Her fingers released my face, only to snatch me up off the table and bring me over to the sofa, where her handbag was. She dropped down into one of the chairs, placing me down on the floor directly between her massive bare feet.

On either side of me, her toes began calmly scrunching into the carpet. It made me think of a cat flexing its claws. This comparison was helped by her toenails being so long, she obviously hadn’t trimmed them in a little while. I was distracted for a moment by her rippling toes; the cords of tendons in each toe pulling, tightening, and then relaxing again, only to repeat.

“NOTICE ANYTHING?” she said with no real urgency.

I looked up to meet her monumental face gazing down at me. She was leaning forward, her hands resting on her knees, so far forward that white-tipped strands of her long hair had fallen forward and trailed over her legs.

She was watching my face closely and I began to get a bad feeling. She always fixed me with this studying look when she was about to suggest something novel or unorthodox to me – usually at my expense.

“I AGREED TO YOUR RESTAURANT,” she started, rubbing a finger back and forth across her lips as if in thought, “BUT YOU HAVE TO DO SOMETHING FOR ME ALSO.”

I squared my shoulders. “What’s that?”

Behind her fingertips, her lips curved into a small smile. “HERE’S A HINT…”

Her toes began to clench harder, the long raking into the carpet, now more restlessly, generating a low scratching sound. I watched the display before looking back up at her in confusion.

“Massage your feet?”

“THAT WOULD BE LOVELY, BUT NOT NOW. I HAVE SOMETHING PARTICULAR IN MIND. YOU DON’T SEE WHAT THE PROBLEM IS?”

Her toes carried on scratching through the carpet. It was the only sound except for the white noise down the hall which was Stuart showering. I continued to stare at them, as if struck dumb. I had never been this close to her feet, except that one time at Scott and Tasha’s house, when I’d woken up shrunk. But I hadn’t been thinking straight then. Now I could make out the lines on her soft leathery feet, the faint flaky scales of dead skin around her toenails, and the fine dusting of dried, crystallized sweat emerging from the base of her toes. The bulbs of her toes were like big balls of pale pink putty, or marshmallows, each topped with a nail like a softly shining porcelain plate with a generous length of white tip extending out. Her big toe was like a huge exercise ball; I could’ve stretched my back over it.

“YOU KNOW WHAT I WANT, WISEGUY,” she said after a minute’s silence. “YOU’RE JUST PLAYING DUMB, AREN’T YOU?”

“No,” I said tiredly. “You want me to lay down a new roll of carpet.”

There was an impatient sigh from above.

“CLOSE YOUR EYES.”

I gave her a suspicious look. “Why?”

“JUST DO IT, AND I’LL GIVE YOU ANOTHER HINT.”

Without another word, I shut my eyes. Somewhere very close by, her feet shifted. There was a soft draughty feeling; a displacement of air, and a presence of someone. Or not someone. You know when someone is right there in a room with you, you can’t see them but you know they’re there. Or someone is right behind your back. It was like that. But I knew it wasn’t someone, but something. And not behind my back, but right in front of me.

Then something soft began stroking up and down my jaw. It felt like someone’s palm; Jennifer’s palm. I could almost imagine her standing in front of me – both of us normal size – like it used to be. I knew it wasn’t her palm, but it was nice to think so.

For one thing, Jennifer was into scented hand soaps, so her hands were always very soft and fragrant. I knew this from being on the receiving end of spontaneous face massages back when we’d been together. She wasn’t a big massage person, except face massages, because it allowed her to carry on talking to me face to face at the same time (usually these massages were used to sugar-coat some degree of onerous request of me she was making at the same time). If I was sitting down, she would jump on my lap unannounced, straddling my thighs, push me back into the seat and start running her hands all over my face and hair, sometimes kissing me on the lips as well.

But at my current size – welp – no more of that! A single one of her thumbs could capably massage my entire head, and even then it was too big. She could have kept my entire head stuck under the flat of her thumb like a marble. At my previous size, she’d used to run her thumbs around my eyebrows and over my eyes, which I loved, because sometimes she would close my eyes this way and then plant a surprise kiss on my lips and then pull away before I opened my eyes again.

Now, her oppressively huge thumbs were no longer capable of such delicate actions on my person anymore, without squashing some of my essential facial features along the way.

Thinking this, I felt a twinge of longing and regret as the thing probing my features carried on up my cheek, over one of my eyes and along my brow. I tried clinging to the fantasy that it was her hand, but the thing currently touching my face was not as soft as her hands usually were, and it had a faint odor that made my nose wrinkle a little, without being intrusively offensive.

The pressure against my face withdrew. I opened my eyes to find the massive bulb of her big toe hovering just in front of my face, angled up to expose the concentric ridges of the toe print. For a fraction of a second, I had the impulse to draw my finger around the ridges, but repressed it. It would probably tickle her and her foot would lash out and boot me in the head by accident. Or deliberately.

Her foot rested on its heel, with the other toes splayed and shifting. I tilted my head up to see her face past this huge intrusive big toe, which was hovering right up under my nose like it was having to restrain itself from leaping onto my face again.

She had been leaning forward watching me the entire time. One forearm resting across her knees, the palm cupping the elbow of the other arm, which was raised to support her head. She was sucking her thumbnail with her expression arranged into a partly inquisitive, playful look. If I didn’t know any better I would have thought she seemed to love drawing her toe over my face even more than any other time she’d given me a normal face massage.

My member was starting to spring to life. This was giving me the most confusing hard on I’d ever had; I hated being tiny, being under her like this, being demeaningly explored by her toe like it was my job to stand still and let her do it. But the way her eyes were looking at me burned into me like a laser. She’d never looked at me like this when we were dating: like my body was a delight to her; a little toy, an apparatus she could manipulate for her own private enjoyment.

I was torn in two. I felt fear and passion in waves that made me feel like I wanted to throw up.

I was seeing the girl I loved and a towering, kind of frightening monolith that looked exactly like her, and whose actions I had little control and influence over.

I took a step back, but was uncomfortably aware that, unless I sprinted a little way, it wasn’t easy for me to move out from under the shadow of her great foot.

I swallowed, trying to calm myself down, then said:

“Okay, enough of that, what’s the hint?”

She observed me under her dark lashes calmly, continuing to bite her thumbnail. “TAKE A GUESS.”

The long thick overhanging white edge of her toenail swung forwards suddenly and tapped my nose. She did this with playful intent. Unfortunately, getting the first person perspective of that sharp toenail tip lancing at my eyeballs was about as playful as a python snapping for my face.

Obviously Jennifer had a lot of confidence in her accuracy. Or I hope she did.

For a brief instant my nose was in unwelcome proximity to the underside of her toenail, where a bunch of odorous God knows what was gummed up underneath, including something giving off that classic old cheddar foot smell, very likely toejam. Normally I was a big fan of vintage cheese. But this was going too far, even for me.

“Um, Jennifer,” I said slowly, swallowing as my sinuses felt like they were shriveling up and dying, “no offense, but you need to cut your toenails.”

Her smile deepened as she dropped her foot back onto the floor. One slender finger glided down to pet the crown of my head, like I was a dog that had just performed a trick.

“GOOD WORK, SHERLOCK. NOW – ” she smoothly pulled a toenail clipper out of her handbag and lowered it onto the floor at my feet, “—BEGIN.”

At my size, the gleaming silver toenail clipper looked like a two-handed weapon of torture. The Mafia could’ve used it to slice my fingers off.

My pupils disappeared up into my eyelids for a moment. “Do I have to?”

“IT’S ESSENTIAL. I PLAN ON WEARING SOME OPEN-TOED HEELS, SO MY FEET ARE GOING TO BE ALL EXPOSED. AND THIS IS A FANCY PLACE WE’RE GOING TO, YES?”

“You could just wear some closed shoes,” I suggested. Worth a shot.

“WHAT?" she said dangerously, "IS THERE SOMETHING WRONG WITH MY FEET?”

I leaned back, looking away contritely. “Of course not.”

“WELL YOU’RE ALL THE WAY DOWN THERE,” she said, scrutinizing me carefully. “YOU HAVE A GOOD VIEW OF THEM. YOU TELL ME HOW THEY LOOK.”

She stared down at me, her toes wiggling impatiently. I took a moment to examine her feet, not sure what I was supposed to be noting. They looked fine to me already; smooth, flawless, her toes long and slender and muscular. It was just the toenails were a little on the long side, but so what? In a busy restaurant, who would even look? I regretted pointing them out in the first place.

“They’re perfect!” Trying to sell it, I even padded up to one of her big toes and pressed a kiss onto the hard smooth surface of her toenail.

“BULLSHIT! LOOK HOW LONG MY TOENAILS ARE! YOU FLINCHED WHEN I POKED YOUR NOSE!”

“That’s because I thought you were about to toe-punch my face.” I got to my feet, groaning. “You know it would be a million times faster if you did it.”

“I DON’T WANT SPEED. I WANT QUALITY. LOOK AT THOSE TINY, DELICATE HANDS,” she gestured down at me, “YOU’LL DO A REALLY FINE JOB. WE HAVE TIME.”

Letting out a heavy breath, I wheeled around and pulled the clippers up into my arms. Given they weren’t intended for dual handed grip, they did not sit comfortably in my arms like, say, a rifle. I noticed huge smudged fingerprints coating the reflective silver surface – where Jennifer’s fingers had been on it when she’d fished it out of her handbag.

Starting at the big toe, I carefully positioned the clipper blades into place around the white part of a nail, then used my body weight to push down against the lever. Luckily, the nails of each successive toe required less force. The big toe was the hardest.

The toenail fell away and I left it on the carpet, preparing to move onto the next toe. But Jennifer’s voice crackled above:

“UH UH,” she tutted. “WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO WITH IT?”

I paused, my mouth open as if to protest. Then I bent down and reluctantly picked up the toenail, which was so big I could have tucked it in my belt like a dagger. To my (well concealed) disgust, the underside of the toenail felt greasy and was covered in a film of greyish gunk like dirty starchy glue. It looked like cottage cheese but smelled like blue cheese. Although, with the dirt streaking it, it looked a little like blue cheese as well. Having this filthy comparison to my most favorite of foods was sacrilegious. I wondered if I could ever eat cheese the same ever again.

I placed the toenail down over to the side, then rubbed my hands against my shorts, but to no avail. As soon as the toenail juice touched my hands it stuck there and began to harden like clay, and I couldn’t get it off.

With each toe, more loose toenails joined the first, until a little pile began to grow. By the time I was finished, I was red-faced, panting and sweating. And that was just one foot. I was only halfway finished.

Jennifer observed me patiently as I hefted the clipper over to her other foot and got started all over again. I worked through her foot more quickly this time, having adjusted to the task. Nevertheless, by the time I was finished, my shoulders sagged, my back ached, and sweat was running my sides. Every big gulp of air I took seemed to be disagreeably scented with a sharp spice of cheddar.

“SEEING THOSE LITTLE BICEPS OF YOURS BULGE WHILE YOU WORK OVER MY FEET IS REALLY SOMETHING…” She purred. “YOU’RE LIKE MY OWN PERSONAL SLAVE.”

“I’m not your slave,” I said with a huff.

Her finger trailed down and brushed through my hair. “I KNOW. IT LOOKS LIKE A LOT MORE GROOMING IS REQUIRED,” she joked.

Without even giving me a moment’s rest, she took back the clippers from my hands and quickly replaced it with a Q-tip the size of a sword. At least it was lighter than the clippers, but I didn’t know what she wanted me to do with it. My lungs heaving, I looked at it, and then up at her.

She made a downward thrusting gesture with her finger, and then rotated it. I took it she meant I was to prod the Q-tip between her toes and rub it around for cleaning.

She slid her foot towards me, and her toes splayed. I climbed up onto the smooth surface of her foot, and sitting myself down, began to jab the Q-tip between the spaces of her toes, and work it around vigorously. This was difficult as her toes kept wiggling and shifting, yanking the Q-tip around in my grasp. I felt like I was trying to steer a horse and carriage.

“Can you just keep still?” I said through gritted teeth.

Jennifer answered through small squeals of laughter:

“YOU’RE TICKLING ME SO MUCH – YOU DON’T REALIZE HOW HARD I’M TRYING TO NOT SWAT YOU OFF MY FOOT LIKE AN ANNOYING LITTLE FLY.”

Yikes, things could always be worse, Jerry, I thought to myself staidly. At least you're not as small as a fly.

I imagined her hand slapping down on me with a loud SMACK and shuddered, deciding to just shut up and do my job as fast as possible. Luckily, this time it was a little easier than clipping, and I managed to run through the line of toes in very good time. It helped that each foot only had four toe spaces, compared to five toes. However, where clipping the toes got easier with the smaller toes, this time it was the other way around. The smaller toes had tighter spaces, creating more work for me to drive the Q-tip in and shift it around.

Once I was finished, the muscles in my arms were beginning to feel heavy and leaden, and the cotton end of the Q-tip was coated in some of that grayish paste, plus lint. It also smelled bad, and I was relieved when she finally took it from me and wrapped it in a tissue for disposal.

She then withdrew something else from her handbag of horrors and placed it down on the carpet in front of me.

“JUST ONE LAST THING,” she instructed.

It was a vial of transparent nail polish. She unscrewed the lid and placed the end of the brush in my hands before I could make a sound. The open polish bottle wafted its acrid smell up my nostrils making them sting, and my eyes water. For someone my size, I daresay it could be classed as a biohazard, like mustard gas.

I jumped back, covering my nose and shaking my head, but I couldn’t drop the brush anywhere; if any of the polish got on the carpet she would kill me.

“Nope.”

“OKAY, FINE,” she said lightly. “I’LL DO IT. YOU JUST HAVE TO SQUISH YOUR HEAD IN BETWEEN MY TOES TO KEEP THEM SEPARATED.”

Without another word of complaint, I gripped the brush tightly and began to stir it in the bottle, while Jennifer smiled triumphantly down at me.

With the brush thickly coated in clear polish, I then positioned myself in front of her big toe and began to apply the brush to the surface of her toenail in even careful strokes. I was not much of a painter, but this didn’t require the hand of Rembrandt. I just needed to keep closely within the ‘lines’ of her skin and ensure the gloss was applied evenly, and didn’t leave blobs or bumps.

After a while, Jennifer began to hum quietly over my head. Not, apparently, with impatience, but indolently, distracted by my quiet, methodical working. The vibration of her humming was relaxing, but if I stopped to rest, her finger soon journeyed down and tapped the top of my head lightly to coax me to continue.

I began to lose track of the fact I was painting enormous toenails, and not, for instance, plates or Frisbees. It was just the lingering odor wafting out from between her splayed toes that made the fiction wobble. The Q-tip had eliminated all the detritus from between her toes, but not all the odor. It clung to me like muggy swamp air.

Time passed as I carried on in this trance state. All of a sudden I found myself finishing her final pinky toe.

“NICE JOB,” she said, inspecting my work.

I straightened and cringed; the joints at the small of my back felt like rusted iron. All the muscles in my arms were trembling.

Jennifer took the polish and brush back from me, lifting them up and returning them to her handbag.

Meanwhile, I went to step back but something caught me and held on.

The fabric of my pants had accidentally got hooked on one of the sharp outer edges of Jennifer’s newly cut big toenail.

“Wait—” I said, only just noticing, hurrying to try and free myself.

But she didn’t hear me.

As she went to stand up, her foot shifted, lifting up, and slinging me over the floor violently. It was like I had been picked up and thrown. Getting detached from her toe, I went flying head first into the pile of her toenail trimmings.

 “Aaaargh!”

I cried out like I’d fallen into a pile of syringes. It wasn’t that different; the sharp points of her toenails jabbed my limbs all over, in some places pricking me deep enough to draw blood. At my size they were like little curved knives. Scrambling out of the pile, I jumped to my feet, doing my best to brush the nails off my body. Little spots of blood stood out over my arms and legs.

Then I leaned back on my feet, taking a few deep breaths, grateful I didn’t have a big toe clipping embedded in my chest.

There was a booming giggle from above.

“OOPS. HOW CLUMSY OF ME.”

She hadn’t seen the bloody pricks on my skin.

For some reason, outrageous violence didn’t bother me. I loved horror movies and found them funny. Maybe that was why I endured being small pretty well, relatively speaking. But little things always got to me; bee stings, accidentally ripping off a chunk of fingernail, jamming my finger in a door hinge. I tended to have a cartoonishly over the top reaction to that kind of stuff; a kind of swooning, fainting reaction. And falling into a pile of all those gross prickly nail trimmings – literally stabbing their oily toejam under my flesh and injecting it into my body  – just did it for me.

The thick cloying smell of nail polish didn’t help. And it was everywhere now: inside my nose, inside my head. There was nowhere I could turn.

I coughed, causing an instant headache to break out. Getting to my feet, I turned and began to wander away in no particular direction. But the smell followed me.

“I need a break,” I said. My voice sounded oddly far away.

Then I don’t remember what happened.

But when my eyes opened I found myself curled up on a soft padded surface. It felt amazing; like the most comfortable bed ever.

I ran my hand over the surface, it felt like a suede leather sofa, with creases and folds. I stretched luxuriously and yawned. My body, particularly my arms, gave off small aches and pangs. I went still again, preparing to go back to sleep.

There was a low reverberating giggle from above me. Then a jet of warm air hit me, like I was right in front of a heater.

I blinked.

“…what?”

I was lying on a huge cupped hand, with fingers curled up at one side, and on the other side, Jennifer’s expanded face drawn in close to watch me. Her lips pursed tightly as she sent a long spurt of warm air directly into my bemused face.

In protest, I held my arm up before my face. When the gust subsided, I noticed Stuart standing over her shoulder, watching me with a little concern. He was bare chested with a towel wrapped around his waist.

“IS JEN WORKING YOU TOO HARD?” he joked. “OR WAS IT THE SMELL?”

Jennifer chuckled and shoved him with her free hand. “HEY! MY FEET DON’T SMELL – DO THEY, JERRY?”

“It’s nothing but a garden of roses down there,” I muttered, knowing if I said anything else I would be in deep trouble.