahhhh,” chuckled Emma despondently, smiling in spite of her low mood. “I know I’m just being a wet blanket. It’s just…hard to feel normal about things anymore.”

“Well…yeah!” laughed Daisy, resuming her braiding. “You’re almost 15 feet tall, Em! Kinda hard to pretend that things are normal when you’re stronger than a tractor, haha!” 

“Heheheh, yeah,” chuckled Emma, wishing that her sister wouldn’t talk about it all like that. Emma knew that she was trying to be helpful, but she was hitting all the wrong notes. 

“What’s it like when the two of you are…uh…you know…?” Daisy ventured. 

“When we’re what?” asked Emma blankly, having no idea what her sister was hinting at. 

“When you’re in bed.” Daisy had paused her braiding once again. Emma rolled her eyes and sighed. Of course Daisy was asking about that; she had never quite known where the boundaries were. The odd thing was, Emma didn’t feel irritated by the intrusion — instead, she felt irritated because she had this crazy thought, somewhere in her brain that she knew was wrong, that Daisy had asked because she was trying to get some kind of “inside scoop” on Daniel.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” said Daisy quickly in response to Emma’s sigh. “Too far, too far.”

“N-no, no it’s…it’s ok,” said Emma, suddenly feeling very tired. She thought back to the strange, intimate scene she and Daniel had had in this exact spot, just a few days before. There was no way of explaining that to Daisy — Emma hardly knew what to make of it herself. 

“We’re just…we haven’t been doing a lot, to be honest,” she answered, semi-truthfully. “It’s been…complicated.” 

“Hmm! I bet!” said Daisy, and the conversation dropped. For the next few minutes, they chatted about random things, recalling old times, to the point where Emma could almost pretend that they were just casually hanging out. But when Daisy was done and had to go back inside to sleep, Emma was left with herself again. She curled up in the hay, deliberately facing away from the farmhouse, as she willed herself to sleep, determined not to cry. Some strange buzzing sounds kept her up a bit longer, and actually made her get up and go to the open barn window once to investigate. There didn’t seem like there was anything there, so she went back to her hay, shaking her head at the apparent near-sleep hallucinations she was having. But when she went to sleep, unbeknownst to her unconscious ears, the buzzing resumed by the window. If she had been awake and close enough to see it, she would have seen that it was a drone.