“I don’t wanna go though!” Jenna cried up at her mom while grabbing onto her skirt.  “I’m just a kid to them!”  That morning while getting ready she had stopped and checked her height.  She did not quite make it to the lowest mark, which was labeled “Jenna, age 4 – 2’2.”  Her mom had even dug some of her old clothes that hadn’t gone in a yard sale for her to wear. 

“The least you can do is not act like one!” her mom scolded.  “I’m talking with your principal about letting you stay home as long as someone brings you your homework today, to you think you can manage this for one more day?”  She had already managed to shake Jenna’s tiny hands free from her clothes and was busy straightening her skirt.

“I guess…” Jenna replied, looking down at her shoes.  “Just one more day?”

“Just one,” her mom replied, leaning over her daughter.  She ruffled her hair then stood back up.  “Then you’ll get to spend all day safe at home.”

Her mom left, and Jenna went into the school.  The only thing she could see in all directions was legs, forming barriers she had to swiftly dart through if she wanted to get anywhere.  A week ago she had stopped trying to hide herself from their eyes and found that it barely made a difference: she was so short no one really noticed her anyway.  It was all she could do to avoid the sea of churning legs each time she tried to get to her next class.

The argument with her mom had delayed her, and Jenna was still turning her locker’s dial with both hands when the person on the top row arrived at theirs.  She tried to avert her eyes when the pair of legs taller than she was walked up and hoped that she would go unnoticed between the legs.  The front of the skirt rippled back however, and Jenna found herself caught in the gaze of the woman towering over.  To her horror she recognized the face all too well: Maddie.

  “Hey there little guy, want some help?” she asked, not recognizing her friend.  Without waiting for an answer she knelt beside her and grabbed the dial between her fingers.  “What’s your- oh hey Jenna!  I barely recognized you down there!”

Jenna sheepishly looked away.  Maddie’s face alone was massive, and even kneeling she towered over her.  “Yeah, you sure have gotten big,” she offered, trying to avoid looking at her gigantic friend.  “Never would’ve seen it coming.”

“I mean, I’m not that big,” she replied, blushing.  “I didn’t even think I’d grown since I last saw you.”

“That sort of thing sneaks up on you,” Jenna said.  “You must be what, thirty feet now?”

Maddie thought about it for a second.  “With how much taller I am than you I’d have to be,” she began, “but I’m still shorter than everyone else, so that doesn’t make sense.”

“Everyone else must have grown, too.”

“But we still fit in the building just fine, if I were thirty feet…”

Jenna sighed.  “Look, Maddie, I don’t want to talk about it, okay?  Could you just help me with my locker and leave me alone?”

“Sheesh, fine.”  She turned the dial to the digits Jenna gave her then popped it open with a click.  While Jenna gathered her things from the locker Maddie stood and loomed over her friend.  “I know it’s hard for you to be shorter than everyone else, but you don’t have to be such a bitch about it.”  With that she turned and left, leaving Jenna alone to struggle with her load.

With her books gathered Jenna spun around and slammed her butt into the locker door hard enough to close it with a single motion.  She moved to step forward, but a tremendous shin in her path caused her to freeze just short of running into it.  Jenna gulped and looked up the leg twice as tall as her, it’s knee alone a good bit above her head, knowing who it was.  Sure enough, far away were Gina’s sparkling blue eyes while she smirked down at her.

“Going somewhere?” she asked while pushing her shoe forward.  Gina lifted it from the floor and placed the white tip of her oversized Converse against Jenna’s stack of books.  “I haven’t seen you in so long I thought you might be avoiding me!”  With a slight nudge she toppled Jenna backward, sending her books scattering when she hit the floor.  “Then again, I don’t usually look out for bugs.”

Gina carefully set her shoe down beside Jenna with her heel next to the smaller woman’s feet, making it clear that her foot was not nearly as long as she was.  “I hope by now you’ve given up dreaming of growing,” she said, sliding her shoe until it bumped into Jenna.  “You’re so ravaged by that shrinking disease this is about the best you’ll get.”

Jenna did not feel like getting bullied by Gina today.  She rolled away from the encroaching shoe and scrambled to her hands and knees, but before she could get all the way up Gina’s other foot came down.  With a sharp blow she drove Jenna to the floor, then held her firmly against the ground.  The width of her foot covered the whole small of Jenna’s back, pinning her securely.

“I really am sad that you got it, you know,” Gina continued.  “You had all the makings of a giantess – you were strong, confident, and didn’t take shit from anyone.  I was jealous of you, and you made me want to be my best!”  She pressed down on Jenna, making her wince from the pressure.  “But now you’re smaller than everyone else, and I can’t help but feel a little sorry for you.  Just a little though, since you were so mean to me before.”

Jenna tried to squirm out from beneath Gina’s shoe, but she was held tight.  Gina laughed and pressed a little harder, causing her to grunt.  “I could watch you struggle beneath me all day,” she began, “but I have places to be.  Rumor has it they’re looking for volunteers to bring you things after you get pulled out of school, and I’m not about to leave a good friend in the lurch like that.”  She pushed down hard again then relented, removing her foot from atop Jenna entirely.  With a chuckle she left, and Jenna set about gathering her books again.

The crowd parted around Gina, making a cacophony of shuffling to get out of her way.  One student, in a rush to make a path, forgot to watch where she was going and tripped over something.  After a brief struggle she lost her balance and fell to the floor, nearly missing bashing her head against the lockers.

Jenna fell a pair of legs bump into her, and she looked up in a panic to see one of her classmates continuing backward.  She stumbled back, and with a yelp she slipped.  Her calves hit Jenna hard, knocking her to the floor again, and her butt just missed pulverizing Jenna’s spine.  Fortunately the girl’s legs splayed outward instead of landing atop Jenna, and the small woman quickly sat up.

“Hey, watch where you’re going!” she reprimanded, looking up the black leggings on either side of her.  “You could’ve really hurt me!”

A shock of platinum blond hair shot up above the red shirt covering the clumsy girl’s torso.  “Why don’t you watch where you’re standing instead?” she retorted.  Swiftly she coiled up a leg to her waist and shot it forward, slamming her shoe into Jenna’s chest.  The blow knocked the breath out of her lungs and sent her careening away until she slid into the feet of someone else.  Luckily that person paid her no mind, and Jenna was able to gather her things in peace while the girl stormed off in a huff.

Three weeks later Jenna stood on the doctor’s upturned palm, her miniscule weight barely dimpling its skin.  She looked up at the doctor leaning over her, terrified to move in case the titaness made a single wrong move.  The doctor’s blue eyes were focused on her tiny body, kept from shaking out of fear only by the ruler she was leaning against.

Abruptly the doctor pulled the ruler away, causing Jenna to stumble forward as it withdrew.  “Just under three inches,” the doctor reported, causing her to clutch her ears.  Being so tiny compared to other people made their voices that much louder, she had learned, and significantly deeper as well, as though their voices were running at a quarter speed.  She set the ruler aside and leaned in closer, not noticing Jenna’s discomfort.  “Have you been in any sort of pain or discomfort recently?”

Despite covering her ears Jenna could hear the doctor quite well.  “Standing in someone’s hand is quite discomforting, yes!” she shouted.  While normal people’s voices were booming to her, she had to struggle to make her voice even register to them.  To make it worse she had heard a recording of her voice that morning, and it was little more than a mousey squeak.  “I’ve been too busy shrinking to notice much else!”

The doctor’s lips drew into a narrow line and he held Jenna closer to her face.  “Other than your height you look to be in perfect health,” she said.  “I’ve reviewed your labs extensively since your last visit, and there’s no physical reason you should be shrinking.  Frankly, with how you’d been growing I expected that you’d be holding me in your palm before long.”

Jenna let her rage explode: it’s not like anyone was afraid of what she would do anyway.  “Well frankly, doctor, I think that’s a load of shit!” she shouted, stepping forward to stand on the heel of her palm.  “I’ve been getting smaller for months and you’ve been on vacation, and when you come back you make lame jokes about it?  I’m not here so you can laugh at me, I’m here to get some fucking help!”

“Doctor, please excuse her,” Jenna’s mom boomed from across the empty exam table.  “She’s been irritable lately and I don’t know why.”

Jenna spun around and spied her mom between the doctor’s fingers.  “You don’t know why?” she yelled, finding a new target for her anger.  “I’m three inches tall, for fuck’s sake!  If anything I’ve been remarkably calm about this!”

Jenna’s mom gave a nod, and the doctor’s fingers began curling inward.  Jenna shrieked at the encroaching fingers, and with nowhere to go curled up in a ball atop her palm.  Seconds later they had completely covered Jenna, enclosing her in the doctor’s loose fist.  She screamed out of a mixture of fear and fury, but the flesh enclosing her muffled her voice quite effectively.

“Now that we won’t be interrupted,” Jenna’s mom began, “tell me straight: what’s the prognosis?”

“Like I said, there’s no medical reason for this,” the doctor replied.  The heat from her hand made Jenna uncomfortable, and she began to sweat.  “If this is the result of some shrinking disease it’s never been reported before, and I have no idea what to look for.  For all I know, she could stop shrinking tomorrow or she could keep going indefinitely.  Hell, she might spring back up when whatever this is has run its course.”

There was a long silence while Jenna’s mother thought about it.  “There must be some way you can help her,” she said.  “My daughter hates being doll-sized.  We’ll do anything.”

“There’s nothing I can do,” the doctor admitted.  “Anything to make her life easier is on you.  Keep the house free of clutter, keep a close watch of her size, and if she gets too small – say, smaller than an inch – keep her somewhere safe at all times.  I’ll keep looking for something, but the outlook is grim.”

There was another long pause, then the fingers around Jenna opened revealing her mother’s concerned face mere inches away.  She started from surprise at her mom looming so close to her, but did not even have the energy to recoil.  Instead she sat there helplessly while her mom’s hand approached, fingers held out to pick her up.

Her mother’s fingers pinched Jenna around the waist and lifted her out of the doctor’s hands.  Her eyes went wide while she was carried through the air, but neither her mom nor the doctor paid her any mind.  Gently her mom set her down inside a hard sunglasses case, the felt lining rough against her skin, then snapped it shut.  In darkness Jenna tumbled and landed in a heap on one end when her mom picked it up to move it again.  There was the faint sound of a zipper, and Jenna was trapped in a purse.