The gravel road I was walking down seemed to go on forever.  The rain just kept on coming down harder and harder. I hadn't planned on getting stranded in the middle of a storm, and I was stupid enough not to bring an umbrella with me in the car. It wouldn't have helped much though. The strong wind coupled with the heavy rain made it feel like it was literally raining sideways.

It was almost completely pitch black outside. the only light source that I had was a small flashlight that I kept in my glove compartment, and the flashes of lighting that illuminated the sky for a second. The trees to the left and right of the road continued to sway in the powerful gusts. Some of the trees looked weak enough to fall over completely in the wind.

The gravel road up to this point had been going downhill. But now, the road seemed to be heading up-hill now. Now I was fighting the keep myself from being blown down back to the bottom. 

Once I reached the top of the hill, the road ended at a small, one-car garage. The door was shut, so I didn't know If there was a car inside or not. Then off to my right, It came into view. A large mansion appeared. I'm not an expert on houses, but the house looked pretty new. Probably one of those homes that millionaires retreat to sometime.  I walked up the front door and rang the door bell. I didn't hear it go off inside. Maybe they didn't have power,  or it was broken. I didn't know, so I started knocking on the door.

"Hello? Is anybody home?" I called out.

No response. 

"Hello?"

Still nothing. I guessed that there wasn't anybody home. Even though I was out in the middle of the storm and completely drenched, I didn't want to barge into a house with nobody home.  But when I turned away to return to my car for the night, I heard a very faint whisper.

"Come in, Come in, Come in"

I just barely heard it over the sound of the rain coming down. I turned around to see if there was anybody. Nothing.  I guess I was just hearing things. I kept walking, and then I heard a creaking sound. I turned around again to see that the front door had opened a little bit. Strange, I thought, but I wasn't about to enter a stranger's house uninvited. I decided to keep walking, when suddenly there was a bright flash of light and an incredible boom sound. I sounded like a bomb when off right in front of me. Apparently, lightning had struck just a mere few feet in front of me. It startled the shit out of me and I ran straight towards the house, opened the door, slid inside,  and slammed it shut.

 Once I came to my senses, I realized the mistake I made. I just broke into a strangers house. I was really hitting myself for it. Oh well, I was inside away from the storm, and that's all that mattered to me at the time. I found a light switch near the door, but the lights wouldn't come on. I was right. The power was indeed out in this house.  My clothes were completely soaked, but I didn't exactly want to strip down in some stranger's house. I at least took off my shoes, and hid them near the front door so they wouldn't be found .

I decided to explore the ground floor of the house a little bit. The house looked like a pretty rich house. It had a large living room area with a large TV(Looked like one of those new 4K TVs), a large couch, and a recliner, and a side door that emptied out onto a wooden deck overlooking a yard.  A pretty modern looking kitchen.  A pretty fancy looking dining room that didn't look like it was used very much judging by the amount of dust. 

I didn't want to be in here, nor did I want to go back to that storm again. So I decided to look for stairs that lead to a basement.  sure enough, I found a set of stairs and went downstairs. Once I reached the bottom, I found that it was a Rec Room. It had a Pool Table, Ping Pong table, a Bar, Dartboard, and just through a sliding door was a home gym.

But then, I heard the whisper again.

"Come in, Come in, Come in."

This time I heard it much clearer. Somebody must have been in the house! They must be teasing him. It sounded like It was coming from a door next to the bar. I opened the door and entered what was a storage room. It was really dusty and full of cobwebs like nobody had entered here for a long time. It was so dusty, It set off my allergies and I started sneezing and my nose got stuffed up.

I decided to call out again.

"Hello? Is anyone there?"

No response.

"I'm sorry for entering your house without your permission."

Still nothing.

Getting more and more nervous, I kept walking. Searching for the person who was whispering to me.

"Okay, you've had your fun. I said I was sorry. You can come out now."

Nothing.

After I let out a large sneeze, I stayed perfectly still and silent to try and listen for sounds of somebody.  The only sound that could be heard were the occasional rumbles of thunder outside.

"Well, Okay then, if that's how it's going to be. I guess I'll be going now-"

And then it happened. I smelled something really weird. I couldn't describe what I smelled like, only that it was strong and irritating. A gas of sorts had filled the room and I couldn't breathe. I start to move toward the door, but then I started feeling light-headed. I started to feel drowsy. Then I fell on the floor, and my mind went blank. 

******

I woke up on a cold surface. I had no idea how long I was out. I didn't know where I was. Last I remembered I was in a spooky storage room of a mansion I walked into. I got knocked out by some sort of gas, but I didn't know what. I noticed that my shoes were back on my feet for some reason. And that my clothes had dried. I felt really cold though.  My nose was still stuffed up and my throat was really sore. Sounded like I caught a cold from walking around in the storm. Wonderful.

I couldn't tell where I was. It felt like I was on a marble floor of sorts. Whatever kind of room I was in, it was dark and really wide open. But then I heard the sound of a door opening and closing. It didn't sound very far away.

Then suddenly the whole room filled with light and that's when I realized what was going on. The room that I was in was Kitchen I walked through earlier, except that it was huge. The marble floor I was on was actually the island counter top. I was absolutely stunned. I had shrunken. How? Where? Why? Who?  These questions raced through my confused and scared brain at the moment.

Then I heard a voice that sounded like it was coming from another room

"Ah, home at last."

This voice definitely wasn't a whisper. It sounded like whoever lives in this house had come home. And they probably wouldn't be pleased to see a tiny man on their kitchen counter. It might scare the shit out of them.  As long as nobody came into the kitchen I'd have time to think and assess the situation. 

Now I could hear them talking again. They sounded like a man and a girl.

"All right, I'm heading up to bed.” The man said.

"Okay," said the girl's voice, "I'm going to get something to eat first and then head to bed."

Shit! One of them was coming in right now! I had to act fast. I needed a place to hide.  There wasn't much to work with from where I was at. There was a news paper off to the side. Maybe I could hide in one of the folds. I ran as fast as I could, but trying to run with a stuffy nose isn’t an easy task.  Thankfully there was an open fold on my side I could easily push up and get inside.

Just as I made it underneath, the girl entered the kitchen. She was a beautiful blonde girl with blue eyes and looked about my age. From my size, she was huge. Even though I was on a counter top, she still looked pretty tall.  Imagine what she looked like if I was on the floor.  I swore I recognized her. But I didn't know exactly who she was.  She walked over to the refrigerator and was taking out what looked like some sort of left-over meat. She then put her food in the Microwave to heat up, and then started humming some sort of tune that I couldn't recognize.

That's when my nose started to itch. I was about to sneeze. Of all times, it had to be now. I tried to hold it in for as long as I could. But sadly, it was to no avail. All I did was charge it up. I tried to muffle it up by holding my left arm over my mouth and then-

"AAAACHOOOOOOOOO!"

The girl stopped humming. Her face turned towards the newspaper.

"What was that?" she murmured.

Crap.  She heard me. There wasn’t much that I could do now. If I changed positions now, she’d see me for sure. So I waited to see what would happen.  I heard footsteps coming over to my hiding spot and-

“This newspaper is over a week old,” said the girl, “I’d better recycle it.”

 Then gravity shifted.  She was turning it on its side and I started sliding out of the fold of the paper. There wasn’t anything to grab hold of, so I fell.  I would be OK if the paper was still over the counter-top, but that wasn’t the case.  When I fell out of the fold, I saw that I was falling towards the floor. The fall looked it would kill me if I landed. I screamed and shut my eyes.  

I felt like I hit the ground sooner than I thought I would. But to my surprise, I wasn’t dead.  Nor was I injured.  And the ground felt soft, not hard. Then I opened my eyes to realize I wasn’t on the floor. I was in the hand of the girl! I looked up saw the girl’s shocked and confused face. She looked like she was about to scream, but then covered her mouth with her other hand. We stared at each other for a few more seconds and then I decided to break the ice.

“Umm,  Hi?”