“Ewww…” Emma laughed as she peeled at the chewed mess of grape gum still plastered in Tom’s hair: the very wad of gum she’d pressed him into at his smaller and far more helpless size.  He’d managed to regrow back to eight inches in the intervening time by avoiding opening his mouth to lie, but it wasn’t a marketed improvement.  “You’re gonna need a shower before class, huh?”

            Her tone was neither joking nor apologetic; she was just as earnest in her desire for Tom to have some self-pride as she was, perhaps contradictorily, never going to acknowledge for a second that this morning was made any more difficult by her proffered gift of used chewing gum.

            The girl managed to collect most of the slippery candy with the tip of her fingernail, though much of it remained flecked hopelessly into her older brother’s hair.  Obediently, the now doll-sized liar held still while his sister did her rudimentary cleansing of his face that still reeked of grapes and Emma’s saliva.       

            “Probably,” he replied matter-of-factly as his sister’s other hand cupped against his back, keeping him centered over her short-clad thighs.

            “Did you remember to brush your teeth?” she questioned with sudden sternness.

            “Yeah,” he mumbled before the question was even processed.  Immediately he lost another three-quarters of an inch.

            Rolling her eyes and shaking her head, Emma allowed herself a broader smile.  As usual, she wasn’t at all bothered by his lie.  If anything, the sight of him reducing just a little more in her grip was a welcome sign.  “Gosh, what are we gonna do with you, Tommy?  You don’t want people saying you have bad breath, you know.”

            Pinching the small purple ball of gum between her fingers, then, she bit her lip, trying to hide another scheming grin.  Steadily she moved the gooey wad closer to her brother’s little face.

            “Open your mouth,” she whispered.

            More confused than startled, Tom raised an eyebrow, eyeing the lump in his sister’s other hand, and tried not to instinctively gag.

            “What?” he managed.

            “Your mouth,” she snickered.  “Open nice and wide for me.”

            “Really?”

            “Yep,” she confirmed.  She teased the sticky ball against Tom’s lips, causing him to shudder slightly at being reintroduced to its texture.  “Come ooooon.  We’re gonna fix your breath.  And you know I love sharing with my little brother…”

            “I…” he muttered.  “I don’t think I can fit the whole-”

            Taking her window, Emma shoved as much of the gum ball into her brother’s mouth as she could fit, wedging it such that shutting his mouth in defense was impossible.  The lump, still thick with the lingering juices of the girl’s throat, was far too thick to be refused.

            “Don’t talk anymore,” she ordered, gently but with enough firmness Tom knew the discussion was over.  She smiled from the corner of her mouth and brushed a fingertip over Tom’s gum-speckled hair.  “Just bite down.  As much as you can get.  And keep it in.  Don’t spit it out at me.”

            Nodding with passive defeat, Tom tore through as much of the revolting used gumball as he could until nearly every corner of his mouth was filled with what essentially amounted to his sister’s throat-flavored garbage. 

            “Good,” Emma said with satisfaction as she watched her toy-like sibling’s efforts.  She pinched a fingernail through the stringy mess that spilled from Tom’s mouth, though there wasn’t much; he’d managed to take a lot of it in, and she was glad to see his spirit in that regard.

            The bus rolled into the parking lot of the school just then and came to a stop.  Students all around began lugging their backpacks up from the floor and preparing to trudge inside.

            “Now just keep chewing my gum, okay?” Emma instructed.  “I’ll tell you when you can stop.”

            Smacking his jaws in an effort to chew through the ball that filled his entire mouth, Tom just tried to settle into a steady breathing pattern.  By now the gum was sucked away of most of its grape flavor, leaving it with the consistency of old clay and the potent leftover taste of Emma’s breakfast.

            “Looks like you’re not quite tall enough to go to class, Tommy,” Emma teased jovially, squinting studiously at Tom and drawing him closer to her face as he continued gnawing.  Her breath wafted down to his nostrils, scented with the heady hot grape that already covered so much of his body and now filled his jaws.  A fresh grin spread itself over her lips.  “So I guess you’re mine for now, huh?”

            Tom nodded in agreement with her sly statement, shrugging to himself.

            It wasn’t like there was anything to be done, after all.  It was well-known that most teachers at the school didn’t want shrunken liars in class, and requested that any offenders currently standing below their natural height simply skip the period and make up the work rather than sit in the room in public rebellion of society’s most vital value. There were a few exceptions, but for the most part, this was the golden rule.

            This, of course, for Emma, translated to her getting to “chaperone” Tom for the morning until he was of adequate height to move himself around.  The young man had become pretty complacent with this fate, though; looking on it with some perspective, things could be far worse, and of his siblings, he infinitely preferred to have Emma in charge of him.  Of course, that didn’t mean there weren’t noticeable downsides to being in her overly creative clutches.

            “You’re probably too big to fit in my purse,” Emma sighed, clearly disappointed as she held the handbag up to Tom’s seven-and-a-quarter inch frame.  She unzipped the top of the leather container all the same and shifted her grip on her brother so that he fell back into the opening.  As she predicted, he was long enough, but with her make-up, pencils, and of course extra chewing gum, fitting him in was going to be too tall an order.

            “Darn!” she grumbled.  By now the bus was nearly empty as others shuffled down the aisle; her two oldest siblings had already departed the vehicle for the day with friends and bookbags in tow.  She frowned, thinking the issue over as she cradled Tom in her hand.

            “I should’ve gotten you to lie again before I shared my gum,” she complained quietly.  It was something she dared never mention in the presence of Alaina or even her oldest brother or mother, but nonetheless, it was understood between Tom and Emma that she couldn’t have cared less how often he lied as long as it was to her advantage.  “You would’ve fit if you were just a few inches less.  Oh well.  There’s enough room in here.”  Her hand reached for her backpack and undid the back zipper, pointing inside.

            “I’ll just keep you in here until you’re too tall to fit, then you can go to your class, okay?” Emma said with genuine intent as she scooped her brother up and held him over the largest pocket.  Mumbling an affirmation, Tom wiped his mouth of moisture from the soggy gum wad.  He was laid with surprising care into the base of the pocket before Emma’s hand at last released its possessive grip on his back and rose up.

            “And remember: don’t spit my gum out!” Emma warned a final time, smiling cheerily before sealing Tom inside with the zipper.  “Actually, I guess it’s yours now, technically…”