"I hope everyone had a nice week!" Barbara's tone was bright and loud, intended to lead the group in a good direction at the top of the hour. Laura Payne sat bolt upright on the edge of her chair, overeager grin on her face, hands folded on her lap behind Rodney. He stood boldly on her knees, focusing upon the counselor with laser-like intensity to avoid catching the expressions of his fellow clients, after last week's fiasco. No longer in workout clothes, his black dress shirt nonetheless accentuated the breadth of his shoulders, the V they formed leading to his waist. It was an interesting choice for him to go with black slacks as well, rather than a color combination that might have attracted more attention, as many Tinies did when wandering around on floors shared with inattentive Normies. Laura, however, looked like she came fresh from a jog around the park in a tracksuit in primary pastels.

In a somewhat surprising gesture of playfulness and intimacy, Lionel Kelley was perched upon Margaret's shoulder for this session. He seemed quite comfortable, nearly cradled in her voluptuous cable-knit fisherman's sweater, her lustrous hair swept about him in a dramatic backdrop. She too sat upright but with a less-rigid structure to her: she seemed self-assured and lithe, like an assassin. Though she grinned at her professorial-looking little man, Barbara took note of her appraising eye for Rodney.

On their loveseat, Brent and Miriam Little bickered about something—that is, he bickered and she chuckled and cooed at him, swatting his flailing arms down exactly as he attempted to swat her huge, pawing hands away. "You just calm down there, little guy," she said, winking at Barbara. "We're trying to get started, as soon as you settle down." Today she wore a form-clinging, spaghetti-strap dress in dark sage, with hot pink pumps and ankle ribbons. She looked for all the world like she were about to go out drinking with girlfriends in Miami, rather than working on her relationship with her querulous homunculus of a husband.

He bounced on his butt upon the taut trampoline formed by the short skirt that stretched so taught across massive, plump thighs. "Stop it! Stop touching me! You don't need to touch me all the time! Always stroking me, groping me like I'm… some kind of… cat you want to fuck!" Brent had escalated from stage whispers to outright shouts, cries that died before they reached the vintage dark oak walls of the immense dining hall. Miriam merely blushed cutely and fluttered her eyelashes at her peers.

Cribbing quick notes on the couples' demeanor, Barbara tucked thick Latina locks behind one ear and thrust her chin up. "Well, this has certainly been illuminating, and we haven't even begun. Is everyone ready?" The Kelleys nodded coolly; Laura was about to speak when Rodney barked out, "Born ready!"; Brent and Miriam hissed "She's talking! Shut up, she's talking!" at each other.

"All right, then," said Barbara, leaning back into her stuffed leather chair. "First of all, I think it would be useful for us to discuss what we learned from last week's session, how we feel that went. Any takers?" She made a subtle show of stretching out one long, muscled leg and crossing it elegantly over her knee, before assuming a classic listening pose.

"Holy fuck," whispered Rodney. Laura's hands lifted briefly, and she looked as though she might clutch him and wring him between her fists.

Margaret's voice rang out. "Well, let's talk about that. The elephant in the room, I think. Rodney really went out on a limb last time and shared some highly personal information with us."

"Aw, fuck," muttered Rodney, for an entirely different reason. He slumped to straddle his wife's thin knee, bracing himself for the impact of communal judgment.

"Hey, now, Rodney. Easy there." Her tone was soothing and warm. "I just wanted to say I admired your bravery with that. It was an admittedly chancy tale, you were taking a risk, but that takes a lot of grit, sir."

He blinked rapidly and gaped at her.

"I'm serious! We all had the opportunity to expose ourselves and learn something, and you're the only one who jumped in with both feet. I admire you for that." She leaned forward, planting her elbow upon her knee to prop her head, while ensuring Lionel never slipped off his shelf. "I hope you didn't beat yourself up too badly after that session. I saw you crumple when you were done talking and, honestly, my heart went out to you." She sat up and glanced at Miriam and Barbara. "That's what I want to say. He was very brave, he took a chance, and he trusted us. Right? He trusted us with some very personal information. I want to acknowledge that."

Rodney gasped with surprise. A smile struggled into being on his face. "Thanks, Margaret. Yeah, I felt like an asshole after that session, but what you just said… that means a lot to me. Thank you."

She smiled back at him, blinking slowly, very slowly, where her husband couldn't see but Laura certainly could.

Barbara tilted her head and mirrored Margaret's expression. "That was very thoughtful of you, Margaret. What a wonderful gesture! That's true, Rodney really did put himself out there for us, didn't he? That's the kind of candor and engagement I'd like to see in this group." She inhaled, pushing out her chest, effectively commanding the attention of Rodney, Lionel, and Brent. It was no accident, and it did not go unnoticed by their respective wives: Laura seemed irritated, Margaret looked thoughtful, and Miriam winked at the counselor.

Barbara continued: "What I would like to do for this session is crib from the Gottman Method. Normally this is a style of counseling that's best implemented for newlyweds, young people or old couples, anyone who's embarking upon a new relationship." She paused, licking her glossy lips. "But I felt it would be useful to treat the entire group as a kind of 'newlywed' arrangement, if you'll pardon my liberties, and start fresh with some opener questions to get to know each other, as couples and as a group. Does that make sense? Wonderful. Let's start with you, Laura and Rodney." She made a show of consulting her notes, though it was clear she likely had the entire course of the day's agenda printed clearly in her head.

"This is a technique the Gottman Method refers to as 'love maps.' I like how poetically he phrases it, that each person approaches the other with their agenda, a map to their personality, but it's only a pencil sketch." She raised her eyebrows and looked at each couple in turn. "It's only through the relationship that these plans and designs get put down in indelible ink. Isn't that lovely? So what we're going to do now is address some of these issues that we're coming here with—that we come to our own relationships with, assuming the other person knows what in the bloody blue blazes we're talking about—and look at them frankly, treat them as though we've never seen them before, and work on them together." Her grin was tight and her jaw was set, and therefore no one had any questions for her.

"I'd just like everyone to bear in mind that fondness and admiration for each of you are going to be strengthened by expressing respect and appreciation for each other. Let's try to keep that in mind as we move through these questions. Okay?" At Barbara's words, Brent shot Miriam an accusing glance that she purposely failed to notice. "Laura."

The wiry, pale woman bore a strained grin as she attended to the counselor.

"How well do you feel you and Rodney work as a team? And how could you improve?"

The atmosphere in the room became significantly denser as each couple considered this fundamental challenge. Miriam sat up straighter and grinned genially, failing to notice how Brent turned away in disgust. Margaret slightly turned her head to regard the little man on her shoulder, and he looked up at her, considering.

But the question wasn't directly posed to them. It was served to Laura and Rodney, and they were locked in a psychic struggle. "Well," began Laura, stretching this word out as her forehead creased in lines. "I mean," started Rodney, meeting her gaze but turning his head doubtfully.

Laura's light blonde hair lofted in an arc as she snapped toward the counselor. "We like many of the same things," she said quickly.

"That's right!" Rodney nodded at Barbara, taking a stronger stance upon his wife's thigh. "We're both into eating right and working out. That's very important to us. We keep track of each other, encourage each other, you know, keep our motivation up."

"That's absolutely true!" Laura stroked her little man's back gratefully. "Some days I'm weak, but little Rod's there to bolster me again. 'You got this,' he says, 'you've done harder things than this. You're strong, you know what you want! You don't want to turn into some fat cow.'" No sooner were the words out of her mouth than her eyes went big and round, and her snow-fair skin developed rosy cheeks. Flinching, Rodney glanced at Miriam and said, "No offense."

The very large, voluptuous woman smiled back at them. "Hm? What?"

Barbara nodded, and the Kelleys noticed that she hadn't written anything down. "That's good. Outside of exercise partners, how do you two function as a team? I'm thinking more as a married couple. Life partners."

Laura stammered, "Well, exercise is a huge part of our life."

"Right," Rodney said, "but I think she means more like how we get along−"

"I know what she means!"

"Okay."

"And that doesn't make what I said wrong!"

"Okay! Jeez!"

Laura closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "I didn't mean to snap, but I wish you were a little more supportive sometimes. Especially in front of other people." She opened her eyes and stared at him. "Sometimes I feel like you put on a little performance for other people's sake. But the way you feel you need to make yourself look good is to make me look bad, and I don't care for that. I'm not a bad person."

Rodney had no way to retreat, standing on her knee as it was, so he raised his hands to appease. "No one said you're a bad person! Everyone here likes you, I promise. I wish you were a little more self-confident, you know? Like, half my energy goes to patching up your emotional wounds and insecurities, so when it's time to be a partner, I'm exhausted and you've got nothing for me." He took one step forward, then another, and the comparatively larger woman actually sat back as if rearing from his advance. "But when I'm weak, who do I have? I can't come to you: that's your time to remind me who's the boss, where the power is. It's more like I have to do the emotional lifting for both of us!"

Laura gaped at him wordlessly. Rodney looked more than a little surprised himself. One hand striking another broke the prolonged silence of the room, then another clap, and Barbara quickened the pace of her applause. "That was remarkable, you two! You jumped past my question but you fully answered the next one. That was really impressive! I'm so proud of you two.

"The important thing here, according to Dr. Gottman, is to show each other respect and admiration right now. Don't chastise each other, don't interpret each other's words as a personal attack: just step back a moment and listen to what the other person has said about their needs. Can you do that?" Barbara was sitting upright and pushing her chest out, nodding forward, looking for all the world like a queen exerting her power.

Rodney looked as though he'd been struck, but he relaxed quickly and turned his focus into regarding his wife as though she were a new person. "What you need from me," he said slowly, "is more support from me. You need me to feel like we're on the same team. Is that right?"

Laura nodded as though in a trance. "That would help me feel stronger, yes. I don't want to−"

"Ah, Laura," interrupted Barbara, "let's not focus on the negative right now."

The wispy woman looked at the robust, sultry counselor and nodded. "Okay. Yes, Rodney, I would love to feel like you're on my side, not competing with me. I want to feel like we're entering the world together, trying to achieve things together."

The tiny, muscular man seemed to soften visibly. "Babe, do I not make you feel that way? I'm so sorry." He carefully picked his way down her thigh and slid to the seat of her chair where her hand rested. "I don't want you to feel like I'm, like, using you to feel better about myself. Yeah, I want to be a good partner to you." He tucked himself into her resting hand and wrapped his arms around her thumb, murmuring apologies into her skin.

Laura stared at him, amazed. Her free hand lifted to rest upon her heart. "Thank you, Rodney. For my part… I guess I'm too sensitive. I didn't know you had such emotional needs. You're always so strong and bold, you always seem like you know what's going on and you're on top of it. I don't want to drain my little man dry. Can you let me know what your needs are, when that happens again? Just tell me when you're weak or if there's something I can do for you."

"Good, good," noted Barbara, marking on her clipboard. "That's exactly right, Laura. You're a natural." The blonde grinned weakly at her, then lightly gripped her husband to bring him to her chest. She bent her head to encircle his tiny head in her thin lips. "I had another question for you two—who was your best friend in childhood—but that seems rather trivial right now. I'll let you two enjoy this moment." She looked around. "Any volunteers for who goes next?"

Margaret opened her mouth and Lionel closed his, each looking away in opposite directions. "We'll go!" chirped Miriam, bouncing in her seat, setting Brent bouncing in her lap. "We're great partners! Brent loves everything I do with him, though he could express a little more gratitude and he could be a little more attentive to my needs! But we're great partners, we work so well together! He complains a little too much, which gets under my skin, but he really has no reason to! He doesn't listen to me when I tell him that, so maybe you could tell him. He'll listen to you, you're beautiful, and that's all he wants in a woman." She chuckled and rolled her tiny husband around her vast lap with her pudgy forefinger. "Stupid, shallow little Brent. Always chasing the sexy ladies! Now you tell her what great partners we are, and if you lie I'll fart on you." She looked up at Margaret, grinning. "He actually loves it when I fart on him, but he acts outraged. Such a little actor! He should've gone into theater, I keep telling him, so dramatic! But he just couldn't stay away from all this sexiness. He's basically a penis with two legs."

Brent's face turned progressively redder until he rolled to his front and covered his head with both arms.

Dumbfounded, Barbara weaved slightly in her seat, her jaw hanging open. "That was… wow. I'm sorry, Mrs. Little, but that was the question for the Paynes. I have something else entirely for you."

"But Brent hasn't explained to everyone what perfect partners we are for each other. Stop crying and speak up, Brent. You are not in hell; stop saying that." She laughed and looked up at the other couples. "He keeps saying he's in hell! So dramatic!"

"Miriam, please try to focus." Barbara fixed the large woman with a hard stare until she settled down slightly. "What I want to ask you two is, how is your current relationship different than others that haven't worked out?"

That actually shut the massive woman up for a second. By now Rodney was nestled in Laura's cradling hands, both of them peering across the group circle at Miriam and the mortified little man in her acre of thighs. Lionel's scaled-down reactions were difficult to read but Barbara appreciated Margaret's thoughtful nodding as she weighed the question in her mind: whether she was thinking about her own situation or extrapolating what Miriam or Brent might have to say was inscrutable in her composure.

"Well, I'd have to say that−"

"I'd like Brent to speak first, Miriam, if you don't mind." Barbara was back to her chiseled-in-marble self.

Out came Miriam fat bottom lip. "But I do mind! He's never had any other relationships. I've got all sorts of stories to pick through!"

"A string of failed relationships," murmured Lionel. "Quelle surprise." Margaret quickly stifled her snickers behind one fine hand.

"Miriam," said Barbara more firmly. "Brent is going to speak first."

An uncharacteristically dark complexion drifted across the large woman's face. "Fine. Go ahead, you pathetic little worm. Tell us what you've got." Her pudgy finger stabbed at him once more, shoving him along the wide fields of her lap with significantly less playfulness than before.

Everyone looked up when Barbara rose from her chair and strode toward Miriam. "And just to ensure that Brent feels safe to speak completely freely, I think I'll hold onto him for a little while." She locked Miriam in an intense gaze, plucking the tiny person from her lap and taking all the time in the world to do so. Miriam trembled with the desire to snatch him back in her puffy fist, but she was clearly locked into submission by the regal, commanding therapist. Barbara did not break Miriam's gaze even as she stepped backward, the heels of her thigh-high boots thudding solidly against the floor, and nestled again in her own luxurious throne. She didn't look away until she brought the nebbishy little figure to her full, dark lips in her cupped palms.

"Are you quite okay, Mr. Little?" she purred.

You could have heard a pin drop, but for Brent's tiny voice: "I think I need a minute, thank you."

"Take all the time you need, Mr. Little."

Miriam's massive bulk fairly quivered with the tension of needing to speak, to protest, to squeal like a wronged princess, but Barbara's unblinking scrutiny held her in check. Impressed, Margaret wore a smile that faded in and out of being as she studied the two, while Laura slid to the back of her seat as though sitting too close to a large fire.

That is all they did for a long time: Brent lay in Barbara's warm, enveloping hands for a few minutes, and she dipped her bee-stung, burgundy lips into that chamber to whisper questions to him, then covered him in her thick Mediterranean mane to lower her ear upon his little body and receive his response. It was a very slow and meditative process, during which Barbara rarely moved her gaze from Miriam, daring her to move a muscle. Miriam's breathing grew heavier and quicker. Margaret couldn't resist peeking at Miriam and savor her internal conflict. How the counselor seeming pinned that tremendous bulk of womanly flesh to the loveseat with nothing more than those smoldering dark eyes was like the display of a superpower or a spell.

Lionel also watched, but his attention was led away by the throaty moans his wife emitted. He wanted to ask what was going on in her head, but he also wanted to keep watching the exotic and powerful woman communing with the henpecked little man in her grip. To speak up would have been to shatter the moment. As well, he was intrigued by the rising body temperature that wafted through Margaret's sweater and the visual effect of her huge trachea sliding sumptuously beneath her skin, right next to a conspicuously pulsing artery. It became harder to think straight, as his head grew lighter, and he struggled to remain aware of how much time was ticking away.

Like Lionel, Rodney reflexively wanted to mutter "holy fuck" every five seconds but was scared to twitch lest the spell be broken. He was kneeling now on all fours, upon a narrow thigh draped in polyester/spandex blend, because he didn't trust his knees to support him standing. His cock was raging hard; a small portion of his brain tried to calculate how much of a gaffe it would be to dry-hump his wife's leg in the moment. An even smaller portion wondered how she would interpret that.

Laura, however, was as hypnotized as Margaret, blown away by this show of command and ownership. Where Rodney projected himself into Brent's position, Laura's imagination was beggared to comprehend how much training and discipline it would take for a woman to have such a potent tool in her arsenal. Was she born with it? Was it a fortuitous combination of Barbara's strength and a particular weakness of Miriam's? She was pretty sure that if Miriam charged Barbara, the counselor would be overwhelmed by her considerable bulk and physically bettered. The confrontation looked like a lemur squaring off against a silverback gorilla, and successfully.

Within Miriam burned a white-hot star of emotion. How dare this woman take her toy away! Why wouldn't anyone listen to her about how much Brent loved and needed her? She didn't understand the smirks or the averted gazes every time she spoke up. Why were they reacting as though he were a person, as if anyone cared what he said? What did that hussy think she was doing, practically making out with Brent in front of the entire room? But every time she started to form a work or move so much as a finger, those deep, soulful dark eyes would flash at her, and all Miriam's muscles seized.

Not entirely all. Something was working within her, because she became aware of a cooling dampness creeping under her prodigious butt. She should have been worried about staining her dress or the loveseat, but she was consumed with confusion as to her reaction. She didn't even have the courage to check if her nipples were standing. Despite the churning, frothing tissues within her hips and the chain lightning coursing from her mountainous breasts to her drooling pussy, her fingers ached to wrap around Barbara's throat and snap that beautiful, creamy caramel neck like a chicken bone. But why couldn't she move?

For his part, Brent was in a heaven of which he could scarcely have conceived. He hadn't known such tenderness in years, this bedding of the meat between each knuckle, the palms and pads of hands well-nurtured in moisturizing creams and perfumed oils. The way the counselor's full lips blocked the ceiling and twitched and ground together within arm's reach. How her teeth glinted in the shadows, how the tip of her tongue danced behind them. How her breath smelled of cinnamon and sepulchural humidity. Even when she turned her head and blanketed him in her hair, when she placed her blind, curving ear upon him, he ached to caress the cartilage, to trace the winding grooves with his tiny fingers. He had the mad urge to slip his face into her aural canal… and sniff. That was nasty, earwax was nasty! Where did this urge come from? And yet he wanted it. He wanted to feel her inanimate, slightly warm skin and cartilage all around his face and to peer into the dark hole that led into her skull. These concatenate instincts never arose with Miriam, who somehow turned the most beautiful aspects of her sexuality into brutal weapons and terrifying monsters, while Brent was falling in love with the therapist's mere ear.

"Are you ready," she whispered upon him, gusting his hair from his eyes.

He chuckled ruefully. "All good things must end."

Her mouth paused above him, teeth parted, her pink and pebbly tongue glistening in the cavern of her maw as though she were about to say something. But she didn't, and her head lifted away, and her palms gently deposited the tiny, shaken man upon her own bronzed knee. The hem of her mustard skirt hugged her crossed thighs some distance behind him. He pulled himself up into a kneeling position, like Rodney's, but when he realized his bare hands were planted upon Barbara's bare knee, he glanced up at Miriam in a mild panic. He was stunned to find the magnificent, obscene beast trembling in what appeared to be a restrained neurosis.

"What did you do to her," he breathed.

Barbara merely caressed the tiny man with a fingertip, from the back of his head to where his butt stuck out. "If you're ready, Mr. Little, please share your answer with the group, speaking loudly enough for the Kelleys to hear you."

Everyone waited several seconds, until he stammered that he'd forgotten the question. "Holy Christ," yelled Rodney, collapsing upon his wife's leg. She patted him sympathetically, releasing a long, pent-up breath. Lionel chuckled, within the depths of his wife's hair; Margaret rolled her eyes. Only Miriam seemed transfixed, her attention riveted to her absconded possession.

"I should like to know, Mr. Little," the counselor resumed, "how your current relationship with Miriam is different than any past relationships that haven't worked out." Slowly she rocked her foot, and then her lower leg. One thigh pulsed hypnotically upon the other, and Brent's attention was momentarily possessed by the large patella shifting smoothly beneath him.

"Past relationships," he stammered. "There have only been a couple, I guess, before I met Miriam." Brent stared down the length of Barbara's considerable leg, from where her shin disappeared into her boot, to where the shirred leather straightened out around the ankle and her boot's toe swiped playfully through the warm air. "Let's say two serious relationships, not counting dating."

"Let's say that." Barbara's full lips parted a bright grin, for the benefit of the other people assembled.

"Well, in college, there was Jenna. But, you know, that's college. You're experimenting, figuring yourself out. It was my first time away from home, like it was for most people there. Jenna and I dated for over a year. I thought it was pretty serious; I learned it was just about sex for her."

"She used you for sex?" She raised one fine eyebrow and glanced at Miriam.

"It sounded like she was addicted to the thrill of it." Unthinking, Brent stretched out along the skin of her leg, propping his head up on his elbows. "She liked that she could crush me at any point, she liked fighting against herself, against that urge. Like, I'd be on her breast, and she'd reach up to grasp herself but she'd stop her hand just inches above me. Or she'd, you know, place me between her thighs, and sometimes her legs would close on me and then open up quickly again. She'd apologize, but I could hear in her voice how much she loved it."

"Okay, a purely sexual relationship. Is that what it was for you?"

"No, I wouldn't say that. I mean, I loved her, or I thought I did. I thought I knew who she was—hell, I thought I knew who I was." He seemed not to hear his wife's whimper as he draped his arms around the therapist's knee, laying his cheek upon her gently rocking patella. "I loved her potential, her boldness, her creativity. She played a song for me that she was working out on piano. It went nowhere but it started out so confidently and beautifully."

"Please don't say 'like her'," muttered Lionel into his wife's ear.

"I guess a lot like her." He didn't notice Margaret's snicker. "She liked partying, which of course I couldn't share with her. I'd heard stories about tiny guys invited to college parties. I'd read the news. Astonishingly high mortality rate with little to no investigation, but you couldn't keep the tiny men away, each one thinking he'd be the exception, he'd be smothered in pure college-chick sex and live to tell the tale. I was fine learning from other people's examples."

Barbara regarded the tiny man on her leg bemusedly, peering at how his minuscule hand rubbed the side of her knee dreamily. "And then what changed?"

"We were just talking one day. I started talking about the future, and she quoted some line about 'gather ye rosebuds while ye may'."

"What did that mean to you?"

"She was just seeking thrills, pleasures, amusements. That's all I was to her. She came from a small town without a lot of Tinies, so I was her walk on the wild side. And when I started getting serious, she ditched me in a large soda cup in a diner and literally picked up another tiny man on her way out."

"How did that make you feel, Mr. Little?"

Brent drew his hands up beneath his chin once more. "Used. Like, it didn't matter who I really was, on the inside. She just wanted some tiny thing to fuck for a while. And if she'd told me that from the beginning, maybe I would've been fine with that. But she didn't make her intent clear, and I started falling for her, and that's when she ended it."

Rubbing her fingertip in a small, slow circle in his back, Barbara asked him how that differed from his present relationship.

Now he looked up at his wife, who gawked at him greedily. "Not much, I guess. Jenna used me for her entertainment, and Miriam does the same. Neither of them regard me as an actual, real person." He sat up and straddled the therapist's large, smooth knee. "The difference, if there is one, is that Jenna split when I tried to talk things out with her. Miriam just laughs at me and shoves me inside her somewhere. She acts like I never said anything at all."

"And you've been together how long?"

"Six years, three months," he said without hesitation.

"That's dedication." Her voice was bright with a smile.

"I suppose."

"And I suppose you have a type."

Brent turned around to look up at her. She gazed beneficently upon him, wreathed in thick, lustrous black hair, her grin nearly occluded by her full breasts. "It sounds like it, though my other relationship doesn't fit that profile."

Barbara pouted cutely. "I don't know if we'll have time for that. Miriam?"

The massive woman grunted gimme and charged at the therapist's lap. She snatched the little man up in one meaty fist, before he knew what was happening. "Excuse me, I need the bathroom," she gasped. With surprising speed Miriam waddled toward the exit, one hand fumbling with the hem of her stretchy dress, the other awkwardly jamming her little man into the crowded cleft of her thighs.

The group collectively coughed and looked to Barbara for a distraction. Hastily she tossed a question to the Kelleys—what was your favorite vacation?—which they fielded eagerly: Thailand. Barbara and the Paynes listened as Lionel enjoyed the many temples throughout the country, some seemingly constructed for men of his diminished height. They watched Margaret's expression light up as her narrative drifted from extolling the world-class cuisine to more savory reviews of the young men preparing it: knotted muscles working beneath dusky, smooth skin; anime-like stylings of dense, glossy Asian hair. Lionel stared at her jaw, working massively beside his tiny, becardiganed body, as though he'd never heard this story before. "I guess we each came away with what we wanted out of that trip," he said, laughing without much spirit.

"Or didn't come," his wife noted. Before he could ask what she meant by that, Barbara adjourned the group session and wished them all well. Margaret ignored Lionel's questions all the way out the door; Laura and Rodney thanked Barbara for her time, which she returned curtly because clients had to understand that the time was up. Some patients attempted to stretch out their time by introducing one topic after another, hoping to gain her professional advice for free on sundry topics, but the therapist was firm on this point. She escorted them to the door, looked forward to seeing them next week, then closed the door firmly. The vintage wood rattled and creaked, and the pebbled glass pane within it clattered for emphasis. To really underscore the point, she turned the deadbolt hard into the jamb.

Turning, she paused to regard the arrangement in the former dining hall. How lucky she was to get such a gorgeous space at such a reasonable price. Her boots clacked against the hardwood floor, trodden by so many generations of inhabitants and owners over a century. She stood in the center of the ring of chairs, noting with some distaste the dark blotch on the loveseat. But her head lifted to her own throne, the overstuffed leather chair with sweeping wooden arms and the cozy, embracing back. From this she walked past where the Kelleys had been sitting to the hutch behind them. Her long fingers ran over the well-oiled wood of the cabinet, where families had stored silverware and fine china, had stored both alcohol and perhaps guns. The legacy of the Abernethy Building never ceased to impress her.

As it happened, she now stored something in the hutch. The lower cabinets were set with glass doors, which had been papered over by a previous tenant. The former owner of the property had explained that, rather than a childish attempt to hide something, it had been a necessary measure to protect preserved foods in jars from exposure to light.

Was it really so childish to hide something, she wondered, as she squatted down before the cabinet. Her skirt snapped up to her waist as her toned thighs spread wide, exposing not a stitch of garment beneath. She was unconcerned as to whether any of her clients realized she showed up for their sessions with absolutely nothing between them and her unshaven pubis but degrees of shadow. The potential for exposure turned her on, as evinced in the noise her vulva made when she slipped her middle and ring fingers inside herself, thrusting gently before a cabinet.

It had caused a slight crisis of aesthetic for her to slice out a tiny hole in that lovely paper behind the cabinet door. The design was a tasteful, muted art deco design, faded with time. It could easily have been 70 years old or more, for all she knew, and she felt terrible guilt about defacing it. She supposed every tenant left their mark, in one way or another, each contributing in some small way to the marvelous, storied legacy of this building.

She fucked herself slowly, pondering this, and opened the cabinet door. To the back of it, a tiny, naked man was suspended. His legs were tied in string, his arms were bound behind him in string, and string led up to a small thumbtack that kept his face at the peephole.

"How did you enjoy today's session, Mr. Smyth?" Barbara futzed with the thumbtack until it popped out and rolled around the top shelf of the cabinet. She pinched the string and lifted the little man up to her face. "Was it a nice show for you? How about that lonely Mr. Little? Does he remind you of anyone?" She smirked and stuck out her tongue to gently rub its tip over his genitalia; he moaned behind the masking tape covering his mouth, momentarily closing his terrified eyes. "I'm sorry to leave you back here in the nosebleed section: it's truly an injustice that the owner of such a gorgeous building doesn't get front-row seats. Especially after how generously you sold it to me! Truly unfair." She pouted and rolled to her back upon the hardwood floor, raising her knees like mountain peaks.

"I'd invite you to the after-party, Mr. Smyth, but I'm afraid it's a personal engagement." Her one hand began to grope her crotch greedily, to the syncopated rolling of her hips, while her other lowered the tiny man between her clenching inner thighs. "I suppose there's nothing to stop you from watching, however."

Barbara's cannonball ass ground into the floorboards and the heels of her boots scraped until they found a steady brace for resistance. "Now, then, let's review," she said, letting the little man twirl a bit. She felt the warm, fleshy body bounce against her glistening knuckles. "The problems between the Littles are obvious, but here's what I believe is impeding Mr. and Mrs. Kelley…"