Claire was just starting University, her parents had given her a lift down with everything she needed to move in to her new home. It was student building. Each floor was a different flat that had four to five people living in it, sharing a kitchen and front room. She was on the fifth floor, right at the top.  After her parents helped with lugging everything up the narrow flight of stairs they hugged her goodbye and said they’d call when they had made it back home.

She saw them pull away from her window, so she started with the arduous task of unpacking. After she had made the bed, hung her clothes up and pushed a few boxes out of sight she decided it was time for a break.

There was a knock on her door and it creaked open.

‘Hi’ a lively voice called out from behind her, ‘I’m Georgia, guess I’m your new roommate’

‘Claire’ she shifted nervously towards her.

‘Don’t worry I won’t bite’ she teased. Georgia was obviously attractive, it was easy to spot. She had long brown hair that reached down to the point of her shoulders. Her skin seemed flawless and she was taller around five foot eight. Claire was a little dwarfed by her at first. ‘Here, like this’ She thrust her arms around Claire bringing her in for a hug, ‘girls hug, I’m a hugger.’

‘Have you met any of the others yet?’ Georgia continued.

‘No’

‘Number four Candice, she’s really nice, sweet and funny I’m sure you’ll like her. Number three is nice too, Sam, he’s harmless a sort of gamer type. Number 1 hasn’t got here yet sooo I don’t know who that is; and as you already know I’m Georgia and I’m in room two.’ She hammered her sentences out one after the other, ‘so number five, how old are you?’

‘I’m 19’

‘Awww, like a little baby, I’m 23. I took a couple years out working to get some savings before I started. How about course?’

‘Course?’

‘What are you studying?’

‘Oh I’m doing English literature.’

‘Same. That’s good, do you want to walk to lectures together, we’ve got introduction tomorrow’

‘Yeah cool, it’ll be better to go with someone, I don’t really know anyone at the moment. I just moved up here for Uni, I’ve never really been here before.’

‘Don’t worry about it you’ve got me.’ She winked, ‘How about we do a getting to know each other thing later, movies, drink, pizza. It’ll be good to get fat for one night.’

‘Sounds great, I’ve just got a few more boxes to unpack, but we should definitely do that.’ She kneeled down to pull one of the fully packed boxes back from under her bed.

‘I’ll leave you to it then.’ Georgia started to leave, but the glint of something caught the corner of her eye, the drawer to Claire’s desk was slightly open, she reached in and pulled it out. ‘Cool, is this like a Star Trek gun or something’ Georgia said holding it in a firing position, ‘how about a game of Russian roulette’ She pointed the gun at Claire.

Claire turned back around to see what Georgia was talking about, when she saw her pointing her shrink ray at her she screamed and threw herself on to her bed.

‘Wow real commitment’ Georgia laughed, ‘Relax I’ll go first’

Before Claire could let out a ‘no don’t’ Georgia had squeezed the trigger back with a grin through gritted teeth.

Georgia looked up bewildered to see something dropping towards her. She dived forward as the gun crashed down handle first behind her, the barrel dropped with a second thump inches from where she had landed. She slowly brought herself back up to her feet staring at the gun. She was in shock, looking around everything was out of proportion, weirdly slanting upwards towards the ceiling, it was like standing in a square with skyscrapers on all sides.

Claire crept towards the edge of her bed a thick lump formed in her throat, she was dreading every moment. She peeked over the edge and let out a groan, choking back and finding it difficult to breathe.

Georgia fell to the floor when she saw the giant face peer into view above her. Claire’s deep brown eyes burrowed into her. She felt sick at the sight of her, she only just realised how small she was. A giant hand descended towards her like a claw machine, ignoring all the other toys and sparkly gems it selected her. The fingers caged her in, the index finger came under her left arm, the third finger under her right, and the middle finger pressed against her back and curled up between her legs pushing her into the palm.

Claire felt the tiny girl struggle inside her balled up fist, she was being careful not to drop her and was trying to think of what to do. She fell back on her bed and rested her fist against her stomach. She took in a deep breath and unfurled her hand dropping the tiny girl onto the exposed skin of her stomach where her shirt had risen up. She let out an even longer exhale to compose herself. As she did this her stomach dropped and Georgia fell, rolling on to her side.

‘Georg…’ she started

‘What the fuck?’ Georgia screamed. She clambered back up to her feet and stomped hard on the flat of Claire’s stomach, it growled reactively causing her to tense up. ‘What the fuck?’ repeating herself.

‘Georg…’ she started again.

‘Change me back’

‘It doesn’t work like that’

‘Change me back’

‘I said it doesn’t work’

‘Change me back now!!’

‘Georgia It’s one way’ pausing for a moment to look at the worked up expression on Georgia’s face,

‘the extra molecules that made up your larger size were redistributed, mostly as air and…’

‘What’

‘It can’t just add them back… they’re gone… your stuck like that… permanently’ she hesitated saying the last word, looking down at her chest to avoid looking at her minuscule roommate.

‘Why did you do this? Why do you even have a shrink ray?’

‘That’s sort of hard to explain’

‘Try’

‘It’s embarrassing’

‘I’m three inches tall and it’s embarrassing?’

‘Um… See I have always had this fantasy’

‘About shrinking people’ Georgia looked up to see Claire’s face turning red, ‘Oh god you planned to shrink me, you were going to shrink me and use me as some sort of toy, and now I’ve done it for you’

‘No, no I was never going to shrink you. In these fantasies I was the shrunken one.’

Georgia stared back up at her confused, tears welling up in her eyes.

‘I was the shrunken one’

‘Why did you scream when I pointed the gun at you’ she stuttered out, ‘You wanted to be shrunk.’

‘Once you’re shrunk its forever, I’m not ready for that. I would need someone who I knew would look after me and not just use me as a sexual object. So I was going to be the giantess first’

‘So you were going to shrink me’

‘No, there are a lot of people on the internet begging to be shrunk. Not just shrunk, they want to be eaten or stepped on’

‘You’re not going to eat me are you?’ Claire’s stomach rumbled again underneath her.

‘Only if you want me to’ Claire joked.

‘No I don’t want you to eat me’ she shouted.

‘I was only going to do it with people who wanted me to. I wasn’t just going to shrink random people and keep them as pets or something. I wanted to do it with people who understood, who shared my fantasy’

‘So what do we do now, I’m stuck like this I need help’

Claire gently pushed the tiny girl across her stomach till she slid down the tilt of her left side. Georgia slipped to the bed sheet in a soft thump. She looked around to see the giant form of Claire swing her legs to the floor stand up and walk to the bedroom door. She pushed it closed and clicked the lock.

‘Claire…’

She turned around and looked at the tiny girl on her bed with hungry eyes, this was so close to what she wanted, what she had spent nights reading about; but she couldn’t. She sighed and walked back over to Georgia.

‘Claire, what are we going to do?’

She bit her lip. ‘I’ll take care of you’

Georgia looked up a little bit worried after everything Claire had just told her about her fantasies.

‘We’re on the same course, we have the same modules. I can take you with me and you can listen from inside my shirt pocket, or I can take notes and help you when I get back. Also you can’t feed yourself at that size, how are you going to get the kitchen cupboard open or the fridge. You won’t even reach the countertops. ‘

‘I know you’re trying to help but’

‘Georgia, I’m the only one who knows about this right now, I’ve read every kind of story about this, I know how to protect you. Do you really want our other roommates to know what happened to you? That usually goes bad pretty fast, they have fun with you and soon you end up licking their feet before they step on you.’

‘Oh god Claire, no. Life isn’t like that, just because I’m small, they’re not going to, I mean I wouldn’t, I umm Claire, I think I need to, I need to think this through.’ She sat clutching her knees to her chest, ‘I should have pulled the trigger, and I should have shrunk you. This is my fault, I should have shrunk you.’ Tears starting flowing as Georgia repeated herself a few times.

Claire cautiously climbed back on to her bed. She cupped her hands around Georgia and brought her up to her chest.

Georgia could hear the thumping of Claire’s heart, she pushed herself against the sound of the beating and cried. The giant hands pressed her close. She felt warm. She felt safe.