“What… what are you going to–to do with m–me?” John asked with a frown and clenching his fists, trying to look mighty and ferocious, he failed.

  “W–what?” Laura raised her hands, confused.

  “You! You are pnning something!” He pointed his finger at her, happy that he had managed to say the whole sentence.

  “N–No… I just–”

  “I have to escape, if I don’t escape, you will– you will–”

  Laura looked at him petrified.

  “You will do something to me!”

  Laura’s shock turned into sadness, she lowered her hands and her shoulders and kept looking at the floor.

  “You… you are afraid of me, aren’t you?”

  John hesitated. His breath came in short bursts, his body still coiled like a trapped animal. “I—” His mouth opened, then shut.

  Laura exhaled slowly, as if steadying herself. “I don’t bme you.” She finally looked at him, her expression unreadable.

  John clenched his jaw. He didn’t want to feel guilty. “You could hurt me,” he muttered. “Even if you don’t mean to.”

  Laura nodded. “I understand.”

  “Why? Why would you take a man like me into your home? Buy him a bathroom on day one? What is the big idea?”

  “I don't– I just–”

  “If–I I'm going to stay, I need to–to know.”

  She kept looking at her shoes.

  “Listen… I don’t know what it means to be small.”

  John crossed his arms, he was about to say something, when she continued.

  “...But I know what it means to be afraid.” She raised her face and looked him in the eyes. For a split of a second, John felt as if Laura was the small one of the two.

  “I will be back in a bit, I will get lunch and bring you something to eat.” She turned around and left the apartment once again.

  “Wait, am I a dick?” John facepalmed a few minutes after she had left.

  John closed the Discord and Subreddit pages, nothing good was actually coming out of staying online all the time.

  He decided to instead lie down and stare at the ceiling, thinking about what he had said. After an hour, he had convinced himself he was the one who was guilty, he didn’t think about her. That one thing was clear.

  But when she came back to the apartment, his body tensed up once again.

  He knew it was Laura. He knew she was just bringing lunch. But his body didn’t care—it still jolted with that same gut-deep be ready to run instinct. She didn’t enter the room right away, John heard her working in the kitchen.

  After a while, Laura stepped inside, holding a small pte. Her movements were careful, deliberate, like she was trying not to spook him. She pced the pte on the desk and gave him a quick gnce.

  “I got you something that should be easy to eat,” she said, a little too fast, like she had rehearsed it in her head.

  John blinked. It was scrambled eggs and a pancake.

  She hesitated. “I, uh… I thought something soft would be better.”

  John nodded slowly.

  Laura used a fork to carefully break up the pancake into pieces small enough that he wouldn’t have to wrestle with them. She did the same with the eggs, making sure nothing was too much for him to handle. Then, she unwrapped a napkin and pced it beside him, like it was his own little pcemat.

  John stared.

  Laura sat on the gaming chair in front of her desk. “I don’t know what you like yet.”

  John swallowed. “No, this is… this is good.”

  She gave a small nod, then started to scroll yet again in her phone.

  He swallowed hard, tearing his gaze away. Instead, he reached out, hesitating as he grabbed at a piece of egg with both hands. It felt strangely dense. He took a bite, and it was… fine. Normal. But the act of eating was foreign, each chew making him more aware of just how little of himself was left.

  Laura gnced at him but didn’t comment. His hands clenched around a piece of pancake. The syrup made his fingers sticky, and the frustration rose up in his throat.

  “I feel like an idiot,” he muttered.

  Laura looked at him. “What?”

  “This. All of this.” He gestured at his meal. “It’s stupid. I’m getting worked up over eggs.”

  Her gaze softened. She reached out, stopping just before her hand got too close. “You’re not stupid. I am sure we can find you better food.”

  He took another bite, swallowing it down despite the lump in his throat. He didn’t like she kept watching him.

  “Uh… did you already eat?” If he looked away, it was easier to talk to her.

  “Yes.”

  “And– is there anything else you will do now?”

  “No.” She didn’t sound mad, she was sad, which made it harder for him to be mad at her. “I just want to make sure you don’t choke, or something.”

  “O–okay.”

  After struggling for a bit with his food, he managed to feel full, he turned around and went back to his shoebox, while he was looking away, he said “I’m done.” Laura took the pte and the leftover food and left the room.

  An hour after browsing endlessly on social media on the sofa of the living room, Laura got a message from John.

  John: uh thanks for the food

  John: sorry if I was weird

  Laura: It's okay. just let me know if you need anything

  Laura: I don’t mind if you’re weird.

  John: hey, I haven't thanked you for all of this... you can't even believe how it feels like to be small

  Laura: You don’t have to thank me. but… yeah, I probably can’t imagine it

  John: It's like. my body doesn’t know what’s real anymore. when you walk past me, my stomach drops like I’m on a rollercoaster. Everything is too loud. too fast. I feel like I’m constantly bracing for something, even when nothing happens

  John: when you walk past me my stomach drops like I'm on a rollercoaster, I see you and it's like seeing a kaiju

  Laura: damn

  John: I mean I know it's not your fault! Haha, sorry, if it came out wrong but still, like... I mean, you get what I mean? Because I'm so small?

  Laura: yeah. I get it.

  John: Everything's too loud, too fast. I feel like I’m constantly bracing for something, even when nothing happens.

  Laura: like your body’s still freaking out even when you’re safe?

  John: exactly. and it makes me feel like a goddamn animal. like some skittish thing that flinches at shadows.

  Laura: I don’t think that makes you an animal.

  John: Then what does it make me?

  Laura: someone who’s trying to survive.

  John: …

  Laura: remember that you can count with me

  John: I will remember, thank you

  John: I'm sorry my body reacts the way it does

  Laura: it's not your fault

  John: by the way, do you work or study? I'm just worried I'm keeping you busy when I shouldn't

  Laura: oh, don't worry about that, I'm currently unemployed

  John: ha! Me too

  Laura: I'm looking for work, but it has been a little slow

  John: you tell me, I have been at it for a while

  Laura: Sometimes I feel lonely, so it's nice to have someone home

  John: it is

  Laura: I don't go out too much myself, I'm not the kind of person to go and drink on Friday night

  John: how so?

  Laura: I guess it's just not my kind of pce

  John: well that's a shame, I bet there would be many men who would be happy to meet you

  Laura: nah, I doubt it

  John: yes! Seriously! Like... My body freezes because I'm small, but personally I think you are really pretty

  Laura didn't answer for a bit, in the living room, she was blushing

  Laura: nah, I'm not

  John: I'm serious! If I was still a normal guy, I would probably ask you out

  She didn't answer.

  John: Laura? You there? John: sorry, I guess I was being weird again

  Laura: don't worry sorry, I thought I had seen a great thrush sit on my window, but thank you, that means a lot to me

  John: Oh cool, did you get a picture of it?

  Laura: no, it flew away before I could open the camera

  John: damn, guess I distracted you

  Laura: It’s fine. I see birds all the time.

  John: Still, it would've been nice.

  Laura: yeah.

  John: so, uh… what do you do when you’re not, you know, dealing with this whole tiny guy in your house thing?

  Laura: I just stay home, mostly. Read books, watch stuff, py games, and listen to lots of music.

  John: sounds nice.

  Laura: sometimes. Other times it just feels like waiting.

  John: yeah… I get that.

  A few minutes passed.

  John: Do you think things will ever feel normal again?

  Laura: for you?

  John: yeah.

  Laura: I don’t know. But I think you’ll find a way to live with it.

  John: That's not really the same thing, though.

  Laura: Maybe not. But sometimes living with something is the closest we get to normal.

  John: …I guess that makes sense.

  Laura: yeah?

  John: yeah.

  John: I feel nothing is real at all, it’s wild

  Laura: Funny that you say that

  Laura: I feel like that all the time

  Truth is that they didn’t talk to each other until the evening after that, John kept scrolling memes, nothing actually useful, just memes, and Laura kept reading that book I had seen her read when she first saw John, but in the evening, Laura got an idea.

  She set a small pstic box on the desk, flipping open its tiny brass tch with a quiet click. Inside, nestled in a felt-lined interior, was a miniature chess set. The board itself was no bigger than a book, the pieces barely the size of her fingernail. Magnetic, John realized, when she plucked up a pawn and let it snap back into pce.

  "You py?" she asked, tilting her head.

  John sat on the table, knees drawn up, still watching her warily despite everything. He could reason now. The fact that she hadn't crushed him, caged him, or otherwise treated him like a bug was beginning to register as real rather than just an anomaly waiting to turn dangerous.

  Still, when she moved, he flinched.

  Laura hesitated at that. Her expression softened, but she didn't comment. Instead, she simply nudged the board toward him, careful, slow, letting him take the lead.

  "I—yeah. I know how to py," John muttered. His voice was quiet, scratchy.

  "Great. Then you can destroy me in under ten minutes." She giggled.

  He hesitated, looking down at the board. The pieces were so small—he could actually move them. He reached out, touched a pawn. The magnet held firm, a slight resistance against his fingers. He had to brace the piece with his two hands and use his legs to separate it from the board. He slid it forward, testing.

  His body still thrummed with unease, but the motion was steady.

  Laura moved a pawn in response. "Alright. Show me how terrible I am."

  Her fingers, massive in his view, descended toward the board with a deliberate slowness, as if she were trying not to startle him. He could see the ridges of her fingerprints, the fine creases in her knuckles as she pinched the tiny piece between her fingertips. The sheer scale of her was still overwhelming. Her hands alone could scoop him up effortlessly, and yet here she was, moving a pstic pawn like it was something fragile.

  The sight made his breath hitch. He exhaled, forced himself to focus.

  John moved a knight next. Laura mirrored him, shifting a bishop, her hands momentarily blocking his view like some great, living curtain. He found himself studying the way her nails gleamed under the light, how she unconsciously tapped the piece twice before letting go.

  After a bit he stopped focusing on his size.

  Laura’s skill was, as promised, terrible. She blundered a rook within five moves. He didn't even have to try to beat her, but for the first time since waking up like this, he wasn’t just reacting to the world. It felt a bit like doing exercise really, and aside from a few pieces like the bishop and the knights, he didn’t actually have to raise the piece, just slide it vertically or horizontally, most of the time anyway. John was actually having fun.

  A knight slid into pce. Checkmate.

  Laura groaned, flopping back against her chair. "Couldn’t you have waited a little longer to beat me?”

  John ughed. “Were you pying for real? Or are you really that bad?”

  “I have always known I was bad at chess, but not this bad.”

  “I set you up several times, and you fell for each one of them.”

  Laura was drumming her fingers on the desk softly. John kept looking at her fingers, it was easier to talk to her that way, he paid attention to her movements, the way they moved and retracted. At his size, it was almost as if each one had a life of their own.

  “Yes. I’m not good at looking ahead.” He looked above to see her face, she wasn’t looking at him, she was actually looking away, defeated. This somewhat calmed him, if she looked at him directly, it would activate his flight or fight response. Was she looking away on purpose?

  “...You know, this has cheered me up a little, want to py again?” He made sure he was looking at the pieces of chess before asking her so if she looked at him, he wouldn't notice.

  “Sure!” She said, a bit loud for his ears.