“Oh, Peter…” sighed Suzanne as she cradled her five-inch-tall son in the palm of her hand, keeping her fingers curled slightly upward to protect him from falling out as he sat cross-legged on her warm pad of skin.  “I just don’t know about this.”

                “Mom… c’mon,” said Peter with a joking smile, raising an eyebrow.  “You can’t seriously be freaking out about this NOW.  You’ve told me it was okay for the last year!”  To comfort his mother, he reached over and gently stroked her thumb, which was laid calmly next to him as an extra protective barrier.

                “I… I know…” said the worried woman, a few tears welling in her eyes.  “B-B-But… are you sure another year here wouldn’t be better?  I mean… I just think that high school is…” she whispered, her voice beginning to crack.

                “Mom, I’m fifteen, not three.  Every other kid my age goes to high school now.  I know I’ve been homeschooled up until now, but… I’ve gotta get out there somehow!  You know, meet people, get some new experiences…” said Peter with excitement.

                Suzanne, who was seated in an armchair in the family living room, raised an eyebrow and crossed one of her legs.  “Oh, you know I know that, Peter.  But… it’s just… you’re so…”

                “What?” asked the boy innocently, knowing very plainly to what his comparatively giant mother was referring.

                “…special…” said Suzanne with a guilty gulp and a grin, raising her other hand and gently stroking the top of her son’s brunette hair with a soft fingertip.

                In this much, at least, Peter had to admit to himself his mom was right.  His size wasn’t the result of some unnatural or otherworldly occurrence in his life that had rendered him less than half a foot tall. He had simply been born at under two inches long, and had grown up to be roughly five inches tall.  He wasn’t even the first of his kind, although he was something of an anomaly nonetheless.  In fact, for relativity to his size, he was quite lanky, with long, thin limbs and a sallow face.  His mother constantly worried that he wasn’t getting enough to eat, but the real reason for this was simply that Peter enjoyed getting exercise, and it wasn’t even for personal health. 

What Peter wanted more than anything was an adventure of some kind to appear in his life, and this led him to often partake in the tiny, amateur equivalent of free running in his own home, which made his mother worry even more.  His mother tended to worry about almost anything Peter did, though, so this never held much stock for him as he would gleefully zipline from across the kitchen counters, or scale a bedpost with only a piece of string.

                After there had been such a media frenzy surrounding Peter’s birth, Suzanne had taken it upon herself to homeschool the tiny boy, both for his own physical protection in a world not designed for ones his size, and to shield him from the judgmental outsiders.  Suzanne had been paranoid for many years that if not protected at almost all times, Peter could easily be kidnapped, and he could do little to save himself.  Finally, though, as he had just turned fourteen and prepared to enter the eighth grade level courses, Peter had been pestering his mother to allow him to attend a regular high school where he could interact with other teens his age, and learn from actual trained teachers.  Suzanne had taken great issue with this, but after hearing her son’s desperate case to see the outside world on a much more regular basis, she had relented, deciding that the transition between middle school and high school was the best place to enter her son cautiously into public schooling.

                The big day had come up far more quickly than Suzanne had emotionally prepared herself for, though.  Despite the weeks-worth of technical measures the terrified mother had implemented in the school and amongst the staff for her son’s incoming academic year (something the school was only too happy to oblige, as being able to add the fact that they had allowed what many considered to be a severely physically handicapped boy to attend the school would look good on their history and advertisement as a school), Suzanne was still not ready to let her literal “little boy” leave the safety of her hand and go off into a real school, where she could no longer protect him minute-to-minute.

                “Mom… the bus is gonna be here in like fifteen minutes,” said Peter slyly, breaking his mother’s sad trance by tapping on her thumb with his fist.

                “I…” she gasped, suddenly realizing herself again, and tilted her head back down to look at her son, and she couldn’t help but allow a few fat, salty tears to plop out of her eyes.  She quickly pulled her head back, whipping her blonde hair a bit and brushing it out of her eyes, but she wasn’t fast enough, and several of her tears fell right on her son’s face, soaking it.  “I’m sorry, honey,” she cooed, laughing a little at how pathetic the situation was, as she raised a finger from her other hand to help dry his face.  “This is just… very hard for me.”  She gingerly placed her fingertip against his cheek, pressing hard enough to get most of the excess tear water without pushing her son too hard.

                “Mom, I got it, it’s fine,” said Peter, pushing her finger away and wiping his own cheeks.  “You won’t be there at school to do that for me, remember?” he smirked.

                “Now, you just remember,” she said, almost scolding, intending for her son to heed her words fully.  “If you need anything.  ANYTHING… during the day, and you just give your sister a call.  The administration is perfectly fine with her giving you any help you need,” she said.  “Understand?  You just give her a call, and she’ll be there in no time.”

                “Umm, yeah, sure,” said Peter unsurely, scratching the back of his head absentmindedly.  His sister Erica was two years older than he and was entering her junior year of high school, and he had a sense she didn’t particularly feel like babysitting her five-inch-tall brother when she would much prefer to hang out with her friends.  “I’ll do that.”  He removed his cell phone from his pocket: it was a device that had been special ordered by the family from a phone company looking for a unique advertising opportunity, and it had ended with Peter getting a fully functioning, correctly sized cell phone that allowed him to make calls to normal sized cell phones that dwarfed him considerably.

                “And I’ve told her.  If you need something, she’s going to help you.  So she understands too, okay?” said Suzanne.

“Yeah, Mom, I got it, really,” responded Peter, mentally gulping, knowing that bugging his older sister was not very high on his priority list.

“Do you want some breakfast?”

“Yes, but I can…”

“No!” said Suzanne, more forcefully than she intended.  “Let me.”  She stood up slowly from the chair and headed toward the kitchen, still cupping her son lovingly in her cushy palm.  Peter didn’t object, knowing his mom was trying to squeeze out every last second she could of taking care of him.

                Just as Suzanne and Peter entered the kitchen, Erica and Jessica, Peter’s thirteen-year-old sister, stepped in as well.  Erica was moving groggily despite her clearly well-picked outfit and painstakingly applied make-up, wearing a pair of skinny jeans, a tight pink shirt that barely concealed her navel, a variety of colorful bracelets that represented the current accessorizing trend, and a silky sheen running over her recently straightened dirty-blonde hair. 

Jessica, meanwhile, looked thrilled to be there, seeming to have an enthralled gleam in her blue eyes as she proudly brandished her favorite blue t-shirt with the Happy Bunny printed on it, combined with a pair of flowery-printed jeans.  With a bounce of her nearly bleach-blonde hair upon entering the room, Jessica stopped in front of her mother and brother.

                “Are you really going to school today, Peter?” asked Jessica with a gigantic toothy grin to her handheld sibling.  He nodded, smiling.

                “I really am, Jessie.”

                “Are you excited?”

                “You bet,” he winked, causing his little sister to beam brightly, giggle girlishly, and scurry off to the fridge to look for some orange juice.  Peter grinned to himself.  His little sister was a bit attached to him, and while it got on his nerves from time to time, his relationship with Jessica was admittedly far better than the one with Erica.

                Suzanne set her hand gently down on the kitchen table, allowing Peter to step lightly from it and await his breakfast, which she busily began preparing with the toaster once she was sure he was safely upon the marble tabletop.

                Jessica set her glass cereal bowl down with a loud and obnoxious clatter, and quickly tucked into her corn flakes, tenaciously scooping her shining silver spoon back into the lake of milk before bringing it back up, full of golden, crusted clumps, and depositing them messily over her lips, allowing several droplets of milk to spill down her chin.  She laughed as she busily ground the flakes up into a pulp with her molars, wiping the white dribbles away with the back of her hand before dipping back in for another bite. 

A stray drop of milk that happened to be swatted off Jessica’s thin chin by her massive hand flew down and splashed wetly onto the lapel of Peter’s shirt, but he simply wiped it away, stepping back a bit further.  He mentally scolded himself, having learned very well over the years that it was best to steer clear of his thirteen-year-old sibling when she was eating, as her table manners weren’t exactly up to snuff, and for a boy Peter’s size, a lack of her table manners had on more than one occasion left him with sprayed chunks of food or drink coating his clothes and face.  The best policy was normally just to give Jessica a solid cubic foot of space around her eating area to avoid the splash zone.

“There you go!” said Suzanne proudly, trying to conceal the sadness in her voice, as she slowly placed a napkin with a quartered piece of toast before her son.  “Eat up.  You’ve got a big day ahead of you.”

“Thanks Mom…” said Peter sheepishly, awkwardly picking up one quarter of the partially blackened piece of bread and nibbling at the corner with a soft crunch.

“Erica, honey,” Suzanne seemed to whine slowly at her eldest daughter, who was clicking away at a new text on her cell phone and ignoring the others.  “Can’t you eat something?”

“Mom, I’m gonna get something at lunch.”

“That’s not the same.  You need your breakfast.  Come on, just let me make you a…”

“Mom, I’m fine,” groaned Erica, returning to the text.  Suzanne shrugged and sighed, not in the mood to argue with her daughter on this morning where she was already so emotionally distraught.  Jessica finished her cereal in record time, wiping away a thick milk mustache with a little chuckle before hopping off her chair and heading for the laundry room to grab her backpack, which was freshly stuffed with new school supplies.

“Jessica, your bus doesn’t come for almost an hour.  Relax,” said Suzanne with a smile, knowing her youngest was just as thrilled for the start of the new year as her son.  Hanging her shoulders and drooping her smile for dramatic emphasis, Jessica lumbered back to the kitchen table, laying her head on the side jokingly before cracking a smile and chortling uncontrollably.  Suzanne laughed too, shaking her head at Jessica’s hyperactive sense of humor, and returned to Peter, who had eaten a sixteenth of the toast slice before placing the rest on the napkin, politely wiping his mouth.

Knowing his mother was about to heartily object to his eating so little, Peter took the lead as he grabbed up his proportioned backpack, filled with notebook paper and pencil tips designed to fit his body, and slung it over one of his shoulders.  “Mom!  Seriously, the bus is on the way.  You want me to be late my first day?”

Suzanne, noting to herself how desperately she didn’t want her son to go to school at all, kindly deprived her son of the truth, and instead set her hand back on the tabletop, palm up, with a motherly smile, her upper lip quivering again with the effort to not turn the waterworks back on.  Walking toward the front door, Suzanne leaned against the frame before opening it, peeking out the window nervously, pondering what her son was about to undertake.

“Are you… are you SURE about…”

“Mom, don’t worry about me.  I’ll be fine,” said Peter optimistically, grinning.  To help quell his mother’s fears, he grabbed ahold of her thumb, lifting it up, and hugged it against his chest warmly.  This sent goosebumps down his mother’s arm, and she smiled, the tears welling again.  She wiped them away before Peter could see them. 

Bringing a fingertip from her free hand to her lips, she kissed it loudly, then lowered it toward her son, pressing it gently against his cheek.  Being so small, Peter could actually feel a trace amount of wetness from his mother’s plush lips, and he wiped it away, embarrassed, as he ceased hugging her finger.  “Mom… seriously, we’ve got to work on that.”

“Sweetie, just… please… be careful,” begged Suzanne, bringing her son a bit closer to her face so he could hear her gentler, hushed tone.  “If anything ever happens to you at that school, I swear to God…”

“MOM…” groaned Erica, her arms crossed, tapping a foot next to her mother as she waited for the door to be unblocked.  “The bus is coming.  Let me through?”

“All right,” said Suzanne slowly, lowering her hand away from her face and slowly uncurling her fingers from their defensive position around her little son’s seated body.  “Ready?”

“Yes, Mom, I’m ready,” answered Erica, rolling her eyes, and opening her hand unceremoniously, palm up, for the transfer.  Slowly and caringly, Suzanne lowered her hand over her oldest daughter’s softer, younger palm, allowing Peter to disembark carefully onto Erica’s hand.  With her brother on board, the normal-sized teen stepped to the side, grasping at the door handle and swinging it open roughly before stepping carefully down the steps so as not to send Peter flying from his precarious perch in her hand. 

“Bye, you two.  Have a… great day…” called Suzanne, pulling a tissue from her pocket and blowing her nose.

“Bye, mom,” Erica said begrudgingly over her shoulder as she began the walk down the block to the bus stop, Peter still cupped safely in her palm.

Peter watched the seeming runway of the sidewalk coming along far below, his sister’s red Converse lifting up and moving forward in midair before planting back on the concrete to take a step toward the bus stop, still sitting comfortably in the palm of her hand, his tiny backpack hitched to his shoulders by the straps.  The bus stop was coming closer into view, and Peter’s heart couldn’t help but speed up with anticipation.

At five inches tall, Peter still took up the majority of his sister’s hand as she cupped him calmly, curling her fingers in slightly to ensure he didn’t fall.  His entire family had become well-practiced at walking normally while keeping their hands almost perfectly horizontal, fingers wedged upward like a miniature fence of flesh to protect him.  It was something he deeply appreciated, as despite his adventurous nature, getting around solo took a bit more time than getting a quick lift from either of his sisters or his mother, and two of the three were almost always too happy to oblige a request for a lift.

Looking upward at his sister’s serene face, her hazel eyes blinking calmly in the wind, her long eyelashes flicking together as she did so, he decided this might be an opportunity to try to improve his relationship with his oldest sister, as, for the foreseeable future, he would be needing her assistance for his day-to-day activities.

“So… are you… are you gonna join a bunch of the clubs?” asked Peter, fishing clumsily for something he had in common to speak to Erica.  He received no answer at first, so he gently tapped on her thumb.  “Huh?”

“I heard you.  And I don’t know yet,” said Erica, clearly not particularly interested in conversing with her tiny brother at the moment, even going so far as to shift her thumb a little further off to the side, making it harder for him to tap on it and try to get her attention.

Swallowing, Peter deduced it was worth another try.  “I sure am!” he said energetically, sounding a little more overly zealous than he intended, but he continued.  “I’m going to join the environmentalist club, and the dance club, and the cooking club, and…”

“You know I’m not going to take you to ALL of those, right?” asked Erica, frowning a little as she finally looked down into her hand and made eye contact with her sibling.

“I… oh…” sighed Peter a little dejectedly, reclining slightly against his sister’s other four fingers that were propped behind him.  “I guess so.”

“Don’t push your luck, okay?  I already have to take you to every single class you’re taking.”

“Really?” asked Peter, surprised.

“Yeah, really,” replied Erica, rolling her eyes, obviously not thrilled with the idea.  “Mom doesn’t want anybody other than me touching you while you’re at school, so I have to come find you in all your classrooms and take you to wherever you’re going next,” she snorted in annoyance.

“Oh.  Um, sorry,” answered Peter, silently blaming his mother for partially impeding his chance to build up a better reputation with his older sister.

“Yeah, whatever,” shrugged Erica, reaching into her pocket with her other hand and whipping out her cell phone to begin promptly typing out a response to the text she had received.  Her eyes fell away from Peter and to the screen as she read her message.

Slowly, Peter leaned all the way back against his sister’s fingers, crossing his legs atop the heel of her hand, and placing his hands behind his own head like a pillow.  As he did, Erica reached the bus stop, coming to a halt by the curb.  The sun was still a blushed shade of pink as it began streaking upward in the sky.  The sight made Peter feel even more hopeful for the possibilities of his day, and he could hardly stop himself from shaking.

“Can you just calm down?” complained Erica after a moment, so Peter stopped, smiling, pleased to at least have his sister acknowledging him again.

“Sorry.”

“You really can’t spaz out like this at school, or people are gonna have like a freaking heyday with you.”

“I… I know that, Mom’s been talking to me about…”

“Peter, get real,” said Erica, putting most of her weight on one foot in attitude, and using her other hand to pat the top of her head, making sure her silky locks were still perfectly in place.  She raised a condescending eyebrow at him as she elevated him slowly up from his chest level position of before and up nearer to her nose.  “Mom doesn’t know ANYTHING about high school.”

“She does!” said Peter in defense of his over-protective parent.  “She told me people would probably treat me a lot different, even more than most people who come visit us, because they’re not prepared for me, and I shouldn’t blame them.”

“Right,” said Erica with an amused smirk, nodding slowly, obviously having something else on her mind.  She wiggled her fingers slightly under her brother’s back, making him flinch for a moment before she brought her thumb back into its original safety position next to his body.  “Look, here’s what you gotta know: don’t act like a total weirdo, and maybe you’ll get through this year in one piece, okay?”

“What?” gasped Peter, shocked at the blunt honesty.  “R-R-Really?”

She nodded.  “Well, I don’t mean somebody’s going to try and rip you into two pieces, but really, yeah.  I mean, a lot of people know about you from the papers and stuff a while back, but all that’s gotten a lot quieter, right?”

“I know.”

“News flash:  a lot of that’s going to start coming back now that you’re going to regular school.  And a lot of people that didn’t know about you before… well, I don’t know.  Just try not to act like a freak, okay?  Because then Mom will fry me.”

“I…” said Peter, his mouth feeling a little dry as he realized the veracity of everything his gargantuan sister had spoken, so he stopped himself.  “Okay.”

“Cool,” she nodded neutrally, and at that moment the bus came screeching in to the stop, the door swinging open.  Peter pulled himself into a fetal position to make it more convenient for his sister as her fingers slowly pulled themselves tighter around his body to secure him as she scaled the bus steps.

“Mornin’,” drawled the 5 o’clock shadow-wearing bus driver, who didn’t even bother looking at Erica as she stepped onboard and entered the narrow alley leading into the main area of the seats.

Peter watched large, unfamiliar faces rush past him as Erica strode confidently for the back of the bus.  As he passed, each stoic, bored head, full of dread for another long year of school, seemed to transform: eyes bugged, heads turned, jaws hung open, even a few gasps were dropped.  Most of the talking stopped and quieted to a low buzz until Erica had stopped at the last row and plopped down in the seat next to her friend Lena, lowering out of view behind the shield of the leather seatback, for which the now-embarrassed Peter was grateful.

All heads had turned back to face Erica, eyes still wide as dinner plates, pupils dilated.  Finally, one girl who appeared to be a sophomore opened her mouth and actually spoke, pointing an accusing finger at the pair.

“He’s… he’s…” she gasped, swallowing hard in order to continue speaking clearly.  “He’s that one k-kid… the…”

“Yeah?” answered Erica confidently, raising an eyebrow at the girl, squinting with so much fire it looked like daggers would shoot out from her retinas.  “You have a problem?”

The girl lowered herself back into the seat, clearly spooked by Erica’s show of aggression.  She shook her head no.  Erica raised herself higher in the seat, looking over the rest of the bus.  “Yes, this is my brother.  His name’s Peter.  He’s really small.  You probably read about him somewhere.  Are there any QUESTIONS?” she yelled out for emphasis.  Peter shivered as he felt the vibrations through the skin of her palm as she cried out, and he couldn’t help but notice her flesh steadily dampening with a cold sweat.  She was obviously a bit nervous about what she was doing.

After another minute of silence, save for the gentle chug of the bus and the grinding of rocks under the wheels, the heads had all turned back to the front.  A few of the freshmen continued peeking back toward the rear seating area where Erica was seated, but for the most part, they were at least physically ignored for the remainder of the bus ride.

“Hi there, Peter,” whispered Lena, leaning close to him so that he could hear her clearly, grinning widely and reassuringly at him as she brushed her thick black hair back over her shoulder to get a better view of him.  “Feel ready for this?” she asked soothingly, her warm, minty-toothpaste breath steaming outward against his face.

“I think so…” he said uncertainly, slightly befuddled by the shocked reception he had received upon boarding the bus with his sister.  He had, of course, known in the back of his mind that this was bound to happen, but having it happen, and having to watch so many gigantic individuals staring at him and him alone as if he was some sort of hamster being carried to school for show-and-tell by his older sister’s protective hand, he couldn’t help but feel a bit tight in his stomach.  Nevertheless, he felt a warm sense of gratitude to his sister, who normally just did the bare minimum required to make sure her brother didn’t get trampled to death in his daily existence.

“Erica?” he asked slowly.  His sister was already busily typing away again on her phone with her unoccupied hand, and she didn’t even glance at him.  Nevertheless, he felt it was necessary to say:  “Thanks.”

She still didn’t look him in the face as her hand slowly came to rest on her knee, with Peter still reclining comfortably against her fingers, but the small boy couldn’t help but notice the tiniest of sly smiles cross his sister’s lips.

“Yeah, whatever, twerp,” she said as neutrally as possible, rocking the hand holding him in a playful manner, knocking him up from his comfortable cross-legged position, but splaying her fingers to make sure he could catch himself on her soft digits before falling onto her jeaned leg.  “My hand’s not an armchair, you know.”

                Walking toward the school, perched safely in Erica’s hand, Peter felt like he was an astronaut preparing to board the shuttle and jet out of the stratosphere.  He had never gotten to visit his sister’s high school, and yet he suddenly found himself about to attend it, where he would be learning new things, getting grades, and hopefully befriending people.  Peter crossed his fingers, silently praying to himself that this last one in particular would be possible to pull off.

                “Okay, where am I going first?” asked Erica, not afraid of hiding the distaste in her voice for the great deal of extra walking she would have to do before getting to locate her friends and her own classroom.

                “Wait, wait, wait…” said Peter as calmingly as possible, rummaging through his backpack.  While doing this, and not able to grip onto the flesh of his sister’s palm for support, he was a little more at risk, and it was in times like this that he could feel the imperfections in smooth motion of Erica’s hand as she walked.  No matter how hard people tried, even his three family members who had gotten years of practice at it, keeping a hand perfectly straight for long periods of time entails some kind of margin for error, and Peter could feel it, rocking his body slowly like a boat on the ocean through his sister’s fingers, which wiggled slowly against his back as she walked cautiously through the thick sea of people all heading for the front doors.

                Peter politely balled himself up again, making it easier for his sister to grip him as she slipped through the school entrance and into the foyer, which was crowded with students trying to decode their schedules or get a cell phone signal.

                “Seriously, I need to know now, because this is the hub.  This is where you get everywhere, from here,” said Erica, raising her hand up closer to her face.  She tickled her fingers gently against her brother’s sides as if to prompt him.  He convulsed for the briefest second, even giggling, before retrieving his schedule from his backpack with a smile.  Pulling his arm roughly from around his sister’s thumb, which was pinned gently against his leg to keep him from being dropped, Peter cleared his throat.

                “American History, room 136,” read Peter roughly against his sister’s fingers pressing down on his stomach.  “Mr. Browning.”

                “136?” groaned Erica, setting off quickly down one of the wide hallways.  “That’s in the exact OPPOSITE direction of where I’m going.”

                “Sorry…”

                “Whatever, we just gotta move fast…”

                The rest of the way to history class was a jostling roller coaster ride for Peter.  His mother never allowed people holding her son to move at any speed over a walk, let alone actually run, but here his sister was all but sprinting.  He secretly relished the thrill of flashing blindly through the cavernous halls of the high school, past dozens of strangers he might soon meet in a class.  Erica’s soft, wide fingers had closed tightly around him, holding him in a firmly clenched fist just hard enough not to harm him.  While this wasn’t his preferred method of transport, as he enjoyed the freedom of sitting in an open hand and not having to rely entirely on the dexterity of his current transporter, he trusted his sister whole-heartedly, and knew that he would soon find himself flying to the hard carpeted ground if these measures weren’t taken.  Her thumb was digging uncomfortably against his right thigh, but before he knew it, she was allowing him to sprawl back into her palm as she came to a stop in front of room 136.

                “Here we go…” said Erica uncaringly, stepping over the threshold and entering the classroom.  As she did, she looked down at her brother, who was righting himself back into a seated position in her palm.  “That was okay, right?”

                “Yeah, yeah, it was fine.”

                “I mean… because, you know Mom is…”

                “I know.  Relax.  Just don’t run into anybody,” said Peter with a wink to his sister, who only shook her head at him, feigning pitied amusement at his ridiculousness.

                “Where do you want to sit?” she asked, eyeing the desks, many of which were already occupied by students, most of whom had their wide eyes glued to the new student who had just entered their midst.  “Because I literally have to go right now.”

                “Okay, okay, sorry… umm, that one,” said Peter arbitrarily, pointing forward to the closest empty desk, midway into the classroom clump of seats, surrounded on all sides by other desks.  Shrugging, Erica lowered her cupped hand toward it, allowing her brother to crawl quickly off onto the surface with his backpack in tow.  She retracted her arm as soon as Peter was clear, walking backwards toward the door.

                “I’ll be back in like an hour.  Remember, try not to freak out about stuff,” she said with a friendly grimace and a raise of her slender eyebrows before turning and jogging out the door to make it to her first class on time.

                Peter set to work pulling notebooks and tiny pencils out of his backpack, ready for action, before taking a calm seat on the desktop, trying to keep his eyes trained on his new supplies.  It was the best distraction from the dozen or so pairs of eyes he felt staring at him with an almost physical presence, and he couldn’t help but feel his shoulders start to shake, not from fear, but from embarrassment.

                Keep it together, he ordered himself mentally.  You’ve worked hard for this.

                After a few moments of silence, Peter couldn’t help but notice the frenzied whispering that had started up behind him.  He was able to ignore it at first, but he finally couldn’t take it much longer, and looked over his shoulder.

                In the desk directly behind him sat a thin, sporty-looking girl about his age with nearly silvery-blonde hair and crackling blue-gray eyes.  Her lips were pursed, and almost seemed to be vibrating: twisting, as if she was hatching some sort of complicated scheme in her mind, and the physical repercussions couldn’t be helped.  Her hands were clasped politely on top of her desk, her thin, violet, fashionable poncho draped over shoulders, partially concealing a silver cross necklace.

                Her eyes were trained, unblinking, on Peter, and he couldn’t help but begin to sweat, and this time not from the embarrassment of being the center of attention, but quite frankly because she was one of the most beautiful girls Peter had laid eyes on.  Granted, he didn’t leave the house all that much, and most of the normal-sized girls he had met were just the friends of his sisters, but this girl was almost too much.  Her face looked like it had been carved lovingly over a decade into pure pearl: it was a striking face, and it looked like it could have convinced anyone of anything it wanted to.

                Her lips slowly parted, decompressing and inflating partially like plush, pink balloons, rippled with thin creases.  “What’s up?” she asked, her mouth widening into a sly grin.  The words were soft and purposeful, as if she spoke with a low enough volume in order to force listeners to pay closer attention to her.  She leaned forward across the desk, sliding her upper body across the surface, until she was close enough that she probably could have reached out and touched Peter.

                The boy felt sweat begin to drip down his back.  Don’t blow this, he thought.  You need friends around here.  Why not try to make one right now?

                “I… I, uh…” he mumbled, far too out of his comfort zone to come up with something to say to this towering beauty as she continued staring him down with an expectant smile.  His throat went dry.  Suddenly, the thought of potential joking popped into his head.  “The sky?”

                The girl laughed sweetly, tilting her head to the side playfully and sliding her hands outward, still clasped together, into the space in front of her desk.  Peter instantly cursed himself mentally for his terrible sense of humor, thinking in retrospect that it would have been far better to have given a more standard answer, but the look on the girl’s face now wasn’t of ridicule, but of actual amusement.

                “You’re funny,” she said, nodding and narrowing her eyes deceptively at him.  Peter blushed ten shades of red, his fingers trembling with the thrill of this meager conversation.  “What’s your name?”

                “P-P-P…” he sputtered, closing his eyes and clearing his throat.  “Peter.”

                “Peter, huh?  Nice to meet you.  I’m Sharon,” she said.  After this, she nodded off to her left and right sides, indicating at the two girls on either end of her desk, who Peter now realized were staring at him almost as intently.  “This is Kimmy,” she said, nodding to her left.

                Peter made eye contact with Kimmy.  The girl looked almost too young to be a freshman in high school; it seemed to Peter she could have passed for one of his younger sister’s friends.  She looked short (relatively to normal-sized people, anyway), with strawberry blonde hair styled into a swooshing little bob cut.  Her pale face seemed to puff up as she smiled so hard that deep dimples creased cutely along her cheeks, showing off teeth that seemed speckled with discoloration.  Evidently, the girl had worn braces, and not done a fantastic job of brushing her teeth during this time, because the distinct, circular shapes seemed lightly bronzed onto her teeth.

                “And this is Amy,” said Sharon cheerily, pointing to the girl on her other side as Peter turned to smile back at her.  Seeming almost to be Kimmy’s opposite, Peter could tell Amy was long and lanky, coming in only a few inches shy of six feet tall, even as a freshman.  Long, dark brown hair flowed pleasantly just past her shoulders, framing her face, which lit up with a smile.  Unlike Sharon’s grin, though, Amy’s countenance made Peter a little uneasy.  It wasn’t a smile so much of friendliness, but of pride.  Victory, almost, although Peter couldn’t imagine where it came from.

                “Um… hi, guys!” said Peter kindly, standing to his feet so they could see him better.  “It’s nice to meet you, too.  I’m…”

                “Oh… my… God…” gasped Amy, cutting off Peter’s friendly introduction, her eyes bugging.  “That’s so… so…”

                “Amy!” grumbled Sharon, poking her friend’s shoulder with an elbow and whispering out of the corner of her mouth.

                “So…” continued Amy, not paying the slightest bit of attention to her friend, her bugged eyes still locked to Peter, as she reached a long arm forward, her hand outstretched, fingers wiggling playfully in midair.  Peter, who had always been offered the option of being picked up or not whenever in contact with normal-sized people, was confused and unprepared as Amy grasped her thumb and forefinger against the scruff of his shirt and plucked him from the desk, dangling him just above the surface.  A wide smile spread across Amy’s lips as she rotated her wrist, shaking Peter a bit.  She giggled heartily as the small boy helplessly hung over the painful drop between her firm, authoritative fingers, trying to keep his stomach from spinning on itself.

“Hey!  Hey!” squeaked Peter, completely bewildered by the forward action of the apparently headstrong Amy, grasping roughly at her fingers in an effort to get himself put down, but her grip was far too strong to budge.  “I… I… s-sorry, really, but p-please…” he gasped, his legs dangling hopelessly in the empty space.

                “Amy!” whispered Kimmy hurriedly.  “Don’t get us DETENTION on the first day!”

                “Relax…” cooed Amy to her friend, waving an uncaring hand.  “I’m just saying hello.”  She brought her face in closer to Peter, squinting, and made a comical face at him with widened eyes and a lopsided smile.  “How you doin’ little guy?”

                “I… I…”

                “Amy, let him down,” said Sharon, rolling her eyes, obviously more annoyed at Amy’s childish behavior than fearful for Peter himself.  “FYI, Amy: Totally not going to take the hit for this when the teacher blows his stack at you.”

                “Okay, okay, cool it,” groaned Amy, lowering her hand back to the table and roughly releasing her grip on Peter’s shirt.  She winked at him, the corner of her mouth tipping slightly upward.  The tip of her tongue poked out from between her lips playfully.  “He knows I’m just playing, right?”

                “Um,” gulped Peter, remembering his promise to himself to not mess up the opportunity to make friends.  “Y-Yeah?”

                “Amy, look!  You scared him!” moaned Kimmy, laying her head on the desktop.  “You’re gonna make him hate us, and we just met him.”

                “I’m not scared, really!” interjected Peter, wanting to maintain any kind of positive relationship with any of his fellow classmates.  “It’s okay.  I… I normally just like being asked first, that’s all.”

                “See?  Told you,” complained Kimmy over to Amy, who was feigning remorse with a shrug and a roll of her brown eyes.  “Now look what you did.”

                “Okay, okay.  Look.  I’m sorry, Peter, okay?” asked Amy, looking partially cross-eyed at the tiny boy before her.  Clearly, she wasn’t so much sorry as just sick of hearing her friend’s pestering.

                “It’s fine, really,” laughed Peter as reassuringly as possible.

                “Morning, class!” called out Mr. Browning as he marched into the room with a spring in his step.  “Summer’s over, and school is IN, so I want heads off the desks and minds alert, because we’re going to learn about your favorite subject!” he cheered over-enthusiastically, the sarcasm thick in his voice.  “Now, I’m sure it said it on your schedules, but my name is Mr. Browning, and I love HISTORY.  As I’m sure you all do, as well,” he said with a sly grin as the class half-moaned at the mere idea.  “Before we get going, though, I think, since we’re all in high school now, it would be nice to get to know each other a little.  So, I want you to find someone you DON’T know.  Yes, someone who’s NOT your best friend.  And I want you to chat with them.  Make a new friend.  It’s fun.  Okay, go!” he rattled off with a clap of his hands, clearly practiced at his yearly opening routine.

                Peter’s eyes scanned around the room.  Most of the people were clearly ignoring Mr. Browning’s instruction and grabbing the arms of their friends to form a group.  Only one person besides himself didn’t lunge for another human being.  In the corner of the room sat a girl Peter hadn’t even noticed as his sister placed him on his chosen desk. 

The girl’s red hair seemed almost to be catching aflame from the sheen of its radiance.  Her face was speckled with freckles, all along her rose cheeks, which seemed to pop even more with her sparkling green eyes.  Peter’s own eyes traced along her simple olive sweater, down her jeans, and to her worn-out white tennis shoes.  He was almost surprised, just as he had been upon seeing Kimmy; the girl appeared rather short, and Peter guessed she couldn’t have been more than a couple inches over five feet.  Of course, to Peter, this was still massive, but the boy had learned to accurately gauge the relative size of people despite the fact that everyone he met dwarfed him like an office building might to a regular-sized being. 

Peter couldn’t help but blush a little; she was cute.

                More than her physical appearance, though, Peter noticed how isolated she appeared in the back corner of the room.  He opened his mouth and reached out an arm as if to call out to her, but he found himself quickly snapped back to reality as a gigantic, tanned hand came crashing down in front of him, fingers splayed, slapping into the desk within reaching distance of his tiny arms; the force, to Peter, felt equivalent to a tectonic shift, and he rolled onto his back as the surface vibrated violently, the hand’s thumb coming calmly to rest right in front of him.  He heard the deep, slightly throaty laugh that followed, and didn’t even need to follow the long, toned arm back to its owner to know it was Amy who had done it.

                “Amy, oh my God, seriously?” whined Kimmy, rubbing at her hair nervously.  “What’s wrong with you?”

                “Nothing’s wrong with me, Kimmy,” answered Amy almost dreamily, as her wide eyes were still fully trained on Peter as she lifted her hand off the desk, curling her fingers together into a soft fist.  Her chocolate brown irises seemed to hide a thirsty glint: a glimmer of unbalanced desire.  “I just wanted him to look at me again.”

                “It’s fine,” blinked Peter a few times, biting his lip.  Just nerves, he told himself meekly in his mind.  New experiences.

                “Is it really okay, little guy?” asked Amy, scrunching up her face cutely and speaking in an over-exaggerated baby voice to Peter as she stared down at him uppishly.  “I didn’t scare you, did I?”

                “No, no, no… I’m… I’m fine…” stuttered Peter.

                “Guess what?” she asked with a huge grin, her wide pink lips parting, revealing her perfect white teeth.

                “Uh… what?” gulped Peter more anxiously than he meant to sound.

                “I want YOU in MY group,” she chuckled, gently placing her curled fist against her chest to indicate herself, as if Peter wasn’t clear on this fact.  “How’s that sound?”

                “I… um,” swallowed Peter.  However, he quickly reminded himself that he simply had to bite the bullet and keep on going in order to make some friends.  “Sure.  Yeah, that sounds great, I…”

                “Cool,” she sighed, propping her arm up on the desk, and resting her chin on her upturned palm, gazing down at the small boy before her, only semi-aware of her friends by this point.  Peter could see her thoughtfully biting her lip, as if contemplating something.

                “Tell us about yourself,” said Kimmy eagerly, leaning forward and brandishing her partially discolored teeth with a proud smile.  “What’s your favorite movie?”

                Peter opened his mouth to answer, but he was quickly cut off before he could speak.

                “Oh, don’t ask him that,” said Sharon, annoyed again.  “Who cares about that?”

                “I do…” mumbled Kimmy, crossing her arms and sticking up her lip in spiteful defeat.

                “Well, I don’t,” shrugged Sharon, locking eyes with Peter and causing him to tremble with the intensity of her stare.  “Sorry.”

                “That’s… that’s f-fine…” said Peter as calmly as possible.  He wasn’t sure what it was.  Amy was still making him nervous, but he was pretty sure it was just due to her overly aggressive nature.  And Kimmy was just being a little immature.

                But Sharon.  Something about Sharon was causing a cold sweat to form along Peter’s back.  She hadn’t done anything to call for this.  But as Peter stared into her eyes, he couldn’t help but get the sensation that the steely sight of those oceanic blue-grays was going to turn him into stone.  Like she was acting physically on him without moving a muscle.

                A simple stare.

                Peter felt woozy, and he had no idea why.

                “Tell me,” said Sharon, leaning forward confidently.  “What’s it like… being so small?”  Despite the questioning way in which Sharon worded it, there was a calm, understood immediacy in her sentence.  As if she was commanding the boy to answer her.  It sent a fresh set of chills down Peter’s spine as he watched her silvery-blonde hair hanging like an endless fleece draped over her angelic face.

                “Sharon!” groaned Kimmy, laying her head back down on the desk.  “And you told me to…”

                “It’s okay, really,” said Peter with a wave of his hands and a reassuring grin, snapped out of his stupor.  “I… I don’t mind talking about that.”

                “Great.  So… tell me what it’s like,” repeated Sharon, her voice warm.  She leaned forward even further until she was straining across her own desk, her head now very close to the edge of Peter’s desk.  He took a few steps forward, as if compelled mentally to do so.  He stopped himself quickly, though, clearing his throat.

                “It’s not so bad, really,” said Peter.  “I know I’m different and everything, but my family helps take care of me, and I’ve got friends.  And… I just like to learn stuff.  Anything I can.  I used to be homeschooled, but now I’m here.  It’s… a little harder.  Than for most people, anyway.  Probably.  I mean…” stuttered Peter, losing his confidence as he attempted to avoid big-headedness.

                “Relax short stuff.  I get it,” said Sharon.  By now, she was so close, her hot breath was able to roll over Peter as if from a dry ice machine.  It counteracted the chills, making him feel like he’d just stepped into the aura of a stone oven from a snowstorm.  Goose bumps popped up along his arms.  He inhaled, the stinging scent of her cinnamon chewing gum piping along his nose and mouth.  The air around him had suddenly become warm, sticky, and spicy with the fragrance. 

Intoxicating.

                “That’s really, really awesome,” said Amy, shaking her head in seeming acceptance, her unblinking eyes still locked to the little boy.  “So… you just decided to come to normal school?  Just like that?”

                “Um, yeah, I guess,” said Peter with a nervous smile, scratching at the back of his head.

                “I know new schools can be freaky,” said Sharon, catching the boy’s attention again, as his consciousness had momentarily been fully diverted to taking in the massive and lanky Amy’s brief statement as she leaned back in her chair, still towering over him like a healthily colored monument.  “I moved to this city a few years ago, so I know what it’s like.  Believe me…”

                “Oh…” said Peter, not sure how to respond as he received another steaming blast of cinnamon air.

                “So you’re going to be our friend.  And we’ll help you out.  You know, ‘til you get used to it.  Right, girls?” Sharon asked, shooting a side glance to Kimmy and Amy, both of whom shook their heads with cheeky smiles.

                Peter gulped, nodding and returning the gesture.  “Yeah!  That’d be… that’d be great!”  Even as he spoke the words, though, Peter couldn’t help but feel a strange sensation in his gut.

First period was a surreal experience for Peter.  His attention at had been so focused on what was said that even as Mr. Browning had to explicitly snap everyone’s attention back to the front of the room as the students openly turned their backs on the instructor, whispering in low voices, as they gawked at Peter, that the boy hadn’t even seen enough to care.  And as it had happened half a dozen times over the course of the period, it was something of a godsend for the miniscule fifteen-year-old. 

Even as the bell rang out loudly in his ears, informing the students that they were to head to the next class, he didn’t stand up, and instead stared at the white board and all the year’s unit materials that Mr. Browning had displayed for the benefit of the class after the unofficial “make a friend” time had come to an end.  He was snapped out of this, though, not by the jostling wind of enormous students all making a mass exodus from the classroom and passing by his desk, but by Mr. Browning, who took a seat in the desk next to Peter after having shepherded most of the curious onlookers toward the door who wanted a better glimpse of the doll-sized student.

                “Hey, buddy,” said Mr. Browning cheerfully, catching the boy’s attention.

                “Hi, Mr. Browning!” said Peter with an optimistic grin.

                “They talked to me about you and everything, so I know what’s gotta happen in here.  I just wanted to know if…” continued the teacher.

                “Really, it’s all good.  As long as I can see the board, I can write down everything I need, and there won’t be a problem.  I don’t want to cause any trouble or anything.”

                “I’m sure we’ll be fine,” responded Mr. Browning.  “And… your sister is going to come and pick you up for your next class?”

                “Yeah, she should actually be…”

                “Hey, twerp, ready to get going?” asked Erica, slipping in the classroom door and powerwalking toward her brother’s desk.  “I have to get all the way back to the foreign language wing in a few minutes, so…”

                “Sure, sure, sorry,” said Peter, hastily gathering his supplies.

                “I wanted to make sure, quickly, though,” said Mr. Browning.  “I saw you chatting with those girls that sit behind you.  I… well, I don’t want to say you can’t handle yourself, but it did seem like…”

                “It’s fine, Mr. Browning,” said Peter as he obediently hopped into the soft, waiting palm of his older sister, which she had placed gently on the desktop next to him.  “I can take it.”

                “I’m sure you can, Peter.  I’ll see you in class tomorrow,” said Mr. Browning with a wave as Erica began half-running in the other direction for the door.

                “Where?” asked Erica with some snap in her voice.  “We have seriously got to move.”

                “Right, right… um…” drawled Peter, scrambling for his miniature schedule while trying to stay balanced against the fleshy wall of Erica’s fingers and thumb.  “Biology.  Room 58.  Mrs. Baker.”

                “Okay, okay, that’s not so bad… we can take a shortcut through the cafeteria,” said Erica with a shrug, taking a sharp turn in the hallway and causing Peter to sprawl outward in her palm.  She quickly closed her fingers around him like a cage to prevent losing him over the edge.  “Sorry about that…”

                “It’s all good,” laughed Peter, pulling himself back to a seated position by grasping at his sister’s gargantuan thumb.  There was silence for a few moments as Erica marched determinedly for the correct sect of the school.

                “Were you seriously talking to some girls?” asked Erica with an amused snort.

                “As a matter of fact, I was!” answered Peter with feigned pride, crossing his arms as if trying to preserve his dignity.  For a moment, he went off-balance, but Erica’s fingers were stilled curled inward for him to catch himself against.

                “Oh yeah?  What were their names?”

                “Uh… Sharon, Amy, and Kimmy.”

                “So which one did you ask out?”

                “Shut up,” snickered Peter, slapping his sister’s pinky finger playfully as he leaned back against the wall of fingers, crossing his legs and reclining.

                “Whatever you say, your royal highness,” she said with a serene shrug, flicking her fingers into his back and forcing him to stop leaning against them.  “Really.  I meant it.  My hand’s not your La-Z-Boy.”

                “Are we there yet?” groaned Peter.  “I think the bell’s going to ring in a couple minutes.”

                “What did you say?  58?”

                “Yeah.”

                “Right.  Okay, here we are,” said Erica, opening the door slowly and entering the biology lab.  The teacher Mrs. Baker was standing at the front of the room, scanning a clipboard, but her beady eyes shifted to Erica and the tiny human being perched in her palm as they entered.  Taking a few steps forward on her pudgy legs and ruffling her clearly artificially colored bright-red hair, Mrs. Baker pinched at the horn rim of her eyeglasses, squinting at Peter in momentary disbelief before settling down, tittering quietly to herself.

                “Yes, yes, they told me about you.  Peter, right?  Peter Clark?”

                “Yep!” chimed Peter proudly, sitting up on his haunches in his sister’s hand for a better look at the science lab.

                “You can go ahead and set him down at the first desk in the third row, honey,” she croaked calmly, indicating to Erica.  “We’re going by alphabetical order.”

                “Sure,” said Erica, jogging to the intended table.  Ignoring the new wave of google-eyed stares, hanging jawlines, and squeaking chairs as students leaned forward across their desks for a better view, Erica leaned down and allowed her brother to disembark onto the table.

                “Stay in those seats!” barked Mrs. Baker before anyone had a chance to slink out of their chairs and toward Peter’s desk.  “I’ve got a fresh stack of parent slips I’d love to hand out if I have to.” 

“Okay.  Be back for third period.  Gotta run,” Erica said with a quick wave as she darted back for the door.  As she slipped through, she passed another girl who was entering, and who slowly began ambling toward Peter’s desk, which had an unoccupied seat next to it.

                Instantly, he recognized her as the redheaded loner from his first period class.  Her head hung a little as she neared, the sheen of her pumpkin-toned locks seeming to capture all the ceiling light as it beamed down to her, her overly used sneakers shuffling against the tile uncaringly.  As she stopped in front of the desk, towering over Peter before taking a seat, their eyes met, and she blinked her swirling emerald eyes in surprise to realize that her assigned seat was next to his, her long, light eyelashes batting together in a struggle to stay composed.  Getting over it quickly, though, she brushed her fiery red hair out of her eyes, and quickly took a seat, almost seeming embarrassed to be standing up so high above the diminutive lad, although even when seated, she still had to look down at him to meet his eyes.  Peter grinned at her, but she turned her head away quickly, and the little freshman guessed she felt she had overstepped her boundaries by maintaining awkward eye contact with him for such an extended period.

                The bell rang for class to begin, breaking Peter’s unintended concentration on the girl who sat nervously next to him, her hands neatly crossed together on the tabletop.

                “Good, we can get started,” stated Mrs. Baker with annoyance, placing the clipboard on her desk and moving to the overhead projector.  “Welcome to Biology 1, period 2.  If you’re in the wrong place… go ahead and leave now.” 

No one could tell if it was a joke or not.  Peter shot another glance at the stoic girl next to him, watching as she calmly brushed another silky vermillion bang out of her eyes with her pointer and middle fingers.

                “As you can see…” continued Mrs. Baker loudly.  “I’ve placed a few of the tools we’ll be using in the lab this year on your tables.”  Peter eyed the implements.  There were a few beakers in varying sizes, the smallest of which were actually about as tall as Peter himself.  There were also some test tubes, a burner, some translucent disk-shaped dishes, and a few vials that seemed to contain liquids of some sort.  “You will need to be well-versed in your biology vocabulary.  All of it.  So, I want you to get out your books, and label these items on a piece of paper using your glossary.  I know it’s the first day of class, so I gave you an easy assignment.  You’re welcome.  Work with your lab partner, you’ll need to get to know them well; you’re stuck in these seats for the year.  Get to work, please.”

                Peter’s heart couldn’t help but flutter as he ignored the groans of the class while they fished for their books in their backpacks.

                The girl had already gotten out her own book, and was busily flipping through the pages for the glossary.  Peter took a few cautious steps forward, not wanting to make her nervous, despite his own equally uneasy feelings.  The sour alcoholic stench hanging in the air from the recently cleaned lab instruments made him feel a hint of wooziness, but he brushed this aside quickly, and cleared his throat.

                “Hi,” he said sheepishly.  The girl stopped flipping through the pages, turned her head to look down at him, and smiled sweetly, although her eyes seemed uncomfortable looking at him still, as if she felt bad for doing it.  For a moment, from the guiltiness of the glance he was getting, Peter felt like he was in a wheelchair, missing several limbs and wearing bandages.

                “Hi…” she repeated softly, speaking at roughly the same volume as Peter; the boy figured she was afraid to hurt his ears, having no prior experience speaking to someone so small.

                “I’m Peter.”

                “L-Lisa,” she responded uneasily, turning to face him a little more fully in her chair as she got comfortable looking down at him, grasping the plastic seatback with her right hand.  The effect still seemed to make her feel out of place, and she resorted to slouching down a little in her seat in an effort to get closer to being eye level with Peter, which the boy found to be an amusingly thoughtful gesture.

“You can look at me in the face, I won’t bite,” said Peter with a smile.  The tiny fifteen-year-old couldn’t bear to let her go on so awkwardly on his account, so he resorted to get it corrected immediately.

                “Oh.  Um, I…” stumbled Lisa, realizing how obvious she had been.  Nervously, she quickly brushed her red hair out of her face again and bit her lip.  “Sorry.  I’m just not used to…” she continued, but stopped herself.

                “…talking to somebody like me?” asked Peter with a reassuring grin.

                “No, no, I just…”

                “It’s okay, really, I get it all the time.”

                “I know,” said Lisa, sounding a bit dejected with herself.  “I just figured it must get… so old for you to have to hear people talk to you like this.  I’m sorry.”

                “Don’t be.  Actually, what I usually get is people… kind of not wanting to look at me in the face, like they’re embarrassed.  I mean, I guess I get it, but really, I just want to talk to people.  That’s all.”

                Lisa nodded knowingly, grimacing a little at her conversational misfortune.  “All right.  I can do that… Peter, right?” she asked, finally locking unblinking eyes with the little freshman, her soft lips curling steadily into a friendly smile.

                “Yes,” answered Peter with a bashful smirk as both were finally set at peace with one another.

                “And… I think that’s the last one!” announced Lisa, still keeping her voice soft enough to keep Peter’s eardrums from popping, as she closed the biology book with a snap.  “Hydrogen peroxide, right?”

                “Yeah, looks like it,” replied Peter, scratching at his chin in thought as he observed the clear liquid in the tube.

                “I don’t know what else it could be, anyway,” sighed Lisa, grasping at the cap and unscrewing it, sniffing lightly at the air.  “I mean, that smell packs a real-”

                “I know!” coughed Peter loudly, covering his nose and backing away.

                “Oh my God!” gasped Lisa softly, instantly snapping the cap back on, her jaw dropping.  She reached out a hand, as if she wanted to comfort Peter, who had entered into a hacking frenzy, by giving him a light touch on the shoulder, but suddenly remembered how difficult it would be to keep it from being awkward.  “I’m sorry!  I just… I wasn’t thinking, I…”

                “It’s… it’s okay, just maybe a warning next time,” laughed Peter as he wiped his watering eyes.

                “Everything okay over here, you two?” asked Mrs. Baker sternly as she strolled by the table.  “Mr. Clark?  You keeping it together there?”

                “Yep.  Sure am, Mrs. Baker,” he said with the same grin, giving an enthusiastic thumbs up at her as she nodded and walked to the next table.

                “Are you sure you’re okay?” asked Lisa breathlessly, placing her hands over her mouth.  “Please?  Seriously, tell me you’re okay.”

                “Nope.  I’m… I’m dying…” moaned Peter dramatically, collapsing to the tabletop on purpose and clutching his hand over his forehead in show.

                “What?” squealed Lisa with fear, barely making a sound, clenching her fingers into a fist and pressing hard against her lips.

                “Kidding!  Kidding!  Sorry,” said Peter sheepishly, leaping up to his feet.  Reminding himself that Lisa was entirely unaccustomed to dealing with boys that happened to be less than half a foot tall, he decided that joking sarcasm, however evident to him, was probably best to save until after she wasn’t so anxious around him.

                “Don’t DO that to me!” whined Lisa with a soft, slightly irritated smile.  “You’re making me nervous already…”

                “Sorry.  I don’t mean to,” said Peter with another smile, taking a few steps closer to Lisa’s hand, which was resting calmly on the desk next to the closed biology book.  “This is just… how I try to fit in.  I don’t know, I guess I’m not too good at it yet.”

                “Believe me, I’m not either,” said Lisa with a quiet snort.  “You’re the first new person I’ve talked to at this school.”

                “Really?” asked Peter, sounding a little more eager than he would have preferred to let on, as his cheeks flushed a little.

                “And… that’s kind of saying something, because I… don’t really talk to people all that much.”

                “Sounds like we’ve got something in common,” said Peter, taking another few steps, and stopping right next to Lisa’s calmly resting pinky finger.

                “Thanks for making me feel better about talking to you.  When I saw you in class this morning, I thought you just looked so… so…”

                At this, Peter felt a little déjà vu coming on to the treatment he had received in the morning from Sharon and her cronies.

                “Out of place?” chuckled Peter uneasily.

                “No!” gasped Lisa.  “No, no, not at all.  Actually, I thought it was… pretty cool of you.  You said you’ve been homeschooled for your whole life, right?”

                “Yeah.”

                “I mean, to come to a school like this?  When you’ve never been to one before?  I don’t think I could have done it.”

                “Hey, who knows?  Maybe you would have surprised yourself,” winked Peter, giving her pinky finger a gentle pat with his hand to show his support.

                At the touch, Lisa’s whole hand flinched, and her eyes darted down to Peter, who jolted back immediately upon feeling the vibrations in her soft and previously unmoving flesh.

                “I’m sorry!” exclaimed Peter.  “Really, I’m sorry.  I didn’t mean to…”

                “No…” breathed Lisa.  “I’m just… on edge, I don’t know.  Please don’t think I did that because…”

                “I surprised you.”

                “No, I… I saw you…” continued the young redhead, breathing more steadily.  “I guess it was just…”

                “What?”

                “Oh, nothing, really.  I’m sorry.  I didn’t mean to make you think you’d surprised me.”

                “Hey, c’mon, it’s fine, really.”

                “You’re gonna think I’m a creeper…”

                “You’re not a creeper.  Believe me.  I’ve met creepers.  You’re not one of them,” said Peter with a playful roll of his eyes.

                Lisa swallowed.  “I guess… just, the feeling of your hand.  I don’t know, I… had wondered what it would feel like, to have someone… like you touch me,” she said uneasily, sidestepping the awkward phrasings that might easily have been substituted in.  “It was just different for me.  And… God, I am starting to sound like a creeper...”

                “I… think I get it,” said Peter as reassuringly as possible, doing his best to sympathize with her plight.  He imagined that, to him, the equivalent of having a thumb tack come alive and touch his own finger with a hand about the size of his own thumbprint would be pretty unnerving, and yet at the same time shocking.

                Besides, Peter’s heart was fluttering so much into an unhealthy overdrive at this moment that he wasn’t inclined to hold any kind of grudge for Lisa’s wording.

                Lisa herself was beginning to blush.  Blinking a few times, she turned back to the worksheet she had been filling out for the both of them containing their findings from the biology book glossary, and began hastily scribbling the final few sentences required before they could turn in their work, using a pencil about as long as Peter himself.

                “Class is almost up, guys!  Start wrapping it up!” called out Mrs. Baker from the other side of the room as she continued patrolling around, the buzz of chattered conversations between lab partners filling the room, and effectively drowning out the nearly whispered exchange between Peter and Lisa.

                “Sorry I can’t help more on the writing,” said Peter, trying to break the silence that had settled over himself and his comparatively gargantuan fifteen-year-old lab partner.  “But I’m pretty sure the teacher can’t read anything I put down to paper.”

                “How do you even… do homework, or tests, or anything?  I mean…” said Lisa curiously, suddenly realizing how it could have been interpreted as insensitive. “Sorry.  But, really, how do you…”

                “Pretty much how I’ve done it my whole life for my mom,” said Peter with a little snicker.  “I write it out, then give it to my mom, and she blows it up on the scanner.  Except now, we have to email that stuff to all my teachers.”

                “Sounds like a pain,” said Lisa with a little grin, picking up the completed page and beginning to slide her chair out of the desk.  “Wait here a minute, okay?  I’m gonna go turn this in.”

                “Uh… sure.  Where could I possibly have gone, anyway?” said Peter with a completely serious face.  He held his stone expression for a second, causing Lisa to look concerned that she had made another social error, but Peter quickly cracked a smile, and Lisa followed suit, shaking her head that she had fallen for it again as she headed for the front desk of the classroom to turn in their work.

                With a moment alone to collect his thoughts, Peter sighed to himself with a grin.  He had done it; he had made what he perceived as a real, live friend.  It practically made goose bumps run along his skin.

                As Lisa came striding back from the front of the classroom, Peter couldn’t help but notice that her chin seemed a little more pointed upward, and her squeaky old sneakers didn’t trudge across the ground; she took actual steps.

                As Lisa sat down again and began repacking her backpack, she turned back to Peter.

                “What class have you got next?” she asked gently.

                “Uh… Art 1, I think.  Just the basics.”

                “Oh…” sighed Lisa, sounding a little disappointed.  “Cool.  I’m in the band, so I think that’s what I’ve got next.”

                “Really?  What instrument do you play?”

                “Clarinet.  Since I was ten.”

                “Wow,” said Peter, blowing a little whistle sound effect to show his impressment. “You must rock on that thing.”

                “Yeah, right.  Rock.  Me,” she said, shaking her head again with a shy grin.

                “I’ll bet you do.  I want to hear it sometime.”

                “What?” she asked with a giggle.  “No, you really, really don’t.”

                “I do,” said Peter adamantly.  “I want a concert.”

                “Well, then, Mr. Clark,” she said, trying to sound prim and proper, keeping a falsely stiff upper lip.  “You shall have your concert, from a boxed seat, of course.”

                “Wouldn’t have it any other way,” said Peter in a similarly dry tone, and both of them snorted with laughter, trying to keep straight faces.  As they continued chuckling, the bell rang, causing the mass of students to practically leap from their desks and sprint for the escape route.

                “Woah.  Okay, I guess I better get to band… make sure I’m ready for this little concert thing,” said Lisa, standing up and pulling her backpack strap over her arm.  “Hey!  How do you…”

                “My sister,” said Peter.  “She comes by and gives me a lift in between every class.”

                “Sounds like a great gig.”

                “Yeah, but only when she’s not cranky,” said Peter sarcastically in a hushed tone.

                “I’ll see you around, all right?” said Lisa with a tiny, rippling wave of her fingers before heading for the door, looking over her shoulder at Peter one final time before exiting.  Erica dashed in seconds later, rushing back to the table and staring down at her brother as she caught her breath.

                “I think this job is going to kill me,” said Erica with slight irritation, laying her palm flat on the table, fingers straight together, for Peter to load up.

                “Hey, it’s just two more years, then you’re gone to college, and I’m somebody else’s problem, right?” said Peter with a sly smile, clambering over his sister’s soft fingers into the center of her hand.

                “Two YEARS?  I don’t think I’ll make it through the WEEK,” she said, her hazel eyes widening for effect as she raised her arm away from the table and headed back for the door with her brother cupped into her warm hand.

                Peter sat calmly on his desk in the art room where his sister had set him down for third period before dashing off, his eyes tracing over the high walls.  Murals, smeared with shades of neon, adorned the longest segments with what looked to Peter like horses made of light, streaming away the purple darkness behind them.  He smiled to himself.  He wasn’t sure what it was, but the fact that he had actually managed to make a new friend in his last class, combined with the overwhelmingly large image (to Peter, at least) of the horses on the wall, was filling him with a sense of hope.  As if success was within his grasp.  He had stepped forward, and was meeting the challenge unflinchingly.

                The bell rang for the start of class as the final students grabbed the unoccupied seats in the room with a clatter that hurt Peter’s ears as they steadily noticed his alien presence and set to whispered speculation regarding his existence.  The boy was trying to get used to it, and instead focused more closely on the wall murals to block out the cancerously embarrassing attention.  The backdoor opened and the teacher, Mr. Jameson, strolled uncaringly into the tiled art room.  As his gray hair frizzed outward in various directions, Peter guessed that the man was within a couple years, if not sooner, to the sweet release of retirement.

                “Morning, morning…” he grumbled, in contrast to the greeting he was giving.  “Freshmen, right?  Right?”

                A soft mumble of affirmation came out from the room.  Mr. Jameson nodded, coughing lightly into his grizzled fist.

                “Today, I just want to see what you can do.  Paper in the back.  Pencils and paints there too.  Go ahead and… make something.  Create.  Anything you want.  The real learning starts tomorrow.  I’ll be back in a few minutes to check over the attendance chart.”

                The class immediately pulled out of their chairs and lumbered for the back counter to pick up the supplies, while Peter stood up, walking toward the edge of the desk.

                “Mr. Jameson!” he called out, receiving no reply from his teacher, who was at least twenty feet away at the front of the class.  “MR. JAMESON!”

                “What?” squawked the teacher as if awakened from a daydream as he stood and strode toward Peter’s desk, his eyes refocusing.  “Oh right.  Yes, you, they told me about you… Paul…”

                “It’s Peter.  And I…”

                “You’ve got paper, right?”

                “Yeah, all I have to do is put something down and email it to you, and…”

                “Fine,” he said with a single nod, turning back and moving for his office door.  Peter couldn’t tell if the gruffness in his voice was just irritation at the special circumstances he was having to deal with, or if it was just Peter himself.  At any rate, the small boy began rummaging through his backpack for supplies as his classmates took their seats again, deciding he’d try to work on getting the old man’s approval later on, once he re-entered the room.

                No sooner had Peter removed a colored pencil tip from his backpack, along with a tiny paper square, and begun to sketch the outlines of what the boy had envisioned as some sort of fantastical wild beast, before he heard a hushed whisper in a quick, machine gun-like spurt, cutting through the continued buzzing of the rest of the class.

                “Psst!”

                Peter turned his head to the right, and found himself staring into a pair of feminine gray eyes, flushed partially with smoky hazel.

                “Yeah, you!” whispered the young girl, blinking a few times and raising her chin slightly as she ran a finger through her slightly unkempt light brown hair, which was held together messily in a pair of twin pigtails by red scrunchies.  “What’s your name?” she questioned, the slightest of slurred urban accents saturated within her voice.

                “Uh…” gasped Peter, getting his bearings.  “Peter.  Peter Clark.”

                “I read about you, I think.  In the paper or something,” she said, scrunching her nose and making a face of arguable distaste.

                “Probably.  It’s been a few times.  I mean, I haven’t really done anything though, I-”

                “Yeah, okay,” she answered, cutting Peter off and looking back to her large piece of paper and the accompanying water color paints she had selected.  “So, I was wondering if you’d help me out with my project.”

                “Sure!” said Peter enthusiastically.  “Yeah, sure, I’d like to!”

                It’s coming easier now, thought Peter proudly to himself.  Look at all the friends you’re making.

                “Cool,” she said brightly with a nod, reaching forward, fingers outstretched in preparation to grab up her new, diminutive classmate.

                Peter gulped hard, his spine tingling, as the girl’s soft, doughy fingers wrapped themselves tightly around his body like cobras, compressing him against her wide, creased palm.  The touch of her skin was cold, as if she had recently picked up a snowball with her bare hands, and Peter shivered, far too surprised to have any kind of verbal reaction as he was casually lifted off the table and carried across the terrifying gorge between the desks. 

Peter’s blood practically turned to ice.

The girl’s hand squeezed inward gently as Peter was lowered back toward the desktop.  He felt like his lungs were being constricted.  He gulped in a few shorter breathes, panicking slightly, the realization that most of his body had been swallowed up into the all-encompassing flesh of this fifteen-year-old girl’s hand and fingers taking its toll in a mere few seconds.  As much as Peter hated being plucked up by his clothes as Amy had done in first period, he at least had free reign with his limbs then.  At this moment, save for his head and ankles, Peter was immobile in the dominating grip of this stranger, and this alone was enough to send a few beads of sweat down the back of his chilled neck. 

With a sigh, Peter felt his feet touch the desktop, and almost reluctantly, the tree trunk-like fingers pulled back as well, allowing him to inhale and exhale regularly again, the cool, malleable wall of palm skin rising away.  Peter coughed lightly, looking upward at the enormous torso of the girl.  For a moment, she stared into the hand she had just used to grasp Peter without permission, as if he had left a mark there, with glowing eyes.  Her lips parted slightly, allowing her to exhale quietly; clearly, to Peter, the sensation was just as new to her as it was to him.

“Hey, umm…” mumbled Peter, clasping his hands together as he realized they were shaking slightly.

“Mandy,” she answered confidently, shaken from her moment of subjective epiphany by his voice.  Her gray eyes scanned over his body in a pattern, as if she was trying to ingrain his image into her mind’s eye.

“Mandy,” repeated Peter with another cough.  “I… I don’t really know how to say this, but I…”

“Look, I know you’ve got to draw something too on your tiny piece of paper over there, so how about we get to work, huh?” she said wistfully, pointing back toward Peter’s desk and twirling at one of her pigtails with the other hand, as if only half-listening to him and daydreaming with the other part of her consciousness.

“Right, right, I know, I just think you should know… I… look, don’t take it the wrong way, it’s not you… but I don’t really like being picked up… like that,” grumbled Peter, feeling incredibly uncomfortable with each successive word that escaped his lips.

“Okay.  How should I pick you up, then?” casually questioned Mandy as if it was the most natural thing in the world, her pointer finger extending up to her mouth and playfully flipping her plush pink lower lip up and down, creating a little popping sound with each flick.  Her eyes continued to almost unblinkingly study the boy.

“Errr…” groaned Peter, unsure of how to tell her he wasn’t particularly interested in being transported by her, after how brash she had been.  He quickly cleared his throat, deciding against it for the time being.  “W-What do you want me to do to help?”

“Well, see, I got these watercolors,” began Mandy, flipping the plastic lid open and sliding a white bowl full of water closer to the set with her damp fingertips.  “And I was hoping, maybe… you’d walk through it, and make little footprints on my paper?”

“I…” drawled Peter, then shrugged to himself.  It honestly didn’t sound as horrible as he had come to predict, and at this point, the boy just wanted to get this over with so he could return to his desk.  “Sure!  That… sounds cool.”

“I know,” she answered proudly, squeezing her eyes shut and grinning so widely it looked to Peter like her face must have been sore for a second afterward.  She opened her eyes again, and absentmindedly began twirling at the frizzy brown ends of her pigtails again, getting her finger entwined deeply into the long, auburn follicle ropes.  “You might want to take off your shoes.”

“Yeah!  I… right, right,” said Peter.  The situation was becoming so surreal to the lad that he was starting to have difficulty accurately following the developing conversation with this young girl who clearly had only the loosest understanding of basic social etiquette.

It’s okay, reminded Peter to himself mentally.  It’s okay.  This is how you make friends.  And you need friends.  You need friends.  Everybody needs friends.

He kicked off his little tennis shoes, depositing then on the desktop, before sliding his socks off his feet and jamming them into the opening of one of his shoes.

                “Okay, I can go ahead and-” began Peter brightly as he raised his head, only to find the immense wall of palm flesh sliding for him again across the desktop.  His foot raised, and he took an involuntary step backwards as Mandy’s hand smashed into him like a fleshy linebacker, her fingers wrapping quickly around him and catching his fall.  He groaned with soreness as he tripped over her pinky finger, only to find himself easily grasped back into her firm hold.  He could almost feel the muscle in the heel of her hand pulsing against his ribcage as she lifted him from the ground, his arms pinned uncomfortably to his sides.  His eyes darting wildly, Peter’s heart clutched in his chest as he realized where he was headed.

                “Uh… M-M-Mandy?” wheezed Peter as he was lowered toward the porcelain bowl.

                “It’s watercolors, remember?” said Mandy with a cheerful shrug, dunking Peter’s immobilized body roughly into the freezing water with her soft fist.

                Peter sputtered violently as he found himself plunged fully into the bowl of water intended to dampen the paint, held in place by the crushing weight of his classmate’s closed hand.  The ice cold liquid rushed through the fabric of his clothes and all over his body, getting in easily between the cushy crevices of Mandy’s firm fingers.  Shivering, he shook his arms, attempting to break through the bonds of the girl’s cool digits, but this was obviously a no-go, as he soon found he couldn’t shift them in the slightest.  Peter inhaled hard in panic for oxygen, and instantly took in a throatful of the water.  Metallic tasting on his tongue, like the sink hadn’t been cleaned in a while.  The boy gagged weakly in the water, shaking.

                The moment dragged on for what seemed like forever to Peter until he came out of the water with a quick snap of Mandy’s wrist, the water splashing everywhere on the desk.  As his waterlogged vision re-adjusted to the room, he noticed his aquatic re-emergence was due to a different hand gripping onto Mandy’s forearm tightly, ripping her hand (and Peter) from the bowl with great force.  As he blinked again, he also realized with a start that the entire class, or what seemed like it, had crowded around Mandy’s desk for a better look at the ongoing event.

                “Hey!  Look, you got water all over my-” accused Mandy with haughty annoyance, looking upward at whoever at halted her preparation to exercise Peter as an artistic utensil.

                “Shut up!  You… you…” hissed a female voice, almost in a rage, a light Spanish accent prevalent in the words.  As Mandy was still gripping onto Peter’s body at a sideways angle, he strained his neck to look backward and upside down, following the arm of whoever had saved him from his five-second underwater misadventure.

                Although his vision was still blurry, Peter had a decent view of his rescuer.  He squinted, still somewhat disoriented, realizing from his mental stores that it was a girl who had been sitting on the far side of the room.  Her soft Hispanic features were twisted into a look of anger and frustration as she continued gripping at Mandy’s arm with her tanned fist, her upper lip quivering, her freshly-brushed brunette hair hanging like willow tree leaves over her face.  Clearly, she had made haste in reaching Mandy’s desk to pull Peter out.

                “Let go of me, Alita, he said it was okay!” whined Mandy.

                “You picked him up and put him in your bowl of water, Mandy.  Put… him… down,” growled Alita.  Peter could feel the vibration of her hand shaking all the way through Mandy’s wrist and into her icy palm.  Her grip was clenched like a metal claw onto rusted steel.

                There was silence between them for a moment as the group continued buzzing to one another.

                “Yeah, Mandy, seriously.  Let him go,” came a male voice from somewhere in the huddle of students.

                “She didn’t hurt him or anything…” mused another female voice.

                “I heard her ask him.  He said he’d help her paint her thing,” pointed out a boy’s voice from the other side of the circle of people.

                “But she… she…” moaned a girl’s voice with a near-shriek, clearly unable to handle the situation.

                “Hey, man, you okay?” piped yet another new voice out to Peter as he remained clenched in Mandy’s quivering fist.

                “Of COURSE he’s okay!” interjected Mandy through gritted teeth.  “It’s watercolor paints!  I have to get him wet before he can…”

                “You did not have to put his whole body into the water, and you did not have to pick him up like that.  He could do it himself,” responded Alita with a more measured drawl, stumbling slightly over the pronunciation of a few of the words that were evidently only part of her second learned language.  Peter felt another thick vibration as his momentary savior shook Mandy’s arm harder.  “Put him down now.”

                “HEY!” came the craggy bark of Mr. Jameson as he re-entered the room from his office, hearing the commotion through the wall.  “WHAT is going on in my classroom?” As he pushed his way through the wall of teenagers, Mandy instantly lowered her hand toward the desk, releasing her peer prey from her cold, wet fingers, allowing Peter to roll uncomfortably back to the desktop on his stomach.

                “Mr. Clark, you feeling all right?” he asked, sounding a just few degrees more concerned above abject boredom, as he leaned over the table, eyeing Peter.

                “He’s okay, Mr. Jameson!” said Mandy with a little too much enthusiasm before the small boy could even get ahold of himself.

                “I didn’t ask you, young lady,” snapped Mr. Jameson, giving the evil eye to Mandy, who quickly piped down and took a nervous step away from the desk.

                “Yes!  Yes, I’m f-fine…” sputtered Peter as he pulled himself speedily to his feet, coughing up a tiny swallow of freezing copper water.  “Fine, really.”

                “She put him in her water bowl,” said Alita quietly, the fire still burning her voice, her dislike for Mandy practically dripping from her words.  “She picked him up and put him in her water bowl and held him there.”

                “What?” hissed Jameson, his eyes bugging slightly.  “Everyone?  Is this true?”

                The class instantly starting shouting out their partial version of the scene, fighting for the teacher’s attention: some were backing Mandy, saying Peter had given his full consent to aid her with her art project, and some were trying to point out that Peter hadn’t asked her to pick him up and dunk him fully underwater.

                “HEY!” cried out Peter at last with every ounce of volume he could summon, nearly shattering his vocal chords.  It was loud enough to get everyone’s attention, as everyone so close together, and the class quickly shushed, all staring down with wonder at the boy, more out of amazement that he was capable of being so loud than for wanting to hear his own opinion of the actual story.  “I told her I’d help her with her project.  I…”

                “No.  No, she, she…” stuttered Alita, clearly saddened by Peter’s defense.

                “I did, Mr. Jameson,” said Peter confidently, wiping his damp bangs out of his face and smoothing one of his hands down his cold cheek to slosh away some excess moisture.  “I… guess, maybe I didn’t need to go all the way under, but…”

                “I see…” grumbled Mr. Jameson, rubbing at his stubble-pocked chin.  The gears were turning.  Peter couldn’t tell whether it was in his favor or not.  “You,” he said at last, pointing with a knobby finger to the author of Peter’s unexpected dunk.  “Missy.  What’s your name?”

                “Mandy… Delaney…” she answered uneasily, trying to smile cutely to the teacher, as her finger slowly fished its way back through her split ponytail end.

                “Ms. Delaney… see me after class.  And Mr…”

                “Peter Clark,” said Peter quickly, avoiding Mandy’s gaze, although even without looking, he could practically feel her irises trying to rain laser death through his spine.  He swallowed hard, attempting to push the feeling out of his mind.  “…sir.”

                “We’ll… get you a… towel or something, or…”

                “A tissue would be fine, if you’ve got any in here,” said Peter quickly, his eyes darting around to his classmates, nearly all of whom were staring down at him with shock, simply enjoying the show of watching the teacher carry on a conversation with a person small enough to fit into each of their hands.

                “Here… P-Peter…” came Alita’s voice from behind Peter.  He turned to find a tissue big enough to be a blanket for himself dangling in midair just in front of his face, pinched tightly between Alita’s slender pointer finger and thumb.  Peter could hear the unsteady anger in her voice; she clearly was still distraught with what she had just seen.

                “Thanks,” he said with a grateful smile to Alita, who returned the gesture.  Peter grasped his arms around the comparatively fuzzy edge of the tissue and took the bulky thing from her hand.  Wrapping himself in it, he instantly began to warm up, shimmying it against his damp back and rubbing it into his icy hair, soaking in the starchy scent of the dusty tissue.  He sneezed softly, causing most of the people surrounding him to flinch.  It took a shrill whistle from between two of Mr. Jameson’s fingers to get everyone back to reality.

                “Let’s get back to work, everyone.  If I don’t see something on everyone’s paper by the end of class, at least, I’ll be whipping out the detention log sooner than normal.  Come on!” he called out, clapping his hands together for effect.

                This threat got everyone moving again back to their seats to complete their work, bustling around and trading paints and pencils for ones they needed for their own projects.

                “Delaney?  Go ahead and pick a different seat in the room,” said Mr. Jameson with a slow wave of dismissal to Mandy, who quickly grabbed up her supplies and began backing away.  As she did, she caught Peter’s eye, her pupils narrowed and dilated.  Peter couldn’t be sure, as he was still very nervous and cold, but he would have sworn the black in her eyes was swirling like an ink well.  Like jet smoke from a wildfire.  It made his stomach churn itself.  With a final twist of her upper lip that could only have been read as utter disgust, Mandy sauntered away, her ponytails bouncing robotically against her shoulders as she walked.

                “You are… really okay?” asked Alita, who Peter noticed by this point had slowly slid into the chair of the desk he was now occupying.  Gently, she picked up the ruffled tissue in her fingers and offered it to Peter again.  “You need another one?”

                “No, no, it’s fine,” he said, waving his arms.  “I… um… thank you.”

                “It was nothing.  I am very sorry about her.  She’s always been this way, even in middle school.  I had hoped she might have improved over the summer,” said Alita, looking genuinely remorseful.  To Peter’s delight, there wasn’t the slightest sign of discomfort as she spoke to him.

                “You seem pretty relaxed,” said Peter.  “I appreciate it.”

                “I have had much practice.  My own little brother is quite a handful.  You are nothing compared to him.  Besides, it must be scary to be at a new school after you were homeschooled for so long.”

                “How did you…”

                “The newspapers.  You were there a few days back now.  I recognized you when I walked into the classroom.  I had hoped to meet you, but… unfortunately, it had to be when you were being shown a lack of kindness by Mandy.”

                “Thanks again for that,” said Peter with a grin, going to pick up his shoes, but then he stopped himself.  “You know what?”

                “What?” asked Alita with a grin, resting an elbow on the desk, placing her chin on her hand and gazing down at Peter, not with inanimate curiosity as he had seen all morning, but with simple wonderment.

                “Mandy may be a little off her rocker,” whispered Peter, making sure his tormentor was out of earshot.  “But she at least knows art.”  With a cheerful gait, Peter made a break for the still-open watercolors paint, and, leaping into the air, planted both feet hard into the squishy, wet compartment for red paint.  With Alita watching with a questioningly raised eyebrow, Peter began to march across Mandy’s piece of paper, leaving a trail of his tiny painted footprints across it.      

“Now that is art,” giggled Alita approvingly, golf-clapping her long fingers together, smiling down at her little classmate as he made intricate, swirling patterns across the page with each tiny step.

                Peter sat cross-legged on his sister’s lunch tray on a table in the cafeteria, munching idly on a tip of a french fry from the paper carton.  As he chewed, he allowed himself to soak in the scene.  The cafeteria was easily the largest room he had ever been in, and the sheer, overwhelming magnitude of the space was starting to make him feel light-headed.  There were at least four hundred kids in the hall, most of them occupying the circular tables, but many as well walking in between the tables, carrying trays full of hotdogs, chips, and other assorted processed drivel that Peter wasn’t particularly fond of, but this wasn’t even on his mental docket as he took it all in.  His jaw hung open.  It was a sight to behold: like an aircraft hangar, or a space station.  Peter had nothing to compare it to.

                Many students that walked by slowed down to get a better look at Peter, but he was close enough to the center of the table that anyone who stopped by to stare was easily shooed away by Erica and her friends.

                “Erica?” asked Peter quietly, looking over his shoulder and up at his sister, who was resting her chin on her upturned forearm and giving her attention to one of her friends, giggling at what was being said.  “Erica!”

                “What?” she asked with a sigh, sounding bored, as she diverted her attention to her brother.  “I know the food sucks, but get used to it.  It’s pretty much what they have everyday.”

                “No, no, I wasn’t going to say that,” answered Peter, standing up and sidling in between the french fry carton and a sloppy, half-eaten chicken salad sandwich that rested next to it.  “I was just going to ask what’s down that way,” he said, pointing toward a long hallway jutting off from the side of the cafeteria.  Erica sighed.

                “That’s the music wing.  Neither of us ever has to go down there though…”

                Peter smiled to himself.  Not too long ago, Lisa had been down that hallway, playing her clarinet.  “Can we go down there?”

                Erica raised an eyebrow at him, a bite of mulched food making one of her cheeks puff up a little as she mulled it over confusedly.  “Really?”

                “Yeah!”

                “Uh sure, just make sure you’re back soon,” said Erica at last, starting to turn back to her friends.  Unlike Erica, her friends all had their rapt attentions on Peter, wondering smiles spread over their lips.  No matter how many times they saw him, they could never get over the thrill of watching him move and speak.

                “Wha… you mean, go by myself?” gulped Peter.

                Erica shrugged.  “What’s the prob?”

                “I… I don’t think I can do that.”

                “Well, I guess you’re hanging with me, then,” said Erica, clearly never intending for Peter to volunteer to go on his own expedition.

                “I’ll take you, Peter,” said Lena with a grin, leaning forward and brushing a few black bangs out of her eyes.

                “Thanks!”

                “Lena, seriously?” said Erica, raising her upper lip in slight disgust.  “You don’t have to do that, he’s being ridiculous.”

                “I have my next class down there anyway.  I can show it to you!” said Lena, slowly extending a hand and laying her fingers and palm flat on the table, just off of Erica’s tray.  “It’s no problem, really.”

                “Okay, but hurry up… next period starts in like fifteen minutes,” groaned Erica, surrendering.

                Peter clambered off his sister’s lunch try and gingerly stepped onto Lena’s fingertips.  As he did, though, he slipped onto his side.

                “Sorry.  I had french fries…” said Lena sheepishly, eyeing the glistening layer of grease coating the upper halves of her fingers.

                “It’s… fine, it’s cool,” said Peter quickly, hiding his marginal irritation as he wiped fatty grease from his hands and pant legs while pushing himself up against the long, plush fingertips.

                “On?” asked Lena sweetly, cupping her other hand around Peter to ensure his safe boarding.

                “Yep!” piped Peter as the warm, wide platform of flesh rose into the air, Lena’s fingers curling in slowly for added protection.  As he rose higher into the air while the seventeen-year-old teen girl pushed out of her chair and stood up, Peter gawked brightly at the entire room, which he suddenly had a much better view of.  The boy couldn’t help but want to fly over the room, watching it zip by like a countryside from up above.

                “Okay, okay, I’m coming too… Mom will kill me if you get out of my sight,” groaned Erica, popping another fry in between her teeth and chewing slowly.  “I don’t think you want to be late on your first day, anyway.”

                “It won’t take long, will it, Peter?” chimed Lena, bringing her face closer to Peter again and tapping her pink tongue playfully against the roof of her mouth.  The boy coughed lightly as a rush of boiling, runny french fry breath clouded around him in a warm haze, and as he stared in between the girl’s jaws, he felt a little off-put to see tiny flecks of crunched yellow fry littering her wet, sticky tongue from every angle, a few overly greasy strands of saliva dangling loosely from her upper molars.  At times like this, Peter wished his tiny eyes didn’t allow him the ability of seeing such minute detail in the world.

                “Nope!” grimaced Peter as he covered the cough quickly with a fist, turning away from the massive open mouth that had parted so near to him like the gaping jowls of a whale.  Nodding excitedly, Lena began strutting off toward the music wing, keeping her long, tan fingers walled softly around Peter’s gently vibrating body as she took hard footfalls on the ground, with the begrudging Erica following behind.

                Peter could tell Lena wasn’t accustomed to carrying him as, despite her best efforts, her hand began bobbing slightly and making the boy feel a little queasy, but he forced himself to hold it together.

                “The band room is at the end of the hall, I can show you where they we keep the instruments!” said Lena, looking back down at Peter.  As they passed by another door, though, it swung open and Mandy came trudging out, nearly knocking into Lena, who stopped to ensure she wasn’t jostled and put at risk of losing her miniscule hand passenger.

                Peter locked eyes with Mandy.  For an instant, he saw the same dark clouds brewing in her irises, but they parted almost instantly.  The girl raised a hand, twirling at her pigtails again with a dreamily spinning fingertip, a smile of gentle truce seeming to appear on her face.

                “Hey… it’s you again!  The tiny little kid!” grinned Mandy as girlishly as she had at their first meeting.  “Remember me?”

                How could I forget, thought Peter bitterly.  “Uh-huh,” he answered as neutrally as possible.

                “Who are you?” asked Erica calmly to the freshman girl.

                “I’m his new friend,” piped Mandy quickly.  “We met each other in art class.”

                “Oh, that’s cool!” said Lena cheerfully.  “You guys should date each other, you’d both be so…”

                “Oh, God, Lena, why do you always have to…” moaned Erica, rolling her eyes, clearly disgusted at the very idea.

                “It was a JOKE!  Gee!” laughed Lena, looking down at Peter.  “Sorry, Peter.  You knew it was a joke, right?”

                “Yeah.  Yeah, I did,” said Peter, trying to hide his discomfort as he locked subtle eyes with Mandy again.  Again, he saw it.  The flash.  A glint in the young girl’s eye, a tensing of her fingertip as she so calculatingly twirled her pigtail.

                It ended as soon as it had begun, the look of adorable joy returning to Mandy’s cheeks and lips.  “I have band next, little guy.  What do you have?”

                “Err… math, I think.  Yeah, math, with Ms. Tritter,” said Peter, who had slowly started to learn his schedule by this point.  Mandy nodded almost knowingly, as if her thoughts were elsewhere at that moment.

                “Math.  I hate math,” she said, shrugging.  “I hope you have fun.  I’ll see you soon!” she giggled, heading off in the other direction and rippling her fingers in a dramatic wave.  With that, Lena looked up at a clock on the wall.

                “Oooh… I just remembered, I have to sign the check sheet for an instrument locker, I haven’t done that yet.  I think we’re gonna need to postpone the tour, Peter.  I’m sorry,” said Lena, flattening her palm and moving her hand closer to her friend.

                “Okay, let’s move it along.  The math department is right down this way, we can get there pretty quickly if we go now,” said Erica, extending her flattened hand and laying it across Lena’s greasy fingertips for Peter, who quickly climbed over the bump of feminine skin and found himself in his sister’s own palm again, which was lightly touched with french fry grease as well.  The stuff was thick enough that it started to soak into the seat of Peter’s pants, but he quickly resolved to not make a big deal out of it.

                “I’ll see you next period, Erica,” said Lena with a wave before allowing her eyes to fall down to Erica’s opened hand, where Peter was nestled comfortably.  A baby grin spread over her lips and she made her voice softer and more high-pitched.  “I’ll see YOU later, too, Peter.”

                “Uh-huh.  Thanks, Lena!” smiled Peter as Erica started walking off in the other direction.

                “That freshman seemed a little… off,” said Erica out of the corner of her mouth as she skillfully turned a corner in the hallway without shaking Peter around her palm.

                “Um… yeah, she kind of is,” shrugged Peter.  He had resolved not to divulge to his sister the fact that Mandy had nearly drowned him in the previous period, for fear of consequence from his mother of being pulled from the school.  “All kinds to make a world, right?”

                “Yeah, guess so,” said Erica, arriving in the math department.  “Which room?”

                “112, I think.”

                “All right, sounds good,” said Erica, heading into the second closest classroom.  No one was there yet, and Erica began hesitantly backing up before seeing a note on the door.

                “Went to go grab lunch.  Be back in five minutes,” the note had hastily scrawled on it.  Erica shrugged, looking down at her pint-sized sibling, biting her lip in thought.

                “It’s fine, just set me down on one of the desks.  It’ll only be a couple more minutes, probably.”

                “Thanks,” said Erica gratefully, heading for the closest desk and setting Peter down gently.  “I reeeeeally need to go talk to my physics teacher before class starts…”

                “No problem.  Have fun doing… whatever you do in there.”

                “Yeah.  Right,” snorted Erica, heading back toward the door again and slipping out.

                Peter began marveling at the classroom, becoming lost in his thoughts again.  Colorful posters with math equations, jokes, and helpful life tips to be encouraging to the students.  A giant novelty meter stick hanging from a wall like a trophy.  A slide rule chart hanging above the chalkboard.  It was all so new to the boy, and all he could do was stare, letting all his other senses all but take a break.

                No sooner had he slipped fully into his near-dream state, though, and Peter felt a piece of cloth dropping down over him, bathing him in darkness, before feeling firm, constricting fingers wrapping themselves around the cloth and his body as well, roughly pulling him off his desk and into the air in the precarious pocket of blackness.

                Peter opened his mouth, but no sound came out.

                Peter felt like he was on a Viking ship carnival ride, rocking back and forth in wide arcs that whipped the wind past the outside of the cloth he was trapped in, the arm of whatever person had grabbed him and was currently gripping him tightly into the fabric swinging absentmindedly at their side.  It was an average, unassuming motion; Peter figured whoever it was wanted to stay inconspicuous as they strolled onward, but to a boy of only a few inches of height, each swing of the arm was a stomach-flipping excursion. 

                Normally Peter, being adventurous, would have enjoyed such a thing for the thrill, but not at this moment, when someone had very purposefully tossed a cloth over him to conceal him before scooping him like a doll from that desk in the math classroom.  Whatever was going on, Peter had a feeling it wasn’t going to go well for him.

                “Why?” whispered Peter to no one in particular under his breath, wrapping his arms around his legs in a crouched position to avoid being slammed too hard against the firm fingers clenching his body into the cloth.  “Why today, of all days?  The one day Mom needed to see that everything was going to go okay.  I couldn’t get through one day without something going wrong…” he whispered bitterly, growing more angry and frustrated with every passing second.  Through the cloth, which Peter had a feeling was a scarf of some kind, he could feel the fingers shifting their grip on him before, at long last, the swinging motion of the arm stopped.

                Before long, Peter could hear the bell ringing, signifying lunch was over and it was time for fourth period.  In no time, Peter heard the sounds of backpacks jostling, tennis shoes stomping, and muffled voices in rapid-fire conversations as all the students proceeded en masse to their next class.  He sighed, cursing his luck again.  Crying out for help would almost certainly register as but a whisper compared to the thunderous booming of the voices around he and his mysterious captor.

                Peter pressed his ear against the scarf fabric, hoping to be able to get a better idea of what was happening to him.  Despite the thickness of the material diluting most of the sound, he could make out a thin, metallic clicking noise.  To Peter, it sounded like a door handle or latch being undone.  A moment later, he heard the slapping of plastic against rubber before hearing a soft metallic clanking, different than the one before, ringing out.

                “What is going on?” groaned Peter, a thin layer of perspiration forming around his forehead, both from the heat generating inside the balled up scarf and the fear slowly building up inside of him.  Peter was used to feeling at least somewhat powerless in a variety of situations.  From his necessity to be carried around by everyone to the technical reality that he could very easily be killed on accident by so many things, the fact of his inability to act effectively in dire situations was apparent to Peter.  However, this was different.  Never before had the boy been deliberately and maliciously snatched up before by an unknown person, clearly with the intent of something, at best, thoroughly against the school rules.  Peter really couldn’t fathom what might happen to him, but at the same time, he felt optimistic that whatever was about to happen could be worked through if he just focused well enough.

                “Okay… just keep it together…” breathed Peter, wiping his forehead, his hands shaking anxiously.  He waited, hardly daring to inhale, for a few more seconds of silence before receiving a jarring jolt from his surroundings as he was suddenly plunged forward again.  Unable to process what was happening, so quickly did it take place, Peter found a crack of light appearing in the cloth as the long, restrictive fingers slowly released their calculated grip on his body, forcing him to slip toward the opening gap in the edge of the scarf.  Yelping, Peter grasped his arms around his shoulders in fear before plummeting head-first out of the scarf and into the blinding light.  As his eyes had adjusted to the darkness of the scarf, Peter didn’t even have time to figure out where, exactly, he was before diving directly back into darkness.  Skidding down a long, cold, metal slope, Peter crashed down at the base of a long and dark tunnel.

                Wincing from the impact, Peter tried to wriggle himself into a position where his body wasn’t angled downward, but soon found it to be impossible, so constrictive were the dimensions of the tunnel.  To Peter, it was like sitting in a dark, to-scale MRI machine.  Almost immediately, the slightest wave of claustrophobia began settling in, but the miniscule freshman forced himself again to stay calm.  “Breathe… breathe… you’re okay, you’re okay,” whispered Peter to himself, praying that he wasn’t lying to himself about this hope.

                As his eyes readjusted to the darkness, Peter could just barely make out what was around him.  The tunnel appeared to be made of brass, with dark red splotches of rust beginning to form along parts of it.  “Is… this a pipe?” whispered Peter, trying again to squirm into a more comfortable and less precarious position, but again finding it to be impossible.  Finally calming himself again, Peter tried to reason through his mysterious predicament.  His best guess was that he had been dropped into some kind of pipe, either in a wall or in a janitorial closet.  Either way, thought Peter, it was far better than what might have potentially happened, being at the total mercy of his still anonymous captor.  For all he knew, he might’ve ended up in a garbage can or an abandoned locker.  With a cold shiver, Peter uncomfortably found himself considering the unfathomable possibility of being dropped on the floor before being mashed into a scarf-wrapped pulp by the falling crash of a rubber-soled sneaker.

                “Don’t be stupid,” wheezed Peter, shaking his head to clear his thoughts.  “Just nerves.  Just nerves.  Don’t think things like that.  You can figure your way out of this one.  You always do, and…”

                Peter didn’t even have time to begin formulating a plan as he heard the clashing cacophony of rubber and plastic, before hearing a metallic creaking just outside the pipe.  Confused, Peter began squirming to try and find a better position from which to move, before the tunnel began shifting as if from some twisted funhouse game, the rippling rust patterns twisting around Peter’s vision and making him dizzy.

                “Hey!  Hey!  Is… is someone out there?” gasped Peter meekly, attempting to get ahold of the swirling pipe to no avail.  “HEY! CAN ANYONE HEAR ME?”

                There was no reply as the metallic clacking continued, followed by an eerie twisting of vinyl and cold copper.  Peter trembled, realizing fear of the unknown was taking over against his better judgment.  Swallowing hard, Peter struggled against the strange dip in the pipe, realizing he wasn’t going to fit down the hole behind him.  The only way was back up the way he had come.  Gathering his breath, Peter prepared to begin pushing himself back up the pipe, when this was made impossible by the sudden, jolting shift of force downward, instantly turning the pipe vertical and stranding Peter at the bottom.  The pipe vibrated as if being handled from the outside.  Peter even heard the soft clacking of foam, although he couldn’t be sure of what was causing it.  All the uncertainty was quickly taking a toll on the boy, and all he could do was clasp his clammy hands together in worry, waiting it out.

                It didn’t take long to get his answer.  Cold air rushed through the darkness for a split second before a shrill, lyrical sound whizzed through the pipe like an intangible bullet, and suddenly all of it became clear.

                Peter was wedged upside down into a musical instrument that was currently being played by a fourth period band class student.

                “HEY!  SOMEONE, I’M STUCK IN HERE, HELP!” screamed Peter, but soon found his already feeble yelling voice outmatched by the uncaring, musical march of a C major scale being pumped through the black metallic pipe of what Peter assumed must be a clarinet.  Outside the pipe, Peter could hear the rising sounds of other instruments: raspy blurts and squeaky pops alike from students warming up for the first class of the year.  Already, his chances of being heard seemed less and less likely.

                Peter spent the next ten minutes vocally battling with the roar of the band’s musical practice with no effect.  And eventually, the boy could tell just how badly he was losing the fight as he felt a cold, wet dribble pop against his back.  Spit was draining through the instrument steadily as the warm, misty breath of the clarinet’s player was chilled in the tight environment of the instrument’s body.  Peter flinched as he felt more drops trickle down the pipe, his legs and arms feeling cold and unclean as more and more of the unknown player’s icy saliva splashed against his skin and clothes. 

                As a tickling drip of it slid down his back and onto his head, soaking his head disgustingly in the muck, Peter was on the verge of tears, and bitterly remarked to himself.  “So… THIS is school.  THIS is what I was in such a rush to see for myself.”

                Peter didn’t have much time to linger on this before he felt his entire body being sucked partially back up the pipe upside down, the air current switching directions entirely.  Confused for a moment, Peter gasped as he realized the player was taking a very deep breath, no-doubt in preparation for a fortissimo blast.  He clenched his muscles and shut his eyes, tucking his head against his chest to protect himself just as the air came barreling down through the clarinet.  Feeling himself jostling loose, Peter watched as the light came nearer and nearer, the foam pads moving up just in time to avoid smacking into him.

                Peter was fired out of the end of the clarinet like a cannonball, a few stray droplets of cold spit from the player spraying every which way in his wake.  Too terrified to make any sound beyond a meek whimper, Peter bounced once on the carpet of the band room, his vision blurred, his head in a great deal of pain.

                He heard a few gasps from up above, and, already blushing from timidity, Peter rolled over onto his side to stand up, and blinked in surprise to find his face a few inches away from a large bare foot, the arched, pale sole scrunching against a worn-out pair of lime green flip-flops, the long, emerald-painted toes extending majestically. 

                It was a source of embarrassment to Peter to admit to anyone, but as he often found himself at ankle level with people, he had sort of by accident learned to identify most people by the sight of their feet rather than their faces.  As it happened, Peter recognized this particular foot he found himself in front of.

                “Peter!” hissed the familiar voice of Lena from above.

                Groggily, Peter scrubbed his fingers casually through his hair to try to rid himself of the excess dampness still nestled there and looked up between the valley of Lena’s long legs and up to her face far above, which was staring down at him worriedly through her silky mane of chocolate brown hair.

                “Uh… yeah, hi, Lena,” mumbled Peter, unsure of himself, completely aware that the eyes of a couple dozen seventeen-year-olds were zeroed in on him at this moment.

                “Is there a problem over there?” came the distant call of the band conductor from the podium at the front of the room.

                “No problem, Ms. Stinger.  None at all,” smiled Lena good-naturedly up at the front of the room before frowning back down at Peter.  “What are you doing here?” she whispered.  “Were you just…”

                “Yep,” nodded Peter knowingly.

                She placed a hand over her mouth, looking terrified with herself.  “Oh my God.  I… I…”

                “It’s fine, you didn’t know,” said Peter, waving a hand.  “I just… I’m kind of supposed to be in…”

                “Algebra, right?”

                “Yeah.”

                “Right,” nodded Lena, brushing her bangs out of her eyes and looking up to the front of the room again, raising her voice so she could be heard.  “Ms. Stinger?  Sorry, may I be excused for a minute?”

                “Be quick, honey,” the conductor called back.

                “Thanks!” responded Lena, lowering a cupped palm down to the carpet level in front of Peter.  “Want a lift?” she smiled.

                “Totally,” groaned Peter, already complete out-adventured for the rest of the day, as he clambered over the fingers of his older sister’s best friend, and settled in nicely as she raised him back up to the height of her stomach.  Although it wasn’t terribly frequent, Lena had held Peter on several occasions, and had learned how to keep her hand steady as well to keep him comfortable.  She stood up cautiously, placing her clarinet on the seat behind her, and slowly made for the door, careful to keep her fingers curled protectively around the boy.  Peter kept his head down, keeping his eyes trained directly on the intricate creases in the warm skin of Lena’s palm, hoping he wouldn’t have to look at any of the shocked eyes beaming onto him.  Even though he couldn’t see him, he could just feel every single head in the room turned and gawking at him.

                Shutting the door behind her as she made her way down the hall, Lena cleared her throat, and Peter breathed a sigh of relief, feeling far less self-conscious.

                “So… I guess I was kind of wondering why you were in there?” said Lena hesitantly as she made her way slowly toward the math hallway.

                “So was I,” said Peter wearily, looking up into the teenage girl’s face.

                “You mean… someone just… PUT you in there?” gasped Lena, her eyes bulging.

                “Yeah.  But, listen, you…”

                “Who?” she continued breathlessly.

                “I don’t know, Lena, I’m sorry, they just kind of grabbed me when I wasn’t looking, but…”

                “Peter, we need to go see the principal, or… or, something, I don’t know, maybe talk to your teacher, but you have to…”

                “No, Lena.  Please?”

                “Why?” frowned the towering teen girl, stopping in her tracks for a moment.

                “Because if my mom hears that I got randomly snatched off a desk and stuck down a clarinet, I’ll be out of here faster than they can get the enrollment withdrawal forms signed.  Seriously.”

                Lena sighed as she continued walking.  “I get that, Peter, but…”

                “And I really want to be here, Lena.  So freaking badly,” moaned Peter in emotional agony, a decade’s worth of dreams pent up in his words.  “I just want to be normal.”

                Lena bit her lip, sighing in frustration, but she could hear the anguish in the tiny teen’s voice, and she could almost feel her heart breaking at the sound of it.  Against her better judgment, Lena nodded.  “Okay, okay, Peter, look, we’ll take you to algebra and say you… needed an extra bathroom break or something, I don’t know.”

                Peter exhaled with relief.  “Thank you.”

                “Don’t thank me yet, buddy,” said Lena, rolling her eyes as she turned a corner in the hallway, heading toward the algebra classroom.  “Your mom would be upset if she found out about this for a reason, you know.”

                “Yeah.  I know.  I just… need to pay more attention, I guess.”

                Lena gripped the handle of the door to the classroom, pausing for a moment before leaning her face in closer to her friend’s little brother.  “Peter, I hate to have to tell you this, but… seriously.  If someone decides to do that to you again, and no one’s around, you knowing what’s going on isn’t going to make a bit of difference.  They’re going to do it again, and… you might not be as lucky to find someone you know right after it happens.”

                Peter sighed dejectedly.  Deep down, he knew she was right, and it scared him.

                Peter could feel the perspiration collecting on the back of his neck as he tried his best to sit calmly in the center of his desk and focus his attention up at the algebra teacher Ms. Tritter as she continued going over the class syllabus and rules.  Once again, he could feel pairs of huge eyes sneaking peeks at him, but this time was different.  It was embarrassing enough as Lena had to carry him into class a full fifteen minutes late and put him in his place; now, because he had drawn attention to himself, everyone seemed even more fascinated with him.

                He didn’t blame them.  He knew it must be odd and probably a little unsettling for some of them to see him.  And yet somehow, this didn’t help the fact that each time Peter felt a curious gaze flashing over him like some sideshow freak from the circus, it felt like having needles jammed into his sides.

                The end of class couldn’t come soon enough for the boy.  As the bell rang and students began filing past his desk, slowing down out of instinct to stare down at their genetic anomaly of a classmate, Peter did his best to stare straight ahead.  He caught eyes with Ms. Tritter for a moment.  She grimaced at him and held up a finger, indicating she wanted him to wait before leaving class.

                “Good thing.  Was just about to walk right off the desk and freaking fly to English class,” whispered Peter under his breath, his sarcasm not so much directed at his teacher at just his continuing general bitterness of the day’s unfortunate events.

                As soon as the final student had shuffled out of the room, book bags rustling and giggles peppering the mumbled conversation, Peter watched his math teacher set her lesson planner down her table at the front of the room and begin slowly sauntering down the aisle toward him.

                Ms. Tritter smiled, her thin, peach-tinted lips pursing politely, as she raised a slender hand, her long, smooth fingers pinching around the rim of her black-rimmed retro-style glasses to adjust them, her luminescent brown eyes focused entirely on Peter.  Having fixed the position of her glasses on her nose, her hand found its way to her wild blonde curls, streaked occasionally with darker locks baked by sunlight exposure, and ruffled them, her fingers scrunching at the top of her hair.  Peter watched as Ms. Tritter, satisfied, slid both of her well-lotioned hands down her thin form-fitting black sweater and pushing out the wrinkles.  Finally, she came to a stop, her youthful face towering above him, her tall, knee-high black leather boots grumbling out low rubbery squeaks as her feet stop moving.

                Peter gulped.  It was something of an imposing sight to be the only one in the room, watching this woman’s eyes trained on him as her tremendous size filled in everything he could take in with one glance.  However, his apprehension began to fade slightly as Ms. Tritter slid lithely into the chair in front of Peter’s desk, leaning her arms backward on the chair so she could face the tiny student.

                “So… you’re Peter, right?  Peter… Clark?”

                “Y-Yeah.”

                “Yes!” chuckled the enthused Ms. Tritter, pumping her fist with delight.  “Sorry, I normally take about a month to learn any of the names of new students.  Maybe it’s my lucky day.”

                Peter’s heart began to feel soothed.  He felt much more like he was talking to another student, not a teacher.

                “Well, I’m Ms. Tritter.  It’s nice to meet you, Peter,” smiled the woman, suddenly extending her hand closer to the boy.  For a moment, Peter’s heart skipped a beat as the gigantic woman’s shapely hand uncurled itself, her palm lowering overhead almost ominously, the shadows of her fingers flashing across his widened eyes.  However, she instead rolled her fingers into a fist except for her pinky, which she extended outward toward Peter for a hand-fingertip shake.

                Peter blushed, feeling stupid for having thought for an instant Ms. Tritter would’ve been so rude as to just pick him up without asking.  He politely grasped her fleshy fingertip in both hands, shaking it vigorously.  This was certainly a welcome change of pace.  Peter never got to greet new people with a handshake for the rather obvious reasons, and he could always sense a certain discomfort from people at this, wondering what they were supposed to do.  Of course, Peter didn’t blame them, but it was nice to finally meet someone who wasn’t terrified of hurting his feelings by turning the somewhat problematic situation into a tasteful little in-joke.

                Letting go of Ms. Tritter’s fingertip, Peter took a step back as his teacher refolded her arms on the chair’s back.  She sighed, smiling at him, and then cleared her throat.

                “Now, Peter… the reason I wanted you to stay after was…”

                “I know, I know, it was because I was late, and… I’m so sorry!” blurted Peter apologetically, wanting to nip the question in the bud as soon as possible.  He knew very well where this conversation was about to go, and he didn’t want to have to get into that at all with this woman.

                “No, no, no, Peter, it’s fine, it’s all right…” soothed Ms. Tritter in a hushed tone, almost cooing with her words.  “You’re a freshman; you just have to learn the ropes.  Believe me, everyone’s late to a class sometime.  There were a few students late to this very class; in fact, they just arrived a little bit before you, that’s all.”

                “Oh… well… okay, then,” said Peter hesitantly.  “In that case, thanks, Ms. Tritter, and… I think my sister must be running late, she’s supposed to come pick me up any minute to take me to my next class, and…”

                “I know, Peter, but don’t worry, I’ll write a note for your next teacher if I have to, I want to talk to you about something else,” interrupted Ms. Tritter calmly, raising a hand and resting her chin on her upturned palm, clasping her long fingers gently around her pale cheek.

                “Oh?” gulped Peter nervously.

                “You know what I’m going to ask you.  It’s not even the fact that you were fifteen minutes late, it’s just that… well, there’s no really nice way to say it, but with your… situation, your teachers have been given pretty strict instructions to know where you are at all times during their classes.  And so, since you’re my responsibility from the time that bell rings after lunch until right now, every day, I would be remiss if I didn’t find out why you were so late?”

                “Right…” muttered Peter under his breath, staring intently at his shoes to avoid eye contact.  However, as he watched the shadow of Ms. Tritter’s face grow slowly around him as she leaned in to hear him, he knew this tactic wasn’t going to work well.  Peter never had been particularly talented at lying effectively.

                “Well?” came the gentle, hushed voice, a little louder this time, the woman’s toasty breath, smelling faintly of fresh pear, wafting down over Peter and making goose bumps stand up on his skin.  He blinked a few times, trying to get his bearings and swallowed in his dried out throat, desperately trying to piece together an alibi.

                “Well, see, I was here, but after my sister left, I kind of got thirsty… I didn’t really have anything to drink at lunch, and…” continued Peter, grasping nervously at the hem of his shirt to cool himself down.  “And so Lena offered to take me to get a drink.”

                Ms. Tritter raised an eyebrow, obviously not totally satisfied.  Her hand shifted, grasping the rim of her glasses again and nudging them further down her nose so she could more effectively glance at Peter in full, the top of his head not even reaching the neckline of her sweater in height as he stood on the desk.  “And… you were gone for fifteen minutes?”

                “Yeah… well, I also had to use the restroom, and… that was sort of annoying to deal with, you know?” offered Peter realistically, feeling his cheeks involuntarily blushing again.  “Like, I was kind of embarrassed, actually, but… you know, duty calls, or…” he continued, then fought the urge to slap himself at the horrible pun he had just accidentally made.  He gulped again.  “…or whatever.  So that was that, and she brought me back.”

                “All right, then,” sighed Ms. Tritter.  She looked marginally more neutral on the whole thing now, but Peter could tell she could see right through him.  “Your next class starts in about a minute, and I don’t see your sister.”

                “Yeah, yeah… she’s… she’s supposed to come get me,” repeated Peter, stumbling over his words, still quite flustered.

                “Listen, Peter, don’t feel bad if this makes you uncomfortable, but… I want you to have a good start to your first day of high school, so…” whispered Ms. Tritter, slowly sliding her way out of the chair and standing back up to full height over the desk.  Gingerly, her massive hand found its way down to the desk, her long, silky-smooth fingers pressing together as they lay flat down on the desktop like a mattress of skin.  “…could I offer you a lift?”

                Peter swallowed hard, eyeing Ms. Tritter’s considerable appendage nervously.  It wasn’t that he didn’t trust Ms. Tritter’s potential skill at carrying him, or even the fact that she had the largest hands he had probably ever seen on a woman, but rather the fact that she could easily continue questioning him on the walk over, taking advantage of his unsettled state to find an inconsistency in his story.

                However, Peter admitted to himself, the day had already had enough hiccups in it without adding even more awkward walks of shame late into the next class.  Resolving to just move onward, Peter looked up at Ms. Tritter, smiled, and nodded.

                She returned the favor, brushing a few wild locks of hair away from her ears as she gazed down at him with an almost impossibly wide grin.  Gently, she tapped her fingers against the desk as if beckoning him into her palm, her well-kept nails clacking softly against the hard desktop.  Without a second thought, Peter clambered over his teacher’s fingers and took a seat in her palm.  He couldn’t help but glance around the miniature, flowing sea of skin around him and its patchwork of prints and smooth creases.  Obviously, he was quite accustomed to these sights from the amount of time he spent sitting in the hands of his mother and sisters, but he was still struck by the magnificent size of Ms. Tritter’s hand.

                Peter was even more surprised as he was raised up off the desk without the slightest jarring motion, with as much precision and skill as his family had learned to have when carrying him.  He turned and grinned again at the gorgeous face of his perceptive math teacher, who simply winked at him, before starting for the door, with her new student perched on her doughy palm, her firm fingers cupping protectively around him.

                Despite her mistrust in his flimsy lie of a story, Peter knew he had lucked out getting Ms. Tritter as a teacher.

Ms. Tritter had only made it halfway down the hallway before an out-of-breath Erica had come sprinting down from the other direction, her backpack hanging on to her shoulder by only one strap.  Getting ahold of herself, she brushed two fingers past her bangs to put them smoothly back into place.  Her eyes widened momentarily to see her brother perched in someone else’s hand, but she quickly recognized Ms. Tritter as a faculty member and relaxed.  After a brief introduction and half-hearted apology from his sister, Peter watched Erica dash off in the other direction to reach her next class in time, allowing him and his towering goddess of a math teacher to make their way toward his English class.

                Somehow, Peter felt less embarrassment entering this class late than he had the previous one, mostly because it was only by a few minutes, but also because Ms. Tritter was an absolute natural at soothing out the situation.  Once again, Peter could feel the eyes of every teenager in the classroom falling curiously upon him, and Ms. Tritter seemed sensitive to this, curling her fingers a little more tightly around her cupped palm to block out the stomach-churning sight from her tiny passenger’s vision as Peter hunkered lower into the skin of her hand, nervousness once again overcoming him.

                Quickly apologizing for the interruption, Ms. Tritter gave the briefest of explanations to Mr. Garrison the English teacher before gently lowering her hand down onto an empty desk, allowing Peter to step out carefully onto the flat surface.

                Peter was almost disappointed.  Somehow, as he’d been carried to class in the soft, warm hand of this woman who just an hour ago had been a stranger, he felt just as safe and content as when he was being lovingly held by his mother.  Thanking Ms. Tritter for the ride, Peter sheepishly began unloading his backpack, keeping his eyes locked once again with his shoes until the onslaught of wandering eyes began to subside into subtlety.

                “All right… all right… settle down…” droned the middle-aged English teacher, scratching a persistent itch on a receding gray hairline and rubbing pensively at a rubbery forehead.  Peter could detect the years of experience in his voice, but just as well a sense of boredom with life.  Clearly, Mr. Garrison was none too thrilled to be in this job at this point in his life.

                “I’ve already taken roll call… so… I’m guessing you would be…” drawled Mr. Garrison, continuing on and locking eyes with Peter.  Instantly, every teenager shifted in their seats to stare in wide-eyed wonder back at the little marvel struggling to regain his composure, his tiny cheeks flushing red with realization of how centered he had become in the room.

                “P-P-Peter…” squeaked the lad, embarrassed at how quiet the word came out of his cold lips.  Somewhere off in the far corner of the room, Peter heard a boy’s snicker.  From the other corner, he heard a girl coo in adoration and pity.

                “Sorry… didn’t catch that… I’m a little hard of hearing in my right ear, you see.  One more time?” responded Mr. Garrison, coughing lightly into his fist and prodding demonstratively at his dangling earlobe.

                “P-Peter… Peter…” tried the boy again, his name coming out just as quietly.  More snickering ensued.

                “That’s enough!” barked Mr. Garrison in the direction the muffled laughter had come from.  “Sorry, son, little louder for me?”

                Peter felt like his stomach was triple-knotting itself around his lungs.  He felt his breaths becoming shorter, his vocal chords becoming less willing to function.  He had never felt this much stage fright in all his life. 

                All at once, the things he had been thinking about for the past hour were hitting him.  Being plucked from his math class by his unknown assailant and trapped in Lena’s clarinet, being late for class, dealing with the knowledge of his utter helplessness at the hands of anyone who meant him harm.  It was becoming too much. 

                Intangibly, it was like there were two giant thumbs pressing down on his shoulders, causing his knees to wriggle uncomfortably against his will.  A moment later, it almost looked like the colors of the room were clouding together.  Spinning.  He was becoming dizzier.  Peter blinked a few times, wondering haphazardly if he was going to faint.

                “Peter,” came the calm, sultry response from behind Peter that instantly electrified his bones and snapped him back to reality.  “His name is Peter.”

                “Thank you… um… sorry, I’m still learning names, obviously… you are?”

                “Sharon,” answered the confident voice of the girl.  Peter felt goose bumps rippling along his skin as he slowly turned to look over his shoulder.  Instantly, he found himself face-to-face with the towering upper torso of the same girl he had encountered this morning in American History class.  She raised an eyebrow at him as she tilted her slender chin down toward his level, her silvery-blonde hair catching the light just right as it slid past her smooth cheeks, giving her an almost mythical appearance that make the back of Peter’s throat go dry.

                “Hey, short stuff,” she whispered easily to him, plush lips curling into a self-assured grin, her crystal-clear blue-gray irises practically cutting the boy down at his knees with a single drilling glance, before returning her gaze up to Mr. Garrison, nodding slowly.

                “Sharon.  Right.  Thank you.  And… now I have… Peter CLARK, here you are on the roll… all right, now… let’s start getting into this syllabus I’ve passed out…” continued the teacher.

                As Peter nodded to Sharon in thanks and turned his head back up to focus on what Mr. Garrison was saying, he found his attention completely diverted away from the task at hand.  Even as he stared ahead, hanging on the every droll word of his English teacher, he could feel it. 

                Sharon’s eyes on him.  Wonderingly.  Studiously.  Hungrily. 

                Even without turning around, he could feel her staring subtly at him, her palms clasped together in thought, her lower lip curling partially into her mouth in thought.

                Peter didn’t know what to think.  He felt terrified and amazed at the same time by this titanic siren of a young woman.  She almost didn’t seem human, her beauty making it impossible to pull one’s gaze away from her, yet her calculating and psychotically calm expression making it a painful experience.  A powerful double-edged sword in the form of an unassuming blonde fifteen-year-old girl in her first day of high school.  It made Peter’s stomach churn in more ways than one to think of her.

                Peter wasn’t sure how long he had zoned out in these thoughts, but he was instantly shaken out of it to feel a soft, slender fingertip tapping lightly on his shoulder.  He practically toppled over from the shock of it, cringing from surprise and leaping to the side as he turned to watch Sharon slowly retracting her hand back to her desk, looking somewhat unnerved at the tiny boy’s reaction to her simple touch.

                “No need to spazz, short stuff, just wanted to get your attention.”

                “Huh?  Wait… oh… oh, sorry, um…”

                “I just thought we should get going on the assignment thing.”

                “What assignment… thing?”

                Sharon rolled her eyes, smirking at Peter as she crossed her arms, glancing down at a piece of paper on her desk.  “We’re supposed to fill out this icebreaker worksheet thing in the pairs of desks in front and back.  Ringing a bell?  You’re gonna have to learn to pay attention more or you’re gonna get eaten alive at this school,” she cooed, opening her jaws dramatically, wriggling her slimy, glistening pink tongue around between her dark cheeks, before clacking her teeth loudly together a few times, simulating chewing.  “Not for real, obviously,” she winked.

                Peter gulped hard.  Just a joke, he told himself.  Get it together.  You need friends.  You need them.

                “Right… right, sorry.  Sorry… Sharon,” he repeated a few times, getting his bearings, realizing he must have stopped paying attention for at least fifteen minutes of class if not more.  “Um… what does it say?”

                “Well… it wants our names… but I guess you’ve got that part down,” she said nonchalantly, her warm voice reverberating powerfully through Peter’s eardrums in a way he couldn’t quite describe.  “Okay, I guess it wants… hobbies?  I don’t even know why they make us do this kind of thing.”

                “Yeah… yeah, me neither,” Peter agreed, trying to sound as friendly as possible, although in reality, having been homeschooled all his life, Peter had yet to encounter an icebreaker activity such as this.

                “Listen, not to be rude or anything, but he wants both of us to turn in a paper, so… is there like some dinky little computer you need to use, or what?  Because I’m not sure you could handle this puppy right here,” Sharon simpered, brandishing a fresh-from-the-box sharpened pencil between her smooth fingertips, skillfully spinning it around the fleshy crevices between each one.  The thing was taller than Peter’s entire body.

                Finally, grasping it between her thumb and pointer finger, Sharon drew the pencil closer to Peter in a swift stabbing motion, who ducked back just as the razor-sharp graphite tip prodded into his general direction.  “You know, unless you want to… try it?” she asked in a pleasant voice, holding the dangerously pointed writing utensil nearer and nearer to Peter’s body.

                Peter gulped and shook his head “no” politely, placing a hand on the bumpy yellow siding and pushed it out of the way.  True, it was just a pencil, but the way Sharon was holding it in her powerful fingers, pointing it downward at Peter’s body like that, it might as well have been a recently welded battle spear.

                Even beyond this, there was something in the way Sharon had presented the pencil so calmly, a faint glint in her eye, that made Peter uneasy.

                “No, no… I think I’ll be fine… I just write it up on my own paper, and…”

                “Yada, yada, I get it,” interrupted Sharon, bringing the pencil back to her own normal sized page and beginning to scribble her name down.  “Still… it’d be awful cute.  Probably kinda entertaining for me, too.”

                “Yeah… haha, yeah, probably would be,” answered Peter, realizing how false his voice sounded, but was unable to help it.  He plastered a fake smile on his face and folded his arms behind his back, trying to focus on stopping his knees from involuntarily shaking again.

                “And she poked you with the pencil?” Erica asked calmly as she carried her brother down the hallway toward the final class of the day.

                “Well, I mean, she didn’t actually… poke me…”

                “What’s the problem, then?”

                “No problem, I was just saying.”

                Erica stopped dead in her tracks and brought her hand up closer to her face as her tiny brother leaned back against her soft fingers, confused as to why she had halted.

                “Bro, look, no offense, but you’re sort of putting me in an awkward spot here.”

                “Why?” Peter asked innocently.

                “Look, I mean, it’s no big deal or anything, but… it’s mom.”

                “She doesn’t have to know that stuff, right?”

                “Well…”

                Peter was beginning to feel worried.  Bracing himself against his sister’s palm, he carefully stood up on the fleshy surface, hanging onto his sister’s gargantuan thumb for support as he tried to hold himself up higher.  “Well, what?”

                “Look, don’t get mad at me about this or anything, it wasn’t my idea, but… mom kinda said I need to report everything to her.”

                “Everything?”

                “Everything.  She was pretty freaked out about all this.  You know that.  She’s not gonna be okay with it until she knows everything went perfectly for you today.”

                Peter sighed.  Somehow, he wasn’t surprised.  “She’ll never be okay with it.”

                Erica paused for a moment, swallowing uncomfortably.  “Yeah, I know.”

                “But you can just tell her it was fine, right?”

                Erica rolled her eyes.  “I’ll do what I can, but seriously, you’ve gotta be careful.  You know she’s gonna grill you about it too, and she’ll just be waiting for something to not add up.  You know she doesn’t want you here.  She wants you back at home.”

                Peter hung his head, flopping with defeat back into a sitting position.  “She doesn’t want me to ever grow up.”

                Erica continued walking again, gripping the strap of her backpack in one hand for support, and peered down at her brother sulking pathetically in her hand.  “Look, Peter, it’s not fun for anyone, but the fact is… you’re not going to.”

                Peter felt hollow.  He knew she was right, and that was what burned the most.

                “This your class?” Erica asked quietly.  “In the East Gym?”

                “Yeah.”

                “Cool.”  Without another word between them, Erica strode into the gym, which was already bustling with kids unpacking their athletic uniforms for class, many of whom had already headed off for the locker rooms to change.  Stopping at the partially folded wooden bleachers lining the long brick wall of the cavernous place, Erica stooped down and allowed her brother to solemnly disembark onto the seat before heading off for her own class.

                Peter sat down, rooting through his backpack for his wadded up gym outfit at the bottom, and gazed across the impossibly wide expanse of the gym.  The classrooms had been large enough. 

                This was almost too much. 

                Peter felt practically swallowed up by the sheer size of the place, the open air feeling cold and uninviting on his skin.  The rough wood of the bleacher seat was chipped and smelled a little like rubbing alcohol.  Wrinkling his upper lip, Peter unwrapped his custom-made gym uniform from the bag and pushed the folds out of it, letting it hang in front of him, before feeling the unmistakable twinge of impending defeat.

                Where was he supposed to change into it?
                “Great…” Peter huffed under his breath, frowning.  All he needed was another impossibly awkward situation to top off this peachy day.  Blinking a few times with frustration, Peter could feel vibrations of heavy footfalls rumbling through the ground and up to him.  He looked up again to find himself staring into a monumental pillar of toned flesh, a quadricep like a tree trunk tightened warmly on the smooth plain of skin.  Momentarily flustered, Peter’s eyes quickly darted the rest of the way up the towering figure before him, his vision whizzing past the rumpled hem of an athletic shirt, the mountainous hills of two fully matured breasts, and finally to the face of a woman who looked to be in her late forties staring down at him.

                “Um… Ms. Watson?” Peter piped nervously, gulping a little.  He knew he certainly had no reason to be nervous around a teacher, but there was something about his new gym teacher that was imposing.  Unnerving.  The way she held herself, with one hand poised on her athletically curvy hip, her fingers scrunching into the carelessly wrinkled Physical Education shirt.  One of her thick brunette eyebrows raised almost accusingly on her somewhat rubbery face, like she wasn’t starting down at one of her students, but rather a centipede skittering across the floor.

                “You’re Clark, right?  The kid the school board made all the hubbub about?” she asked with slight annoyance, her feminine voice pervaded by a gravelly gruffness.

                “Yeah.  Yeah, that’s… that’s me,” Peter said with an earnest smile.  With some irony, considering this was a gym teacher, Peter noted to himself that it sounded like the woman smoked pretty regularly.

                Ms. Watson nodded, frowning a little and clearing her throat.  “Right.  So, according to the school board, I’m supposed to be able to supervise you while you’re in this class, so I can’t let you go into the boy’s locker room on your own, even if you can get a friend to take you in there.”

                “That’s fine.  I knew that,” Peter offered, continuing to stare directly up at his teacher, who made no attempt to stoop at all to lessen the huge expanse of air between each of their faces.

                “My office is in the back of the girl’s locker room.  The best I can offer you is just letting you in there so you can change, and bringing you back out here afterward.”

                “Okay,” Peter responded, swallowing.  Somehow, this made him a bit nervous, but he wasn’t about to go breaking any rules on his first day when he’d already drawn more attention than he’d hoped.  Besides, all things considered, this wasn’t so bad an arrangement.

                “Good.  So, you just hop in, I guess,” Ms. Watson said, her voice coming out sounding more like an order than an offer.  She kneeled slightly, lowering her hand toward the wooden bench a few inches away from Peter’s feet.  The boy couldn’t help but be amazed as he watched the bare, meaty thighs in short gym shorts carrying the comparative immense figure before him into a crouching position, the massive muscle contained within the tan skin seeming to inflate slightly as Ms. Watson clenched in order to hold herself steady.

                Peter eyed the leathery palm of the huge hand laid in front of him before cautiously stepping into it.  Ms. Watson’s fingers were long and thick, looking powerful enough to allow her to palm a basketball.  As the diminutive freshman took a careful seat in the center of his teacher’s palm, he could feel a slight unevenness below his rear end in the form of swollen callouses on the heel of the hand.  He shifted uncomfortably as the woman’s hand rose back up to chest level.

                “Don’t mind that, my hands just get a little rough from the weights in the West Gym,” Ms. Watson said indifferently, evidently feeling the boy’s slight squirming against her skin.  Silently, the pair proceeded across the gym.  Peter got a few more stares from kids who had already changed into their uniforms, but for the most part they were too preoccupied with chatting or roughhousing along the padded walls to care about him.

                It was refreshing, for once.

                Peter tried to keep his eyes averted as Ms. Watson pushed through the swinging wooden door into the girl’s locker room and began walking through the immense caverns of navy blue metal lockers, although he caught glimpses of girls in sports bras and panties dashing past on the tile floor.  All of them slowed down when they saw the stern look on the gym teacher’s face, before coming to a complete stop and gasping in shock at the sight of Peter cupped in the teacher’s rough palm.

                Peter looked back up, feeling his cheeks fully flushed from the embarrassment of being so near to the partially nude girls.  He wondered if they cared that a guy was being allowed into the locker room.  It was almost like a breach of their privacy.

                Would any of them complain?  Would there be problems with the school board?  Would they have to come to some other, even more uncomfortable arrangement?

                “Keep it together.  It’s all cool,” Peter whispered under his breath as Ms. Watson’s hand came to a smooth stop at the surface of the desk in her cramped office.  More stress was the last thing he needed at this point in the day.  Sighing, he climbed off the tips of the woman’s firm fingers and looked around the desk, clutching his backpack against his chest.

                There was a laptop pushed up against the very edge of the desk that to Peter looked more like a big screen TV, as well as a plastic cup containing broken pencils that read “ Best Mom Ever” in dull red letters partially worn away by repeated trips to a dishwasher.  A very small picture frame not much taller than Peter himself was propped up in the corner of the desk, showing Ms. Watson hugging a muscle-bound man in a t-shirt Peter assumed to be her husband, with a young girl in pigtails who looked to be in elementary school standing in front of her parents and frowning.  A short stack of attendance sheets spilling from a manila folder was the only other item on the surface.

                “Look, Clark, we’ve gotta get class started,” Ms. Watson said suddenly, breaking the silence with the blunt weight of her voice and making Peter jump with surprise.  “You wanna get going, or what?”

                “Yeah, sure.  Could you just…” Peter nodded, looking suggestively at the door for Ms. Watson to leave him in momentary privacy.

                “Could I what?”

                “You know… give me a minute?”

                Ms. Watson raised an eyebrow again.  An amused grin cracked across her lower lip.  “No.”

                Peter felt like a lump was making its way up and down his dry throat.  What?

                “I… um, I mean…”

                “School board’s order.  I’ll show you the email if you want.”

                “I… no, no, I don’t need to see it, but…” Peter stammered, feeling the familiar shaking threatening to return to his knees.  “…why?”

                Ms. Watson shrugged uncaringly, tilting her head and pressing her tongue against the inside of her cheek in boredom.  “Liability, I guess?  Something like that.”

                “I… guess that makes sense,” Peter shrugged uncomfortably.

                “Now c’mon, we don’t have all day and the others are waiting.  Take off the shirt and drop the pants.”

                Peter did as he was told, closing his eyes a little as he quickly jerked the clothing off, although still keenly aware that the powerful woman was standing over him like a stone titan.  Watching.  Waiting.  Probably subconsciously studying.  Probably raising an eyebrow in disapproval.

                He was cold.  Icy, almost.  He could feel the goose bumps rippling along his skin.  He wondered if Ms. Watson could see it.

                Arbitrarily, Peter mentally thanked whoever it was in history that had decided underwear didn’t have to be included in the gym outfit.

                Gratified to be done, Peter ended the ten seconds of embarrassment by tugging his gray gym shirt over his head, knowing sooner rather than later he’d need to swallow his pride.  He was in this for the long haul.  He’d promised himself.  This was just all part of the package.  He was in no place to complain.

                “Good work.  See, and it didn’t even sting,” Ms. Watson offered in her best attempt at a joke, although she still sounded irritated with the burden that had obviously been thrust unwillingly upon her by the school board.  “Now, I do have other students to teach too.  Leave your stuff there next to the computer, no one will be able to get in here.  Hop on.”

                Peter didn’t say another word as he awkwardly clambered into the once again awaiting hand of his gym teacher, grateful at least for the warmth he could feel in her toughened skin.

                It was the homestretch of the new chapter of what Peter was beginning to realize was a journey much more complicated than he’d ever considered.

                Peter stood uncomfortably, his arms crossed behind him, back on the shaggy wooden plank that made up the front bleacher seat, as he tried to focus on the instructions given by Ms. Watson about the first day’s work while ignoring the multitude of eyes from his gigantic classmates falling upon him with interest.

                “..and that will finish up the preliminary fitness test once we begin th- EYES UP HERE! -is set as a class.  Anyway, I hope you were all paying better attention to that than it looked like you were.  Eyes front, guys, you’re not in middle school anymore.  That crap doesn’t fly here,” the gym teacher barked monotonously, obviously having gone over these steps countless times before with new classes.  A few students that had been gazing in wonderment at the five-inch-tall anomaly of a classmate were snapped back to reality by Ms. Watson’s outburst, but Peter could feel their eyes shifting back to him soon after.

                He swallowed.  Ignore them.  Ignore them.  Once they see there’s nothing here to stare at, they’ll stop staring.

                “All right, there’s a lot of you, so in order to keep some kind of order around here, I need you all to get into groups of at least two and a max of five.  Count ‘em, five.  Not six because you have to squeeze your best buddy in.  FIVE.  Let’s get a move on,” Ms. Watson drawled loudly onward.

                Peter gulped.  How was this possibly going to work.  Sure, people were curious about him, but it seemed for most of the class at least to be in the way you’d be curious about a poisonous snake.  Awestruck, perhaps even wondering if it’s really right there or if your eyes are lying, but you’re afraid if you get to close the simple exterior will betray its true nature of malevolence.  As he stared around, he could tell that the eyes that had fallen upon him previously in a studious manner were all diligently avoiding him, clearly not wanting to deal with that burden in these tests.  His heart began to sink.

                Peter’s dread, however, suddenly turned to a warm wave of relief as he looked into the clump of students before him hastily finding their friends and jumping into groups, and saw the face of Lisa from his biology class that morning, her fiery red hair tied back into a silky ponytail.

                Almost immediately, she caught his eyes as well, smiled nervously, seemingly wanting to start walking toward him, but hesitant, as if she might be rejected.  Peter smiled back and waved his hands wildly in greeting, a sign which seemed to relax her as she gingerly made her way through the bustling crowd of students toward Peter.

                The short, skinny teen stopped just short of the bleacher and crouched down on her haunches, very nearly at eye level with Peter but still having about half a foot of height on him, brushing a few bright ginger locks off her pale forehead.  Her pretty emerald eyes sparkled in that same way they had in the morning, and for a moment, Peter felt the odd sense of joy you get when seeing a long-lost friend after years have gone by.  He grinned back at her.

                “Hi, Peter,” Lisa whispered simply and softly, leaning in closer, but doing so carefully, as if afraid a sudden move would spook her little classmate.

                “Good to see you again.  I’m glad I recognized a face,” Peter responded calmly, feeling at peace once again with the soft-spoken, trustworthy redhead nearby.

                “Same.  I… I haven’t really met anyone else today… or, I mean, haven’t met anyone I think I’d want to be partners with.”

                “Neither have I,” Peter shrugged.

                “You okay with being partners, then?” Lisa whispered hopefully.  Even with the raucous chatter echoing through the stone and rubber canyon of the gym, Lisa’s gentle voice managed to cut through it, significant but not forceful.  To Peter’s small ears, it was like hearing a song.

                “Of course,” the boy smiled.  “Maybe I’ll get through this day in one piece, hmm?”

                “Well, well, well…” called out a familiar voice from a few feet away, a note of harsh imperiousness inherent despite the snarky feminine tone.  “Look who it is again.”

                Peter frowned slightly to himself and turned to watch the triad of young women he had met in his very first class, reunited once again, marching toward him practically as a unit.  The dimpled, freckled Kimmy on the right, picking idly at one of her braces on her front teeth.  The tall and bronzed Amy running long, slender fingers vigorously through her luscious chocolate hair on the left.  The center was occupied by the owner of the voice: Sharon, her riveting blue eyes already locked obsessively on Peter, her tantalizing silvery blonde streaks bouncing against her narrow shoulders.  A siren who had been mistaken for a fifteen-year-old freshman and placed into a gym outfit that was woefully underprepared to contain the personality inside.

                Peter swallowed hard again in his throat, although once again he wasn’t sure why exactly it was as he stared up at the trio of gleeful, glistening smiles.

                “Hiiiiiii, Peter!” Kimmy peeped excitedly, waving her hand over and over as fast as she could.

                “Relax, Kimmy, we don’t want to freak him out again.  Do we, shortstuff?” Sharon hissed quickly to Kimmy and winking cutely at Peter.

                “Look, it wasn’t my fault!” Amy gasped defensively.  “I didn’t know he didn’t like to be picked up.  And… and I was gentle!  Wasn’t I, little guy?”

                “Uh… yeah, yeah, you were,” Peter interjected quickly, although his voice obviously didn’t register terribly clearly among the girls, who now were standing directly over Peter and the crouching Lisa, who remained motionless as well next to her tiny friend.

                “Don’t try to get out of it, Amy!  Can’t you just apologize for once in your life?” Kimmy groaned with annoyance.  “He didn’t like it!  And he’s nice!  I want him to be our friend!”

                “Yeah, yeah, okay, okay, we went over all that stuff this morning, I’m done with it,” Amy responded, waving a disinterested hand at her considerably shorter and less physically developed friend, sliding her fingers back around her athletically curvy hips with attitude.

                “So, shortstuff.  Who’s your friend here?” Sharon asked, her voice steady, although Peter thought he could sense the slightest twinge of venom in her deceptively lyrical words as she glanced judgmentally at Lisa, who quickly leapt to her feet again.

                “This is Lisa.  Lisa Carol.  We’re in the same bio class.  Lisa, this is Sharon, Amy, and Kimmy, and…” Peter coughed quietly.

                “Hi,” Lisa said, smiling hesitantly and waving gently.

                “Okay, cool, awesome,” Sharon butted back in, for once not even staring at Peter as her eyes worked up and down the body of Lisa, as if she were a computer scanning for weaknesses.  “So we’re a couple short, and you two look like you need someone to adopt you.”

                “Yeah… yeah, that’d be… fine,” Peter said slowly, feeling a curious wave of doubt once again, but he put it aside.  He knew not every friendship here he formed was going to go smoothly at first, so he needed to just learn to live with this.  With any luck, he’d have some friends by the time this year was over.

                “Sweetness!” Sharon piped with a huge smile and enough artificial sugar in her voice to give everyone in earshot diabetes.

                “All right, everyone, you know what we talked about earlier… or, at least, I HOPE you do!” Ms. Watson called loudly out to everyone from the center of the gym, all of whom by now had bunched into their individual groups.  “Take the sheet and pencils I passed out, fill in the numbers for everyone in your group.  I’ll help keep time, but I need you all to stay on task, we have to get this done before we play a single round of kickball next week.  Ready?”

                “Who wants to go first?” Sharon smarmed.

                “Oh, I totally got this,” Amy chuckled piously, catching Peter’s glance again and grinning proudly down at him.  “You cool with that, little dude?”

                “Yeah, that’s fine with me,” Peter shrugged, trying to smile good-naturedly.

                “All right, let’s start the pull-up round!” Ms. Watson barked.  “Approach one of the bars positioned around the room, you may have to take turns, but there’s enough for every group to have at least one, and let’s get going.  Someone take notes and keep track of the numbers, I don’t want to have to do this all again with you!”

                “I’ll count them for you, Amy!” Kimmy chimed eagerly.

                “What?  Noooo, I want our new friend to do it,” Amy grinned happily while turning away from the dejected expression of the short, strawberry blonde freshman.  She stepped forward, twiddling a freshly sharpened pencil between her thumb and forefinger, then leaned over and offered it in Peter’s direction.

                Flinching a little, Peter was reminded of his odd encounter with Sharon in English, and stared at the large, tan fist before him gripping the massive lead utensil.

                “Don’t be a jerk to him, Amy, you need to make it him-sized,” Sharon offered, helpfully crossing her arms and fighting back a satisfied smile.

                “I was gonna, I just didn’t want to take it away from him if he thought he could handle the whole thing…” Amy snapped back, sliding her fingers around the pencil, ready to snap it.  “Watch this, little guy,” she winked.

                Peter couldn’t help but stare in awe as the girl’s strong, firm fingers fastened around the thin, woody structure of the pencil and began bending slowly.  He could hear the softest sound of tearing material, straining against the weight of her soft flesh and muscle beneath snapping the spear-like object like the twig that it was.  Her tanned knuckles slowly were drained of some color as more splinters from within the pencil were shattered until the whole thing seemed to explode with tiny, soft shards of the bright yellow painted coating and dry wood chips.

                Hesitantly, Peter looked up at the magnificent smirk of Amy before she set the pencil halves down, and turned to walk toward the metal pull-up bar screwed to the wall a few feet from the edge of the bleachers, her fingers running quickly back through her hair and tie it up into a messy ponytail with a scrunchie she had wrapped around her thin wrist.

                “Ready… GO!” Ms. Watson called out.

                Without wasting another second, Amy leapt up toward the bar, wrapped her palms around it, and began heaving herself up.  Once.  Twice.  Again and again, with perfect form, her chin passing just over the top of the bar before she allowed herself to lower back down again, her legs remaining perpendicular with the ground, just as the gym instructor had showed them earlier on.  Finally, with a tiny, strained grunt, she let go, landing lithely back on the ground, huffing and puffing quietly a few times to catch her breath.

                “Well?” she giggled, her breathing slowly returning to normal, sauntering back over toward her chosen scribe.

                “Wow…” Peter said cautiously, raising his eyebrows, too impressed to manage much else.  “Um, you got… sixteen.”  Gulping, he hugged the half-pencil to his person and awkwardly began filling in the graphite inscriptions on the sheet, recording the rather impressive achievement of Amy.  The numbers were slightly crooked, but he didn’t think there would be complaint.  Somehow, he had a feeling Amy had already gotten what she wanted just by having him pick up the pencil in the first place.

                “Yeah!” Amy laughed, punching the air in victory and giving a high-five to Kimmy, who was quietly waiting with her hand extended.

                “Those arms of yours, Amy… I don’t know how you manage to get yourself to keep them like that.  Nice and strong,” Sharon encouraged with pearly whites showing brightly, tightening her fists and clenching her very small but nonetheless visible biceps in an act of subtle mocking.

                Amy stopped celebrating for a moment and her smile disappeared, obviously detecting the insinuations in Sharon’s voice.  There was an awkward silence as the pair locked eyes, both with hands on their hips, their lips pursed, a tiny smile on Sharon’s mouth.

                “I think…” Amy continued slowly through gritted teeth, ceaselessly staring into her friend’s coldly ocean blue irises with an unblinking zeal.  “…that Lisa should go next.”

                “Abso-lutely,” Sharon drawled, finally breaking her optical gridlock with her friend as all three girls instantly looked to Lisa with eager grins.  “Sound good to you, girl?  We don’t want to be rude and go first everytime.”

                “I… I… well…” Lisa stuttered, frowning and taken aback at the suddenness of the moment.

                “What, nervous about the lil’ ol bar?  It’s not so bad.  You just saw Amy do it,” Sharon mused, giving a little half-smile, her subtle efforts of momentary, emotional derailment now focused squarely on the unfortunate Lisa.  “I bet you could do just that many, or… or maybe almost as many, but that’s okay.  Nobody’s good at everything.”

                “I… sure, I… okay, okay,” Lisa stammered, blinking uncertainly and looking back down at Peter, who gave her an enthusiastic thumbs up and an assuring smile.  This seemed to perk up the anxious young girl, who was only about as tall as Kimmy, but was even thinner and lacking in the slightly chubby, tomboyish build of the latter.  Uncertainly, she approached the bar and climbed up onto the stone step that had been placed for people not quite tall enough to jump up and grab the bar.  Taking a deep breath, she took one last look at the group.

                The intimidating and beautiful trio of Sharon, Amy, and Kimmy all had their arms crossed, the weight shifted to one leg, a single eyebrow raised to compliment a seemingly positive smile that belied an obvious hope for failure.

                Peter tried to focus on grinning at his friend with encouragement, but couldn’t help but be troubled by the sight of the three young women towering like gorgeous, effeminate monoliths beside him, all frozen in the same position of power and dominance to the nervous redhead, who carefully extended her hands up to the bar and grasped the cold metal against her palms.  It was like the three operated under a sacred, feminine hive mind, and Peter had no doubt as to who was in utter control of that particular hive mind.

                Lisa let her feet slide from the step as she supported her weight on the bar and began pulling herself up.  Already, Peter could see her struggling.  Despite her lightweight and narrow shoulders, her arms were thin and lacked any definition, even as she strained to pull herself up.  Peter watched hopefully, quietly praying that she’d get one and show up her silent detractors.

                Lisa breathed heavily, grunting, as the top of her head passed the bar and her chin neared, but then she stopped, her frail biceps giving out as her arms trembled violently, and she let go, rubbing her pale palms together, her fingers sore and slightly numbed.  She hung her head as she approached the group again in silent shame.

                “Awww… it’s okay, Lisa,” Sharon cooed in a sugary, comforting voice.  “Like I said… nobody’s good at everything.  Maybe you’re just not quite the type for this sort of thing.  The physical stuff, I mean.”

                “Yeah… I guess not,” Lisa chuckled uncomfortably, unsuccessfully trying to hide her sadness, not so much at her failure to deliver, but at the overpowering feeling of being shown up by the other girls.

                “Although I’d be careful with her, Peter,” Sharon warned, only half-joking, her terrifying, mythical gaze once again locking to the tiny lad.  “I wouldn’t trust her to carry you around anywhere.  Might drop you right on your head, and… conk… there goes math and your ability to breathe without a tube.”

                “It’s okay, Lisa, it was a good shot.  You were almost there,” Peter offered quickly and quietly, unsure of exactly what to say to cheer her up as he attempted to ignore Sharon’s snide remarks.  “It’s just the first test.”

                “I know,” Lisa sighed, crouching down again to be nearer to Peter’s face.  “Thanks.”

                “Hey, Peter!” Kimmy quipped, clambering past her friends.  “How are YOU gonna do that, huh?  I bet your little hands can’t fit around the bar!”

                “Oh, don’t worry about that, shortstuff,” Sharon offered throatily, her eyes shimmering as she raised a hand closer to chest level and extending a pointer finger from a tight fist, holding it perfectly straight in simulation of the metal bar.  “You can just pull-up on me,” she cooed with more transparently angelic sweetness than Peter assumed he could stand for the time being.

                “Okay, okay.  Well, what else happened today?” Suzanne asked hurriedly, her brow furrowed, as she leaned up against the backboard of her bed, her hands cupped together, with her freshman son sitting comfortably in her soft palms.  Peter laughed, resting his arms on his mother’s gigantic, firm fingers as if he were reclining in a leather chair.

                “Mom, I don’t know how many ways I can word it.  That’s… really all that happened.  Nothing crazy happened.  No late classes.  No teachers who didn’t already have the whole report thing about me.  No zombies crawled out of the softball field to eat us all,” the boy added with a sarcastic chuckle, grinning good-naturedly up at the worried face of his titanic mother.  She pursed her lips, still gazing pleasantly down at him, but obviously searching for some hole in his recounting of an absolutely flawless first day of school.  She sighed.

                “Honey, this is serious.  I really, really need to know if anything-”

                “Mom!”

                “Anything at all?”

                “Nothing went wrong, at all.  Erica got me at the end of every class, took me to the next one, and I got everything done.  No problems.”

                Peter could almost feel the tensed muscles in his mother’s hand relaxing slowly as she began to accept the story as truth.  She sighed again, slouching a little into the pillows.   Her outstretched, cupped palms gently moved closer into her body until they were practically pressing up against her rotund chest, allowing Peter to continue looking up at her through the rounded valley of blue blouse fabric.

                “Well… all right, then.  That’s enough for now on that, I suppose.  What about… the other kids?”

                “What about them?”

                “They didn’t…”

                “They were nice.  I mean, a few of them stared for a couple minutes, but…”

                Peter could detect his mother’s eyes narrowing again, her skin quivering at the thought of her son being embarrassed by wandering eyes.

                He had always appreciated his mother’s protective nature and loved her dearly, but at times such as this one, when the slightest mention of Peter’s equilibrium being interrupted made her angry, it was frustrating to deal with.

                “Maybe I should call up your teachers again about that…” Suzanne whispered solemnly under her breath, obviously fighting back a snarl.  Peter could feel her fingers curling in more closely around his body.

                “Mom, it’s fine, we knew this would happen, I’m totally okay with it, and… did you just say again?”

                The comparatively giant mother half-smirked, trying to lighten the mood.  “I just did it for your own good, honey.  If you’re at school, I don’t want you having to be distracted, or deal with any kind of…”

                “Mom.  Please.  It’s fine.  You don’t need to call them… again…” Peter choked out uncomfortably.  “Things are going great.  I’ve got it under control.”

                Suzanne smiled warmly, tilting her head lovingly down at her middle child.  She raised a finger and brushed it with incredibly practiced gentleness over his sandy blonde hair.

                “You do, don’t you, sweetie?” Suzanne whispered, slowly bringing her hands up closer to her face.  She stopped just short of her chin, pressing the heel of her hands against it and uncurling her fingers.  “Give Mommy a kiss?”

                Peter nodded, slightly annoyed, but realizing this was a victory for the time being that his mother was managing to at least put aside a small portion of her intense worry.  He stood up, carefully padded across his the soft skin of his mom’s palm, and leaned in, planting a kiss on the tip of his mother’s nose.  She giggled, pulling back and biting her lip for a moment, before shrugging and moving back in to return the favor.

                Peter flinched but soon relaxed as he felt her smooth, damp lips press up against the entire right side of his face.  He closed his eye to avoid the intake of air as she puckered wetly against his face, smooching him loudly before pulling off with a smack, grinning at him.

                The tiny teen ignored the layer of his mom’s saliva film plastered stickily across the entire half of his head including his hair, not wanting to appear rude by rubbing it out immediately after receiving such a show of affection from his colossal parent.

                “Thank you, honey,” Suzanne cooed, brushing her finger back across her son’s hair, massaging his head and allowing him to relax back into a sitting position in her palms.  “I’m so glad your first day of school went well.  And… well, I know sometimes I don’t seem like I’m supporting you, but…”

                “Mom, it’s fine, I get it,” Peter added quickly, placing a hand on his mom’s thumb and caressing it kindly to comfort her.

                “…all I want is for you to be safe, Peter.  I couldn’t bear the thought of… I… I mean, I just couldn’t handle…” she continued, her voice beginning to choke up a little.

                “I know,” Peter whispered reassuringly.  “I can take care of myself.  I’ll make you proud.”

                “I’m sure you will, sweetie.  You already do, in fact.  I’m sure you’re going to have a fantastic year.”

                “Thanks, Mom.”

                “Are you tired at all?  Do you want to take a nap?”

                “Umm… yeah, actually,” Peter admitted.  Normally, a single day wouldn’t have worn him out, but considering the mini adventures both mental and physical he had endured throughout this particular day, he was absolutely beat.  The tricky part had been hiding this from his mother, in case she got the idea that every day of his school year was going to leave him like a marathon runner post-race; however, for the time being, she seemed remarkably at peace with things.

                Suzanne beamed.  “I had a long, long day at the office… so many new employees to train on the new software… and I thought maybe I’d be able to rest for a few minutes before I make dinner.  What time is it, 5 pm?”

                “Yeah, about that, I think.”
                “Fine, fine.  Would you… would you like to sleep in here, with me?” Suzanne asked as subtly as possible, although Peter had learned his mother’s ways, and could hear in her voice that she desperately wanted to spend some time with her beloved son.  He shrugged.

                “Sure, why not?  Um… how are…”

                “Just… lay down.  Tilt your head back, honey,” Suzanne encouraged with a soft smile, her eyes almost twinkling with delight as her diminutive child leaned back into his mother’s fingers before finding them curling up around him, her two hands cupping up against each other, sandwiching Peter inside a very snug cocoon of his mother’s palms and fingers.

                “Um… Mom?”

                “Don’t worry, sweetie, just give me a second to lay back,” Suzanne whispered quietly.  Peter was jostled lightly between his mother’s pressed hands for a moment before feeling the woman’s enormous body go horizontal on the bedspread.  Ever so gently, then, Suzanne laid her prayer-position hands, her son safely between them, atop the crevice of her breasts.

                “Comfy?” Suzanne asked warmly down to her son as he settled into his bed of tender skin and firm fingers like a sleeping bag.

                “Yeah…” Peter smiled.  He wasn’t lying about that part.  His mother did things like this frequently in his youth, when he actually did need a nap after a full day, and she knew how to hold him perfectly so that he was both entirely safe and incredibly comfortable, but somehow it felt a little odd to him to be held like this, in such proximity to his mother’s chest and between her hands with very little wiggle room to speak of.  However, he knew there was no reason to make anything of it, and for the time being, his mother seemed to be actively supporting his continuing attendance at public high school, a though which almost instantly quelled any reservation he had about the napping arrangement.

                “Good,” his mother giggled in a hushed voice before closing her eyes and smacking her lips together a few times, rolling her face a few times against the pillow.  “Sleep well, and we’ll have dinner in an hour or two.”

                Peter was only awake for a few more minutes before he heard his mother’s breathing slow and settle into her throat as she drifted off to sleep.  He felt her massive, protective hands loosen around him slightly, but not enough that he would fall out of them.  Snug and finally completely calm for the first time that day, the boy closed his eyes and managed to settle in enough to fall asleep, cuddled against his mother’s fingers.

                Peter marched confidently down the hallway, his books gripped in his arms, a steely-eyed expression on his face.  Nothing was going to stop him right now.

                Carefully, he brushed past the other and equally normal-sized students as he made his way toward the next class.  He remembered exactly where it was.  He had studied his books and notes and was ready to absorb what the teacher had to say.  His mind felt like a steel trap, primed and ready to instantly take in whatever knowledge became available.  He felt like an animal.   He couldn’t get enough of it.  It was a glorious thirst to just be and exist in a world he finally understood with perfect clarity.  A world he could take on himself.

                “I’ve made it,” Peter whispered under his breath, a smile cracking across his face.  “I’m here.”

                “Hey, Pete!” called out a male voice from somewhere in the crowd.

                “What’s up, man?” Peter shouted back happily, looking forward again to make sure he didn’t bump into anyone.  Across an adjacent hall, Peter caught eyes with his math teacher Mrs. Tritter as she smirked at him over the rim of her black glasses, her luscious blonde locks flowing easily around her shoulders and neck.  She winked at him, which Peter returned with a nod and a smile back to her.

                “Hey, Peter,” smiled Alita, the girl from his art class, tapping him on the shoulder and bouncing her wild black hair across her shoulders as she headed in the opposite direction.  “I’ll see you in art later, yeah?”

                “Hi, Alita!  Definitely, see you then,” he answered quickly before they passed, heading onward toward his original destination.  “Just around here, I think…” he sighed to himself, turning a corner, before bumping into another person turning the corner.

                “Whoops!  Oh, hey, I’m sorry about that, I wasn’t looking where I was…” Peter began with an embarrassed smile before stopping in his tracks, staring into the cold blue eyes of the other student before him, shaggy brown hair hanging down partially over his eyes.  The teen was frozen in place, no expression on his face, his arms hanging limply at his side, like he was dead on his feet, with all the color drained from his cheeks.  “Hey… hey, are you… all right?” Peter asked hesitantly, becoming nervous as he waved a hand in front of the teen’s dead eyes and received no reaction.  “Um… HEY!  ANYONE?  COULD…” Peter yelled out for help before realizing something else.

                The sound had stopped all around like it had been swallowed into some dark corner of the ceiling.  No footsteps.  No shuffling books.  No bodies brushing past one another.  No chitter chatter.  It was empty, and suddenly the atmosphere felt freezing against Peter’s skin.

                Peter turned around to find everyone in the entire hallway had frozen perfectly in place just like the guy in front of him, their bodies returned to a simple, at-attention stance, their arms hanging at their sides, their faces emotionless and empty, like all brain activity had stopped save for those functions keeping the people upright and breathing.  Like robots all working on a simultaneous circuit that had suddenly malfunctioned, leaving all of them without purpose or direction.

                Peter felt his breathing hasten in his chest.  He stared at his hands and placed them against his cheeks, ensuring he hadn’t befallen the same fate.

                He clenched his fingers into a fist and tapped himself on the forehead.  It was definitely not affecting him, whatever it was.  He shivered, wondering what move to possibly make first.  Call for help?  Try to revive them?  All-out panic?  Peter stared in wonder and terror down the long tunnel of the hallway, seeing every single normal body, like he had become, frozen in time.  He pushed carefully past them, turning a corner and into a central junction point of the building that led into multiple hallways, where he could clearly see roughly one hundred other students gathered, all just as stock-still.

                Definitely the all-out panic, Peter finally decided.

                The silence was painfully broken in Peter’s ear drums with a thunderous rumbling from high above.  The ceiling seemed to be collapsing for an instant, but as Peter ducked down, holding his arms over his head, he watched as the ceiling actually continued rising upward until only unrestricted sunlight flowed inside, covering the students, who remained unchanged.

                “HELLO!” Peter called upward toward the opened roof, although he had no idea why.  Perhaps because it was the only place he had seen any kind of movement not originating from his own body in the past couple of minutes, which at this point, for all the confusion he was experiencing, could’ve been hours.

                There was no verbal answer, but suddenly the sunlight was being blocked out again by dark shadows.  Silhouettes.  Three of them.  Peter couldn’t be sure, as he had somehow become used to be a regular-sized human being amongst these now-immobilized peers, but the shapes seemed to resemble people.

                Massive people.  Giants.  Larger even than Peter normally viewed them.  He couldn’t even keep his jaw up.

                “Well, back to school.  This is more like it,” declared a thundering feminine voice from far above.  The voice was young yet imperiously sultry.  It had only been a day, but he knew that voice, and the identity of its owner made his heart pound even faster.

                “I want to play, Sharon!” a second girl’s voice rang out shrilly, whining impotently.  “Now.”

                “You’ll get your turn, Kimmy.  Shut up for now,” the first voice ordered with false sweetness, slowing down and silencing for a moment.  Peter watched the shadow tilt toward him, as if the head were facing him.  He could see the shadowy hair of the first figure shifting slightly, blotting out more rays of light. 

                Even though he couldn’t see them, he could feel eyes upon him.  Piercing.

                “Well, there he is now.  Our favorite little friend,” a third voice chimed in with an overly confident assertion.  “Can I grab him now?”

                “What?” Peter squeaked in terror, the words barely forming in his throat.

                “Not yet, Amy,” the first girl’s voice boomed.  “Don’t want to spook him into pissing his itty bitty little pants, now do we?”

                “Hello?” Peter managed to cry out as loudly as he could muster, given his dry throat and trembling knees.

                The trio of shadowy giant teenagers snickered girlishly for a moment before allowing themselves to descend into full-on shrieking and cackling with delight.

                “Well, hello down there, shrimp,” Amy sneered condescendingly, placing a massive hand on her tilted hip.  “Enjoying the view?”

                Peter cowered closer to the ground, his lip quivering fearfully.

                “Quit it, Amy.  You’re already giant enough.  Think of what you look like to someone like him.  I mean, it’s just rude.  Isn’t it, short stuff?” Sharon drawled, chewing each word and spitting it out with distaste.

                “What’s going on?” Peter huffed under his breath, although somehow his imperceptible words were picked up by the trio, who all giggled again.

                “You’re finding out where you belong, little guy!” Kimmy smarmed.

                “Where I…” Peter uttered weakly.

                “You know, short stuff,” Sharon continued.  “I used to think I was done playing around.  With dolls, I mean.  Turns out I was wrong.”

                “No… please…”

                “Oh, yes.  There’s no denying it.  It’s time to see what kinds of games we can come up with, my little doll-boy,” Sharon’s voice boomed powerfully, a shadowy arm shooting into the school, massive fingers outstretched, a palm swallowing up Peter in darkness as he felt cold whip around his entire body, screams unable to escape his throat as he was grabbed up by the apparition of Sharon.

                Peter awoke with a terrified gasp, the shadows’ monstrous appendage dissipating as he was brought back to reality, the terrifying sight of the unreal vision’s fingers transforming back into his own mother’s, which still clutched him snugly and warmly between her giant hands. 

                He sighed, and instinctively began pressing with all his might to part his sleeping mother’s heavy fingers so that he could get out.

                It took some effort and a little grunting, but with a huff, Peter pulled himself from the bed of his slumbering mother’s praying palms and plopped, mentally defeated for the moment, onto the smooth, rounded, blouse-covered mountain of her left breast.

                It wasn’t that he hadn’t appreciated her kindness in keeping him warm during his nap, but he had a feeling that if he had to endure the feeling of being so tightly and claustrophobically gripped for another few minutes after that dream, he was going to vomit.

                Finally catching his breath, Peter kneeled atop his mother’s left breast as she continued on in a sound sleep, careful not to ruffle her freshly ironed bright blue blouse. 

                The woman had obviously been so wiped out from work she hadn’t even bothered to change into comfier clothes before hitting the sheets, in addition to the fact that the instant he and Erica had walked back in the door from the bus ride home, his mom had swept him up to her bedroom for a full debriefing of the day’s events.

                Staring at his mother’s blissfully sleeping face, and then down at the hills of her comparatively tremendous chest, he puzzled idly at why she had chosen such an odd arrangement for sleeping, and yet somehow he already knew the answer.

                At Peter’s birth, since his body hadn’t exceeded much more than an inch in length, breastfeeding had been out of the question for the various logistical reasons, namely that the baby Peter couldn’t have managed fitting Suzanne’s colossal nipple into his miniscule mouth, let alone having the strength to suck the milk out.  Ever resourceful, though, Suzanne had taken to using a pump to collect her newborn son’s nourishment from her breasts and pouring it into a dropper.  From there, holding the little baby Peter in her palm, she would gingerly pinch the rubber dropper and allow small beads of milk to dribble into his mouth, which he hungrily gobbled up.

                Peter had seen proof of this in family photos, and while it was admittedly a little odd to see, with his infant body so small the camera barely picked it up in the massive cupped palm of the new young mother, it was an omnipresent reminder to him of his mother’s dedication to being a parent, no matter the issues that had to be dealt with.

                Nevertheless, Peter had always had the feeling his mother missed the bonding time with him that she had enjoyed with his infant sisters, both of whom were born at a completely normal size and had no need for accommodation.  So, on occasion, he found his mother hugging him a little closer than was probably necessary toward her breasts.  It wasn’t a conscious decision, or at least he didn’t think so; rather, his mother’s need to be close to him, coupled with her constant worry that he would someday accidentally end up mulched on the bottom of someone’s sneaker, guided her.

                With a shrug, Peter slid down the fabric slope into the smooth valley between his mother’s breasts and strolled casually along the button line of her blouse and down to her stomach, near her beltline, where it would be easiest to slide back to the bedspread. 

                He walked slowly, careful not to disturb her sleep, instead focusing on the rhythmic rising and falling of her chest that he could feel even down her abdomen, the heat from her body radiating through the clothes and making his feet tingle a little with comforting maternal warmth. 

                Crouching down and clutching the small folds of fabric in the vast blouse adorning the field of his mother’s torso, Peter slid easily down her hip, onto the cushy floor of the sheet, and headed for the edge of the bed.

                More than anything, after such a fitful experience in his restless nap, Peter just wanted to get away and have some isolation.  His entire day had been one of immense contact and attention-garnering chauvinism, whether or not he wanted it.  While Peter had always enjoyed the company of other people, and while he had certainly mentally prepared himself for whatever misadventures might befall him at public high school, this was far more than he was prepared for.  From being chauffeured to all his classes in the palm of his sister’s hand, to having every other student in the room gawking at their runty peer like he was the illegitimate offspring of a circus freak and a science project, Peter needed to be able to feel invisible to the world.  Although as his mother often reminded him for his own safety, being invisible to others in his position was a dangerous idea.

                Peter sighed and clambered down onto the winding wooden staircase Suzanne had had carved specially into various tables, desks, and beds around the house for the small boy’s easy access.  They were beginning to show a little wear, but since he was the only one who ever had to use them, they held up well, and each step offered a soft creak, reminding Peter of the familiar and known.  This house had been mostly what he had resided in for his entire life, and now, to know that almost half his waking life wouldn’t be spent in it, he was filled with some newfound apprehension.

                The trek across the soft white carpet of his mother’s master bedroom was peaceful yet deafening in its oddly cold silence for Peter. 

                The door ajar, he ducked through the crack into the empty hallway, he leaned against the olive green walls, staring down at his feet and exhaling with effort.  He closed his eyes, just trying to keep things in focus.

                His moment of reflection was interrupted by tremors in the carpet below him, becoming stronger and stronger.  Peter could feel the atmosphere around him changing and the vibrations of the carpet tickling the muscles in his legs and feet.  Without even opening his eyes, he could sense the motion of things around him, air brushing gently against his cheeks.  His head still hanging, Peter inhaled, feeling a thick, salty aroma of bodily musk filling his nostrils. 

                Knowing precisely what this was, and opening his eyes again, Peter found himself staring down at a colossal right foot just a few steps away from his body, clad in a hot pink sock and decorated in white spots.  Bulbous toes larger than Peter’s head wriggled playfully against the fuzzy fabric, and slowly, Peter’s vision shifted up the slope of the foot, past the tight jean leg, and along the bright purple blouse to his younger sister Jessica’s gorgeous smiling face as she gazed down upon him, a goofy grin on her lips.

                “Hey, Jessie,” Peter croaked, clearing his throat after having not spoken for a while aloud.  He wrinkled his nose, sensing the tainted scent emanating from the gigantic thirteen-year-old’s socks hanging in the air.  He couldn’t help but notice as his sister ground her toes together inside the footwear that barely noticeable but nonetheless present dark patches of sweat had formed in the toe crevices of the pink socks.

                Jessica giggled and covered her mouth politely, clearly sensing her brother’s discomfort as he stood before her toes.  Her golden locks covered her eyes partially as she gazed down at him, tilting her head with slight amusement.

                “Sorry, Peter.  Do my socks kind of smell?  I wore my Converse today and I finally just took ‘em off,” she admitted somewhat apologetically, nevertheless grinning a little as she watched Peter’s face fight off a disgusted expression as the pungent aroma continued to fill his every breath.

                “Uhh… yeah, just a… little,” Peter wheezed out, finally unable to stop himself and coughing a few times into his arm.

                Snickering, Jessica leaned over quickly, laying her cupped hand palm-up before her brother, curling her fingers in slightly.  “Wanna hop in?  Get away from the big stinky tootsies?”

                “Yes, please,” Peter groaned facetiously, quickly stepping onto the soft skin of his teenage sister’s fingers and plopping easily into a seated position, filling her palm, as she raised him back up, grinning playfully.

                “How was real person high school?  Well… I mean…” Jessica blurted excitedly before realizing her breach of etiquette and retracting, her eyes shifting uncomfortably with embarrassment.  “You know… what I mean…”

                “I know what you meant, yeah,” Peter nodded with a smile, knowing his sister meant well.  He was just glad to be up in the clean air above, rather than so close to the carpet.  His mother made a habit of vacuuming the floors that Peter most frequently walked upon to limit his exposure to the elements, but inevitably, Peter found himself trudging through crumbs, stray hairs, and specks of paper that ended up flecked over the soft terrain of the halls.

                And, of course, there was the issue of being constantly in closer than comfortable proximity to the feet of his mother and two sisters.  Suzanne had made it a house rule for herself and her daughters that shoes were never, under any circumstances, to be worn around the house.  This was to ensure that, if one of them accidentally began to step on Peter without seeing him, they would immediately feel him shifting beneath them and be able to stop before the unthinkable happened. 

                For Peter, this also meant there was never a shoe to buffer him with space from their feet, and despite a high quality of hygiene in general in the Clark household, at the end of a long day of work or school, Peter consistently found himself surrounded in a muggy odor of sweaty skin and salty cotton generated by six tired feet stamping around the house cautiously, usually oblivious to the strain this would put on Peter’s nose. 

                This was why Peter primarily tried to stick to countertops and tables when he could help it.  He didn’t really have the heart to complain to his mother or sisters about the smell, because if he was being honest with himself, it was only ever absent for a few hours after they took a shower, and complaining didn’t seem like the thing to do when they all already sacrificed so much to accommodate him.

                “I’ve gotta do some homework before Mom wakes up to make dinner and stuff.  Wanna come?” Jessica asked brightly, obviously wanting to get off the previous subject she had accidentally uttered.

                “Sure.  But… you’ve got homework?  You’re only in middle school.  How do you have homework the first day?”

                “Oh, it’s just filling in a sheet about something-something… I don’t know, I wasn’t really listening,” Jessica shrugged slyly, pressing a finger against her pursed lips as if to shush her brother.  “Don’t tell Mom,” she whispered.

                “Come on, Jessie, you’ve gotta pay attention to everything, even if it seems little.  It’s more important than you know,” Peter warned firmly, trying not to sound bossy.  Despite being small enough for Jessica to pluck off the ground with two fingers, he knew it was his duty as a “big” brother to make sure she stayed on the straight and narrow path as often as possible.

                “That makes sense,” Jessica smirked.  “Just like you, right?”  Slowly, with practiced skill, the teen kept her hand holding her brother perfectly level as she strode swiftly toward her room.

                “Yeah,” Peter chuckled.  “Just like me.”

                Peter sat peacefully on the expansive desktop in the second day of his American History class, scribbling notes onto his slip of paper with the broken tip of a pencil.  It wasn’t a perfect system, but it got the job done well enough.  His eyes wandered around the room to the torsos of the other fifteen-year-olds hunched over desks, pencils in hand, every one of whom dwarfed him like apartment complexes.

                He had a feeling that note-taking times were soon going to be his favorite occasions in class.  Everybody was too busy writing to spend any time staring at him in abject shock like he was some kind of rocket-riding zoo animal.

                Hoping to catch Lisa’s eye, he glanced over his shoulder to her direction in the back corner, though she was too focused on her notes as well.  Her ferocious red locks framed her serene face with even more sheen than the day before.  Peter watched with odd interest as her fingers batted a pencil lightly against her lower lip in thought before she continued writing.  He knew it was awkward to stare in her direction this long, but he couldn’t help it.

                Unfortunately, Peter could also feel the eyes of Sharon, Amy, and Kimmy burning holes in the back of his head with the intensity of their gazes, even without having to look back at them to confirm it.  Swallowing hard, he returned his attention to the teacher’s ramblings.

                “I know this is only your second day of high school, so just so there are no heart attacks before I say the word “project” to you all, let me emphasize something,” began Mr. Browning, clearing his throat as he gazed out over the students.  “This will be due at the end of the semester.  I repeat: end of the semester.  That’s a whole lot of time for you to get going on research like the sensible, time-managing young people I know are hidden in there somewhere.”

                A couple people chuckled awkwardly at the man’s joke, but most just rolled their eyes.

                “All right, so here’s the scoop,” Mr. Browning continued.  “You’re going to be picking an event from American history that interests you.  You’re going to research and prepare a report and presentation as a small group for the class and myself by the end of the semester, and focus specifically on why it relates to the now of America.”

                Groans rippled through the class, and several students bonked their heads onto the desktops melodramatically, folding their arms over their heads.

                Peter, having never been assigned a real project before due to his homeschooling, felt strange to have his interest so thoroughly piqued by the prospect while everyone else seemed to be suffering from the plague.

                “Settle down, guys.  Remember I said end of the semester?  No sweat.  You won’t be picking topics today, because I want you to have time to look through your books for a subject that really captures your attention.  However, I do want you to pick out your partners now.  I want even groups, so form up into clusters of four.  No more, no less,” Mr. Browning said, flipping through some papers in a manila folder on his desk.  “Go ahead and do that now.”

                Although he was interested already, at these words, Peter’s ears really perked up.  He quickly flashed another glance back into Lisa’s corner of the room as all the students began leaping from their chairs and stampeding toward their chosen partners.

                This time Lisa’s gemlike green eyes met his gaze, and a bashful grin was spread over her lips.  They nodded to each other knowingly as she rose from her seat.

                “So how about it, shortstuff?” came Sharon’s velvety voice from behind Peter, causing him to flinch despite the fact he knew it was coming.  “We’re one short back here.”

                Amy and Kimmy were eagerly half-lunged over their desks in order to get closer to Peter, though Sharon remained unmoved in her seat, her smooth fingers crossed properly together over her paper.  Her startlingly light blonde hair was poised as perfectly as porcelain over her shoulders.

                “I… I, um, think I’ve already got a group going,” Peter admitted quickly as he turned around to face the trio.  The effect was instant as looks of disappointment and shocked revulsion colored the faces of the three girls.  Even Sharon, stoic as she was, cringed.

                “You what?” Amy moaned with irritation, wrinkling her nose in apparent disgust, her tanned skin tone blushing.

                “You don’t want to be with us?” Kimmy piped mournfully as her normally cheerful dimples faded from view.

                “Hey, Peter,” Lisa said quietly, still clearly afraid of spooking him with her voice.  She took a stand next to Peter’s desk and gazed down at him with a gentle smile.

                “Oh,” Amy muttered with a huff.  “You again, huh?”

                Lisa bit her lip, looking uncomfortable as she took an empty chair next to Peter’s wildly oversized desk.  “Yeah, it’s me.  Good to, um, see you three again,” she managed uneasily.

                “It’s mutual,” Sharon cut in abruptly.  “So, you two planned a thing ahead of time, or what?”

                “Um, not really.  We just kind of picked right now.  It’s not a big deal,” Peter reassured, sensing the tension immediately resuming from the day before in gym class.

                “Oh, I know it’s not a big deal, shortstuff,” Sharon answered, her words simultaneously delicate and imperious.  “I just thought since we were trying to make friends with you yesterday, you might want to do the same for us now.  That’s all.”

                “I do!  Really, it’s just, um…” Peter stammered, feeling a cold sweat on the nape of his neck.  He glanced up at Lisa, who looked as off-put as he was.  “I’m sorry, I appreciate the offer, but Lisa and I are…”

                “It’s Lisa and you now, hmm?” Amy butted in, raising a curious eyebrow, her tone lilting and obviously sweetly sarcastic.  “That’s fun.  That’s really cool.”

                “Yeah,” Kimmy agreed as helpfully as she could, crossing her arms and looking down at the desk glumly.  “Real cool.”

                “Don’t worry about it, girls,” Sharon demanded softly of her two cronies, though her unblinking blue-gray eyes remained glazed over and trained directly on Peter like a pair of sniper scopes.  “We’ll just find someone else who needs a friend.”

                “Sorry again.  Good luck to the three of you!” Peter said as good-naturedly as possible as he turned his attention more fully to Lisa, who had inched her chair closer to his desk so that she could rest her elbow on the edge.  From the look in her eye as she warily glanced back at Sharon again, he could tell she was just as vexed from the oddly aggressive encounter.

                “Looks like we’re just about squared away now!” Mr. Browning called out as he looked over the room, which by now was mostly split up into sets of four, with the exception of the desks surrounding Peter and one other group of three.  “No need to overthink this.  What’s going on back here?  Still negotiating?” he asked of the unresolved partnerships.

                “More or less, yeah,” Amy said, beaming disingenuously and resting her chin on her fist, her dark locks spilling over her hand.

                “We’ve got mysteries of the past to explore now, so unfortunately I can’t give you guys much longer to figure it out.  How about I just tiebreak this thing?  Let’s see, we’ve got three in the front here, then another three with you,” Mr. Browning counted out, pointing to Sharon, Amy, and Kimmy with these last words before his gaze fell to Peter.  “And then Peter and… Lilly?  No, sorry, Lisa.  I’ll learn names by the end of the month, don’t worry.”

                “That’s right,” Sharon answered with a subtle nod, shooting Peter a glance that iced him to his core.

                “Well, then, Lisa and Peter?  I’m sorry, but I’ve got to give preference to the groups already with bigger numbers and split you guys off.  Can you each just fill in one of the vacancies in the other groups?”

                Peter’s heart sank, and he knew without a doubt he was seconds away from feeling even lower.

                “We’ll take him,” Sharon said reflexively.  “Peter can go with us.”

                “Perfect!  And Lisa, you can go with this group up front, okay?” Mr. Browning said happily, indicating toward the row with a wave.

                Peter looked up at Lisa, and he could see the look of defeated sorrow in her eyes matching his own as she looked down at him with clear lament, her silky red mane drooping over her left eye just a little.

                “See you in Biology,” Peter whispered hopefully to her as she rose out of her seat.  She nodded, a slight smile appearing in the corner of her mouth again, as she made her way to the front of the room.

                “Excellent, we’ve got our groups.  Come up with some possible topics on your own tonight to discuss with your group tomorrow.  Now, let’s get right down to business here.  Turn to page fourteen in your books,” Mr. Browning droned on, satisfied with the distribution and totally unaware of the silent social pressure in a certain corner of his classroom now mounting high enough to break off the needle on a barometer.

                “Well look at that,” Sharon sighed under her breath, leaning forward across her desk, her words slurring heavily enough that Peter was compelled to glance at her over his shoulder again.  He couldn’t help but feel his wrists tremble a little at the sight of her silvery locks draping loosely over the edge of the desk, almost like a waterfall.  “I guess we’ll get to be your friends after all.”

                “Y-Yeah,” Peter answered back with the most amiable grin he could muster despite his frustration at the new grouping, desperate to ease the obvious tension.  “I bet we’ll make something awesome.”  He could see the other two girls out of the corner of his eye leaning back in their chairs, arms crossed and smirks very self-satisfied, particularly in the victorious body language of the tall and toned Amy.

                “You know it, shortstuff,” Sharon responded, drumming her forefinger rhythmically against her cheek.  Her eyes widened for a fleeting moment.  “It’s going to be something really special.”

                “Ahem,” Mr. Browning called out, scratching his forehead and holding the textbook higher in the air as a demonstration.  “Page fourteen, you guys?”

                “We’re ready to go, Mr. Browning,” Kimmy simpered back at him with a cheesy smile as she flipped through the pages.

                “Totally,” Sharon murmured, giving Peter one last soul-prodding glance of her oceanic irises before turning her attention to the book again.

                “Excuse me, Mr. Browning?” Amy asked suddenly just as the teacher was opening his mouth to resume the beginning of the lecture.  “I’m sorry to interrupt.”

                “Yes?”

                “I just didn’t want my fellow group project member to miss anything, and he… doesn’t have a book, see?” she explained innocently, her eyes darting down to Peter while her fingers tapped anxiously against the spine of her text.  “Can I share with him?”

                “Of course,” Mr. Browning said warmly, nodding.  “Peter, I’ll just have you share with Amy for today.”

                “Okay,” Peter grimaced, taking a few steps backward.

                “Cool.  C’mon back, groupie,” Amy intoned invitingly, reaching across the gap of desks again.

                Peter looked up and couldn’t help but flinch at the looming sight the girl’s slender fingers, waggling above him as they descended for their passenger.  She pinched the back of his shirt and plucked him from the desktop just like the day before, letting him dangle for a few seconds longer than necessary over the crippling drop to the carpet below, then deposited him roughly into the fold of her open book.

                Dusting himself off as he rose to his feet and readjusted his rumpled shirt, Peter ignored the intent gazing of the silently entertained class and focused his attention on Lisa: the only teen in the room wearing a look of genuine concern for his wellbeing.

                He gave the shy redhead another smile to let her know he was all right, though in reality, he was just as unnerved as he’d been the previous time.  Luckily, she seemed to accept it, and the distress in her countenance faded.

                “Amy, in the future, I think it would show better manners if you asked first Peter before you, um…” Mr. Browning corrected with uncertainty, clearly mystified with the odd phrasing emerging from his mouth.  “…pick him up again.”

                “Right.  Sorry, Mr. Browning.  It won’t happen again,” Amy lied with a poker face almost as good as Sharon’s.  “Just trying to help out.”

                “I know you are, and I appreciate it, but even so…” the teacher proceeded, shifting his attention to Peter, now perched in the open pages of Amy’s book.  “Peter?  Everything good with you?”

                “Yep, totally.  No problem!” Peter chimed quickly, throwing in a nervous chuckle.

                “Good,” Mr. Browning grunted, clearly eager to drop the awkward subject and move on with the lesson.  He snapped his fingers and pointed at the page, which slowly got all the fifteen-year-olds in the room to turn back toward the front as well.  “Now, I want you all to take a good look at the insert at the top right of the section header…”

                Peter folded his hands behind his back and put all of his concentration into reading the paragraph Mr. Browning had pointed out.  Before he could even begin chewing over the words, though, he saw Amy’s hand flatten itself against the page a few inches away from his feet, her svelte fingers thrumming against the white surface and rattling his shoes with each tap.  She apparently had no intention of stopping.

                The hapless freshman blinked, unsuccessfully ignoring the towering presence of Amy glowering over him just behind, and marveled at just how quickly the idea of this semester project had gone from an adventurous curiosity to the legal sentence it felt like now.

                “Welcome to Unit 1.  Later this week we’ll have our first lab, which you can read about in the back of the syllabus.  Today, though, we start with plant cells, so I need everyone to open up their texts to page eighteen, please,” the freshmen biology teacher Mrs. Baker informed the class curtly, her beady eyes darting over the desks to ensure no one had their cell phones out before returning to the folder in her hands.  “I seem to have grabbed the notes for another class by mistake, though, so I’ll back in a couple minutes.  Go ahead and take a look at that first page.”

                A hum of chatter broke out as the kids began unzipping their backpacks and fishing out their notebooks and texts, while Mrs. Baker exited the room, leaving them to talk amongst themselves.

                Peter already had his supplies out, and his gaze shifted to his left up at Lisa.  He could tell she hadn’t scooted her chair to the furthest corner of her desk away from him like the previous day.  After a moment of waiting, her head tilted down toward him as well.

                “Hey,” she said awkwardly, folding her hands in her lap.

                “Hey,” he answered while swallowing with sudden inexplicable anxiety.  “It’s a bummer the groups didn’t work out in last period.”

                “Yeah, totally,” she agreed with a nod, her tone still a little somber.  She unclasped her right hand and brushed her fingers past her ear to comb over her radiant red tresses.

                “It’ll be cool.  You guys will make something awesome,” Peter insisted.

                “Uh-huh,” Lisa said disbelievingly, rolling her eyes.  “I went to middle school with a couple of them and we had a group project to do too.  I think they both called in sick the day we had to present it.”

                “Oh,” Peter answered quietly.

                “Hey, listen, I wanted to ask something else,” Lisa said suddenly, frowning and resting her arm on the back of her chair.  “Maybe it’s weird to ask, but Amy… you know, picked you up again in class and, um…”

                “What?”

                “I mean, doesn’t it… you know, bother you when that happens?  When people just do that?”

                “I guess it does, yeah,” Peter admitted with a shrug.  “I’m kind of used to it by now.”

                “Does it happen a lot?”

                “Not really,” he said.  “It’s happened more in the last couple days than usual, though.  Mostly it happened a long time ago when we’d go to family reunions and my little cousins wanted to play.  People still sometimes do it if they haven’t seen me before, like a few of my little sister’s friends.”

                “That sounds like it would get old pretty fast,” Lisa said.  “I don’t get why people are like that.”

                “I don’t really care, honestly,” Peter added, covering up the truth just a little.  “It’s the best way to get around for me until the world collectively agrees to build tiny ladders onto things.”

                “I guess,” she snickered sheepishly.  “So you don’t mind when people have to carry you?”

                “Not at all,” he said.  “I appreciate the lift.  It’s the suddenly picking me up part I’m not crazy about.”

                “I see,” she said, biting her lip nervously.  “Why didn’t you tell Amy to back off then?”

                “I didn’t think she meant badly by it,” Peter said, not really knowing the answer himself.  “I don’t really want to tell people to back off, anyway.  It seems like a bad move to make for someone who’s never been to real school and hardly knows anybody.”

                “Maybe,” Lisa said uncertainly, and her emerald eyes seemed to shimmer.  “If you change your mind about that, though, I’ve, uh… I’ve got your back, you know?”

                “Thanks, Lisa,” Peter responded firmly, and he could see the slightest pink hue flush into her cheeks at the mention of her name.  She must’ve felt it happening, too, because almost immediately she was propping her elbow on the desk and palming the side of her face to cover it.

                “No problem.  I’m sorry, I know it’s not any of my business, I just hate to see… um, I mean, it just doesn’t seem right.  People being able to just do whatever they want to you,” Lisa continued as the emotion began to rise in her voice with these final words before she stopped herself, laying her palm flat on the desk.  “Sorry.  I’m done.”

                “I appreciate it.  Really,” Peter reassured, and as he kept staring up into the face of this towering girl who stood at a below average height for her age, admiring her green eyes and pretty freckled face wreathed by her fiery mane, he realized something strange in himself.

                As sociable as Peter was, he had been conditioned by the risks of being around new people who didn’t know how much shouting hurt his ears or how scared it made him to be picked up by the back of his shirt.  His knees would quiver and his hands would shake.  The five-inch fifteen-year-old had had enough life experience to keep these nervous tics in check, but he always felt them bubbling up under the surface, especially when people like Amy scooped him up repeatedly without consent.  Around most of the people he had met in the last day, this trend had continued on as it had for most of his life, no different than he’d been expecting.

                But Lisa was different.  In her presence, sitting close enough that these same dangers were potential threats, Peter was calm now.  His heart rate was peacefully low.  His limbs were free of trembling.  His mind was an ocean.  He felt just as comfortable as he did sitting at home with his mother and sisters, the three people he trusted more than anyone else.

                He couldn’t help but feel warm as he and Lisa continued smiling timidly at one another.  He knew this feeling wasn’t something he could adequately express to someone who hadn’t hazardously lived their whole life at the size of an action figure, nor could he say it without feeling incredibly embarrassed, but it was there nonetheless, and he felt a sense of gratitude to this girl he hardly knew welling inside of him.

                He wanted so badly to return that feeling of simple human trust that he cherished so deeply.

                Then Peter remembered the day before, absentmindedly touching his hand to Lisa’s fingertip and her apprehensive admission that she had been curious about the feeling of someone so small touching her skin.  In her eyes she had that same glow of wonderment he witnessed almost every other day of his life in passerby.  The only difference was that most people looked at him like he was a winged piglet put in a carnival freak show, while Lisa’s gaze simply held the decent interpersonal respect he saw those same people exchange with others just because they happened to be the same height.  At that moment, he realized how he could express his friendship.

                “Lisa?” Peter asked suddenly, breaking their silence that was dulled only by the quiet roar of the rest of the class conversations going on around them.  “Would you pick me up?”

                The girl’s pupils dilated and she blinked a few times, wrinkling her nose cutely with confusion.  “What?”

                “You heard me.  I was just wondering if you wanted to try?”

                “I… I mean, I… w-why?” Lisa stammered, her mouth hanging open slightly.  Peter could hear in her tone that, yes, she very much wanted to try it, but was too shocked at the odd abruptness of his question.

                “Well, for one thing…” Peter began, “…if there’s a fire and we have to evacuate the building, I’m kind of toast if I have to run out on my own.”

                “Oh,” Lisa sighed, recomposing and nodding again.  “That’s true.”

                “I could use a helping hand if disaster strikes.  How about it?”

                “Um, all right,” Lisa said, swallowing hard and lifting her hand off the desk, her fingers quivering.  “You’re… you’re sure about this?”

                “It’s not a big deal.  You can just lift me off the desk.  My family does it all the time without even thinking about it.”

                “What if I drop you?” Lisa muttered worriedly, concern flooding her expression as she put her waiting hand flat back on the table.  “I… I mean, I… I wouldn’t, obviously.  I’d be super, super careful with you, Peter, it’s just…”

                “C’mon, I’ve got all the faith in the world.  I’m not a land mine about to go off,” Peter said earnestly, stepping closer to the edge of the desk and holding his arms out wide.  “I trust you.”

                Lisa’s cheeks flushed even rosier than before at this last statement.  She batted her eyelashes anxiously a few times and then nodded, silently bringing her hand to the edge of the desk, her pale palm upturned for Peter to climb in.

                The tiny freshman embarked more slowly than he would into the hands of his sisters or his mother, not out of a lack of confidence, but because he wanted Lisa to at least get a feel for his nearly unnoticeable weight before lifting up, just to boost her faith in herself.

                He could feel her fingers quiver beneath him at the novelty of it as he took a seat, and laid his hand on her thumb to steady himself.  Though he felt sure of Lisa’s abilities, he couldn’t help feeling bashful.  Her thumb was soft and being able to lay his hand on her skin again brought him comfort.

                “Going up,” she whispered with an entranced half-smile, and raised him a foot off the end of the desk with such delicacy and care that Peter hardly noticed the ascent, save for the cool breeze brushing past his cheeks.

                “You’re pretty good at this,” Peter remarked with surprise.  “At holding still, I mean.”

                “Am I?  I just didn’t want to make you sea sick,” Lisa said.  “Or air sick, I guess.”

                “You really are.  Seriously, I’m pretty sure my sisters can’t even hold me this straight, and they’ve been doing it for years.”

                “Thanks,” she answered simply, tilting her head away from him with embarrassment and clearly trying to hide some muted pride.  “It’s good to know there’s something I can actually do, after I totally flopped at those pull-ups yesterday.”

                “Hey, no sweat,” Peter said, crossing his legs and settling in to his friend’s tenderly cupped palm.  “I bet most people couldn’t get one either.”

                She shrugged, though her hand remained rock-steady.  “Sharon and Amy did.”

                “So what?  They probably practice ‘em on the weekends so they can be ready to show them off in class,” Peter chuckled.

                “They don’t like me, do they?” Lisa asked after a pause, grimacing.

                “They… well, they hardly know you,” he answered quickly, uncomfortable with her statement, as he’d been guessing the same thing.

                “They didn’t look happy that we were going to be in the same project group,” Lisa continued.  “Sharon was, um… well…”

                Peter nodded, even without needing to have an adjective applied to the blonde-haired siren that Lisa had mentioned.  “I think they’re just still getting over being weirded out at sitting near someone like me.  That’s all,” he insisted with a sigh.

                “Amy, too.  She was mad about the whole thing and she kept saying “you and I” about us, like we’re… we’re…” Lisa said, giggling good-naturedly at this last memory, before silencing herself and coughing softly.

                “Like we’re an item?” Peter answered back with the same uncertain snicker, his heart pounding a little faster in his chest now.

                “Yeah.  It’s just silly, I…” Lisa said with another false laugh, then bit her lip, retracing over obviously regretted words.  “I mean… I… she’s being silly.  About stuff.  Um…”

                The pair froze again, with Peter now hoisted to about chin level with Lisa.  Just as he found himself getting lost in the sparkling abyss of her green eyes at the closest he’d seen them yet, their gaze broke off uncomfortably, and Lisa’s hand began lowering back toward the desk instinctively.  Neither knew what to say next.

                “Sorry for the wait!” Mrs. Baker called as she re-entered the classroom with a controlled slam of the door to get everyone’s attention again.  “Got my notes, then a couple of my colleagues needed help getting the printer unjammed, then… well, never mind, not important.  I’m sure you’re all familiar enough with these first pages by now to teach the material to me instead of me to you.”

                Peter stepped lithely off the ends of Lisa’s slim, cushy fingers and hopped quickly back to his papers before his tactile encounter with his lab partner could be seen and misconstrued.  He glanced stealthily up at Lisa’s face as her hands rushed back to the text to turn the correct pages, but she was focused on the now-busily lecturing Mrs. Baker, almost obsessively so.  She was clearly avoiding looking directly at him, just as much as he was.

                His heart fluttering wildly in his chest, Peter began to realize that maybe it wasn’t just trust he was feeling around this girl.

                  Like the day before, Peter found himself drinking in the scene of the cafeteria more than actual beverages as he perched on the corner of Erica’s lunch tray, the aroma of chocolate milk and boiled carrots wafting in a steamy haze about the space.  Today was already shaping up to be more positive, despite losing Lisa as a partner for the history project in first period, and Peter was determined to make the rest of his tenure at the school a successful one starting at this moment.  Fewer students bustling toward their tables had slowed down to gawk at him, which was comforting as well.

In fact, the only real hiccup during the meal for Peter had originated from a cluster of three guys in football jerseys who had stopped behind Lena, whispering to each other with stupid grins on their faces while looking condescendingly on the diminutive freshman.  They didn’t have long to get into the mumbled conversation, though, before Erica was spinning around in her chair and delivering a glare fiery enough to split skulls.  Obviously taking the hints, they’d jostled each other and sauntered off to a farther end of the room to eat.

                  Peter was mostly just glad to be out of the second art class.  Mercifully, Alita had sat next to him and kept steely eye contact with Mandy as the latter entered the classroom.  This successfully steered the overly creative watercolors painter toward a different corner of the room, ensuring she wasn’t given the chance again to dunk him again.  Despite the protection, though, Peter had still felt the ponytail-sporting girl’s eyes drilling into him with surgical interest throughout the class.  Even when he glanced up in her direction as casually as he could as a polite encouragement for her to cease and desist, she continued watching him like a lioness stalking a sickly gazelle.

It made his stomach turn to notice how evidently content she was with making him feel this intimidated.  Her eyes bored through him, taking on that same cold and mathematical intent that chilled him to the marrow before she’d let a half-smirk cross the corner of her mouth.  With a flourishing twist of her ponytail around her fingers, she’d return to her artwork as though nothing had happened.  Meanwhile, by the end of the period, Peter was left with a dusting of sweat on the nape of his neck.

                  “Is everything okay, Peter?” Alita had pressed, clearly sensing the uneasiness in the five-inch-tall scholar’s hunched form as he pretended to be hard at work on copying a picture from a sketchbook of a wolf.

                  “Yeah.  Everything’s good.  I’m just thinking,” Peter insisted quickly, scribbling another tuft of fur onto his drawn beast, which wasn’t turning out particularly impressively due to his distractions.

                  “She’s not bothering you still, is she?”

                  “No, she’s- I mean… no.  It really is fine,” Peter insisted awkwardly.  “All she’s doing is looking.  I’m used to that.”

                  “Okay,” the girl sighed with hesitant acceptance.  “Well, if you want, I can keep sitting here during our other classes.  Make sure she doesn’t… um…”

                  “I’d appreciate that,” Peter said with a relieved smile.  “Really, I would.  Thanks.”

                  “You’re welcome.  I figure everybody deserves to be able to sit in class without worrying that somebody’s going to make them go swimming,” Alita said, frowning slightly at the realization that she may have made a faux pas, but Peter gave a genuine chuckle to let her know it was all right.

He always found it easier to connect with people the sooner they stopped treating him like his body was composed of egg shells.  Alita seemed willing to talk to him like a normal student and person, which above all else was what the freshman yearned for in interaction with his fellow and usually much taller human beings.  If he could ensure he had at least one ally like her in this and his other classes, it would be a far pleasanter semester.

“Hey.  Earth to twerp,” Erica droned, prodding her brother gently in the shin with her pinky finger and jostling him back into the present moment.  “Are you going to eat anything, or what?”

“I guess.  I’m not feeling real hungry today.”

Erica gripped a fork in her other hand and arced it over Peter’s head, spearing a lettuce leaf doused in Italian dressing from her plate.  Depositing it between her lips, then, she crunched down and frowned a little.

“Mom told me to make sure you eat.”

“You’re kidding.  I’m not six anymore,” Peter groaned as he sat up and pulled himself over the rim of the tray to observe his somewhat unappealing options.  The salad, a muffin, and a small boat of tater tots.  Far less interesting than staring around at the throngs of students.

“Yeah, well, maybe when you start eating like a normal guy she’ll stop saying it,” Erica pointed out, twirling the fork between her fingers and swallowing the bite of salad.  “I’m not your babysitter, though, so just pick something and eat it so I can tell her you did, okay?”

“All right,” he sighed, knowing his mother and older sibling just had his best interests at heart.  Besides, having survived a full day and a half of public high school already, he was beginning to see that keeping his strength up would be a key to thriving.  He broke off a mushy lump of the muffin in his fingers and began nibbling idly at it on the edge of the tray, which seemed to satisfy Erica, who returned to eating her salad and conversing with the girl next to her.

“Hey.  Peter,” Lena whispered from Erica’s opposite side, leaning closer to her friend’s tray.  Her hand was cupped around her mouth to try and project her words to Peter alone.

“Yeah?”

“Can… we talk for a second?”

“Uh, yeah, sure.  You mean, like…”

“Alone.  Is that okay?” she whispered.  “I just wanted to talk about yesterday for a second.”

“Oh.  Right,” he said, realization dawning again.  Somehow, he already had a slightly sinking feeling of what she might want to discuss, namely about his misadventure that ended with him jammed into her clarinet by an unconfirmed assailant.  She’d agreed to keep silent on the matter after he’d begged her to, knowing that his mother would have him bundled him out of the public school wasteland mere minutes after the account came out, but it surely was putting a strain on her knowing that he might still be in peril.

In truth, it was a weight on Peter’s shoulders as well, though he dared not share that with anyone.

“Erica?” Lena said, giving her friend a tap on the shoulder to draw her attention in the other direction.

“What’s up?” Erica answered with a half-giggle as she turned around, still grinning from whatever gossip her other friend had been sharing.

“Is it okay if I take Peter over to the other hallway?  Just for a second?”

Erica’s smile instantly faded as her brow furrowed.  She batted a dirty blonde lock off her cheek and grimaced with suspicion, then snorted.

“Why?  Did you two start dating when I wasn’t looking?” she asked in her trademark grab for information through ruthless teasing.

“Actually, yes, and we were gonna go make out in an empty classroom.  You can come watch if you want,” Lena answered smartly.

“Whatever,” Erica groaned with a suddenly disinterested shrug, clearly eager to have the story on her opposite side continued as she turned back again.  “Can you be back in a couple minutes, though?  I’m still trying to figure out how to get us both to classes without pulling a muscle.”

“Absolutely,” Lena promised, laying her hand down flat on the tray for the freshman to board.  Peter was happy to discover the hand was free of french fry grease today as he scarfed down the last of the muffin scrap and clambered onto his sister’s friend’s soft fingertips.  After a nod from the hand’s owner, he comfortably seated himself in the center of her palm and set his hands on her thumb for extra support, anticipating the unpracticed balance.

He felt as though the breath could fully rush back into his chest after Lena had walked out of the cafeteria with him.  There was something about the sheer scale of the place that made it difficult for Peter to achieve an equilibrium, and he found himself somewhat grateful for a reprieve in the hallway that led toward the music wing, though certainly not grateful for what he feared was coming up.

“This should be good,” Lena announced quietly as she held her cupped palm at chest height, turning a corner into an alcove near the first office door in the hallway, which appeared to be empty except for the pair of them.  She leaned against the wall and patted her short brunette locks down with her free hand.  “I’m sorry I’m being funny about this, Peter.”

“No, it’s fine.  I… know I kind of asked something big of you yesterday,” he admitted with some embarrassment, twiddling his thumbs and focusing his attention on a crease in the expanse of Lena’s peachy palm, unwilling to look her in the eye just yet.

“I understand that you want to be here, Peter, I really do.  I mean, I… know I can’t really know what it’s like, being you, but… I’d just feel so bad if something went wrong when I could’ve done something,” she said.  “Plus, you know she’d kill me if anything ever happened to you.”

“Yeah,” Peter sighed, reflecting on the staunchly matriarchal attitude of Suzanne Clark.  “My mom can be kind of... like that, I guess.”

“Well, yeah your mom would, too.  I actually meant Erica.”

Peter had to let out a puff of disbeliving air at this suggestion.  “Right.  Erica would kill you.  You remember that she’s the one that got stuck with chaperoning me here and taking me to every single class, right?”

Lena’s gaze, somewhat intense given the serious subject she wanted to discuss, softened at this guilt-ridden display.

“Peter, you… know she cares about you, right?”

“Yes,” Peter said.  He was indeed aware of his sister’s general concern for him, no matter how oddly she chose to show it.  Still, it was hard to believe that at least a small part of her if not the majority strongly desired the responsibility of the miniscule freshman’s caregiving to be placed elsewhere.  If she were to find out about his mishap of woodwind entrapment, it struck him that among her first emotions might be joy at the plausibility of him being returned to the custody of their mother for continued home tutelage.

“I’m serious,” Lena pressed, bringing her hand higher until their eyes were more or less level.  “She’d have somebody’s neck if they laid a finger on you.  You know that.  And then she’d have mine for keeping it from her.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I know you think I’m just saying it to make you feel better, but I’d hate to be whoever it was that did that to you yesterday.  Especially if Erica ever did find out.”

“Are you going to tell her?” Peter drawled resignedly, still keeping his sights fixed on the cushy flesh of Lena’s palm.

The seventeen-year-old paused for a moment.  Peter could hear a lump being swallowed in her throat before her lips parted again, releasing an exasperated sigh.

“No.  No, I’m still not, even if I… know I probably should,” she said, giving Peter cause for a rush of butterflies in his stomach.  Maybe things weren’t so doomed after all.  “I couldn’t, after what you said yesterday.”

“All I want is a real shot at making things work here.  Maybe once people get used to seeing me… riding around in people’s hands and stuff, it’ll be okay,” Peter suggested optimistically.

“Let’s just say this, though,” Lena said.  “Can you please look at me?”

At last lifting his chin and granting eye contact to the girl, Peter bit his lip, willing himself to stay contented.

“Yeah?”

“You really do need to keep an eye open.  I don’t just mean trying to be careful, I mean…. maybe trying to take notice, so you could be ready if it happens again.  Has anyone been acting weird around you in the last day?”

Peter had to hold back a flood of laughter.  He probably couldn’t accurately predict the number of people who’d acted weird around in the last twenty-four hours if he had a calculator and a yearbook.  It was like almost every day of his life, existing under the casual study of curious onlookers like some kind of circus freak, magnified times a hundred.

“You know what I mean,” Lena said, sensing that the real answer was probably a very high quantity.  “Anyone in particular?”

No real contemplation was required for Peter to come up with the names and faces of those in the school who had showed particular interest in not only being near him but engaging in close contact.  Mandy certainly sprang readily and creepily to mind.  In fact, it seemed entirely possible that she was the one responsible for his misfortunes.  Not that he could prove a thing now, of course.

“Maybe.  A couple.  Like that girl we met in the hallway yesterday at lunch,” he said.  “But I really didn’t see who it was.  There’s nothing I or anyone else could do it about it now, even if I did want them in trouble for it.”

“I know,” Lena said, lowering her hand back down again and setting off into the hallway again.  “Just promise me you’ll tell me anything else you think of.  I’m kind of in this now, too, whether I want to be or not.”

“Thank you, Lena,” he said as she re-entered the lunchroom.

“You’re welcome,” she answered, catching the eye of a still-suspicious Erica, who was leering comically at them from the table.  “Now let’s get you back before she actually thinks we were making out.”

                Algebra with Ms. Tritter sailed by, and maybe more than any other class, Peter found himself getting legitimately absorbed in the subject matter, able to almost completely let go of his insecurities about the massive world around him.  The fact that he hadn’t been kidnapped and stuffed into a clarinet again wasn’t such a bad thing, either.

                There was a calming note to the young and curly-haired teacher’s methods, both in her easygoing explanations of the introductory material that usually included a few cheesy jokes, and in her voice, soft-spoken but with enough command that everyone was willed to lean forward a little further.  Whenever she’d adjust those black thick-rimmed glasses on the edge of her nose, she’d pick a spot in the room and grin at whomever she could make out.  Peter was the subject of this treatment several times, and it gave him a warm feeling inside to be acknowledged so cheerfully with no annoyance attached like he had come to sense with some of the other educators in charge of him.

                The class-ending bell came much sooner than Peter had been expecting.  He’d hardly noticed the full page of notes he’d taken, as it seemed like just as much time had been spent listening to Ms. Tritter lay out the groundwork concepts for the semester.  Students filed past his desk in the center of the room, backpacks slung over a single shoulder, yammering to one another about the upcoming period.  Most of them seemed to ignore Peter, or at least limit their studies of him to stealthy glances, which made him happier than anything.  He assumed it was safe to guess now that Erica’s trip back from her physics class was something of a long haul, because as with the previous day, he was soon left alone with Ms. Tritter in the room.

                “Enjoying Day 2 so far?” the woman asked sunnily, laying a manila file on her desk before folding her hands behind her back before stepping into the center aisle of desks.

                “Oh yeah, I’m… I’m loving it.  Really,” Peter said.  He was far too enthused with being here to make any attempt at sounding coolly disinterested.

                “I’m so glad to hear it,” she responded, coming to a stop at the desk adjacent to the one Peter was using, and seating herself on the edge of it, where she could comfortably clasp her hands over a black stocking-clad knee.  Though it put her at a level far above her tiny student, who was still comically dwarfed in the center of the desk, there was nothing in her calm and collected posture to suggest she had to lower herself to be even with him.  “I think it’s going to be a great year.”

                Peter tried not to let himself get distracted, but there was no way around the fact that this towering woman was positively beautiful, and suddenly focusing all her attentions politely on him, as though he was the most important person in this moment.  He knew he could very easily get lost just staring into the curly jungle of that blond hair, so he immediately forced himself to nod and stay engaged.

                “Y-Yeah.  Yeah, it should be,” he managed.

                “Your sister must have a long way to come to get you here,” Ms. Tritter commented, glancing at the door and then the clock with a raised eyebrow.  “I’m sure this arrangement isn’t exactly the ideal for either of you.”

                Peter shrugged.  “I’m not so great with floors.   We have to compromise.”

                “I realize that.  I’m aware of the precautions being taken to make sure things go smoothly for you here.  I meant, if it’s all right with you, I’d be glad to walk you to fifth period every day,” she said kindly.  “If it would be a help, I mean.”

                “Oh,” Peter said, gulping.  “That… I mean, don’t you have something else you have to be doing right now?  Another class, or…”

                “Nope!  I actually take my lunch break right about now since I have to proctor in the middle of the day, so it’s no trouble.  Your English class is on my way to the parking lot anyway, so it would be very simple.  I’d be glad to do it, if you’re comfortable,” she insisted, pinching the corner of her eyeglasses between a thumb and forefinger and adjusting them again.

                “I… I’d r-really appreciate that.  A lot,” Peter mumbled.  He normally didn’t get this flustered around people who treated him well, but damn it if there wasn’t something enchanting about being spoken to so normally by a titaness so simultaneously confident in herself.  “I’ll bet Erica would appreciate it even more.”

                “I’m sure she would,” Ms. Tritter chuckled, sliding off the edge of the desk and taking the extra step forward until she was looming benevolently above the desk, her head tilted slightly to the side as she gazed down at the five-inch-tall teen.  The fingers of her right hand opened slowly and as nonthreateningly as possible, unfolding her open palm onto the desk.  “Ready to go?”

                “Definitely,” he answered.  Gripping his backpack to his chest, Peter hopped aboard his math teacher’s creamy palm again and experienced another rock-solid ascent in her care.  Only his family and Lisa had managed any better at handling thus far in his life.

                Like the day before, the pair had run into an out-of-breath Erica, who was in even worse spirits than the day before, obviously expecting this sprint to be a required daily occurrence to get everyone to class on time.  Of course, her mood brightened significantly to hear Ms. Tritter’s suggestion, and after a promise that Peter’s mother would be informed of the new arrangement for this particular period transition, the teen’s older sister darted off in the other direction with a little more spring in her step.

                “Peter, would you mind if I shared something with you before we get to your class?” Ms. Tritter said, breaking up the brief silence as they neared the languages wing.

                “Uh…. sure.”

                “I hope you don’t take this the wrong way.  I know it might sound ignorant of me to try and compare our situations, but… I was homeschooled myself until ninth grade too, and before that I hadn’t lived in one place for more than a year and a half.  English wasn’t even my primary language then,” the woman explained.  Her soft fingers appeared to curl upward a little closer to their contented occupant.  “What I’m saying is, I know the jump can be a bit… jarring, especially if you’ve already got another obstacle placed in front of you.”

                Peter listened carefully, surprised to have his preconceptions about the obviously fiercely intelligent and well-adjusted professional flipped on their heads.  He doubted the woman had even reached age thirty yet, and yet she blended in so well with the fabric of this particular society after such a varied upbringing.  How did she do it?

                It probably helped that she wasn’t the size of a doll, Peter reflected to himself.   Still, it was impressive.

                “I see,” he uttered, quietly witnessing the curve of the creases in her fingers deepening as her cupped palm narrowed around him.

                “So I suppose I just want you to know, even if I can’t… quite understand your situation, from personal experience, I’m here if you need to talk at all.  About anything,” she declared, coming to a stop outside Mr. Garrison’s English classroom.  “No pressure.  I’m just putting it out there.”

                “Thanks,” he said, watching her other hand grip and twist the handle to enter the class.  “I’ll remember.”

                “That’s all I’m asking, Peter.  I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said with a smile as she entered the already half-full class, having made it with a minute to spare.  Like the day before, a few heads turned at Peter’s entrance, but most people returned to their previous conversations before they’d even fully lost focus.

                Upon entering the room, the freshman’s eyes darted not to his assigned desk but the one behind him, which was vacant at the moment.  It felt like a certain cautious reverence was required with that open space where Sharon would soon seat herself.  Religious rites ought to be performed over it to ensure the sheer blond, silent vixen didn’t go too powerful.

Peter knew it was probably a mistake to have allowed the hypnotic young woman to put such fear in him, but one look from those silver irises and a single hot exhalation of her omnipresent cinnamon gum was plenty to intoxicate him.  Somehow, he had a feeling the effect was similar on people who stood at normal height as well.

He barely had time to unpack his bag onto the surface after being released from Ms. Tritter’s palm when he heard fingers tapping authoritatively on the edge of the desk behind him.  Swiveling around, careful not to knock anything down and appear anxious from the get-go, Peter found himself staring up at the analytical and only vaguely human countenance of Sharon, the luminescent gray pools surrounding her pupils already affixed to his body.

Despite listening intently for her entrance, he’d missed her steps and the sound of her slide into the chair.  She might as well have been a ghost.

“Don’t look so happy to see me, shortstuff,” she said dryly.  “How are things down there today?”

Peter blinked, knocked way off guard within two sentences of conversation with this girl before he’d even had the chance to open his mouth.  This was already shaping up to be a great class.

“Fine.  I’m doing okay,” he said.  “How are you?”

Sharon let out a single chuckle of mild derision, half-smirking.  “No need to be nervous already.  You don’t have to use robot questions to talk to me.”

“Right.  Sorry,” Peter corrected.

Why was he apologizing?

“You’re funny when you’re like this.  And I’ve really only seen you like this, so I’m starting to assume it’s just always a good time around you, shortstuff,” she continued, unimpeded by his stumbling syllables.  She leaned forward across her desk, her deceptively angelic face hanging over Peter’s desk and somehow his entire existence in this instant, the silvery blond tresses providing a canopy that might’ve well blocked out the rest of the world if they swept just a little further.

“Well, I… I guess I like g-good times,” Peter muttered, clenching his trembling wrists in fists before they could be noticed, though he had a feeling Sharon had already noted and become gratified with this development as her face moved steadily closer.

“I’m sure you do,” she said, obviously only semi-convinced.  Her hand rose, fingers outstretched toward Peter for a few pregnant seconds that cooled him from head to toe, but suddenly the digits changed direction and instead combed through her luscious locks.  “I’ll tell you what.  Stick with me and my friends around this place.  We’ll help set you straight.”

“Oh.  Uh… well, um, I’m glad,” Peter rambled blindly.  The sight of the girl’s white palm elegantly approaching him like a treasured toy was something that took several minutes to fully recover from.

“Trust me.  I’ve gone to school with most of these… people since kindergarten,” she continued, pronouncing “people” with all the respect of “giant, moist cockroaches.”

“I’m sure that c-comes in handy,” Peter offered.

“You have no idea.  Since you’re in real school for the first time, I want to make sure you’re started off right,” Sharon explained.  Her hand slid out of her hair but still hovered ominously above the desk, her fingers kneading as though she was rubbing a pair of coins together.  Her tiny audience’s eyes remained glued nervously to this simple act.  “We don’t want people taking advantage of you.  Putting you in places you don’t want to be.”

Too late for that, Peter thought with a huff.

“Yeah, I… guess that makes sense.”

“Take that girl in history class for example,” Sharon said nonchalantly, and suddenly Peter’s legs froze up even tighter.  “I don’t really remember her name…”

“Lisa.”

“Right.  Lisa,” Sharon said, releasing a bored puff of air, clearly having forgotten the name by choice rather than accident.  “Every year she sits by herself in a corner of class and barely talks to anybody.  I mean, don’t get me wrong, she can do that if she wants, but… is that really how you want to start off your time at school, when you already don’t know anybody except me and my friends?”

“Well, I actually did meet other people too, I-”

“All I’m saying is…” Sharon cut in pointedly.  The temperature of her words was plummeting by the breath.  “Maybe just give it a little thought.  People know me here already.  They listen to me.  I can make sure you have a good time this year.”

“I do appreciate it, really,” Peter said, more and more unsettled with each passing comment from the gigantic beautiful creature above him.  “But I’ve met lots of nice people here.  I’m sure it’ll all turn out fine.”

“Will it?” Sharon posed.  It came out less as a question and more a floating prophesy.

“All right class, crack open those books.  I hope you all read the introduction, because there will be at least one question from it on the first quiz Friday,” Mr. Garrison droned as he trundled himself into the classroom.  “Face forward, please.”

Peter snapped himself out of the trance Sharon had locked him into, quickly busying himself with the contents of his backpack, his stomach now set on a spin cycle of steadily increasing velocity.

                Peter sat transfixed behind the plastic scorecards on the sidelines of the east gym, safely poised on a folding table as he witnessed what he could almost convince himself was the hallowed storm-bringing of Olympians.

Or at least Olympians playing volleyball.

                Due to his sore lack of stature and hitting power, he had been assigned to scorekeeping duty while the rest of the freshmen class played.  It stung, like it always did when Peter was forced to miss out on fun activities that normal-sized kids could participate in with nary a blink, but he was at least grateful he got to be involved somehow, and what was more, watch the ferocious display of digs, sets, and spikes.  There were four nets set up side-by-side in the pristine space so that everyone could be involved, and Ms. Watson had allowed Peter to choose which court he presided over.

                After quickly scanning the area, he’d become aware that most of the eyes of the class were on him again, clearly interested in having him for their side.  It wasn’t a welcome change, and knotted his stomach back up the same way it had been the day before: a feeling he had mistakenly thought was beginning to fade.

                However, after his gaze passed over the goggle-eyed student body again, he latched suddenly onto Lisa, standing unassumingly by the side of the small crowd, with her brilliant red tresses tied back in a ponytail.  As usual, hers was only pair of eyes that didn’t lock onto him with academic hunger.  She delicately raised a hand and waggled her fingers at him, an encouraging smile on her lips, and suddenly Peter felt relaxed, despite the continued presence of monumental gawkers.  He quickly selected her court, much to the groaning chagrin of several disappointed parties.

                Of course, as Peter realized once Ms. Watson had deposited him onto the side table, he wasn’t exactly being left alone yet.  Just as soon as he’d chosen, he could feel a sense of foreboding creeping under his skin.  The trio of Sharon, Amy, and Kimmy had guessed Peter would make such a move and ensured they were in the same game as Lisa.  Each of them, especially Amy, flashed him a self-assured and borderline victorious grin as they filed onto the court and took their positions.  For a moment, it made Peter question his choice of court, but a gratified glance from Lisa set him straight again as the class finishing lining up and Ms. Watson blew a whistle to begin the games.

                From the first serve it was clear that the talent on the court wasn’t evenly spread.  Most of the players fell into the camp of Lisa and Kimmy, both of whom clearly didn’t have much practice with a volleyball.  Sharon, being fairly athletic, had some experience, but even her efforts paled in comparison next to the Amazonian Amy, who took full advantage of her height and toned physique to dance effortlessly around the court, leaping up to the net to smack and place the ball with near-perfect accuracy.

Her bronzed arms bulged a little on each dig, and she seemed capable of bounding right over the net on each lithe attack.  Nearly every one of her spikes met the floor on the opposite side for a point, and when her inexperienced opponents were lucky enough to get under the ball, they ended up with raw forearms just trying to get the thing back in the air, and that included the boys who had to try very hard not to look like they’d been hurt on the dive.  There was boredom as well in her gestures, as if it was all inevitable to her.

Amy was a titanic and ferocious beast at the game, and each time Peter found himself having to flip the score card counter over the metal rings due to her fierce moves, he could see her shooting him a glance, expectancy in her dark irises.

She had her audience, and Peter couldn’t help but be reminded on each spike that those same powerful fingers had so effortlessly plucked him like a scurrying mouse from the sanctity of the ground.  He had felt the musculature even in her firm fingertips, practiced at applying just the right amount of pressure to accomplish whatever needed doing, be it shutting down volleyball tournaments or snatching up tiny teenagers into her warm palm.

By the time Amy had closed down the first game and moved onto the second, every ear-splitting crack of her hand against the ball caused Peter to cringe, unable to help himself imagining being attached to the white sphere as it soared over the net, closer and closer to Amy’s enormous waiting hands to receive their prize.  The thundering screech of her larger-than-average shoes as she dove across the floor didn’t help matters, either; it made Peter grateful to be on a table rather than the floor.

The tiny teen did his best to ignore these aggressive displays, though, and focused his attention instead on Lisa, who was unfortunate enough to be on the opposing side to the team Amy was single-handedly delivering to victory.  The redhead seemed unconcerned with the increasing gap in the score, and was simply doing her best to contribute wherever possible without having her arms shattered by one of Amy’s whizzing spikes.  Several of them landed on the linoleum hard enough to make a crater, mere inches from her feet, and as Peter watched, he was well aware that any one of those impacts would render him a quadriplegic were he in Lisa’s position.  Her play style was decidedly more defensive, but she simultaneously appeared unwilling to cower in the corner of the court like some of her even less athletic cohorts.

It impressed Peter, to say the least, to see her throwing herself as best she could into a foreign sport, her orange ponytail whipping back and forth behind her head with the effort.  After a few minutes of watching her get the hang of it, he was able to forget even Amy’s percussive show.

With the end of the day nearing, Ms. Watson’s whistle bleated in everyone’s eardrums, drawing attention for the announcement of the three-minute warning.  Out of the corner of his eye, Peter saw Amy drawing further back on the court and bending down a little so Sharon could whisper something in her ear, a smile cracked over her thin lips.  The siren’s silver eyes flashed over in his direction as she finished uttering the last of the secret to her taller crony, flaring like flames in the midst of a fog.

Peter clutched his arms around his chest for warmth.

The players took their positions again and served to Amy’s side.  Kimmy, the shortest of the trio, hunkered down and bopped the volleyball up, allowing Sharon to tap it on her slender fingertips just above the net.

That was when Amy came charging up the court in a blur of pounding feet and whipping hair, nearly bowling over a clearly clueless male classmate who had been blankly observing the play.  Her fingers clenched into fists that, despite the roar of cheers and laughter over the entire gym, Peter would’ve sworn he could hear crack.  Hurtling off the floor with the full power allowed by her toned thighs, Amy would her mighty hand up, where it collided with the ball and fired it back over the net, directly into Lisa’s face.

Peter wouldn’t have needed to hear the sound of the strike to wince, though it was a thunderous marriage of rubber on flesh all the same.  Lisa, thin and noticeably dwarfed by the towering Amy, was swept down to her haunches by the blow, and audibly gasped.  Even at the distance, Peter could see her biting her lip and fighting back the urge to moan with the stinging surprise that no-doubt was still resonating in her skin.  As Lisa pulled a trembling hand away from her face, a distinct pink welt was visible, and her smallest classmate flinched again.

Frozen in place, Peter turned away from the sight of a few players on Lisa’s side checking on her and observed the opposition.  Amy’s hands were planted firmly on her hips, her mouth quivering a little, as though fighting back a gleeful little curl.

A few feet away, Sharon was standing with arms crossed.  More practiced stoicism was gelled on her face, unmoved and devoid of emotion as Lisa was helped back to her feet.  With a tilt of her head, the mythic blonde paid Peter one of her famous glances that managed to barrel right through his being.  Her lips pursed tightly together for just a second, puckered, and then relaxed again.

Peter tried to swallow, but realized his throat had gone bone-dry.

“Sorry!” Amy called out to Lisa with barely concealed sarcasm.  “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” came the humble reply from the victimized girl.

“That was totally on me.  I’m just getting into the game, I guess.”  Amy’s eyes darted over to Peter as she spoke these final words.

After a timeout whistle from Watson, Lisa was hustling off the court, still grimacing from the sting of Amy’s spike, but she couldn’t help but smile at the sight of Peter.  She took a seat behind the table, careful not to jostle it as she laid a soft, pale hand on the surface behind the scorecards.  Peter felt instantly soothed at the sudden proximity to her again, and almost matched the width of her grin.

Eyeing her hand, the same one that had so tenderly cradled him with iron steadiness in Bio, he found himself wishing she’d be willing to hold him again, but knew it would be a serious overplay to request such a thing.

“Hey,” he began awkwardly, scratching the back of his head.  His eyes fell on the pink welt on Lisa’s cheek, but he forced himself to return to her green eyes for refuge, before the mounting secondhand guilt got too great.

“Hey,” she responded with a sigh, shutting her eyes for a few extended seconds.  “You know, I don’t think I’m cut out for volleyball?”

“Nonsense.  You just need practice,” Peter defended instinctively before realizing she was just trying to lighten the mood.  “You were doing pretty well.  You got a good number of hits out there.”

“Uh-huh.  Fifteen in an hour isn’t exactly Olympic level.”

“Nineteen,” Peter corrected, blushing as soon as he’d said it.  Lisa blinked, processing his precise count, but clearly resolved not to let him stew in his bashfulness for too long.

“Wow.  Better than I thought,” she said.

“It’s definitely more than I could get.  I think my limit would be one.”

Lisa fought back a giggle and shook her head, resting her cheek on a hand.  “You’re a real goofball, Peter, you know that?”

“I try,” he said simply.  The tiny freshman eyed Lisa’s forearms, rosy as well from striking the ball, then traced up to her raw cheek, unfettered by the dotting of freckles over her countenance.  “I feel like some people around here could use a laugh sometimes.”

“I know what you mean,” Lisa whispered under her breath, shooting a glance back at the court, where Amy had just slammed her umpteenth ace.  Her voice puffed theatrically with sarcasm: “I’m starting to think the three of them don’t like me very much.”

“Maybe so,” Peter said truthfully.  “That doesn’t matter, though.  Not everybody has to like everybody.  They’re not worth the time if they don’t.”

The green eyes swiveled back to Peter at this.  “They seem to want to make friends with you, though,” she said as she lowered her head toward the table, resting her cheek on its side.

Peter shrugged, taking a few steady steps closer to Lisa’s adorable billboard-sized reclining face.  He stopped just an inch shy of where a silky strand of her red hair had come to rest.  “I know the kinds of friends I want to have.”

Lisa batted her eyelashes a few times, obviously just as flustered now as her much smaller peer, and allowed herself another smile.  For the second time this day, they were caught in a surprisingly comfortable silence.

“All right, that’s it.  Class dismissed,” barked Ms. Watson after a final attention-getting whistle.  “Don’t leave your sweaty shorts on the floor, or they become mine, and they’re ten bucks for a new pair.”  She marched back from the center of the gym through the sea of exhausted trudging teenagers toward the scorekeeping table, addressing Lisa by surname as she did all students: “Feeling all right, Carol?”

“Yes, I’m fine, thank you.”

“Just splash a little cold water on it and it’ll be gone in a couple minutes.  Keep on the move next time,” the woman instructed, tucking a pencil behind her ear through the ruffled nest of her short brown hair.  Her eyes turned to Peter.  “Sorry we couldn’t find a way to bring you in on this game, Clark.  I’m still trying to figure out ways to have you participate.  I want you to be getting something out of class time, too.”

“That’s fine.  I understand,” Peter said with a nod, recognizing the difficulty the woman was probably having in integrating a five-inch-tall kid into physical feats intended for those whose ankles he could barely pass.

“Ready to hop in and hit the lockers?” the P.E. teacher said, an honest-to-goodness grin revealing rows of slightly discolored but nonetheless straight teeth.  Her tanned hand lowered to the table, the thick fingers toughened by weightlifting forming a lightly callused bridge for Peter to dock.

He stiffened slightly at the timbre of her voice, even as he willingly climbed aboard her palm with a last smile at Lisa.  The forty-something educator’s gruff tone from the day before had mollified noticeably; certainly it struck Peter as a step forward, considering the irritatingly intimate proximity he had with the woman while changing in and out of his gym uniform, but this adjustment irked him all the same, as though she’d been replaced by some B-movie extra-terrestrial.

“I’ll keep thinking about some possibilities and keep you posted.  And if you think you’ve got any ideas about how to keep yourself busy during days like this, you just let me know, okay?” Watson said, even more gently than before.  “We don’t want you getting bored, hon.”

What was this “hon” business from a woman who would’ve looked perfectly comfortable cracking skulls in the MMA circuit ten years ago?  Peter wasn’t one to judge someone’s personality, but this was the same individual who’d put up only a meager effort to conceal a blistering contempt for him the day before.

The freshman hugged his legs to his chest in the leathery palm as Ms. Watson re-entered her office, resolving at last to ignore it and instead focus on the several far more pressing and threatening aspects of his reality, namely the fact that his most sinister fans were hell-bent on removing the closest person he had to a best friend from the picture.

                “So what’s the deal, twerp?”

                Peter lifted his head, yawning after a fairly exhausting second day of his freshman year, as he reclined in his older sister’s hand on the school bus.  He’d nearly been lulled into a nap by the vibrating hum of the road felt through her soft skin.  After resting his head against her fingers like a pillow, precisely in the way she’d forbid him from doing, for a moment he assumed she was reprimanding him for it.

                “Sorry,” he mumbled, pulling himself into a cross-legged position in her palm.

                “What?  No, I don’t give a crap how you sit,” Erica answered, semi-flustered.  As she had the row all to herself, the seventeen-year-old was able to lean her back against the window and kick her legs across the beaten leather seat, with the hand containing her tiny sibling cradled against her stomach.  “I meant are you going to tell me what you and Lena were talking about at lunch?”

                Peter gulped but ensured not to outwardly react.  His minute actions went invisibly under the radar of most people he encountered, but his mother and siblings had become very skilled over the years at detecting subtle alterations in Peter’s body.  Erica generally played too aloof to comment, but he knew perfectly well she could see them.  Suddenly, despite the sanctity he felt perched in his sister’s unmoving and practiced hand, he became vulnerable.

                “Why?” he asked, hoping it didn’t sound too defensive.

                Erica smirked, raising a playfully disdainful eyebrow.  “Uh… cuz she’s my best friend and she’s just scooping you up and walking you around to talk about secrets?  I don’t know.  I just thought it was weird.”

                That was fair, and Peter knew it.  After his careless mentions of Sharon’s pencil poking to Erica, the latter was probably at least on an orange alert for his general security.  “She just wanted to hear how things went yesterday and this morning.  I guess she was a little worried about me,” Peter responded casually.

                “That does sound like her,” Erica said.  “You were gone a few minutes, though.”

                “She wanted a play-by-play of the classes.  You know how she is,” Peter said with an amiable chuckle.  “I started going on about the teachers and homework and other kids in the class.  Real boring.”

                “Uh-huh.  So why couldn’t she just ask you all that at the table?”

                “It was kind of loud in there,” Peter said.

                “I guess so,” Erica shrugged, cognizant of her sibling’s lifelong struggle to be heard against high volumes.  Her voice dipped as though the questioning was done, but Peter felt a stiffness remaining in the poise of her arm that told him she was still thinking about it.  He patted his fist genially against the rounded heel of her hand, hoping to encourage her to relax, but it didn’t work, and all he earned was another confused look from on high before the pad of her thumb nudged his little hand away.  This conversation probably would’ve been far easier to smooth over if Lena hadn’t had to stay after school today.

                He didn’t blame Erica for a little paranoia.  Their mother had placed a great deal of responsibility on her eldest daughter.  Erica was more than capable of handling it, but the fact remained that in the wild social jungle of their high school, Peter was a burden, and he was sorely aware of this fact.

                Glancing up and over his sister’s shoulder above, Peter could make out familiar houses whizzing by outside the bus window.  Their stop was next.  Once they were home, the odds were far greater that Erica would disappear into her room for a couple hours and forget all about gently interrogating her liability of a brother.

                “Twerp.”

                Peter looked up, suddenly aware that his sister had lifted her hand up closer to her chin without him even noticing.  He could feel a few wisps of her warm breath settling against his face, her lips close enough that he could’ve stood up and touched them.  Though not at all intimidated, it surprised the middle Clark child to be allowed so near to her face.

                “Erica,” he croaked, matching his sibling’s serious tone in an attempt to lighten the mood.

                “You’d tell me if something happened to you, right?”

                Peter gazed up at his sister’s massive, lean face hovering above him, her dark blonde locks sweeping every which way.  Frowning, he searched for some twitch in her expression to indicate that she was just pulling an elaborate gag on him, as her normally omnipresent dose of sarcasm was nowhere to be found.  But he saw nothing.

                “What do you mean?”

                “C’mon.  Don’t try to play dumb with me.  You suck at it.  I know you too well,” she said sincerely, and though the words might’ve sounded cold or dismissive, it occurred to Peter that it was probably the most affectionate thing his sibling had said to him in years.  He swallowed hard again.

                “I’m not playing dumb,” Peter lied.

                “If you got in trouble somehow.  Someone tried to do something to you at school.  You’d tell me.”

                “Well, yeah.  Obviously,” the freshman said with feigned dawning realization, then threw in another chuckle.  “It’s not like I’m gonna be able to do anything about it without my back-up, right?”

                “I’m serious.”

                “Me too,” Peter said.  “Honestly, everything’s fine.  I’m just trying to adjust, you know?  It’s… getting to me a little, yeah, but I can handle it.”

                “Are you sure?” Erica pressed with concern, throwing her brother off with every successive answer.  “Because there really isn’t room here to try and take on everything yourself.”

                “I know that.  And if anyone tries to do something to me, you’ll be the first to know,” Peter said, then added in one of his few actually truthful contributions to the conversation:  “Lena wanted to make sure I knew to go to you, too.”

                “Good,” Erica said, at last seemingly sated for the time being, just as the bus lurched to a stop in a small puff of black smoke out the tailpipe.  Gathering her backpack from the floor with her free hand, Erica slung it over her shoulder and shuffled through the aisle toward the door.

                “Have a good afternoon, folks,” the bus driver said disinterestedly as the Clark teens disembarked.  Peter noted the man’s five o’clock shadow was apparently the exact same length as the day before, as though he was strictly maintaining a look of slight dishevelment.

                The walk back down the sidewalk to the house was a silent one, and Erica already had her cell phone out in the other hand, her thumb busily tapping away at the screen, hardly paying Peter any mind, save for the fact that her hand was as skillfully steady as usual.  It was a treatment the freshman was used to, and even fairly comfortable with.  In fact, he needed the quiet reverie just to try and chew over the little ethical dilemma he’d involved himself and Lena in, as well as his sister on an unfairly ignorant level.

The guilt was already beginning to metastasize after Erica put herself out there in the name of keeping him safe, and Peter had a feeling it was only set to continue growing, especially if anything else less easily resolved should happen to him.

                “Home,” Erica droned loudly into the echo-rebounding foyer of the house to no one in particular as she nudged the door open with a knee, her eyes never leaving the screen of her phone.  Kicking her flats off into the corner of the hallway, she let her backpack slump with a rocky slam to floor and booted it into carpeted area of the adjoining sitting room.

                “Erica, please don’t start an earthquake on my tile,” Suzanne Clark automatically called out from the other room with little urgency, obviously aware of how short a time her daughter would probably remember this decree.

                “Mom, stop trying to make me feel fat,” Erica monotoned back: the closest she ever really got to joking around with their parent.  Peter stifled a cackle with his fist, and noticed the corner of his older sister’s lip curve upward ever so slightly at his enthused reaction, though she quickly straightened up again.  “And that goes for you, too,” she droned without looking at him.

                “Erica, why do you have to throw your stuff around so loud?” Jessica complained as she appeared over the banister at the top of the stairs.  “I thought somebody drove a car into the side of the house.”

                “Everybody around here is awfully worried about the floors, aren’t they?” Erica snarked back with a shake of her head, then glanced back down at Peter in her palm.  “All right, where am I putting you?  I have stuff to do.”

                “Peter, do you want to come with me?” Jessica piped in, dashing down the stairs as fast as possible.  Her golden locks were tied back in two tight braids, which bounced against her shoulders on each step.  Once she reached them, Jessica brought a hand up to Erica’s palm and the youngest Clark gently draped her index finger over her tiny brother’s shoulders: a common alternative to hugging among members of the family where Peter was concerned.

                The freshman laughed, leaning into the friendly embrace of the girl’s finger as it curled instinctively around his frame, and wrapped his arm over the doughy curve of her digit.  He gazed up at his younger sibling’s hopeful expression, her baby blue eyes widened expectantly.  “Sure, Jessie.”

                “Cool.  Open up, then,” Erica said to their sister, extending her occupied hand.  Jessica cupped both palms about an inch below the end of her oldest sibling’s fingers, allowing an easy bridge of smooth feminine flesh for their brother to exchange carriers.

Once his sisters had their hands lined up, Peter clambered over the edge of Erica’s fingers and trounced safely into Jessica’s slightly smaller palm, where he immediately let himself splay out a little further to relax.  His younger sister had always been far more encouraging to use her hand as an easy chair, not-so-subtly offering it as an alternative to reclining on a couch cushion.  It was in humorously stark opposition to Erica’s usually strict set of regulations about laying down, and after such a long day, Peter planned to take full advantage.

“Comfy, Peter?” Jessica asked.  She giggled as the brush of her brother’s clothing, as well as his pattering little feet tickled her skin, and brought the fingers of her other hand a few inches above him once he was settled in to act as a makeshift sunroof.  “Do you have enough room?”

Erica rolled her eyes at the sight of her thirteen-year-old sister’s precocious fussing.  “Oh my gosh, Jessie, relax.  He’s not a freaking prince.”

“I just want him to be comfy, geez!” Jessica fired back semi-seriously, wrinkling her nose and turning her chin up at Erica.  Looking back down at Peter, then, her tone and expression softened immediately again.  “Are you, though?”

“Absolutely,” he said with a grin and a hearty thumbs up, leaning his head with satisfaction against the pad of Jessica’s thumb.

“Wanna see something funny?  Aunt Marcy emailed me a video of some pugs making noises that sound like singing,” Jessica described, trying not to start giggling at the mere mention of it.

“Absolutely,” he said, crossing his legs contentedly over her slender pinky finger.

“Awesome!” she piped happily, regarding her sister one last time as she turned and headed for the stairs again.  “We’ll be having fun watching funny dogs while you’ll be off sending your boyfriends pictures of your-”

“Don’t you even finish that thought!” Erica snapped, earning a triumphant chortle from Jessica as the latter bounded up the stairs, her hands forming a protective carriage for her brother all the way up.

Minutes later Jessica was lying back on her bed in her brightly lit room, which Erica had once accurately termed the Pinkpocalypse, with her laptop between her legs and her brother deposited onto her stomach to witness the performing pug video.

Peter sighed with the relaxation he’d been craving after a day of varying tensions as he settled into the steady rise and fall of his younger sister’s flat abdomen, the folds of her yellow top providing a handy blanket.  He hardly even noticed the dogs, even as Jessica’s laughter caused him to bounce seismically on the surface of her shirt.

Tomorrow he could worry about the veritable juggling act his high school career was shaping up to be.  For now, he could just be.

                He was a mere week into his revamped education track and already Peter was beginning to wonder how his peers had handled the prior nine years at such a rigorous pace in the public school system.  As his mother had been juggling her real estate career with home schooling her shortest child since he was five years old, he’d often been left to his own devices with the lesson plans.  As sharp as he was, Peter had picked it all up quickly and was indeed prepared for the material now being presented to him, but the workload was still something else to consider.

                Within two days of the syllabi passing around, lesson plans and homework were being liberally doled out, and already talk of eventual quizzes and tests was on the lips of Peter’s teachers.  It was a lot to take in; fortunately, the lingering novelty of it all was enough to help energize the freshman into action.

                U.S. History with Mr. Browning wasn’t shaping up to be quite the disaster Peter feared it might be after the semester project groups had been chosen and he’d found himself entrapped into a major commitment with his trio of self-appointed best friends.  Far more time was spent getting engrossed in the birth of the nation in his assigned seat, which also allowed for time to speak to Lisa.  Every interaction, however brief, led to him feeling the keen burn of Sharon’s silver eyes on the back of his neck, but being able to chat with the petite redhead, still among the only students in the place to treat him like a true equal, always made it completely worthwhile.  It was impossible not to get lost in those freckles sprinkled over her cheeks, or the emerald eyes laid above.

                He hadn’t forgotten what had happened seven days before in gym class, when it looked distinctly like Amy had carried out a volleyball-themed mob hit on Lisa for Sharon.  A great deal of the intervening hours had been spent worrying about potential bullying he was inflicting on Lisa just by associating with her, but he was always soothed out of this mindset through conversation with her.  He couldn’t allow himself to be cheated out of friendship by selfish onlookers, not when he’d fought this hard to attend the school.

                Of course, association with Lisa came with its consequences for him as well, however slight.  Sharon’s gaze had grown even colder if such a thing was possible.  Kimmy picked up a habit of blowing wintergreen bubbles large enough that Peter could’ve fit inside, then popping them with a rubbery crack that jolted the miniscule freshman violently enough that a condescending giggle was triggered in the whole trio.

Amy had been forbidden from physically picking Peter up, though she still found ways around the rule that allowed her to get her hands on him.  Often the freshman would suddenly feel a firm fingertip pressing into the space between his shoulder blades, then stroking downward to the small of his back, stopping just short of fondling his rear end.  He’d swivel around, startled, and be met with more raucous chuckling from the entire group.  Any attempt on his part to request a less unseemly method of attention-seeking was usually shriveled up by Sharon’s eyes before he could even get the words out.

                Fortunately, he got History out of the way first-thing, and then he’d have the sanctuary of Biology to be near his lab partner without interference.  He was beginning to get the sense that the blunt and beady-eyed Mrs. Baker, even with all her experience as a teacher, was incredibly disorganized, often leading to pleasant stretches of time where the students were left alone while the woman rummaged through her office for the lesson plan or homework assignments.  Today was no exception.

                “Wow.  She almost got through the whole class before she forgot something,” Lisa whispered down to Peter as the pudgy-legged educator headed for the door, the class erupting into chatter before Baker had even shut the door.

                “I really thought she’d have this one,” Peter commented.

                “Do you think she’s showed up to a class with everything she needs at the start?  Ever?”

                “If she ever did, it was probably on a Saturday when she forgot we didn’t have class on the weekends,” he chuckled, earning a snort from his peer, as well as an approving slap on the edge of the table with the heel of her hand that rattled the surface.  Noticing immediately, she froze in place again, curling her slender fingers into a reverent fist, and laid both hands on the table again.

                “I…”

                “Really.  It’s cool.  I can handle the table shaking a little,” Peter said, ceaselessly amused by her desire to keep him safe from threats like barely-noticeable vibrations.  Plus, her melodic laugh was positively infectious, and he would’ve taken any opportunity to listen to it.

                “I know.  I just sometimes kind of forget that you’re…”

                “…five inches tall,” Peter finished softly for her, pausing in grateful awe as the reality of her error dawned on him.  “Trust me.  You have no idea what that feels like.”

                Slightly embarrassed but nonetheless pleased with herself after her new friend’s answer, Lisa bowed her head toward the lab table until her temple touched it, a sweet smile on her lips.  Peter took a few steps closer to her until he could’ve leaned against her elbow, clad along with the rest of her arm in a wiry white sweater that intermixed with her cascading titian tresses.

                His gut twisted pleasantly, like he was strapped in the car of a roller coaster and riding the chain toward the top of a hill, or at least how he imagined that would feel if it wasn’t such a safety hazard for someone his size.  The longer he looked at the gentle face of this girl who truly had begun to actually forget that he was smaller than her hand, allowing himself to feel safe staring into the green pools of her eyes, the more he felt a yearning inside himself for a connection he had long ago subconsciously written off as impossible for someone like him.

                “Can I ask you something?” Lisa intoned timidly, still with her head resting against the desk, and Peter’s stomach proceeded to roll a full three-sixty.

                “Y-Yeah.  Yeah,” he managed.

                “You know a week ago, when we kind of, um…” she proceeded.  “…practiced what we’d do if there was a fire?”

                “Uh-huh.”

                “Do you think maybe we should, um… you know, just to make completely sure we’d be ready…”

                “Try again?” Peter asked, working very hard not to sound over-eager at the thought of her picking him up again.  A week ago he’d effortlessly asked her to try lifting him, but suddenly he felt that confidence sapped, replaced with anxiety at saying the wrong thing, as though every word he said to her suddenly meant a little more than before.  Why?

                “Yeah.  I mean, as long as you’re-”

                “Oh no, no I’m… I’m fine with whatever,” he said as casually as possible, shrugging.  “Want to practice again?”

                “Yes,” she whispered, blinking as she lifted her head up from the table again.  Where Peter’s words were more hesitant now, Lisa’s had taken on a steadier tone: still just as caring, but with more assurance in herself.  Her right hand, which had been resting palm-down against the surface, turned slowly, her fingers unfurling until it was flattened and waiting for Peter to board.

                “Thanks,” he said out of habit, taking a few weightless steps toward the hand belonging to a girl he was beginning to realize more and more wasn’t just the first real best friend he’d had.  Testing the softness of her fingertip again, he stepped in with more confidence than the first time she’d opened her pale palm to him, lowering down to his haunches in the creased center of her hand.

                “Going up,” she said again, the same way she had a week before.  Goose bumps rippled up Peter’s arms as he ascended from the surface, so even that he found he was able to stand fully up in Lisa’s palm as she carried him.  It was more like delivered upward on a cloud of air, the tender give of her skin beneath his shoes the only indicator that he wasn’t, in fact, floating right now.

“How’s that?” she whispered.

                “That’s, um…” he mumbled, drinking the feeling in as best as he could.  “That’s pretty good.”

                “I’m glad,” she sighed.  “So you think I’ve got the hang of it?”

                “I think you do.”

                The bell for the end of class tolled loudly, an irritating reminder that Mrs. Baker hadn’t returned yet with the homework.  A few students just shrugged and resolved to escape the classroom before the woman returned with their assignments, though a few including Lisa and Peter remained.  Even with bodies jostling past the desks, stomping aggressively across the carpet to reach the door, Lisa miraculously remained motionless.  At the very least, she was more skilled at this than Jessica, who had been holding her brother regularly with an attentive and nurturing focus for more than half her life.

                “I guess your sister will be here to get you soon, huh?” Lisa said.  “Maybe I should put you back down?”

                “Maybe,” Peter stated back, hesitant to give a positive confirmation so he could continue to enjoy the sensation he had now of staring into Lisa’s generous green eyes from just a little bit closer, comforted in the full knowledge that he was moving absolutely no where unless she wanted him to.  As another student exited the classroom, sweeping absentmindedly by the lab table, a small breeze picked up the ends of Lisa’s red hair, a few strands of which fluttered up toward her hand and brushed along Peter’s arm.

                “Maaaaybe,” she repeated back in a hushed tone with an increasingly broad grin, copying Peter’s contemplatively deadpanning, and earned a smile from her passenger.  The final remaining student besides the pair scurried out of the room at the sight of the ticking clock for next period.

                “Lisa,” Peter said suddenly, surprising himself with the dulcet sound of her name in his throat without him having fully authorized it.

                “Yes?”

                “I, uh…” he began.  Her attention was completely on him.  The rest of the world was nothing in this moment.  How could he possibly be expected to perform under this kind of pressure?  “I was… was just wondering… if sometime you wanted to g-”

                “Let’s get going, twerp!” Erica groaned as she pushed the door open and entered, immediately catching sight of her brother in unknown hands.  Peter and Lisa, their reverie interrupted, both flinched at the sound and turned to look up at the upperclassman as though they’d been caught in the middle of something federally prohibited.

Like when she’d witnessed Ms. Tritter holding Peter on the first day of school, Erica’s irises flickered, her lips flushing white for just a moment.  She stepped forward cautiously, clearly trying to gauge the potential threat, her tone softened considerably:  “Sorry I’m late.  Everything good in here?”

                “Yeah.  Yeah, everything’s… good,” Peter gulped, thrust back into the mad pace of reality, half-gratified over and half-cursing his sister’s serendipitously timed arrival.

                “Who’s your friend?” Erica asked as she walked up to the lab table, more in her normal voice, having assessed that her sibling wasn’t in immediate peril, though she still braced slightly.  Lisa, looking just as inexplicably guilty as Peter at having been caught red-handed in nothing, had been stricken silent.

                “This is Lisa,” Peter said.  “Lisa, this is my sister Erica.”

                “Hi,” Lisa peeped, instinctively lowering her hand back toward the table.  “It’s good to meet you.”  As soon as Peter had stepped out of Lisa’s palm and back onto the table, Erica’s whole frame seemed to relax a little more.

                “You too,” Erica said, then laid her own palm onto the table next to Peter.  “We’re already running way behind, so is it cool if we get a move-on?”

                “Yeah, totally,” Peter agreed, hopping quickly into his sister’s hand as it rose up to be level with her stomach.  Instantly the eldest Clark made for the door, with the next bell set to sound any minute.  “I’ll… see you in gym later, Lisa.”

                “See you,” the redhead said softly as she reached down to grab her backpack.  She waved her fingers delicately at him, unable to hide a hopeful smile.

                “You sure do work fast, don’t you?” Erica chuckled as she leaned in closer to Peter, where he was perched on his usual corner of her lunch tray.

                “Say what?” he mumbled, his mouth half-full of shredded cheese he’d pulled from a taco on his sister’s plate.

                “You heard me,” she answered snidely, raising an eyebrow.  “That girl in your bio class.”

                “Who, Lisa?” Peter said, swallowing hard on the entire huge bite of food, and ultimately ended up hacking as a few chunks of it went down the wrong pipe.

                “Cool it, Romeo,” Erica snarked.  With a gentle index finger, she pressed on her brother’s shoulders, tipping him forward to make it easier to breathe again.  “And yes, that Lisa.  What’s the deal?”

                “Deal?  What kind of deal?” Peter said, punching himself in the chest in an effort to fully recover as he brushed his sister’s long finger away.

                Erica rolled her eyes.  “Well, she did have you in her hand, and you seemed pretty okay with it.  How’d you get there?”

                “Nothing interesting,” Peter shrugged nonchalantly.  “She’s my lab partner, and she’s a pretty cool person.  I guess we figured… like, if there’s ever a fire or something, I’ll have to…”

                “…ask her to roast some marshmallows with you?” Lena cut in from next to Erica, scooting in closer now that she’d revealed her snooping.  Her tone was sincere and amusingly eager as she brushed a chin-length lock of her brown hair behind an ear.

                It was Peter’s turn now to roll his eyes and throw his arms up as he sniveled at Erica, who was wearing a pretty smug grin.  “Oh, and you’re wondering why I don’t want to tell you about my friends now?” he groaned.  “Why didn’t you just throw it up on Facebook?”

                “C’mon, we need stuff to talk about.  It gets boring around here in the mornings,” Erica groused sarcastically.  “Lighten up.  You know Lena won’t tell people about your super-secret crush.  Will you?”

                “I really won’t, Peter.  Pinky swear,” Lena vowed.  Her hand appeared over the edge of the lunch tray with the aforementioned finger extended toward him.  Sighing, Peter touched his own tiny digit against the thick pad of his sister’s friend’s, though of course curling them together was totally out of the question due to the laughable difference in proportion.  Still, this was as legally binding a promise as he was going to get from these girls whom he often suspected could survive for days on nothing but the most menial scraps of gossip.

                “She’s not a super-secret crush, or really any kind of crush though,” Peter insisted as quietly as he could, well-aware that the other female occupants of the circular lunch table were beginning to lean in and eavesdrop on his romantic humiliations.  “She’s just my friend.”

                “Uh-huh,” Erica droned.  “Yeah, keep telling yourself that.”

                “Which one is she?  Is she at a table right now?” Lena gasped excitedly, rising up in her chair and turning her head in hopes of spotting someone in the cafeteria by pure luck.  “What does she look like?”

                “Red hair, freckles, white sweater, jeans…” Peter spat out automatically, then cleared his throat.  “She, um… doesn’t eat lunch on this period.  She’s on the next one.”

                “Ohhh,” Lena sighed.  She slumped back in her chair.  “Darn.”

                “I don’t suppose you know how many freckles, too, twerp,” Erica snorted.  “Or what direction she brushes her teeth?”

                “You guys must be even more bored than I thought if you’re this desperate,” Peter noted pompously as he slid back onto the tray and approached the partially eaten taco again, this time tugging a shred of lettuce that had fallen onto the plate.  Lifting it to his face, he dramatically chomped into it with as much forced zeal as he could muster.

                “Whatever.  We’re gonna reserve full rights to make fun of you, though, when you come crawling back wanting some advice about asking her out,” Erica teased, grabbing the entire taco itself once Peter had his leaf and crunching into the shell with just as much energy.  A rain of corn chip crumbs spewed downward in the carnage, but the freshman kept his look of unflinching defiance even as a few ricocheted harmlessly off his countenance.

                “No we’re not,” Lena whispered, shooting her friend a feigned glance of scolding, then leaned in closer to Peter until he could detect the chili sauce on her breath that instantly and watered his eyes.  “Peter, if you want any advice about that stuff, you know you can talk to any of us and we’ll be glad to help.”

                Gulping and wiping at his forehead, Peter looked up at the other six girls at the table, all of whom were listening in on the conversation now.  They all vigorously nodded in unison with enlarged and hopeful eyes, expressions of cooing fondness plastered on their faces.  There wasn’t a single one of Erica’s friends that didn’t positively adore Peter: something that occasionally surfaced as a source of mild ire for the girl.

                “You all make me sick,” Erica drawled.  She let her taco drop onto the plate, where the yellow shell shattered audibly.  “I swear.  You’re gonna give him a big head with that kind of attitude.  How’s he supposed to learn to do anything on his own?”

                “Don’t be mean to your brother, Erica,” her friend Sydney pouted, twirling a finger through one of her cotton-candy-pink-dyed locks of hair.  The others nodded in agreement.

                “Hopeless,” Erica grunted jokingly.  She leaned back in her chair as she realized she wasn’t going to win this particular argument about whether or not Peter deserved to have everything he wanted in the world, according to her entire friend group.

                “Excuse me?” sang a voice from behind Erica that managed to cut through the roaring chatter of the cafeteria.  Every occupant of the table swiveled around to face the owner of the voice: a woman with short black hair, peppered with wisps of premature silver.  Appearing to have barely crested middle age, she wore wide-brimmed brown glasses that hung around the back of her head on a thin bronze chain that rattled a little on every step.  Her eyes, a shade of hazel not quite as luminous as Erica’s, had locked to Peter, though as was rarely the case when meeting strangers, the freshman didn’t get the impression that he was being examined like a piece of fruit.

                “Yes?” Erica piped in, matching the woman’s volume.

                “You’re… Erica and Peter Clark, yes?”

                “That’s right,” Erica said.  Peter nodded from down on the tray, nibbling more docilely on the remainder of his lettuce leaf like a timid rabbit.

                The woman leaned in closer to the surface of the table, clinging to the eyeglass chain with her thumb.  “Peter?  I’m Lucy Park.  I teach theatre courses here, and direct the play and musical productions.  I was wondering if I could have just a brief moment to speak to you, maybe in a hallway so we can hear each other?”

                “Uh… sure,” Peter said, unsure of himself, but at least confident the woman had no foul play in mind.

                “Your sister can bring you, of course.  I’m not just trying to whisk you away,” the woman said reassuringly.  “Only a couple minutes of your time, I promise.”

                “All right,” Erica shrugged, laying her hand next to the plate so Peter could embark.  Once she had him, the pair rose from the table and followed a beaming Mrs. Park, weaving through the bustling students and trying not to knock over full lunch trays.

                Upon reaching the entrance to the music wing, the theatre teacher turned and faced Peter, her hands folded together somewhat reverently.

                “I suppose I’ll get right to my point.  This year’s fall play is a comedic production called Grimm-a-Palooza.  The idea is that it mashes a number of Grimm fairy tales together into one show.  It’s got Sleeping Beauty, Hansel and Gretel, Red Riding Hood, and Tom Thumb, and others too.”

                Peter swallowed, already suspecting where this might lead.

                “Anyway, the reason I’m telling you is because…” Lucy continued as her eyes fell off of Peter out of embarrassment, but her voice stayed determined.  “…ordinarily when the play is put on, Tom Thumb is performed by someone who is… maybe not quite six foot six in height, though still not of the stature described by the original story.  I thought if you would consider playing the role yourself…”

                Peter felt Erica’s hand stiffen slightly under his feet, as he knew it would.

                “…well, it just seemed like a unique opportunity for the stage and for the actor portraying the part.  Understand, I… know this may come off as insulting.  I’m aware what it probably looks like that I’ve come up to you in your first week at this school without having met you before and asked you to consider putting yourself out there in front of your peers.  There’s no need to give me an answer now.  All I wanted to do is pose the idea to you and hear your feelings on it.”

                Peter chewed is lip.  Certainly this wasn’t the first time in his life that his height had been viewed as a “unique” opportunity for something or other.

                At age three, he’d been suggested as the central figure of a commercial for a brand of toddler gummy vitamins that would’ve heavily involved a metaphor about tiny kids becoming big and strong through the use of the company’s product.  Suzanne Clark hadn’t taken kindly to such a degrading proposal for her young son, to say the least, especially when the advertising executive pitching the concept had without warning tickled the underside of the then-two-inch boy’s chin with her fingernail.

                Another occasion had arisen five years before.  Out to dinner at a restaurant with his mother and sisters, Peter had been approached at their table by a man and woman from a foundation looking into humane methods of medical testing to prevent the spread of disease in various parts of the world.  Their request was for some tests to be run on Peter, as they suspected his specialized genetic make-up might carry some answers.  Suzanne was merely hesitant at first as the pair described their processes of taking hair, mucus, and blood samples, but as they continued to ramble on with their desire to test some of Peter’s physical abilities through rather severe adjustments to eating, drinking, and sleeping, it became clear that this wasn’t a group the boy would be associating with.

Despite being ten years old, Peter had observed something beneath the surface.  He fully recognized their good intentions for an even greater good, but all the same, he could sense the drive for achievement in the couple as they stared down at the prepubescent Peter like a little chunk of meat, infomercial smiles spread on their rubbery faces.

The conversation had ended fairly swiftly afterward, with Suzanne demanding the pair be removed from the restaurant.  Even Erica, distant as she was back then, looked concerned for her brother after the encounter.  And the eight-year-old Jessica, of course, mortified at the notion of her helpless sibling being experimented on, had spent the better part of the evening crying under the covers of her bed with Peter cuddled up to her cheek and being unknowingly bathed in a wading pool of her tears.

                Something about Lucy was different, though.  Her eyes suggested she truly wasn’t in this to exploit Peter, but acting out of pure interest in making the play an interesting exploration in student art and, even, perhaps, allowing the physically disadvantaged young man the chance to participate on fairly even footing in an extracurricular activity.

                Peter wasn’t stupid.  As eager as he’d been the previous week to join the various club offerings of the school, he knew there was little he could contribute much in.  And he had, indeed, often wondered what it might be like to be an actor.

                Granted, his experiences in theatre had been pretty much limited to a few puppet shows his younger sister and her friends would perform for a delighted Suzanne and a bemusedly bored Erica, but he was still eager to give it a try.  The more he thought about it, the more he realized it was, in fact, a real opportunity for him: not just to get out there and try something new, or to interact with more of his peers, but to show everyone once and for all that he was a perfectly normal human being just like them who only happened to stand at less than half a foot tall.

                Looking upward at his sister’s steely expression, Peter leaned back against the heel of Erica’s hand and scratched the back of his neck.  His sister gave him a single glance, her eyes flashing, in answer.  He could tell she was still hesitant, but it certainly wasn’t an outright rejection of the entire idea.  Perhaps she had seen the same thing in Lucy’s eyes that he had.

                “I… I think it sounds… like fun,” he said truthfully.  “Would it be all right if I took some time to think about it and let you know?”

                “Absolutely!  I’m glad you think so.  I think we would all have such a great time discovering the show as a group.  Auditions are this Friday.  If you’re interested in participating, I’d still like to see some of what you can do, just so I have a reference point, but if you do decide to come, I think I can safely guarantee you the part I mentioned,” the theatre teacher said excitedly, clasping her hands together in thanks.  “I’ll let you get back to your lunch.  If you have any questions, just drop by my office any time, I’m just down here in the music wing next to the percussion classroom.”

                “Sure thing,” Erica said, knowing this last comment was more directed at her, as she was the primary mode of transport.  Peter, meanwhile, waved goodbye as the woman disappeared back down the hallway.  The two elder Clark kids remained alone in the hallway for a moment.

                “So, you’re gonna be a Broadway star, huh?” Erica said after an awkward pause.

                “Uh… yeah.  Obviously, except for the attitude and glitter.  But it’s just that…” he mumbled.

                “Yeah, I know.”

                “Mom is…”

                “I know,” Erica repeated, then sighed, acknowledging the uphill battle her sibling was now facing in the form of their highly protective parent.  “Better start brushing up on your persuasive speaking skills, twerp.”

                “I’m sorry to have to cut your time short out there,” Ms. Watson apologized as she shouldered open the door to the locker rooms where her office was located.  Peter perched in her broad palm, eyeing an especially pink callus on his teacher’s thick thumb that definitely hadn’t been there the day before.  “But now that we’re a week into school, I’ve got to get some of these forms sent off during office hours or the folks dealing with the filing system will have my hide.”

                “It’s fine,” Peter said.

                In truth, he’d have preferred to be outside watching his class play kickball.  Even if he couldn’t participate, it would still beat hanging out with his gym teacher in her office.  Plus, it would’ve given him a chance to offer moral support to Lisa.  The trio had made no more attempts to legally beat down his friend in the midst of the games after Amy’s spike the previous week, but all the same, he sorely wished he could be present.

                “Believe me, I’d leave you out there with your friends if I could,” the woman continued, practically reading his mind.  “It’s just the whole to-do the school board had over making sure you’re safe, especially during this class, when we’ve got balls bouncing all around the gymnasium.”  Ms. Watson re-entered the tiled little space of her office, the omnipresent blue brick of the locker room comprising her walls as well.  It felt to Peter like a particularly colorful jail cell.

                “Really, I… understand,” he repeated.

                “Glad to hear it, Peter,” the woman said, forcing an unnervingly cheesy smile as she took a seat at her desk and set her hand down on the surface for her student to step off.  Twitching as he did so, the five-inch pupil realized that, for the first time, the gym teacher hadn’t called one of her students by their last name.

                There was no denying Ms. Watson’s gruff no-nonsense demeanor had been steadily transitioning into one of earnest friendliness over the past week, and Peter wasn’t sure he was a fan.  A change like this in his acquaintances ordinarily gave the freshman cause to feel relief, because it meant someone was beginning to comfortably view him as a normal person.  Somehow, though, he couldn’t feel much more than awkwardness around Ms. Watson, as if she had suddenly started wearing a bright red clown nose and refused to acknowledge its existence.

                Still, he supposed he owed his teacher the benefit of the doubt, as she did seem to be trying to make the effort to treat him kindly, or at least her own somewhat eerie version of kindly.

                He gazed up at the powerful woman and watched her tweak the bangs of her short hairdo with a meaty thumb, her exposed bicep bulging rhythmically as she pinched her fingers together.  Once she was satisfied, her hand fell back to the desk and snatched up the computer mouse in pale enough knuckles that Peter felt fairly certain she could crack the plastic with a good enough squeeze.  Her eyes remained glued to the flashing screen as she set about filling in her forms, but Peter’s eyes couldn’t help but stay on her, a mix of respect and fear intermingling in his stomach.

It wasn’t that he hadn’t seen plenty of muscular people in his life; after all, anyone above the age of two would handily beat him in most any physical contest.  Rather, it was the way the towering woman performed every act with such aggression in a hundred subtle ways that might go invisible to all but someone like Peter, and perhaps that was part of what made him so uncomfortable.  She was trying to be something she wasn’t, or at least trying to hide the real side.  He watched her firm fingers pounding on the side of the mouse, her shoulders stiffening at regular intervals when she’d send off a new email, and heard her teeth clacking together out of habit.

Peter didn’t know Ms. Watson well, but at his size, the average human body was a veritable canvas of the psyche, and as sure as he breathed, the freshman could sense something was off in the tanned, toughened specimen that sat before him.

“I’m glad to have those out of the way,” the gym teacher sighed, leaning back in her chair and digging her fingers against her temple before standing from the seat and ascending to her full statuesque height above her student.  “There’s only a few minutes left of class, so everyone will be heading in to change soon.”

“All right,” Peter said, folding his hands behind his back.

“Why don’t you go ahead and get changed?” she said.  The phrase came more as a suggestion than the barked order it had been on his first couple of days, but it didn’t make Peter feel any better about the fact that Ms. Watson was legally obligated to watch him strip down to his underwear twice a day.

Admittedly, it was a menially small price to pay for the appeasement of the school board that had allowed him this chance at normalcy in his existence.  He still didn’t have to like it, though.

“Um, sure,” Peter said dryly, pulling his t-shirt and jeans out of his tiny backpack, stored in its normal spot next to Ms. Watson’s black coffee mug containing freshly sharpened pencils.

“I’m giving the blinds another pull to make sure you’ve got privacy,” Ms. Watson said, twisting the plastic wand that controlled the small shades of the window separating her office from the gym locker room.  Already Peter could hear the girls running around, slamming metal doors open and throwing sweaty uniforms into backpacks.

He gulped and tugged his own tiny gray shirt up his torso.  The sooner he learned to not make this weird, the faster this semester would go by.

“Had a long day?” Ms. Watson asked, and it took Peter a flinching second to realize she was directly addressing him.  Though she’d been standing close guard over him during the previous six classes of his young high school career, the woman hadn’t actually tried to engage him in conversation while he was changing, and he infinitely preferred that arrangement.  Still, her voice was too expectant of reciprocation to ignore without coming off as rude, however awkward the circumstances.  Peter bit his lip.

“It wasn’t so bad,” he answered neutrally, keeping his eyes locked to the surface of the desk.  Maybe if he displayed the minimum amount of engagement, she’d take the hint.

“You’re lucky.  Mine was an absolute bear,” Ms. Watson said, taking a heavy seat in her swivel chair, this time tilting herself so that she faced Peter where he stood.  She leaned toward the floor next and began fumbling with her shoelaces.

“Oh.  Well, it’s over now, I guess,” Peter said.  He tried to sound simultaneously optimistic and disengaged.

“Not quite.  I’ve still got more paperwork to go over before I head home.  It just goes on and on,” she said wearily, obviously at least partially convinced that all this would be interesting to her student.  A soft breeze brushed Peter’s face as she suddenly lifted her right leg up toward the desk, pressing the heel of her tennis shoe against the edge.  Digging her fingers into the mouth of the footwear, she tugged, releasing her socked appendage onto the surface.  She quickly followed suit with the other until both cotton-clad feet were propped up on the desk in front of the keyboard, close enough that she could’ve leaned her right foot down onto its side and touched her toe to Peter’s leg.

                At such close proximity, the freshman’s lungs filled immediately with the sour aroma of his gym teacher’s tired feet, still encased in the tight socks that were darkened under her heel and the ball of her foot with sweat.  He took a few steps back and covered his mouth, but it did little to stifle the pungent cloud forming around the desk.  Peter, often more aware of people’s bodily functions than they themselves, had long ago decided to be the ironically bigger person and courteously ignore as much as he was capable of doing without impeding his good health.  This situation, however, was beginning to bend the rule.

                “That’s… too bad,” Peter commented at last in answer to his teacher, who, apparently blissfully unaware of the effect the stench of her socks was having on her miniscule student, was intently picking at something under her thumbnail.

                “I’m sure it must sound petty for a physical education teacher to complain about having to move too much, but sometimes I just really feel the need to wind down, you know?” Ms. Watson continued with a shake of her head.  She ran her hands through her hair, clearly exasperated.

                “Uh-huh.”  Peter, seeing the opportunity as his teacher closed her eyes to relax, threw his t-shirt on, having discarded the gym uniform, and set about yanking the shorts down around his ankles.

                “Getting too tightly wound isn’t good for anybody.  And that’s just common sense,” Ms. Watson said, and Peter’s stomach lurched as he watched her arms reaching forward again with fingers outstretched toward her feet.  Pinching the ribbed lip of her sock between her fingers, she stretched it down over her heel, peeling it away from the skin in a trail of glistening cotton fibers.  Her toes wriggled as they were liberated at last from the fabric prison, her heel bouncing twice on the desktop with enough force that Peter nearly lost his balance.

                “Common sense,” the freshman repeated under his breath, or what little remained of it.

                “What was that, hon?” Ms. Watson asked sweetly as she finished removing the second sock, until at last both bare feet, tanned and sticky from a day of standing and jogging, took up potent residence on the desk.  With no buffer zone any longer between Peter and the massive peds, the rancid odor was able to pervade fully this time.

                Certainly, Peter was well-acquainted with the foul whiff of overworked feet, given the amount of time he spent on the floor at home, but almost never at this vicinity.  This woman, however, had put herself into another category.  Nausea began to rise in the young man’s gut.

                “I just… said I agree.  Common sense,” Peter said, fighting back a cough in his throat.

                “I thought we’d see eye to eye,” she said.  She pressed the big toe of her right foot against the left, massaging up and down the instep and sighing deeply.  Every wrinkle of her forty-year-old sole gave off a different fleshy glow reflected from the light above off her salty, lubricated flesh.  “You’ve got to know when to take it easy.”

                What the hell was she even talking about?  Was this how normal adults handled small talk?

                Peter knew he didn’t have a great deal of experience with a broad range of people, so his socializing skills were more limited than most his age, but he was almost positive the majority of people didn’t communicate in this way, and certainly not those who so obviously were faking an attitude for reasons unknown.

                “Y-Yeah,” he said, finally unable to keep back the coughing.  Ms. Watson, as he expected she might, completely ignored it.

                “I’m sure your mom does the same thing after a long day.  She’s a real estate agent, isn’t she?”

                “That’s right.”

                “And a pretty good one, from what I’ve seen in the papers a couple times.  It must really wear her out.”

                “Sometimes,” Peter said with a shrug, finally forcing himself again to affix his eyes to the surface of the desk, rather than getting lost in disgusted reverence for the tanned, sweat-gleaming appendages rubbing up against each other like greased animals.

                “You know, my mom worked for a living too.   All day on her feet.  At the end, she’d come back and just lay down on the couch, and I’d try to make it easier on her if I could.  Just a little rub here or there to help pull my weight,” Ms. Watson rambled nostalgically.  “You ever do that for your mom?”

                “What?” Peter said, looking up at her face again.

                “You know, hon.  Just give her a little foot rub after a long day slaving for you?”

                At this point, Peter realized he’d been standing in his underwear for several minutes without having put on his jeans, and was keenly aware that his teacher had been quite calmly observing him almost the entire time without moving her gaze.  He kicked the shorts away as though they’d unexpectedly caught fire and leapt into his denim pants, nearly tripping himself in the process.

Ms. Watson chuckled throatily at him as she began jamming the toes of her opposite feet together, the digits squirming over one another with the same quiet violence Peter had observed in nearly every other movement the woman had made so far.  He shivered, and not just from the cold of the office.

“Not really, no,” Peter answered, looking down and pretending to rummage for something through his backpack once he was dressed again.

“Hmm.  Pity,” Ms. Watson said, sounding genuinely disappointed, to the extent that it caught Peter’s attention even amongst her already alien digressing.  “I’m sure she’d appreciate you giving it a try someday.  Your hands would just… well, I’ll bet you’d have a talent for it.”

Peter nodded neutrally, holding back another hacking storm as the oxygen pumping through his body was composed of about 90% dank, feminine effluvium leaked from the acrid pores of his gym teacher’s naked soles.

Miraculously, the woman leaned back in her chair again and folded her knees, removing her feet from the desk and plopping them to the tile with a wet slap.  She sighed.

“Well, I suppose your sister will be here any minute to pick you up, hmm?” Ms. Watson said, and then batted one eyelid in the creepiest attempt at a wink Peter had yet witnessed.  “And if you take my advice about your mom, let me know how it goes.  I’ll bet it makes you the favorite for a while.”

“I’ll bet,” Peter mouthed to himself with uncommon hollowness.  He hugged his backpack to his chest and tried to ignore the chill that still nipped at his skin, despite being back in clothes.

Peter studied the endless mottled rush of elms and picket fences beyond the bus window.  He didn’t have many opportunities to see the enormous outside world zoom along, as his specialized seat in his mother’s car ensured he couldn’t see much more than leather walls and protective straps unless he craned his neck to see this sky.  This was a rare treat, and something he knew he’d be looking forward to more and more on the rides between school and his home.

Perched on his sister’s shoulder as she leaned against the window, the freshman held his breath and tried to meld the details of the houses into his mind, wondering what it might be like to try sketching them out later, but there was simply too much to take in.  He gripped a tuft of his sibling’s dishwater-blonde hair tighter in his fist for support, absentmindedly winding it around his wrist.

“Don’t pull on my hair or you’re coming right off of there and back down here again,” Erica warned as she texted feverishly with her phone in her lap, her eyes not even moving away from the screen.

“Right,” Peter responded from beneath the soft canopy, loosening his grip but continuing to play with the silky strands all the same.

                “So are you gonna ask her out?” Erica droned after a strange pause of several minutes where Peter almost managed to lose himself in the scenery again.

                “What?”

                “Quit pretending you’re deaf.  That only works once a day,” Erica said dryly, but Peter could tell from her tone that an amused smirk was threatening to creep onto her lips.  “That girl that was holding you in bio.  Lisa.  You gonna go for it?”

                “Hardy-har-har.  Didn’t you get all your laughs about that at lunch today?  You don’t even have your audience here for back-up,” Peter fired back with a dismissively sarcastic snicker.

                “Back-up.  Right,” Erica snorted with derision.  “You could tell everybody at that freaking table wants to find you a girlfriend before we’re even a month into school, right?”

                “Maybe a little.  I think they’re just having fun.”

                “Maybe,” she said.  “How do you know I’m not being serious, though?”

                “Lisa’s just my friend,” Peter said.  “I’ve only known her a week, anyway.”

                “I’m not saying go get married and pop out a bunch of kids, I’m just saying see if she wants to hang out.  It can’t hurt you,” Erica said.  “And anyway, your face doesn’t get like that much.  How it looked when I picked you up from class, I mean.  You looked like a freaking kid seeing the circus for the first time.”

                Peter swallowed.  She really did notice things in him, with just as much skill, it seemed, as he had in noticing the nuances the race of giants he lived amongst.  He held his breath.

“It doesn’t matter.  I’m… still me,” the freshman grunted quietly with self-deprecation, looking disdainfully down at his doll-sized frame.  “What would she want with this?”

                “Ugh.”

                Hearing his sister make bemused throat noises wasn’t something at all new to the freshman, but for once he couldn’t quite comprehend the timing of it.  After how her friends had been acting at lunch, he assumed she’d leap to agree with his practical take on things.

                Instead, he suddenly felt her shoulder shifting below him, tilting forward.  He sensed gravity taking hold of him, despite his safety grip on Erica’s hair.  Turning to look over his shoulder, he felt great relief to realize his sister’s hand was cupped just below him, allowing him to tumble back about an inch and into her palm.  Once she had him, the seventeen-year-old brought her brother just under her chin so her face blocked his window view.

                “Cool trick.  Try it from a little higher next time,” Peter said quietly, hoping to provoke a real smile this time.

                “Okay, listen up, twerp, because I’m going to try to clue you into something here,” Erica answered stonily.  “You can’t just keep on going like this.  Thinking like… this.”

                “Thinking like what?”

                “Like you’re not worth anything to anybody,” Erica said bitterly, practically spitting the words under her breath.  “Because that’s bullshit.”

                Peter paused, letting the cuttingly heartfelt whisper linger for a moment.  He was surprised by Erica’s words and even touched by her willingness to put them out there, but certainly not swayed: not after the brick wall of denial he’d been constructing over the past week and, really, ever since he was capable of considering his nonexistent potential for romance.

                “I… know I’m worth things to people.  I do.  I’m just trying to be realistic about this one thing.  You said it yourself.  There’s no room for me to try and take everything on myself,” Peter said, matching his sister’s tone.

                “That’s different, and you should know it,” she snapped.

                “Why is it?  There’s nothing I can do for myself at school.  I can’t walk to class, turn in homework, buy a lunch, go to the bathroom-”

                “But you can talk to people and make them feel special,” Erica butted in with enough force that Peter flinched.  “That’s something you can do better than any of the six-foot guys I know.  God knows I never really figured it out with Sean.”

                Peter bit his lip, knowing every word was genuine, especially after this final admission.  Erica had split rather messily with Sean, her boyfriend of two years, just a month ago during the summer and refused to even allude to it in any capacity to a single member of the household.  He didn’t know the details, but he did know from personal experience that his sister had issues with closeness and general human warmth that might well have contributed to the break-up.  This conversation right now was by far the most emotionally open one he’d ever had with Erica, and he almost felt the need to chuckle at that fact, if it wasn’t all so startling.

                 “Why are you saying all this?” Peter asked quietly.

                Erica sighed.  “Look, you convinced Mom to put you in high school to start living a more normal life, right?  People with normal lives sometimes have to scare themselves and just give things a shot.  And maybe you haven’t figured that out yet, so I’m just giving you a hint,” she said.  The bus lurched to a stop at the end of their street.  “And besides, if you pity-party any harder, it’s gonna start to rub off on me, and neither of us is even the drinking age yet, so you need to drop that soon.”

                Peter blurted in surprised laughter and bowed his head, embarrassed and thankful for his often tactless but nonetheless good-hearted older sibling.

                “I know,” he managed as Erica rose up and sidled out of the bus seat, her hand closing slightly around him to shield him from the eyes of the other passengers.  “Thanks.”

                “Don’t mention it, twerp,” she said, stomping down the steps of the yellow transport and onto the sidewalk.  Her phone, which she’d pocketed earlier to caringly browbeat her brother back into his senses, was already back in her free hand and her fingers were tapping away.

                “So along the lines of that more-normal-life thing…” Peter began, hugging his legs to his torso.  “Any suggestions for what to say to Mom about being in Grimm-a-Palooza?”

                “Don’t… freaking say the name of the show.  It’s gonna give me an ulcer,” Erica gagged as she walked down the street toward their house.

                “Really, though.  Please?  I’d… really like to give it a try.”

                “I know.  I’m thinking,” his sister reassured as her gaze remained on her cell phone screen.  “If you want any kind of chance though, you can start by not telling her first-thing that they want you to play freaking Tom Thumb.”

                He muffled another snicker.   “It doesn’t bother me.  I don’t understand why it has to with her.”

                “Get used to it, twerp.  She’s always gonna flip out over anything that might be taking advantage of you.  That’s probably never going to change.”

                “I know,” he sighed.  “So what else can I even say?”

                “I don’t know.  Tell her you’ll need things for college apps in three years,” Erica said with a shrug.  “Show you’re a team player or something.”

              No further suggestions came as the pair arrived on the stoop of the Clark house.  Erica shouldered her way inside, flinging her backpack into the carpeted sitting room with bombastic aplomb just like always.

It wasn’t like he blamed his mother.  Getting Suzanne to give an inch on anything that involved even infinitesimal potential risk to her tiny son’s wellbeing was a skyscraper-sized order.  As dearly as she loved her children, she had apparent difficulty being straight with Peter about why she wouldn’t let him participate in any given activity, and would often resort to just about any excuse she could grab onto.  Peter expected this conversation to go no differently.

“Welcome home!” Suzanne sang from the kitchen.

Despite his love and revere for his mother, the freshman felt something like an omen mixed with indigestion swelling inside himself.

Erica entered the kitchen with her brother still cupped in her palm and laid her hand on the marbled island counter, where Peter quickly stepped off and walked closer to the edge, where he could survey his mother and plot the most eloquent attack possible.

Even in her best moods, Suzanne Clark didn’t let much by when it came to her son’s participation in activities where he only came up to the ankles of his peers.  Frankly, Peter half-attributed her enrolling him in actual high school to divine intervention.  Weaseling an extracurricular activity out of her would probably require similar luck.

“Hey, you two,” Suzanne said from the kitchen table, the surface of which was covered in paperwork.  “Have a good day?”

“Oh, yeah!” Peter said so happily he almost gave himself a cavity.

“Everybody was nice today?  No problems getting to class?”

“Nope!  I’ve made friends already in almost every class.  Everybody is just really cool,” he continued, refusing to let the overly broad smile drop from his face.  Peter had to give himself every advantage possible from the get-go, and that meant reinforcing the lie that his high school was a veritable sanctuary of safety and prosperity for five-inch-tall teenagers.

“I’m so glad to hear it,” his mother said with a seemingly satisfied smile, shifting her attention to her daughter.  “Erica?  What did you do today?”

“Nothin’,” the girl reported predictably with a shrug, swinging open the pantry door and rooting through the boxes of granola bars and crackers.  She looked over her shoulder at Peter, mumbling: “Want anything while the door’s open?”

“Could I get a fruit bar?  Thanks,” Peter said pleasantly, folding his hands behind his back and trying not to let his legs sway with anxiety.  He cleared his throat as he turned back to Suzanne.

“Mom?  I, uh… I had a really interesting conversation with a teacher today,” he started.

“Oh?  Which teacher?” his parent said.  Her gaze had returned to the paperwork and she was busily scribbling away with a few signatures on dotted lines.

“The… theatre teacher.  Mrs. Park.”

“I think I met her once.  She’s a very sweet woman,” Suzanne said, then paused in her writing.  “You’re not in a theatre class, though.”

“Oh yeah, it wasn’t about… a class, she actually came in at lunch and talked to me.  She… just wanted to offer, if I wanted to think about it, umm…” he fumbled, but at last puffing up his tiny chest and throwing it out in the open.  “…being in the school play?”

His mother’s hand placed the pen back on the table with quiet grace and she turned her head at last to regard her tiny son on the countertop.  She pressed her index finger into the side of her cheek and pursed her lips, the way she always did when her brain was working very hard on coming up with the least disappointing way to tell her child “no.”

It was a look Peter was well acquainted with, and he could tell he was already losing ground fast here to his mother’s over-protective nature.  Sometimes the woman would sweep her thumb thoughtfully over her chin before moving to pin her finger against her temple, but today she’d moved right to the danger zone.  If she tilted her head and stroked her palm down the side of her face, Peter knew it would be all over.

Erica, now leaning on a bar stool in front of the countertop island, chewed with her mouth open on a fruit bar, the package crinkling as she peeled it back.  Her fingernail dug into the bottom corner and she tore off a gummy crumb the size of her brother’s fist.  Wordlessly, she nudged her sibling in the hip with the offering, which he gratefully accepted, if only to find something to do with his nervous hands.  He began jamming the morsel hungrily into his face.

“Oh, Peter,” Suzanne sighed: probably her most common pairing of stressed syllables.  She smiled, but both her children could tell immediately how forced it was.  The woman rose from her chair and walked slowly toward the island, wringing her hands together.  “That’s… wonderful that you’re finding opportunities already at your school.  I’m so proud of you…”

But.  There had to be a but.  Where was it?”

“…but I just don’t know.  I’d be worried about how safe it might be.  Especially backstage in the dark, or around the other kids.  How would I know someone was looking out for you?”

“Well, Mrs. Park is in charge of the play.  She’s… probably liable in the same way my teachers are, right?” Peter said.  “It would be the same as going to class.  And you’ve even met her and liked her, so right now she even has that over my actual teachers.”

Suzanne winced almost imperceptibly, tapping another couple fingers to her skin, getting closer and closer to the point of no return.  Erica munched on her snack in the silence.

“That’s true, I suppose,” the doting parent sighed.  “But what about the auditions?  What if the selection process puts you at a disadvantage?  I wouldn’t want to see you disappointed.”

Grimly, Peter tried not to stew on the irony of this final sentence.

“She basically already offered me a part.  She said I still have to audition so she can see what I can do, but as long as I go, I’m in,” he said more confidently as he stuffed the last bite of the fruit bar down his throat.

“What part?”

“I don’t remember,” Peter said, perhaps too quickly, without skipping a beat.

Suzanne’s eyes narrowed in concentration, and her gaze fell to her daughter as she placed her hands on her hips.  “Erica?  Was this the sense you got too?”

“Uh-huh,” the girl agreed with some apparent disinterest, mouth still full.  “If he shows up, he gets to be in it.”

“I see,” Suzanne said wearily, placing a hand back to her forehead.  Peter cringed, and it wasn’t just because he’d swallowed something three times too large in record time.

“So what do you think?  The audition is Friday.  Please, Mom.  I really, really want to do this,” he begged, fighting the urge to put his hands together.  It was time to start laying his cards down or risk losing the chance for good.  “I could finally start showing more people that I’m not just some little freak-”

“You’re NOT some little freak!” Suzanne scowled remorsefully, her voice cracking as she lowered herself down to eye level with Peter, her manicured fingers curled over the lip of the marble.

“I know, Mom.  But they don’t know that yet.  This might be my chance to show them,” Peter whispered soothingly, patting his mother’s index finger, which rose to stroke his shoulder at the contact.

“But… but…” Suzanne muttered.  She was on the ropes, but not done yet.  “Jessica has her… dance class, on the opposite side of town, that I already have to… pick her up from.”

“I could carpool home,” Peter offered, discouraged.

“I already hate that you have to be on that bus without any protection.   I don’t want you in a car without your special seat,” Suzanne protested.  Her resilience was building back up as she continued to ramble.  “And with the distance from Jessica to you, you’d be there so late, they might start to close down… who knows who’d be supervising then?”

“Mom…”

“I’m sorry, sweetie, but this distance is going to make it too tough,” she sighed apologetically.  Peter understood fully that his mother’s wall of half-concocted excuses only existed out of her terror that he might be harmed, but all the same, it stung deeply to be denied this after his previous appeal.

“I’ll drive him.”

Both Peter and Suzanne, stunned, swiveled over in the direction of Erica, still with a bite of the fruit bar hanging out of her lips, as she continued leaning nonchalantly against the stool.

“What did you say, honey?” Suzanne asked, trying to hide her anxiety at her final excuse being cut down.

“I said I’ll drive him home after his thing,” Erica repeated with a shrug.

Peter blinked several times to ensure he was still awake and not in some mirror universe hellscape, then quickly got excited chills up his limbs when he realized his mother wouldn’t be coming back from this last verbal defensive maneuver.  He tried not to look too gleeful for his defeated parent.

“His rehearsals are probably everyday.  Are you sure you can-” Susan attempted meekly, quietly panicking now.

“Mom, I know how to drive a car, and school is only twenty minutes away.  I think I can handle it,” Erica snarked, finishing off the food and discarding the snack wrapper on the countertop before sauntering into the hallway and hurrying upstairs.

“Well,” Suzanne said, swallowing audibly, curling her fingers around her son’s back as though trying to pre-emptively protect him from the mortal dangers of after school activities.  “I guess we’ve… got an actor in the house now, huh?”

“I guess so,” Peter said with a smirk, hugging his mother’s massive hand and wishing he could do the same for Erica a thousand times over without it being weird.

The Wednesday morning bell was seconds away from ringing as Erica jogged into Peter’s U.S. History room, so there was barely time for the freshman to dive from her palm and onto the surface of the desk to remain punctual.  Once she’d dropped him off, of course, the girl was far more leisurely about her exit and subsequent commute over to her own first period.

           Apparently she was learning to take full advantage of her perfectly valid excuse for being late to class, which the freshman decided could only work in his favor, since her general demeanor seemed to have improved as of late.  Almost out of breath himself from the rush despite the fact that he’d just been sitting in his sister’s hands the whole way, Peter wiped his eyes, which had watered from the wind blowing past that would’ve threatened to topple him down to the carpet far below if not for Erica’s fist forming a protective cocoon around him.

It was by no means his favorite way to travel, particularly since his younger and more immature cousins had occasionally taken it upon themselves during family reunions to playfully entrap Peter under household objects, or even just their own clammy and Cheeto-dusted fingers, giggling as he squirmed in an attempt to escape their grubby grasps, until the game was ended by an enraged Suzanne or Jessica.

Such a thing hadn’t happened in years since his relatives had gotten old enough to treat him with a modicum of human respect, but the sensation still lingered and tended to spook the freshman whenever his family felt the need to restrict his movement in their hands for safety reasons.

Not that he’d ever mention this fact to any of them, of course.

                As the last students guiltily filed in with the serenade of the bell followed by overhead office announcements, Peter craned his neck to find Lisa in her normal back corner of the room.  Today she had on a maroon sweater, but even against the ruddy competition, her silky locks still shone far brighter.  He couldn’t quite make out her face, as she seemed to be focused intently on a piece of paper she was writing on.  Gripping a pencil, her hand glided slowly in rounded swirls that let Peter know she was probably writing in cursive.  Awkwardly, he tried waving his arms without being too obnoxious, but it was no use.

                “Lisa!” he hissed, getting a few heads to turn with interest, but not the one he wanted.  “Hey, Lisa!”

                Still nothing.

                “I told you, shortstuff,” Sharon said from behind him, snapping Peter’s attention up to her silvery eyes instantly.  “Some people don’t always make the best friends.”

                “What do you mean?” Peter muttered, averting his eyes after a few stinging seconds.

                “Her, in the back.  I told you she doesn’t talk to people.  This is just what she does.”

                “She… she’s probably just tired or something,” Peter said as he looked back over at Lisa’s minute, robotic motions.  The classroom door swinging open interrupted his concerned study.

                “All right, sports fans, let’s get going.  Sorry I’m late,” Mr. Browning said cheerily, clapping his hands against a textbook as he came through the door.  The noise silenced the buzzing chatter of the class after just a few repetitions.  “It’s good to hear this kind of energy so early in the morning.  I can’t wait to see you bring that enthusiasm to your History Now spiels.”

                The class groaned collectively at being reminded of their academic obligations.  Peter dug through his backpack for the scraps of paper he’d written his notes on.

                “History Now,” he had to admit, was a pretty cheesy sounding name for the yearlong homework system.  Every week several students were assigned to give a brief presentation on a focused aspect of the subject matter from the recent lesson plans, and two other students along with Peter had been randomly assigned to go first.

                It was nice, Peter thought, to be able to get it out of the way so early, and he only needed to complete it once more later in the semester.  His topic was “mercantilism,” and all he had to do was talk about it for a few minutes.  He’d put plenty of study into it, far more than he probably needed, and was eager to demonstrate his ability to comprehend 16th century economic practices.

                “Would anyone like to present first?” Mr. Browning asked.  There was silence.  “Anyone?  Anyone?  Buehler?” he added, chuckling at his movie reference, but stopped himself when he realized how few of the students even understood it.

                Inhaling deeply and then releasing the air through his nostrils, Peter tried to pump himself up and patted onto his leg the drum solo from a song he’d heard on the radio that morning.  This would make good practice for his debut on the high school’s stage in Grimm-a-Palooza, assuming Suzanne didn’t backtrack on her allowance at the last second.  Mustering the gumption, then, he raised his hand.

                “Peter!  Great, thanks for volunteering,” Mr. Browning said happily.  “I was afraid I was going to have to make you all draw straws.”

                Peter straightened his notes precociously, a little boost of adrenaline coursing through his veins.  As eager as he was, a simultaneous feeling of anxiety was beginning to take hold.  After all, he’d never before had to formally present anything before a large group, and he could already feel every eye on him again like on the first day of class.  Now, though, if he could just cool off and embrace the limelight, it could be on his terms, not theirs.

                For courage, the freshman earnestly peered back to the corner of the room to see Lisa, but was surprised to see hers was the only pair of eyes not locked to him.  If anything, her head was bowed the same way it had been during biology the day before, ensuring there was very little of the room she could actually make out.  Peter crumpled the edge of his notes, if only for something to occupy his hands, and realized how sorely he wished he could just make simple eye contact with his friend.  It would’ve helped immensely.

                “Errr… Peter, normally people come up to the front to present, but I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable.  Would you be all right with that?  Could you have a friend give you a lift?” Mr. Browning said, scratching his chin with slight embarrassment.

                After all this work he’d put into the research for a two-and-a-half-minute project, not to mention his continued quest to be treated as much like his taller peers as possible, Peter didn’t see how he could skip the chance to present from the front.

                “Sure, I can come up,” the height-challenged freshman said, turning once again to the back corner of the room, fully expecting that this question would at least give Lisa cause to look up at him finally.  It seemed like a no-brainer to address her in a moment like this, especially since she was the only person in the school besides his sister and two teachers that Peter had authorized to hold him.

                But once again, he was met with the sight of her startling red locks, covering her eyes as she leaned over her paper.  Her hand was moving slower now as she continued writing, like she was putting at least some energy into listening, but it kept up its trail all the same, having not even paused to acknowledge that Peter needed someone to carry him.

                “Is there… a particular person you’d be comfortable getting a ride from?” Mr. Browning said, repeating the previous question.   He nearly stumbled over the words, obviously severely unaccustomed to so casually mentioning the possibility of one student transporting another in their hand.

                “Uh… m-maybe,” Peter said.  He considered calling out her name again, but the soft syllables caught in his throat.  Instead he continued staring in Lisa’s direction, hoping if he did it intensely enough, she’d snap back into the present and acknowledge his existence.

                There was no such luck.  The girl remained hunched silently over her work, still as a statue save for her hand poised with the writing utensil.

                Was something the matter?  Had something happened to her?

                More than anything now, Peter wished he could speak to his friend.

                “I can take him,” came the sly quicksilver voice, slithering as a sharp whisper into Peter’s ear.  He nearly let the scribbled notes fall from his numbed fingertips.

                “Thank you, Sharon.  Is that all right with you, Peter?”

                Peter turned, realizing the queen bee had already silently risen from her chair and was standing over him, barely tilting her chin down to see him, as though his geographic position hardly warranted notice.  Her pale hand descended, curved a little like a crescent moon as her fingernails tapped with the volume of dropped pins onto the surface of his desk.

                “Y-Y…” he peeped, shell-shocked by the sudden sight of her looming over him: a beautiful mirage that barely minded his being.  What was he even saying right now?  “Y-Yes.”

                “Climb in, shortstuff,” she said.  The words came as steely orders despite how low under her breath they were delivered.

                Peter stepped closer to Sharon’s hand, the hairs on his arms standing on end.  He was painfully aware of how quiet the room had become as every person except for the one he cared about most was watching with supreme interest, but even if there’d been sound, it would’ve gone unnoticed by the hapless student.

Unlike most people who were offering to give Peter a ride, Sharon had made no effort to flatten her palm horizontally to act as a cushioned platform for her passenger.  Instead, she bent her fingers ever so slightly, creating an awkward shelf of space where he might stand.  Her wrist was steady, and Peter could tell she was entirely in control of her bodily movements, so there wasn’t a risk of falling.

Unless she wanted there to be one, of course.

And as Peter stared upward along the slender mountain of Sharon’s body and up to her cutting eyes, he realized there might very well be one.  His confirmation to let her carry him felt alien and distant in his mouth, and he wondered how it had managed to pass his lips.  The very idea of letting Sharon touch him in any context unless his very existence depended on it filled him with crackling, icy dread.

Unfortunately, the gentle clearing of a throat somewhere off to the side of the room flooded Peter with self-consciousness and jumpstarted him into action.  He placed both feet onto Sharon’s fingertips, and quickly realized he’d have to lean into the wall of her delicate digits if he wanted to feel entirely secure.  The girl’s hand rose almost immediately as she began walking up the aisle of desks, and with a heart-jolting thrust, Peter fell against Sharon’s palm.  Her skin was warm and incredibly soft, like a baby’s, yet the freshman couldn’t have felt colder as he became aware that his entire body was pressed up against Sharon’s hand, right where she wanted him.

The ride to the front of the room was a brief string of seconds but stretched on for what felt to Peter like minutes as he attempted to shuffle his body into a position that didn’t require him to awkwardly hug himself into Sharon’s flesh, yet try as he might, he couldn’t find the right angle, as though he’d been magnetized to her palm.  The longer he laid against the supple surface of the siren’s appendage, the more his heartbeats seemed to slow and become heavier, like a rock swaying against the inside of his tiny chest, and he knew she could probably feel it.  He managed a glance over his shoulder from this higher perch, where Lisa was more easily seen, but even now she still didn’t look up.

Unpeeling himself from Sharon’s hand at last felt to Peter like lunging onto a beach after being lost at sea.  As the girl set him down on the top of the wooden podium next to Mr. Browning’s desk, he found himself wishing to bend down and kiss the safe ground, but resolved not to for the very real possibility of further ostracization.

Sharon all but floated back to her desk, her hair sweeping gracefully behind her, and suddenly all attention was back on Peter.  The note cards in his hands had dampened with nervous sweat.

“M-M…” he mumbled, biting his tongue and forcing air into his lungs through sheer will.  “Mercantilism.”

His memory had gone blank as he looked back up to find all eyes, especially Sharon’s boring right through him, and he fumbled with the cards, reading their bullet points aloud like a foreign language.

Peter was on time to his second period biology class, but was dismayed to find Lisa hadn’t beaten him into the room.  Most of the students were already present, and so with a sigh, the freshman stepped off Erica’s hand and unpacked his belongings onto the pitch surface of the lab table.  He tried to ignore the gaping emptiness of the chair next to his space, but it proved difficult as Mrs. Baker arrived, her arms stacked high with books and manila folders, and plunged into an introductory lesson on photosynthesis.

Lisa wandered in sheepishly about ten minutes late, gripping the straps of her backpack in a tight fist and dragging the laces along the floor.  The pudgy teacher’s dry-erase marker squeaked to a halt on the board as she turned to raise an eyebrow at the tardy redhead before returning wordlessly to the notes.

“Sorry I’m late,” Lisa said delicately.

“Just make sure you get what you missed from someone,” Mrs. Baker said contentedly without turning again.

Peter watched as Lisa shuffled her sneaker-clad feet on the way down the aisle, again avoiding his gaze as she slid into her seat as inconspicuously as possible and pulled a pencil out from behind her ear, where it had been mostly concealed by her cascading hair.

The freshman paused, setting his pad and graphite tip down in front of his crossed legs, too distracted now as he peered sheepishly up at Lisa’s face.  He searched desperately across the soft landscape of her face for a sign: maybe a glint in her eye, a quicker pace to her breathing, a deeper etching in her dimples.  Something, at least, to give him a starting point for wrapping his head around this stonewalling behavior.

But he saw nothing.  Not a twitch or a sigh.  She’d settled quickly into note-taking and tried to copy down as much as she could before Baker wiped the work away and replaced it with even more, and Peter could only stare at her for so long before he risked becoming lost too or worse getting caught with his attentions so humiliatingly squared on Lisa.  He wanted to raise a hand or try to whisper his friend’s name, but something stopped him, as though the redhead suddenly had an aura about her that made her untouchable in this moment.  It almost seemed to repel him.

When the freshman thought he could endure the strange divide no longer, though, Mrs. Baker finished doling out the monotone lecture notes and began passing worksheets back through the aisles on which to practice the material.  The stack of white sheets, buoyed on a sea of student grumbles and bored hands, at last reached Lisa, who accepted two sheets for her table and passed the rest back.

“Lisa?” Peter murmured hopefully.

At last she turned her head to acknowledge his existence, silently shattering the invisible barrier that had been gelling so frightfully between them.  Her eyes lit up at the sight of him, and her lip quivered, but the smile he’d witnessed slowly revealing itself to him over the past week was nowhere to be seen.  She waved her fingers in that graceful way, as though petting piano keys to lull out whispered notes, and gave Peter a pleasurable little shiver.  For a moment, things felt like they could be all right again.

“Hi, Peter,” she said a little too solemnly as she slid one of the papers closer to her lab partner.  Her voice was hesitant, like it had been at their first meeting eight days ago, and puzzled Peter immensely.  The way some of their conversations had gone in the class periods past, he’d seen her start to emerge from her shell and treat him without fear or judgment, like an ordinary person.

Especially after Erica’s unorthodox pep talk on the bus ride home the day before, he had been feeling just empowered enough to consider the possibility that Lisa might be willing to catch a movie with him.

That sensation was completely sapped now.  She almost resembled a cornered animal, interacting with him out of fear rather than the kindness he’d come to recognize.

Fear.  Over a boy so small she could hold him in her hand.

What had gone wrong?

                “What’s up?” he managed awkwardly after the girl’s eyes had returned to her paper.

                “Nothing, really,” she sighed.  Her green irises flashed to him again.  “How are you?”

                “I’m… fine,” he answered uneasily, reflecting on the irony of such a question from someone acting so peculiarly out of her element, even given her more reserved nature.  “You?”

                “I’m good.”

                “Are you… doing okay?” he tried quietly.

                “Yes,” she said briskly.  Her hand scooped the pencil up and set about scribbling out answers with enough speed that it was a wonder her writing came out legibly.  “We should probably get to work before she starts walking around to check on us.”

                “Yeah.  Yeah, totally,” Peter said, nodding as he hesitantly grabbed up his pencil tip again.  With stupendous fortitude, the freshman set about looking over the blank field of the worksheet and transcribing answers onto his tiny notebook pad so his mother could scan it later for Mrs. Baker’s aging eyes to read.

                About six very distracted answers down the sheet he realized he’d been filling in the spaces one number down.  Hardly the end of the world, but Peter had been staunchly meticulous so far in making his work clear for his teachers to read, in effort to avoid any level of resentment.  By now he took it as a personal character defect to have made such an error.  With a groan, he fished out the pink eraser Suzanne had sliced off of a pencil for him to use.

                It was unwieldy work using a piece of rubber the size of a healthy sponge, but after scrubbing out his incorrect placements, Peter picked the pencil tip back up and glanced over at Lisa, engrossed in her own sheet still.  He placed his dark utensil back to the paper, squeezing it tighter than he had before, and scratched in the first few letters before his iron grip on the thin piece snapped the tip cleanly in half, leaving his hands blackened with powdered residue.  Flustered, he gasped aloud.

                The destruction of Peter’s puny pencil was nearly silent, and certainly turned no heads in the room despite the tedium of the work, but he did notice Lisa’s hand pause with a distinct jerk at the sound of his surprised intake of breath.  She lifted her head up and inhaled deeply enough that her maroon sweater swelled a little, then turned to look at him again.

                “Everything okay?” she whispered, quickly ascertaining what Peter had done.  “Do you want another one?”

                “T-That’d be great,” Peter said, blinking numbly.  Erica carried a small baggie of extra pencil tips and other supplies for her brother to change out in between classes, but there simply wasn’t storage space in his backpack for more.

                Drawing another pencil from her own pack, Lisa bent the tip of the freshly sharpened lead tool against her thumbnail until it broke off.  She handily captured the tiny tip between two fingers before it could bounce into the void below the desk and steadily lowered it toward her lab partner.

                “I’ve only got two pencils, so you may be out of luck if this one breaks, too,” she said.  The girl allowed herself the slightest of smiles that let Peter know the person he thought he’d become acquainted with this week was, in fact, still in there behind the stone stoicism.  Reaching forward, he plucked the implement from between the tender give of her fingertips.

                “Lisa,” Peter said meaningfully, aching too much now from the silent treatment.  The redhead didn’t even have time to pick her own pencil back up before freezing in place, sensing the weight of the spoken word, and looked back to her friend, a forlorn glaze in her emerald eyes.

                “I’m sorry,” she said, breaking eye contact almost immediately.

                “What?”

                “I said I’m sorry.  Just for… everything.  I didn’t mean anything by it.”

                “By what?” Peter followed up in the same breath.

                “I didn’t mean to… bother you this week,” Lisa choked out.  She bit her lip.

                “To bother me this- what are you talking about?” he stammered, mouth hanging open now.

                She shrugged with resignation.  “You don’t have to be embarrassed or anything that I know about it.  Really.  I know all of this is so new to you, and I’m… kind of more used to doing my own thing, anyway.”

                “No, I mean… why would you think you were bothering me?” he asked, hoping in his mild horror his questions didn’t come off as demanding when she clearly was already so concerned with her lovely humanity being mistaken for something irritating.

                Lisa swallowed.  “It doesn’t really matter.  I talked to people in gym yesterday while you were off with Watson.  They told me.”

                “Who?” he pressed with exasperation, already fearing the answer.

                “Well… Sharon,” she uttered.  Almost as soon as she said it, Lisa frowned.  She seemed to notice the incongruous logic, as though she’d been under a temporary spell right up to this moment, and speaking it aloud had liberated her.

                “Sharon.  Sharon said that,” Peter repeated.  He’d seen it coming, but he still felt like he’d been flicked in the stomach, which for the diminutive freshman was a fairly major blow.

                “Y-Yeah.  She… said the two of you talked in your English class.  About how you’re new here, how you’re trying to find friends, that you said I kept bothering you in the classes we have, I…” she continued, her tone growing more sickly now.  “Oh, God…”

                “Lisa, I never said anything like that to her.  I promise,” he said.  Peter extended both arms, subconsciously imploring her to believe what was already clear to both of them as an easily grasped concept of Sharon’s deception.

                “I’m sorry about this too, then,” Lisa mumbled.  Her hand, flattened against the black of the lab table with her fingers spread out, slid over the surface of the table closer to Peter but stopped a few inches short.  “I shouldn’t have listened.  I don’t know why I even did, I… I knew she and her friends didn’t like me, but…”

                “No.  I… get it,” Peter said, accustomed to the silver siren’s masterful wordplay even by this early point in his exposure to her.  “I’m sorry too.  Next time, though, if you hear something about me, all you have to do is talk to me.  I’m easy to talk to.”

                “I know you are,” Lisa said.  Her fingers lithely lifted off the dark desk, hovering around Peter’s waist level.  Her index finger, fully extended, lowered itself gently into Peter’s upturned hand so that his palm was suddenly cupping the soft heft of the girl’s fingertip.

                The freshman’s synapses crackled with voltage that nearly shorted every fuse in his system.

                “Are we finished with those practice sheets yet?” Mrs. Baker droned as she strolled past the lab desks, not quite singling out Peter and Lisa, but obviously throwing most of her volume in their direction with enough surprise that it threw both off balance.

                Lisa, suddenly looking like she’d committed a serious federal crime, withdrew her finger from Peter’s hand.  The redhead granted her tiny friend one last, warm smile like she’d begun to show in the days prior and then picked her pencil back up, setting back to work with a slightly shakier hand.

                The five-inch freshman, meanwhile, held his gifted pencil tip in his fist and became quickly lost molding the sensation of Lisa’s tender touch into his memory, desperately hoping he didn’t look too silly with a goofy smile stuck on his face.

Peter was a bundle of neuroses and optimism as he sat in his sister’s hand on the way to the gym.  Sure, things were smoothed over with Lisa, but it seemed the pair of them might well have bigger problems.

                The uncomfortable realization he and Lisa had made about Sharon’s attempt to separate them had at least concluded with the promise to never get the full story about one another from anyone other than the source.

                Still, the freshman was troubled.  They were only a week into school, and already this queen bee was trying to lay waste to friendships she didn’t approve of.  It certainly was clear that people did, indeed, “listen to her,” in the sense that doomed sailors might follow a song onto a cliff’s side.

                As nervous as it made him to potentially inspire conflict with her, Peter was tempted to try broaching the subject with Sharon in English class that afternoon.  However, at Lisa’s insistence that they needn’t involve the silver-haired vixen further than she’d already involved herself, Peter relented and promised not to say anything.

                It was just as well.  His stomach was churning enough as it was when Ms. Tritter transferred him over from Algebra class, and not just from his haunting admirer.  He’d held Lisa’s fingertip in his hand, and he’d been swelling with barely muted joy for the intervening periods.  The anxiety over Sharon was combatting this emotion handily inside him, and Peter’s awkward silence hadn’t gone unnoticed by his kindly math teacher, who’d questioned him on his state.  Not wanting to make a scene or involve Ms. Tritter more than was necessary, he passed it off as nothing to a clearly disbelieving but nonetheless reluctantly accepting curly-haired educator.  It was a complicated day, to be sure.

                English passed quietly and without incident, much to Peter’s relief.  Sharon hadn’t taken a single opportunity to scare him by putting her lips mere inches away from his back, and she seemingly hadn’t caught onto his and Lisa’s unraveling of her deception.

                Erica arrived earlier than normal, before most of the class had filed out, and as Peter climbed aboard his sibling’s hand, he caught Sharon’s lunar eyes narrowing into slits at the sight, her hands folding tightly together atop the desk, but somehow there wasn’t a need to be made nervous.  His sister had him now.

                Conversation was kept to a minimum as Erica power-walked her brother to P.E. with her backpack slung over one shoulder.  This was fine by Peter, as it gave him plenty of time to stew about the upcoming period, where he, Lisa, and the trio would all be in close enough proximity for some probable social inelegance.

                Minutes after arriving, he was changed in Ms. Watson’s office and then bussed back out to the east gym in his teacher’s workout-weathered palm.  It was as though the universe was conspiring to maximize the time for Peter to be put on the line with his peers.  The burly gym instructor had rushed along her tiny student’s outfit transition, where she ordinarily would’ve languished for several minutes by casually dropping some cheesy jokes while Peter stood vulnerably in his underwear.  Ordinarily the five-inch freshman dreaded these encounters where he was all but forced to give a personalized strip tease to his teacher, but on this particular day he would’ve done just about anything to avoid going out there and facing the music.

                Well, almost anything.

                Today began the bowling unit for the week.  Peter was dismayed to discover it was yet another activity that he couldn’t take part in, though he did have benefit of knowing how to score keep.  This was his job on the occasions Suzanne wasn’t feeling too paranoid to take all her kids out for fun.  Such an event hadn’t happened in a while, though, and he was eager to be involved some way.  Bowling didn’t particularly strike him as a contest well-suited to a physical education class, but after a few bemused groans from the group, Ms. Watson had barked out some comments about hand-eye coordination improving with the sport, and most had shut up or at least learned to keep their mouths shut.

                Peter, as usual, was perched on a folding table to view all the action from a safe distance.  He was well-behind the lines of the masking tape-demarcated lanes Ms. Watson had set up on the gym floor with pins arranged at the end.  None of the bowling balls were any heavier than ten pounds to prevent serious injury in case one of the more testosterone-fueled students tried to practice some shot-put.  All the same, it was reassuring for the freshman to know that the legs of his table couldn’t be easily slammed out from under him by a loose lime-green cannonball.

                Lisa appeared first out of the locker room and, spying her friend on the table already, made her way over with noticeably more spring in her step than she’d had that morning.  It alleviated the freshman’s nerves to see that things were, as he’d hoped, more or less back to normal.

                “Feeling a perfect three hundred today?” Peter asked her as he tilted a half-sized pencil against his chest like a battle-hardened lance, letting his smile show.

                “Is that the best score?  I don’t think I’ve tried this since I was maybe six years old,” Lisa said timidly, biting her lip and twiddling idly with her thumb.

                “Oh, you’ll pick it up fast.  It’s a ball,” Peter chuckled.

                “You’ve… I mean, not to imply, but…”

                “Of course I’ve played it!” he said seriously, earning a pair of flared and concerned emerald irises from his friend, before cracking another grin.  “Okay, maybe just not with a ball that would make me into jelly.  But my family used to go to alleys on the weekends, and when we’d get home my sisters would set up a lane on the table and I’d use a golf ball to hit packing peanuts.”

                “That’s…” Lisa said warmly.  “…that’s really cute.”

                As usual, she seemed to second-guess her word choice, and looked like she wanted to backtrack, but for once Peter wasn’t troubled by the use of the adjective.  Often he’d hear the word “cute” uttered in his regard, spoken with the tone someone might use to identify an especially rambunctious gerbil.  The way his family used it, though, and now Lisa, simply implied admiration, even adoration.  Even something more.

                Though the latter couldn’t possibly have been in the sense Lisa meant it.

                Could it?

                Peter swallowed and gave her a reassuring nod.  “Thanks.  Maybe it’s not as impressive as, you know, knocking the actual pins down, but I’m pretty darn good at it.”

                “Maybe you can show me sometime,” Lisa said, curling her thumb between her red tresses like a nervous little kid.  “After I give you that personal clarinet concert, obviously.”

                “Absolutely,” Peter said.  His fingertips tingled.

                God, was this how every person felt at moments like this: simultaneously exposed, elated, and terrified, the emotions all engaged in chemical warfare, or was it just those that were small enough to fit in someone’s hand?  In spite of himself, Peter had to guess he wasn’t a special case, because Lisa’s finger was still twirling in her hair with greater speed.

                “Make sure you don’t get off this table, shrimp,” Amy directed imperiously, her toned and tanned figure suddenly looming behind Lisa’s considerably more meager stature.  “We like you best when you’re not flat as a tiny pancake.”

                Peter’s eyes couldn’t help but be yanked up to the face of the most imposing member of the trio at the peak of her nearly six-foot frame.

                “Not under any bowling balls,” Kimmy said, a goofy smile on her lips as her freckled dimples deepened increasingly.  She appeared next to the towering Amy, shorter and a little plumper than her fellow redhead Lisa, almost impish with her pinchable cheeks.

                The doll-sized freshman willed himself not to be nervous.  His lips were dry.

                This was silly to be intimidated.  What could they possibly do, now that everything had been cleared up with Lisa?  They were untouchable.

                “You two don’t have to be so gross, he already knows what’ll happen if he goes on the floor,” Sharon said, rolling her silvery eyes as she appeared last from behind her two cronies.  “Don’t you, shortstuff?”

                “Ha.  Yeah, I’ll watch it,” Peter said as casually as possible, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his shorts.  “I’m playing it safe.”

                “Well, there’s a surprise,” Sharon drawled under her breath, her eyes flashing to Lisa, who still hadn’t turned to face her triple threat of opponents yet.               

                “How’s the face, sweetie?” Amy asked of her quieter classmate, clasping her enormous hand to Lisa’s shoulder.  Her tone was sugary, almost like an aunt checking up on a shy niece, and given the difference in their heights, this wasn’t difficult to imagine.  Lisa flinched at the familiar contact as Amy’s tanned fingers clenched so close to the nape of her neck, and Peter’s esophagus knotted up.

                “It’s… okay.  Thanks,” Lisa said, swallowing hard enough that Peter could see the lump forming in her throat.

                “Maybe next time just try ducking, you know?” Amy continued.  She patted Lisa on the shoulder hard enough that it almost knocked the latter off balance, then let her arm fall back to her side again.

                “All right, let’s line up, pick your lanes.  Don’t care which, just so long as we only have four to a lane so you’re not waiting up,” Ms. Watson bellowed over the expanse of the gym as she re-entered the space with clipboard in hand.  Eyeing the five-inch freshman’s table, she raised an eyebrow.  “Peter, you’ve got this lane’s scores?”

                “Uh-huh,” he affirmed with a gulp as Sharon, Amy, Kimmy, and Lisa filed next to the lane directly aligned with Peter’s table.

                “Let’s get the ball rolling, then,” the gym teacher said dryly.  “Try to have fun and don’t make fun of your neighbors if they keep getting gutterballs.  And if I see any balls flying up in the air and then slamming down into my gymnasium floor, the people responsible will be spending their afternoon with me in detention.  Clear?”

                “Clear,” the class mumbled in high-volume unison.  Drawing the brightly colored balls from the cage on wheels Watson had rolled out of the closet for use, they plucked small scorecards from their pockets and took turns winding up to aim for the pins pressed to the nearest brick walls.

                Peter, meanwhile, dutifully scooped up his pencil, draping it over his shoulder like a bayonet, and sighed as he watched the trio glancing over their shoulders at Lisa, who almost seemed to shrink herself at their gaze.

                At least it wasn’t rugby they were playing today.

                As usual, the miniscule freshman’s job got fairly boring after the first P.E. bowling game drew to a close.  He watched most of the inexperienced players including Lisa let their shots drift off to the side and miss the pins, and it made him wish he had the stature and constitution to march out into the open and give some instruction on stance.

                Just to be of use somehow.

                Still, Peter soldiered on, bracing the pencil against his shoulder and scribbling out clear enough numbers that the scores’ owners could make them out.  Halfway through the second game, he nearly cracked his second pencil tip of the day to feel a cold fingertip drumming against his shoulder blade.

                “I had a strike on that last turn, shortstuff, not a spare,” Sharon informed him with uncharacteristic pleasantness.

                “Right.  Sorry about that,” Peter said, spinning the half-sized writing utensil around and setting about awkwardly rubbing away his error.

                “Don’t worry.  I’ll take care of it,” Sharon said.  Her fingers pinched around the top of the pencil and snatched it up before Peter could even let go, let alone protest having his only job taken away from him.  His feet left the sanctity of the table for just an instant as Sharon’s hand went skyward and lifted him up, but luckily he let her have her way before he was too completely at the mercy of the girl and gravity.

                “Okay,” he mumbled, righting himself as his classmate erased the mistake far faster than he could hope to a full-bore pace of erasure.

                “You don’t have to apologize.  There are just certain things some people do better,” she explained coolly.  “Maybe there are… more things in your case.  And it’s always better to let others take care of the things you can’t do.”

                “I can handle erasing, I promise,” Peter said with a good-natured snicker, hoping to break up the immediate tension Sharon was so masterful at conjuring.  The laugh wasn’t reciprocated.

                “Maybe you can manage it, but there are always other things you might not be able to see coming,” she said.  “It’s a big world here, shortstuff.  You need friends to look out for you.  Keep you out of trouble.”

                The transition was so slick, Peter had barely noticed it.  His limbs stiffened.

                “T-Thanks, Sharon.  I’m, uh… glad you’ve got my back,” he said.

                “It’s not just that,” she said.  “I’m trying to make sure things turn out okay for you at this school.”

                “They will!” he blurted defensively, then coughed.  “They… they are, I mean.”

                “Mhmm,” the unconvinced silvery-blonde exhaled.  Her head tilted to the side, like a hawk examining its prey in close detail, before her attentions were diverted out to the lanes, where Lisa was lining up for her next turn.  “Your friends matter, shortstuff.  The sooner you figure it out, the better.”

                Lisa’s stance had improved, and with a good wind-up, the ball sailed down the lane and took down four pins, the victorious crashing of them somehow almost drowned out by a condescending chuckle from a clearly unimpressed Sharon.  However, it went unnoticed by Peter.

                Something else had overtaken his senses with the same immediacy that had on numerous occasions throughout his life kept him safe from incoming stray cats, stray countertop apples, and grabby kindergarteners.

                It was the seismic growl of a bowling ball, rolling like a ten-pound sparkling purple missile toward the table at a rate far faster than the diminutive freshman could’ve hoped to take evasive action against even if he wasn’t stranded on the tabletop.  Someone even less skilled than Lisa had, apparently, lost control.

                Peter, instantly accessing the threat, planted himself firmly on the table with his arms at his sides, and looked hurriedly up to Sharon, the nearest human being, for potential aid.  He saw her silver eyes flash, reverting to the floor and plainly detecting the bowling ball, before returning back to him without so much as an emergent glint.  No other part of her body budged.

                “PETER!” Lisa shrieked from up at the line, jolting in the direction of the table with arms outstretched and no hope of reaching him in time.

                The impact of the ball on the hapless folding table was greater than Peter had been anticipating.  He could hear the screech of the screws struggling to hang on, followed by the cheap metal legs buckling under the force of the ball, toppling, knocking him instantly off his feet as the plastic surface tipped into the cruel grasp of gravity like a crumbling fault line.

                Tumbling head over heels, Peter careened off the side and met a half-instant of cold air before plopping unceremoniously into the eerie white visage of Sharon’s hand, which was waiting for his arrival with plenty of time.

                “Watch your step, shortstuff,” Sharon crooned, her steady voice able to cut even through the echoed rumbling of a dozen bowling balls rampaging down the gym floor.  Her fingers curled inward closer to Peter, making it impossible to sit normally in her hand without threatening to spill out.  The skin was soft and delicate, like a flower petal, but still cool to the touch.

                “You okay, Peter?” Ms. Watson asked, jogging closer to the table with whistle brandished in hand.  Every pair of eyes in the room was now on the five-inch student cupped oddly in Sharon’s restrictive palm, his legs scooped awkwardly over her thumb.  He couldn’t tell what he hated more: the physical strain of all but wrestling Sharon’s fingers just to sit upright, or the mental one of having four dozen curious giants all focused on his action figure-sized frame just like on the first day of school.

                “Y-Yeah.  Yeah, I’m f-fine,” he said, still just recomposing himself after being so violently startled.  Peter struggled to avoid peering out at the gawking faces, but the alternative was looking at the porcelain flesh that now, despite rescuing him from some broken legs, imprisoned him.

                “Do you need to see the nurse?” Watson queried loudly.  “Feeling anything in your ankles?  I could check it out, too, in my office if you think you twisted anything.  I know some first aid, so it wouldn’t be any trouble.”

                “No, no, I… I really am fine.  Thank you,” Peter said, on the verge of full-body tremors from all the eyes that had fallen on him.  As he glanced around the gym, though, he began to realize the students weren’t looking at him with wonderment or amusement, as one might a performing circus monkey that had just dropped its juggling balls, but simply with fear.

                Not of him, but for him.

                “All right, if you’re sure then, let’s keep going.  Everyone pick up your pins and for God’s sake, watch where you’re kicking the equipment before someone gets hurt!” Watson barked as she strode back to her post.

                “Um, S-Sharon?” Peter said, taking a deep breath and at last settling himself as he attempted unsuccessfully to pull his legs against his abdomen.  “T-Thanks for the catch, really, but… you can… let me down now.”

                “Just making sure you’re still in one piece,” Sharon said with almost abrasive warmth.  Her hand lowered toward the table, with her fingers even touching the edge, but she didn’t flatten her palm to let Peter out.  If anything, her firm fingers closed more tightly around his limbs.  “That’s the way we prefer you.”

                “Sharon,” said a firm voice Peter took a second to register as Lisa’s, stronger and more assertive than he’d yet experienced it.

                “Yes?” the reply shot back, metallic and automatic.  Sharon’s piercing eyes widened acutely on Peter, not even bothering to acknowledge Lisa.  Like crescent moons darkened on one sliver of the rim, the siren’s irises threatened to spin from her sclera as poisoned shuriken and slice cleanly through the boy’s spine.  It made her miniature freshman captive sincerely wish he was strapped into a plane plummeting toward the ocean, or really just literally any other location than his current one.  He felt moisture on the back of his neck, wondering if Sharon’s palm had grown clammy, until he realized the nervous sweat actually belonged to him.

                “You should put Peter down,” Lisa declared, suddenly standing beside Sharon.  “Now.”  Extending a hand, the tender-hearted student grasped Sharon’s wrist.

                The platinum blonde twitched like she’d been slapped across the face, her lip quivering slightly as she stared with nauseous revulsion at the unwelcome appendage of someone so painfully unpopular actually daring to touch her.  Appearing quickly behind the duo were Amy and Kimmy, looking like spectators about to watch a world champion boxer bat down a hot-headed ticket-holding challenger.

                “Obviously I will,” Sharon said, smiling so widely Peter was terrified a chuckle would escape her thin lips.  Her eyes drilled back through him once again.  “I’m just making sure he knows his limits.”

                Her hand finally unfurled onto the tabletop, allowing her catch to roll on his side back to the surface, where he pulled himself to his feet to dust off.  Lisa’s hand, at last, roughly released from her opponent’s wrist.

                “Nothing more dangerous than not knowing what you can, or… can’t do.  Is there, shortstuff?” Sharon said.  As usual, her seemingly innocent confirmation question had the density of a statement already sure of itself.

                Those grey sunshield eyes were throwing down a challenge, and already ridiculing him with their laughing light for pre-emptively failing.  Daring him to step out into the ring with only his toothpick arms as defense and defy her iron will.

                “No, there’s not, Sharon,” Peter said.

                For the first time, her name came out of his mouth without anxiety or apprehension, but simply as a word, representing the fifteen-year-old teen queen rather than a fanged mythical beast.  He could see Amy and Kimmy’s smiles straightening out again, and even Sharon’s eyes lost a little of their midnight luster as he broke free of their mental grasp at long last.  Whatever imaginary curse had been laid on him was severed at last, and in his first seconds of freedom, the path ahead was finally clear.

                He swiveled, turning toward Lisa: the benevolent redhead standing above him with her hands folded neatly in front of her waist without their usual anxious white-knuckle tightness, a cherishing twinkle in her green eyes, and a gentle curve on her kind lips.

                Enough was enough.

                “Lisa, would you like to go out to see a movie with me this Friday?” Peter asked, with enough volume that everyone in the vicinity and even a few others surrounding them could make it out, but his gaze was locked onto his friend, the only one in the room who mattered.  If he’d managed to pull his attention away even the slightest amount, he’d have witnessed the matching slack-jawed expressions on the trio, the most stunned of all in Sharon’s stony, angelic countenance.

                “Of course, Peter,” Lisa breathed.

Peter could hardly keep his hands from trembling with restless trepidation as he scribbled out the words of his audition monologue upon a scrap of notebook paper.  Every few seconds he looked up again at the full-size sheet containing the lines, which had been vertically propped up for his use like a miniature billboard between Erica’s fingers.

                His sibling, as usual, was completely preoccupied with whatever drama was taking place on her group text message app, but she’d agreed to lend a literal helping hand after they’d arrived at the school’s theatre and realized the potential stage stars needed to be able to read from printed dialogue.  As she’d already committed to driving him to and from play practice in the heat of the moment with Suzanne, a gesture that would’ve once warranted eye-rolling complaint from the girl now was accepted silently.

                So here they found themselves, camped on a bench outside the auditorium while Peter tried to keep his nerves in check.  Erica had already signed Peter up on the waiting list to go in, so all they had to do was await the gleeful call of Mrs. Parks’ directing assistant.  Several students hustled by the hall and into the auditorium, preparing to take their turns, while other theatrical hopefuls huddled in chairs or against the walls mouthing the words to themselves, practicing inflections.

                No pair of eyes had paid more than a glance to Peter, so focused was everyone on preparing for their appearances onstage, which he found particularly gratifying, especially given the pressure he already had mounted in his chest.  Mrs. Parks had essentially promised him the equally height-challenged role of Tom Thumb, but that didn’t mean his pre-performance jitters weren’t going to build up all the same.

                “Have you got it down?” Erica droned without looking up from her phone, her hand slowly lowering itself onto the surface of the bench.  “My wrist is getting tired.”

                “Almost.  Another two sentences,” Peter promised, trying to pick up the pace.

                “It’s like one paragraph, twerp,” she groaned quietly, but still picked her hand back up so the words could be easily read again.  Then she added as a hiss: “Plus I kinda gotta pee.”

                “You can go.  I’ll make do,” Peter said earnestly.  “If anybody gives me problems I’ll just practice my opera singing real loud.”

                “Cool,” she said, setting the paper down on the seat and rising up.  She turned to her diminutive sibling before walking back down the hall toward the restrooms, her tone becoming stern as she wagged a finger at him and adopted a close mimicry of their mother’s voice.  “Now don’t go anywhere!”

                “But where am I gonna - har har har!” Peter muttered back with telltale sarcasm, returning to his transcription as a chuckling Erica marooned him on the island of the bench.  The final words went quickly, and the freshman completed with a flourish, proudly plopping onto his haunches with the lines in his quivering hands.

                Sure, he’d just been handed the role because he had the five-inch height requirement.  Peter didn’t care.  He was about to be a part of something for the first time in his life that didn’t involve his mother or siblings.  Another massive weight was able to slide from his shoulders as he began militantly rolling through the words of the audition paragraph, keeping them under his breath so as not to disturb the other students scattered around the hallway.

                To be sure, it had been a roller coaster of a week, and there was plenty to be glad for.  It was only two days ago that the terror trio had been shut down and Lisa had agreed to a date all in one fell swoop, and though it wasn’t exactly a marriage proposal, the anticipation of it felt grander than anything he’d experienced up to this point.

                Now it was Friday, and the tortuous crawl of the past two days combined with the simultaneous free-floating ecstasy of knowing Lisa just might reciprocate his feelings could finally find some resolution.

                In fact, the only thing standing between Peter and the fabled trip to the movies with Lisa was this audition and a couple of hours, which didn’t exactly do any favors for his anxiety or lingering sense of inadequacy in both departments, but the freshman willed himself to keep it together.

                He’d made it this far and things seemed to be going his way now, after all.  There was no sense in dumping on any of it.  Plus, after he’d gotten through sharing with Lisa his nearly-assured role in the play, he’d promised to relay every detail of the experience to the enthused redhead on the drive over to the theatre, so there was that to look forward to as well.

                Peter pulled his gaze away from his lines.  The audition words themselves belonged to the titular Jack of Jack in the Beanstalk, who apparently played a fairly major role in the script, and given the volume of puns stuffed into this short paragraph, Peter felt he had a good idea of how to play it.  Having chewed over the intonation and accentuation he wanted to use, he let his eyes wander around the broad hallway to the people who would presumably become his extracurricular peers in the near future.

                Just across from his bench was a girl he knew he recognized, though he wasn’t immediately sure where from.  Her wavy brunette hair was cut short near the level of her chin, and though she wore a gray sweater, her bright neon pink socks suggested she was doing so semi-ironically.  Somewhat lanky, she sat with her legs crossed and her back straightened like a practiced young yogi.  It took a minute of scrutinizing his memory before Peter realized the girl was in his third period art class, though he couldn’t say he’d ever exchanged a word with her or even knew her name.

                “Hey.”

                The voice surprised Peter, as he’d been so focused on identifying the girl across the way from his bench, especially because it had come from his side.  He peered over the edge of the perch and realized the greeting’s owner was seated on the carpet further down the wall.  It was a short kid with narrow wrists who nonetheless would’ve still looked like a behemoth compared to his action figure-sized classmate, and Peter knew he recognized this student from somewhere as well.  Odder still, though, was the fact that he knew he recognized the boy’s voice before he even saw his face.

                “Uh, hi,” Peter said back amicably, knowing it couldn’t be too early to try and befriend his probable costars.  “What’s up?”

                “Nothin’ much.  You’re Peter, right?” the kid questioned politely.  Refreshingly, this stranger looked on the miniscule freshman with the same lack of prying as the few friends Peter had made so far, which automatically told him this at least wasn’t an exploitative conversation starting up that would lead, as so many in his life had, to a ham-handed request to try holding him.

                “Yeah.  And you’re…”

                “I’m Calvin.  Sorry.  I probably could’ve said that at first,” the kid said, throwing up a hand with regret.

                “No, it’s okay.  I knew I recognized you,” Peter admitted.

                “Art class,” Calvin said.

                “Oh.  Wait, so you’re-”

                “I was the one who told Mandy to stop,” Calvin said sheepishly.  “Not like it did anything, though.  Sorry about that.”

                “That’s all right.  I appreciate it anyway,” Peter said, filled with renewed gratitude as he remembered that this kindred spirit of a shrimpy freshman had, indeed, spoken up on that first day when Mandy had taken it upon herself to involve Peter in her art project with an over-abundance of thoughtless creativity.

                “Don’t worry too much about her.  I went to elementary and middle school with her.  She’s… just kind of like that,” Calvin said, hushing himself, as if Mandy might accidentally hear, wherever she was in the world at this moment.

                “I’ll try,” Peter promised, feeling utterly unconvinced of the girl’s harmlessness, but nevertheless glad someone cared enough to help put him at peace with the situation.

                “I hope I’m not bugging you or anything while you’re learning the words, but you’re trying out for the play?” Calvin asked quietly.

                It was odd for Peter to speak to someone who so clearly had the same bursting desire to be liked yet was still hopelessly bogged down by insecurities.  Had Calvin not been sitting right there, plainly at a height of at least five-foot-five, the freshman could’ve sworn his compatriot stood at his own distinctly low eye level.  No matter who Peter spoke to, no matter how much they cared for him or wanted him to feel comfortable, he was near-constantly reminded of the titanic proportions of everyone he met, but this kid was making the puny fifteen-year-old feel he was in easy company.

                “Yeah, I am,” Peter said proudly.

                “That’s really cool, man,” Calvin answered with a nod as his eyes returned to the page.  “I hope you do well.”

                “Same to you,” Peter exhaled, having braced himself for what he was certain was an oncoming “how the hell is someone like you supposed to be seen on a stage?” probe.  To his delight, though, such confusion hadn’t even crossed Calvin’s face: he apparently had immediately accepted the possibility of it.  As insignificant a redaction as it was, Peter felt a surge of confidence.

                A clearing of a throat and the stomping of rubbery sneakers abruptly commanded Peter’s attention as he turned back toward the main thoroughfare of the expansive hallway and felt that momentary burst of can-do attitude liquefied into adrenaline as Mandy sauntered by.

                The exchange lasted a few heartbeats as she passed the bench, but for the churning in Peter’s innards, it could’ve gone on for several elongated minutes.  Her dark hair, as-ever tied back in a messy ponytail, was twirled playfully around her index finger as she militantly trained her gaze on him: a walking contradiction that made her even harder to read.  The hazel eyes bore through him, eliciting an involuntary cringe.  Far flung from the cold stare of the school’s queen bee that Peter had been enduring the past two weeks, Mandy’s eyes left nothing to the imagination.

                A smile curved over her lower lip as she finally turned her attention back to where she was walking and proceeded further onward.  Peter slumped back, feeling his heartbeat pounding just a little faster than before.  He flashed a glance over to Calvin, who apparently hadn’t noticed the girl at all.

                “Yo, did they call your name yet?” Erica’s voice sounded, suddenly right behind Peter, as her thumb lightly nudged him in the hip.  Flinching from the survival instinct of expecting Mandy instead, he swiveled back around to face her, accompanied by an audible intake of breath that instantly put a bewildered frown on his sister’s face.

                “Yo,” he repeated back, forcing a smile and calming himself down.

                “What was that?” she asked, sitting back down on the bench.  She retracted her hand back into her lap with some jilted reverence.  “Are you seriously this nervous about-”

                “Yep,” he said a little too quickly.  “Just nervous.  I’ll be fine in a second.”

                “Right,” Erica said, her eyes narrowing deductively as she observed him with obvious disbelief.  Her lips parted to voice what Peter had to assume was a snarkily worded objection to his lie, when the theatre doors swung open and the hyper presence of Mrs. Parks’ curly-haired director’s assistant cut off the interrogation, which the freshman frankly couldn’t have been more grateful for.

                “Next group is up!” the senior student announced cheerily as the previous audition hopefuls filed past, some looking more pleased with themselves than others.  “Peter Clark, Calvin Simms, and Bluebell Hathaway, c’mon in!”

                Peter turned, watching Calvin as well as the girl across from his bench rising to their feet, then returned with a shrug to his sister’s face far above.  Frowning, she cupped her hand in front of her brother, and silently he embarked into her ascending palm, furtively wiping a hand over his brow for having avoided a full-blown questioning for the time being.  Taking a deep breath then, Peter allowed himself to arrive at a remarkable place of peace as Erica carried him into the cavernous, velvety theatre, following closely after Calvin and Bluebell.

“Just so you know…” Erica sighed nonchalantly as she gave the steering wheel a twist, pulling the car out of the high school’s parking lot and into the pre-rush hour traffic.  “You’ve used up your favors with me for at least, like, four years after this theatre thing.”

                “Fair enough,” Peter said with a shrug, loudly enough that his sister could hear him as he sat strapped in to his protective box seat behind the driver’s side: the only location their mother had ever allowed him to ride in the car.  The opening atop the box gave him plenty of space to echo his voice off the high ceiling of the vehicle, but it still made conversation a little unwieldy unless he had someone accompanying him in the back row to lean over and speak directly in.  Generally when the whole family was on a drive, Jessica would happily call shotgun on the back seat so she could beam gleefully down at her brother in the box for the whole drive, but today it was just him.

                Fortunately, Peter was in far too good a mood to let the lonesomeness of his security abode get to him.

                The audition had gone as well as he could’ve hoped for.  Erica had set him down on the very edge of the stage, forcing Mrs. Parks to scoot up closer to make out his voice.  Once Peter had gotten over the sheer magnitude of the theatre stretching into a shadowy infinity, a place he hadn’t actually set foot in yet, he managed to refocus himself and put up the comedic performance of his young awkward life.   Calvin had actually cracked up at his delivery, and Mrs. Parks had snickered several times.  It was hard to tell in the placement of the stage lighting, but Peter could’ve sworn he even saw a smile crack on Erica’s lips.  Of course, this could’ve very well been an optical illusion, but who could say?

                Calvin and Bluebell weren’t so bad themselves either, and had obvious prior experience on a stage.  The former’s dramatic gestures and bellowing voice despite his small frame made Calvin a clear pick for at least something in the play, and Bluebell delivered her lines with a quiet sweetness that managed to swell and fill the space.

                After the trio of auditions had finished and been informed they’d hear about casting and callbacks within the next week, Peter was scooped back up by Erica and given a wink from Mrs. Parks on the way out, indicating for all intents and purposes that Tom Thumb was his.

                And now he was headed home, just in time to hit the road again in time for the six o’clock movie with Lisa.  Since the audition was over, Peter was able to channel his nerves almost exclusively onto the first date of his life and some alone time with the only girl he’d ever had feelings for.  Already he could tell the evening was going to be something of a roller coaster for his little heart.

                “Sooo…” Erica drawled, trying to sound disinterested in whatever was coming next, though Peter could hear she felt otherwise.  For a moment, he cringed, wondering if she was about to open another line of questioning about his ghostly reaction right before the audition, but his fear was quickly alleviated.  “…do you know what the hell you’re doing tonight?”

                “Oh,” Peter mumbled.  “Uh… I think so.”

                “You asked her out.  You did the easy part already,” she said.

                Easy part?

                “Great,” Peter chuckled sarcastically.  “Okay, so what’s the hard part then?”

                “The rest of it, basically,” Erica answered casually.  “Not like I know what I’m talking about, obviously, the way things ended up with Sean, but…”

                “So are you about to give me all the tips, or what?”

                “Tips?  I definitely don’t have any of those,” Erica said.

                “How about just be yourself.  That would sound pretty good, right?” Peter smarmed.

                “Only if “being yourself” doesn’t involve being a little smartass,” Erica retorted.  “It’s easy to tell you to do that.  Really what it means is don’t pretend to be what you think she wants.  Trust me, you have no idea what she wants.”

                “I don’t?” Peter answered, a little anxious in spite of his sister’s half-joking tone.

                “The day dudes understand what we want is the day the earth splits open,” Erica said.  “We’re way too complicated for you to keep up with, so don’t try.  Just do your talking thing.”

                “Right.  My talking thing,” Peter said with a nod.  “After all, it’s not like I have the arm length to pretend I’m going for a jujube and then put it around her shoulder instead.”

                Erica snorted.  “Exactly.  Use what you’ve got.  Which isn’t much, but it’ll do.”

                “That’s encouraging,” Peter said, shaking his head.  For a few more minutes there was silence in the car, which the freshman wasn’t entirely ungrateful for.  The more time he had to psych himself out, the better his chances were of avoiding a complete collapse via knee-buckling once the date was in full swing.  At least, that was what he hoped.

                He could feel the car slowing down as Erica turned down a narrower street.  He couldn’t quite see high enough to tell where they were from his low vantage point, but Peter knew they weren’t home just yet.

                “Where are we?” he piped.

                “It’s Friday and I ran like four miles yesterday.  I’m getting a freaking milkshake,” Erica informed him as they slowed to a crawl in the drive thru line.  “Want anything?”

                “Are you buying?”

                Hearing his sister heavily clear her throat for melodramatic effect, he didn’t even need to see her face to know how high her eyebrow must’ve risen.  “Ahem.  Uhh, are we already forgetting who agreed to drive you home every single fricking day for your little show?”

                “Didn’t hurt to ask,” Peter threw back with a shrug.  “Can I just get a straw full of yours?”

                “Fine, fine,” Erica mumbled as she rolled down the window at the microphone, preparing to call out her order, when she realized with a loud groan that the device was plastered with a poster informing all customers that they’d have to come inside, as the sound system was down for the day.  “I swear to God.  Nothing in this town works.  Ever.”

                “Are you still going to get one?” Peter said, trying not to laugh.

                “You better believe I’m getting one!” Erica retorted as she screeched into a parking space and undid her seat belt.  “You’ve got your fancy date and Jessica’s got her friend from dance class coming over for the night.  This is kind of the highlight of my weekend.  Are you coming in or not?”

                “Uhhh…” Peter mumbled.  His restaurant experiences historically hadn’t always gone with flying colors.  When they didn’t involve over-eager researchers approaching the family wanting to run tests on him, there often could be found a kid with the desire to prod him in the chest, and then at least a couple dozen awkwardly glancing eyes by default.

                But then again, he was about to embark on a similar public venture this very evening, and he’d have that pressure piled on top of the demands of not screwing up his date with the person he cared so deeply for.  Maybe this would be good practice.

                “I don’t care if you don’t want to come in.  I’ll roll a window down if you want.”

                “No, no, it’s cool.  I’ll come in.”

                “All right.  Get your annoying buckle thing off then,” Erica ordered softly as she opened his car door, spoken with the experience of someone who’d struggled time and time again with the specialized seat in her youth before her little sibling had the know-how to escape on his own.  Once Peter had the tiny straps tugged off his shoulders, he leaned back into his sister’s palm as it scooped down into the box to collect him.

                The early evening breeze, redolent of autumn and greasy fast food waste, felt good on his skin as his sister clutched him against the warm fabric of her shirt, and helped soothe him for the almost inevitable silent scene of their entrance.  To Peter’s delight, however, nobody seemed to notice his arrival, though he also had Erica to thank for that, who had strategically curled her fingers high enough that someone would have to be standing right in front of her to realize she was cradling a tiny human  in her hand.

                Even the ordering process went uneventfully as Peter watched the looming face of the cashier input Erica’s impending chocolate shake into the system and step back behind the counter before returning a minute later with the frosty styrofoam-contained treat.

                “That’ll be three-sixty-eight,” the worker droned, obviously half-asleep on the job, as she adjusted the black baseball cap of her uniform.  As she accepted Erica’s crumpled dollar bills, her eyes fell to Erica’s other hand, and in a bracing moment made eye contact with its five-inch occupant.

                Peter couldn’t blame her for the shock in her eyes as the change toppled from her trembling hand and clattered to the bleached tile, her mouth agape as she glued her gaze to the little human.  Though his anomalous existence had been well-known in his younger days, the years of home school had made it much easier to write him off as an urban myth or publicity stunt, which Peter was fine with, as it meant far fewer prying eyes.  Despite his sympathy for this probable situation, though, the freshman couldn’t help but feel a bit like a mouse used to feed the pythons in a pet store.

                “Oh my God!” the girl gasped, clasping her hands over her mouth.  The surprise had clearly awoken her from her minimum wage-induced haze of boredom.  Ignoring the dropped cash, she leaned further over the counter, practically laying atop it in an effort to get a better look at Peter.  Her bright brown eyes bulged with amazement, while her co-workers all seemed to have stopped in their tracks, as Peter could no longer hear the squeak of their sneakers or the bubble of the potato fryer at work.

                The freshman gulped.

                “Hey.  Excuse me?” Erica said in a voice of barely maintained civility, snapping her fingers.  “Could I get my change, please?”

                “He’s… he’s that… that guy, isn’t he?” the cashier uttered, shuddering a little, then added in a hushed whisper: “That little guy.”

                By now, the other workers at stepped closer to the counter for a furtive peek at the apparently astounding customer, though at least one had stooped to retrieve the dropped currency.

                “Ahem.  Change.  All I want,” Erica muttered.  She’d dragged the chocolate shake a little closer to the edge of the counter, but now her hand was held back out, palm up, and acting as an extra barrier between the steadily approaching cashier.

                “That’s incredible.  I can’t believe you brought him here!” the young woman continued, clearly not having registered a word of the seventeen-year-old’s reminder.  Her right arm rose from the surface, her hand up and her fingers outstretched as she reached closer to Erica’s closed hand.  “Please.  Please, would you… would you just let me…”

                The motion of the girl’s arm was slow and calculated at first, but in the next moment she was lunging out across the counter, her hand darting for Peter.  In the subtle violence of the moment, the boy watched over the curved crest of his sister’s fingers as the cashier’s grabby claws grasped the heel of Erica’s hand and gave it a tug, jostling the miniscule freshman hard against his sister’s shirt.  He tumbled head over heels, feeling for a moment the pull of gravity as he bounced from Erica’s palm, before landing heavily back against her thumb rather than the far less forgiving floor below.

                Peter heard the protests of several employees further back, moving to grab and restrain the cashier but having far too much distance to close in that split second when the object of her amazement was within her grasp.

                But of course, they weren’t necessary, because Erica had already sidestepped the woman, cutting off the contact with her quivering fingers in an instant.  In the subsequent instant, then, the elder Clark sibling had her fresh chocolate shake scooped up and steadied with her elbow pulled back, and with a flash of sloshing ice cream and a screech of surprise from the cashier, Erica had emptied her cup onto the offender’s face.

                There were a few gasps of shock from the fast food restaurant clientele somewhere behind the scene.  Peter’s chest heaved a little from the adrenaline of it all as he blinked in disbelief at the now-tranquil cashier wiping icy chocolate sludge from her face and uniform, shaking her head and avoiding eye contact as though she’d been slapped out of a hypnotic trance.  In a way, she had.

                The silence, punctuated by the slopping droplets of chocolate hitting the floor, lingered for several seconds as the rest of the others behind the counter stood blankly before this exchange, unsure how to proceed in the event of a fellow employee attempting to literally grab a customer into her hands.  A moment later, the general manager charged forth and rushed the cashier away from her post before throwing his hands pleadingly together in prayer.

                “So sorry about that,” he said rigidly.  “Would you like me to make you another one?  Free of charge, of course.”

                “That depends.  If you make me another one, I’ll probably throw it on this bitch again.  Is that okay with you?” Erica answered so seriously anyone listening would’ve known there wasn’t an ounce of joking in her proposal.

                Too stunned to respond in either the affirmative or negative, the GM backed reverently away from the ice cream-splattered counter and crossed his arms, his eyes apologizing but his vocal cords clearly unable to come up with anything else.  Nodding, Erica turned and stalked toward the door.

                Peter, meanwhile, no longer preoccupied with the strangers’ eyes on him, clutched the fabric of his sister’s shirt and curled his legs up closer to his stomach as he settled into the center of her palm again, strangely comforted despite the momentary excitement.

                “E-Erica,” he managed as his sister silently crossed the parking lot again.  “I… I-”

                “Okay, so maybe going in there was a bad idea after all.  I kept you from getting grabbed by a psycho, but I also didn’t get my chocolate shake, so we can probably call this one even,” Erica said simply, cutting her brother off before he had the change to stutter through anything as mushy as a thank-you.  “Cool?”

                “C-Cool,” he said, allowing himself a satisfied grin as they reached the car again.

                “Thank you.  It’s the second theatre on your left,” droned the Cineplex employee, ripping the paper stubs off and waving a disgruntled hand in the general desired direction.  His eyes hadn’t even bugged at the sight of Peter perched in Lisa’s gentle hand as she carried him gingerly up to the counter, which the tiny freshman was thankful for.

                He already had plenty to contend with given how anxious he was for this outing, or date, or whatever the heck it was, since they’d wisely avoided putting a label on such a thing when it was just the first time, though as he sat in the incredibly steady palm of his new friend, he felt the slightest hint of clamminess in her skin, indicating she must’ve been in a similar boat.

                “Thanks!” Lisa said spryly with tickets in hand, swerving past the cash register and into the tiled entrance of the place.  Her hand propped a little higher up as she advanced slowly on the well-lit refreshment counter.  Peter couldn’t help but glance down at the luminous glass surface, catching a glimpse of his reflection, modestly dwarfed by Lisa’s still-slight frame that nonetheless towered over him.  He smiled at the sight that had admittedly only danced in his innocent daydreams up to now, unable to help it, and looked up to her beaming expression; she, meanwhile, had apparently been sneaking a peek at him while he inspected their image in the glass, but quickly diverted her gaze again.  The boy had to hold back a chuckle, and again felt a tinge of relief.  Despite being the one who could easily overpower him with the end of her thumb, Lisa was just as nervous as he was.

                “You could’ve let me pay,” Peter reported smugly, patting his friend on the pinky and causing it to tremor.  “I had that twenty bucks all saved up and everything.”

                “Don’t be silly,” she snickered.  “My mom already gave me the money anyway.  I think she and my dad would pay me just to leave the house sometimes and go have fun, if I asked for it.”

                “Why don’t you?  We’ll go to a theme park!” Peter joked.

                “I’ll keep that in mind,” Lisa said.  Her palm rose up until Peter was nearly level with her chin.  “I’m not really a roller coaster person, though.”

                “What a coincidence,” Peter shrugged. He crawled forward on his knees up to the heel of her hand to give himself a better vantage point.  “Neither am I.”

                The two snorted with laughter together as an equally bored employee appeared behind the countertop, indicating that the effervescent glow of the popcorn light did little to allay the dullness of the work.  Peter felt tickled by a few warm goose bumps, knowing that Lisa probably hadn’t even given it a second thought, as he realized she hadn’t been so terrified of offending him by participating in the personal jab at his size that she hadn’t blushed a deep blossom shade and stifled her words into blubbering.  A week ago, this most likely wouldn’t have been the case.

                More and more, that gaping line created between them by the oddity of his situation was coming closed.  And Peter couldn’t have been more eager for it.

                “Can I get you… folks something?” the deadpanning twenty-something employee asked, tweaking the cap of his hat and pausing only momentarily at the sight of Peter in Lisa’s hand.  However, he too didn’t appear jolted enough to offer anything more than a cursory darting of the eyes between the unique couple before his gaze shifted onto the counter again, dull and deadened.  Peter made a mental note to insist on more outings in the future where the staff were too bored with life to be shocked by his presence.  Certainly it would help avoid minor calamities like had occurred over his sister’s milkshake earlier, and better still, meant he might actually extend this wild tryst into a two-date affair.

                Date?  Peter stopped himself from thinking too hard.  Definitely dangerous to assign labels before he could get a full read on Lisa.  Don’t get ahead of yourself, he insisted with a clenching of his steadily sweating fists.

                “Yes!  Peter, um… what do you want?  Candy?  Popcorn?” Lisa questioned, apparently almost startling herself at not having brought this up yet.  A tiny queue of other patrons had formed behind them already, and the miniature freshman could see the employee’s eyes rolling back far enough at this poor timing that his scleras practically overtook his skull.

                “Popcorn sounds… good,” Peter said with a nod.  “If that’s what you want, too.”

                “One small popcorn, please,” Lisa said.  The man seemed to chew on his tongue a little as he robotically set into the motions to bag up a trove of the fluffy buttered snack out of its whirring tank.

                “Not a fan of sweets?” Lisa asked down to her temporary charge.

                “Oh, I like sweets,” Peter said.  “But a lot of those have shells, and if I can’t see what I’m doing in the dark to break them open, I’ll probably just end up dropping anything you hand me on the floor.”

                “Ohhh,” Lisa drawled with quiet recognition, batting those bewitching emerald eyes.  “That makes sense.”

                The freshman almost winced, pre-programmed to expect some show of scientific interest whenever he let slip one of the many strange exceptions his life required to function normally, such as in the consumption of candy, but Lisa had accepted it as though it was the most natural thing in the world.  As though she’d been silly for not having thought of it herself.  It simultaneously filled Peter with relief and also made him wish he could convince her not to place that kind of burden on herself so often, though he knew it would be futile.

                “One small popcorn.  Five ninety-eight,” the employee droned, setting the paper bag painted with colorful logos and promos for some upcoming sci-fi thriller onto the glass counter.  The top was brimming high with clumps of freshly popped corn that instantly flooded Peter’s senses with its overwhelming salty-sweetness, and he tingled at its steamy aroma.

                “Wait.  Stand back.  I’ve got this one,” Peter announced with a timbre of falsely emboldened pride far outpacing his actual confidence level.  It earned a knowing giggle from Lisa, and she nodded.

                “By all means, Mr. Money-Bags,” she said kindly, clearly becoming more comfortable with this familiar tone all the time, and waved her free hand out before him, fingers extended and palm outstretched.

                The refreshments attendant rolled his eyes again and crossed his arms, apparently trying to bite back an irritated grimace, which Peter still much-preferred to a look of abject curiosity about whether or not there was a wind-up mechanism positioned behind his neck.  Quickly he peeled out a craftily rolled-up twenty dollar bill from the sleeve of his pant, the only place long enough to transport the paper even in its carefully compressed form, courtesy of his younger sister helping with the tight folding earlier.  Another lithe note of wind-chime chortles emerged from Lisa’s lips at this sight, which Peter couldn’t help but warm to.  He’d hoped she’d find this a little funny, because he himself certainly did.

                “Here you are, sir,” Peter said as politely as he could, knowing the line behind them had already swelled to four waiting families.  He stiffly held out the tubed bill at arm’s length which, after a moment of unsure hesitation, was accepted between the rough fingertips of the young man, who unrolled the currency and slid it into its appropriate slot in the register.  Tapping at a few more keys and clearing away the charge, the man nudged the popcorn bag forward across the glossy surface, along with a handful of clattering change that Peter instantly realized with an awkward gulp that he couldn’t possibly transport, especially with the introduction of several coins.

                “I’ll… get the change for now,” Lisa offered, scooping up the money and dumping it into her pocket, before clutching the popcorn bag and scooting it off the edge.  She winked as they left the line, leaving the employee to gratefully get on with the next customer, who’d already been vigorously tapping at the plastic face of his watch to indicate his displeasure with all the stalling.  A sly smile crossed Lisa’s lips, almost catching Peter off-guard.  “I’ll get you back later.  Honest.”

                “Yeah, you just watch it with that fourteen dollars of mine, or I’ll send my hired goons after you,” Peter threatened with a wag of his diminutive finger as Lisa padded across the swirling patterns of the faded carpet toward the correct hallway.

                “Oh?  How are you going to hire them if you don’t have your fourteen dollars?” the girl teased, lightly tapping Peter in the shoulder with her fingertip which he realized with a happy start was probably the closest she’d ever come to actual, jovial, physical kidding around with him.  He shifted in the cushiony terrain of her palm, tracing a crease that ran through like a river on a map, using only his thumbnail, and wondered if she could detect it.  Knowing Lisa, she probably did.

                “I’ll… uh… hey, I have other money.  Somewhere…” Peter retorted jokingly.

                “Yep.  I’ll believe that when I see it,” Lisa said.  “I’m sure you’re loaded.”

                “I am!  It’s just rolled up in my other pants,” he added.  Immediately they both broke out into more snickers as they at last reached the gleaming signage above the appropriate door.

                Brushing past the heavy portholed entrance, the redhead entered the darkness, now curling her fingers in a little closer around Peter’s sides to keep him contained in the reduced visibility.  She even laid a fingertip on his shoulder, which he knew very well was for added acknowledgement of his position in the blackness, but that didn’t mean he still couldn’t experience a shoot of pleasure up his spine to be in direct contact again aside from the flooring of her soft palm.  She was practically magnetic, and it only took a simple touch.

                Hesitating momentarily, Peter gritted his teeth and went for it, reasoning that if anything went wrong because of it, he could just argue the same defense that Lisa probably would if he were stupid enough to mention the fact that she’d laid a finger on his shoulder.  Probably faster than he needed to, the five-inch freshman raised his hand and gently laid his palm upon the girl’s nailbed, curling his fingers over the curve of her fleshy digit.  He felt it shiver beneath his touch, but Lisa kept it in place, and neither party said anything about it as she began the ascent up the stairs toward the back of the theatre.

                The previews were already playing, so no one could make out and gawk at the unusual pairing as Lisa clutched the popcorn back against her stomach in one hand and cupped far more precious an item in her other.  She kept the boy level with her chest as she delicately traced the blue guidance lights along the floor with the tips of her shoes.  Peter had insisted she could choose any seat she liked in the place, but after a few explanations of past experiences at the movies, Lisa realized her date had a tough time making out the entire image on the staggeringly massive screen unless he was close to the very back.  So, in the spirit of allowing them both to fully enjoy the show, she promised they’d take the remotest chair they could.

                Luckily, the back row appeared empty, giving them space to spread out, with the popcorn bag on the adjoining seat, and Lisa’s cupped hand now-propped up on her elbow, which she’d pressed into her leg.

                “I can, um, set you down in this one next to me if you like?  It… might be kind of hard to see, though,” Lisa admitted under the quiet roar of the movie trailers that flashed over her cheeks with their epileptic light display.  She bit the corner of her lip and attempted to disguise the forthcoming hope in her voice.  “If you want though, I’ll just… you know, hold you up?”

                “That might be best.  As long as you don’t mind your arm getting tired out,” Peter insisted a little sheepishly.  “I don’t think I can see from down there otherwise.”

                “Then that’s what we’ll do,” Lisa said resolutely, lifting her forearm just a little higher to ensure her hand’s passenger had the best possible view.  Her finger, much to her tiny date’s excitement, remained positioned on his shoulder.  Terrified of bringing attention to this which, despite its G-rated nature, was probably the closest Peter had ever come to real intimacy given the current context, he kept his hand in place over the digit, enjoying the tender grooves of her fingerprint beneath his own touch.

                The freshman was feeling ever-more grateful from the moment-to-moment of whatever-this-was.  Though they were just talking and sitting together like normal, there was a new kind of freedom here.  He’d only ever been able to speak to Lisa at school before, often with the threat of lecturing teachers or jealous teenage socialites casting a stern eye over their proceedings.  Those often served as obstacles, if only at the back of his mind or, where Sharon and her friends were concerned, a more tangible one.  Or three.

                Now, though, there was nothing to get in the way of establishing a line of connection, save for the possibility of screaming babies in the theatre.  Which, Peter had to admit, did open the door for more awkward stammering on his part, but he figured there wasn’t going to be a better opportunity in getting to know this young woman who had captivated him so.  Besides, for the next two hours at least, he didn’t have to feel concerned about tripping himself up or saying something foolish while the movie went on.  He could just bask in Lisa’s company, savoring the feathery weight of her finger draped over his shoulder, and enjoy an activity with her, out on a Friday night, as she generously placed puffs of the over-buttered corn atop her fingers for him to nibble on while the opening credits rolled out.

                Almost like a normal fifteen-year-old.  Which, for Peter, was a more than perfect compromise for now.

“You’re sure you don’t want any more of this?  You hardly touched the pieces I gave you!” Lisa commented brightly as she gazed into the greasy depths of the popcorn bag, which still contained the seedling dredges of the snack and the accompanying yellow stains painted along the inner paper wall.

                “Are you kidding?  If you poked me hard enough I’d probably pop harder than the corn,” the tiny freshman commented wearily, patting his stomach which, despite the rather filling three clusters he’d downed, hadn’t expanded in the slightest.  His date had already been more than generous with the stuff, actually having to return several pieces to the bag once she’d delivered a new clump only to realize he was still hungrily nursing the previous bite.

                He blinked, as the theatre lights had steadily risen back up, stinging his dilated pupils.  Most of the other patrons had departed already, trampling over crushed drink cups and empty candy bar wrappers, and the few that remained were more engrossed with waiting patiently for a potential after-credits teaser scene than turning to stare at him.  Again, a more-than-grateful happenstance for the boy.

                As the pair had grown more comfortable in the intervening two hours while the movie played with Peter being perched in Lisa’s hand, he had leaned back slightly in her palm, stretching out, though not quite with the level of casual abandon he did while seated in Jessica’s hand.  This was only done at the whispered suggestion of his friend, who’d leaned over just far enough toward his ear to let her silky words sink in against the booming speaker system surrounding them in the hall.  She’d of course, probably in fear of looking like she’d gotten fresh with him, reminded him that she had her own chair back to rest against but he did not, so her curled palm would have to be a substitute.  He obliged immediately, trying not to sound too pleased as he got settled in.

                From then on, it got even more difficult to focus on the plot of the film, as most of his subconscious was now dedicated to soaking up the sensation of Lisa’s hand nestled against his back.  By the end, Peter knew he probably would’ve flunked a movie trivia quiz that drew questions from anything other than the title and the loosest of narrative strings.  Best of all, it all came so incredibly naturally the boy had to marvel at the fact that his ankles weren’t trembling with enough fervor to make his friend think she was experiencing a seizure.

                Even if things had gotten easier here tonight, though, that by no means meant Peter was purged of his insecurities or worries about doing something to in some minute fashion negatively impact his relationship with this girl.  He still had a lot to prove, to her, and even more to himself.

                About… whatever this was.

                “If you’re sure, then, I guess we’ll just dump the leftovers?” Lisa said with a shrug that still allowed her to keep her palm almost unnervingly still while she shuffled with the crumpled remains on her knee.   Frankly, Peter was unbelievably impressed that she’d kept her arm so statuesque throughout the entire runtime of the film, let alone keeping from flinching during the more bracing moments where some surprise burst of percussion took place onscreen.  Though she’d kept her slender limb propped on her thigh for support, that was a long time to keep her hand aloft, yet she’d done it, without complaint or even the suggestion of a second thought.

                It was amazing, really.  Even his younger sister, overzealous though she was about holding him, tended to place him on her shoulder or her knee while they watched TV together for extended periods of time.

                “That’s fine with me,” Peter said.  “No one likes leftover popcorn anyway.”

                “Agreed,” she said with a nod, at last ascending back to her meager stature that nonetheless put Peter at a once-again towering height above the sticky floor.  She pinched the bag in the fingers of her other hand and began the sidling march back between the seats and toward the aisle, now far-easier to make out in the glow of the space.  A janitor, hoisting a broom and gripped in the same throes of mortal boredom as his cohorts at the ticket and snack lines, edged past Lisa, glancing at Peter but paying him little mind as he set to work cleaning up after the sloppy audience.  Lisa plopped the popcorn garbage into the open bin and sauntered down the slanted tunnel back toward the door, her shoes clacking soundly against the gleaming floor in probably the only square footage of the theatre not currently gummed up with spilled cola and half-melted gummy bears.

                The girl’s hand, crusted lightly with butter and salt granules courtesy of reaching into the container multiple times to retrieve pieces for herself and the reach-challenged freshman, hardly wavered as she nudged into the swinging door and brought them out into the lobby, now a little more crowded since they’d arrived with other teens and college students home for the weekend and looking to catch a later showing.

                “Wow.  Guess it’s good we got here when we did, huh?” Peter noted as he looked out over the throngs of bustling young people, the newest patrons apparently comprising a frat house in letter jackets shoving each other around to get further in line, while a few people who were obviously couples clung tightly together.

                “You can say that again,” Lisa muttered with the same brand of apprehension.  Her fingers, which had been lying flat up to now, swooped in just a little higher, shielding Peter from easy view, despite how much distance there was between here and the end of the hall where all the commotion was taking place around the refreshment counter.  He was pleased, as he didn’t want to look quite so much like a shivering shrew to have requested this act, and peered furtively between the crevices of Lisa’s fingers.

                Glued at the hips and even tighter at the hands, hardly aware of anyone around such that many of them almost tripped over the multicolored tile itself, the pairs of significant others made the tiny freshman even more uncomfortable than the sight of looming football-scholarship clowns who could accidentally send him flying with a simple misplaced elbow.

                He was truly glad these pairs hadn’t appeared in the movie he and Lisa had just viewed, because he was willing to bet most of them were going to fill up the back rows they’d just been required to utilize.  Most-likely they’d miss the majority of the plot onscreen in favor of sucking each other’s lips off and fumbling awkwardly for nipples through the fabric.  Such a thing would’ve been distracting and, perhaps worst of all, put an enormous amount of ridiculous pressure on Peter, even as their closeness filled him with bittersweet worry.

                After all, what were the odds he’d ever achieve that level of intimacy with someone?  A touch on the shoulder was one thing, but a kiss?

                Right.

                And maybe after that he’d flap his arms, fly off into outer space, and lick the sun.

                “Your mom said she’d meet us just outside the front entrance, right?” Lisa confirmed quietly, holding Peter closer to her chin as she began to shoulder her way through the crowd, careful to avoid even making contact with any of them for fear of the miniature boy being thrown from her palm.  Though she protectively cupped him into the very center anyway.

                “Yep.  And knowing her, she’s been sitting out there in the car for forty minutes already just to make sure she didn’t miss us coming out,” Peter chuckled, resolving to put the thought of the young and frisky lovers out of his mind for now, as he began to recognize it wasn’t pure disgust at their lewd public displays he was feeling but burning envy at the opportunities they had for regular romantic contact.

                The teen’s headspace was getting more complicated all the time, and he wasn’t an especially big fan of it.

                “Oh, good!  Let’s not keep her waiting, then,” Lisa jabbed back with an equally broad snicker, passing by what seemed to be the last of the college-age crowd.  Most of them had remained either completely self-absorbed or at least focused on choosing a candy bar from the glass display case.  Those that had allowed their attention to shift over to the oddly divergent couple may have offered a raised eyebrow or even a partially hung jaw, but these were to be expected from strangers, and Peter couldn’t blame them.  Besides, he had Lisa’s pretty freckled face to focus up on instead as she determinedly navigated the winding lines of people with the efficiency of a bomb expert creeping through a minefield.  Those piercing green eyes, flashing slightly with the effort to seek out any and all potential threats that might accidentally bump into her, once again robbed Peter of all sensory distinction as he sunk into the lush light of them.

                God, if only…

                “Well, well, well,” a voice cut in through the chattering hustle-and-bustle flooding the theatre lobby.  The snarky feminine tone sounded out from somewhere behind Lisa, and though Peter couldn’t see a face over the narrow hill of her shoulder, he could just make out the sight of some fingers.  Specifically, some fingers twirling habitually through a long brown ponytail around the corner in a pattern that was instantly recognizable to a boy who’d once had the misfortune of being grabbed up inside a firm embrace and whisked away for creatively nefarious purposes.

                Instantly the little pit of healthy anxiety he’d been feeling this whole evening over Lisa evolved and twisted itself into a lumpy knot inside his stomach, enlarging by the moment as more and more of the new individual’s body appeared behind his redheaded carrier, and his fears about her identity were confirmed with a look of straight-lipped antagonism and a thousand-yard stare glazed into those driven hazel eyes.

                Mandy.

Apparently having been impacted by the forcefulness of the curious words trailing from Mandy’s lips, Lisa swiveled carefully around to face the girl who’d once dunked Peter into a shallow cup in order to utilize him as an artistic utensil.  His throat having dried out to an arid crisp now, the little freshman didn’t have nearly enough time to humbly suggest they just keep on walking toward the exit and escape whatever was about to transpire.

                “Hi, Mandy,” Peter piped up neutrally, hoping to wrap this up as neatly as possible.  He knew it would only drag out the affair and probably inspire some passive-aggressive ire not to acknowledge her courteously on the front end.

                “Hello there, little guy,” she responded airily.  “It’s good to see you again, out and about, like the big people.”  The girl’s gaze rose up to Lisa’s face, instantly wrinkling with some barely disguised disdain like she’d inhaled a cloud of noxious eggs, but rapidly returned down to the boy sitting in the pale palm.  Once again, her eyes flooded with that same playful luster the way a preschooler eyes a brand new toy, gleaming with promise for play.  Her shoulder fidgeted, briefly causing Peter to wince at the assumption that she was about to reach out and snatch him away from his perch, but she was only shoving her hand into her pocket and grappling with its contents.  All the same, he inched back in Lisa’s palm, which instantly withdrew closer to her stomach.

                “Y-Yeah.  Yep.  Just having some fun,” Peter said.            

                “And who’s your friend here?” Mandy asked, demanding with a quicksilver succession.  Her upper lip sneered a little at the mention of Lisa, while that stiffened finger continued busily swirling through her partially tangled locks.

                “This is… Lisa,” Peter said hesitantly, not particularly keen on meshing these two social worlds of his, but supposing it wouldn’t hurt to have someone else aware of Mandy’s existence since he’d had to bold-facedly lie to his sister about her potential involvement in his musical misfortunes on day one.  “Lisa, this is Mandy.”

                “H-Hi there,” Lisa said.  She frowned uncertainly, obviously picking up on the standoffish vibes her date was projecting from the minute this macabre juvenile’s greedy eyes had settled on his little body.  “Nice to meet you.”

                “I’m sure it is,” Mandy said calmly, utterly unfazed by use of her bizarre manners.  She continued ogling Peter, not even flashing away for a second to acknowledge his handler.  “I saw you at the theater tryouts.  So you’re going to be in a play?”

                “Uhh… maybe, yeah, yeah,” Peter muttered.

                “That’s crazy,” the girl responded without breaking contact, and from the sound of her reaction, it wasn’t so much a casually made hyperbole as a legitimate statement that the concept was, literally, psychologically insane to her.  “You’re so small.  How will anyone see you up there on the stage?”

                “I… I guess I’ll just…” Peter said, sapped of explanations already from Mandy’s imperious stare.  “Um…”

                “They’ll see him in the spotlight,” Lisa said softly, offering feeble aid as her date stumbled through a response.  “It’ll be like he was standing right in front of you.”

                “If he was standing right in front of me, he’d still only look like one of my dolls,” the girl answered swiftly, allowing not even a half-smile to crack her lips to indicate she was kidding.  “But that’s okay with me.”

                “Good,” Peter swallowed.

                “Since you’re here, you should come be with me for a while,” Mandy said, brushing away the previous defense as easily as a buzzing fly.  “I’m going to go watch ScreamSight 6.  It’s supposed to be way better than 5.  Lots more blood.”

                “Umm, thanks for the offer, but…” Peter muttered, inadvertently glancing to Lisa for support.

                “…but we just saw a movie,” Lisa finished.  She took a step back from their accosting fellow student and her ominously eccentric aura.

                Hazel eyes seething in a way that it looked like her family name and entire ethics system had been insulted on a fundamental level, Mandy nodded curtly and turned around.  Peeking back over her shoulder a final time, her lips again parted to speak.

                “See you in school, tiny boy,” she swore quietly before fading once again easily as she’d come into the increasingly rowdy crowd of college kids.

                “What… was that about?” Lisa wondered aloud as she at last broke free of the throngs and passed through the final glass barrier into the outdoors, where the sun had only recently sunk below the rosy horizon.  “That seemed a little, um…”

                “You really don’t want to know,” Peter murmured, running a hand across his scalp from the stress.  Already he could feel a few drops of chilled sweat had beaded on his neck just from the extended proximity to that girl in a public space.

                “Okay…” Lisa said.  “If she’s being weird or anything to you, though, you know… you can let me know.”

                “Okay.”

                “Seriously.  Like I said before.  I’ve got your back.”

                “I know.  I will.  Thank you,” Peter promised with as much truth as he could muster, and this seemed to satisfy her as they approached Suzanne’s minivan.  The woman had, as predicted, been dutifully parked by the curb right where she’d promised for quite a while now.  After buckling in and going through a few moments of idle chitchat about the quality of the movie and the serving size of the popcorn, Lisa and Peter were secured into the leather backseat and Suzanne was pulling out of the parking lot.

                Relieved to be free of that encounter and back in the sanctity of the familiar, surrounded by two of the people he trusted most in the world, the tiny freshman decided he wasn’t going to let Mandy affect his mood in even the slightest measure.  And as he looked back up to Lisa’s reassuringly grinning face, those soft hands folded politely in her lap as the car rolled gingerly over some speed bumps, he realized it wouldn’t be too hard.

                There wasn’t a whole lot of conversation amongst the three on the way back.  Peter and Lisa realized they weren’t quite sure how to operate in front of an adult when they were still struggling to piece things together for themselves, and so mostly kept it surface-level here, discussing some upcoming assignments, plus a rumor of a particularly humorous prank pulled by an upperclassman in a gym bathroom involving fake mice and rubber turds.  Suzanne, after her initial questions about the night’s feature film, remained pretty silent, turning the radio up just high enough to distract herself with a few retro tunes from her own teen years, but stayed uninvolved in her child’s date or whatever-it-was at the risk of embarrassing him.

                As over-the-moon as he’d been with this whole affair, Peter was still sizably grateful to his mother for her behavior in driving them to and from the theatre.  He knew it had taken a herculean effort for the woman to watch the child she still often viewed as her baby boy, cradled in the hand of a teenage girl she’d only met on this one occasion, disappearing into the movie theatre without her supervision, where any number of catastrophic events could befall ranging from being snatched up by sticky-fingered kiddies in line for the newest animated comedy, to a slushie accidentally capsizing on him and inflicting hypothermia.

                Peter had actually held his breath in bracing anticipation as Lisa clambered out of his mother’s back seat with him in tow before the movie started, expecting Suzanne to sound out a rambling final warning of cautionary measures for Lisa.  They’d already gotten there later than expected because his mother drove so slowly whenever he was in the car, even while strapped securely into his specialized car seat consisting of a bundle of reinforced straps and buckles in a box.  Perhaps it was Lisa’s obvious attention in keeping Peter level with her palm, though, or simply her caring and unprompted promise to Suzanne to keep him safe while inside, but evidently the tittering mother felt confident enough to hold her tongue just this one time.

                Suzanne didn’t even make any further comment other than a final cheery note of gladness to have met the redhead as they arrived at Lisa’s house again.  Slipping out the sliding door, the shy fifteen-year-old hesitated as she turned back to face Peter.  The pair were equally self-conscious in the effort to think up a proper farewell that not only was compatible with their current depth of friendship or whatever-this-was, as well as one that wouldn’t be embarrassing for Peter’s mother to witness.  At last, they seemingly settled on it, in remarkably synchronized time.

                “Thanks so much for this, Peter,” Lisa crooned, leaning back into the car and hovering over the box containing her date.  “I had a really good time.”

                “Me too, Lisa,” Peter said back, feeling mildly emasculated to be looking up at her from inside his makeshift child seat that he’d probably require for the entirety of his miniature existence.  Still, he noted there wasn’t the slightest hint of judgment in the girl’s expression.  Her eyes were focused squarely on him, and only him, rather than the burgeoning world of unusual accommodations that surrounded him at all times.

                After a second of hesitation whereupon the hearts of both bashful teens were arrested in their chests, Lisa’s fingertip, which had been tapping thoughtfully at her lip, descended into the opening of the car seat.  Alighting again on Peter’s shoulder as it had in the movie theatre, albeit without the necessity and therefore defense of it as she’d had then, she soothingly stroked her fingertip along the tiny boy’s arm in a motion that stirred his synapses into a berserk overdrive.  No longer afraid of how it was perceived, Peter placed his hand back on her velvety fingertip in the same manner he had back in the theatre, the pair of them just as silently and emotionally naked for it, more so than they’d been yet, despite how simple a gesture it was.

                A smile crossed both of their lips: a silent promise that this night wouldn’t be the last of its kind, and Peter could easily see the color flushing into Lisa’s cheeks as she bid him a last goodbye and turned with a wave to himself and his mother, filing up the cobblestone walk to her front stoop.

                “So,” Suzanne called back to her son in the backseat as they reversed out of Lisa’s driveway, unable to see him but compensating with eager volume.  “Did you… have fun tonight, honey?”

                “Oh, man!” he laughed, unable to hold back his jubilation now that he didn’t have to worry about utterly humiliating himself in Lisa’s presence any longer.  However, he quickly put himself back in check, still with a goofy smirk on his mouth.  “I mean.  Yeah.  Yeah I did.”

“And then what happened?” Jessica begged eagerly, her crystalline blue eyes bulging with glee as she laid upon the artfully heart-adorned bedspread, her tiny brother cupped into her hands where she could get the most immediate account from him without interruption.  Practically as soon as Suzanne had pulled back into the garage with her son in his car seat, the little blonde hellion had appeared in the doorway.  She’d unbuckled and whisked her five-inch sibling up and away into the sanctity of her bedroom for a more formal interrogation of his first-ever date before a chuckling Suzanne even had a chance to get out of her own position in the driver’s seat.  Erica, reading a magazine at the kitchen table, had only rolled her eyes at the sight.

                “And… then we bought popcorn,” Peter reported dutifully to his young audience as he relaxed into his sister’s palms.

                “How big was it?  Like, what size?”

                “Small.”

                “Did you eat very much of it?”

                “Uhh, like three pieces.”

                “Did you go sit in your seats then?”

                “Yep.”

                “Did she hold you while you watched the movie, or hold you on her leg?  Or put you in the chair?”

                “Held me.”

                “Is she good at holding you?” the girl pressed sternly, a frown cutely crossing her face.  “She better be good at holding you.”

                “She’s very good at holding me.”

                “Swear?”

                “Swear.”

                “She doesn’t just pick you up, right?  She asks first?”

                “Uh-huh.”

                “Every time?”

                “Every time.”

                “Okay, okay.  So you bought popcorn and sat down and she held you.  Then what happened?”

                “Oh, for God’s sake, Jessie,” the freshman laughed, crossing his legs and resting them comfortably over his little sister’s thumb.  It was an act she was of course more than okay with, as he often suspected it was part of a long-held campaign on her part to make her hands his preferred relaxation destination on the entire globe.  Certainly she’d at least cracked the top ten, as there weren’t many people who were quite as saccharinely accommodating as his younger sibling.  “Isn’t that enough?”

                “No!  I want to hear more!”

                He slapped his forehead, already overwhelmed with the prospect of deciphering the night’s vastly pleasant events for himself, let alone his sister’s bright-eyed consumption.  She was liable to turn just about anything he said into her own personal soap opera to be overthought, inflated, and then discussed at length with a hive of gossipy seventh graders at her school.  As talkative as Erica’s friends could be around the lunch table, the churning rumor mill of the youngest Clark and her peers made those older girls appear as silent wearers of the habit.

                “I… uh, it’s just…” Peter stammered.

                “C’mon, pleeeease?  I want to know everything that happened,” the girl pouted, pulling her lips into a comically curved frown as she leaned in close enough that every wispy exhalation through her nostrils breezed through Peter’s hair.  “Why don’t you want to tell me what happened?”

                “It’s not that I don’t want to tell you!” he snickered defensively, patting his sister’s quivering fingertips for reassurance.  “It just wasn’t a big deal like you’re making it.  Honest.”

                “But it had to be!  You… you went out to the movies!  At night!  Alone!  With a girl!” Jessica reminded him in clamoring succession, as if each of these facts had been forgotten in the brief time since he’d dropped Lisa off and returned to the house.  Evidently she was just as surprised as Peter had been that he’d managed to wrangle his way into getting a non-familial human female to harbor some sort of emotional feeling for him.  Frankly, he couldn’t blame her for the lingering shock.  It was still a bit hard to believe.

                “Yes, I did.  She had eyes and hair and a nose and a face and everything,” Peter commented, causing Jessica to bounce her feet against the baseboard of the bed in frustration, rattling the entire mattress beneath her body.  She drummed her toes against the smooth wooden surface with impatience.

                “You’re kiiiiiiilling me!” she groaned.  The girl caged her fingers in even closer around her sibling, still allowing him to lie in her hand, but she was beginning to roll over from her stomach and onto her back.  Steadily she lifted him up during the transition.  She faced the glitter-crusted ceiling, lofting her hands over her face and holding her fingers such that Peter was able to perch upon their fleshy spires and peer down at his sister’s massive and doe-eyed countenance below.

                “What are you doing?” he snickered, settling in comfortably to his clubhouse composed of his adoring sibling’s fingers.

                “I’m holding you hostage.  You can come down once you’ve told me about your whole entire date with your girlfriend,” Jessica smarmed, grinning cheekily and instantly swallowing the giggle that would’ve given away how deeply she was kidding.

                “She’s not my girlfriend.”

                “Yes she is.  But even if you don’t call her that, you’re still telling me what I want to know if you want me to let you go.”

                “Joke’s on you, Jess, because you made it pretty darn comfy up here,” Peter fired back, cradling his hands behind his head and lounging his whole body further over the smooth planks of Jessica’s probing digits.  He faked a yawn, even closing his eyes to seal the deal.

                “Oh yeah?” she mocked, and suddenly her grip on him was shifting again, just as he knew it would with enough gentle smack-talk.  In a moment she had pinched him around the shins with her thumbs and forefingers, casually letting him slide off the tips of her thumbs and dangle by his feet over the bridge of her nose.  Once she had Peter hung upside down, she tilted her chin a little higher, examining him closer.

                “How about now?” she challenged with a smirk.  The warmth of her breath steamed over his cheeks.

                “This… well, aside from all the blood rushing to my head, it’s still not that bad,” he said, crossing his arms.  “Seriously, this is the best you can throw at me?”

                “Nope!” she said, a chuckle rumbling up from her throat as she pressed her tongue firmly against the inside of her cheek.  “If you don’t tell me what I want to know, I’m… I’m gonna…”

                “Gonna what?”

                “…I’m gonna swallow you up, Peter,” she warned in a farcically deep voice, which still managed to come off as fairly high pitched due to the thirteen-year-old’s normally flighty vocals.  “Gonna eat you…. right… up.  For dinner.”  She stretched her jaws back open, allowing her sibling a good look at her glistening tonsils down in the black depths.  Saliva gushed from between her gums and down the slick curves of her cheeks, and slowly her tongue slaked its way over her bottom row of teeth, wriggling about as it emerged from the dark cave.

                “Uh-huh.  I don’t think I quite fit your dietary needs.”

                “Yum-yum-yum!  Big brother, just what I wanted!” the girl teased, rubbing her stomach in broad circles with her free hand.  Her tongue swirled once then twice around the perimeter of her lips, applying a fresh layer of gloss.  “You’ll make a peeeerfect snack.”

                “Is that supposed to scare me?” Peter questioned pleasantly as he stared down into the slimy pit of his little sister’s mouth.  He blinked as a few flecks of frothy spittle landed on his face while Jessica’s tongue lashed about, making a real show of winding its way around her plush lips and then squirming back into the wet hovel to gather a fresh coating of sticky moisture.  “Because if it is, it’s definitely working.  It looks and smells like you haven’t flossed in two weeks.”

                Snarling with false disdain, Jessica didn’t try to summon a verbal retort, but instead extended her writhing red muscle all the way out of her mouth.  The proximity to the hot, bud-stippled flesh caused the hairs on Peter’s neck to stand on end.  Breathlessly he watched the undulating landscape of his sister’s soggy tongue approach his head for a taste.  Slurping against the miniature boy’s neck, then, the girl licked deliberately down along his cheek and to his temple, painting a generous coat of her spit across his skin.  All the while he remained perfectly still in her tender grip.

                “Actually, make that three weeks,” Peter corrected after an appropriate pause, smudging away a glob of the gooey gift that had dribbled into his hair.  Jessica only erupted into a flurry of rapidfire giggles as she sucked the offending organ back into its mucky cave between her lips.

                “Is she releasing the kraken again?” Erica’s voice sniped from the doorway as she leaned against its wooden frame with the magazine tucked under one arm.  She stared in pitifully at the goofy display of empty threats taking place on her youngest sibling’s bed.  The sarcasm sopped from her every ironic syllable.  “I thought she only did that game when she was like five years old.  Oh, wait, what am I talking about, she still is…”

                “Go away, Erica.  Peter’s telling me about his date,” Jessica complained loudly, briefly closing off the gaping maw of damp doom she was threatening to plunge her sibling into with all the seriousness of a stand-up comedy hour.

                “I’m sure he is,” Erica grunted, passing back into the hallway and heading for her own bedroom.  “You guys need to get a life.  Like, each of you.”  A slamming door was heard before the last word was even finished projecting out.

                “What does she know about this stuff, anyway?” Jessica chastised quietly, already recollecting her brother into a more secure palm and cupping him into its center.  Her features softened as she rolled back onto her stomach again and kicked her feet up in the air, allowing Peter to sit in her palms like a couch again.  Worry had etched itself indelibly into her angelic face.  “You… don’t mind that I like to play with you a little, do you, Peter?”

                Scoffing with a dismissive snort, the fifteen-year-old patted his sister’s fingers again and even gave a hug to the closest thumb, which gratefully snuggled back around him.

                “Hey, to me, it just looked like you were doing a totally lame job of interrogating me, but whatever you want to call it,” he shrugged.  “No, of course I don’t mind, Jessie.”

                “Good,” she said with some evident relief, a bit of tension releasing in her shoulders.

                “It’s at least an improvement from when we were little,” Peter said mostly under his breath.

                “Yeah, I, uh… well, Mom didn’t really like it when I actually did drop you in there,” Jessica commented wistfully, rolling her baby-blue eyes and clacking her teeth together in memory of the event that was now playing with equal clarity through both of their minds, though from dramatically different perspectives.

                It was pretty hard to forget, at any rate.  Once, in search of a particular pocket doll of hers that Peter had craftily hidden from his young sibling as a prank, she’d entered into a very similar style of investigation by dangling the boy above her melodramatically broadened lips.

                However, when he’d refused to bend to her will and give up the location of his hostage toy, she’d actually gone through with it, releasing the grip on her fingers and allowing him to plop right into a spongy wrestling match with her tongue.  Having entrapped the diminutive child between her cheeks and sucked on him like an organic jawbreaker for several excessively drool-inducing minutes, a horrified Suzanne finally yanked her son from the girl’s jaws and took him away for a weepy warm-water bath.  It was only through some delicately persuasive speechmaking from Peter, insisting everything was in good fun, that the very young Jessica had avoided a severe spanking and subsequent grounding.  The activity had, of course, been aggressively curtailed since then, but the aftermath had brought them oddly closer.

                “Probably not,” Peter agreed at length as he proceeded to use his sister’s spiraled thumbprint to help wipe away the warm spit that still clung to his skin.  She happily helped in this endeavor, even mopping several strands of her golden hair against his face to completely dry the results of her slippery game away.  A few of her luminous stray locks ended up glued to his cheeks after the effort, but the freshman couldn’t have cared less.

                “Do… you want to hang out with us a little bit tonight?” Jessica posed innocently to her brother once she’d finished cleaning his face of her saliva, though she still kept her pinky finger rested against his hand, which he responded to with a few friendly strokes.

                Peter couldn’t help but feel immensely touched by his sister’s sweetness.  Even though she had a new friend from that dance class of hers coming over to spend the night and engage in whatever frilly activities suited girls of their age, she clearly felt attached enough to him after his day of forward strides to want to split her time between her social life and her height-challenged sibling.  It was awfully tough to say no to that prospect, especially when she looked down at him with such hope in her adorable eyes.

                “You’re sure I’m not gonna cramp your style?” he chuckled.

                “No!  I don’t know, I just… want you around, big brother.  Around me, I mean.  It’s hard to see you as much with your regular pe- I mean, regular school now,” she drawled, avoiding his gaze for a moment, and sheepishly chewing on the corner of her lower lip.  “You know?”

                The freshman nodded, acknowledgement at last striking, a bit on the late side.  For years, his home schooling meant he was always present when Jessica arrived home from a long day, ready to spend time with her in whatever way she wished to make up for the hours apart.  Already their respective passages into their teenage years had created numerous divergences in their common interests.

                Now especially, though, the demands of Peter’s homework and additional time out of the safety of the house had separated them far more than usual, and he realized it had taken something of a toll on his doting little sister.  He couldn’t help but feel a rending twinge of guilt in his gut, despite there being nothing he could really do about this change in the norm.  Clearly, there was only one correct answer here if he wanted an intact conscience after this little exchange.

                “I… think I do, Jessie,” he said warmly, patting her finger.  “Sure I’ll hang out with you.  You and…”

                “Stella’s her name.  She should be here any minute now,” Jessica said with a goofy smile splayed over her face at his answer.  “You’ll like her.  She’s really cool.”

                “I’m sure she is,” he said, just as the telltale bong of the doorbell echoed through every wall in the house.  “Wow.  You must be psychic.”

                “Totally.  Let’s go see her, okay?” Jessica said excitedly, bundling Peter into her cupped hands and bouncing off the end of the bed, practically pirouetting on the balls of her feet as she made her way to the stairs.  She took the carpeted ledges two at a time on the way down but kept her brother firmly sandwiched between her palms to prevent bucking into the cruel grasp of gravity.  Suzanne had already reached the front door ahead of her hosting daughter and swung it wide open to receive their guest.  Peter righted himself in Jessica’s palm just as she came to a skidding stop in the doorframe, sunlight spilling in and momentarily blurring out his view of the newcomer.  A few awkward blinks and some shadow provided by his sister’s thumb finally corrected this, however.

                There stood Stella, who definitely wouldn’t have been a difficult individual to pick out of a police line-up even if Peter didn’t know she was from his sister’s dance class.  Lithe and slender, almost willowy, the girl’s long honeyed hair reached down nearly to her waist, and was wavy enough to suggest innumerable tight buns it had been woven into so she could defy gravity more freely.  Her posture, too, indicated a constant bodily vigilance, as her arms were folded before her waist and her spine remained ramrod straight.  Her face, however, hadn’t taken on the narrower appearance of the rest of her body and was rounder, almost childlike, with dreamy almond-shaped eyes that beamed a deep sea green hue.  If it wasn’t for the noticeable height advantage she held over Jessica, her frame might’ve almost suggested to Peter a fairy out of one of his childhood picture books.

                “C’mon in, Stella!” Suzanne said with a wide beam, beckoning entrance as the girl nodded, lugging her purple overnight bag in over her shoulder.  Her sneakers tapped quietly against the hardwood of the foyer, as though every step was made with the intention of walking across water without unspooling ripples over its cool surface.  Peter couldn’t help but be impressed.

                “You found us!” Jessica crooned with some light sarcasm.

                “Somehow,” Stella snickered, her voice of a lower timbre than Peter was expecting considering her svelte build.  Silky, and almost flinty in tone, like the vocal equivalent of warm syrup.

                “Did your mom have an easy time finding us?” Suzanne asked, wordlessly accepting the flowery duffel from Stella.  “You can leave this by the stairs if you like until you’re ready to take it up to Jessica’s room.”

                “Thanks.  We almost got lost a couple times, but I had the directions all written down.  We live a lot closer to the dance studio, so it’s… a little bit of a drive,” Stella said.  “It’s okay, though.  I’m here now!”

                “Yes you are, so I’ll let you girls get to it,” Suzanne said excitedly after a slightly embarrassed side-glance from her youngest daughter in regards to her continued presence.  “I popped some cookies into the oven a few minutes ago, so those should be piping hot and ready to eat in a little while.  I hope you like chocolate chip.”

                “Awesome.  That’s my fav,” Stella said.  “I even…”  The words began in the same confident tone but seemed to crawl back between her lips and melt away onto her tongue when her eyes at last fell to Jessica’s hands to take notice of the mythically tiny boy perched atop the girl’s fingers.  Stella’s irises flared with invigoration in much the same way Peter had seen others at his school react, though she refrained from dropping her jaw, which he appreciated.

                “Have fun, you two!” their mother said cheerily, turning and scuttling back into the kitchen to attend to her baked goods, which were already beginning to flood the ground floor with the hyper-sweet aroma of gooey cocoa chunks.

                “Stella, this is my brother, Peter,” Jessica said proudly once they were alone at last, brandishing her clasped palms a little higher so that the five-inch boy wouldn’t have to be looked down upon during this introduction.  It was a gratefully humanizing habit of hers that not even Suzanne always thought to address, and was another reason Peter preferred to be held by Jessica than most other human beings.

                “I know.  I’ve heard about him before,” Stella said pointedly.  Her aquamarine irises were locked more intently now to the specimen in Jessica’s palms.  “It’s nice to meet him.”

                “Hi.  Same to you,” he said, already growing unsure of himself under the prying scrutiny of the girl’s invasive gaze.  It wasn’t simply that she’d subtly avoided speaking to him directly in her introduction.  She wasn’t quite drilling into him with the silvery dexterity of say, Sharon, but she definitely was looking upon him with that distinctive depth that made Peter feel as though she was peeling his tiny clothes off his fragile little body with a mere bat of her eyelashes.  The smile that now played upon her thin lips touted that this wasn’t an inaccurate sensation.  Something was definitely cooking in that skull of hers.

                “He’s going to hang out with us a little tonight, if that’s cool with you,” Jessica said, her tone implying the issue was already more or less decided without Stella’s input.

                “Oh yeah.  Duh.  The more, the merrier,” Stella agreed, though Peter was half-hoping now she’d reject the opportunity and he could just try to make up quality time with his sister later in some less exacting context.  Already he was beginning to wish he’d requested a more personal playdate with Jessica so he wouldn’t have to endure a pair of miniature emerald globes studying him for the whole evening.

                “Good!” Jessica chimed, reminding Peter that he had to put up with this now for better or worse, as he’d already made a promise to his spurned sibling.  “You guys are gonna be best friends.  I know it.”

                At this, the slimy tip of Stella’s tongue spilled out the corner of her lips for just a moment, glinting in the dimmed light of the chandelier above.  It slithered back inside just as soon as it had appeared, but instantly caused Peter’s blood to run colder, even with Jessica’s warm fingers cuddled around his sides.  Despite the fact that he’d fearlessly put up with an entire monstrous tongue from a different craftily playful girl mere minutes ago, even the sight of the same muscle flicking in his direction while Stella scrutinized him beneath her inquisitive survey was enough to inspire some jitters.

                “Yes.  Yes, we will be,” Stella confirmed, savoring the confounded expression on Peter’s face.

                “Well.  What do you want to do first?” Jessica asked, blissfully oblivious to the tangible tension congealing between her new friend and precious big brother.  Peter briefly considered giving her thumb a tug in an effort to gain her attention, but with Stella staring him down with the precision of a military sniper now, it didn’t seem possible to convey a coded message even via cough without ousting himself as rude.  So, he held his tongue.

                “Oh, I don’t know exactly…” the teenage dancer sighed, belying the truth and rocking backward and forward from her toes to her heels.  She slid her tongue along her top row of teeth, well-within Peter’s view as she continued staring him down.  “But I think I’ve got some ideas for where to start.”

                Peter wasn’t quite sure why, exactly, he agreed to this childish game of Truth or Dare with his younger sister and her honey-haired new friend Stella.  They’d picked a spot in the living room out in the center of the carpet, sprawled in a circle with the tiny freshman seated on the ground, flanked on either side by the bare legs of each towering girl that essentially formed curved cliffsides for him, so there wasn’t really a way to try sneaking off now under the pretension that he had other things to do, when Jessica knew perfectly well he didn’t.  More importantly, he’d agreed to hang out with her this evening after so many missed occasions for bonding, and he had to honor that promise.

                So here he was, watching the massive girls occasionally reaching out into a plastic pink bowl containing a rainbow assortment of M&M’s as they took turns asking each other for candid opinions on their classmates, and occasionally him for admissions as well, though none of them were particularly taxing yet.  Mostly it had to do with things he’d seen or done during his brief tenure at the high school, and thankfully he hadn’t been there long enough to have accrued a particularly daring history.  His sister had set a generously portioned and crunchy red chocolate candy into his lap to be eaten at his leisure.  However, Peter was still pretty full from the popcorn at the movies, so mostly its shell was just melting into his hands.

                He suspected his willingness to join this eagerly proposed game had something to do with the fact that he was so cosmically elated after the time he’d spent with Lisa this evening that he was fairly certain he’d willingly comply with any request, from dragging the mountainous garbage can outside on his own, to dressing up in a tuxedo for Jessica and going on a follow-up date with one of her Barbies like she’d enacted innumerable times in her elementary school years.  Considering the range of options, it wasn’t hard to say yes to this seemingly simple request.

                Unfortunately, the more he glanced over to Stella, he was beginning to feel the tiniest twinge of regret.  Not much, as he reminded himself for the umpteenth time that younger acquaintances deserved a free pass for staring at him because they didn’t know any better.  Still, he’d have been lying to say it was a bit unnerving to see the cross-legged teenage dancer eyeing him so openly without even the courtesy of doing it when she thought he wasn’t looking.  Evidently, she wasn’t bothered with the possibility of him feeling intimidated by her already impressive five-foot-seven frame, considering she’d only just escaped the window of the tweenage years.  Peter guessed it was ideal for leaping about the dance floor on the balls of her feet, though for his purposes of having to watch her monumental being looking upon him like an especially enrapturing zoo exhibit, it wasn’t much appreciated.

                If anything, her eyes only widened when she received his returned attention, her slender brows bouncing a few times at him, and the rest of her body reacted in subtle ways as well.  Her feet were encased in thin lint-trekked gray socks that were resting on their sides a mere matter of paced away from where he sat on the carpet amongst the twin titans.

                The long toes within the tight fabric scrunched aggressively as if to wave to him, and though he couldn’t be certain, they seemed to be crawling closer and closer to him as the minutes ticked by, with Stella steadily stretching out her leg to put Peter closer to the fabric-covered underside of her foot.  However, he decided it was best not to get needlessly paranoid over the random bodily motions of a young girl, and instead refocused his attention on the game.

                “Okay,” Stella said, a conspiratory grin spreading over her lips in such a way that Peter couldn’t help but feel even more insecure.  Even vulnerable, though with Jessica seated right beside him, he couldn’t imagine why.  “We’ve done a lot of truths now… I think it’s time we make it a little more fun.  Right?”

                “Right!” Jessica giggled with an egregious nod.  She herself had been picking more truths than dares in comparison to the apparently youthful daredevil that was her dance class compatriot, and was clearly willing to jump at the chance to prove herself given the divide.  In fact, in her eagerness, she’d completely forgotten to turn to Peter to request his opinion, something she generally did without even thinking.

                “Great!” Stella said, clearly content to disregard Peter’s view on the matter as well.  “I’ve got just the thing, then.”  Her fingers slid into the immodestly short shorts that revealed such a generous length of her thin legs, toned by rigorous routines and bounds in front of a floor-length mirror.  Incredibly, she actually managed to fish something out of a hidden pocket, returning with a gleaming quarter centered in her expansive palm, which Peter was only able to see by craning his neck.

                “Are… you going to flip it to decide what we do?” Jessica questioned, still smiling but clearly nervous at the prospect of what she might be asked to do if she received the dreaded secondary option of the game.  She played nervously with the ends of her bleach-blonde locks, batting at them with her thumb with sharp, jutting movements: something Peter noticed, and reflected as something she generally only did when especially anxious.  At least he was in good company in this regard.

                “You got it!” Stella chuckled, tossing the coin over in her hand, allowing it to topple through the air for a fleeting moment before capturing it again under her folding fingers with a soft slap of her flesh against the warm metal.  “Trust me.  It makes this waaaay better.  No one can chicken out of what they get.  Fair’s fair, for everybody.  You know?”

                “I guess that makes sense,” Jessica agreed.  At last she looked down to her tiny brother beside her leg, smiling in search for reassurance.  “Ready to play, Peter?”

                “Of course he’s ready to play,” Stella cut in before the boy could open his mouth and consider voicing a potential objection to the loss of agency here.  She, too, looked to Peter, letting the glow of her eyes sink into him.  “I mean, it’s not like he could be afraid of a dare.  He’s a big high school boy, after all, right?”

                Jessica didn’t react, clearly missing the subtext of that jab, but the curved smirk that quickly played across Stella’s youthful lips to Peter with immediate effectiveness that she was poking fun at him, even challenging him.  Which made him feel all the more foolish to let some stupid dreg of pride get the better of him and spew out the words in a frigid tone before he could stop himself: “I’m not afraid of anything.”

                “Awesome.  I didn’t think you were,” Stella responded coolly, nodding her head and raising an eyebrow again to indicate she was more just placating him like an overexcited toddler than actually accepting his answer as an admission of reality.  Which, Peter supposed, wasn’t terribly inaccurate of her, since he was indeed afraid of numerous things in the world, many of them entirely practical considering the risk of being trodden into paste beneath a tennis shoe tread.

                “Who goes now?” Jessica asked quietly.  “Do we start over?”

                “I think it’s your turn now,” Stella said.  An impish curl on her lips, she tossed the coin over to Jessica, who fumbled awkwardly and caught the currency against her chest, at last cupping it into her palm.  “Which means your big high school brother gets to challenge you, whatever it is.  Heads is truth, tails is dare.”

                “Okay…” the girl sighed, giving the quarter a flip and letting it cascade onto the back of her hand.  She flinched at the sight of the eagle, but seemed to relax a little when she remembered it was her caring sibling issuing the dare rather than the edgy thirteen-year-old across from her.

                “Get her good,” Stella hissed good-naturedly down to Peter, causing to wince almost as broadly as his sister.

                “Okay.  Um… I dare you to… call up the pizza place down the street, and try to order a stir fry,” Peter drawled, attempting to make the command easier with each syllable.

                “Sure!” Jessica laughed.  There was evident relief in her voice that he hadn’t asked her to prank call her crush or toilet papering the neighbors’ hydrangeas.  She whipped her cell phone out and immediately began pounding the digits in after double-checking the number.

                “Wow,” Stella groaned under her breath, clearly more than underwhelmed by the ease of the dare.  “You guys go hardcore, huh?”

                “You bet we do,” Peter retorted almost defensively, though he kept a smile on his face as he watched Jessica carry out the dare and mostly fail to hold back her giggling as she made the absurd request to the hapless restaurant and finally close the device up again.  She placed a hand over her mouth, still quivering with erupting chuckles: “They hung up on me.”

                Next up was Stella, who tossed the coin into the air with impressively pinpoint accuracy to keep it centered over her hand.  It spun end-over-end at least ten feet up before plopping directly back into her creased palm again, which Peter couldn’t help but be impressed by.  When it came up heads, her shoulders visibly deflated.

                “You didn’t want truth?” Jessica snickered.

                “Truth sucks,” Stella declared, crossing her arms.  “All right, Jess, what are you givin’ me?”

                “Have you… ever made out with someone?” Jessica posed delicately, clearly enamored with learning this spicy tidbit at first but quickly becoming embarrassed to even mention such a longshot of a fairy tale.

                Stella sputtered out a demeaning chortle.  “That’s it?  You’re sure?  Yeah, of course I have.  Plenty of times.  Probably with… three different boys.  No, four.”

                “Wow,” Jessica uttered, bowled completely over emotionally and almost physically as she placed her hands down against the carpet, nearly bumping Peter in the knees with her thumb.  The concept of lip-locking, let alone with wrapping tongues and saliva exchange, was obviously such a foreign concept to Jessica that she’d been half-joking when she selected the question.  “That’s… that’s…”

                “It’s not a big deal,” Stella said, blowing it off just a little too haughtily, and churning her tongue around the inside of her cheeks.  “Okay.  Big high school boy.  You’re… up.  And I choose your challenge.”

                Peter tried not to let his frown become too visible as he lifted the edge of the coin up from the carpet where Stella had placed it.  There was no sense feeding into the girl’s impolite games by giving her a reaction.  He was the older one, after all.  It was on him to set an example and inspire some maturity, however much he was starting to doubt it would be possible with someone as thoroughly self-confident as the pixieish dancer.

                Trying not to grunt too loudly at the awkwardness of his grip, the miniscule freshman lugged the coin up against his stomach and gave it enough of a toss for the quarter to flip a few times in midair and plunk back onto the ground.

                Tails.

                Of course.

                “Perfect,” Stella huffed shallowly, clearly just a little too excited about this opportunity.  From the sound of her voice, Peter couldn’t help but wonder if she’d suggested the inclusion of the coin in the rules exclusively to arrange this exact scenario between the pair of them.  It was only now he realized that, based on where they started in the line-up, she’d made it possible to control his fate in the game.

                An instant later, it went from a suspicion to an essential confirmation.

                “I dare you… to stick your face in my sock,” Stella sniggered triumphantly, lowering her voice enough that no one outside the room could’ve picked up on her vindictive tone.  “And take a deep breath.”

                Jessica cleared her throat, her blue eyes bulging in surprise at Stella’s challenge to expose Peter to the whiffiest corner of her dance-toned figure, but no rebuttal was offered.

                “Oh,” Peter managed, mulling the dare over and liking it less and less with each passing second.  “That’s… well, I… it’s just that that’s…”

                “Unless… you’re too much of a little chicken?” Stella proffered sweetly.

                Peter’s face flushed a deeper pink.  He blinked, looking up from Stella’s eagerly worming fabric-entrapped toes and to her giddily grinning face, then next to the hesitant grimace Jessica was wearing as she chewed pensively on her fingernail.  While he knew his sister wouldn’t make him participate in anything he didn’t want to, he could also see the desire in her eyes to establish a friendship with this girl she apparently happened to find very, very cool.  The boy frankly couldn’t quite condone such a thing judging by the decorum Stella had exhibited so far tonight, but he knew it wasn’t his life to run, and after all she’d done to try and ensure he had as normal a social life as possible, he decided it wasn’t his place to endanger a new relationship of hers, even through the tiniest of gestures.

                “Hey,” he shrugged at last.  “Like I said.  I’m not afraid of anything.”

                “That’s the spirit,” Stella congratulated happily, stretching her leg out just a little further such that the sole of her car-sized sock was shoved into Peter’s personal bubble, close enough that he could reach out and touch its worn-out fabric and darkened rings of sweat beneath the toes.  The motion and subsequent rush of wind caused him to cringe with the same instinct that protected normal-sized people from oncoming traffic, and he hadn’t even touched his face into its rancid underside.  “So do it.”

                “Yeah…” Peter muttered more to himself than anyone else as he briefly studied the broad wall of fuzzy gray cotton containing what he estimated to be at least a size-eight ped, obviously encased in those purple shoes for the majority of the day and marinating in vinegary discharge leaked from her pubescent pores.  A stiff cloud of pestilential flavors was already wafting smugly off Stella’s foot.  Thank God he at least had the taut sock as a buffer.

                “C’mon,” the girl encouraged warmly, her voice actually becoming friendlier as the vision of what he was about to do preemptively danced through her unfortunately creative mind.  “Let’s see what you’re made of.”

                Gulping up clean air and holding his breath in what he was fairly certain would be a useless defense, Peter gave one last glance up to his hopeful sister above and plunged his face into the folds of dingy fabric over Stella’s sole.  As predicted, the proximity to the girl’s appendage plugged his sinuses with an unbearably pungent aroma.

                “Big, big smell or the dare doesn’t count,” Stella commented.  “Like, at least for a minute.  Don’t worry, I’ll count.”

                “A minute?” Peter hacked, already feeling what little usable oxygen he had on reserve being tainted with the rank zest of Stella’s squalid skin and spongy toejam.

                “Longer if you want,” the girl commented nonchalantly.  She flexed her foot, bunching the damp cotton tighter around Peter’s cheeks.  “I don’t care.”

                Too revolted to even bother trying to puzzle out the illogic of that suggestion, the boy tried to calculate how many seconds he’d already endured this repugnant sacrifice for his sister’s social life as the salty air continued to seep into his poor respiratory system.  Surely the counter was in the upper forties by now.  It had to be close.  Whatever it was, Peter was having an increasingly difficult time keeping the revelation of his disgust from becoming known to either party.  He didn’t want to worry Jessica, and he most certainly didn’t want to give Stella the satisfaction she clearly sought so quasi-sadistically.

                It had to be in the fifties now.  Close enough.  He attempted to edge his nose away from being quite so completely buried in the moisture of Stella’s footwear, when he felt the ridged pad of a thumb tapping at the back of his skull, lightly bouncing his face once again into the squishy surface.

                “Ah-ah-ah!  No cheating, big high school boy,” Stella chastised in a sing-song voice as she effectively pressed Peter’s now-squirming head back into the underside of her disgusting foot.  “You’re just at twenty-six seconds now.”

                Twenty-six?!  Maybe in some warped wormhole of the space-time continuum where reality crawled to a tenth of its normal speed.  Though, given how positively repulsively Stella’s sole reeked, Peter didn’t want to completely discount the possibility of some chemical reaction taking place between her balmy skin and the mealy fabric that allowed for such a phenomenon.  Science was a funky thing.

                “He… didn’t really look like he was cheating,” Jessica said, frowning and holding out a hand as if to reach in and pluck Peter out of the briny miasma of the dancer’s secreted effort.  If he’d been struggling, of course, she would’ve had him out from under Stella’s insistent finger in a heartbeat, but the boy was determined not to make a scene.

                “Sure he was.  I know how to count,” Stella promised, giving Peter’s head another light mashing that flushed his nose with a fresh dose of the sticky excretions infecting her innocuous sock.  Again, he refused to fight.  “We’re at… forty-one now.  Almost there.”

                “This seems like a pretty big dare,” Jessica commented as she scratched the back of her head with the hand that was considering rescuing her brother.  “Kinda gross.  Did you even shower after dance?”

                “Was gonna, but didn’t have time if I was going to make it here on time,” Stella announced to no one’s surprise, especially Peter’s.

                “Do you… play like this with other people too?” Jessica posed.

                “Oh, all the time.  It’s always more fun.  Trust me,” Stella giggled.

                “Oh… okay,” Peter’s sister relented, apparently adequately convinced.

                “I think that’s it, actually,” the miniscule freshman wheezed.  He’d managed to slip out from under the girl’s braced fingertip during the conversation and, trying not to crumble down to his hands and knees in weakness after having his system cleansed from gut to brainstem in vile teenage musk.

                “Hey, you’re not done!” Stella barked a little more harshly than she probably intended, because her voice softened immediately after witnessing how startled Jessica was by her abrasiveness.  “I mean… I only counted fifty-two seconds.  You have eight more to go.”

                “Thanks but… no thanks.”

                “It won’t count if you give up, you know. You’ll lose this turn.”

                “I can live with that,” Peter breathed.  He stuttered his breaths, hopelessly trying to heave away the stink that now clung to his hair and clothes like the scent of wet paint.

                Christ, that girl must’ve put her entire heart and soul into dancing.

                “Are you… okay, Peter?” Jessica questioned naively.  She wrinkled her nose.  “That looked pretty smelly.”

                “Yep!  Amazing!” he answered with a victorious thumbs-up, still dumbly dogged not to allow this invading girl to degrade him emotionally as well as physically.

                “I’m gonna go check on the pizza in the oven, then, okay?  It should be almost done, and then we can all have dinner,” Jessica said, raising an eyebrow at her brother as he readjusted woozily to potable air.  She rose to her feet, carefully enough to give Peter a wide berth as she braced her wriggling toes against the fibers of the carpet for support and pushed up to her feet.  “You two can just watch TV for a minute ‘til I get back if you want.  I’ll be quick.  Promise.”

                “Sure thing,” Stella said as Jessica swiped up the remote from the nearby coffee table and pounded the right buttons to give life to the bright LCD screen, along with its soft infomercial roar.

                Once the entertainment was provided, Peter watched his sister bound happily around the corner toward the light of the kitchen, blissfully unaware of the risk of leaving her brother and new friend alone in the same room. He opened his mouth to meekly request his sibling take him along for her trip, but his throat still burned with the lingering ghostly flavors of Stella’s sock, and he was marooned in the living room instead.  Immediately Peter felt a tingle run up his vertebrae as if through divine warning.  He almost didn’t hear her incoming over the sound of the TV, but he’d been helplessly victimized enough times in his life that his inner ear had long-ago trained itself to pick up on threats, however innocently quiet.

                “Finally,” Stella breathed with annoyance as soon as her friend had disappeared, and an instant later her slender fingers crimped around Peter’s legs, coiling him into her commanding fist.

                “Hey!” Peter gasped as he was launched into the air, too shocked yet still stricken with the inescapable sensation that this little rendezvous with Stella’s grabby mitts was inevitable.  “Please!  Please, put me d-”

                “Yeah, yeah, I know.  Put me down!  Wah-wah-wah!  Please.  You’re like a foot off the ground right now.  It wouldn’t even hurt if I let you go,” Stella taunted somewhat callously as she eyed the carpet just below Peter’s feet.  Indeed, she was still seated on the floor and holding him fairly level with her chest, so it wasn’t exactly a death plunge.  At worst, he’d bruise his ankle if he was dropped at the wrong angle.  But that wasn’t really the point here as the girl’s fingers finished snaking completely around the five-inch body in her hand.  Somehow, this was even less desirable than having his face pressed into the plush moisture of her dance-seasoned foot.

                “I’m… okay with you picking me up, all right?” Peter lied, deciding to just cut his losses and reinforce in his memory that this girl was simply inexperienced around him.  It just had to be spelled out for her, in calm and civil English.  “But please.  I really don’t like being picked up, or… held like this.  It doesn’t feel good.  Please, put me down, and if you want, I’ll step into your hand.”

                “Yeah, I don’t think so.  It’s easier to look at you like this,” Stella said, somewhat irrationally as her fingers rippled around Peter, alternately compressing into his chest, stomach, and crotch, which earned a grimace and a hollowing cringe from the freshman as though he’d been kicked in the family stones, though he decided not to broach the subject of what she’d just done, considering how forward he already understood her to be.

                He gripped the curled edges of the girl’s soft fingers, prying lightly at them with the hope of encouraging her with a little physical motion to lower him back to terra firma, but it was evidently in vain.  She had no intentions of letting go, at least not yet as she brushed away a few fluttering strands of that unwieldly long hair of hers with her free hand.  Those eyes flashed with a curious hunger he’d witnessed in too many faces in his life for it to be comfortable, with many of them taking place within the past couple of weeks at his new school.  He was used to getting it from kids younger than him, however.

                This could still be salvaged.  Admittedly, Peter was seriously starting to question Jessica’s talent at selecting new friends considering this one had no qualms with forcing him to breathe in her sweat and then imprisoning him in her fist, but nevertheless he remained determined to show his sibling the same love she’d always shown him and keep the peace here by any means necessary.

                “Okay, well… you’ve looked.  You can look at me fine on the ground, too, I’m sure,” Peter suggested amiably, though it was getting tougher to remain cheery as the girl’s pinky finger was tapping rather casually at his jean-clad rear end, not quite spanking but still with enough pressure that it was obviously meant to be more a test of his strength than a mere reflex motion.  He struggled to shove his hand underneath her finger, hoping to discourage her with a barrier, but he couldn’t quite reach, and so Stella went right on patting the older boy’s butt with increasing rapidity.  She seemed to ignore his friendly idea for release and smiled again, noting his inability to halt her explorations.

                “I’m sure I can, yeah.  And I will look at you again down there.  Later.”

                “Could… we do it now, though?” Peter pleasantly requested through gritted teeth.

                “Nope,” Stella informed him softly.  “Not until I get what I want from you.”
                “And… what would that be?” he returned, entirely certain already he didn’t want to know the answer.

                “It’s pretty simple.  You failed the first dare I gave you, so now you have to try another one.  A bigger one,” Stella explained, then added with eerily sweet gentility: “So you’re going to go inside my sock.  Under my foot.  For half an hour.”

                “What?” Peter gagged as he remained clenched in Stella’s fist, a little too out of it now to fully process this absurd invasion of his personal bubble that was quickly turning into something much, much worse and probably significantly smellier.  “I’m… I’m not g-  you don’t seriously think you can-”

                “It’s called a double dare.  Ever heard of it?” Stella queried with a simpering grin as she leveled off her hand even nearer to her face, allowing her tiny capture to get his bearings once again at close enough range to bop her in the nose.  He sincerely wished he had the nerve.

                “Yes.  Of course I have.  But that’s not how they work!” Peter said, trying his best to keep cool but steadily losing his capacity to do so as the urgency rose in his voice.  At least she wasn’t squeezing on him unlike some of his older cohorts had.  She could still, clearly, be talked to.  “They’re just supposed to up the stakes of a dare.  You still don’t have to do it.”

                “Maybe around here that’s how they play it, but not where I come from,” Stella murmured, exhaling a warm puff of air into his watering eyes.  “How would it even be a fair game if people weren’t punished for failing their turn?  That’s a pretty important part of any game.”

                “I don’t really… think that’s true,” Peter said.  He heard the wavering picking up in his voice, knowing it would be even more of a dead-giveaway for how scared he was beginning to feel of his self-assured thirteen-year-old dancing queen.  Surely she could already feel the tremors, given how snugly her fingers were wrapped around his body.

                “Take my word for it,” Stella commanded in a low whisper, offering a final half-smile and a sly wink before her digits released their fleshy coil.  Too surprised to yelp, the air was instead sucked from Peter’s throat as he descended the thankfully short plunge toward the ground that, while it wouldn’t hurt, was surely destined to be unpleasant, as he realized he was now inside the dark, silver tunnel of frayed strings and fluffy cotton that comprised Stella’s well-worn sock.  At least the gut-twisting anticipation of the inevitable was helping to distract him from being literally suffused within the potent sanctum of the brackish smells he’d been forced to sample just a minute before.

                God.  She was really going to do it.

                Any lingering doubts Peter foolishly clung too were quickly jolted out of him with literally concussive force as Stella’s slender appendage wound its way back into the shoe, the ball of her foot colliding with him and dragging him deeper into the cottony tube under its weight until he felt his body pressing into the buoyant dead end of the toe section.  She had him pinned right where she wanted, and a moment later had the geometry of his body arranged to her tastes, with his squirming form stretched out beneath each of her five bouncing piggies.

                While unrelenting in their blithe contact with his body and especially his face, smearing their bulbous undersides against his cheeks and hair and dancing all around, Stella’s toes at least weren’t inflicting pain.  The loamy scent of them and lumps of putrid toejam tucked into seemingly every crevice weren’t exactly welcome company as the snug fabric kept Peter molded into her skin, but it still could’ve been much worse.

                “I think you’re taking this a little too far,” the freshman protested with the understatement of the decade.  He was shocked that he hadn’t devolved into stuttering squeaks now, and felt grateful he’d been battle-hardened by high school social life to a certain extent in order to withstand this kind of inhumane treatment.  Plus, if he really couldn’t fix this himself, Jessica would be back at any moment to sort things out, though he couldn’t imagine it would go smoothly.  He wrestled with the girl’s toes, fighting to part them and allow him to peek through the crevice and up toward the filtered light.  However, she was making it difficult, clenching his arms and legs whenever she could get a grip on them with the dexterous digits and refusing to let go for at least a few seconds.

                “C’mon.  You’re a big high school boy, after all.  I thought you’d understand how games work by this point in your life,” Stella taunted, at last spreading her toes far apart enough that Peter could make out the vague shape of her lips flapping through the taut layer of gray sock fabric separating him from the outside world.  “Just relax and take your lumps.  You failed the dare, so now you get the double dare.  Trust me, you’ll be a lot happier if you just go with this one and avoid the triple dare which, by the way, I already have a really good one thought up.  So I wouldn’t try it if I was you.”

                “B-But...” Peter muttered, cringing as a doughy toepad bounced against his head again.  Though panic still hadn’t yet set in, given that he was still in the relative safety of his house with his siblings and mother just a few rooms over, his confidence was rapidly draining as Stella launched into this self-righteous speechifying.  “Y-You…”

                “Not that you’d probably be able to get away from this one, anyway,” Stella continued calmly, wrapping her prize up a few more times in her scrunching digits that again wrapped him up in the odorous and increasingly damp sock fabric.  She listened to him sputter for another moment, enjoying the feeling of his surreal little limbs batting uselessly against the ball of her powerful foot, and smiled in spite of herself.  “Now calm down and quit moping like a little boy.  It’s thirty measly minutes.  Only thirty times more than the few seconds you just did.  How bad could it possibly be?”

                Peter reflected on that rhetorical question as he endured a ridged toeprint grind against his face with especially determined aplomb, actually managing to force apart his lips and rake its wretched-flavored grimy flesh against his teeth and tongue, all while her foul skin continued pumping against his nose, ensuring his senses were flooded with only the essence of her foot and the energetic dancer’s grit that came with it.  He concluded with bitter abandon, after some thought and the feeling of another toe squashing into his gut and cleansing him completely of clean air, that “it” could, possibly, be quite bad indeed.  This suspicion was further confirmed as he felt a drop of her lukewarm sweat trickling between his dry lips and pooling saltily below his tongue, stinging his cheeks in the process.

                “How about we go give your sis a hand and check on those cookies, then?” Stella sighed flightily, and though Peter realized it was probably stupid to be surprised by anything the girl decided to do against his will at this point, he could feel his heart quickening.  Maybe this was an appropriate time to start mildly panicking as he was suddenly pancaking into the far-harder surface of the carpeted living room floor as the teen’s toes squashed him down below their squirming heft.  More shuffling beyond his fabric prison and a shift in weight from the ball of her foot and down to the heel revealed Stella was standing up.

                “Stella, p-please… don’t,” Peter gaped, finding it hard to squeeze out the words as the mounting emotional duress of being literally walked on began to take hold before Stella had even taken a single step.  Plus, he had an awful lot of poundage bearing down on him through the heated pad of Stella’s sole and lengthy toes, so chit-chat was made even less feasible.

                “Hey.  The other part of the double-dare is no complaining,” the girl scolded, rocking her foot back along her instep and braying Peter’s skull back along the carpet beneath the crushing might of her toes, effectively cutting off his meager rebellion.  “I told you, you lost the challenge fair and square.  This is what you get.”

                “Just… don’t… d-don’t w-walk on m-”

                “D-D-Don’t w-w-walk o-o-on m-m-me!” Stella mocked back with a robotic chant of Peter’s stuttering.  Snickering piteously, she lifted her foot off the ground, briefly sending her captive game partner into vertigo as he felt the chilly pull of gravity beneath him and, even worse, the sinking promise of falling into its grasp with a titanic girl’s massive foot to quickly follow onto his fragile frame, dog-pile style.  “You gripe a freaking lot of the time, big high school boy.  It must really get on your sister’s and mom’s nerves.  Seriously.”

                “DON’T!  STOP!” Peter cried, humiliated as he heard his voice crack into a squeal with melodramatic horror in far greater proportion than he’d convinced himself he was actually experiencing.  Still, the way his limbs were shaking now, vibrating his entire body against the unwashed flesh of Stella’s sensitive foot, he knew he was afraid, and she knew it, too.  What did he care at this point?

                He was about to be stepped on, after all.  The concept was just beginning to take poisonous hold.  He’d been grabbed up by strangers, drooled on, nearly had objects dropped on him, even been shoved into a couple of mouths, but never been at the utter mercy of someone’s entire body weight.

                Another chuckle rumbled from above as the girl flexed her sole again, studying Peter’s quaking reaction to her simple threat.  His mewling was evidently even more of a positive for her.

                “I told you no complaining,” Stella informed curtly.  Her foot hovered down a little closer to the ground.  “Now you might have to deal with a triple dare.  I warned you…”

                “Stella?  The food’s ready.  Where’s Peter?” a voice called out with concern from somewhere above, which even through the haze of his terror, the entrapped freshman recognized as his sister’s.  Unfortunately for all parties present, what was already in motion couldn’t be stopped with even the tightest of superhuman reflexes.  Stella’s foot was going down, and with it, her prisoner.  “Peter?”

                “Jessie!” Peter squeaked, so quietly the decibels became instantly lost in the tangle of gray fabric.

                For a second the freshman considered trying to cry out again but his throat was bone-dry, devoid of any further defense as he felt himself plummeting toward the ground.  The sheer hemisphere-tremoring clout of Stella’s foot stomped him back into the carpet so hard he almost felt his ears pop, blurring all his senses into a pulpy mishmash of scratching sock fibers, a bruising sky of foot flesh, and what he was pretty sure was a blood-curdling scream from Jessica.

                “What are you DOING?”

                The next few moments were all too much of a jumbled neurological mayhem to even hope to distinguish the individual layers of happenstance.  Peter was vaguely aware that the world was being flipped vertically, or at least Stella’s sock.  A crack of skin-on-skin had sounded a moment earlier from on high, a slap maybe, as the dancer was sent toppling backward, her leg kicked into the air.  It echoed in his tiny ear drums so distantly it may as well have come from the next subdivision over.  Ruffling fabric and spilling luminescence quickly rolled Peter along the girl’s imprisoning sole until he was peeled out of the fusty cocoon of sock cotton and landing in Jessica’s waiting hand.

                All he could be sure of for the next several minutes as he numbly attempted to reacquaint himself with sensory perception was Jessica’s golden hair brushing around him, her fingers babying his battered body into her trembling palm, and tears pouring down her reddening cheeks as she choked out an anguished sob.

                Peter groggily drifted back into consciousness on Monday morning after a fairly peaceful rest and peered over to the blaring neon readout of the digital clock beside his bed.  Deciding he still had a few minutes before rising from the overstuffed pillow and getting dressed for school, he tugged at the Band-Aid his mother had insisted he keep wrapped around his elbow like a sling “just in case” after the over-dramatized clamor of the Friday night visit from Jessica’s dance partner and former-new-friend Stella.

                The slumber party had ended much more abruptly than anyone had planned, mostly owing to the fact that Jessica had walked in just after the vindictive teenage visitor had stuffed Peter into her sock, positioned him under her toes, and stamped him hard enough to rattle the living room furniture.

                What followed was a theatrical display that might’ve seemed over-the-top even for the laziest daytime soap opera finale, as Jessica had struck Stella across the face and wrestled her miniscule brother out of the gritty footwear, cradling him in her hands and bathing him in a salted pool of bitter tears as she alternately huffed for air and screeched with uncontrollable rage at her violently inventive guest.

                And, of course, once their mother had rushed into the room at the sound of her daughter’s screams to find Stella sprawling over the coffee table with the raw imprint of Jessica’s hand on her cheek, and the youngest Clark herself kneeling on the carpet and shaking as she tried to pet Peter back into coherency, things had only escalated into even more of a sensation.  After Jessica had sputtered out the scene she’d just witnessed and Stella had flimsily attempted to lie her way around the fiasco, it was probably only the threat of legal repercussion that kept Suzanne from clobbering the offending thirteen-year-old with her own tightly balled fist.  Peter heard his mother’s knuckles crack just as much as her voice as she frigidly interrogated the girl, and from the look in her glazed eyes, he wondered just for an instant if Stella was about to be sporting a swollen shiner over her opposite cheek to match the slap mark gifted by Jessica.

                Instead, Suzanne managed to keep herself in check just long enough to refocus on the medical emergency of the moment.  She called out for Erica, who was already curiously poised at the top of the hallway stairs, to call and have Stella’s mother return to pick her up immediately while she and Jessica took Peter to the hospital.  Wordlessly the eldest daughter agreed, flinching at the sight of Peter sprawled in their younger sister’s hand below, her lips turning pale.

                By the time the five-inch victim had been delicately strapped into his car seat and zoomed out of the neighborhood, he’d already mustered enough clarity to insist his barely-conscious appearance was just a temporary effect, like accidentally passing out from dizziness, and he could hardly feel any pain now.  This was more than a bending of the truth, as violet bruises were already sprouting across Peter’s limbs, but the last thing he wanted after his foolhardy quips of bravery was even more of a fuss being made.  Of course, Suzanne was more than halfway to the emergency room by the time he was able to vocalize this wish, careening over curbs and only taking stop signs as laughable suggestions, so it was mostly moot.

                Jessica, carrying Peter into the whitewashed tunnels of the clinic, was still sobbing too hard to relate the story to the confused attendant, so Suzanne repeated back what information she’d been able to glean from her blubbering daughter.  It wasn’t long before they were being ushered into a room for a check-up, with x-rays and bloodwork all on the way.

                Peter babbled out some semi-rational dissent to all this, but after he’d had a chance to look up at his red-eyed mother on the verge of a nervous breakdown and Jessica most likely running low on bodily fluid given the volume of tears she’d already leaked into her now-sopping shirt, he decided it would be optimal to put their fears to rest as soon as possible.  He already felt guilt even more crushing than the spine-kinking blow delivered by Stella’s treading, and that, indeed, was saying something.  Erica arrived soon afterward, a similar look of stony horror carved into her normally indignant features, and it was then and there that he knew he really had no choice in quelling his family’s shared mortification.

                He was released only a few hours later after several thorough curative rundowns of his condition due in part to his unique specimen but mostly to Suzanne’s squawked insistence that the doctors may have missed something.

                The drive home, and the remainder of the weekend, saw Peter being treated like a glass figurine.  He was quite used to this, having gone through innumerable minor stumbles in his youth that left a mark, many of which involved similar scenarios of foolish children trying to fee-fi-fo-fum their way through an ill-conceived game of trapping him beneath grimy toes.

                Somehow, though, this occasion was different.  Suzanne was often panicky whenever her son ended up with the slightest of scratches, but now she was hardly able to concentrate.  It seemed his mother was lost in a morbid fog, as though the stomp Stella had delivered onto her boy had turned him into a pulpy crimson stain in the carpet rather than just imparting a few lumps, and she was already in a deep vegetative state of mourning.

                Erica, usually with a snarky quip armed and ready to fire, didn’t have a single thing to say to her brother.  Several times he’d caught her peering down at him on his temporary bed in the living room, brow furrowed and whitened lips pursed, but she’d cut swiftly back around the corner if he looked in her direction.  Apparently she and her mother had something in common for once, though Peter wished it could’ve been something other than a comatose reaction to nearly losing a member of the family.

                Jessica was crying enough for three people, of course, to make up for the deficit in her sister and parent.  In fact, the freshman had found it tough to get much complete peace, as his younger sibling tearfully requested to hold him for hours upon hours at a time in the intervening days.  Her arms quivered unceasingly, a constant swelling of salty moisture pouring from her eyes long after Peter assumed she’d dried out her ducts, meaning most of this time was spent vibrating in her clammy palm as a sorrowful shower rained down and puddled around him, soaking his clothes.  Peter, feeling far better now physically but worse than ever emotionally for something that wasn’t at all his fault, didn’t have the heart to refuse his sister even after the thirty-seventh time in a day of feeling her fingers curling underneath him and her quavering words begging to take care of him again, hoping her constant vigilant presence could somehow undo the giggling cruelty of her new-friend-turned-sworn-enemy.

                Thankfully, though, Peter had made it through the gloom-infested weekend, his spirits only slightly dampened now as the lingering positivity of his date with Lisa and the achingly pleasurable sensation of her finger alighting on his shoulder took hold in his mind.  He sat up on his pillow, sinking into the buoyant blue terrain as he rose blearily to his feet at last, and tingled at the sudden conscious realization that he’d get to see her again today.  No matter what anyone threw at him today, that couldn’t be taken away.  It stung to be incapable of sprinting all the way to school on his own to wait for the angelic redhead to arrive.

                God, he felt like a loon.  Was this supposed to feel like this?

                Whatever it was?
                The lullabied tone of small knuckles rapping quickly pulled Peter back to attention as he stumbled down the plush hill of the pillow and scrambled onto the sheets.  Creakily the door swung open, spilling in the hallway light and momentarily blinding Peter as he trekked across the fluffy dunes of his bedsheets toward the customized staircase fixed to the endpost.

                “H-Hi, Peter,” crooned a voice so quiet it probably wouldn’t have caught the boy’s attention unless he was already staring at the meekly advancing form of his younger sister.  Her eyes, still raw and pink from the deluge of tears she’d shed this weekend, were mercifully dry this morning.  The freshman crossed his fingers that this was a sign they could all finally move on again as Jessica padded carefully into the room.

                “Morning, Jessie,” he replied as sunnily as he could, not wanting to risk sending her back over the edge with a less-than ecstatically gleeful greeting.

                “How… are you?” she questioned as she arrived at the end of the bed and leaned in, brushing her hands over the ruffled folds of the bed until they’d arrived where Peter stood.  She arched a finger, stroking the tip along her brother’s minute cheek with the delicacy of trying to touch a butterfly’s wing.  By her ethereal tone, it seemed she only half-knew the boy as her sibling, and he’d instead become some fragile hospice patient hooked up to tubes through every orifice and on the brink of a lung collapse.  Not a good sign.

                “I’m good.  Ready to get back to school, though,” Peter answered just as cordially.  He hoped against hope to avert another breakdown, but he wondered if it was already foregone.

                “Are you going to get off the bed now?” she asked with genuine curiosity, despite possessing full knowledge of the fact that the five-inch teen rose at the same time every morning and descended the miniature staircase on his own.

                “Yeah.  Probably can’t go to school in my PJs,” he said good-naturedly, giving his sister’s finger a playful shove, but this only caused her to flinch and withdraw her hand.

                “Don’t hurt yourself, please,” she requested gravely, lifting herself back to full height and staring piteously onto the surface of the bed again, her head tilted to the side.

                “I… um, sure, sure, okay,” he said, biting back reassurance of his capacity for wrestling with human fingers and decided to just let the girl heal from this haunted weekend on her own terms.

                “Why don’t I take you downstairs?” she said, posing it more as a deliberate suggestion than a request.  “We’ll get you something to eat before you get dressed.”

                “Uhh… yeah, that’d be great,” Peter said, stepping tentatively into the reoffered plush padding of his sister’s palm. He noticed she took even longer than usual to let him get settled in before steadily ascending back up.

                “I’ll come back upstairs and pick out some clothes for you if you want?” Jessica said as she exited the room.  “You wouldn’t have to worry about it.”

                “No, no, that’s fine, really, I’ll… manage.”

                “I was thinking about something,” the girl commented as she took the stairs one at a time, delicately shifting her weight onto the balls of her feet as though the slat of each step might contain an unseen trap and send her precious cargo plunging to his doom below.

                “What’s that?”

                “Your bed is so high up.  I don’t know.  It doesn’t seem safe,” Jessica explained.

                “It’s… well, it’s always been like that.  You know that.  I’ve got my stairs, though,” Peter countered cautiously as his sister’s thumb pulled him a little tighter into her palm for security, something she didn’t usually do while transporting him up or down steps.

                “I know.  But that’s dangerous too.  You might slip and fall off of them.”

                “Maybe, but that’s true of everything, isn’t it?  Anything can happen anytime,” Peter said, chomping onto his tongue and cringing as soon as the words had left his mouth.

                Probably precisely the wrong thing to say.

                “I know,” Jessica answered after a hollow pause, gingerly stepping down onto the hardwood of the foyer and sweeping her tangled golden locks over her shoulder.

                “Well… what I mean by that is-”

                “I want to talk to Mom about it,” Jessica stated, cutting him off in the same frigid timbre.

                “About what?”

                “Finding a new place for you to sleep.  A better place.  Where I can make sure you’re safe.”

                “Jessie, you-”

                “It’s my job to keep you safe,” she croaked, her syllables turning into enough of a sputtered bungle that her handheld brother knew there was no more contesting the matter at this point in time.  “It’s my job, and I messed it up really bad.  And now I have to do a better job.”

                It took all Peter’s willpower to avoid slugging himself in the jaw.  What had he just earned himself with that carelessly callous reminder of his easy mortality to the girl who definitively held the title of Most Overprotective Sibling in the Known Universe or Any Other Still Undiscovered?

                It had already taken a tremendous amount of persuasion on Suzanne’s part to convince Jessica that it was not necessary to sleep with Peter in her hands from now, lest he be snatched away by invaders of either the burgling or extraterrestrial variety.  While this arrangement had been attempted in times past, usually at Jessica’s request after she’d accidentally caught sight of a scary movie on cable and wanted a companion to keep her safe in the night but still didn’t take up much room, it wasn’t ideal.  It wasn’t that the girl wasn’t gentle with him; if anything, Peter had sometimes found himself comfier while sandwiched between his little sister’s protective palms, at least at first.  However, she generally tended to clutch him closer and closer to her chest in her sleep, eventually lovingly hugging him in with a good deal of pressure.  It never got painful, exactly, but it did make it awfully hard to get a full eight hours when Peter was getting cocooned in his sibling’s pajamas while her hands squeezed into him, retaining heat and generating sweat at an unfortunate rate.  Drool trickling out of the girl’s lips in her slumber was also a problem, as it was usually involuntarily wiped away with a hand that then immediately returned to cradling Peter, often dousing him in her sticky toothpaste-flavored juices.

                As they entered the bacon-scented hearth for breakfast, still with Jessica’s fingers fastened defensively around Peter’s limbs, the freshman wasn’t above a light-hearted silent prayer that he didn’t just seal a detrimentally nurturing fate for himself.

Peter was having a hard time deciding where to plant his hands as he achingly awaited Lisa’s arrival in the biology classroom. Normally he didn’t think about these kinds of details quite so anal-retentively, but given that he was about to be in the presence of a person who was capable of giving him a near-lethal goose bump overdose at the mere suggestion of being in her vicinity, he was suddenly overthinking everything once again. Already he could feel his cheeks flushing with warmth like that time Suzanne had allowed him to sample a drop of champagne at Christmas, yet his fingertips felt distinctly separated from the otherwise overwrought chemical reaction with a tingly chill.

                It was confusing. As usual.

                But Peter couldn’t have cared less as he saw the last of the students file in before class started, followed by the petite redhead, whose eyes lit up in that magical way, her lips immediately spreading into a sweet grin as she darted carefully between the desks toward the tiny freshman, who didn’t even feel the slightest impulse to flinch at her rapid approach, like he would’ve for just about any other charging human on the planet.

                They’d of course exchanged a few furtive glances during first period history at one another that reliably flooded Peter’s gut with emotional novocaine. One look at those glistening emerald irises, even from across a city block of towering desks, was enough to counter the whole hour’s worth of skull-drilling glares the diminutive boy could feel from the trio just behind him. Frankly, he was surprised he didn’t have Sharon’s cold fingertip tapping incessantly at his shoulder for an interrogation about the date he’d so publicly requested to put her in her place, let alone Amy’s entire hand coiling around him.

                Maybe Sharon had too much of a death grip on that superhuman level of pride she carried around like a mythic aura to mention it. Or maybe she was just trying to let him stew before cornering him for the full questioning. Somehow, in this instant, it didn’t matter.

                Whatever the case, he and Lisa were finally out from under the laser-vision inspection of the silver vixen, the amazonian volleyball prodigy, and freckled crony. Which, as Peter realized, suddenly made him infinitely more nervous. It was all on him now. No more excuses. When he really thought about it, were the terrible three really that much scarier than being alone with Lisa?

                Well, yes, demonstrably so, but that didn’t mean Peter wasn’t anxious now.

                “Hey,” Lisa said, anxiously biting the corner of her lip as she slid into her chair, placing a hand on the edge of the table to avoid rattling it in any way, as she was always so careful to do. As soon as she was in, her fingers began fidgeting with a flowy strand of her orange locks.

                “Hi,” Peter managed, nearly choking on the dryness of his throat. Willing himself to speak rather than linger in the awkward yet fulfilling peace of just staring at one another in a moment of ethereal silence amidst a classroom full of bustling bodies, he cleared his throat. “It’s… good to see you.”

                “You too,” she uttered, obviously just as short on words. Her hand trembled, nonchalantly turning over to reveal her pale palm. “I know there’s n-not really a reason to right now, but, um…”

                “Sure,” Peter breathed, rising to his feet and striding toward the girl’s fingers, grateful that she was offering the chance to be held rather than forcing him through the clumsy syntax of requesting it without looking too peculiar. His feet sunk gently into the plush give of her flesh as he dipped into her palm and steadily rose a few inches off the jet-black surface of the table.

                “I… had a lot of fun on Friday,” she said.

                “Yeah, yeah, same here.”

                “Would- I mean, I don’t want to… you know, assume, but-”

                “Y-Yeah?”

                “…that… that wasn’t a one-time thing, was it?”

                “I hope n- I mean, that would be nice. To do it again sometime,” Peter fumbled, trying desperately to limit the quantity of stupidity in his smile.

                “I think so too,” Lisa replied, her voice steadily gaining confidence, even as her tone remained just as light and airy as ever. “Your mom seemed kind of… nervous. I mean, I understand, completely, she’s worried about you, but… was she okay?”

                Nearly overcome with the selflessness of this concern, Peter shook his head. “Yeah, she’s fine. She always gets like that when I go anywhere without her.”

                “Okay.”

                “I know she just met you, but she really likes you already,” the freshman continued, not quite sure who he was talking about anymore.

                “Oh! Well, that’s… good. I’m glad,” Lisa said with an uncertain smile. “I just want her to know I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”

                “I… think she knows already,” Peter reassured, still muddled in the exact identities here.

                “Good. Still, though, I wish there was a way to convince her for sure. Your sisters, too. I’m sure they worry about you.”

                You don’t know the half of it, Peter thought to himself, and then felt his lips parting again almost against his will. “Are you doing anything next Friday?” he blurted. It was difficult not to cringe at the unwieldy sound of those needy syllables coming without so much as a transition.

                “Nope!” Lisa answered just as quickly, wincing with similar disdain for her own lack of self-control. “I mean… I’m not, uh… I’m not doing anything. Nothing.”

                “Cool. Would you, uh… you know-”

                “Sure,” the girl said, helping him along as best she could. “What do you want to do?”

                “I…” Peter mumbled. He hadn’t intended to get this far in the conversation, and certainly hadn’t planned any further than the emotional hurdle of feebly requesting a second date or whatever-this-was. Now he was back in uncharted territory, as per usual. Immediately another idea popped into his head, but somehow it seemed just a little on the creepy side to request the possibility of Lisa simply holding him in those angelic and protective hands of hers while they talked until their throats went sore.

                “Wait a minute,” Lisa said, startling Peter and simultaneously filling him with relief. “What about… I mean, we don’t have to, but what about something with your family?”

                The thought took a moment to register for the boy. He could definitely see the logic, and was certain that his mother and sisters, as well as any given human being on earth, would learn to love Lisa after a solid evening of quality time. On the other hand, after a weekend where the emotional states of the three women had been nearly shattered thanks to his seismic stint under Stella’s foot, it wasn’t going to be without risks. Especially where Jessie was concerned.

                Of course, those worries once again were purged the instant Peter looked back up at Lisa’s face and caught sight of the hopeful glow in her green eyes, full of genuine desire to reassure those closest to him that she was a positive force in his life, and suddenly the answer was so clear he berated himself for not responding in the same picosecond as her question. He lifted his hand, giving her thumb a soft pat.

                “S-Sure!” he blubbered, and could’ve almost melted at the sight of the soothing respite washing over Lisa’s adorable features, her eyelashes batting as she sunk a little deeper into the chair, her muscles evidently relaxing again as they settled back into their familiar groove with one another.

                “Awesome,” she said, bringing her other hand to bear near her palm, her fingers edging in toward her friend. “I know, it probably sounds a little rude to… you know, invite myself over, but-”

                “Not at all!” Peter defended, instinctively giving her thumb another touch that stretched into a stroke. He watched it shudder with the same fervor as his entire arm. God, what was he going to do with himself?

                “J-Just wanted to make sure,” Lisa said, for a moment clenching the fingers of her opposite hand softly into a fist but instantly spreading them back out, clearly pre-meditated, almost in an invitation to repeat the act. It took an awful lot of willpower for Peter to not immediately respond in kind with his hand. “Maybe you can let me know… if it’s okay. You know, once you find out.”

                “Oh yeah, absolutely,” he breathed, stuffing his hands into his pockets before they could start visibly trembling again. “I’m… sure it’ll be totally fine. But I’ll let you know.”

                “Thanks,” Lisa said. “Really.”

                “Of course.”

                “I just don’t want anyone to feel nervous about us being… you know, hanging out and stuff.”

                “Right. Yeah,” Peter answered dreamily, a little too focused on landscaping in his mind’s eye what the final words on that sentence might’ve been before the bashful redhead amended them.  “I’m sure they’ll appreciate it.”

                Still trying to find a position that kept him looking too much like he was made of anxious jelly, Peter crossed his arms over his chest, allowing his sleeves to slide a little further up his arms, and recoiled at the instantaneous reaction on Lisa’s part. Her usually stock-still hand quavered, nearly knocking Peter on his side. Her eyes, still with their soft glow, bulged instantly with silent panic, her lips parting to allow for a sharp intake of breath.

                Heart fluttering, Peter looked from side to side for the source of her horror, until he looked down and realized the deep purple bruises that were now tattooed across his limbs, courtesy of the ride in Stella’s sock, had been made suddenly visible. And Lisa had been apparently immobilized by the mere sight.

                “Are… are those-” Lisa managed meekly, her index finger shakily extending back from her hand in his direction before she pulled it away again. Her entire palm seemed to curl closer around him.

                “It’s nothing. It just happened over the weekend,” Peter said hurriedly, rolling his sleeves back down, but the damage was already done.

                “When?”

                “Friday. After I went home,” the freshman said as calmly as possible.

                “How?”

                “My, uh… sister had a… friend over. It was just a misunderstanding.”

                “What do you mean? What happened?” Lisa pleaded quietly, shutting her eyes for a moment and shaking her head. “I… I know it’s not my business, you don’t have to tell me, but-”

                “No, no, it’s okay. I know it looks… kinda bad, but it’s really not. Just sore,” Peter said, lying somewhat.

                “Did someone drop something near you?”

                “No, it was um…” Peter attempted, realizing there wasn’t a perfect way to phrase it. “Well, she… my sister’s friend… she had us play truth or dare, and it got a little… out of hand, I guess.”

                “Out of hand?”

                “Yeah. She sort of just… um…” Peter said through gritted teeth, hoping to get this part of the conversation over with, given how much obvious pain it was causing Lisa to hear about it as she flinched at nearly every additional innocuous detail. Lifting his foot off the surface of Lisa’s palm, he stomped it lightly back down into her flesh, demonstrating the act he’d experienced on a much grander scale three days before.

                Lisa’s other hand rushed to her face, covering her mouth as another gasp was sucked in.

                “You- you’re not serious… she didn’t a-actually-”

                “Not hard. Really, it’s fine. Not a big deal,” Peter rambled.

                “Oh my God,” Lisa sighed. There was a barely distinguishable crack in her voice here, but the boy could tell she was doing everything in her power to choke it back. Her fingers trembled as they remained cupped over her mouth. “Are… are you okay?”

                “Yes! Seriously!” he said. “I’ll be fine. Believe me, I’ve seen a lot worse. I’m a fighter.” Dumbly he put up his fists in a false show of aggression, nudging his sneakered foot against Lisa’s thumb in a faux-karate kick, and at last earned a nervous half-smile from her, though she remained a little more ashen than before she’d seen his violet forearms.

                “I… guess you are,” she said, holding back a giggle. “Okay, okay, sorry for the… twenty questions… I just didn’t want you to feel like you had to… you know, hide something for my sake.”

                “I know. It’s fine.”

                “Because you don’t,” Lisa insisted. Slowly she lifted up her hand, then propped it up on two fingers into her palm, simulating the shape of legs, and pretended to kick them softly against Peter’s shins in similar fashion. “I’m a fighter, too. And I’ll stick up for my friends.”

                “Thank you,” Peter said, infinitely assuaged to see Lisa’s playful side emerge again just as the door swung open and the eternally tardy Mrs. Baker waddled into the classroom on her pudgy legs with an armful of scribbled notes and manila envelopes. “It means a lot.”

The acrylic odor of the outdated art classroom was already beginning to tickle Peter’s sinuses, forcing him to stifle a few low coughs as he stood on the table stained with the sticky remnants of improperly cleansed watercolor from the last class, but not even this could’ve pulled him out of his dreamy state of elation.

                Biology couldn’t have gone better. He’d wondered if things would somehow feel different once he finally had the chance to speak to Lisa again for the first time after their date, feared it even, and in a way he was right. Things had gone far more smoothly than ever before, consistent stuttering on the part of both shy teens notwithstanding. Breaking the ice like they had over the weekend, it seemed, had opened up a few avenues, most delightfully for Peter being Lisa’s willingness to offer up a hand to hold him during their conversations. Taking a seat in the creamy, stock-still altar of the redhead’s tender palm made the tiny freshman feel an almost overwhelming sense of security. The fact that Lisa seemed to feel similarly about holding him was quietly phenomenal.

                Of course, perhaps even better than this was the ease of their chitchatting. It occurred to the boy that he’d opened up to Lisa about his unfortunate weekend exploits inside Stella’s sock far easier than he once would have, and better still, their relationship, or whatever it was, would soon be given an even bigger boost after his family had a chance to observe them together firsthand for their reassurance, especially where Jessie and his mother were concerned.

                The bell rang signaling the start of the period as Mr. Jameson lumbered creakily out of his office. Peter glanced across the expanse of the table, expecting Alita to appear with seconds to spare like she usually did to take her seat near him as an anti-Mandy watchdog. His dark-haired classmate, soft-spoken and charmingly helpful over the course of these introductory two weeks of high school, was capable of transforming into a protective spitfire if Peter’s finger-twirling admirer gave him a few too many greedy glances. In fact, Alita’s presence had allowed Peter to have quite a peaceful classes where he was free to create without fear of having his leg snatched up in Mandy’s grubby fingertips and utilized for some nefariously artistic purpose.

                Today, though, she didn’t appear. Slightly troubling, Peter realized, given how he’d been taking her guard duty across the table for granted, but it shouldn’t be an issue. Just so long as-

                “Heyyyy, tiny boy.”

                Peter nearly toppled onto his side as the warm, saliva-drenched words sifted out of Mandy’s lips a mere inch from his body and into his ear drums as though her entire massive tongue had wormed its way into his skull in abject defiance of all physical laws. The girl had crept into the seat right next to him with silent but deadly footsteps, no longer kept at bay across the room by Alita’s narrowed eyes and sneering grimace. That light brown hair was swept over her shoulders, out of its usual ponytail, and wavy after so much regulated constriction.

                Recovering as quickly as possible so as not to appear weak, Peter grasped his knuckles and pretended to fiddle with his thumbs as he looked as calmly as possible into the broad hazel eyes staring into his very soul from so close he was becoming lost every few seconds in her warm exhalations flavored of morning breath and waffle syrup. He gulped, gnawing the corner of his lip.

                “Hi,” he said stiffly. Peter shuffled back but sensed Mandy just adjusted too, sliding in a few more inches across the surface of the table as she leaned in to make her face his entire world. Hoping for aid without having to make a scene, the boy peered in the direction of Mr. Jameson at the front of the room, but Mandy’s shoulder was strategically blocking his view. Worse still, the world-weary educator had already started droning on with the day’s instructions, apparently having long ago learned to leave the whisperers to their own point-deductible devices rather than shushing, meaning this unwanted conversation wouldn’t be ended under the old man’s jurisdiction.

                Swallowing again, the lump in Peter’s throat took a little more effort to force down his throat.

                “Well?” the girl groaned under her breath, her brow furrowing with genuine disdain. Apparently Peter was already not keeping up with the pace of this chat to her liking.

                “Y-Yeah?”

                “Aren’t you going to tell me?”

                “Tell you… what?”

                “How your date with your girlfriend went.”

                Peter blinked, fighting back a fresh round of hacking thanks to Mandy’s hot, sugary breath, and buried his fingers into his pockets. “She’s not, uh… well, what I mean is, it went well. Thanks.”

                “She’s not what?”

                “Never mind.”

                “No. I want to know,” Mandy pressed. Her fingers drummed at the surface of the table, casually inching in closer until her index finger could poke at the rubber tip of the freshman’s miniscule shoe.

                Once again, her brashness had rendered the boy speechless, and the feeling of her thick digit prodding at his footwear wasn’t helping, especially because the finger was steadily beginning to nudge at his ankles and calves, working its way up. Action was needed soon before she traveled much higher.

                “It really… doesn’t matter, we, uh- we should probably pay attention to what’s… happening,” Peter mumbled, steadily growing in confidence and taking another step back, though as he expected, Mandy’s finger followed, this time applying pressure at his knee. He finally swatted the pale fingertip away with his own hand, harder than he intended, and to his surprise she relented.

                “She’s not your girlfriend? Is that what you’re trying to say?” the uninvited tablemate continued, ignoring the request. Her lips pursed together, shifting from one side of her mouth to the other as though she was swishing the next response around between her cheeks.

                “Uh, yeah. Sure,” Peter said. The sooner this topic was shut down, the better.

                “So why couldn’t you come watch the movie with me, then?”

                It took a moment for the freshman to decide if the question was a serious one, though as usual Mandy appeared fully convinced of every bizarre non-sequitur spat out from those lips of hers.

                “Look, I don’t, um…”

                “I thought we were friends. That what you said on our first day of school. You wanted to be friends. You asked me to be. You remember that, don’t you, little guy?”

                “Yes, I remember that,” Peter grunted, deciding to brush over her incorrect vision of the past. Then, recalling the conversation he’d had with Lisa just a period before, re-inflated his lungs with a deep sigh and puffed up his chest. “Listen, I… don’t like being called that.”

                “Called what?”

                “Little guy. I have a name,” Peter responded rigidly, regaining his feeble mojo after remembering the sensation of sitting in Lisa’s hand. “Please call me Peter.”

                Mandy’s eyes widened, the gray speckles in her irises stretching back with surprise. It was a look the boy was unaccustomed to seeing in a girl who clearly wasn’t often fazed by obstacles placed in the way of getting what she wanted.

                “Ooooh, Mr. Big Shot. Okay, then. Didn’t mean to hit a nerve. Petey,” Mandy said, quickly recovering and taking on a goofily playful tune. The smooth pad of her thumb squeezed into her middle finger, idly making rotations against the spiraled flesh as she studied her tiny challenger, before the digits sprang forth again, this time aiming for Peter’s torso. Before the boy even had a chance to flinch her fingernails were edging their way into the fabric, bunching it up and giving Peter a tug closer toward her creased palm.

                “Um, Mandy?”

                “What’s up, Petey?”

                “Can you please let go of me?” The freshman’s fingers dug uselessly at Mandy’s tightly compressed digits, feeling the uneven grooves of her nails as a result of chewing them, and had no luck in removing them. He cleared his throat, gathering up another dose of emotional strength. “I want you to let go of me.”

                “Sure thing,” she shrugged, releasing him with a flick of her fingers that knocked Peter square on his rear end. She cupped her chin into the palm of her hand, resting her elbow on the table, and gazed down at him with a renewed glint in her hazel eyes. “Just having a little fun with you. Since you’re apparently not off the market yet.”

                “Are you-” Peter gawked.

                “Maybe I am.”

                “Uh…”

                “So maybe we can do something about it, huh? If you’re too scared to go see a horror movie out in public, then we can see one at my house. Alone. On my basement TV.”

                Still trying and failing to chew over this unfolding proposal, Peter attempted to hypothesize a way in which Mandy could’ve stated any of this with even more spine-crimping creepiness, and finally concluded that, no, she absolutely could not.

                “I’m not, um, real interested in-”

                “That’s because you haven’t given it a try, Petey. Watching horror movies is good for you. It can teach you how to handle real things. I bet you must be scared of a lot of things in your life. Especially because of-”

                “Mandy, that’s nice, but I’m not-”

                “-because you’re so tiny. So much tinier than all the normal people. But I can help you get over that.”

                “I’m… not afraid,” Peter gulped hesitantly, remarking to himself how costly it was the last time he uttered those infamously foolhardy words to someone as equally unbalanced as Mandy, but somehow in this moment, he didn’t care. He clenched his fists, noting that he was rather strangely able to avoid paralysis by this standoffish teen for perhaps the very first time. Suddenly, over the low horizon of Mandy’s shoulder, he spied the narrow frame not of Alita coming to his rescue, but Calvin, tall only by direct comparison to Peter. Even standing across the table from Mandy, the theatre enthusiast appeared dwarfed by the overconfident hellion, but his face was all business.

                “Hey. Mandy. You’re not bugging Peter, are you?” the blonde fourteen-year-old said, tapping her on the shoulder with a bony fingertip that instantly snapped the girl out of her semi-power-drunken persuasion. She flashed that telltale look of pure cold steel at Calvin, but apparently realized the value in giving up her attempt before there was a repeat of the first class.

                “Nope. Not at all. We’re just talking. Cuz we’re friends. Aren’t we, Petey?”
                “Well, all the same, you don’t mind if I join you two, do you?” Calvin simpered back, pulling himself into a chair. Despite his unimposingly boyish build, the teen was evidently able to command at least a modicum of respect from Mandy, who was now on the verge of snarling, but at last wordlessly scooped her notebooks up and swept over to another table with unoccupied seats, leaving Peter and his substitute back-up alone.

                “She, uh, was bugging you, wasn’t she?” Calvin asked, scratching the back of his neck and sinking lower in his chair to help close the height differential of their eye levels.

                “A little, yeah,” Peter said, at last easing the tension in his muscles as he padded across the table toward Calvin. “Thanks for that.”

                “No problem. I saw Alita wasn’t here. I didn’t know if that was the reason Mandy hadn’t tried talking to you in here since… well…”

                “Yeah. I think it was,” Peter laughed uncomfortably. “I appreciate it.”

                “Hey, I felt kinda bad anyway after that first class when I didn’t really do anything to help. You should be able to sit in class without her breathing in your face.”

                The tiny freshman couldn’t help but let out a quiet snort. “Oh, so it’s not just me?”

                Calvin rolled his eyes, lowering his voice so that only his miniature audience could make it out and leaning his face in nearer to the tabletop, though Peter found himself able to stand still without the normal bodily mandated wince. “I don’t think she’s used a toothbrush since she lost her first tooth.”

                Peter stifled another guilty chuckle, stuffing a fist against his mouth, and struggled not to double over at the same time as his stage peer.

                “God, that’s awful, sorry,” Calvin snickered. “I’m not a jerk. I swear.”

                “I believe you,” Peter coughed, finally managing to restrict his mirth to a broad grin before notice was taken.

                “She’s just… well, you know. A little bit… like that. So I gotcha next time, especially if Alita’s not here.”

                “Uh, yeah, yeah. Thanks,” Peter said, unable to help himself from wondering. “But, I mean…”

                “Yeah?”

                “Why?”

                Calvin frowned now, obviously puzzled by the question. “Cuz… you seem cool. I don’t know. Plus we’re gonna be in the play together. If you can’t count on your people everywhere else besides the stage, it would make us kind of crappy, you know?”

                Feeling oddly empowered by the exchange, then, the boy awkwardly attempted what he’d only ever seen in movies depicting high schoolers played by twenty-five-year-olds and extended his fist. Without hesitation, Calvin put out his own tightly balled hand, nudging it against the tiny nub of Peter’s enthusiastically offered bump and not even knocking the five-inch boy off balance.

                At last rooting through his backpack for supplies once Mr. Jameson’s craggy eyelids were squinted in his direction, Peter happily set to work on this period’s project, having long forgotten Mandy’s leering presence thanks to what he sensed was his life’s first-ever bromance with a kid remarkably like himself who just happened to have a few extra inches on him.

                “Oh… my… God. So… effing… cute,” Sydney squealed, brushing a few pink hairs away from her heavily shadowed eyes as she fawned over Peter on his milk carton throne situated on Erica’s lunch tray. The other seventeen-year-olds all giggled, leaning in nearer and elbowing each other in the hips over the account of the tiny teen’s romantic exploits he’d just finished delivering by popular demand. The girl steepled her sparkle-painted fingers together, flashing a grin nearly wide enough to blind Peter with the cheeky luster of her pearly whites, and earned an exhausted chuckle from the boy.

                “Thanks,” he laughed, leaning into the thick straw that was poked into the paper carton and gulping up another swallow of the drink after a heavy inhale.

                “And you sat in the back of the theatre, didn’t you?” a different girl piped in, fighting back another snicker as she scrunched her black hair in her fist. “Did you… you know…”

                All the girls broke into raucous cackling while Peter’s cheeks bloomed a distinctly crimson hue. Of course, Erica, watching all this in barely withheld disgust, finally rolled her eyes so high they nearly disappeared into her skull, and crossed her arms over her chest, releasing a pent-up grunt not unlike an agitated gorilla.

                “N-No, I, uh… w-we just watched the movie,” Peter stammered.

                “Nothing at all? Not even closed mouth?”

                “Uh… n-not really…” The freshman fumbled, hurriedly wrapping his lips around the milk straw again and began sucking up the beverage so aggressively his face was on the verge of turning purple.

                “That’s good, though! She knows you respect her now.”

                “Monica, look, you’re embarrassing him. Don’t be mean,” Lena cut in affectionately as she often did. She reached in, giving Peter a sporting stroke on the shoulder with her thumb that helped relax him out of his jitters.  This, of course, only earned another huff from Erica, whose hand approached the tray suddenly as well, though diverted away from her brother and instead snatched up another green grape from the bunch, which she jerked away from the crusted vine with more force than was necessary.

                “I didn’t want all the details, I just wanted to know if they kissed when-” Monica defended innocently.

                “I swear, if I have to hear about that from him, I will puke all over you. And I will not care at all how much you spent on the shirt,” Erica hacked to break her revolted silence, apparently in a losing battle with her gag reflex as she shot her friend a discerning stink eye as well as an accusing index finger. “You do not want to test my aim.”

                “Fine,” the girl sighed as she slumped back into her chair, allowing her tablemates to lean in closer.

                “You’re gonna go on more dates with her though, aren’t you, Peter?” Sydney wheedled.

                The miniature freshman smirked, his gaze flashing momentarily to his sister’s face above. Though subtle, he noticed Erica’s façade of abhorrent nausea at this story had been let down for just a moment, as her eyebrow lifted slightly with veiled curiosity.

                “Y-Yeah, yeah. We are,” he said.

                The reaction was instantaneous and harped with delighted mewling as all parties present except Erica practically threw themselves halfway over the table to get in closer to Peter. It reminded the boy a lot of the original announcement of his movie night with Lisa, and it was becoming clear that repeats of the event did not in the slightest diminish the adoring reactions of his female public. He was instantly met with a chorus of encouragement and wreathed in dangled hair and salad dressing aroma from rapidly moving lips.

                “That’s great!”

                “I knew you would.”

                “Where are you going?”

                “So… fricking… adorable.”

                “When? When?”

                “What are you doing next time?”

                “It’s on Friday,” Peter muttered, momentarily overwhelmed. “It’ll be at… well, um… I mean, I hope it’ll be at our house. Maybe to… uh, play some games with the family.”

                An eerily synchronized “ooooo” was belted out of the lips of every girl besides the diminutive student’s sibling, and for that second it seemed nigh impossible that this circle didn’t have some telepathic link to one another for such occasions as this. Erica’s mouth opened for a split second, but she immediately shut it again, apparently thinking better of whatever she was going to say. Given the towering encroachment of titanic squealing girls around him, it was difficult for Peter to concentrate enough on his sister’s countenance to read her opinion of this news.

                “Bold. Letting her meet your family all of a sudden. It’s a big move. She’ll like that,” Monica explained, giving Peter a comically obvious wink.

                “I- wait, it… it is?” he choked, having not given much thought to the successful prognosis of his second date with Lisa other than the glorious fact that there, was in fact, going to be one. The idea of grasping the underlying meaning of the gesture hadn’t occurred to him.

                “Ohhh, yeah. She’ll know right away what that means,” Sydney encouraged, cupping her pink locks away from her cheeks again as she loomed suddenly over Peter. “You’ll be getting that kiss sooner than you think.”

                Peter’s head slumped lower against his chest. He could already feel his heart thumping faster against his chin. Though it wasn’t the intention of his personal social life coaches/cheerleaders, this conversation was beginning to pluck at his fragile nerves just a little.

                “Okaaaay, and I think it’s time for a break from the twerp’s soap opera,” Erica cut in loudly, shouldering past all the girls who were leaning in over her lunch tray and shoving her hand onto the plastic surface. She settled her tanned fingers near the base of the milk carton. “C’mon, Loverboy. I’m getting… something else from the lunch line. I don’t know. Are you coming?”

                “Aww, don’t take him away, Erica! We can make sure he’s safe while you go,” Monica pleaded, clasping her dark fingers together and dramatically waving them under her friend’s face.

                “It’s okay, I’ll… be back,” Peter said, hopping down into his sister’s palm and obediently curling up without trying to make it obvious how much he wanted a break from the lunch table. A collective high-pitched moan rang out from the remaining girls as Erica promptly cupped her five-inch sibling into the curve of her fingers and scooped him away from the tray and off between the winding table aisles again.

                “How’re your arms?”

                “My what?”

                “Don’t make me say it again.”

                “Oh. They’re… fine. Thanks,” Peter said, having not quite comprehended that his sister was displaying her version of authentic compassion toward his bruises. A few heads were turned as they walked, but little by little, most were learning to ignore the anomaly of his scale, even in crowded spaces. Another small blessing. Erica meanwhile seemed to be working her way through the awkward unknown of open affection, or at least her closest approximation.

                “Not even kidding, if this stuff about you and your girlfriend-”

                “She’s… she’s not my… I mean, not yet, or… I don’t know-”

                “-like I was saying, if this stuff about you and your not-girlfriend keeps up too much longer, we’re going to start eating lunch on the benches by the football field,” the eldest Clark groaned with grating exasperation, lifting Peter closer to her chin so he could make out her gall above the clamorous din of students gossiping and daring one another to try the mysterious brown sauce on the penne. Her thumb braced itself over his chest, something usually only Jessica bothered doing even in her normal state of overprotectiveness. “It wasn’t exactly my plan to turn you into their new project when you and Mom got this whole thing figured out.”

                “Yeah, I know. I’m not, uh… you know, trying to get them to do it,” Peter offered as Erica inched him nearer to her ear lobe, pressing a hand against her skin for support.

                “They’d still do it even if you never said a word to them,” his sister grunted, leveling her hand back down toward her stomach as they finally cleared the noisiest epicenter of the cafeteria and re-entered the line demarcated by black cordoned poles as though the students were being invited onto a premiere event to pick up their microwaved meat and apple sauce.

                “I know,” Peter repeated with a sigh. He draped his arms over his sibling’s slender thumb, which strangely didn’t shy away like it often would. “I don’t mind, though. I… I know you do, but I could use the help. S-Sometimes, anyway…”

                “Don’t flip out over her coming home to meet us,” the girl responded, immediately sensing the source of Peter’s quiet ire before his head was even bowed again. “You’re fifteen and two weeks into school. You can feel okay to flip out if you’re… I don’t know, twenty-six and engaged.”

                “Twenty-six? Is that when most people get engaged?” the boy peeped. Instantaneously his anxiety kicked in again about the possibility of ever hitting that hallowed place in the hierarchy of human relationships, let alone within the next eleven years. It was a staggering thought and, after the idea had a chance to burn a hole in Peter’s brain stem, painfully humbling.

                “You heard the part about not flipping out, right?” Erica snapped under her breath as she snatched up a banana at random from the pile, obviously having not put much thought into what food she was going to purchase before picking Peter up from the tray. She shuffled past a few students still being indecisive about seconds, along with others trying to stuff a few gum packs into their pockets without being caught. “Honestly. You did the first date by yourselves fine. Just have her come over. Be normal. Because I know you know how.”

                “Right,” Peter gulped, infinitely more soothed by his sister’s refusal to listen to his nonsense than any of the bubbly commentary made by her schoolmates.

                “It’s only weird if you make it weird.”

                “Or if Jessie makes it weird.”

                Erica cleared her throat, even allowing herself a rare snicker that wasn’t saturated with her trademark low-voiced sarcasm. “Good point. Okay, so it’s only… eighty percent weird if you make it weird. Close enough.”

                “That’s… good to know.”

                Peter sat with his legs crossed like a sage atop a mountainous stack of graded papers stored in Ms. Watson’s office, flanked on either side by the burly woman’s ancient desktop computer and a dirty gym uniform hamper just off the edge of the scholarly precipice. Alone only briefly in the space while the physical education instructor oversaw the mass clean-up of strewn dodgeballs out in the main gym, Peter felt incredibly at ease, and had wasted no time in changing out of his uniform and back to his jeans while the woman was out. He breathed in and out, repeating some of the yoga-lite activities gone over in the beginning of class today, and found it was easy to get himself into a startlingly relaxed state of mind, especially given how his day had gone overall.

                Sure, Mandy had been on the verge of confessing the scariest affection in the history of young love during art class, but thanks to Calvin’s intervention, he was feeling more secure than ever. Coupled with Lisa’s agreement to meet with him again and her suggestion to make his family more comfortable by having it at his own house, not to mention having Erica’s blessing for the whole thing, everything was looking up. His usual ride from math in Ms. Tritter’s hand was, of course, more than delightful. The first play practice for Grimm-a-Palooza and his debut as Tom Thumb taking place immediately after the final bell rang was just icing on the cake.

                Of course, the biggest win in Peter’s book for this day in particular was English class. Despite all the calming things Lisa and Erica had about his state of affairs, he’d spent at least the first twenty minutes with every muscle in his body tensed like a mouse trap just a whisker’s brush away from snapping in half. Sharon sat right behind him as usual, her cold aura permeating his skin even though she never poked him in the back with a fingertip or pencil. She’d held off on the interrogation about his dramatically arranged first date during history class, and he was certain the ball was going to drop now that they were totally alone without her cronies or Lisa to intervene.

                But, surprisingly, it never came. He’d even turned around at one point, shocked beyond belief that the girl wasn’t locking him into another quicksilver trance to ascertain every intimate detail of the evening. All he received in return was a sweep of her platinum locks, a militaristic flutter of fingers, and a muted “Hey shortstuff.” No breakdown, no demands, no icy threats to his personal safety. It almost seemed too good to be true.

                Maybe there was something to this yoga stuff after all, or maybe he was just inconceivably lucky. Either way. Inhaling heavily one final time for good measure, Peter filled his lungs for six solid seconds and closed his eyes, containing it for eight more pulses as he clasped his hands calmly to his knees. At last the air wisped back through his lips, more slowly than the intake, until his lungs were dry again at the end of ten seconds. Peter sighed quietly, blearily opening his eyes just in time to experience a rush of warm wind and the incoming backdrop of smoky-gray, blotting out all other known objects in the room until he was cocooned in what he now realized was a gym uniform, dampened by blotchy sweat and pungent with salty secretion.

                He thrashed briefly, too surprised to make more than a muffled peep, but soon felt fingers wrapping themselves around him through the soggy fabric and compressing him into it. Those slow breaths he’d been taking for granted mere seconds ago were suddenly squeezed from his lungs and replaced with toxically acrid oxygen, soiled by rampant body odor and only the faintest memory of that rubbery gym floor. What stilted gasps he was able to get in were quickly replaced with coughs. The entrapping digits groped around him, reshuffling the sweaty cotton at every angle to wedge it between his legs and against his neck. After turning over a full rotation, Peter realized he was no longer on the stack of papers and being lifted up from the desk, with only these alien fingers to support him.

                “HEY!” the imprisoned freshman shouted, knowing most of his volume was instantly absorbed into the layers of rumpled shirt anyway, ripe with this stranger’s excretion, but he knew he had to try. The Peter of two weeks ago most likely would’ve remained perfectly silent out of terror and shock, but no more. Even if he couldn’t even overpower the thumb that was hammering at his stomach through the fabric and utilizing him like a stress ball, he wasn’t going to just lie there and take it without protest. Unfortunately, calling out also carried with it the inevitability of having his momentarily opened jaw filled with a swampy mouthful of rancid cotton, its sour remnants poison against his tongue.

                He hacked weakly, spitting into the raging storm cloud of manhandled gym clothing but only meeting another splash of warm liquid against his teeth. Beyond repulsed, he braced himself, protecting his head with his arms and leaving his body vulnerable to more thumps from those pounding fingers. By now the pressure on the clothes into a concentrated point in the center where the boy just happened to be inhabiting had caused a great deal of the accumulated sweat painted across the school logo to drip down onto Peter, and his street attire was positively soaked.

                “HEY! STOP!” he ordered. The futility of the gesture was not at all lost on the freshmen, but if he could get the noise level up high enough, whatever was happening to him right now might be seen as more trouble than it was worth. Be it prank or worse.

                For once, he found himself wishing Ms. Watson was here to watch over him with that voyeuristic gleam in her eye and the unsettling curve on her lips, and he never dreamed he’d feel that way. At least she had the common decency to degrade him instead with thinly veiled insinuations about foot rubs rather than outright assault.

                Resistance was getting tougher as Peter wheezed for air, but still didn’t give up, punching every which way and occasionally actually finding success in preventing the fingers from meeting their mark through the padding of the shirt. He was so tightly tangled up in viscid material, his legs thrown over his head and his hands at any given time above or below his chin, he couldn’t even say which direction was up. Nevertheless, he carried on, throwing out a knee wherever he could, and rasping an embittered rebuttal in between uncooperative swallows of acidic sweat.

                “THAT’S ENOUGH!” Peter bellowed at the top of his lungs, louder than he would’ve thought himself capable given that he’d been tumbling weightlessly in the grasp of his attacker for more than a minute, and for an instant the fingers finally came to a stop, cupping him into a weight below that he assumed to be a palm. At last the fabric, no longer being squeezed every half-second, poofed back outward, giving the abused freshman some breathing room, rank though the limited and stale air was.

                Who was this? Who could think this was funny? It wasn’t like there weren’t several obvious candidates, but given the lack of direct contact, clearly thought through on the part of his detractor to avoid being identified, not to mention how dizzily disoriented he’d become on this whole discomforting trip, it was too tough a call to make with certainty.

                And just like that, he was falling. It took a moment to register as he realized the fingers were no longer keeping him aloft and suddenly he only had seemingly endless layers of balled-up fabric and dribbling sweat for support. But then there was nothing beneath, and Peter realized he was dropping. He shrieked but felt it quickly sucked back into his throat along with another sour drop, out of responses and out of options as the mysterious, or not-so-mysterious, girl allowed him to plop out of her claw not toward the desk where she’d found him but somewhere further below.

                The fall of course felt much longer than it was, and the impact was considerably softer than Peter would’ve assumed before he remembered his surroundings and decided, based on the lack of lateral motion in his blind and slimy encampment, that he’d been deposited rather unceremoniously into the dirty laundry hamper. Another flop from above followed, adding a little more pressure onto his sweaty cave, and Peter guessed the gym shorts had been added in. The sound of rubber soles smacking the tile floor sounded out and then quietly fell away as his anonymous detractor made her exit, leaving Peter alone.

                “HEY!” the boy called out after a meek few seconds of breathless waiting, just a little too nervous to try poking his head out from between the folds of fabric for aid in case the perpetrator returned to stifle his complaints more permanently. “S-Someone?”

                Seconds turned into minutes, or at least the boy thought so. His heartbeat had sped up enough that it was hard to judge the general passage of time. The basket was nearly filled to the brim even before Peter and his accompanying oversized uniform were thrown in, stacked high mostly with filthy rented attire, exchanging spiced odors and degrees of moisture amongst one another. Peter groaned, realizing this would probably make it hard to identify the owner of the uniform. There was a budge beneath the pile-up of discarded fabric, causing the freshman to sink just a little deeper into the sweaty vortex of gray and eye-stinging shadow, and then he heard another footstep, louder and more self-assured than what had come before.

                “HEY!” Peter repeated, feeling the brief weightlessness overtake the entire basket as Ms. Watson snatched it and her student up. “HELP!” Though he knew it was a stupid and impossible notion now that an authority figure had arrived, for just a fraction of a second, he couldn’t help but experience a rush of imagined sensations beginning with the clothes being flung violently into the rotund metal darkness of an industrial washer, followed by the slam of the ovular door and the cranking of a dial that would execute him once the tank was filled up with skin-broiling suds. “H-HELP ME!”

                There was a jolt. The mesh basket halted in midair, steadied by the hand of his powerful teacher, and then light began to flood into the wilting burial ground of soaking clothing, followed by those meaty fingers fishing through the . Too glad to be recognized here, Peter didn’t allow himself to feel even an ounce of shame as he practically threw himself into Ms. Watson’s curled digits and waited calmly as she folded him firmly into her leathery palm and drew him out of the sweaty purgatory.

                “Oh my God,” she croaked, the middle-aged woman’s tanned jaw hanging open and revealing her glistening uvula as she let the basket smack back down to the floor, spilling a few of its grimy contents onto the floor around her bleach-white tennis shoes. Steadily her soft fist unfurled, allowing Peter to roll back into the center, though her fingers remained closely caged around him. Groping in the air behind her with her free hand, not wanting to take her dinner plate-sized scleras off her miniature pupil for a single instant, Ms. Watson found her way into the chair and cupped Peter into both hands, idly stroking a thumb along his shoulders.

                “Uh, t-thanks,” he mumbled, not quite sure where to go from here, but above all enthused to be free of the basket.

                “Did… did you fall inside? I shouldn’t have left you in… oh Lord, I…”

                “No, no it wasn’t that. Not at all,” Peter explained hurriedly, waving his hands, and doing his best to ignore the woman’s finger doing its best to comfort him with long caresses along his arms and hips, just a little more tender than was probably required in this moment. “It was… someone. A... a person. I d-don’t know who.”

                “A student did this to you?” she gaped, pursing her lips so hard she practically swallowed them inside her maw. Peter watched her toned biceps flexing inherently at his meek declaration. She shook her head and released a steaming sigh through her nostrils, evidently less anxious than she’d been a moment before, though Peter couldn’t quite imagine why. He supposed there were some liability issues running through her mind at this moment, and frankly, he couldn’t blame her.

                “Y-Yes. Yes. Sorry, but I couldn’t tell who. She, um… she used the shirt you f-found me in and dropped me in there.”

                “God damn kids,” she growled, abruptly less so on the verge of an emotional break than she’d been a few seconds before. Already her words were sounding more like the artificial constructions Peter had been used to more recently. “Sorry. Language. I’m supposed to be setting a good example for everyone.”

                “It’s… fine.”

                “Especially you.”

                “T-Thanks,” Peter said uncertainly, at last placing a hand against Ms. Watson’s thumb, which was still stroking up and down the length of his entire body with slightly more firmness than he preferred. He brushed it away as casually as he could, and the teacher, seemingly noticing her pattern at the same time as the toy-sized boy, obliged instantly.

                “Well, listen, before you leave, then, we’ll need to go down to the office and talk to someone. The principal, at least. Maybe the superintendent! We’ll give your mother a call, too. We can’t be having things like this happening. Not in my school, and certainly not in my class,” the woman railed, rambling quickly through the next steps with a fiery tongue. Her fingers seemed to curve in even closer to her charge’s body.

                Peter’s stomach lurched, twisting into itself even harder than when he’d been flipped repeated upside down and had an unknown fifteen-year-old girl’s sweat strained through his lips.

                “W-Wait,” he muttered. “We, um… we h-have to do all that?”

                “Well, yes. Of course we do,” Ms. Watson said, sounding just a little too much like she was overacting for Peter’s tastes. However, in his state of mild and quickly mounting panic at his mother learning about this latest misfortune especially after his dangerous sleepover games with Jessica’s ex-friend, the boy was determined to focus on nothing else except stopping this course of action at any cost. He had no doubt his continued attendance at this school, and with it, his odds of ever maintaining some normalcy in his life would be extinguished.

                “Listen, I, uh… I don’t want to make a scene. It’s not necessary.”

                “Look, hon. I’m not just going to let someone get away with messing with you in here. This little ol’ heart of mine won’t be able to take it.”

                “Please. Please… don’t tell the principal. Or my mom.”

                “Why shouldn’t it? You’re my responsibility, and you’re clearly at risk here.”

                “I… I know. And maybe that just means I shouldn’t be in here by myself. Without you… keeping an eye on me,” Peter gulped, at some level unable to believe he was willing to say those words aloud to this woman, but at this drastic stage, he had to play all his cards. “Look, m-maybe I just fell into that basket myself. Nobody else. Just me, being dumb. I’m not even hurt. See?”

                Ms. Watson frowned, biting the corner of her lip, evidently considering these words, unreasonable though they probably should’ve seemed.

                “You know they might not let you stay, don’t you?” the woman breathed at last, having studied Peter silently for several seconds. “That’s what you think, isn’t it?”

                “Y-Yeah.”

                “And that upsets you.”

                “Yes.”

                The woman breathed out again, and somehow the pad of her thumb found its way back to Peter’s shoulders, massaging them vigorously and inching back down his arms. This time, he didn’t stop her, as something at an unconscious level told him he needed to be in her good graces to the fullest extent right now.

                “You really want to be here, don’t you? At this school. In this class.”

                “Yes,” he chirped quietly, feeling his voice crack but not particularly caring. Every emotion in his arsenal was fair game at this point. “I just need to learn like a regular person. Be around other people. That’s all I want. It’s… all I’ve ever wanted. Please.”

                Ms. Watson closed her eyes and scrunched up her cheeks, chewing over the request as her thumb wound its way down Peter’s leg, fiddling with his calves.

                “All right, all right. For… now. I’ll be keeping a closer eye on you, though. You can bet that much. Every second you’re in this gymnasium or locker room, you’re mine.”

                “Thank you,” the freshman breathed, regretting what that most likely meant almost as much as he was filled with elation to have this potential disaster for his blossoming ordinary existence averted.

                “Don’t mention it, hon,” Ms. Watson whispered, flashing him an especially deep wink, as her teeth nibbled again at the corner of her lip.

                Resolutely refusing to let the tumultuous events of his locker room exchange with the gym teacher get to him, Peter stepped with confidence off his sister’s soft fingertips and into the waiting palm of Mrs. Parks, who was grinning so widely at her tiniest cast member’s arrival that her plush dimples seemed in danger of splitting at the cheek.

                “Try not to embarrass yourself too much, twerp,” Erica snarked once her brother was clear of her appendage, quickly snatching hold of her backpack strap and skirting off toward the hallway out of the theatre in order to catch the bus home. Somewhat appalled at the seeming thoughtlessness of this response from the seventeen-year-old, the play director closed her jaw before it had hung open too obviously. Peter, meanwhile, was smiling smugly to himself as he took a seat in Mrs. Parks’ hand, knowing this phrase was only the most loving support his sibling was physically capable of gifting.

                “Well, Peter, I’m… glad you’re here!” the woman remarked cheerily, quickly recovering from the perceived lapse in decorum on the part of the Clark family. Several older students were already filing in past the woman, hardly paying the five-inch student in her palm much more than a glance before dumping their backpacks along a common brick wall and leaping up onstage: clearly veterans of the high school’s productions.

                “Y-Yeah, glad to be here,” he said, mildly mesmerized by the ease with which the other kids seemed to be falling into their niche before the particulars of the play were even figured out beyond the parts, which he understood were doled out on a bulletin board in the morning. “Hey, um… thanks for… coming up to me about all this. The play, I mean. I’m excited.”

                “That’s great. I’m sure you’re going to fit right in,” she reassured, taking a few measured steps down the aisles of the theatre’s seats and made her way toward a small staircase on the sideline that led up onto the impressively scaled stage. “I’m not sure if you’ve been in many theatrical productions before or not, but you’ll see in a minute we like to just get comfortable with one another before we start the work. We’ll have you the best of friends with everyone up here in no time.”

                “A-Awesome,” Peter chuckled, trying not to sound too disbelieving, though at least Calvin seemed to be a positive reflection of the department. If half the students here were as supportive, he’d be on easy street. Just as he made this observation, in fact, the petite art classmate passed by Mrs. Parks, making his way onto the stage. Making eye contact with Peter in the woman’s palm, though, he approached with a friendly smirk.

                “Hey, man!” he piped, still himself drinking in the scale of the space given his equal newness. “Wild, this place, isn’t it?”

                “Oh, yeah. Definitely,” the freshman agreed, taking another winding gander in all directions, hardly able to even make out every corner of the velvet-coated cavern without squinting, save for what was laid behind Mrs. Parks’ towering form. The woman, of course, beamed at this topic.

                “I hope it helps inspire you kids to put your all into every performance. We’re not a high school theatre. We’re a theatre,” she corrected with a wink to both boys.

                “Noted,” Peter chuckled, at last settling his gaze on the students beyond, who were already beginning to form themselves into a circle.

                “Just for right now, while we’re warming up, I can hold you, if that’s all right. I could also go find a chair and have you sit on it up here,” Mrs. Parks uttered more under her breath as Calvin wandered further off into the cluster of students. “It’s your choice.”

                “I can just stay here,” Peter agreed, wanting the best view of everything that was happening. “It… won’t distract you, will it?”

                “Not at all,” she said, finally taking a few more steps that led both her and her handheld newcomer into the warm glow of a central lighting unit that placed a halo around the middle of the jet-black stage, where the gathered young thespians had already begun to congregate, the uninitiated probably following suit of their older and more experienced counterparts. “All right, everyone. Let’s circle up, and limber up.”

                An hour later, Peter’s face ached from laughter, his throat raspy for the same reason. After a brief rundown of names and corresponding roles which the boy was scarcely able to keep up with, the cast had run through a couple dozen breathing and stretching exercises, all of which the boy happily performed on the padded surface of Mrs. Parks’ palm, loosening up his muscles but even more so finding he was able to settle comfortably into the space emotionally. Perhaps faster than any room he’d entered in this whole school, the kids surrounding him, divas and misfits alike of all ages, had stopped gawking. In fact, it was like he wasn’t even present after the first ten minutes of warm-ups had passed, a fact that was almost breathtaking to Peter, especially given that most of them still had to look up to the director for instructions. Their eyes were locked to her with genuine interest in the next step, not to the scientific abnormality perched in her palm. Already he knew he wasn’t going to be eager to leave.

                Next came a read-through of the first three scenes of the play, full of flubbed lines and stumbled wordings as the cast performed a cold reading from the script. Most everyone began sitting cross-legged on the stage but eventually settled onto their stomachs. It was tremendously difficult to sit still during some of the more flurried scenes where fairy tale characters settled into inane arguments involving popular culture and nonsensical misunderstandings, as the jokes came fast and hard, rendering most of the cast at least in giggles, especially as the more seasoned performers were already finding their comic voices to emphasize the punchlines.

                Things were a little tougher for Tom Thumb, which was turning out to be a fairly major character in the play, as Peter had to keep his laughter in check enough to run across the page and find his next cue. Mrs. Parks had gratefully highlighted the boy’s lines in his own book such that he was able to just scurry over to the next colored line of text to read his forthcoming puns from the script’s position on the floor. The woman was also courteous enough to help turn the pages, though had only done so after ensuring the boy didn’t want to do it himself. Small a distinction though it was, it was even more of a confidence boost for the five-inch actor.

                Certainly he knew he could use one, especially after hearing the voice talent of his compatriots, even without seeing them in action. Most of them seemed to have at least some experience with acting, including the newbies, and if they didn’t, they’d definitely fooled their tiny castmate. Calvin, as it turned out, was playing Jack of the titular Beanstalk: a fitting choice, Peter, decided, just as much as he was suited to Tom. The others seemed to have been similarly chosen. If nothing else, Mrs. Parks had an eye for casting, but given how kindly she’d been treating him without assuming he was made of glass paper, Peter guessed it was more than something else.

                For the final half-hour, the cast was split off into smaller groups to get acquainted with characters with whom they spent a significant amount of time in the script, if only to start developing chemistry. Peter, it turned out, was something of an outsider, bopping between several cast members, though by far, it turned out, he spent the majority of his time with the character of Rapunzel, who happened to be played by Bluebell Hathaway, the quiet and lanky girl from his art class with short locks and wild socks.

                Given the volume of scenes they held together, it turned out it would be necessary for his dark-haired costar to be well-practiced in holding Tom Thumb. Once the abridged script reading was completed, he was given the chance to scramble back into Mrs. Parks’ hand, and introduced to the girl, who gave him a soft smile that immediately put him at ease.

                Ordinarily Peter saw some real hesitance when being passed off into a new pair of hands for the first time, with Lisa especially leaping to mind in recent memory, but this wasn’t the case with Bluebell. Neither though did her eyes flash with that hungry curiosity he’d seen in Sharon and company. His presence in her hand was simply accepted but clearly taken very seriously, as she braced her opposite palm underneath her elbow to keep steady.

                “I’m not that heavy, am I?” Peter joked, hoping to break the ice as Mrs. Parks helped guide Bluebell by the shoulders down to a seated position before shambling quietly off to check in with the other groups.

                Blurting with a single giggle, Bluebell shook her head, easing her palm in nearer to her face and propping her arm against her knee. It seemed much closer than was necessary to hear him given the breadth of space available onstage, but Peter didn’t mind. Now with far more of the girl’s face to engage with, in fact, the boy’s gaze couldn’t help but move to her ear, where he noticed a small piece of translucent plastic embedded in the opening, and suddenly it made a little more sense.

                “It’s… good to meet you,” Peter said, opening his mouth wider to speak and hoping he didn’t look too foolish by practically yelling at his castmate, whom he now realized was hearing-impaired. He extended his hand out eagerly.

                Bluebell cracked another smile. She reached in with her index finger and placed it gingerly into Peter’s palm, shaking his arm softly before relenting again and blinking several times in quick succession, squinting intently at the subject in her thin palm.

                “You don’t have to yell,” she said, her lip still curved in the corner. The words were rounded softly, as though she’d melded the syllables of each word, though they were conscientiously divided nonetheless. She’d clearly had nearly a lifetime of practice. “It doesn’t make much difference.”

                “Oh. S-Sorry,” Peter muttered, immediately embarrassed.

                “It’s okay,” she said quickly. “I read lips. Usually. Yours are a little harder.”

                “I understand that,” he said, trying not to think too consciously now about how his miniature mouth formed the letters. “Anything I can do to make it easier?”

                “If it’s okay with you, if you want me to know what you said, you probably need to just make sure you’re looking right at me,” she explained coolly, flashing him another reassuring smile as a promise that he hadn’t shattered some social etiquette paradigm. “Otherwise I’ll have to guess.”

                “I’m pretty sure anything you guess would sound better than whatever I said, but sure thing,” he snickered back. He straightened his back, peering up squarely at her face. “Is this better?”

                “Much. Thank you.”

                “Of course, um… Bluebell, isn’t it?”

                “Only my mom calls me that. Everyone else uses Blue.”

                “Blue. I like it.”
                “So do I. Anything’s better than Bluebell, though.”

                “It’s nice, though!”

                “Uh-huh. Come on. I’m deaf, not stupid.”

                Peter shared a guilty yet ice-breaking chortle with his castmate, noting that her hand seemed to tremble slightly under his feet when she spoke, but also realized she corrected for it as much as possible with her opposite hand positioned beneath her forearm. Even without the perfect balance of someone like Lisa, she clearly had his stability in mind. More than that, though, despite the fact that Peter couldn’t quite imagine losing his hearing just as much as he was sure Blue couldn’t imagine standing at the height of someone’s ankle, he realized an easy rapport had developed almost instantly with this girl who clearly didn’t shy away from the idea of her difference, even if others might’ve. It was inspiring, really.

                “So you’re Rapunzel,” he said, raising an eyebrow at her especially short haircut. “If you’re planning on growing it out, you might want to start soon.”
                “I’ll get right on that,” she chuckled. Blue ran her fingers through her low tresses, pinching them in the soft crevices. “A wig might be easier.”

                “Probably.”
                “So you’re Tom Thumb,” she said, repeating his phrasing. “Feeling typecast?”

                “A little bit,” he said, shaking his head. “I guess I can’t complain. I’m not quite cut out for the giant.”

                “Oh, I don’t know about that. I think you could pull it off,” Blue said, and despite the giggle on the end of her comment, it was clear in her tone that, for perhaps the first time since they’d met, she wasn’t making a joke.

                “Ooh, how about this thing right here?” Kimmy giggled, pointing at a glistening glass display containing a rusted musket, with a tattered American flag draped around its barrel, and a variety of vague wild beast shapes etched into the wooden handle. “Why don’t we talk about that for the project?”

                “Because the project’s about the Emancipation Proclamation, not guns,” Amy announced with a belittling chuckle, giving her considerably shorter friend’s strawberry blonde locks a childish tousle. The towering tanned MVP squinted through the translucent barrier, shaking her head. “Plus the animal pictures on it look dumb.”

                “Come on. We’re walking again,” Sharon informed them, suddenly appearing in the reflection of the display from behind, her silvery hair gleaming despite the dimness of the museum wing’s lighting arrangement. She swiveled back on her heel, glancing only momentarily at Suzanne Clark’s face before moving her gaze down to the miniscule occupant of the woman’s hand.

                Peter pondered whether he’d ever in his life felt quite so simultaneously secure and warm while also feeling genuinely like a needle might become buried in his neck via someone’s gaze. Despite the initial embarrassment of having his mother carry him around for the day at the freshman class’s American history museum field trip as a personal chaperone, after they’d spent the past thirty minutes meandering the pristine polished halls with Sharon, Amy, and Kimmy, he was quite content with Suzanne’s thumb being wrapped protectively over his shoulders. In fact, he even found himself hugging his arms around it, tugging his mother’s finger harder into his chest, which the doting parent was only too happy to silently oblige as she continued at a stately pace behind the trio to the next portion of the exhibit.

                Of course, there was a definite downside to bringing up the rear of the group. All three girls took every available opportunity to peep back at their five-inch classmate swaddled in his mommy’s hand, and with every half-smirk or twinkled eye, Peter felt as though he was shrinking even smaller, disappearing steadily under the pale boughs of Suzanne’s feminine digits and sinking into the valley of her palm, where he might accidentally become lost in a fleshy crease. If nothing else, it would allow him to escape their condescending glances.

                It was all right for Sharon and company to see him in Erica’s hand every day at school, but somehow, appearing in his mother’s cradling palm like a coddled infant, unable to so much as walk for himself in a foreign location, Peter could tell he was rapidly losing what limited schoolyard cred he’d accumulated over the past several weeks of school, if any at all.

                Ever since his date with Lisa six days before, he’d been mercifully spared from the shadow of Amy’s looming hand or Sharon’s flinty accusations posed as questions, but somehow, he could feel the temporary social barrier he’d built up with his courage literally melting away into the warmth of his mother’s skin.

                He’d caught notice of his redheaded best-friend-and-maybe-more being shepherded behind the rest of her own project group by a different chaperone, almost too adorably dwarfed by them all. It was bizarre for Peter to see, really, when he remembered what a comparative mountain she was in closer proximity. She’d snuck concerned glances over her shoulder every time she saw him turn a corner of the marbled halls with their three biggest opponents trailblazing ahead, but the boy managed to reassure her with a smile and a wave from his parent’s hand.

                The next room was adjacent to the exit and much better lit, the entire geography of the space filled with interconnected tables displaying prominent American cities at the time of the Revolutionary War in delicately crafted miniature. Foam houses and paper trees were clustered together, with painted plastic soldiers dotting the felt landscape. Peering down at it from Suzanne’s fingers, Peter noted that the town was actually scaled even smaller than himself, and felt a puzzlingly goofy sense of momentary superiority over the extended dioramas, almost devolving into a chuckle.

                At least some people were smaller than him.

                “Peter,” Suzanne whispered as she brought her son up closer to her lips. “I… need to use the restroom. I’m sure there will be a place on the sink where I can just-”

                “No, wait,” he gulped, realizing how staggeringly uncool it would appear to be taken to the bathroom with his parent and actually made to wait on her to finish her business like her personal lap dog. He knew this was lightyears away from what his safety-minded mother intended, but to the trio now standing at attention behind them and eavesdropping on the awkward conversation, he knew exactly how it would look. And he couldn’t have that, not when he was so close to escaping his day-one reputation. “I can stay here. It’ll be fine.”

                “Are you sure?”

                “Yes.”

                “Because it’s nothing to be embarrassed about. I just want to make sure you’re-”

                “Mom, I can stay by myself for a few minutes. What’s the big deal?” Peter crowed, and immediately felt bad for coming so close to growling at his parent who’d taken a morning off from work just so he could experience a field trip with his class. Unfortunately, he already felt the sharp spotlight of Sharon’s eyes on his scalp, and there was no backing down. “I mean… I’ll be fine. Seriously.”

                “Okay,” Suzanne sighed, slightly taken aback by her child’s muted outburst, and turned her face up toward his much-taller classmates. “Would one of you girls be okay giving Peter a place to sit while I’m gone?”

                “Sure!” Amy piped instantly.

                “Uh…” Peter nearly choked. He’d been counting on an alternative to diving back into one of the trio’s hands, especially minus his mother’s supervision.

                “Like you said, just for a few minutes, honey. Unless you’d rather come with me?” Suzanne offered, clearly hoping he’d changed his mind.

                “Nope. Nope, I’m good here,” he corrected just as quickly, gnawing on his lower lip to prevent himself from stuttering as he watched Amy’s right hand, already impressively scaled even from this distance, drawing rapidly closer, reminding Peter of exactly how insignificant he was next to those bronzed fingers. Her palm flattened expectantly, bumping her thumb up next to Suzanne’s.

                The boy couldn’t help but gulp having his mother’s hand lined up with the freshman amazon’s. He’d always imagined his parent’s hand to be on the large side, easily winning out for space within his household, but suddenly with Amy’s expansive tanned palm and powerful fingers splayed out by comparison, Suzanne’s was the loser.

                Not wanting to either frighten his mother unduly or give a single shred of emotional power to Amy, the boy boarded the lanky athlete’s firm fingers and clambered into her palm, where he took a seat.

                “Be back in just a minute, everyone!” Suzanne promised.

                “We’ll wait for you!” Amy cooed sweetly.

                Peter watched his mother power-walking off toward the lobby, probably nervous about every second she left him apart from her in such a massive place, and gulped silently, turning back up to Amy’s boldly grinning face above.

                “Finally alone,” Sharon stated with unnecessary coldness from Amy’s right, tilting her head as she gazed into her crony’s cupped palm.

                “Yep,” Peter said, swallowing the stutter before it could escape.

                “I’ve been thinking,” the silver-haired vixen began. Immediately Amy and Kimmy’s attentions were captured and, reticently, so was Peter’s. She peeked back over her shoulder at the miniature village construction atop the tabletops. “For our project, we’re going to make something like that.”

                “Ooh, I like it!” Kimmy squealed

                “Of course you do,” Sharon said with a roll of her eyes.

                “Sounds fun,” Amy agreed with a nod. She brought her hand higher, elevating Peter closer to those dark, hungry eyes. “A tiny little town. Tiny little houses, tiny little trees, tiny… tiny, tiny little people.”

                “That’s… logical,” Peter managed. He coughed up a smile. “It would look funny to have gigantic people and tiny trees, after all.”

                The boy forced out a laugh at his own joke. Kimmy followed along with him in genuine chortles, while Amy’s upper lip curled with an acknowledging half-smile. Sharon only remained with her gaze fixed upon Peter.

                “I bet shortstuff here knows all about that kind of thing,” Sharon commented curtly. She waved a hand, beckoning the pair to follow her back toward the white tables housing the intricately crafted village. They followed without pause. “Don’t you?”

                “Uhh… what do you mean?”

                “Don’t you live in a tiny house, with your own tiny things?” Amy posed. “That was what I heard.”

                “Um-”

                “Oh, that would be so cute!” Kimmy squealed, clasping her pale hands together and flashing her brace-clad front teeth in a broad smile. “What kind of house is it, Peter?”

                “It’s not a-”

                “Can we see it?” Amy murmured. Her fingers curled in closer. “I want to see your tiny house.”

                “I don’t, um, live in a tiny house,” Peter explained. “Just a normal one.”

                “Uh-huh,” Sharon replied, crossing her arms and raising a platinum eyebrow as her line of sight flashed from the village and back to Peter in Amy’s steadily closing hand. “Still, I’m sure you could find your way around in a place like this.”

                The five-inch freshman, partially in an effort to ignore Amy’s increasingly closely clawed fingertips, rotated around on the padded palm and peered down at the village.

                “I… guess so?”

                “So it’s settled,” Sharon said. “We’ll build a tiny town for our project.”

                “Yes!” Kimmy cried, her strawberry-blonde pigtails flopping over her shoulders.

                Still struggling to grasp what, exactly, building a model town had to do with the Emancipation Proclamation, Peter eventually decided the connection was probably as inconsequential to Sharon as were his feelings of general brow-sweating apprehension around her.

                “But not too much of one,” Amy piped up, furrowing her brow. “I’m about to start having practice after school, like, everyday. Plus training, then away games start.”

                “We’ll make our tiny town a really tiny town,” Kimmy giggled. “And we’ll make it ever better than this one!” She reached out, flicking one of the modeled bushes with her stubby thumb, and sent it tumbling into the engraved street. She sucked in a gasp of surprise.

                “Way to go, Kims,” Amy laughed. By this time, her hand had ascended near to the level of her chin, letting the warmth of her every semi-moist exhalation waft over Peter as she fenced him in with her tall digits, but suddenly it was lowering again, as though an elevator cord had been snapped. The boy flattened himself to the girl’s palm in a necessary embrace, until her fingers were spilling out over the tabletop again. “Why don’t you take a look for us? You know, be our expert on tiny things.”

                “Right,” Peter gawked, just grateful for the chance to disembark from the girl’s roller coaster of an appendage, and hopped aboard the white surface containing the village. Hearing Kimmy clear her throat expectantly from behind, and feeling Sharon’s silver-bullet irises trained like a sniper’s scope on his scalp, Peter strolled into the miniature street laid before him.

                Though he wasn’t exactly keen on being the “expert on tiny things” of the group, given that Sharon had seemingly set their project parameters in stone, it seemed plausible he could actually be of use in constructing the thing. After all, he did indeed have some experience with building implements to aid him in his daily life, such as ladders and staircases to move around his bedroom, or utensils carved for use during mealtimes. Of his limited talents at five inches tall in a world build for people exponentially larger, this was one he could actually claim as his own.

                Plus, the boy couldn’t help but enjoy the perspective he held right now. As the tiny painted population filling the fabric landscape of the town only came in at a height of around one inch, below Peter’s knee, he found himself in the unique position of feeling quite enormous.

                “Take a look around, Peter!”  Kimmy encouraged, bearing that same cheesy grin again.

                “I’ll watch and make sure none of those fake police people come walking in,” Amy whispered.

                “What are you waiting for, shortstuff?” Sharon inquired.

                Shrugging, Peter left the road, padding over the spongy material acting as false grass and approached one of the houses. Even these just barely stood at his shoulders. He patted the rooftop, with its papery shingles, realizing how brittle it was, and it occurred to him he was probably strong enough to break through it. A novel thought, to be sure.

                The houses stretched on down the imaginary block and toward a fountain, with carved plastic water spurting from its top. Peter regarded it with a reactionary smile, noting how the detail of the city wasn’t quite as intricate further away from the edges. Sure, he was being told what his position was in this class project, but that didn’t mean he could do a hell of a job on it. And he was pretty sure he could do better than this.

                “Do you think we could build one like it?” Kimmy pressed from beyond.

                “Definitely a lot fewer houses,” Amy scoffed. “Some of us have places to be.”

                “Fewer is all right,” Sharon said. “But I’m sure shortstuff here can help manage something that won’t disappoint us. Can’t you?”

                “I think so, yeah,” Peter shrugged, sporting a smile, even with the gazes of his partners all upon him from above, shattering the illusion of his own higher stature above the tiny city with their relatively Godzilla-esque proportions.

                “Hey, one of the security dudes is walking this way,” Amy hissed, leaning over the table, her shadow drowning the entire block in momentary darkness. She tapped her fingers against the edge of the table. “C’mon back before we get in trouble and they have to put you in tiny-person-museum jail.”

                Peter nodded, unable to help but notice the amusement in the girl’s voice at this prospect. The few minutes wasn’t enough for how much fun he was secretly having. The freshman purposefully took a slightly longer route out of the miniature neighborhood, stepping into the artificial wild landscape just past the rows of picket-fence houses. He threaded between the trees, running his hands along the steps and tramping across the rubber stones of a paper creek, then tramped up the height of a hill, feeling his feet sag slightly into the foamy material, until his head could pass above the heights of every single molded tree.

                He smirked, observing his temporary dominion for just another instant.

                “That’s enough playing King of the Hill, I think,” Sharon remarked. “Come back now.”

                “Yep, got it, sorry,” Peter mumbled, once again compelled by the girl’s softly-spoken demand, and tramped back toward the edge of the diminutive town, as well as his illusion of size. It wouldn’t do at all to have his parent worry over literally nothing, even if he was breaking a few museum rules right now, namely “no walking on the exhibits.”

                “Riiiight here,” Amy whispered to her puny group partner down below, her fingernails tapping at the edge again. “I’ve got you covered.”

                “Hey, I want a turn!” Kimmy grumbled, elbowing her much-taller friend in the hip as she laid her own hand flat down next to Amy’s. The shortest girl stomped a foot in mock-protest, her flip-flop smacking against her bare heel. She batted her eyelashes, gritting her metal-clasped chompers. “Pleeeease, Peter? Can I hold you for a minute?”

                “Y-Yeah. Yeah, that’s fine with me,” Peter said, averting his gaze away from both girls as he hopped in the direction of the significantly less tanned palm, glossed with some mildly anxious sweat in the creases. Kimmy didn’t exactly project much of an image of strength or steadiness, but she at least appeared eager to give Peter a lift, rather than breathe on him like Amy. He padded onto the girl’s fingertips without a second thought, making for her pale center, which rose up from the table inch by inch.

                “Aih!” Kimmy chirped in pain. She winced, a rumble shooting up through her body from the floor and jostling Peter’s head into the heel of her clammy hand. He could feel her fingers tipping around him, giving way to personal preservation.

                “Hey!” he gaped aloud. The boy’s legs were thrown over the edge, his arms flinging clumsily in attempt to wrap around Kimmy’s thumb, but it was for naught as he tumbled over the edge, back toward the edge of the tabletop, which thankfully was still in reach.

                “Better be careful there, shortstuff,” Sharon stated at a measured pace as her hand appeared at once between Peter and the hard surface, her palm open and inviting, her fingers curled and prepared to receive him into her clutches. As her digits clamped around Peter with just enough firmness to keep his suddenly-trembling frame in check, the girl blinked, turning over to Kimmy: “I can’t believe you dropped him.”

                “I didn’t drop him!” Kimmy protested. She leaned against the town table, having pried her foot out of the flip-flop and cradling it against her thigh, kneading her toes between her fingers. “Not on purpose! Amy stepped on me.”

                “It was an accident, honest,” Amy said, her eyes rolling up toward the ceiling as she planted her slender fingers on her hips. “I was just moving away to give you room.”

                “No you weren’t. You just didn’t want me to hold him!”

                “Maybe you’re just not cut out for handling little boys, Kimmy,” Sharon suggested imperiously, lifting her confined fist up toward her hand and peering in at Peter between her fingers. “Don’t worry now, shortstuff. I’ve got you.”

                “Y-Yep,” he gulped, wedged awkwardly against the vixen’s tender palm flesh on all sides like a full-body vice. Strangely, he actually felt colder the closer her skin squeezed him in, until even his bones shivered.

                “What do you say?” Sharon pressed.

                “Um… thanks,” he muttered, bowing his head as he felt the girl’s fingers closing in tighter around him.

                “Sorry, Peter,” Kimmy said. “I didn’t mean to, um, make you lose your balance.”

                “Make him lose his balance? You dropped him!” Amy retorted at a higher volume.

                “You WHAT?” Suzanne balked, materializing in the broad-arched doorway and rejoining the group at a panicked sprint.

                Peter’s stomach, if it wasn’t already triple-knotted from the pure spine-pricking sensation of Sharon’s fingers encaged around him, managed to add just one more twist-tie.

                “You’re really on a roll, you know that?” Erica sighed, her fingers tapping impatiently at the steering wheel of the family car as she flicked the windshield wipers on to smear away the steady shower that had been pattering down ever since she’d arrived on campus at the end of play practice. She peered into the rearview mirror above, reflecting her brother inside his specialized car seat box in the second row.

                “She’s not gonna let anyone else hold me at school anymore, is she?” the five-inch freshman groaned.

                “I’ll say,” his sister remarked. “With the look on Mom’s face when she got home from your field trip thing, you might have to do some hardcore arguing to get her to let you keep going to school.”

                “Wait… what?”

                “Not really, twerp, relax. But, like, you’ve… you know, you’ve got to be careful about that stuff. Especially when Mom’s right there and going to find out.”

                “Nothing happened, though,” Peter groused. “The table was right underneath. Maybe I would’ve… I don’t know, gotten a bruise or something if I landed wrong. But she saw nothing happened. And she knows it was an accident after we talked about it.”

                “You know Mom’s not going to care about that,” Erica said. She tapped the gas pedal, zooming them down an empty road and through the expansive puddles. “As far as she’s concerned, you took a swan dive off the table and onto your head.”

                “Yeah,” he grunted. Peter buried his face in his hands, slouching deeper into the heavily secured box.

                As bad as it was for his mother to witness a near accident while in the care of school peers, somehow it was made worse by the fact that Sharon had caught him, preventing physical injury. Her grip had snapped him into the cold, unflinching grasp of her admittedly soft fist that never failed to make him feel as though he was being given painful corrective shocks like a test mouse by her every skin cell. The iron digits had loosened as soon as Suzanne had approached, but by then Peter was willingly balled into a fetal position in the center of the titanic siren’s palm, and the silver-blonde was receiving hyperventilated shows of gratitude from his mother.

                Of course the universe would arrange for Sharon, of all people, to fall into his overanxious mother’s good graces. And obviously he couldn’t attempt to explain away any of this to her now, for fear of making the situation even worse, endangering his apparently flimsy odds of staying enrolled in school.

                “Anyway,” his sister said from the front seat after a lengthy pause. The car jostled, hitting a rainwater-flooded pothole.  “Maybe you just… I don’t know, need some more backup plans. Things you can do.”

                “For what?”

                “You know… like, if someone’s not great at holding you, or whatever.”

                “Oh,” he said. “Like what?”

                “I don’t know!” she blurted. She turned the final corner, swerving onto their native block. The car splashed up a particularly wide spray as Erica’s right set of tires dipped through a curb-length puddle. “You keep thinking I’ve got all the answers. I really don’t, though.”

                Peter raised an eyebrow, shrugging his shoulders at this realization. “You’re probably the best source of answers I’ve got in all this.”

                “Well, that’s comforting,” the ever-sarcastic seventeen-year-old gawked as the car inched up the driveway and into the garage. She hopped out, slamming the front door behind her hard enough that the car was rocked for a moment, then swung the side back open and commenced working into Peter’s various car seat straps with her fingertips. “If you want to try to figure it out, though, I mean… I could be convinced.”

                The freshman’s eyes widened as the seatbelts were pulled loose. He shifted aside to make room for his sister’s tremendous hand cupping and filling the space, then hopped inside her palm.

                “Really?”
                “No, twerp,” she droned as she leveled off her hand and made for the door with her backpack slung over one shoulder. “Yes. Obviously.”

                “Oh,” he said. “Um, cool.”

                “Uh-huh,” Erica said. She flattened her free hand against the door and entered the house. “But only because if I have to listen to Mom have one more whining fit over you almost tripping on your own shoelaces, I’m gonna lose it. So we’re gonna figure out how to make you stay in a place you want to stay in. Or… you know, get out of it if you have to.”

                “You can be my sensei,” Peter joked, nudging his sister in the finger. “Teach me how to give someone a wrist cramp with just one punch.”

                “Don’t push it.”

                “Right,” he said. “Got it.”

                “PETER!” Jessica bellowed, bounding around the corner of the breakfast nook, planting her feet so heavily with each emboldened step that the kitchen chairs rattled.  “Why?”

                The boy couldn’t quite remember seeing his sister so simultaneously distraught and embittered, her cute brow etched into a frown, even as her watery eyes were strained pink from previous tears. He flinched, and not from the volume of her voice.

                “I swear to God, Jess, if I go deaf someday because of you, I’m sending you all the med bills,” Erica threatened, shielding her ear with a hand.

                “No swearing in this house!” Suzanne called out from the other room, though Peter could already hear his mother approaching at a rapid pace.

                Great. Even more guilt was inbound.

                “Okay, but can she at least start wearing a bucket over her head or something when she has to scream for no reason?” Erica complained. She plopped her backpack to the floor with a heavy thud and slumped into one of the kitchen chairs, setting her hand down on the table as Peter clambered off his sister’s fingers and onto the glossed surface.

                “Um, why what, Jessie?” Peter asked innocently as he massaged his raw eardrums as he sunk to his haunches against the table’s centerpiece fruit bowl. Not that he really wanted to get into this conversation, but the more trivial he treated this latest supposed atrocity in his delicate existence, the sooner he knew his sibling would be soothed. Hopefully.

                “Why did you let… let strangers hold you?” Jessica screeched, her bright golden locks flouncing about as she dove into a chair, leaning over the table, her trembling fingers clenched pale into the cusp of the surface.

                “They, um… they weren’t strangers,” Peter explained. More than anything, the boy wanted to recount the various reasons why his sister was exactly right about these three particular girls, and that anything that could be done to keep him out of their hands was a good thing, but this wasn’t the time or place. Not with his very attendance at stake. “They’re my partners for our… project. And they haven’t had any practice yet at holding me. That’s all, really.”

                “That’s all?” Jessica squealed in repetition. One of her hands lifted from the table, dragging her fingers over the table with a fleshy squeak of friction. The teen’s digits extended up, tapping lightly at her brother’s miniature kneecaps, as if checking to ensure they were still intact. Her thumb hooked around one of his arms. “They could’ve dropped you all the way to the floor. You wouldn’t even be talking to me now. H-How… how c-could you j-ju…”

                “Listen, um… you’re gonna love it when I tell you about some of what we did at play practice today!” Peter expressed brightly, rising up and giving his sister’s searching fingers a good-natured pat. “We did tongue twisters and stretches, and we did some improv games too to get warmed up, like we played this one called-”

                “Mom!” Jessica cried, interrupting her brother as she stood back to full height, her palm slapping against the surface of the table in anguish. “Tell him he can’t be so careless!”

                “Don’t worry, honey. We’re going to talk about it. Everything’s going to be okay,” Suzanne reassured as she entered the room, wrapping her youngest daughter into a hug and holding her in closer. She shot her son a look, the flash in her eyes indicating this promise wasn’t just something to quiet Jessica down.

                “No it’s not! Not if he keeps letting stupid idiot girls hold him,” Jessica protested as lukewarm tears rolled down her cheeks, seemingly settling at her mother’s hard embrace, though simultaneously still reaching back for the table. Her fingers opened and closed against her clammy palm, extending for Peter, who stepped forward and offered another caress of the girl’s digits.

                “Mom…” Erica grumbled, her gleaming cell phone inches from her nose as she tried to drown out the irritation of her emotionally rampaging sibling. Her finger swam through the newly tangled mess of her dark-blonde locks. “Can you, like… tell her to cool it down for a little? I’m getting a headache.”

                “Shut up! You don’t even CARE about him being safe!” Jessica scowled with harsh venom in her voice, a spittle mist unleashed from between her teeth.

                “Just because you’d rather wrap him up in your blankets like a baby doll…” Erica growled. “He’s not a toy, you know.”

                “HEY,” Suzanne boomed. She instantly halted the oncoming verbal crossfire as her eldest child opened her mouth to unload another retort. Still, the woman’s volume was only just enough to silence both sparring girls, as she glanced back down to her smallest offspring, going through auditory recovery after his entrance to the house. Satisfied, the Clark matriarch held out a finger, her hand poised between both daughters to keep them from leaning in closer or perhaps chucking a phone at someone’s head. “I think that’s enough. From both of you.”

                Peter first looked up to Erica, who still sat closest to him, watching her upper lip cringe and wrinkle at the sight of her youngest sibling, her forehead furrowing as she apparently continued mulling over what had been said. Craning his neck, the boy next turned to Jessica, still bundled in Suzanne’s much longer arms, bowed halfway over the table with her twinkling blue eyes narrowed into furious slits.

                “I want both of you to go to separate rooms. Now. I don’t care who goes where, but we’re taking a break from this,” Suzanne instructed softly as her hand hovered in midair between both girls. She snapped her fingers. “Erica? Jessica? The only rule is you can’t stay here.”

                “Okay, but I’m taking Peter,” the youngest said, twirling her hair around her finger as she plunged her opened palm onto the countertop just behind her brother. “C’mon. Please, Peter?”

                “Not just yet. You can spend some time together later on, hon. I need to talk to your brother for a little bit,” Suzanne said. “Now go on. Both of you.”

                A combined chorus of gripes and muttered words marked both sisters’ exit from the room through different doorways. Jessica looked on longingly toward her five-inch sibling as she walked backward into the living room and toward the den, still anxiously spiraling her finger into her tangling blonde locks, while Erica tromped directly toward the staircase without another glance to anyone.

                “All right,” Suzanne sighed as her clearly tensed shoulders finally reposed, if only slightly, as she sunk into the chair. The woman kneaded her fingers together, drawing invisible circles across her thumb pad with her index digit as she rested her hand on the surface, just a few inches from her palm-sized son, whom she continued to study with pursed lips.

                “Mom…” Peter started, hanging his head, though he didn’t have that sentence planned out any further. In the near-silence of the cavernous, brightly lit kitchen, he fixed his gaze on his mother’s mammoth fingers, each at least as large as his legs and definitely thicker, spiraling together with increasing intensity.

                “Peter, that… that girl that caught you,” Suzanne said. “What’s her name?”

                “Sharon,” he offered quietly. Even saying her name somehow made his lips stick together a little harder, like he’d walked face-first into a spider web.

                “I’m just so glad she was there,” she exhaled. “I’m so glad you have some people that are ready to watch out for you.”

                “Yeah,” Peter coughed, then added, hoping to make the most of the situation: “Especially like… Lisa.”

                “Lisa is very good, too, yes. I was impressed with how she held you,” Suzanne relented. “You’ve done really well. I’ve been really proud of how you’ve been able to manage at school, finding people you can trust, like Lisa and Sharon...”

                “But,” Peter said for her, watching his mother’s mouth opening again without sound.

                “Honey, you already know what I’m going to say.”

                “You think I need to take a break?” he mumbled.

                “I think you need to be able to take a good look at the entire situation,” she said. “But no, I don’t think you need to take a break or quit and come home or anything.”

                The boy’s ears perked up at this unexpected reaction, but he didn’t respond. Instead he lowered to his haunches before Suzanne’s softly opening and clenching fist and laid a hand on his mother’s enormous thumbnail. His gesture caused her to finally stop grinding the gridded pads of her fingers together, and instead she gently draped her pointer finger over her son’s arm.

                “So what do you mean, then?” Peter said. “About taking a good look?”

                “I mean I know you’re not a child anymore, and I can’t protect you from the world forever,” she sighed, nearly staggering her doll-sized child back with two admissions in one sentence that he was fairly certain she’d never make as long as she lived. “No matter how big it is.”

                Suzanne clung to his wrist, and in response the boy only curled in closer to his mother’s hand, which opened amiably, accepting him into the toasty, creased expanse of her palm, where she hugged him into her fingers.

                “Thanks, Mom,” he said.

                “What I need from you, though, is some good faith. If you’re old enough to take care of yourself in… a lot of ways, at least, then you also need to be adult enough to evaluate a situation independent of your own desires,” she said. “And you know that’s something I expect from your sisters just as much as you. This has nothing to do with how much you can or can’t accomplish.”

                “I know,” he relented, resting his cheek against the woman’s tender palm flesh and shutting his eyes. No matter how much resented her occasional umbilical-cord-parenting style, Peter was a rational enough thinker to recognize when she was laying out some undeniable common sense.

                “So I’m asking you, not as my son, but just as a bright, hardworking, logical young man… do you believe you’re safe, going down the road that you are right now?” Suzanne proffered, the weight of these final words evident in her throat. She gulped down a thick lump of restrained emotion. “Do you believe, in your heart of hearts, that going to this school is best for you?”

                “Yes,” he said with immovable conviction as he stared up at his mother while enclosed in the sanctity of her softly closed hand, even as part of him violently repressed absolute knowledge of the terror trio’s mini-people mania and Mandy’s stalker proclivities. “Yes I do.”

                “So… seven o’clock tonight, right?” Lisa asked hopefully as she sat in her U.S. History desk in the back corner of the room, her miniscule admiree perched in the soft seat of her upturned palm. The low hum of drowsy whispers filled the room as students begrudgingly filed into first period.

                “Yep. You’ve got my address, right?”

                “Uh-huh. All written down. In two different places.”

                “Good,” the five-inch freshman nodded. “Can’t wait.”

                “Neither can I,” she responded, though the slight gritting of her teeth suggested she harbored at least some nervous energy over the impending evening to be spent with Peter’s mother and sisters as well for a Friday game night, as a way to help the boy’s anxious family ease into the idea of him dating someone with such a distinct height advantage.

                The moment was silently cut short for both as the girl’s emerald irises snagged on the doorway, prompting the boy to look over his shoulder. Sharon had entered the classroom, with Amy and Kimmy shuffling behind on the way to their desks. Stormy eyes flashed in their direction, only inspiring a moment of cold in his bones before their attention was diverted to respective cell phones.

                “I’m sorry it went like that yesterday, Peter,” Lisa groaned as she looked on. “I heard people talking at lunch that something was happening with your group, like something went wrong, but I couldn’t find you then.”

                “It really wasn’t a big deal,” Peter sighed as he rested a shoulder against the redhead’s thumb. “Well, to me anyway…”

                “Your mom didn’t take it well, huh?”

                “Not at all,” he said, resignedly patting his own palm against the pad of Lisa’s fingertip. “Though, she… I mean, she actually took it… better than I was expecting.”

                “What do you mean?”
                “She actually… wanted to know what I thought about it. Which was great. For forever, she’s just kind of done what she thought was best for me… and now I have Jessica doing it too, and she’s been like my biggest supporter, but ever since all that other crap she’s treating me so different and… God, it’s just a lot sometimes,” Peter rambled, hardly noticing the words tumbling from his lips, but stopped himself as he looked back up to Lisa, her patient green eyes unblinkingly observing him. “Sorry.”

                “Don’t be,” she said. “Sometimes you have to let it out. I understand you’re getting frustrated.”

                “You’ve got that straight,” he chuckled meekly, bowing his head and subtly nuzzling his cheek against Lisa’s thumbprint. He studied the intricate sworl with its uneven edges that still coalesced at the pale center so beautifully.

                “But she trusted you to decide, then?” Lisa said. “Your mom?”

                “Y-Yeah. Yeah, I think so,” he admitted. “She asked me what I thought was best, if I’m still safe being here with… everyone who’s not used to me.”

                “And do you?”

                “Yes,” he insisted immediately, once again choosing to ignore the distant subconscious voice of niggling doubt in favor of a far greater sense of need for purpose and general human-being treatment.

                “Okay, then,” Lisa whispered reverently. She shifted her thumb, running it against Peter’s cheek with startling care, with only the tenderest tip of her spiraling fingerprint brushing against his skin. “I’m glad to hear that.”

                Peter was actually grateful for the telltale alarm of Mr. Browning clapping his hands for the start of class, because if the stupid grin the boy was currently sporting grew any stupider in Lisa’s presence, he was going to have to move to a different county.

                “I… better take you back to your spot,” Lisa murmured, rising from her chair with barely a shift in her hand’s passenger as her fingers curled protectively up around him.

                As the petite ginger navigated between the desks toward the opposite end, both she and Peter’s gaze fell to Sharon, Amy, and Kimmy again, all with sightlines trained upon the pair, their lips equally rigid and pinched.

                “What about them?” Lisa questioned out the corner of her mouth.

                “I’ll be fine,” Peter said. “I’m getting the hang of handling them. I think.”

                “All right,” she said, finally reaching the empty desk and setting her hand down upon it for Peter to disembark. Her eyes remained locked to him, entirely blocking out the silver siren, her tanned amazonian henchwoman, and the strawberry-blonde hanger-on. “See you in bio.”

                “See you,” he answered, hopping off the ends of the girl’s narrow fingertips and giving her a wave as she wove back through the desks to her own corner.

                Peter politely faced forward as Mr. Browning instructed the class to retrieve their notebooks from their backpacks, rummaging through his own for his pencil tip. Already he could feel Sharon’s pupils burning right through his skull and into the paper scrap in his hands, not to mention a palpable glower from her second in command. Commentary couldn’t be far behind.

                “I think it’s interesting how you’re totally cool with Lisa holding you, but not us, your best friends from the very first day of class,” Amy said, passive-aggressiveness dribbling from her every syllable as she poised her jaw against her knuckle. “Not like it’s a big deal, Peter. It’s just… funny to me, you know? The first people who were nice to you, and what do we get?”

                “I said I was sorry,” Kimmy moaned from her desk, leaning dramatically across it, arms extended and fingers clawed as though she’d entered a death scene monologue. Her pigtails seemed to deflate across her shoulders as her squat face sunk into the tabletop, rebounding off her conjured sniffles of faux-apology.

                “What has she got over us, huh?” Amy whispered, and suddenly Peter could feel her hot, vaguely minty-morning breath wafting against the nape of his neck. He shivered, though the actual temperature inspired a thin line of sweat along his brow.

                Now wasn’t the time to prove his mother’s worst fears correct.

                “I guess… I mean, Lisa… asked me,” Peter stammered, gaining confidence as he turned around to face the brunette’s simpering countenance above. “Nicely, I mean. For permission first.”

                “Shortstuff’s got you there, Amy,” Sharon said icily.

                “So I’m a little too pro-active,” the towering girl said. “That’s what my mom says, anyway, and my coach. But I’m just saying, you’d be way safer with me holding you than little miss chicken bones over there.”

                Peter frowned, opening his mouth to protest.

                “It’s just a joke, dude, relax,” Amy shrugged, waving a hand that swung so near to Peter’s face he had to suck in a gasp of air to avoid her lanky fingertips sweeping along his ribs. “Nothing against her. Nothing against being all book-y, I guess.”

                “This really isn’t worth getting into,” Peter said, still hoping to find middle ground here without compromising his agency. He jabbed his leaden pencil tip against the paper scrap. “We should probably, um… you know, notes-”

                “But just look at how much safer you could be,” Amy pressed, bulldozing right past Peter’s quiet rebellion. She flattened her tricep against the tabletop, curling her fingers into a fist and concentrating all the taut muscles beneath her golden skin together.

                Peter couldn’t help but gulp as he watched the iron-strength might of Amy’s bicep bulge into a rotund hill beneath her flesh, earned over countless volleyball drills and conditioning. She wasn’t exactly bluffing.

                “Um… yes, I can see you’re… strong,” he said as nonchalantly as possible.

                “Just letting you know, shrimp,” Amy whispered before unflexing her limb and swiping up her pencil to rejoin the process.

                “Don’t feel pressured, shortstuff. No matter where you fall, I’ll always have your back,” Sharon uttered, the sickly dulcet notes of her voice carrying easily into Peter’s ears despite hanging just above a whisper, and he had the odd suspicion that no one else could hear but him.

                “What’s eating you, Peter?”

                At this particular phrasing, the handheld freshman’s distracted attentions were instantaneously affixed to the mouth on the bespectacled face of his curly-blonde Algebra teacher as she carried him to fifth period English.

                “W-What?”

                “Sorry. Do the kids not say that anymore?” Ms. Tritter giggled as she turned a corner in the empty hallway, her palm steady on every long stride. “They used to say that all the time when I was in high school, and I never got it. Maybe it was just a joke.”

                “Oh. Ha,” Peter said, forcing a chuckle, and knew his fellow after-school thespians would feel some deep shame in how convincing it sounded.

                “What I mean is, what’s wrong? Bugging?” the young educator continued, adjusting her thick, black-rimmed glasses on the bridge of her nose. “You just look so far away, like your brain took the afternoon off.”

                “Um, maybe “bugging” is accurate,” Peter muttered. The woman was incredibly kind, to be sure, providing him with a lift to class when Erica had such a tough time commuting, but most of these daily rides had been silent save for the usual greetings and pleasantries. He wasn’t quite calibrated to engage with his admittedly beautiful teacher in standard conversation, especially not today. “Sorry.”

                “Well, you don’t have to be sorry. Everyone has those afternoons. I just thought maybe there was something that could be done.”

                “Right,” Peter managed. He peered over the cusp of Ms. Tritter’s arched fingertips, seeing the English classroom off in the near-distance: something that, for him, would’ve constituted a stroll of several minutes, but for his teacher in her muted black boots, could be accomplished in a matter of steps. “I mean, it looks like we’re pretty close to the room.”

                “So? We can take a detour,” the woman shrugged. Her voice lowered to a hush as students began to pass her by on their way to class, some gawking momentarily at Peter, but most too engrossed in their friends or cell phones. “Not that I… want to keep you from learning, of course. But if you want a little more of a breather between classes, I can write you a pass. It’ll be fine.”

                “I don’t really want to be getting special treatment,” the boy said earnestly as he crossed his legs in the woman’s palm, curling subconsciously into himself.

                “I totally get that, and I can absolutely drop you off in this room right now. But believe me, I do this for other students too, if they look like they could use just a couple more minutes to let their brains catch up with how fast the day’s clock is ticking,” she continued amiably. “You just seem like you could use a break. A quick one, but a break.”

                Peter gave a last glance to the English class door, knowing Sharon was probably already inside with her metallic scrutiny cooking his awaiting desk with toxic expectation.

                “Okay,” he breathed. “Sure.”

                “Awesome,” Tritter beamed, pivoting away from her path toward the door and instead reverting into a narrower hallway that cut off from the central quad of language rooms.

                A moment later Peter realized he was in a segment of the school he hadn’t yet seen: a white-washed tunnel with the occasional office window blocked off by mini blinds, and luminescent bulbs dotting the lengthy thoroughfare. Comfortingly, no one appeared to be around. Ordinarily, this wouldn’t have been his first reaction, given he was in a near-stranger’s hand and isolated from most of the rest of humanity, but somehow it seemed impossible in Ms. Tritter’s care.

                “So about that bugging,” the math teacher said as she walked, purposefully more sluggish this time than on her way to the English hall. “I know I don’t really know you so well, Peter. And I’m not trying to treat you like I’m your counselor. But you seem like a good kid. I just didn’t think you should have to trudge through the day if I could do anything to help. Whatever it is.”

                Peter couldn’t help but let a smile cross his concern-etched face at this. The woman really did seem as benevolent as she wordlessly professed in gentle action and soft demeanor. All he had to do now was try not to get flustered over those half-hipster-half-angelic features of hers, capped by a twinkle in her eye and those bouncing halcyon curls.

                “Nothing’s really going wrong today, I guess,” the teen sighed. Relaxing slightly, Peter leaned in against the heel of Tritter’s creamy palm, to which she didn’t seem to object. “It’s just a lot of… bigger stuff.”

                “Bigger stuff?”

                “Like, going to school here,” he fumbled. “I guess that’s really… most of the stuff.”

                “What about going to school here?”

                “My mom’s… well, really my whole family… gets pretty freaked out about what happens to me here, and like if I’m safe and everything,” Peter explained.

                “Ah. I see,” Tritter answered, fully sincere. “They’re your family. I’m sure that’s natural.”

                “It… it is. I know it is. And I’m glad they care a lot, but it also… I mean, sometimes…”

                “They care a little too much?”

                “Yeah.”

                “I’ve been there,” the woman said. “I know not quite there, since I’m guessing our childhoods were just a little different from one another, but with the kind of neighborhood we lived in when I was about your age… well, my dad never wanted me to leave the house without another person. And he was probably right sometimes, with the crime rates, but… it still got to me sometimes. Like he didn’t believe I had any power just because I might not have been able to handle some of the things I would run into. Does that sound about right?”

                “Yes,” Peter heaved as he collapsed deeper into the woman’s cupped palm, feeling bizarrely closer to Ms. Tritter in this moment than just about anyone else in a one hundred-mile radius, despite how little they truly knew each other.
                “I thought so.” Nearing the end of the hallway, the teacher-turned-unofficial-psychologist turned right back around and began pacing in the other direction again.

                “I get why they’re worried, I seriously do… I mean, I’ve had things happen in-” Peter muttered, stopping short of admitting anything incriminating with regard to his anonymous ambusher. He bit his tongue, almost drawing a prick of blood. “…happen in my life before, but still… if I can’t at least try, and learn how to get past the things I can get past, then…”

                “Then you’ll just be stuck where you are, forever,” Ms. Tritter said.

                “Yep,” he resounded.

                “That’s how it felt for me, too,” she continued. “I doubt some of that is going away anytime soon, Peter. That’s just how family is, and there are certain things about you that are always going to worry them. But that doesn’t mean you have to let those things get you down.”

                “How?” he croaked, clearing his throat. “I can’t do anything about it if Mom pulls me out of school.”

                “Maybe not, but you can still make use of the time you have,” she said. “You can’t control everything. No one can. Just make do with what you’ve got. You’re already doing that, just by being here in this school at all. I think that’s pretty cool. That couldn’t have happened overnight with your mom, but here you are. It just takes time.”

                “Y-Yeah,” he said, raising an eyebrow as he propped himself higher in the woman’s massive hand. “I guess so.”

                “I hope that soon you’ll know so, too,” Ms. Tritter said as she returned once again at her gradual pace to the hallway’s entrance. She flashed a look to her watch, noting the latest click of the minute indicator. “And speaking of being here at this school, I’ve already robbed you of enough English knowledge. What do you say we get you back there?”

                “Sure,” Peter said with renewed confidence. “I’m ready.”

                Yanking through the enveloping gray void, Peter pulled his gym uniform t-shirt up and over his head. With his feet planted on the cold and desolate stretch of Watson’s metallic desk, the boy savored the fleeting solitude he’d been granted as the woman jogged back out into the gym to ensure his athletically-capable classmates put the equipment away properly. These days, changing outfits with a modicum of privacy seemed to be a privilege.

                Of course, he knew it couldn’t last. The doorknob creaked from behind and the freshman heard the thudding footsteps of his gym teacher  re-entering the office with a confident clamor.

                “Hey, sweet pea,” Ms. Watson crooned in her near-baritone octave. The forty-something eased back into her swivel chair, flashing a slightly crooked smile to her five-inch student midway through his strip. A sheen of sweat was glazed over her tanned temple from more than an hour of stomping from one end of the gym to the other, keeping students on deck as they queued up to punt the kickball.

                The teen gulped, keeping his back to the woman. Sweet pea? He could hear the leg of the enormous chair shrilling as she leaned forward, rearing her massive face at an unnecessary proximity to his half-exposed body.

                “Peter?” she buzzed, and suddenly the boy felt the leathery pad of her fingertip tickling against his bare back and tracing a precise line down his spine, coming dangerously close to his tailbone before she pulled away.

                In surprise, he jerked around, nearly tripping over his own discarded gym-wear still wrapped around his ankles. The sensation of her callused finger caressing along his skin lingered uncomfortably in his cortex like a bad taste. For an instant, it felt like she went in for another stroke, but that was impossible now as he faced up to her looming form.

                “Sorry about that,” Ms. Watson chuckled, ruffling the short brown sprigs of her hair between a few meaty digits. “I didn’t mean to startle ya, hon. Just wanted to make sure you were still with me there. You’re my responsibility in here, after all.”

                “I’m…. with you,” Peter repeated back.

                “I’m glad to hear it,” she sighed. Her broad, chapped lips bent into the widest smile Peter imagined she was capable of. He could see the laugh lines straining around her matured dimples. “I mean, I know you’re probably under a lot of stress. You know, after what happened last week.”

                “Y-Yeah,” Peter mumbled, bucking his head up and down. “Right. That… it’s really not a big deal, honestly. I know it looked like it was, but I was just a little nervous about it then, and-”

                “Now, honey,” Ms. Watson uttered, cutting him off. Her left hand ascended over the edge of the desk, coasting along its sleek surface until her gently clenched fist was poised directly in front of her unwilling protégé. Her index finger steadily peeled away from its fellows, until the ovular pad of the woman’s finger was aimed squarely at Peter’s face, half an inch away. “I’m a physical education teacher. Believe me when I say I don’t take safety lightly, whether it’s in the gymnasium or anywhere else. Like in here.”

                “I… know,” Peter said. His eyes were locked to the gargantuan fingertip, one he had no doubt was strong enough to support a bowling ball just by a single crook.

                “And I’m not just talking about safety for your body, though… I can’t help but worry about one as small as yours,” the woman admittedly with artificial concern infused into every word. “It’s a mental thing, too. Stress can really break someone down, brain and body. So it’s all connected.”

                “Uh-huh,” the boy answered.

                “And… I have to tell you, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about this myself,” she continued, caressing the fingers of her free hand over her chin. “About how I found you earlier this week, stuck down in there… I know you said you’re afraid they won’t let you stay here, if that gets out. I get that. You want to be treated like a big boy, right?”

                “Yes.”

                “But to be frank, the whole matter is… well, it’s been taking a toll on me,” Ms. Watson announced under her breath, slogging through the throaty syllables with some theatrical agony. “You can understand that, right?”

                “I t-think so.”

                Ms. Watson leaned down, pas the threshold of the cushioned swivel seat. Below the expansive platform of the desk, Peter heard the telltale thump of rubber soles landing on the ground as sinewy, feminine fingers pried them away from sock-clad heels.

                “So I guess you understand too, then…” she continued. Her bulbous biceps inflated within her lean limbs as her fingers continued bustling, out of sight. “…I can’t just go on, holding onto stress like that. And neither, I believe, should you.” Ms. Watson leaned away from the edge of her desk, rolling on the chair toward the window a mere two paces away. Without looking at it, the woman coiled the tips of her fingers around the plastic wand that dangled from the drapes, giving it a twist that tightened the mini blinds even further shut with a damning clack.

                “S-So… so you’re saying you’re…” Peter swallowed, feeling his throat thickening at the prospect that his joyride in human normalcy might be approaching an abrupt halt. “…you’re… going to tell the school about it?”

                “I’m beginning to think so, yes,” Watson said. “The school, your… mom, especially. I know she must be worried about you. You say she works a full day, has to be thinking about you that entire time, and she doesn’t get a foot rub when you come home, well…”

                And suddenly, in a smarting moment of unfortunate clarity that housed itself directly in Peter’s brainstem, the boy clicked the misshapen logic puzzle together.

                “I’m sorry, sweet pea,” the woman repeated again with solemn care. She reached back over the desk, her fingers opening up and curling back toward Peter’s shoulders. The leathery protrusions arched, kneading down to the small of his back, this time brushing ever so lightly along his rear. “I know this place means a lot to you.”

                Peter tried not to wince at the gentle grinding of her fingerprints marking up his bare body. His fingers grappled weakly with the shirt, too caught off guard, and felt it fall away.

                “But the fact remains,” she shrugged. “I just can’t go on with all this stress built up inside. Unless, you know…”

                “Unless what?”

                “…unless there was a way to do something about it. Something to make the stress go away,” Watson relented. She leaned back away into the chair, earning a chorus of squeaks from its chilled joints. At once her toned, sun-cooked thighs were arcing into view above the horizon of the desk, filling Peter’s view with the bumpy terrain of the woman’s mighty quadriceps. Following the sculpted pillars of her upturned legs, the boy looked up just in time to see his gigantic teacher’s pair of newly freed naked feet, glossed with a moist twinkle brought on by the heat, light speckling in between her toes from the ceiling bulb.

                “You, um…” he muttered, unable to believe the words he was choosing to formulate. Still, the image of himself someday dressed in a miniature graduation cap flashed through his mind’s eye, along with various incarnations of Lisa’s smiling face that he might not get to see anymore on a regular basis, and the judgment was made abundantly clear. “…you want… a… you know, me to… give a…”

                “You’d give me a foot rub?” Ms. Watson finished for him, bursting with falsified surprise. The painfully cheerful grin returned in full force. Her legs bowed at the knees, lowering her pair of golden-brown, blister-weathered kickers nearer and nearer to where Peter stood on the desk. With a squishy clump, she deposited both heels side-by-side not two inches away from her miniature student’s head. “Hon, that is… that is just about the nicest thing anyone’s offered me in a long time, I have to say…”

                “Uh-huh.” Peter drank in the sight of the twin human canvases before him, each immaculately carved by decades of physical activity and pounding on pavement, grass, and turf.

                “Listen, I… hate to rush it, but if you’re serious about… taking away some of my stress, we may need to get a move-on,” the teacher explained. Already she had her chin rested against her upturned fist, delicately balanced on the arm of the chair like a queen relaxing into her throne. “So what’s it gonna be, sweet pea? Care to help a woman out?”

                “Okay,” the boy said and, before he could let himself dwell on what a bizarre and haunting escapade his school career was turning out to be, he reached forward, taking hold of the woman’s meaty, greasy soles, one in each hand.

                The vertical surfaces were harder to negotiate than he was expecting. His gym teacher clearly didn’t just talk a big game; her skin was toughened, so thick it was difficult to get a good grip on. Luckily, or perhaps unluckily, Peter’s miniscule fingers discovered wrinkles into which he could sink a better handle. The flesh was spongier in these shallow rivers of flesh, already soaking into his hands as the boy went to work massaging the softcore-blackmailer’s weary peds.

                Each of the numerous wrinkles that curved in slanted pathways down the high-arched ball and through the valley of Watson’s sole seemed to breathe with a life of their own, flexing and closing in tandem with the woman’s happily bouncing toes above. Peter did his best to keep up, but occasionally felt his fingers being clenched into the folds and flaps of damp skin, probably by design. The pair of feet stretched so high that the boy realized he couldn’t even touch those dancing digits, even if he stood on his own toes.

                Painted into every crease and every fleshy crinkle was that viscid mess of lustrous sweat that he’d only had the misfortune of glimpsing soaked into Ms. Watson’s socks before. Now, there was no buffer zone, not even that papery cotton to keep his sensitive olfactory nerves separated from these rudely potent monuments of putrescence, and God, Peter wished he had that divider back.

                The boy felt a cough forming in his lungs, freshly deprived of oxygen as he rubbed. The rank excretions of the woman’s middle-aged pores seemed never to run out, and in fact increased as Peter pressed his hands harder into the beefy surface. Ripe with the flavors of rubber and overheated flesh, and dotted by soggy granules of cotton jam along the wall of sole skin, Ms. Watson’s appendages emanated such a sucker-punch of an odor they almost seemed to create their own atmosphere.

                 The minutes ticked by. Hardly five had passed, but the aroma was so pungent, pinching at Peter’s nerve endings and even making him dizzy, he was having trouble keeping up.

                “Don’t forget these, hon,” Ms. Watson reminded perkily. Each of her feet arched downward into his reach, simultaneously closing every crisscrossing sole wrinkle and momentarily capturing Peter’s fingers in the doughy valleys.

                The freshman looked up, poorly timing the turn of his attention as the woman’s middle toe, rancid and sticky with her daily effort, plastered itself right into his face. The teen felt its clay-like tip mush into his nose and mouth, briefly closing his whole air supply. As he backpedaled in a panic, feeling his teacher’s juices tattooed over his lips as a particularly sour memory, Peter heard her suppressing a guttural chuckle.

                “Sorry about that. That’s on me,” she said. The toes splayed and reached just a little higher, giving Peter more breathing space, though not much. “Why don’t you go ahead and reach on in there? Don’t be shy. That’s where I need it the most.”

                Peter nodded, even though she couldn’t see him behind the towering barriers of her propped feet. Fighting back another hack at the oily air, he dutifully tucked his quivering hands into the first velvety crevice between Ms. Watson’s big and second toes. Immediately on impact, he experienced a fresh well of sweat oozing from her skin, but Peter ignored it, only molested by a single drop of salty liquid dribbling down his arm as he continued scouring the mounds of awaiting flesh.

                “Hoo-boy, now this is exactly what I needed,” Ms. Watson informed him, letting a deep moan dangle on the back of her words. “I was right about you. You really are good at this, and I bet you didn’t even know it, did you, hon?”

                “Uh… n-not really, no.” Peter instantly regretted opening his mouth again to speak, as it allowed in another huff of that noisome musk seeping so generously from between the woman’s toes, which were slowly creeping closer to his scalp again. He even felt the burly digits cresting against the top of his hair, ruffling the shaggy locks. His knees sunk awkwardly into the wall of her slimy sole flesh closing in as well.

                “Just goes to show you. You never know what a person is capable of until they try,” she continued, shutting her eyes, her lips hanging open a second longer. Peeking around the bulwark of his teacher’s toejam-smeared instep, Peter couldn’t help but notice the woman’s tongue lap softly at the corner of her mouth. “That’s what I try to teach my students every day. And I hope it’s something you’re learning about yourself in this school. I… definitely understand why you should be able to continue learning here, sweet pea. I really do.”

                Peter robotically bobbed his head, electing not to consider that possibility now. If this indeed was representative of his life’s map, it was a thought just a little too nauseating for the boy to handle.

                “But what’s this?” Blue questioned with singsong lucidity, projecting her normally-whispered voice out into the school theater’s sparsely populated auditorium. The wispy young actress took a few deliberate steps across the blank blue stage, advancing on her five-inch costar, who stood with his chest puffed up upon a prop table in the corner of the expansive space. She brandished a ruffled script in her hand, leaning the dog-eared page nearer to the light for better viewing. “What’s your name, little one?”

                “Tom Thumb!” Peter bellowed, knowing his lines weren’t going to carry far for now without a microphone, but shrugged it off. He bowed gracefully, waving his hand with a royal flourish like Mrs. Parks had instructed, then snuck another glance at the note sheet on which he’d printed his own cues. “At your service.”

                “Tom Thumb,” the girl playing Rapunzel repeated back. She stooped down above his platform, running her fingers along her bony cheek as she studied Peter with mock fascination. “Tell me something, sir. Did you receive that name before or after you were born at such low stature?”

                “Low stature?” he scoffed, following the script. “I tell you, madam, that few have a stature quite as high as mine. I’ll have you know I’ve made a very profitable living selling toadstool tables and other useful products to woodland creatures for a number of years now, and have acquired the funds necessary to build my very own mansion.”

                “Well, I can’t imagine it cost so much to construct even a palace for one of your size,” she responded, cocking her head. The stage lights blared brighter above, but she kept focus upon Peter. “Now, suppose you tell me how you managed to reach the top of my tower here? It must’ve been quite a voyage.”

                “Aye, that it was,” he admitted loudly. “Luckily, I had one of your immaculate yellow hairs, like gold and silk in one, draped from the window to the ground. So it was merely a matter of making the clamber.”

                “My hair?” Blue gasped, placing her hands to her cheeks. “What peril you must’ve been in! And I wasn’t even standing by the window. Are you certain it was my hair you climbed?”

                “I think hair as long as yours would be quite difficult to miss, madam,” Peter said. “I presume it came detached from your head, and sort of drifted there, by happy coincidence.”          

                “That does make sense,” she said, stroking at the invisible golden-locks that would eventually adorn her ordinarily short-and-brunette do with a wig. She strolled around the table, gazing wistfully into the darkness above the seats and then back down to the tabletop that stood at waist height with her scene partner. “Goodness knows I do all I can, but as I’ve been trapped up here all my life, I’ve had precious few opportunities for grooming. Some shedding is bound to happen.”

                “And that is precisely what I’ve come here to discuss with you!” Peter bellowed with the gusto of a seasoned salesman, hardly letting her finish the line. The off-duty student actors out in the front pews of the theater chortled quietly, not wanting to disturb the proceedings; in particular, Calvin’s distinctively goofy snicker carried above the rest. This time the miniscule freshman heard his own words rebound off the nearest wall, creating a pittance of an echo, which was better than he’d fared before. Confidence swelled inside.

                “What is it?” Blue questioned. “My hair?”

                “Yes, your hair!” Peter said, waving an arm. “Now, if you would be so kind as to… give me one more boost?”

                “Oh. Yes, of course!” she sighed, kneeling toward the table. Her fingers slid onto the surface, hand upturned and held steady, as they’d practiced. For a moment the illusion of comedic fantasy was broken as Blue caught her costar’s eye, raising her eyebrow and blinking from his tiny shoes to the creases in her palm, letting him know she was securely poised to take on passengers. The boy could see the anxiety in her eyes at finally having to rehearse this moment, the first of several in the play where an opportunity arose to hold him, and her thin lips seemed to quiver slightly, but Peter knew already how focused she’d become.

                Confident in his footing, the miniature teen stepped forward, clambering with some over-acting to embark on her hand. The other actors witnessing the scene chortled again, well-aware after several rehearsals that Peter was more than capable of getting into a hand without tripping for real. For a moment, Blue’s eyes flashed with worry, until the boy slumped into the center of her palm and gave a broadly dramatized thumbs up and a wink that only she could see.

                “Now, what is it about my hair that’s caused you to risk life and limb just to remind me I’m in need of a beauty salon?” Blue boomed outward. “I’ve no need for those toadstools you say you’ve made such good fortune in selling, as I’ve unfortunately outgrown mushrooms as stools since… birth, I suppose?”

                Another snicker from the audience ensued. Blue lifted her hand, leveling it off at roughly chin level, plenty close now to accurately read the miniscule freshman’s lips. Peter noticed the barely perceptible shift in her pupils, training onto his millimeters-wide mouth, and ensured now to declare his lines with special overemphasis on every hard consonant. The skin of her hand was hot beneath his legs given the flood of stage light.

                “Fair enough. But you see, madam, in addition to those toadstools, I also pride myself on my cleansing wares!”

                “Are you suggesting I need a bath, good sir?” Blue scoffed, planting the script over her heart for effect before glancing at it again. Peter felt a slight wobble in her wrist that was immediately corrected, giving her a fresh shot of faith with a bob of his head as he steadied himself on the cushy curvature in the heel of her hand.

                “Well…” Peter continued, inhaling deeply for humorous effect and choking back a false wheeze that earned another laugh from beyond. “No, no, not at all! However, perhaps, if, as you say, you’ve been trapped in this tower all your life, that marvelous hair of yours is due for a rinse? If you think it shines now, wait until I’m through with it. It will gleam like the midmorning sun during the pitch-black of night!”

                “Perhaps…” Blue said. “I do occasionally find need to rise during the night and can’t for the life of me see where I’m walking. And often I do trip on my hair.”

                “Perhaps, indeed!” the boy said. He clasped a hand to the girl’s steadily rising thumb. “I could demonstrate my wares to you, if you only give me the time to bring them up here and show you.”

                “I’ve got nothing but time, good sir. However, I don’t imagine you’ll get your wares up here without great expense and bodily cost, unless they’re so small they may not even be capable of cleansing my hair anyway. Though if you can manage it, I’d be very interested indeed.”
                “Never underestimate the ingenuity of someone in my line of work, madam!” Peter said, wagging a finger at her and marking the upcoming business transaction by shaking her thumb with the other. She obliged in kind, hitting a gentle rise-and-fall rhythm with her digit that also managed to provide balance for the boy as he stood up on the squishy terrain of her tender palm flesh.

                “You mean you’re going to hire one of your fairies to carry the products up to me?” Blue queried with delight. She brushed a finger along her cheek with mock-fainting joy, though Peter couldn’t help but notice she seemed to have blushed a deeper shade of rose as well. Their director clearly had a knack for casting.

                “Actually, I was just going to use a catapult…” the boy playing Tom Thumb admitted sheepishly.

                “And scene!” Mrs. Parks sounded with a clap from the front row, beaming proudly at her thespians.

                “That was fricking great,” Calvin cackled in the bustling aftermath of play practice. He leaned his back against the front of the waist-high auditorium stage, his neck lolled over the rubber-lined precipice as he gazed up to the distant welled light fixtures so far above on the ceiling. “Seriously, I thought I was gonna die at that part when Britney did that super-fast bacon-joke part with the three pigs.”

                “I know, I was about to crack in about two seconds,” Peter snickered as he stood a matter of inches away from his wiry blonde classmate’s reclining head. His belly still ached a little from laughter when he was off-stage and watching his fellow performers block out the scenes in sequence.

                “Your stuff was good, too, dude. Seriously.”

                “Thanks,” Peter muttered.

                “No, really. I could hear you real well!”

                “Good. Now people will hear me loud and clear when I drop a line on opening night,” the much-smaller boy chuckled.

                “Hey, don’t jinx yourself!” Calvin fired back with a smirk. He tilted his face toward Peter on the stage floor, eyeing the puny actor with a shake of his head. “I made a joke like that once in a middle school play and it, like, happened! I walked out and forgot my first line! I’m too scared to say that ever again now.”

                “Aren’t you supposed to jinx stuff in theater, though?” Peter snickered. “Like, say break a leg before you go on?”

                “Yeah…” Calvin sighed, pressing a fist to his forehead and smiling. “I don’t know. Maybe I just don’t want to blame myself.”

                “I know how that feels,” the shorter freshman joshed.

                “Hey, Peter,” Blue said as she approached the boys between muttering queues of departing theater kids, passing the last row of crimson-lined seats. She pinched her thumbs and index fingers together, twiddling them in a soft cycle. “I just thought I’d ask real quick before I head out, was everything… cool, today? When I picked you up?”
                “You were great!” Peter said.

                “I felt a little shaky there for a minute. You could probably tell. That’s my bad. But I had it under control. Honest.”

                “You sure figured it out way faster than my little sister ever did when we were younger.”

                “I’ll keep that in mind. High bar. But you did good today. Obviously,” Blue giggled, crossing her arms and ceasing the nervous grinding of her fingertips. She raised an eyebrow, looking down to Calvin where he had plopped wearily against the stage to speak to Peter on a more even level. “You too.”

                “Thanks,” the boy mumbled bashfully, waving a hand at the lanky Rapunzel. “You… were good, too. You can sit with us if you want, or…”

                “We’re all just so sweet, aren’t we?” Blue jabbed, joining the miniature circle of outcasts. “Mrs. Parks would be really proud of us, making friends.” She lowered herself onto her haunches in one swift motion with perfect symmetry, pretzeling her narrow legs together as the cotton fibers of her pink-and-green rabbit-patterned socks stretched higher up her calves.

                “Were you guys practicing for that or something, Peter?” Calvin asked. He scratched the bridge of his nose with a thumb. “Her picking you up?”

                “Yeah, backstage before we’ve gone on for scenes, just the last few days,” Peter said.

                “He’s training me well,” Blue smarmed, squinting slightly to make out the movement of the boy’s lips. She inched inward, bracing against her palms, until she could more directly face the five-inch boy standing before her on the low platform.

                “Did that take… much practice?” Calvin asked with some evident concern. “That must freak you out. Just a little. Doesn’t it?”

                “It used to. It still does when people don’t ask me first. But, you know… you get used to it. Like getting on a boat.”

                “A boat made of person that could sneeze on you,” Blue said. She wrinkled her nose cutely, raising a hand as if to catch an oncoming mucus spray, but only batted at a few misplaced locks of her short brown hair. “Only kidding. No allergies.”

                “That’s comforting,” Peter laughed, turning back to Calvin. By now most of the other students had stumbled with their overloaded backpacks out of the auditorium, either making their way to the parking lot, or awaiting rides at the curb if without a driver’s license. “Do you want to try?”

                “Me?” the Jack-and-the-Beanstalk star gulped, his brow furrowing. “You sure?”

                “Yeah. I mean, might as well. You know, in case of, um…”

                “Mandy,” Calvin said knowingly, nodding his head. He shifted, pressing off the ground on his knuckles and turning to face Peter like Blue already was. The narrow-shouldered boy shrugged. “I guess it’s tough to have your back if I can’t… y’know, catch it too.”

                “That’s one way of putting it.” Peter padded a few inches nearer to the edge of the stage in the direction of Calvin’s nervously looming face. “Seriously, give it a try. Blue will have your back in case you don’t have mine as fast as you think you did.”

                “Oh, great…” Calvin groaned, though he obediently brought his hand to bear up over the edge of the stage, nudging Peter in the knees as he deposited his fingers onto the blue plain. “Sorry…”

                “Just keep your hand steady,” Blue said, extending a guiding finger in Calvin’s direction. “Try not to breathe out for a second. Just while he steps in. It’s like firing a gun.”

                Simultaneously bewildered and fascinated, Peter shot her a goggle-eyed glance. Calvin did the same, his fingers curling back into a careful fist for a moment before unfolding again near Peter’s miniscule shoes.

                “What?” the girl gawked. “Never hear of shooting ranges?”

                “Imagine, Rapunzel coming out on stage, guns blazing,” Peter remarked. “Now that’s something I’d pay to see.”

                He stepped forward, boarding the plush terrain of Calvin’s fingers. The young man seemed to have softer skin than Blue, who wore just a couple more calluses, indicating to the five-inch boy that his apparently resourceful female costar lived life a little more in the rough-and-tumble than he would’ve predicted by her zany socks.

                “This is… weird,” Calvin gulped, though the corner of his lip upturned into a beleaguered grin as he watched the toy-sized life in his hand pay forward a necessary confidence boost. “Not… you, Peter. You know. But, it just feels…”

                “Different,” Peter said for him, finding his sea legs quickly as the teen lifted him several inches off the stage floor, and was soon able to stand up steadily, along with the support of Blue’s thumb held out for him like a roller coaster bar, which the diminutive lad gratefully accepted. Despite the new experience, he was able to relax at last.

                It had been a long day, to be sure. The memory of Ms. Watson’s briny bare feet and their accompanying walloping odor stinging his nostrils was still plastered in his senses, but more so was the troublesome exchange wherein he now realized she’d coerced him into it on fear of withdrawal from the school.

                All his fears, whether she fully understood them or not, taken advantage of so she could get a foot rub from a five-inch boy. The thought of it made him just a little sicker than did the multiple hand-washings he had to go through to completely remove the sticky residue of her sweat from his palms after such a thorough rubdown.

                But at least it was over now. At least he could exhale, knowing he’d secured his place in this school for just a little longer.

                In this particular moment, though, now, it was relaxing as little else Peter could’ve imagined to stand here, in the hands of trusted new friends up on a stage that dwarfed him so hilariously, like a lake with a cork floating on its waves, and still feel that maybe, just maybe, he could fit in just as well as anyone else.

                Even if all the other actors were much easier to see.

                “And over here,” Peter announced with a wave of his tiny hand in the direction of his towering bedroom shelf, “is where I’d keep all my trophies, if I’d ever earned one in my life.”

                Lisa stifled an embarrassed snort, shaking her head, even as her cupped palm containing her five-inch date remained just as still except for the slightest of jovial tremors.

                “You’re goofy. Seriously, what are the shelves for? I don’t see anything up here,” the redhead chuckled. With her free hand she reached along the sky-blue gloss of the walls, fingers gliding past the strip of cartoon airplane wallpaper still leftover from childhood. She swiped her thumb over the white painted surface, collecting a coating of dust along her digit. Her nose wrinkled at the grisly sight.

                “Mom used them to store all the furniture I don’t need any more,” he said. “My baby stuff, mostly.”

                “You mean like… your crib?”

                “Yeah.”

                “Ohhh my Goood…” Lisa blushed, her voice diminishing into another bashful squeal. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, not trying to make a big deal out of it, but… it just sounds so cute.”

                “Hey, if that’s a good thing to you, go ahead and picture it as cute all you want,” Peter shrugged, giving her thumb a pat as he leaned back against it.

                “Oh, it’s definitely a good thing,” Lisa mused. Her hand rose higher, nearer to her chin, where a few wisps of her fiery locks could brush past the young man’s face. Pouting, her lips puffed, chin trembling, the smile shifting from one corner of her mouth to the other.

                Peter was robbed of any intelligent retort as he found himself, as per usual, lost in gazing up at the girl’s plush lips, a matter of inches away from him. Fragile as this whole situation seemed at times, there were moments like this, where the miniature boy couldn’t help but let his imagination wander into some soft and slightly moister places.

                He wondered if Lisa’s mind did, too. Unlikely as it was, it was hard not to hope, even pray a little. What if-

                “Hey, Peter!”

                The attention-demanding pronouncement of Jessica entering the bedroom snapped Peter out of his pubescent reverie, and also caused Lisa to immediately lower her hand just a few inches as it cradled the boy, lest its proximity to her lips be interpreted in the wrong circumstance. But it probably already was.

                “Hey, Jessie,” the boy coughed. “You just get home?”

                “Uh-huh,” she mused blankly as she crossed the carpet into the room, though her eyes were locked somewhere above her miniature brother’s head, on the face of the newcomer. Her expression was impossible to read. Those crystal blue eyes were narrowed in suspicion, and probably not just because she’d caught her sibling so near to a mouth that was capable of slurping him inside.

                “Oh! Sorry, guys. Um, Lisa, this is my sister Jessie-”

                “I like to be called Jessica, actually,” the younger girl said to Lisa, offering a greeting wave. Her response didn’t come off as curt so much as forced confidence. “I’m thirteen now, after all.”

                “It’s definitely a big age,” Lisa said with a bob of her head, though obviously sensing the indefinable tension. “It’s, uh, nice to meet you, Jessica!”

                “Nice to meet you too. Lisa,” Jessica repeated, at last looking back to her five-inch sibling in the girl’s hand, her brow furrowed slightly. Her leg bowed at the knee, foot kicked off from the ground in a casual dance pose. Peter watched her keeping near-perfect balance on one leg, the pudgy toes of her dangled foot grasping slowly at the carpet fibers. Whether or not she meant it consciously, it was the closest thing Peter imagined his charitably-hearted little sister was capable of enacting in the form of intimidation. And it was working, though not on the correct person.

                The two girls stood roughly eye-to-eye given Lisa’s lower stature, which Peter couldn’t help but feel a twinge of discomfort over. Probably within a year, Jessica would have the height advantage. He wondered if Lisa was thinking this through at all, or if she was keeping her cool better than him.

                “Are you giving her a tour of your room, Peter?” his sister asked.

                “Yep! We were just about finished, though,” Peter said good-naturedly.

                “Did you show her all the Lego stuff you built? Your stairs and bridges and things?”

                “Some of it, yeah,” he said.

                “He’s really smart,” Jessica explained in a tone stern enough that it was clear she didn’t believe Lisa had yet grasped this fact. “He really knows when he’s safe and when he’s not safe and what to do.”

                “That’s good,” Lisa replied, flashing a questioning glance to Peter at Jessica’s word choice. “Isn’t it?”

                “Yep…” he said. The boy wasn’t a huge fan of where this conversation was steering, after the drama of Jessica’s sock-hopping sleepover and the hopefully temporary devolvement of her relationship back into treating him like a porcelain doll. “Hey, Mom said dinner was supposed to be ready pretty soon. Did it look like it was c-”

                “Are you keeping your arm still, Lisa?” Jessica butted in. Her eyes darted instantly back to the redhead’s sweater-clad limb, pupils opening. “You know, it’s pretty important.”

                “Oh, for sure. For sure. I know to think about it whenever I’m, um…” Lisa said.  “Whenever I’m giving him a boost.” Her palm trembled softly as she flexed her willowy muscles again, reaffirming the poise with which she held the boy. He felt the warm, soap-scented skin beneath his back quiver, but quickly realigned with the stone-still posture it normally held. No bluffing there.

                “Uh-huh,” Jessica said, the last syllable denoting just how drastically unconvinced she was. “You said “whenever.” You carry him around a lot, huh?”

                “Oh… no, not really. Just sometimes, if he… you know, asks me first,” Lisa said. Her hand’s passenger could hear the lump swallowed inside her throat, even from below her chest.

                “Peter? Do you feel steady?” Jessica’s head tilted to the side.

                “Completely,” Peter gushed. He could feel himself probably overcompensating on Lisa’s behalf, but of course it was true. “She’s got my back.”
                “Well, if you’re sure,” Jessica sighed. She shrugged, her bugged blue eyes passing rapidly between Lisa’s face and Peter’s below. Extending her open palm, her petite fingers uncurling, she pressed it up against Lisa’s wrist. “Can I show you how, though?”

                “Uh, of course. Peter? Do you guys want to show me how it’s done?” Lisa asked politely.

                “I promise you, Jessie, she’s got me. But-” the freshman protested kindly, though another gaze up into his little sister’s irises showed him all the fear he needed to see. Her lip quivered, her eyelash batted. She wasn’t just asking on his behalf. “Sure. Sure I can.”

                Rolling onto his side, Peter pulled himself up from the smooth, pale plain of Lisa’s hand, conscious of its rigid plateau even as he walked the plank of her fingers toward Jessica. As he stepped into the considerably hotter palm of his little sister, Peter felt the minute dampness of her skin beneath his feet. The clamminess receded somewhat once he was safely leaned against her curled fingers, but it was enough for him to get the picture.

                “It’s all about focusing on just this part of your arm,” Jessica explained. She ran a finger along the length of her slender forearm, from her elbow and to the heel of her hand, where Peter was patiently cushioned. “Especially when you walk, you gotta just make sure this part is still. And keep it straight with your stomach. If you can do that, then Peter will be safe. It’s what Mom taught me a long time ago… before you guys knew each other.”

                As Peter had predicted, his sibling wasn’t taking this first meeting especially well. Already he was mentally preparing for another day or two of near-constant personal time being scooped up by Jessica’s eager fingers until she could get her anxiety over his safety back down to normal again. He couldn’t quite blame her after the emotional beating she’d given herself after Stella; still, in this particular moment, with the one non-family member whose opinion most mattered watching him be coddled like a toy in a little girl’s hand, it was hard not to be resentful. With any luck, Lisa had a high-tolerance for secondhand embarrassment.

                “I can definitely see the difference,” Lisa said with genuine awe. Peter was duly impressed by the performance of her voice when, if he had to be honest with himself, she was more skilled at carrying him than Jessica. Not that he could ever admit that to his sister, of course, for fear of breaking her soul cleanly in two at the thought of not being his primary earthly defender.

                “It’s okay. I’ve been practicing for a long time. You’ll get as good as me sometime, if you just be careful and think about it a lot,” Jessica sighed, not shying from a humble-brag.

                “Well, I certainly appreciate it. I just want Peter to be safe,” Lisa said, reading the younger girl’s heart and knowing precisely how to speak.

                “Good. Don’t worry, I’ll hang out with you guys when you come back here and give you more practice,” Jessica explained.

                Peter felt a groan seismic enough to split the planet’s crust rising in his throat. Was this really what dating was like? Or was it just because his entire family, Erica included, had to have it in the back of their mind that his date might someday, even with the kindest and most magnanimous of intentions, accidentally smear his body on the underside of a rubber-soled shoe? That little nugget of a possibility had to be hurting his game.

                But instead he swallowed that groan as well as the humiliation raining down on him in this unnecessarily awkward exchange, and just thanked his lucky stars that Lisa was so skilled at appeasing his overzealous guardian angel.

                And at being adaptable to the bizarre reality of treating him not just as an equal but a viable candidate for affection.

                And at being funny.

                And at being painfully sweet.

                And at being the prettiest girl he had ever looked up at.

                “Everyone, dinner!” Suzanne called out from the front hallway.

                Jessica turned her head and automatically took several paces away from Lisa and toward the door, with Peter still cupped firmly in her palm. “Sounds like you were right!” she said cheekily to her miniature sibling. As if to discourage any alternative travel method suggestions, she brought her opposite hand up and over her brother. She blanketed him with her soft skin above his entire body except his head and feet, which poked insistently from beneath her drumming fingers.

                “Right. Um, Lisa?” Peter said as innocuously as possible, trying to distract from his precariously emasculating position sandwiched between his younger sister’s aggressively defensive hands like an escaped hamster. “You hungry?”

                “Starving,” she said brightly, and with an adorable wink, Lisa sent Peter the message that she wasn’t in the least bit negatively impacted by this act of overbearance.

                “Your heart’s beating faster, Peter,” Jessica whispered into her brother’s ear as they paraded down the stairs, her palms clasped against her brother’s torso. She braided her fingers together, gently clamping the boy in against her skin. “You feel safe, huh?”

                “Yeah. I think I do,” he whispered back.

                Peter stood defiant on the neon-orange square on the multicolored path that he’d fought tooth-and-nail to reach, arms crossed as he looked up toward Jessica’s hand slowly approaching. Her fingers were wrapped triumphantly around her own plastic playing piece. A smug grin curled her lips as her arm stretched toward him.

                “Somebody’s not the le-e-eader anymore,” she sang. The girl’s thumb brushed playfully along her brother’s stomach as her piece passed the green, then purple, and finally orange square upon which the five-inch boy was waiting with his best poker face. She deposited the plastic bobble a full two squares ahead of Peter, who’d previously held a solid lead in the trivia board game, and gave him a sporting pat on the top of his head with the pad of her thumb.

                “All right, honey, let’s not rub it in,” Suzanne laughed from the other side of the coffee table around which the group was huddled.

                “I’m just letting him know. In case he didn’t realize,” Jessica snickered, flashing a wink to her tiny sibling.

                “Hey, it’s good you did. I definitely wasn’t paying attention,” Peter snarked. He turned around to Lisa, who knelt by a third side of the table, her arms folded on the glass surface.  “Lisa? Did you realize I’m not winning anymore?”

                “I don’t think so,” Lisa smiled warmly. “I could have used a banner, maybe. Or some sky writing.”

                Jessica broke into a series of girlish cackles, leaning back against the couch cushions and rolling her head back.

                “You all are really hilarious,” Erica droned coolly from her position on the living room armchair a few feet away, not even bothering to look up from her phone. “I’m, like, laughing over here.”

                Peter shot his older sister a dramatic eye-roll. He knew she’d promised their mother to be present for an entire hour of the game night plus the dinner, but that contract said nothing of participating or, indeed, sitting close enough to take part in the game. Still, Suzanne was picking up the slack.

                “All right, looks like it’s Erica’s turn again,” the woman announced pointedly to ensure her eldest child’s attention was diverted. She plucked a card from the stack. “I hope she’s ready, because I’m only reading the question a maximum of two times.”

                “Oh no, what if I don’t win?” Erica piped up dryly.

                Suzanne cleared her throat, releasing a groan from the seventeen-year-old, who at last cast her eyes just high enough to see both the gaming group and the group chat on her cell.

                “Okay, okay, what is it? Can I have one of the baby questions?”

                “Hey, those are only for ages six to thirteen!” Jessica defended instantly. She sat up higher from the floor, planting her palm flat on the game board and nearly toppling her piece.

                Peter’s knees vibrated slightly as his sister’s fingers thumped down a few inches away from him. He had to chuckle at the sudden panic in her blue eyes at the thought of losing her edge over the family if anyone else was allowed to utilize the tween-difficulty level.

                “Don’t worry, Jessie- I mean, Jessica,” he muttered sympathetically, correcting himself. He took a few steps forward and offered a consoling stroke to the girl’s finger. “I bet you still know more of the kid questions than her.”

                “Thanks,” the girl sighed, raising an eyebrow in effort to decipher if the boy was being supportive or poking fun at her trivia knowledge. Her hand ascended a few inches up from the colored cardboard surface. “Hey. You gotta stay on the square if you’re gonna be your own playing piece.”

                “Whoops. Didn’t even notice,” Peter smarmed, glancing down at the now-yellow square. He threw up his hands. “But what can ya do?”

                “Oh, no you don’t,” she giggled. Her fingers curved together as her palm flattened into a wall and cupped into her brother, nudging him aggressively back toward his previously orange stand.

                Peter grunted, putting imaginary effort into resisting his sister’s hand as she slid him along the glossy ground. His miniature hands sunk into the soft flesh of her palm, meeting the young girl’s tensed muscle beneath. Jessica couldn’t withhold her laughter again, and neither could Lisa.

                “I’ll repeat the rules: everyone stays in their own age group questions,” Suzanne explained with over-dramatized seriousness. She glanced back to Erica, who had returned to her phone screen. “No exceptions.”

                “Oh, dang,” Erica coughed. Her sarcasm was practically seeping into the cushions.

                “Although I’m willing to make an exception in the opposite direction and bump you up into the forty-plus difficulty, honey,” Suzanne warned. “We’ll see if that school of yours taught you anything about obscure vice presidents.” She cleared her throat and read out Erica’s appropriate question.

                Snorting, Peter threw a couple of airy punches into the peachy barricade of his younger sister’s hand, watching his fists barely even make a momentary indent in the creased pad of her palm. Both Jessica and Lisa had given in to loosely stifled snickering; he couldn’t help but pay particular focus to the redhead’s lilting laughter, not derisive or embarrassed, but purely joyful. God, she was adorable.

                “Maybe you should use one of the checkers for your piece, Peter, and you can be my playing piece instead,” Jessica suggested with feigned authority. Her fingers curled slowly in toward her palm, meeting her brother’s back. “You’d get to reach the end of the board then and feel sort of like you won, even though I did! I think you’d like that.”

                “Hey, don’t count me out so fast,” the boy laughed. His heart quickened slightly as his sister’s digits gently clasped him into her closing fist. Her skin was scented heavily of some frilly grape-related lotion. “Or Lisa! I think she’s planning a comeback.”

                “Are you kidding me?” the girl said, looking with joking dismay at her own piece in dead-last. “I don’t think I could win even if I got every single question right from now on. I think you guys have played this game too much.”

                “Maybe just a little,” Jessica offered. She ruffled her slender fingers around her five-inch sibling’s legs, letting them dance against her palm, and lifted the boy up from the board.

                Suzanne moved Erica’s piece forward, having received a half-satisfactory answer. She planted the card into the used pile, and looked to the other three in the room with amusement. “What’s going on over here?”

                “Oh, nothing. I’m just telling Peter why I think he should be my piece instead of his,” Jessica said. She cupped her brother into her palm, tousling his hair with her middle finger.

                “Mhm,” Suzanne said. “Why don’t you let your brother back down to his space now, so I can finish “schooling” all of you?”

                The entire circle broke into chortling at the woman’s outdated vernacular. Peter even heard Erica release an accidental peal of laughter. Jessica’s palm lowered back down toward the board, sliding into a soft disembark for Peter just as the oven timer bleeped loudly from the kitchen.

                “Pizza’s done!” Suzanne chirped.

                “Thank God,” Erica groaned.

                Out of the corner of his eye, Peter saw a relieved smile creep over Jessica’s mouth. Her palm, at first tipping to let him out, instantly lifted back up and leaned his body into her fingers again, now with another chance for the game to delay. More importantly, with a chance to keep him in her protective grasp for longer. To the side, he watched Lisa patiently waiting, any hint of judgment hidden from her cheerful countenance as she folded her hands in her lap.

                “Why don’t you help me, Jessica?” Suzanne asked idly. Telepathically, Peter sent a major thank-you in his mother’s direction.

                “Hmm?” the girl mumbled, her mind clearly elsewhere as she looked up from the miniature boy in her hand. Her tongue lapped at the corner of her lip.

                “Pizza? I need someone who’s an expert at getting the pizza peel to go under the crust.”

                “Oh, okay. Peter, you wanna come t-”

                “I think your brother and these two will be just fine waiting for us for a minute,” Suzanne said. “Actually, why don’t we all take a break from the game and come sit in the dining room?”

                “Okay…” Jessica sighed.

                Peter received a last powerful whiff of the grape aroma surrounding his sister’s hands as her fingers brushed along his shoulders and hair. Finally her palm hovered back to the tabletop and tipped, letting him stumble to its surface. With some discomfort, he realized he suddenly felt just a touch more secure upon the game board, out of the thirteen-year-old’s loving grip.

                That was new.

                Jessica rose on both feet in unison, a graceful move practiced over several years of dance, and lithely followed after her mother into the glow of the kitchen.

                “I guess you’re spared my comeback for now,” Lisa giggled. She crouched in nearer, lowering her chin down to the surface of the coffee table such that her eye level only beat out Peter’s by a few inches. “Too bad.”

                “Yeah, too bad. I was ready to see you nail some questions about sixty-year-old pop singers and… I don’t know, deadly bacteria?”

                “Hey, I’m learning things in biology. I could get that second one, at least,” Lisa insisted. Her fiery locks wisped softly along the edge of the table. For support, her fingers gradually appeared over the cusp, gripping the surface so smoothly that Peter didn’t even feel a tremor.

                “I bet you could,” Peter smiled.

                Lisa’s nostrils flared at the gathering aroma of mozzarella and tomato. “Shall we?”

                “Heck, yeah,” he said. “Mom makes a mean pizza. I hope you’re ready to have every chain place ruined for the rest of your life.”

                “More than anything,” Lisa said. Her hand passed onto the table and rotated, palm-up, for her passenger.

                “Guess we better get a move-on…” Peter uttered wryly under his breath as he hopped into her pale hand. He spoke too quietly even for Erica to make out from her chair. “…before my shadow comes back to get me instead.”

                Lisa made an awkward grimace. Immediately the boy regretted his wording.

                “I don’t mean it like… um… I mean, I don’t want to sound like a jerk or-”

                “I get it,” Lisa whispered as she drew him up toward her chin. She glanced to the chair beyond as Erica, eyes glued to her screen, rolled over the arm of the chair and meandered toward the kitchen, where Jessica and Suzanne were slicing up the steaming pie. “It must feel a little… overbearing sometimes.”

                “Accurate,” Peter huffed.

                “It’ll be okay. She just wants you to know she cares,” Lisa continued. She arched up to her full, modest height with nary a waver in Peter’s cushy seat in her palm and sauntered toward the hallway.

                “C’mon, guys!” Jessica called out from the dining room just around the corner. “Peter, I put you next to Lisa…”

                “Well, that’s something,” Peter mumbled to Lisa.

                “…and I’m on your other side.”

                “Spoke too soon,” the boy said, earning another giggle from his carrier.

                The pair stepped up to the dining surface, where Lisa set Peter down on his cloth placemat, right before the well-polished doll’s table. A full square inch of the gooey, sauce-slathered meal was already heaped on his plate. His mouth watered.

                “Mom!” Jessica moaned as Suzanne returned to the room with a large bowl of tossed salad. The girl swiped up her knife and fork, bearing the two enormous glistening utensils down above her brother’s toy-sized place setting. “You didn’t cut Peter’s piece small enough! How’s he supposed to eat it when it’s that big?”

                “I just don’t know what I was thinking, honey,” Suzanne said.

                Peter settled into his chair right by Lisa’s softly folded hand. He watched his sister’s aggressive fingers sawing his food into a mess of melted strings and crumbs. Most of his carefully sliced portion was shredded beyond recognition, glued by steam and cheese to Jessica’s metal implements, each of which was taller than him by a handle. She sliced it in every direction. When she was finished at last, leaving a pile of crimson and white debris on his plate, she drew the fork up toward her lips and licked away the lingering mush still wrapped around the tines. She grinned at him as she gulped down about half of his entire dinner in one bite, the sauce steaming against the ripples of her tongue.

                “There,” the girl sighed, satisfied with her work as the rest of the family took their seats. “Way better, right? Now you don’t have to worry.”

                The freshman squeezed his whitening fists to the underside of the table where Jessica couldn’t see and looked with optimistic exasperation toward his date’s reassuring green eyes above. Lisa shrugged, her smile widening by a hair.

                Overbearing, indeed.

                The overhead bell chimed roundly in Peter’s eardrums, signaling the end of the morning history class. A sappy smirk crossed his lips as he looked across the room to Lisa in the corner, who returned his gaze with a warm smile of her own that couldn’t help but prick up the goose bumps along his back.

                Now a few weeks into school, the boy was beginning to understand just a little of what all the movies, books, and TV shows he’d been exposed to for fifteen years were talking about when they said “a case of the Mondays.” No matter how much he enjoyed the chance to participate in “real school,” getting up at a predetermined time to make the bus was beginning to feel like just a bit of a chore, if only for the first hour.

                Seeing Lisa today helped, though. Despite his annoyances over Jessica’s determination to ensure he never had to walk another step in his life that she couldn’t pick him up and carry him across, the previous Friday’s game night date hadn’t been the clumsy meet-n-greet he’d half-anticipated. In fact, it was a major success, if his mother’s glowing commentary afterward was any indication. Lisa had a lot to prove to the three most important women in his life, after all, not just as a suitable potential significant other, but as a guardian for his vulnerable existence when they were left alone. She had passed, of course, as he knew she would, with flying colors.

                So much so, in fact, that because of their shared trip between first period history and second period biology, Suzanne had authorized Lisa through the principal’s office to ferry Peter to the next class every day. Lisa had asked Erica if she minded first, of course, a question that the seventeen-year-old answered within four nanoseconds with a desperate “yes please.”

                The entire weekend, then, Peter had spent in an intangible cocoon of sheer glee over his luck and gratitude to the petite redhead and, frankly, his best friend, for her perfect first impression on his family as a unit. It didn’t even bother him having Jessica spend nearly every waking hour in his company: clutching him during afternoon TV show marathons, requiring his audience while she rehearsed dance steps, and of course personally attending to his meals with her knife and fork, ensuring every bite was possible for him to swallow without chewing.

                He really did need to figure that minor dilemma out sooner rather than later, before his little sister started insisted on them bunking together overnight.

                “Here we go,” Lisa said sweetly, speaking up a little louder than usual, enough so that her soft voice easily carried to Peter amidst the chattering carnage of exiting students. She lowered her palm onto his desk, laying her fingers at his feet. “Elevator going up?”

                “With pleasure,” Peter said. He climbed aboard, letting himself feel the flush of gravity as he balanced on Lisa’s cradling hand on its ascent.

                “Wait a second.” The booming voice from behind accused its target with sniveling conviction. A broad hand on the end of a toned arm whipped through the air, nearly knocking Peter off his feet. The strange palm landed with a smack on the desktop just a few inches below. Amy leaned over the desk, dark eyes gnawing at Peter.

                “Hey, be careful!” Lisa gasped at the much-taller girl. Her other hand instinctively cupped around Peter’s legs, preventing a fall.

                “Why are you holding him?” Sharon questioned with icy calm from beside Amy, while Kimmy looked on with a freckled pout. “It’s not allowed.”

                “That’s not really… true,” Peter said, not bothering to inflect his normal cheerful tone. He knew it probably made more sense to explain the new rule to the girls before they put up any more of a fuss. In this moment, though, imbued with confidence from the successful events of Friday, he couldn’t help but just let his ire stand on its own.

                “Well, it should be,” Sharon murmured, not missing a beat. “What would it be like for you here if just anyone got to pick you up and take you with them? Who knows where you might end up.”

                “She’s not just anyone,” Peter said. He felt a grumble developing in his throat. Lisa’s hand pulled further and further away from the desk until she had him hoisted by her shoulder. He wrapped a hand around a silky thread of her red hair.

                “Oh, that’s right,” Amy sneered. “She’s your-”

                “-girlfriend,” Kimmy finished slyly. She stuck out her lower lip and summoned some fake sniffles.

                “Erica is the only one allowed to pick him up,” Sharon said. “And Ms. Watson.”

                “This… isn’t the place to talk about this,” Peter said, recomposing. He was roughly 120% sure he had never told Sharon his older sister’s name, nor anything about his special set of rules. Yet she knew them, of course. It was hard to be surprised.

                “Then where is the place?” the vixen demanded softly.

                “That’s not really what I… uhm, Lisa, do you want to…” the boy mumbled, clearing his throat and eyeing the door.

                “Yeah. Yeah, we should get to class-” she said, turning toward the door.

                Everything that happened next took place in a heartbeat. Peter saw Sharon’s ghostly eyes flash like silver flint between himself and Amy’s towering visage above. A signal. In the next instant, firm fingers, warm and all-encompassing, clamped around his body. It was almost too fast to comprehend until the wind was knocked out of his chest. Each of the tanned pillars that made up Amy’s hand mashed around his body, squeezing him into her fist as it rose.

                “HEY!” Lisa crowed, the rage in her voice dialed up for perhaps the first time in Peter’s memory from its usual soothing canter. He could see the shout had startled Amy too as the lanky volleyball goddess palmed him up toward her face for closer examination. Still, she held strong.

                “Put him down,” the redhead ordered curtly. She extended her hand. “Peter!”

                The puny freshman was unsure if he’d ever been gripped by someone as tall as Amy. It was already frightening when young children managed to take hold of him in their clammy hands with possessive strength, but at least they were near to the ground. So the distance from the ground wasn’t far, and generally a panicked adult was nearby to steal him back.

                But Amy was a regular teenage amazon. He was floating in the void above the class, a space he would never have reason to be, a fall that could very well kill him if she released, and he had precisely no control over any of his limbs.

                Peter decided, as he wheezed for breath with the bronzed flesh of her palm pressed hard against his tiny chest, that he was not a fan of this sensation.

                “Let him go now, Amy,” Lisa commanded. She prodded her index finger at the much-taller girl’s stomach, her other hand still open to receive Peter again.

                “Is there some kind of problem over here, ladies?” Mr. Browning interjected from the front of the room. Hurriedly he passed between the desks and arrived at the scene of the spat, hands on his hips. “Peter. You all right?”

                “He’s okay. Honest. Aren’t you?” Amy smarmed, displaying a victorious grin for her capture as she grasped him just a couple inches away from her professionally whitened teeth.

                “I think so,” Peter croaked. His lungs slowly refilled with air as the girl’s titanic fingers relented pressure on his innards. He suspected he was only granted this luxury because there was a teacher glaring right in their direction, though.

                “She snatched him up without asking,” Lisa informed him. “Right out of my hand. It was really dangerous.”

                “Is that what happened?” the teacher droned, looking shiftily between Lisa and Amy.

                “No,” Amy snorted. She batted idly at her dark locks with her free hand, while the opposite one still held Peter at chin level, in the splash zone for the overpowering aroma of her wintergreen gum. Her fingers had his arms folded obediently at his sides, his legs dangling awkwardly out of the bottom of her tightly wound fist. Pure iron. It wasn’t hard to imagine why she was usually called upon to spike the ball in her games.

                “Yes it did. And put Peter down!” Lisa scowled. “Now.”

                “Take it easy, sweetie,” Amy chuckled passively, only bothering to raise an eyebrow at the redhead. Her attention was devoted almost solely to the miniature lad restrained in her wide hand. “I’m only thinking about Peter’s safety.”

                “That’s very selfless, but let’s also make sure Peter is comfortable with it,” Mr. Browning insisted, his voice deepening now.

                “Okay, okay,” she groaned. The tanned giant took her time relenting, her hand lowering only about an inch every few seconds. “I’m just being careful!”

                “So what’s the problem here?” the teacher asked once Peter was finally released on the table. “Why are we fighting over whether or not Peter is safe?”

                “Cuz she…” Kimmy whined, pointing a stubby finger at Lisa’s nose. “…just picked him up and was gonna just leave with him. She can’t do that!”

                Lisa’s hand returned to the desktop, whereupon Peter gratefully crawled back into it. It was done without his giddy jaunt like last time. Instead he entered almost on his knees, so relieved he was to reach a friendly hand. He wanted to throw his arms around the girl’s soft thumb in thanks, but decided that wasn’t the kind of image he wanted Sharon to be gifted with.

                “Actually, she can,” Mr. Browning said in answer. He plucked a crumpled note from his pocket. “I got this in my office mailbox. I’m assuming his second period teacher did too. His sister and Lisa Carol… and only his sister and Lisa Carol… are authorized to hold him for getting between these two classes.”

                “Aww,” Kimmy groused again. She reached out and took the note, which the history teacher proffered to her, and inspected its red pen scrawl with squinted scrutiny. “That’s not fair.”

                “Yeah, like they’d let the girl who dropped him carry him around,” Amy muttered under her breath.

                “What?” Kimmy grumbled. Her fists balled up.

                “Girls. Girls, please,” Mr. Browning said, leveling his arms between the short, slightly pudgy strawberry blonde and the tall, toned athlete in opposition. “Peter, you’re sure you’re fine?”

                “Yep,” the boy peeped from the curled wall of fingers surrounding him in Lisa’s hand.

                “Good.” The man returned his attention to the trio. “The point is, I don’t want you interfering with Lisa and Peter getting to class anymore, understood? I have half a mind to write you up with the principal for harassing one of your peers.”

                “What about the school’s message to look out for others, Mr. Browning?” Sharon observed sharply, having been quietly gazing at Peter in Lisa’s hand for so long. “They had that big poster up in the front hall since the first day of school. We’re just being active bystanders.”

                “I think grabbing people away from other people is a little different than-”

                “-well, Peter’s a little different from other people,” Sharon cut in, easily silencing her adult teacher with just a pearly glare. Her lips flowed from word to word like a practiced opera singer. “And we didn’t have the whole story until now. I don’t think we should be punished for wanting to look out for our fellow classmates, especially those who need to be looked out for even more. Do you think so, Mr. Browning? Do you think we should be punished for caring about Peter?”

                Furrowing his brow, the educator glanced between the cherub-like expressions on the faces of Amy and Kimmy, and the stone-cold, stark-still look of genuine resolve on Sharon’s. He bit his lip and sighed.

                “Peter?” he said.

                “It’s… fine. I’m okay,” Peter repeated, propping himself up on Lisa’s pinky. Looking into Sharon’s unblinking silver eyes, he sensed this was not the time to make a scene. It simply wasn’t worth it. Not when the day had started with such promise in the form of Lisa’s new duty; not when a minor disciplinary hearing might result in his mother rushing to the school and demanding to have the whole event relayed back in excruciating detail. “I just don’t want to be picked up without asking. That’s all.”

                “I think that sounds very reasonable,” Mr. Browning said. “And now that we’re all on the same page, let’s all get to where we’re going before the next bell rings. If you’re late, just tell your teacher to shoot me an email.”

                “Thanks,” Peter sighed, offering a grateful wave to his teacher as Lisa pivoted on her heels and made for the door before any of the trio could offer chase. Still, Sharon’s icy gaze followed them all the way to the door and, the young man suspected, possibly through the walls.

                Peter gazed across the leafy expanse of the school courtyard, the plate glass before him acting as his only barrier to the lingering autumnal air. The roomy marbled window sill upon which he sat, drawing pad in his lap, was a useful tool for forgetting that he was still inside. It was cold beneath his jeans, but other than this mild discomfort, he could press his forehead up against the translucent wall and observe the insects flitting in between the branches.

                “Do you have a good view?” Alita asked from behind him. She’d taken a seat on a chair pulled from a nearby classroom. The winding interior hallway that wrapped around the central courtyard was finally devoid of students rushing late to classes, leaving the pair to carry out their vague “Draw the World” assignment from art class in peace.

                Their aging and mostly hard of hearing teacher Mr. Garrison was nothing if not encouraging of total freedom, especially when it meant he didn’t have to write too detailed of a project explanation.

                “Oh, yeah. This is great,” Peter said gratefully. “You can, um… you know, go outside and get some samples or something for your drawing if you want.”

                “No, no, I do not mind,” she insisted. Her curly dark hair bounced from emphasis of these words, along with her almost-too-bright smile. “I get enough of the outside on my walk home, you know?”

                “Hey, no complaints here,” Peter chuckled. “Thanks for the ride inside.”

                “You are very welcome.”

                Originally they, along with most of the rest of the class, had posted up on the benches outside the school to sketch a randomly selected chunk of the great outdoors.

                However, after about ten minutes of practically religious attention to detail with a drawing of a tree knot on his miniature pad, Peter’s work was ripped away by a strong gust of wind. After pulling himself up from his back on the splintered surface of the picnic table where Erica had placed him, though, and alerting Calvin to his lost art, his fellow thespian had darted off after it, only to return with bad news.

                “Sorry, man,” the boy drawled with some apparent guilt as he brandished the tiny slip of paper between his thumb and forefinger. It was sopping with rain water from the puddle it so ceremoniously landed in before Calvin could catch it. He smoothed it out into his hand, using a cuticle to remove the wrinkles, but this only caused the liquefied lead to smear on the grooves of his fingers.

                “I guess Mother Nature didn’t  want me to Draw that particular part of The World,” Peter said, which got Calvin to smirk again after his forlorn effort to salvage the smaller teen’s work.

                So instead, after Calvin had departed to follow after a bizarrely chromed caterpillar on a nearby sapling, Alita offered to bring Peter to a more serene location, with decidedly less wind, where he could still observe the scenic splendor. He agreed almost immediately, especially after setting his pencil tip down to the next page and having a quick breeze set his hand askew, which made for one untoward-looking bird.

                The diminutive freshman was impressed, considering this was Alita’s first effort in transporting a miniature human life from point A to B. She used both hands, a technique he hadn’t seen used too many times except in his most nervous carriers, and they were damp with anxious sweat by the time she’d made the perhaps fifty-foot journey back indoors.

                Still, she’d only shaken a little on the first few steps; she was easily better at holding him than some of the well-meaning but over-excited and maybe dangerously bubbly friends Jessica had brought home in times past. After receiving his express approval, his classmate had let him off at the window sill, where she’d volunteered to remain just in case, despite the surface offering several inches of additional clearance for safety.

                “What did you choose to draw?” Alita asked.

                “Um, I’m giving that stick right there a try.”

                “The stick with the sleeping moth attached?”

                “No, the- wait, there’s a moth?” Peter casually scribbled at his considerably more boring stick, wondering if he could convincingly re-render it into the one that housed an inverted creature, its brown paper wings folded neatly against its ribbed back. It was going to be a hard sell.

                “Ah, Peter?”

                “Yeah?”

                “Could- um, I feel bad to ask, but…”

                “What?”

                “I need to take a break to the restroom,” Alita admitted, with the same kind of unearned dejectedness that Calvin had used outside. It always made Peter laugh a little on the inside when people appeared to take deep personal responsibility for the obstacles imposed by his size. “Do you want me to take you back outside, to be nearer to the others? Like Calvin?”

                “Nah,” he shrugged. “Do you… think you’ll be gone long?”

                “I shouldn’t, no,” she promised. She rose from her chair and set her sketchpad down on the plastic seat, taking a step closer to the window. Her fingers curled a few inches to Peter’s right, her long nails clicking quietly on the sill. “Are you sure you’re all right alone?”

                “Sure. Take an early lunch break if you want, too,” Peter reassured with a casual snort. He patted one of her fingernails, then froze. At last he’d spied the correct branch to shade so he could re-shape the whole thing into the one with the moth napping beneath.

                “Good, good,” she answered as made her way down the carpeted tunnel at a power-walk speed, clearly eager to come back as soon as possible.

                Peter cocked his head to the side, not quite making out the angle of the stick under a patch of velvet-lined leaves. This was another major downfall of being his size, among a list of other points that could’ve stretched to his house and back. He clambered from one end of the window sill to the other, adding a new swipe of his pencil tip every few seconds, only to find his perception changing from each new angle through the glass. Typical.

                Still, the moth was easily rendered. It even had the good manners to remain still, so near to the window, the dark ovals edging its wings making an interesting challenge for the boy as he kept his hand steady, arcing across the page to perfect the curve of its back legs. It looked large enough to Peter that he imagined he could’ve petted it in a similar manner to the way children could pet housecats.

                Its antennae twitched.

                “You’ll never believe what I found.” The whisper steamed like boiling liquid against the back of Peter’s neck. His grip on the lead tip shuddered, scraping a line clear through the moth’s head. His subconscious recognized the owner of the voice before even he did.

                “Hi, Mandy,” he managed civilly, turning on his haunches to face the girl.

                She silently balked at him from above, clearly with no intention to lean over or sit to even the level of their eyes. As ever, her light brown hair was twisted back into a ponytail, just a little frizzier than normal. Those hazel eyes of hers were shading a little grayer today, though Peter couldn’t be sure if that wasn’t just the cluttered shadow of the window-high bush blotting the light on her face.

                “I asked you a question, little guy,” Mandy informed him. “Did you hear me ask it, in your little ears?”

                “I did,” he coughed. With Alita possibly still a few minutes away, it made much more sense to play nice. He placed his sketch pad at his size, folding his hands into his lap. “What did you find?”

                “You have to guess it first,” she said, the ends of her words wandering off as if she remembered half of a dream after finishing a sentence. Her gaze, though, stayed trained with mechanical precision on the boy.

                “Oh. Um, sure. I can guess. Uh… acorn?”

                “Why would I tell you you’ll never believe it if it’s an acorn?” Mandy drawled, raising an eyebrow. She twirled the ends of her hair in her fingers, while her opposite hand fumbled with a much more ragged sketch pad. Paper shreddings fluttered like snowflakes down to her well-worn sneakers below.

                “Good point,” he remarked calmly. “It could’ve been a… really weird acorn, though, I bet.”

                “No,” she said. “It couldn’t.”

                “Right. Uh, how about… a… deer?”

                “Deer don’t live around here. I’ve walked around a lot of the woods by the school and never saw one. And I don’t live far away,” she explained. “If I did, I would try to catch it.”

                Unsure whether or not the girl was kidding, as her tone remained unerringly rigid, Peter cleared his throat again and soldiered on. “Okay, okay, so it’s not a deer or a weird acorn. How about an owl?”

                “No. You must not have a super-big imagination. But I guess that makes sense,” Mandy offered. “Nothing else on you is super-big.”

                She thumbed at her chin in feigned preponderance while still continuing to play with her ponytail. Her eyes rolled stealthily toward the ceiling but almost instantly snapped back to the five-inch boy seated so helplessly on the window sill before her like a sacrificial offering, with precious little in the way of detour options.

                “Ha-ha, yeah. I guess it’s a-”

                “No more guessing, little guy. You only get three guesses.”

                “Oh. You just didn’t mention that it was only thr-”

                “Everyone knows it’s just three guesses you get,” she snapped again. She shuffled the sketchpad under her arm. “Or, at least, everyone I know who’s normal knows it’s just three.”

                “Ah.” Like usual in Mandy’s presence, he’d run dry on words. He hoped Alita hadn’t stopped to talk to any friends.

                “I’ll just show you what I found out there in the woods,” Mandy said. She turned a page in her book and propped it onto the edge of the sill, displaying the intricately penciled image in all its glory.

                Peter was dumbstruck.

                Dry on words, sure, but now dry on mental processing as well. He’d been thrown for plenty of loops in his life, of course, many of them during these first three weeks of school, and some of those under this creepy young woman’s watchful glare. But this thing he was staring at now on Mandy’s paper was special. It was in a class of its own. It truly did defy all description, except one.

                And that description was: a nude drawing of Peter.

                There was no mistaking it. Mandy was clearly talented at something besides making his blood run in clumps. Unfortunately, that talent was apparently life drawings. His features were all intact: the work of a master study. The face was fearful, even submissive. His bare arms, legs, hands, even his hair were all there like reality. And of course, there was the matter of his sketched penis, flopped against the penciled thigh. Eerily correct. In fact, the entire image appeared to be in practically one-to-one scale.

                It was like staring into a mirror. An incredibly unsettling mirror, wherein he was stripped naked, laid on a bed of leaves, and positively terrified of whatever he was looking at, but a mirror nonetheless.

                “Is that… is that…” Peter stammered, extending a pathetically trembling finger at the remarkably accurate picture. “Is that... m-m-”

                “Do you like it?” Mandy questioned under her breath. She grinned using every tooth in her skull, savoring the expression of utter loss on the tiny face before her. “I’ve been working on it for a couple weeks. I thought I could use it for my assignment. I’m really proud of it.”

                “I don’t t-think that’s a… n-nature picture,” Peter wheezed. The girl had left him empty of oxygen and she didn’t even need to lay a finger on him. Amy could take lessons. On second thought, hopefully not.

                “Yes it is, little guy,” she corrected with a chuckle, as though setting a foolish toddler straight on the finer points of human speech. “I saw him in the forest. It’s a fairy.”

                “I’m n-not sure Mr. G-Garrison will be… um, s-supportive of… I mean, he won’t t-think it’s real or…” Talking was getting harder for Peter by the second. Mandy still had the sketch pad propped up against the window sill, blocking the boy’s view of the hallway. He had to look at it. Even when he tilted his head away toward the glass, the reflection of the artistic horror met his gaze.

                “It doesn’t matter what the dumb teacher thinks,” Mandy said. “I know what I saw, and this is it.”

                “O-Oh.”

                She brought her thumb to her mouth and licked softly at the corner of her nail, then brought it down to the page. Her moistened fingertip widened a crisp line that formed sketch-Peter’s hairline, then remained, stroking back and forth along the top of the boy’s drawn head. Next it traced down, making a zigzag along his chest. Her finger paused over the stomach, then flicked at the paper directly over the pencil render of Peter’s crotch. Unable to help it, he flinched for real at this final move, and watched Mandy’s eyes light up at his reaction.

                “And I’ll tell you something else,” she said, letting a heavy sigh release from her lips. “I’m going to find this exact fairy again. I’m going to take him home. And then I’ll have a new pet.”

                Bile trickled in Peter’s throat.

                Why. Why him? Why her? Why ANY of it. Why was whoever-was-up-there so determined to make him scream at the silent heavens?

                “Hey, Peter!” Alita called from down the hallway as she dashed with the same stride back to the window. She narrowed her eyes at Mandy, who quickly dropped another fresh page over the visage of the stripped Peter, hiding it away. “How’s it going?”

                “Going… it’s going,” Peter sputtered. He was too weak now to get out the word “good.” Not that it would have been truthful.

                “Mandy?” Alita accused. “What are you doing over here?”

                “Nothing. I was just showing the little guy some drawings I did. Since we’re in art class.”

                “Uh-huh. Come on, you know the teacher says you guys shouldn’t be near each other after the things that happened. Go back outside, okay?”

                “I don’t have to do anything because you tell me to,” Mandy spat, letting loose a snarl on the final words that she instantly quelled again to her usual stone demeanor. She flipped her ponytail back over her shoulder and nibbled the corner of her thumbnail again. A glance was fired over to Peter. “But I am going back outside. There’s… things I need to look for.”

                Peter forced himself to look down at his lap as he listened to Mandy’s purposeful footfalls thump back down the hall toward the courtyard door. He plucked his sketchpad up and gripped it in powder-white knuckles.

                “What was that about?” Alita murmured as she took her seat again.

                “Nothing,” the tiny freshman said. He picked up his pencil tip again and made an effort to grant the picture of the moth its second wing, but he gave up within a few seconds, letting the leaden point roll away along the window sill.

                His hands were shaking too hard.

Peter sat-crossed by his older sister’s left knuckle as it perched on the edge of her plastic lunch tray. Holding a halved cherry tomato like a bowl, he dug through its sour contents with the tip of a disposable fork Erica had snapped off for him to use, combing past the seeds and juice.

                He wondered if he should tell her. How he should tell her. His sister insisted on him divulging potential problems, hadn’t she? That penciled etching of his nude form in Mandy’s sketchbook was still fresh in his mind from last period, as if he’d touched a stovetop while it was still hot and left his fingers singed. He couldn’t make a move without recalling it.

                For the first half of lunch, his sibling’s cadre of cooing matchmakers had leaned across the table, oohing and ahhing at his half-hearted explanation of last Friday’s game night with Lisa, eventually leading to another family date tonight, this time at Lisa’s house. They’d offered a few tips for first-time parent-meeting, but Peter’s mind clearly wasn’t on them, which was generally hard to accomplish given how close they normally crowded around him. Eventually they’d left him alone to chatter about matters more their size and speed, leaving Peter to prod at the fruit he’d plucked from Erica’s salad.

                “Hey, Peter?” Lena whispered gently from her seat to Erica’s left. She leaned in nearer to the table, brushing the dark locks out of her eyes. “You okay?”

                “Uh-huh,” he mumbled. He bobbed his head more times than necessary.

                “Rough day so far?”

                “Yeah, maybe a little, or… I don’t know. Just lots of… work.”

                “Ahh, I see,” she said. He couldn’t tell if he’d convinced her. “You’ll get the hang of it. I’m sure.”

                “Thanks,” he gulped, knowing full well that this particular problem wasn’t going to be solved with all the arithmetic in the world.

                Erica’s ring finger nudged into her brother’s thigh. She speared another mouthful of salad with her opposite hand and held the dressing-drenched leaves aloft, looking down at him with eyebrows cast up.

                Of course she didn’t buy it as easily as Lena.

                “What’s up?” he said brightly, attempting to steer her thoughts in another direction than suspicion.

                “You haven’t eaten a single bite of that, twerp,” she commented dryly as she placed the salad bite atop her tongue.

                “Yeah, yeah, I, um… maybe I’m just not-”

                “You can put it back on the plate if you want,” she said, prodding the tines of her fork at the squishy rim of her brother’s rejected meal.

                “Fine by me,” he said. He pressed upward on the base of the vegetative bowl, jamming the cherry tomato into the spears of his sister’s towering utensil. Abruptly she pulled it away and nibbled it over her teeth until its rubbery flesh was punctured with a squelch. She shrugged.

                “You want something else?” Lena ask. She picked up her spoon and began rummaging through the half-eaten array of her lunch. “I’ve got… half a tuna fish sandwich left… couple carrot sticks… peanut butter… hard-boiled egg… what do you think, anything sound good?”

                “I think I’m all right. Thanks, though,” he said with a wave of his hand.

                “Okay,” she sighed. Peering over the room, she made eye contact with another friend and excused herself quietly, placing her napkin over the tray and leaving Peter and Erica alone at their end of the cafeteria table.

                “You’re gonna wish you ate something when you’re in P.E.” Erica placed her fork back in the salad and rested both hands on either side of her tray. “I mean, probably. Do they even, like… make you do anything in there?”

                “Sometimes,” Peter said. “I wish they did more.”

                “I don’t,” Erica said.

                “Aw, gee,” the boy smarmed. “I didn’t think you ca-”

                “I don’t care. But if you twist an ankle kicking a marble or whatever it is she has you do in there, then guess who Mom’s gonna make carry you everywhere for the next month?”

                “I don’t think you’d have to worry about that,” Peter said drearily. “I’m sure you’d have help from-”

                “Right,” Erica grunted, not even needing to hear Jessica’s name. She rolled her eyes and rested her chin on an upturned fist. “Just when I think you’re the one who wins the award for annoying me the most, she goes and takes it away.”

                “Sorry to disappoint.” Peter sat up from the tray and ambled between his sister’s milk carton and a cup of peach slices. He peeked into the syrupy river around the golden fruit, spying his distorted reflection.

                “Whatever,” Erica mumbled.

                “Seriously, do you… know what I should do about her?” Peter questioned, finding himself slowly but surely encircling the real issue of the day that went far beyond his sister’s overprotectiveness and more into the territory of the possible improperly medicated young artist in his class with a penchant for the bare human form.

                “Uh… you’re asking me? I thought she gave you too much attention before.”

                “I figured,” Peter chuckled. Maybe he didn’t have to ask about Mandy at all; maybe there was a shortcut somewhere here where no one got hurt or was any the wiser. “But, I mean…  what do you think I’m supposed to do? To… you know… make her stop thinking about me like I’m helpless and stuff. To just go back to normal?”

                “Oh, that’s easy,” Erica said brightly. She forked another clump of lettuce. “Go back in time and don’t let her weird dancer friend stand on you in her sock like a weirdo creep. Problem solved.”

                Peter couldn’t help but grin at his sister’s brand of bedside tact.

                “I’m serious,” he said. Taking a last lap between the giant amenities on Erica’s lunch tray, he made his way back to the edge where her idle hand still rested in a soft fist.

                The seventeen-year-old rolled her eyes again at the doll-sized complainer beside her plate.

                “I don’t know! It’s Jessica. You’re gonna need to give her electroshock, probably,” Erica said. She twirled the lettuce-flowered fork against her lips, but didn’t open them to take a bite. Her opposite hand, still poised at the edge of the tray, drummed on the plastic cusp. “C’mon. What’s the deal? What are you bugging about?”

                “Huh?”

                “We’ve gone over this before. I know that dumb nerd look on your face when you’re worried about something. And I know you’re not really asking me what to do about Jessica. You and I both know you’d know how to handle her better than me, even if she can’t just pick me up like she can with you.”

                Busted.

                “It really is!” Peter defended. He forcefully perked up, standing at attention beside his sister’s hand. “I’m tired now, too, since she doesn’t like me sleeping on top of my pillow anymore in case I roll off and die in my sleep. There’s nothing else.”

                “Uh-huh. Look me in the eye and say that,” Erica demanded sarcastically. Her hand rose from the tray, palm turned into Peter’s back, and tipped him in the direction of her broadened iris.

                “There’s nothing else.” He didn’t blink.

                “Right. As if you’d win a single round of poker with that face.” Clearly unconvinced, the girl’s hand still disappeared from its place against Peter’s back. The salad lump disappeared between her lips and was shredded to bits within seconds as she glowered at him with her usual blend of disdain and affectionate tolerance for his presence.

                “Like you know how to play cards,” the boy snickered, turning his back just far enough to let his sister think it was safe to crack half a smile.

                He knew very well he wasn’t off the hook for long. It was just too bad Erica’s time travel advice couldn’t work on Mandy, either, because he knew that would make a far more valuable fourth-dimension mission.

                “…and I think we’ll call that last equation a wrap,” Ms. Tritter announced with that winsomely gleaming smile of hers. Crossing a four, she let the chalk stub land in the metal aisle beneath the blackboard and clapped the dust away from her palms as she looked out over the class. She squinted at the clock. “What’ve we got, eight minutes to the bell? Go ahead and go early. Get your books, talk to your friends in the hallways about math… you know, the normal thing.”

                A muted whoop broke out over the room as the students dumped their belongings into gaping backpacks and slung them over shoulders in one move. In almost no time flat, every chair was empty. Getting to leave early was a treat not often granted.

                Unfortunately, it was one Peter didn’t see himself quite getting to enjoy as he watched his monumental peers filing past his island of a desk. He smiled to himself, tapping the pencil tip against the heel of his hand as the low roar of gossip exited the room along with the rest of the students.

                “Sorry you can’t take advantage of the extra minutes off,” Ms. Tritter called to Peter with genuine jovial remorse as she hunched over her desk at the front of the room, sliding papers into folders. “But I’d be glad to give you a ride to English ahead of time if you’d like?”

                “That’s… all right,” Peter coughed. It seemed logical to minimize the time spent in a room with Sharon directly behind him, probably actively scheming on his very existence. “Thanks, though.”

                “Just wanna hang out for a minute, then?”

                “Sure.”

                “Okay.” She flashed him another warm smile and tossed her blonde curls as she crossed the room with a spring in her step.

                Peter nodded to himself, turning the page of his algebra notebook in his lap, and released a weary huff. The pencil tip was worn nearly to a graphite club, hardly useful now for sketching legible type. It was all right for his math notes, but if he had to write out anything for class later to be turned, he’d have to let his mother scan it onto the computer for submission, and his teachers would be forced to decipher the clunky scrawl of letters that smeared into one another like silver paint.

                He let the pencil guide his hand. A few strokes and he had a face, circular and distant like a dropped coin in the center of the page. Next came the hair, rough as it was, then the shirt, extending down toward the base, giving way to legs, then the ends of the dangling arms: hands, fingers extended, reaching, growing larger.

                Peter’s throat turned inside out and stretched up past his gullet as he realized he’d drawn a shadowy specter of a girl, standing above, only becoming indistinct the closer he came to her face. It wasn’t on purpose. All he was doing was sketching a human form, thankfully clothed, but nonetheless above him. He’d drawn countless pictures in his life, especially in his youth, always of a perfectly proportioned body that suggested his perception of humanity was no different, even if he had to look every man, woman, and child straight in the ankle.

                At once he became aware of his stunning bombshell of a math instructor towering above in her form-fitting black sweater, sliding backwards into the chair just in front of his table so she could face him. That cheerful glint in her eyes carried through even past the thick rim of her glasses, the sheen of her hair and the flash of her white teeth in contest with one another. Softly she inched forward, leaning her chin in nearer to the desk until her lowest murmur could be heard by the tiny student.

                In a mad flurry, Peter ruffled through several more pages of the notebook, accidentally tearing a couple in half. He was just a little more than absolutely positive that she’d gotten a look at the picture hew drew.

                Perfect.

                “Let me guess,” she said sweetly, her voice dipping even lower on the off-chance of prying ears through the wall. There wasn’t a trace of malice or pretention in her honeyed syllables. “Girl troubles?”

                Peter’s lip hung open just wide enough to look conspicuous. He gazed up at his teacher’s pretty bespectacled countenance, feeling an unavoidable and incriminating crease forming in his forehead.

                She wasn’t wrong, exactly.

                “I don’t mean to sound like I’m trying to embarrass you. I’m sure that’s the exact last thing you want to hear one of your teachers bring up,” Ms. Tritter snickered, hiding her face behind a hand as she ran her fingers into the wild mane of her hair.

                “No, it’s okay,” Peter sighed. He felt his cheeks burning. “I’m just, um… having a weird day.”

                “Oh?”

                “Yeah,” he said. Was he really about to spit this out? “She… this girl, I mean, that I know… she may have… drawn a picture… of me.”

                “Oh!” his teacher repeated, this time with the proper upward inflection. Immediately her entire face was infused with sunshine. She crossed her hands together on the edge of Peter’s desk, folding her elegant fingers one over the other. Subconsciously, Peter’s baser instinct couldn’t help but force him to notice a lack of a ring on her fourth digit, which only made him blush all the more.

                “Y-Yeah,” he muttered at last, recomposing. He forced himself to make eye contact. “Isn’t that something?”

                “Well, I’ll say it is. I think that’s a sign that she really cares about you. She must think about you a lot,” Ms. Tritter offered.

                God, I hope not, Peter’s skull echoed silently.

                “What’s her name?” the woman questioned, immediately winking. “Just kidding, of course. I wouldn’t try to get you to tell me anything like that. You know that, right?”

                “Ha-ha. I know,” he mumbled wryly. “I don’t mind, really.” Frankly, he was the opposite of embarrassed to let her know about Lisa. Who wouldn’t want to hear about Lisa? The girl was an angel.

                The girl who’d drawn that picture, though, was a much different story. He doubted anyone really wanted to hear about Mandy, except maybe a hypothetically very in-debt psychoanalyst.

                “Anyway, I can tell you have a lot on your mind and you don’t really feel like sharing your whole personal life details with some random lady who teaches you fractions,” Ms. Tritter continued. She opened her hands again, unclasping her fingers as she held them gently out in Peter’s direction. “I just want you to know, if you ever run into a situation… about anything… girls, grades, whatever… where you could just use a pair of ears to bend, I’ve got your back. Do kids still say that? That they’ve got each other’s back?”

                “Yeah,” Peter said, managing a real smile in the midst of his Mandy-flavored turmoil. “I’m pretty sure they do say that.” He stepped up as the bell rang. His teacher’s expansive, creamy palms stretched forward happily to receive him into their soothing grasp.

                Peter was feverishly mouthing the words to one of his Tom Thumb tongue-twisting lines he’d been continually botching at practice when Erica’s car finally squealed to a halt.

                Puzzled, the boy craned his neck to get a peek out the vehicle window above, past the bounds of his specialized car seat. Even if he was preoccupied with the directional tidbits and notes given to him by Mrs. Parks at play practice, he knew the way home from the school very well by now. It was too soon.

                “Uh, Erica?” he said, raising his voice high enough to be heard over the blare of her punk rock radio channel. Maybe she’d stopped for another milkshake like a couple weeks back? If the previous outing was anything to go by, though, he’d already decided he would stay in the car.

                Without speaking , Erica exited her driver’s side door and soon was looming above Peter in his safety box. Her face, as was so often the case, was rigid and unreadable, her lips pursed and eyes narrowed.

                “C’mon,” she said, snapping off his multiple buckles with a pinch of her fingers. She cupped her palm into the base of the container, allowing her brother to load up. “We’ve got stuff to do.”

                Peter propped himself up in his sister’s hand. He gazed out into the green distance far beyond where Erica had parked on the gravel ground. It looked like he’d guessed right. They’d diverted somewhere along the longest stretch of road between neighborhoods, instead turning down a lane that led to one of the district’s larger reservoirs. Down a hill past a protective wire fence, the blue-gray surface of the water was continually churned by artificial jets beneath the lapping meniscus. The whole misting expanse of it stretched past the boy’s sight, even when he squinted and leaned as far forward in his sister’s palm as her fingers would allow him. Froth sifted down against the grassy banks by the clump.

                “Uhh, it’s a nice place, Erica,” he said with lingering uncertainty. He looked up at her face, greeted with the same stoicism as before, and returned his attention to the striking landscape with a shrug. “Not that I don’t appreciate some nature, obviously. It’s really cool out here, don’t’ get me wrong. It’s just that, y’know, but you never seemed the type to-”

                “Do you have to talk, like, every minute?” Erica cut in, gently, but with enough barbed snark to be effective. Shutting the car door, she wandered off the makeshift parking space and into the greenery, the blades of grass rising halfway up her denim-clad calves. Her hand arched higher and nearer to her shoulder, giving Peter a better view of the open space.

                “Sorry,” he hummed at length. He padded his hands overtop his sister’s oversized fingertips, testing the grooves in her warm digits against his own decidedly much smaller skin patterns.

                All the while, Erica descended the loping decline in the earth, planting her sneakers with delicate self-assuredness into the dirt. Her fingers formed a higher barrier around her brother, who gladly sunk into his sibling’s palm and waited patiently for her purpose, ensuring not to fidget too much, as per her usual preference.

                At last, when it seemed the ground was just starting to level off again before it dipped down into the water just a stone’s throw yonder, the seventeen-year-old gently cupped her five-inch charge against her shoulder, allowing him the added support of a few strands of hair as she lowered down to her haunches and took a staggered seat on the grassy slope.

                “Well, this is nice. Are we having a picnic lunch?” Peter couldn’t help himself. It was just too strange to find himself in a situation where his sister not only was willingly increasing their one-on-one time after an entire school day of ferrying him between classes, but doing it in such peaceful surroundings, without a single solitary stranger to eye him like a handheld pet. Really, he couldn’t have asked for better circumstances with his long-estranged elder sister.

                Truth be told, it was nice having somewhere to relax after the decidedly harrowing encounter in his art class. After all, today was the wrong day to be looking harried. He was expected at Lisa’s house in just over an hour and a half, to have dinner with her and her parents, and presumably hear her toot out a few notes on her clarinet. It was his third date with this dream of a girl he’d managed to befriend and maybe something else, despite the natural flow of the universe, and he was determined to look as calm as he could. The manufactured babble of the water spouts over the reservoir were a big help, if he was honest with himself. Still, that made it all the clearer that Erica deserved a good ribbing.

                “I’m not kidding, sis, you picked the perfect spot. It’s so romantic.” Carrying on like this was inevitable, even with Erica’s earlier call for reduced chatter. It was too perfect of a target for jokes. “So… don’t keep me waiting… where’s my ring? You gonna propose to me, or what?”

                In a flash, the goodwill and humor was clamped from Peter’s body, along with most of his air.

                Erica’s opposite hand, resting by her side moments before, swooped in from above and pinned Peter into the palm in which he was sitting. No sooner had she compressed him between skin and skin, then her fingers were massaging his limbs roughly into a spread-eagle position, where her chest could be more effectively pumped down. It took no more than a few seconds to have Peter helpless, flat and mildly panicked as a human pancake between his older sister’s powerful hands.

                What was she doing? He wheezed, kicking his feet and swinging his arms for all he was worth in every direction. Occasionally he felt his shoe clip against Erica’s broad thumb, but it did nothing. No change was wrought. She had him mashed between her palms, as if she was kneading dough. It was all pressure, all around his body. In the thrashing fray, through gritted teeth Peter chanced a look up at Erica’s face above.

                No emotion, nothing. She was just staring out across the water like she had a moment before.

                “Stop!” he finally found reason to pant. “Erica, stop!”

                He realized it had taken him a moment to even summon the words, because he’d never before had to request that Erica release him. Never, in his entire life, had his sister, for all her groaned rants and indifferent tendencies, done something to him that made him feel imperiled. Even Jessica, back in her younger and more reckless days, had earned an outburst or two from him as she gave him an over-zealous squeeze in her clammy fist and tried to convince him to pretty-pretty-please-with-a-cherry-on-top put on some doll clothes?

                But not Erica. Never, until now.

                “ERICA!” he squeaked fruitlessly from beneath the weight of her hand. Still, no change, not even a twitch in her face above. The only motion in the enormous teen’s body was that of her expertly fastened palms, continually rotating and heaving down against Peter’s ribcage. He was beginning to feel queasy, and not just from fear in the face of this unprecedented event. Erica’s wrists were bobbing now, almost in time to the song she’d been playing in the car, with a pounding pulse that fired Peter’s heartbeat into overdrive. Before long, he wasn’t even positive if he was hanging upside down or not between his sister’s hands.

                And God, she was strong. Her flesh became like leather, her muscle like iron. He’d never thought to consider it before. But she was, even if she had relatively thin arms for someone of her age. With a body as fragile as his, in her hands, she was an amazon. An un-doer. Her tanned skin flushed a deeper shade as she laid down more pressure on the sandwich formed by her palms and her hapless, sputtering brother. He could just make out a vein popping in her neck.

                “Erica, let me GO!” he growled, emboldened like he hadn’t been before. Wrapping his hands roughly around the curve of his sister’s wrist, he set his lips down against her skin and chewed. It was hard to get a grip at first, but with some effort he managed to square his jaws and sink his teeth a few micrometers down into the meat of his sister’s hand.

                Almost immediately the battle for air was drawn to a close. Erica’s upper hand flinched and parted, leaving the boy panting in her grasp. Once again, her fingers formed the familiar safety barrier around him, ironic as it was. Peter laid on his back, quivering from shock and adrenaline, but more-so the second one than when his sister first entrapped him between her hands.

                “Not bad,” Erica said at last. Her voice was cool and collected. She drew her palm up closer to her face, studying her brother and the definite red mark he’d made in her hand. “You took longer than I hoped, but not bad.”

                He coughed, his dry throat stinging for water, until at last he could form the words.

                “What the hell?” Peter croaked. He stared, unblinking and disbelieving into Erica’s unaffected countenance. “What WAS THAT?”

                “I told you.”

                “Told me what?”
                “Told you we were going to practice.”

                It was coming back now. The initial blind rage was receding now, replaced instead with a more logical rage directed at her methods. She had, indeed, promised him that she would teach him to be prepared for the next time he was in unwanted hands and unable to get immediate normal-sized-human support. Somehow, though, he’d imagined there would be a little more basic martial arts training and a little less oxygen deprivation.

                “Look, I know you’re probably pissed… and that’s fine… I don’t really give a crap either way. But you do have to know how to do this, whether you like it or not,” Erica explained in the same eerie rationale, though now the stillness of her form and voice at least wasn’t chilling Peter’s spine in quite the same way. “Because you know Mom and Jessica aren’t going to teach you.”

                “That… that really hurt,” he mumbled bitterly. It was all he could manage.

                “Oh, did it?” she simpered. Her lips pursed. “Good.”

                Peter shuddered and bowed his head. Mean as her response was, he did wish he’d sounded just a touch less like a wimp.

                “Cuz you know what?” she continued, her voice slithering to a hushed crawl. “If something ever happens to you? And me or Mom or Jessica or your super-cool girlfriend isn’t there to do something about it? This is what it might be like. This is what you’re gonna have to be able to do.”

                Peter gnawed his lower lip.

                “Look, I don’t care if you actually tell me what your deal was today, but don’t treat me like I’m stupid. And whoever it is, for them, you’re… really easy to take advantage of. Like, really easy. Nobody likes saying it to you, and you don’t like admitting it, but you are,” she said, taking a deep and bracing breath that to Peter’s ears actually bordered on emotional. A lump was gulped down in her still-veined throat. “But you’re also not a god-damned damsel in distress, either. I know you’re not.”

                “How do you know?”

                “Cuz you’re my brother, you stupid little twerp, and nobody in my family lets people push them around.”

                The boy slumped against his sister’s fingers. His nerve was rebuilding, stitch by stitch.

                “Plus… and I also don’t care if what I just did makes you not wanna talk to me for… like, ever, but I will seriously eat off my own leg before I let Mom make me responsible for you getting grabbed up someday when no one was around. You got it?” she grumbled with that reassuring hint of resilient affection.  “I know you’ve got your cute meet-the-parents dinner in a while, so if you’re -”

                “It’s Mandy,” the boy sighed. “The girl we saw in the band hallway the first day.”

                “What about her?”

                “I think there might be… something wrong with her. Like, her brain. The way she acts around me, I, um...” he continued. “…I don’t really know.”

                “Try.”

                “She dunked me in water because I told her I’d help her paint. She keeps just… showing up, like… when Lisa and I were at the theater. And then… today… um, in art again, she…” he said. It felt like releasing a balloon inside his lungs. “…she drew a… a picture of me, without… without…”

                Unable to get himself to utter the necessary modifier, Peter pinched at his shirt. By the look of revulsion in his sister’s eyes and wrinkled lip, he imagined she got the picture.

                “And that’s it,” he said. “She makes me nervous and… kind of scared sometimes, and now I’m asking you… I’m asking you for help. Again.”

                Erica watched her emotionally bare sibling drop back against her fingers. A breeze lifted her bangs up, wisping them in air for just a split second above her eyes. Her lips tightened.

                “Are you going to tell Mom?” Peter asked.

                “Do you want me to?”

                “No.”

                “What if something happens?”

                “That’s why I’m asking you to help me,” he said. “To make sure it doesn’t.”

                The girl nodded, still just as anonymous as when they’d parked the car. Her thumbs swayed, her gaze redirecting out into the reservoir again.

                “I’m not your body guard. I can’t be there every minute of every day,” she said at last.

                “I’ve got… friends. People I trust at school. For when you’re not there. And… and the teachers are all-”

                “Okay, okay. I get it. We’ll keep it on the DL. For now.”

                “T-Thank you,” Peter mumbled, running his hand along his sister’s finger. She didn’t shove it away.

                “Just don’t give me another one of your “I want to feel normal” speeches, okay? You’ve had enough drama queening today,” she said, uncommon concern broaching her callous syllables. “We should probably go back to the house before Mom calls the FBI to find our dead bodies in a ditch.”

                “No,” Peter barked, more loudly than before. It was hard to say, but he could’ve sworn he heard his tiny voice carry across the watery gulf and along the banks.

                “What?”

                The freshman smiled, staggering awkwardly to his feet and lifting both fists in the air in a boxing stance.

                “Put up your dukes, you big ‘ol palooka, and help me,” he said, baring his teeth and unabashedly grinning at the sister who only a couple minutes before had clasped him to her palms and simulated squeezing the life out.

                Erica rolled her eyes at his display, leaning her had back, but Peter would’ve bet most of his miniature furniture that he saw a sly smirk cross her lips just before his world was tossed into reverse again as she answered his challenge.

                Again the long fingers slapped down on his back, mashing his face and neck into the heel of her hand. This time she didn’t even allow him the agency of a front-facing attack stance, limited as it already was. Instead she pinned him by his arms into the creased center of her palm. He was in no position to bite this time at the heavier padding of the heel, and even less position to kick, as she had his ankles shackled between the fleshy pillars of her middle and index fingers.

                As he felt the air draining from his lungs, the vertigo settling comfortably back into his swirling vision, Peter choked through the pain inflicted by his sister’s all-encompassing palms. Senses bedraggled, the boy purified his thoughts into a single point of clarity, just enough to understand the tumbling geometry of his hand-prison, and wrapped his hands around a particularly soft patch of skin in the crevice between Erica’s fingers. Nails extended, he clenched, twisting with all his might in opposite directions until that square decimeter of flesh was contorted to its raw breaking point.

                Peter actually heard the sore expulsion of breath this time from his sister as she released him from her grip, letting him tumble between her legs into the tall grass below. He landed softly in the mottled soil. Battered but victorious, the young man stumbled to his feet, staring defiantly at his sibling’s leering face above.

                “Better,” Erica said as she looked down at him in the shadow between her thighs, an undeniable hint of pride in her voice. “Twerp.”

“So, Peter do you have… a favorite subject?” Mrs. Carol asked from across her dining room table, a little louder than was probably necessary. It was clear, of the two people meeting the five-inch freshman for the first time this evening, she was the more unsure of herself. She fiddled with an earring between her fingers amidst the bob of red hair her daughter had clearly inherited with all its flaming radiance and more, smiling a hopeful smile from ear-to-ear.

                “Oh! Um, hard to say… I like learning all of it…” Peter explained from the wicker place-mat upon which he sat. He regretted his kosher-geek answer as soon as it was out of his mouth. Sagging into himself briefly, he perked back up, giving it another try as he looked over to Lisa at the place setting to his right. She gave him an encouraging glance. “…but I’d have to say biology is, definitely, my favorite subject so far.”

                Recovering, he looked back to Lisa again, flashing her a smile. With some reserved glee, he watched her pale cheeks flush pink.

                “Lisa says the same thing whenever I ask,” Mr. Carol said from the head of the table, his voice gruff enough to match his broader frame and hairy forearms as he put more of his focus into the meal rather than his daughter’s suitor. He carved through the hamburger casserole with a knife, despite its gelatinous form. “Never knew where she got it from myself. I was always more for history.”

                “It must be from my side of the family,” Mrs. Carol said with a wink to her husband, clasping her red-painted fingernails together as if in prayer. She glanced back to Peter at his makeshift place setting. “We’re a very mathematically-minded family tree.”

                “Tell that to your dad the next time we’re figuring the tip for Christmas dinner,” Mr. Carol said, shoveling another bite of food in.

                “Oh, you goof,” Mrs. Carol said with half-gritted teeth.

                “Always me,” he said. Peter was beginning to hear where Lisa’s sweet version of only gently concealed sarcasm came from: probably as a clean fusion of these two people.

                “Do you know where… it came from in your family, Peter?” Mrs. Carol questioned after a pause filled only by the clatter of utensils on plates. “Was it hereditary, or…”

                The young man peered to his right. For a pregnant moment, he saw Lisa’s green eyes flash with mortified embarrassment, her mind clearly going the same place his did, despite the woman’s intentions lying elsewhere.

                “…your enjoyment of science, of course?” Lisa’s mother added quickly, clearing her throat after no-doubt noticing her daughter’s look of humiliation.

                “Oh. Um, it’s hard to say,” Peter said. He scooted nearer to the coffee cup saucer he’d been given as a serving dish, though it still made quite the insurmountable platter. Most of his dinner had already slid into the center of the ringed plate, making it hard to reach. “My mom’s in… real estate. She’s more of an econ major, though. So there’s a few numbers there, I guess.”

                Idly, he wondered if it was desire to impress or just sheer determined idiocy that made him sound like such a lame duck in front of Lisa’s parents.

                “What about your father?” Mrs. Carol followed up next. “What sort of business is he in?”

                Peter heard Lisa’s foot thump on the carpet beneath the table, probably part-impulse and part-signal to her mother. It was too late already, though. Peter didn’t so much mind sharing the information as he did the usually-awkward silence that followed this accidental faux pas. Still, he did it anyway.

                “My, um, dad isn’t… he’s not around anymore,” the boy explained calmly. He felt his friend’s warm gaze on the side of his face, apologetic and forlorn. “He died when I was younger.”

                Lisa’s index finger found its way to his arm, crooking into the elbow.

                “Why don’t you just let the kid eat his lovely casserole, dear?” Mr. Carol asked of his wife in the same baritone as before. He spoke through a mouthful of the cheese and meat concoction. “No need for twenty questions.”

                “All right, all right, but somebody’s got to host,” Mrs. Carol laughed somewhat falsely. She returned her attention to Peter. “I’m so sorry, hon. I had no idea. I didn’t mean to bring up any kind of-”

                “No problem,” Peter insisted immediately. He felt a clump of hamburger lodge in the back of his throat. “No hard feelings. Honest. Ha-ha.”

                Stop talking for God’s sake, he commanded himself internally.

                Another minute or so followed in abject silence, which was far more uncomfortable to Peter than discussing his deceased parent. At least that might distract him from the sensation that Mr. Carol was occasionally giving him disbelieving looks from the head of the table. It was normal, of course, like most first encounters with people who had yet to witness the incredible five-inch-tall living wind-up toy with their own eyes. Peter was used to it.

                Still, the man’s droopy-eyed glances were different. To the freshman’s trained peripheral vision, the man’s studying wasn’t born out of mere shock and awe at the anomaly of Peter’s size, but rather the fact that there was a boy of any proportion whatsoever seated a few inches to the side of his daughter’s hand. And that probably made him more intimidating than anyone who’d ever laid eyes upon Peter before.

                “Peter’s going to be in the school play, Mom,” Lisa said brightly, rescuing Peter from the munching quietude. Her smile broadened. “Did I tell you that?”

                “I don’t think you did!” Mrs. Carol answered delightedly. She steepled her fingers together, eagerly leaning back in Peter’s direction of the table. “You know, I used to love being in my school’s productions. Elementary all the way up through college: every production I could try out for, I was in. Or at least the ones they let me into! Ha!”

                Peter chuckled with her. He could now also see where Lisa had inherited her occasionally dopey sense of humor, possibly as a package deal with the red hair.

                “What part’re you playing, Pete?” Mr. Carol questioned.

                “Tom Thumb!” Peter said confidently, resolving to go for broke on self-awareness. He shrugged, looking to Lisa for support. “I couldn’t play the giant, after all!”

                He and Lisa broke into immediate giggling, as did Mrs. Carol once she deigned it socially acceptable to laugh at a height-related joke at the author’s expense, though Mr. Carol remained stoic, his fork stirring through the mash of casserole and steamed vegetables.

                “Probably not, no,” he agreed coolly, rubbing at the scraggle on his chin as he eyed Peter with unreadable stone eyes.

                Lisa’s clarinet glissaded between liquid-metal notes, her fingers softly rising and falling over the black keys. Carpet ran up the length of the wall, boxing in the swelling noise, exclusively for her tiny audience. As she leaned back against the wall, she tapped a dark-green stockinged foot on the floor, keeping time.

                Peter sat safely on the rusted music stand ledge, watching her toes dance below inside the taut fabric on each four-four bounce. She had an adorable habit of scrunching the largest two digits together at the peak of each tap, and he couldn’t help but smirk as he watched. He bobbed his head, acting as a human metronome while he sat beside the elaborate piece of sheet music she’d chosen to demonstrate her musical talents. It was hard to avoid humming, too, as she transitioned easily between songs. Camptown Races was up next.

                Above the sweet tunes lilting from the bell of Lisa’s instrument, Peter could make out a mumble, indistinct and indeterminable, but oddly harsh. He pushed it from his mind, though, instead focusing on her lyrical talents and the rhythmic arch of her foot on the cool concrete floor.

                “Whew,” Lisa giggled, pulling the reed from her lips at long last. She whipped a strand of hair out of her eyes and took a well-deserved exhale.

                Peter settled into a clapping frenzy. He rocked back and forth on his metal perch, kicking his legs in the open air above the girl’s homemade studio.

                “Yeah! Encore!” he cheered.

                “Oh, stop it,” she snickered. She set the clarinet down on its pole stand beside the case and twirled her fingers through her red tresses. Her opposite hand hovered toward the music stand at a steady pace, fingertips alighting at the rim near Peter and sliding nearer to him, offering plenty of warning. Her skin sidled with a light swish across the metal path, toward her cheerful listener.

                “No,” he harrumphed defiantly. He placed his hand atop her closest fingernail where it came to rest beside his leg, giving it a self-satisfied pat. “I will not.”

                “Is that so?” she said with a grin, her eyebrow tipping up. “Maybe I should play you something else, then.”

                “Do you take requests?”

                “Depends if there are any cuss words in it.”

                “I didn’t think that would matter to a clarinetist. Since there’s no, like-”

                “-words? That’s what you think,” she whispered cheekily. She leaned in closer to the stand, her warm breath steaming against Peter’s ankles. Her fingertip accepted the grip of his hand, lifting up and setting comfortably atop his knee. A smile curved into her lips.

                “That’s what I know!” Peter retorted, matching her oddball charm. Most of his energy at this particular moment, though, was being spent on not staring directly at the beautiful finger currently draped over his leg. It also seemed important to not pop an immediate and obvious boner, which the fifteen-year-old found difficult even if the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen in his life wasn’t touching his leg.

                “THAT’S WHAT I’M SAYING!”

                The voice Peter had detected earlier through Lisa’s music came again, muffled by the carpeted walls and plywood barriers, but it had returned, much clearer than before. It was Mr. Carol, without a doubt, just a floor above and maybe a room over. He didn’t sound happy.

                Lisa, having become fully engaged in the playful spirit of inching closer and closer to Peter by the second, halted, her green eyes pinpointing the general location of her parents in the geometry of the house. She frowned.

                “You can, um… start playing again if you want?” Peter offered quickly, in case she wanted an out.

                “Y-Yeah. Yeah, I can… play something else,” Lisa said slowly, though her gaze was still locked to the ceiling. Luckily for her date, her soft porcelain finger had remained above his narrow leg. Hoping to redirect her attention, he began stroking her knuckle.

                “What are you saying?” Mrs. Carol joined in, her voice just as distorted through the floor, but by the pounding footsteps, it seemed the disagreement had migrated rooms, and words were no longer clipped off.

                “Just that our daughter thinks she’s… our fifteen-year-old daughter thinks she’s going out with… with a-”

                “Stop it.”

                Peter watched Lisa’s eyes expand to the size of the coffee saucer. Her lower lip puffed ever so slightly.

                “One of us should look at this rationally, that’s all I’m saying,” Mr. Carol continued. “Eighth grade was a nightmare for her, you know? I’m just trying to make sure it isn’t repeated.”

                “It won’t be. Can’t you see she’s got a friend now?”

                “Sure, one, who probably can’t find any others-”

                “-don’t talk like that. He’s a nice boy.”

                “I’m not saying he’s not. But you know the kind of attention a person like that must get? Is going to get for the rest of his life?”

                “Oh, so you’re trying to marry your daughter off now?” Mrs. Carol retorted.

                The basement was silent as a mausoleum as the disconcerting sounds seeped through the walls like gaseous poison. Lisa’s fingers slid absentmindedly off the music stand as though she’d lost her grip, hand dangling limply by the wrist.

                Peter, feeling like he’d tried to dry-swallow a pill capsule made for a normal-sized individual, reached out in the newfound void. Though her eyes remained trained on the ceiling, unblinking and now watering from the effort, Lisa cupped her palm below the stand for Peter. He happily obliged, hopping into her hand and recommencing with the massaging of her gentle fingers. It didn’t seem to be helping much.

                “You didn’t hear her that day she came home in tears,” Mr. Carol said. “You know, after that one what’s-her-name girl told her those things about this little kid?”

                “They were just trying to get to her. You heard her say it was fine.”

                “It doesn’t matter. She’s a target now, too,” Mr. Carol spat. His voice was rising. “Anyone that has a problem with a little kid like that in a regular school, or anyone that gets jealous easy? What do you think that means for Lisa?”

                “She’s not a toddler. She’s old enough to stand up for what she cares about,” Mrs. Carol countered, notching up her volume as well. “And since you’re the only one who seems bothered by-”

                “It’s not just me, and you know it,” Mr. Carol barked. “You heard her, before her first… her first “date” with this kid. She’s worried about what it could mean. About what he could mean for her life.”

                The pale flesh upon which Peter sat flushed even pearlier than usual, the blood all but drained away. Her skin was turning wintry as Lisa’s body began to palpitate for perhaps the first time while she held her five-inch charge in her hands.

                Rattling heart incarcerated in his ribcage, Peter released his shivering hold on Lisa’s thumb.

Peter didn’t think he could feel any hollower today.

                After Mandy had revealed her nude drawing of him during art class and implied she wanted to own him, things seemed to have peerlessly peaked. It really, truly didn’t seem like the day could get worse from that point, nor he himself any emptier. That moment, after all, challenged his very grasp of himself as an autonomous entity and a living thing.

                Then there was this.

                The tiny teen crimped into himself in the cooled center of Lisa’s palm. He wanted to be smaller, so she couldn’t look at him. If only this particular size wasn’t his only party trick as a human being; if only he could shrink, too. Far tinier than this. The fact was, he’d spent most of his life silently hoping and praying to wake up at a normal height, even something still-below average. Four-foot-five. Four-foot-one. Below that, even, as long as it meant he could stand on his own.

                What a fool he’d been to feel that way. Heck, this was nothing. People could see his face when he stood in their hands. That was too much. Way too much. But if he could shrink down to an inch or even a half or a quarter inch, or maybe just to the size of a speck of grit, he could get lost beneath Lisa’s thumbnail and not have to share in the pitting embarrassment of this night.

                It was like having his every worst fear confirmed in a single shout from Lisa’s father, and yet simultaneously it made every kind of nauseous sense possible.

                Of course Lisa felt that way. Of course she was worried about the prospect of “dating” someone like him: a circus sideshow freak who’d drawn media attention and boggled eyes alike for his entire existence up to this point and, assuredly, the rest of it as well.

                Lisa still didn’t have the strength to look at him yet. Her jaw was squared to the ceiling, even while her quivering palm kept Peter secure in her fenced grasp. In seconds her entire body was quaking as well, buckling at the knees. It was a full-on internal meltdown, and Peter could feel it vibrating through his shoes. In one swoop his guardian descended toward the floor, letting her stockinged heels slide across the concrete, her head lolling against the wall.

                When at last the pair mustered the will to look one another in the eye, it was no surprise to Peter that his vision was blurred. Of course it wasn’t enough that he’d just heard that this girl he felt so many complex things for had some strong and entirely reasonable doubts about her relationship with him; no, no, he had to tear up like a pathetic petulant crybaby as well, and right in front of her, too.

                “Peter…” Lisa croaked. Those green irises were welled much deeper than those of the boy she held defensively in her hands. Her chin tilted upward in a last effort to keep the tears from toppling.

                “H-Hey, it’s… it’s okay,” Peter forced himself to say.

                “No, n-no. It’s not,” she insisted quietly, shaking her head from side to side with emphatic panic.

                “I mean it, it’s cool. I’m f-fine with it,” he said. He gulped down the incoming wave of emotional snot in his throat before it could start affecting his speech. “I mean, I’m not… I’m not totally fine, it kinda… I don’t know, I just mean… I understand.”

                “No, Peter. Please, just… just listen to me,” Lisa said. Her voice maintained a consistent hush, withholding a similar deluge. Her eyes glistened brighter with saltwater.

                “Right. Okay,” he gulped. He supposed he owed her that much, after all she’d done for him.

                “What they’re saying… what my dad just said…” she grumbled, clearly nursing a fresh grudge with her parents over their inability to argue with indoor voices. “…they don’t understand. There’s just a lot… happening now, with me and… me and you. Us.”

                “Y-Yeah.”

                “…but it doesn’t change how I feel about you. At all. Because I… I care so much about you, and…”

                “Thanks,” Peter swallowed. It was sweet of her, really, to patch things up so delicately. Almost everyone else he’d met in the past month might’ve so easily disregarded his fragile mindset, just as easily as they disregarded his right to stand where he wanted without being poked, prodded, or picked up. She had the kindness to treat him like a real person: she had from day one, and she still was, even as she tried to spare him the pain of rejection.

                She deserved no less than exactly the same treatment. No babbling or fussing, just a straight release. An opening to retreat.

                “Those things I said…” Lisa continued. “They were just when things were getting complicated at school, with those girls, and I’ve just never been really good at handling that kind of... of…”

                “I know-”

                “…but it’s different now. I know now, it’s worth it. To… be around you. It’s worth Sharon and Amy and all of them saying those things to me and… about me, in the hallways, and…”

                “Lisa, please,” Peter lurched. He laid his hand back upon the redhead’s quavering thumb, but didn’t linger there for long. “Just-”

                “What?” Her crystallizing tears were on the verge of rolling now.

                “I hate to see you having to do this. You… you don’t deserve to deal with all this crap,” Peter said. Speaking the words felt a lot like throwing up. “Maybe we should just… just not…”

                Lisa shook her head with greater speed, creating a gale force with the snap of her hair. She could read him before he even found the least painful way to get it out.

                “No,” she said. “D-Don’t. Don’t say that.”

                “Your dad’s… kind of right, though. I’m-”

                “No he’s not. None of them are.”

                “-I am different. A lot different. Being around me, being friends with me, even being... well, it changes everything,” Peter wretched. He wanted to pause, take a breath and possibly curl up and die, but he knew if he stopped speaking, he’d wouldn’t get it out, and then he’d never forgive himself. “My whole life, people have looked at me… held me… touched me, like I’m some kind of alien. Like I don’t deserve to be called a person. And maybe they’re right to. I don’t know. But I do know that it’s… it’s really hard, Lisa. I hate it sometimes… a lot of the time. And I…”

                “…what?”

                “…I don’t want that for you, too.”

                Lisa’s head-shaking slowed to a measured swivel. By now, the tears that flooded between her eyelids had trickled down her cheeks and dampened the strands of fiery hair still curtaining those mournful green eyes. Her index finger curved into her palm, stopping at Peter’s shoulder, and stroked along his cheek with such divine tenderness it rippled the goosebumps along the boy’s skin down to his toes.

                “Peter…” Lisa sobbed, her lips quivering as they bore nearer.

                Peter didn’t allow himself to think any longer. This had gone on long enough. He leaned forward, giving into the personal gravity of Lisa’s soft, warm hands, and fell face-first against the cushioned, pillowy surface of her mouth.

                Immediately the gentle flesh of the girl’s lips responded. She puckered against his face, laying at first just a quiet peck. Once he answered with his own harder kiss to ensure she could feel it, though, her lips swelled for another. Suction adhered him to the damp, strawberry-scented terrain of her mouth. They laid a halo of wetness around his jaw.

                The words and half-cracked excuses had gone out of both their throats. All that was left was the patter of lips and the sharp, surprised, faintly delighted intake of breath from Peter and Lisa. The girl’s hands cuddled in closer around the tiny legs, carrying him toward her lips like water drawn from a stream.

                As he propped himself higher in the pale palms, the boy wrapped his arms around both of Lisa’s thumbs and alternated laying smooches on her upper and lower lip, even daring to nibble softly at her skin. He heard the distant rumble of a moan from deep down inside his dream girl: a note of discovery. It was hard not to make a similar sound as he pressed his face and entire perception into the undulating center of Lisa’s lips again and opened his mouth. He felt the flick of a hot, pink tongue venture out, blessing his own lips with its careful grace.

                “Please,” Peter begged into Lisa’s now-tear-glazed cheek as he watched the red streams of her hair dance past her lips. He smudged away a tear that had rolled all the way to his neck. “I’m sorry, Lisa. Please don’t go.”

                “I won’t,” she swore in that lyrical whisper that made his heart hum along. “I’m sorry too. Peter, I…”

                “Yes?”

                Neither bothered to speak again as lips simultaneously dove for lips, Lisa seeking out the miniature pucker on the boy’s wet face, and Peter letting himself be wrapped into the warmth and safety of the girl’s hands, sure and strong beneath his weightless body.

Peter Clark was one damn lucky kid.

                That was what he’d been telling himself almost every morning for the past two months since he’d first locked lips with Lisa in her basement, their faces stained with tears amidst a heartfelt promise to stick together in the face of the numerous obstacles, but it was more than that, even.

                Every morning, as he awoke to his younger sister plucking out tiny outfit options for him from the dresser, he just rolled over and reminded himself that he was going to school. To take classes, where he was actually landing mostly A’s and B’s, with hardly more than a glare from Sharon or Mandy. To rehearse for a Grimm-a-Palooza where, tonight, he would make his high school stage debut. To see and interact with those he could call, dare he think it, friends.

                Like some kind of person.

                “Stop smiling, twerp. It’s making me more tired,” Erica groaned as she slumped back in the faux-leather bus seat, cupping her tiny brother in her palm laid atop her stomach. Her eyes fluttered half-shut as she raised her to-go mug toward her lips and slurped down another gulp of coffee.

                “Sorry. Good mood. Nothing I can do about it,” Peter shrugged, the sly grin on his lips refusing to part. He wrapped the sleeves of his jacket together around his wrists.

                “Uh-huh. We’ll see about that.”

                “Up too late?”

                “No. Just this stupid school and its eight o’clock bell.”

                “Riiight. Whatever you say,” Peter chuckled. He leaned back against his sister’s thumb, using it as an armrest, which she didn’t seem to mind. “So, are you coming to the show tonight?”

                “No,” she groused, her jaws widening for a yawn. Sleepily, she pawed at her dirty blonde locks she’d knocked askew the deeper she sunk into the seat.

                “So… tomorrow?”

                “Duh.”

                “Oh! Okay, great.”

                “You thought I wasn’t coming?”

                “Um, I kind of assumed Mom would make you go, but-”

                “It’s not just Mom, okay? I’ve been driving you back and forth for two months like you’re Miss Daisy. I’m going to be there to make sure you haven’t been just screwing around that whole time.”

                “True, true. Keep me honest,” Peter agreed. He patted his sister’s  finger.

                “Something like that,” she murmured, taking another sip from her steaming mug. “By the way, you owe me big, so just wait until after Friday night, cuz then it’ll be payday.”

                “You can have any flowers and chocolate they throw on stage for me, how about that?”

                “That’ll do. For a start.”

                “Whatever,” the boy snorted, leaning further forward in her hand as he watched her lips close around the rim of the mug again. He clambered over the rise in her wrist, stepping down onto the fabric of her top. “Can I have some?”

                “Hey, stay put,” she ordered softly, pinching the back of his shirt in her fingertips. She plucked him up, dangling him an inch above her stomach for a semi-stern address. “You heard Mom all eighty times she said it. If we turn suddenly, you’re going splat.”

                “Pssh. I’ve got it under control,” Peter joked back as he hung like a Christmas ornament from his sibling’s slender fingers. As she set him down, though, he willingly backpedaled anyway, letting her collect him back into her palm. “But can I? Please? Please? Just a drop. Please?”

                “Okay, but if you say please one more time, you’re getting nothing,” she snapped, rolling her eyes. Eyeing the safety lid of the mug and furrowing her brow, the teen finally unscrewed the top as she braced it against her chest, allowing the roasted bean aroma to waft out and into Peter’s area beneath.

                Next, keeping the mug wedged against her opposite hand, she dipped a finger into the warm joe and drew it out. The milky-brown liquid dribbled down the length of her digit and into the crevice between.

                “Hold out your hands,” she said steadily, screwing the lid back on top and hovering the coffee-dipped finger above her brother. A smirk on his face, Peter cupped both hands beneath his sister’s nearing palm and collected a couple of droplets as they descended the spire of her finger.

                He drew the pooled liquid to his chin and sucked it down before it could have a chance to seep between his fingers.

                “Ugh. God, I don’t know how you drink this,” Peter wretched, flapping his lips and wiping his coffee-stained hands on his jeaned knees.

                “Why’d you want it in the first place?” she groaned between sips.

                “I don’t know, it’s opening night! I could use a boost.”

                The bus pulled into the school parking lot, sliding into its designated space between the other transports amidst a crowd of disembarking teenagers.

                “Load up,” Erica mumbled. She looped her arm through a strap of her backpack and wrapped her fingers around her brother as she shuffled into the aisle, following after the line.

                “Hi, Peter!” The voice came from a cluster of seniors stepping down from the bus adjacent to them. He turned his head, squinting into the mass. Peter recognized the speaker as a girl named Beth who worked the stage crew. “Good luck tonight!”

                “That’s not what you’re supposed to say for theater, dummy,” a boy beside her responded. He elbowed her and gave Peter a smile. “It’s break a leg. You tell him to break a leg.”

                “Oh! Sorry!” she gasped, giggling on the end. “Break a leg, Peter!”

                “Thanks!” he called after them as Erica stepped up onto the sidewalk and joined the throng of entering students.

                “Good morning, Peter! And… Peter’s sister!” This time the gentler voice came from behind Erica’s shoulder. Peter crept over her fingers, peering as far as he could until he could make out Alita’s flowing black hair around the corner of his sister’s arm.

                “Hey, morning!” he called out as a pair of bodies slid between Erica and his art class guardian, rushing to reach their lockers ahead of time.

                “I’ll see you in three periods!” she promised before fading back into the crowd with a wave.

                “Can’t even teach people my name,” Erica grunted sarcastically.

                “It never came up,” Peter retorted back.

                “Fourth period algebra, represent!” A new greeting peeled through the clatter of anonymous voices. Peter swiveled around in his sister’s hand in time to see the face of Jason, a classmate from Tritter’s math class looming above.

                “Yeah! Um, rep… represent!” Peter said clunkily.

                Jason shook his head, his face frozen in seriousness, but quickly softened as he broke into laughter. “Nah, I’m just playing, Pete. You’re getting it. See you later for some good ol’ fashioned teacher-watching.”

                “How about I just watch you watch her,” Peter muttered, cheeks flushing at the thought of his bombshell of a teacher and secondhand confidante.

                “Whatever works, dog, whatever works. Later.” Jason, too, slipped back into the flow of students.

                As the pair turned a corner in the carpeted hallway, he caught sight of Bluebell leaning against a wall, white earbud wires hanging from her ears. Her head bobbed to the tune as her eyes locked to the floor by the bounce of her leg, clad in knee-high purple socks and birkenstocks. She looked up just in time to see Peter moving by. A slow smile crossed her lips. Her fingers waggled out of tandem in his direction, which he answered with an emphatic wave of his own.

                “Looks like somebody’s famous,” Erica said.

                “You could say that,” he laughed. “Hey, Calvin!”

                “Oh, for God’s sake…”

                “Peter! Dude, are you ready for this tonight?” the boy chirped, face lighting up at the sight of his co-star. He approached the pair, dwarfed by Erica by nearly a full head. His eyes rose briefly to her level. “Hi!”

                “Hey,” she droned, clearly disinterested in being involved. The coffee mug made its way to her mouth again for a long pull.

                “Are you kidding? I’m ready to do it right now,” Peter answered.

                “Well, let’s see it!” Calvin challenged, waving his arms like a circus ringleader. “C’mon, start up that monologue you have to give while Blue runs around in circles yelling at you.”

                “Right, like I’d spoil it for everybody ahead of time.”

                “Good thinking,” Calvin snickered. He extended his fist just above Erica’s cupped palm, which Peter smacked back with his own tiny hand right in the center of his friend’s knuckle. “Catch ya later, man, I’ve gotta get to my locker.”

                “Right on,” Peter said, nodding as the young actor folded back into the crowd.

                “Right on? Do you know how many decades ago that went out of style?” Erica remarked as they finally turned the corner into the history class hallway, sidling between bodies still unpacking their bags in front of lockers.

                “I’m bringing it back,” Peter insisted. He scanned the horizon, eyes darting between the cotton canyons formed by endless torsos ducking between one another as his sister carried him just below chest level. Arms swung, jackets dangled over shoulders, bursts of laughter and hushed whispers zinged among the chattering fray.

                As they reached the halfway point toward Mr. Browning’s classroom on the end of the pod, a pair of unknown seniors separated, and suddenly Peter’s view was granted a full ten feet ahead through the empty space and at the end, in front of a wall of unoccupied crimson lockers, was a sight he didn’t particularly want to have to see so early in the morning.

                Four girls, all standing together. The nearest was hard to make out, with her back turned, but Peter’s eyes were drawn instantly to one particular face.

                Sharon, with her snow-white arms crossed, a thigh-hugging skirt folded between her legs as they crossed over one another to maintain an easy balance. Uniquely for her, that silver-blonde hair was tied back in a pair of twin ponytails. Her lips smacked gently with what Peter assumed to be from her perpetual resources of hot, sticky cinnamon gum. Those lunar irises were, thankfully, not pointed at him, but on the face of the girl he couldn’t see. On either side of Sharon stood Amy, towering above most heads in the hall with her volleyball-star frame, and Kimmy on the opposite hand, spinning a mechanical pencil around her stubby fingers.

                The mystery girl in front of the three had her back to Peter and Erica, so her face wasn’t visible, but as she twirled a finger through the auburn mess of split ends, the miniature boy didn’t have to take many guesses before he realized it was Mandy, standing before the trio. As if their court of four possessed its own magnetic poles, students provided them all with wide berth, passing no closer than a few paces away. Just as Erica stepped parallel with the group in the hallway, Sharon’s quicksilver eyes flashed from Mandy’s face to Peter’s, her imperious gaze snagging him between the bodies.

                Peter swallowed. He couldn’t help but stare back.

                The first-to-second period rush flooded the hall outside history with its usual adolescent bluster. Peter couldn’t help but shoot a final habitual glance through the strands of Lisa’s red hair, past her shoulder, and back into Mr. Browning’s classroom. He could just make out Kimmy puffing up her lower lip in her usual protest of still not joining the exclusive list of people in the school allowed to carry Peter by hand. Aside from this, though, neither Sharon nor Amy even seemed the least bit preoccupied with firing their usual feminine death-glares after him.

                It was a pretty welcome change of pace that had developed over these past two months, really. Peter decided his ultimate and probably unattainable goal was to be virtually ignored by everyone except his friends by year’s end. Plus, he’d just reached one of his favorite parts of the day, where Lisa was actually ordained by the school board and his mother to spend a few minutes of relative privacy with him on the journey to biology.

                The girl’s thumb curled up over Peter’s lap, the pad of her finger resting comfortably on his knee. He patted the inviting digit, hugging it closer to his stomach as his petite special-case transporter began their meandering stroll.

                “Comfy?” she asked brightly. It was becoming a cute instinct of hers, Peter realized, to ask if he was content in her hand. He was fairly certain he’d never had anything but high praise to offer in response, yet she continued to check in regardless.

                “Mmm, I don’t know about that,” he sighed.

                “What?” she balked quietly.

                “I mean, your fingers don’t even have cup holders. What kind of luxury ride is this?”

                Her green eyes glowed, laughing silently.

                “And seriously? Not a single speaker anywhere on here? How am I supposed to crank the tunes?” he continued.

                “Is this how you judge when you’re buying a car, too?” Lisa answered in an equally dry tone, playing along. She turned a corner of the hallway, passing into a wider tile thoroughfare and easily navigating between the shuffling bodies while keeping absolute attention on the subject in her palm.

                “Maybe! I like to know that whatever I’m riding in is treating me like the king I am,” Peter explained. “Not that I can drive, obviously…”

                “So is my hand a car or a throne now? I’m losing track.”

                “Can’t it be both?”

                “I guess if you’re gonna make a big fuss about it, your majesty.” Lisa’s finger rose, prodding her rider in the hip and tickling his ribs as they reached a patch of hallway without any immediate audience.

                “The king will not be… addressed this way!” Peter said, finding it harder to keep up his acting as the chortles broke through his protests. He feigned fighting back against his girlfriend’s finger, instead only hugging it closer as her poking gave way to an embrace against the heel of her hand.

                “Oh yeah? Well, I’m doing a… a… what’s the word? Coup.”

                “I guess somebody’s been paying attention in history…” Peter commented, at last surrendering completely to Lisa’s cuddly fingertips, laying back in her hand as she gently pinched at his sides. Her opposite hand shielded its occupant from outside view, just in case their PG-rated PDA was misinterpreted.

                “Well, that somebody wants a good grade,” she retorted with a smirk. At last her fingers gave up on their ticklish assault, pulling back into a more conservative stance. They turned the final corner in the hallway on the way to bio. A pair of squealing juniors sprinted through past the stragglers, hardly bothering to alert passerby before shoving past, but Lisa ably ducked to the side without missing a beat.

                “Hey, I don’t have to worry about that. I have you. I’ll just copy off you during the final exam,” Peter said.

                “Oh, really? How are you going to do that from all the way on the other side of the room?”

                “Ever hear of Morse code?”

                “Yeah… why, do you know it?”

                “No, I was hoping you did so you could teach me and I can cheat off you.”

                For another moment Peter gazed up at Lisa’s bowed countenance from the cradle of her palm, and then the pair burst into fresh laughter together. The shorter of the two hugged himself back into the girl’s fingers, his chest rattling with the induced slap-happiness. The redhead tossed her hair back as she snickered, creasing her bangs out of the way of her emerald irises as she scanned the hallway’s horizon for their biology classroom a mere stone’s throw away.  Her pace deliberately slowed as she darted into an empty alcove near the janitorial closet, giving them a place of sanctuary.

                Mrs. Baker was never on time, anyway.

                “How do you feel?” she questioned softly once the miniature riot in her hand had worn off. “About tonight, I mean.”

                “Oh! Uh, pretty good, I think. You know, maybe a little… jittery, but that’s gotta be normal, right?”

                “Of course it is,” she said, smiling warmly and cocking her head. “But you seem like you’re okay in front of a crowd.”

                “I hope so. That’s what I keep telling myself, anyway. But this crowd’s going to be a lot of people. Every parent and grandparent of every last person in the cast. That’s a tough audience to crack!”

                “It’ll be okay.” Lisa’s thumb rose again, reasserting itself into Peter’s lap, where he snuggled it in close again. “Just look for me if you get nervous tonight and say the lines to me.”

                “Well, that sounds great for tonight, but what about tomorrow?” Peter snarked.

                “Oh, I’ll be there tomorrow night too.”

                “Really?” The boy felt his cheeks glow like bashful cherries.

                “Of course I will, you silly. I’d go three times if there was a third show.”

                “Right. You could probably do the play yourself by that point. It’s basically ninety-percent fairy tale puns,” Peter said, stroking the firm finger as it draped over his legs. “T-Thanks, though. It’ll… be a little easier, you know. To see you there.”

                “Anytime,” she said with a wink. Her chin descended with some of its normal adorable hesitance, but her lips quickly puckered to plant a wet one on the boy’s forehead, which also ended up mopping up most of his hair. “Sorry about that…”

                “Always come prepared,” Peter joked, scrounging into his backpack and procuring a tiny plastic comb with tines so thin they may as well have constituted normal hairs themselves.

                Lisa giggled at his triumphant display, brushed another cascading lock out of her view, and dipped in again. This time Peter reciprocated, leaning upward into the looming pink lips and smooching her back as hard as he could manage. He wrapped his tiny fingers into the cusp of her mouth, squeezing her delicate flesh as it undulated.

                Out of the corner of his eye, obscured by the flowing strands of red that hung over Lisa’s shoulder, Peter could make out a flash of movement in the entrance to the alcove, slight and sudden. Before he had a chance to finish blinking, the form was gone, but he’d seen enough to surmise it was a girl, probably just a little taller than Lisa. Not that that was a hard standard to come by.

                “I always do,” Lisa taunted in whisper, running her tongue along the inside of her cheek.

                “I guess you do,” Peter blushed. Languishing in the heat of her exhalations washing over him almost made it easy to forget they’d probably just been caught by someone. He forced his discerning glance away from the archway and back up to his significant other’s face.

                What was he worried about? It wasn’t like they were committing a crime.

                “Is something wrong?” Lisa questioned with abrupt concern in her green eyes, having detected Peter’s minimal unease immediately. Her fingers rose, swabbing along her moistened lips. “I’m sorry, I… I didn’t mean to be out of line, I should’ve asked first if you wanted t-”

                “No. No, no, no,” Peter fired back. He leaned down, laying down a line of kisses up Lisa’s thumb from her nailbed to her knuckle. “It’s nothing. I like when you do that.”

                “Okay, then,” she said with a steady nod, apparently reassured. “Noted.”

                “Maybe we should get to class, though, before th-”

                The sound of the overhead bell signaling the start of second period drowned out Peter’s voice. He stifled a laugh, crossing his arms and raising an eyebrow in his possible snidest appearance as he reclined back on Lisa’s fingers.

                “All right, Mr. Academic, whatever you say,” she said. “I mean, Mr. Academic, Your Highness.”

                “Now that’s more like it,” Peter chided. The pair serenaded themselves with lingering chuckles as they passed beneath the alcove fluorescents to rejoin the hall.

Art class was uncharacteristically soothing for Peter. Despite the unusual encounter he’d witnessed in the hallway this morning between Sharon and Mandy that couldn’t have been anything but trouble, the mildly unhinged girl at least had the good graces to essentially ignore him for the past two months. Which couldn’t be counted for nothing. Why let his paranoia ruin the day over a simple conversation? That would only mean letting them win.

                With Alita seated on his one side and Calvin just across the table, just as they’d been doing for a few weeks now, he had plenty of armor from any unwanted advances. Occasionally Bluebell even occupied the fourth seat of the table diagonal from Peter, giving him a threefold security detail as he tried to engage his creative side in peace.

                Today, though, the last stool remained empty.

                Not that the miniature freshman minded as he rubbed dust between his palms and punched both fists into the mound of beige modeling clay he’d been given at the start of class. His hands sunk with some effort into the thick muck. It was a considerably smaller portion of the damp material than either Alita or Calvin had received, but it still amounted to at least half of Peter’s body mass. Far more than enough. For the first few minutes, he’d considered modeling it into a car, but that seemed too easy, and he’d now rededicated himself to molding a moth like the one he’d seen out the window those weeks back.

                After all, with fingers as fine-tipped as his, he figured he stood a fighting chance at tracing some incredibly delicate lines into the wings of the clay creature. Mr. Jameson had insisted at the start of class that finer details would be lost to the firing oven, but Peter chose to remain optimistic that he could craft the single most impressive design to ever come out of this freshman-level art class project. It would make a fine tangible example for any of his peers with silently lingering doubts that he belonged at the table.

                “I am going to get more clay. For the snout,” Alita announced quietly to the table, giving her clay dog’s vague nose a pinch. “Do you two need any?”

                “I’m good,” Calvin mumbled, too engrossed in whatever abstract piece he’d sunken his fingers into.

                “Peter?”

                “Same,” the boy responded. “Thanks, though.”
                With a friendly nod and a whirl of her dark hair, Alita rose from her bench and made for the front table of the room where Jameson was dolling out the materials and sleepily critiquing partially completed projects.

                Amidst the raucous conversations of the room, there was a stealthy patter of shoes on the tile floor, but Peter ignored it at first. As he stooped below the steadily shaping wings of his moth, though, he watched the shadow of his clay’s hand-carved ridges tint even darker under a cast silhouette that had imposed itself conveniently between himself and the sun. A new shadow.

                Almost two months he’d gone without a conversation. At least it was nice while it lasted.

                “Hi, Mandy,” Peter said with teeth-gritting cheerfulness. He spoke up loudly enough that Calvin was shaken from his artistic stupor to pay attention to their table’s guest.

                “Hello, little guy,” the auburn-haired liability said with her usual air of scheming casualness. “I’m glad you remembered my name. It’s been a little while, hasn’t it?”

                Peter flinched as he turned around just in time to watch the girl’s right hand arcing toward the tabletop like a catapult. He sidestepped as her palm slapped hard to the clay-smeared surface a mere inch away from his tiny feet. The fingers drummed impatiently.

                “I noticed this chair was empty today,” Mandy said, indicating to Alita’s seat. “Do you mind if I-”

                “Yes…” Calvin butted in.

                “-thanks. I appreciate it.” The girl’s words droned in their tenor monotone over her Calvin’s as she slid smoothly into the place she’d taken up on the first day of school. Her hand remained flat on the table the whole time, fingers curling and dragging her nails with an unpleasant screet that went unnoticed to most ears except Peter’s.

                “You know this isn’t a good idea,” Calvin spoke up, leaning further over the table. “Mandy, why don’t you go back to your table?”

                Of course, Mandy seemed to have already genuinely forgotten that there was another person in her vicinity as her stare glued back to Peter with that usual sociopathic resolve. Eyes broad, pupils dilating, skin twitching.

                The boy could practically feel invisible tethers from her gaze attaching into his skin, keeping him in line and where she could study him from up close. Providing she managed to finish school by some miracle of bureaucratic incompetence, he imagined she would have a successful career as a hypnotist who robbed the customers blind after the procedure. Already his skin had crawled cold.

                “Hey, what’s… Mandy!” Alita was almost at a run as she returned to the table, glaring at the chair thief. “I was sitting there.”

                “Maybe, but now I’m sitting here,” Mandy explained. The logic was obviously smooth in her mind, at least. “You can sit next to Kyle.”

                “My name’s Calvin,” the normal-sized boy corrected, shaking his head. “…but it doesn’t matter. You need to go away.”

                “I’m not hurting anything, am I, little guy?” Mandy protested in her usual wandering whisper, still trained exclusively to Peter. She crossed her arms over the edge of the table and rested her cheek upon her sleeves, giving her a nearer and unsettlingly side-eyed view of the five-inch freshman. “Am I?”

                Peter sighed. She had gone a whole two months without so much as putting a hand in his same six-inch vicinity. He didn’t quite think she deserved the benefit of the doubt, but maybe this was just the required toll to keep her off his back for a while longer. It wasn’t ideal, but he also didn’t feel like a confrontation today. He still had Alit and Calvin right there, after all.

                “No, I guess not,” he said. “Will you leave me alone while you work?”
                “Whatever you want,” Mandy shrugged. Her stinging attention diverted away from him just as easily as it had anchored itself originally. Sitting up again, her hand parted from around her own clump of fingerprint-smeared clay she’d brought to the table.

                The air started to flush out of Peter’s chest, but he quickly sucked it back in. He hardly had the energy to be surprised today. In fact, if he’d been asked to take his best guess at what Mandy was making out of clay, he probably could’ve accurately guessed the truth in one go.

                It was a humanoid sculpture, of course. Mandy’s fingers stroked with uncommon gentleness along the mushy form of her art project, nudging at the creation’s arms and legs, aligning them more smoothly. The shape was certainly masculine, all six inches of it, or at least a close approximation of it, and though it was only a first attempt, he presumed that the subject wasn’t meant to be clothed as Mandy’s palms squeezed into the narrow thighs. Unlike the drawing from two months ago, this newest masterpiece from the girl wasn’t so immaculate in its detail that any layman could’ve picked it out as Peter. Still, it wasn’t difficult for the boy to look on the clay formation caged between Mandy’s hands and know it was meant to represent his naked body.

                He already regretted not putting up more of a stink when she sat down.

                Neither Alita nor Calvin seemed to notice the work of perverse art itself. Frankly, Peter was glad they hadn’t, or he was almost certain he’d fold even deeper into himself with shame. His pair of temporary body guards seemed to have even abandoned progress on their own pieces in favor of glowering continually across the table at Mandy’s face as she happily etched eyeballs into the clay figure with her fingernails.

                Uneasy at these particularly uncouth surroundings made him, Peter’s hands sagged back into the meager pile of clay he’d almost forgotten was supposed to be a moth by the end of class. There was no reason to let Mandy’s mere presence get the better of him. Not when he had so much going for him right now. So, choosing to adopt a similar cavalier attitude, Peter swallowed a heavy lump in his throat containing all his anxiety and set back to work.

                “So I saw you making out with your little girlfriend in the hallway this morning,” Mandy said.

                Her tone was just as innocuous as ever, just as comfortable in savoring this shred of gossip as any. She didn’t even turn to him. Her fingers continued in their rhythm of primping the clay features of her Peter-statue.

                The boy flinched, keeping himself from slamming a miniscule fist on the delicate pronged leg of his clay moth. Of course it was her he’d seen. He didn’t want to believe that she was back to her old ways of leering at him from afar, but it seemed his instincts were unfortunately correct.

                Make-out seemed like a strong word, anyway. The incriminating event had lasted three seconds maximum, which was probably close to a personal record for kisses with Lisa, who regularly worried she was impeding Peter’s breathing with her gentle passions. Mentally skipping past these semantics, Peter debated whether to give Mandy’s statement the time of day. He could see Alita and Calvin’s eyes had shifted awkwardly to him, waiting for a response of some kind.

                “It was pretty cute. Little guy and his little girlfriend,” Mandy said. She leaned in closer over the table, squinting as she applied some surgical detail into the artificial hair of her project. “Don’t be embarrassed. I think it’s really cool to see you fitting in at this place.”

                Peter kept his gaze on the domed eyes of his moth. They weren’t quite symmetrical.

                “Did you hear me?” Mandy pressed. “I said I think it’s really cool.”

                “I heard you,” Peter said.

                “Don’t you think you should say thank you?”

                “Thank you.”

                “Maybe Peter does not want to talk about that,” Alita said intently.

                “How do I know? If he doesn’t want to talk about letting his little girlfriend hold him and touch him and kiss him, then he can tell me himself. He’s a big boy. Aren’t you, little guy?”

                “I’m not going to talk about this,” Peter snapped mutedly. Civility was becoming harder to come by, as was his already limited focus on the moth. Something had to give.

                “If you say so,” Mandy replied. Her voice still had yet to develop beyond its low and half-disinterested small-talk state. She might as well have been bringing up the latest weather forecast.

                “Why are you asking me about this?” Peter felt himself say, louder than before.

                It was a bad idea to engage. He knew that. He also didn’t care.

                At last, Mandy’s focused attention was dragged wearily from her clay model of Peter that actually stood more than an inch taller than him. She palmed the figurine, wrapping her fingers around it in an embrace that threatened to devolve the finely sketched features anew.

                “I just thought you would have some thoughts you wanted to share with me. You definitely had some things to say about me to some other people.” The girl had refocused completely on him now, the clear subject of her unveiled ire. Her knuckles were fading whiter as they curled around the nude statue. A deep furrow creased into her forehead. Her voice was cool and cutting, nearly as icy as Sharon’s average speaking voice. Peter realized it was the first time he’d ever truly seen Mandy angry.

                It was not a mood he’d ever wished he could witness in her.

                “What are you talking about?” he said.

                Mandy shook her head, a clay-speckled finger twirling into her auburn locks without hesitation for the mess that painted her skin. “You don’t have to play dumb in front of me. You might have a little tiny brain, but you don’t have to pretend like that makes you stupid.”

                “I don’t think he knows what you’re talking about,” Calvin protested sternly. He’d risen from his seat by now and taken a stand behind Peter, towering above both the miniature boy and Mandy, at least while the latter was sitting down.

                “Yes he does.” Mandy’s teeth ground together, slurring her words into a graveled hiss.

                “I don’t,” Peter said bluntly. “Just tell me so I can ex-”

                “You’ve been telling people you think I’m crazy,” Mandy growled. The last word was uttered in a violent hush, like the most sacred of curse words. In that instant, the veins in the fifteen-year-old girl’s eyes seemed to pop, spilling their crimson hue to the surrounding white.

                Peter observed her for a moment. He was a little stunned but not exactly floored by this revelation. It was a lie, of course, but he couldn’t exactly disagree with whoever had started this fib about him.

                What did he mean “whoever?” Any ghostly doubt in his mind was quickly banished for the certainty of knowing that this must’ve been the subject of Mandy’s conversation with Sharon this morning. No question.

                “I didn’t tell anyone that,” Peter said calmly. “I don’t spread rumors about people.”

                “Rumors aren’t rumors if you believe it,” Mandy continued. Her eyes were bulging now. A stray hair that hung too low over her cheek had caught on the corner of her mouth, but was batted away by her tongue.

                “Mandy. I didn’t tell anybody you’re crazy.”

                “That’s sweet of you to say. So I don’t have to feel bad. Or maybe you’re still lying to me because you’re afraid I’ll figure it out.” Fingers trembling as she gripped the edge, the chemical reaction of a fifteen-year-old rose to her feet, using the table for balance.

                “I’m not worried about anything,” Peter lied flatly. As per usual, his knees were beginning to quake as he watched the girl’s wild eyes bead up and down his frame.

                A dribble of saliva formed at the corner of Mandy’s lips, but she quickly slurped it back inside before it could drip down.

                “Leave him alone.” The new voice was soft and measured, like each word had been individually weighed before being spoken, and Peter realized Bluebell was now standing behind Mandy, and unlike Calvin, she had a couple of inches over their uninvited guest. Peter couldn’t help but smile just a little guiltily.

                “Oh, hey, Blueballs.” Mandy had turned to face her slightly taller opponent. Peter detected a flinch in her already unsteady composition.  The girl picked at her fingernails with an nervous fervor, which the miniature boy decided he much preferred over her slapping her palms on the table like before.

                “It’s Blue,” she said calmly.

                “I didn’t… hear you coming.” Mandy stifled a giggle, enunciating each word for the lip-reader to make out.

                Bluebell blinked with the patience of a yoga master and thumbed her earlobe just below her hearing aid. “You won’t either when I come up behind you next time.”

                “Five minutes to the bell. Bring up what ya got! Oven’s piping hot.” Mr. Garrison’s groaned drawl somehow managed to momentarily sever the gasoline-drenched tension that had formed in the cluster of students all crowded around above Peter, each ready to pounce.

                “I’ll see you losers later,” Mandy said with a shrug, dismissing the liquid rage in her throat just as quickly as she’d conjured it. Mercifully her gaze at last left the real-life model for her art. She scooped up her naked-Peter statue in both palms and shouldered past Bluebell, joining the rest of the line for the oven.

                “Woah. She’s… a piece of work,” Calvin whispered, leaning low over the table and resting his chin on his fist. He studied Peter. “Where do you think she heard that?”

                “Who knows?” Peter shrugged, not in the mood to get into the complex litany of passive-aggressive foes he had around the school at this precise moment.

                “Peter, are you ready? I could take your… butterfly?” Alita asked.
                “Moth,” he corrected with a smile. “And that’d be great. Thanks.”
                “Do not mention it,” she said, winking as she delicately wrapped her fingers around the wings of the clay creature, careful not to compress them inward. She palmed her dog-shaped art in the other hand as she sidled by the table and made for the line that by now was trailing out of the firing closet adjacent to the classroom.

                “You can go, too, man,” Peter said, waving his hand at Calvin, who still sat hunched over the table a foot away. “The line’s already almost full.”

                “You sure?”

                “Yeah,” the shorter teen said, reading the specific concern in his voice. “You guys will see her coming out of the firing room, anyway. She’ll have to go past you three. And I know you’ve got my back.”

                “True,” Calvin said. He cradled his abstract piece as he stood up from the stool. He signaled between his eyes and Peter’s body with two fingers, reiterating the promise as he joined Alita in the line.

                Peter slumped down to a seated position, dusting his palms together and mentally trying to convince his shoulders to release some of their built-up tension. It wasn’t coming easily, but with a sigh of relief and a keen eye focused on the door to the firing closet, he knew he was sitting pretty until Erica arrived any minute to ferry him off to lunch.

                That was when the fingers closed around him. Unyielding and cold, as though a snowball had just been molded by the palm, just as it was on the first day of school.

                Peter’s vision blurred into colorful chaos as Mandy sprinted for the door, with his tiny body clenched in her fist.

                Peter’s stomach oscillated against his heart. He sucked up what little air hadn’t been squeezed from his lungs by Mandy’s unforgiving fingers. His chest, already caved to sore capacity against the heel of the girl’s enormous hand, was only slightly helpful in letting him wriggle his shoulders just high enough to avoid banging his jaw against the hovering mass of her thumbpad.

                She was still running. And still holding him tightly in her clammy fist.

                Those Converses of hers pounded the carpet hallway, again and again with seismic fury Peter wasn’t quite sure he could remember experiencing before. No one had ever sprinted while they held him. Power-walked, sure, even jogged for a brief span, but nothing like this. The full weight of her body slamming down to a single foot on every impossibly long stride, the residual vibration rattling up through her arms, to the fingertips, and into his terrified bones.

                Through the mad state of senselessness she’d rocked him into by pumping her arm so fast and squeezing Peter’s five-inch body with such fervor, he’d just managed to make out a sound that gave him hope. A cry from somewhere in the art classroom just as the pair of them had reached the door at full speed. Someone had noticed how Mandy snuck out through a second door of the firing closet and came back in the classroom exit behind him. The panicked, unknown voice was followed by yelled chatter, and sounds of shuffling that Peter couldn’t sort out. He could only hope they were coming after him.

                At least, that was what he’d heard a minute before. Now, there was nothing distinct, although it could’ve just been that Mandy was beginning to make him sick.

                The softer glow of the math wing gave way to a slamming door opened by Mandy’s opposite forearm, another rumble through her frame that chattered Peter’s teeth, and a burst of harsher light. Blinking dumbly, adjusting to the fact that Mandy’s arm had finally stopped pumping and given Peter’s drunken brain a chance to relax, he realized they were in one of the girls’ bathrooms. A dead end.

                Whether that was good or bad remained to be seen. Almost instantly he regretted thinking of it as a “dead end.”

                “Mandy-” he panted.  Not like he had the slightest idea of what kind of appeal to make at this point. He looked up to her pleadingly as she held him at the height of her stomach. For once, though, her gaze wasn’t trained to him, instead seemingly lost in her own reflection in the wall-length mirror above the sinks.

                Peter laid his jaw down against the firm, curved wall that constituted Mandy’s balled fingers coiled around his sides. Hesitantly, he opened his mouth, daring himself to test out one of the defense lessons Erica had spooked into him on the reservoir hillside. Her skin was a little gritty, but it didn’t look any thicker than his sister’s; surely, given how high his adrenaline was pumped now, he could bite hard enough to inflict some pain. Discomfort, at least.

                Then out of the corner of his eye, the boy recalled the sheer drop toward the tile floor below. Even if he managed to take advantage of Mandy’s current failing in surveillance, she could just as easily drop him. Then he wouldn’t even need to wait to see what she’d do to him; he’d just break a bone or five on the drop. If he was lucky, he’d have the landing softened by the girl’s laced shoe, but how certain was he that he’d be able to aim that direction when she dropped him?

                Not very.

                Pausing in thought to let his heart catch up, Peter awkwardly wrestled his head further away from the side of Mandy’s finger. Looking back up in the direction of the bathroom mirror, off which the ceiling lights now glared and impaired clear vision, he could see that his captor was no longer looking at herself. She’d locked eyes with him in the reflection instead.

                So much for the terrible escape plan.

                “Look at you,” the girl chuckled, shaking her head piteously. “Just look at you.”

                For a few moments, the pair remained in squalid silence in the deserted bathroom. Mandy lifted her fist up higher, until her hand was level with her chest, and Peter had a proper view of his current position above the sinks.

                Frankly, he was much happier being held at the height of the girl’s stomach. At least he felt like she was paying less attention to him down there, and his blessings had to be counted in a situation like this, where she’d finally given in to three months of searing tension and snatched him up just like he’d suspected she’d do again for so long. Now, he was forced to look at her. And himself.

                It was pathetic, really. Peter never exactly needed a mirror to remember that he, in fact, stood at around five inches tall. Climbing into someone’s hand was plenty of reminder for the scale difference. Still, when he was forced to look into a reflective surface while in close proximity to a normal-sized human, it put things in an even more unfortunately humbling perspective.

                And it was humbling. Peter hadn’t felt so helpless in a long time, staring at his sad head peeping uselessly out of the top of the girl’s iron-clenched fist, his feet dangling clumsily on the other end. Mandy stood straight up, her other hand wandering through her auburn hair as it so often did, plucking at the stray strands and twirling, looking bigger than she ever had before. She proudly wore a victorious smile on her lips.

                He felt sick.

                “You look so funny,” she commented at length. “Peekin’ around. Like a little gopher in my hand.”

                Peter’s throat was too dry.

                “I guess you don’t have anything to say now, do you? It’s just when I’m not around that you feel like you can say whatever you want about me?”

                That seems fair, Peter thought bitterly to himself.

                “Well?” she grumbled, her voice suddenly devoid of its artificial cheer. The glower of before darkened her features as her eyes narrowed their focus on the image of the tiny boy in the mirror she had squeezed in her fist. “Nothing to say, huh? That’s cool, that’s cool. That’s how most bullies are, anyway, so I know you’re just doing what you know.”

                Peter almost had to wheeze at this statement out of principle, even though he didn’t have the oxygen to spare. Mandy’s fingers had only grown tenser around his frame, to the point that he was fairly sure his hips were already forming soft bruises.

                Bully? Him? Maybe she actually was crazy, and not just mildly unhinged, as the boy had long suspected. What kind of mental gymnastics were required for her to call him the bully in this situation?

                “Mandy… you… need to believe… me…” Peter grunted, carefully choosing words that didn’t require him to completely refill his diaphragm. “I… didn’t say… anything! About… anybody!”

                “Why should I?”

                Peter gulped. He had to keep her talking, even if it was something that upset her and probably increased the chances of deeper bruises. Talking was still better than her attempting a swirly on him, with the toilets so near. Most things were better, in fact.

                “Who… said… something?”

                “A few people,” Mandy sneered. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t wanna hear you try and lie and say you didn’t talk to them. All you have to do is say it to someone, and it goes around. That’s how it works.”

                Was she trying to give him an anti-bullying sermon? It was almost the last thing Peter expected to get from this particular girl.

                “Was it Sharon? And… Amy and Kimmy?” Peter mustered, swallowing empty air. His shoulders were starting to go numb from the strength of Mandy’s cold fingers wound about them.

                “And other people,” Mandy emphasized again. “I’m done hearing you make excuses. All you have to do is say sorry, and I’ll let you go.” At last, she broke eye contact with the mirror image of Peter, and instead lifted her hand up to the level of her eyes. Her hazel irises laid into him with newfound intensity, as though she intended to vaporize his skull right off the chopping block of her fist.

                “You… what?”

                “You heard me. Say you’re sorry, and I’ll put you down.”

                “Mandy…” Peter breathed, fighting back a choking gurgle in the back of his throat. He was surprised at his ability to form complete words without stammering out the syllables. The Peter of three or even two months before would never have managed it. Surely all his classmates needed was a few more precious seconds to track them down.

                “C’mon, you sad little boy. I did all that nice stuff for you… I let you be part of my painting… I drew that picture for you. I invited you over to watch movies. And you just keep on being rude. Rude, rude, rude,” she cantered. “Is it really so freakin’ hard for you to do one nice thing back for me?”

                Peter sighed. This wasn’t going anywhere good, and his limbs were on the verge of losing sensation now. As he’d learned so many times before, there were battles worth fighting, and then there were those worth sitting out so he’d be present for the next one. With Mandy’s palm compressed so heavily against his chest and stomach, this was rapidly turning into one of the latter.

                “Okay, okay. I’m sorry-” Peter began diplomatically. The words he’d mapped out to come next went something along the lines of “that there was a misunderstanding and your feelings were hurt,” but the very concept of forming syllables was squelched out of his lungs.

                Mandy’s knuckles went white, as did her eyes.

                “I knew it,” she declared somewhere between a hiss and a song. “I knew you said it. You pathetic little snail.”

                Peter was flung upside down again, still securely coiled in Mandy’s fist, but once again victim to tumbling gravity as her hand rocked and turned. Retorts mushed to jelly in his mouth. Her Converse slammed forward over the glossy tile, past the sinks, and toward the stalls.

                There was no additional time for thought or counterpoint. Peter was brandished right-side up for only one last painful second as Mandy kicked her way into the nearest bathroom stall. She flashed him one final rage-painted grimace, and then her fingers opened.

                The boy sputtered helplessly as he fell heels-over-head and splashed down into the toilet bowl.

                Reorienting himself in the frigid pool, Peter swam for the surface. He desperately clawed at the ovular porcelain shoreline, but only succeeded in slipping backward again into the water. Spitting a mouthful of the revolting liquid away, only then did the freshman pitifully peer upward, out of the halo of the toilet seat, and to the sight of Mandy towering above him, her hand poised above the silver flush handle.

                “I hope you know how to swim, little guy.”

                “Mandy…” Peter uttered, struggling even to stay afloat as he stared up at her. He was plenty practiced at treading water, but the concept was harder to enact on autopilot when he was trying so hard to come up with an acceptable plea. He also knew full well that if Mandy’s fingers were to depress a matter of inches, all the treading in the world wouldn’t keep him safe.

                “Peter…” she mocked back at him, the pitch rising in her voice. Her opposite hand was planted defiantly on her hip as she stood over the toilet, while her other arm was still threateningly stretched out for the handle. She shook her head. “Peter. It’s such a stupid-sounding name. Like Peter Rabbit or something.”

                “Please…” he hacked, outstretching a hand as far as he dared before using it to tread water again. His voice cracked. “Please let me out.”

                “Gonna have to do better than that,” she scowled. Her fingers danced gently against the unmoving flush handle. “Now that I know what you said, and you spent so long lying about it first, like the true little scaredy-cat you are. Or scaredy-rabbit, maybe.”

                “PLEASE,” he called out, the echo of it bouncing forlornly off the rounded inner walls of the toilet. “Please, Mandy.”

                “All you know how to say is “please” and my name, Peter-Rabbit. It’s like talking to a broken record,” Mandy tsked with another shake of her head. She shrugged. “Oh well…”

                Peter couldn’t be certain whether he saw her fingers arch up in preparation to press the handle, or if they were rising in surprise. He didn’t have to find out the answer, though, as the stall door was wrenched open from outside, and Mandy’s body was yanked away from its lording position over the doom bowl.

                It was difficult to make out the commotion outside, as Peter’s view was limited to the mellow glow of the light above the stall. All he could do was tread. He was fairly certain he could make out the sound of Alita screeching something in Spanish. Multiple pairs of shoes were heard stumbling around on the tile beyond, followed by a loud thump, as though someone's body had hit the floor.

                Peter’s heart was finally allowed to slow down from overdrive as Bluebell appeared over the rim of the toilet above, her hand swooping down to fish out her costar.

                Peter kept his eyes clenched shut, curled in a rigid state while his fingers kneaded vigorously at his forehead. His vision was mostly limited to his own clammy hands, but on all other sides was the smooth terrain of his mother’s palm, which he didn’t anticipate being allowed to leave any time soon. Or ever, if he was honest with himself.

                “I find it disturbing…” Suzanne snarled above across the principal’s desk, venom tinged in every word. “…that this school treats attempted drowning so casually. Or is it just in cases of students who are differently abled?”

                The target of her ire was silent for a moment, then adjusted his glasses and seemed to recompose.

                “Mrs. Clark, I assure you, that is not the attitude of this school.”

                “Then why did I receive a call while I was in the middle of work that my son… my fifteen-year-old son… was nearly flushed down a god-damned toilet?” she spat back instantly. “ANSWER me that!”

                Peter saw his mother’s caged fingers curve just a little further inward and closer to his body at this mention. She had both hands folded atop one another for added security, cupping her miniature son in her lap for the entire run of this draining conversation in the administrative offices. Her thumbs were trembling.

                “Again, I can’t say how dreadfully sorry we are that this was allowed to happen, Mrs. Clark,” the principal explained coolly, though he maintained a certain docility in his voice that Peter didn’t blame him for as the verbal thrashing by his mother. “As I understand it, this was an isolated incident, and-”

                “Isolated incident?” Suzanne said. From the fury in her voice, it seemed possible she would become angrier repeating just about any word in the English language. Her fingers arched nearer to her child’s crouched body in her palm. “Well, as long as it’s just ONE TIME that some girl tries to drown my SON, then I suppose it’s all right. It’s all right with the school. Am I understanding you correctly?”

                “Mrs. Clark… please, I know this is difficult, but I have to ask you to just… calm down, just for a moment, for the sake of-”

                “-for the sake of what? Your feelings?” she growled, her entire frame shuddering as she leaned further across the desk.

                Peter heard the squeak of swivel chair wheels as the principal instinctively shifted backward in his seat, in case the woman chose to lunge across the desk and claw his face clean off. Of course, his mother’s other hand safely closed over him for just a few seconds, lest she lose him over her knee in her rage.

                “I’m… well aware that we have no right to claim innocence in this case, Mrs. Clark, but I only restate the fact that it’s an isolated incident to affirm that this administration, Peter’s teachers, and most of his peers have done everything in our power to accommodate him here. And, in this case, it wasn’t a lapse of judgment or security, but a special case where-”

                “-I can’t believe I’m hearing this,” Suzanne snapped. Her soft fingers trembled against Peter’s shoulders as she cradled him against her palm. “What about that charity organization that gave you a grant on the condition that you accept Peter? What would they say about this?”

                Peter furrowed his brow. Though the embrace of his mother’s fingers was comforting after the harrowing events of art class and his chilling trip into the girls’ commode, her actions now were beginning to inflict just as much of an emotional strain. He understood perfectly well how terrified his parent had to be for him right now; he felt a fraction of it for himself, after all. Still, to hear her resorting to such pious arguments made him a little queasy and, worse, allowed him to realize the fragility of this whole scenario on both sides.

                He’d been so worried all these months about Suzanne pulling him out of school and subjecting him to another lonely four years of homeschool. But what if it ultimately wasn’t her decision that ended his tenure at this school, but the administration’s? All this time, even in imagining a worst case scenario where his mother was too spooked and pulled him on a whim from the institution, Peter always was hopeful that he’d be able to wheedle his way back in with his trademark charm and tiny puppy-dog eyes.

                Such tactics wouldn’t be so useful against the school board.

                “I apologize, Mrs. Clark, again, as many times as is necessary,” the principal groaned wearily. He massaged the bridge of his nose between his fingers. “We’re incredibly proud that Peter elected to attend this school for his secondary education. But again, I have to emphasize that given his… special circumstances, and the accommodations necessary to make his attendance possible, there is a limit in our ability to attend to his needs every minute of every day. Though every student is special in our school, none are… more important than others, and our resources can only stretch so far.”

                By some miracle, the man managed to finish this statement without being cut off by Suzanne’s next fiery retort. In fact, the office ruminated in silence for a few moments with the unfortunate truth of this final declaration. Peter’s stomach, most of all, was swilling.

                The man was right. Of course he was right. Peter, at least in the back of his mind, had accepted the inherent dangers for three months with the understanding that the school could only take its protection so far against the forces of twisted minds like Mandy’s. And he had learned to sleep peacefully in spite of that concept. But apparently, Suzanne had never truly accepted those same terms.

                Peter couldn’t help but shake at the knees at the notion of that revelation on the part of his mother. That he would never be absolutely secure in this place, without her. Such an idea in her brain would do no good things for his current attendance record at the school.

                His mother’s fingers wrapped firmly around him, inviting him deeper against the warm wall of her palm, probably mistaking his shaking for lingering anxiety from his earlier voyage. Which was true, certainly, but not nearly so much as the fear of being pulled away from the school. Away from his teachers, the play, his friends.

                Away from Lisa.

                Peter only sighed. There was no use in offering his own input at this time. There would surely be enough terse arguments about this event for many evenings to come at home. All of which he would lose, of course, by default, because he was the child and she was the adult, and perhaps more importantly, he was the anomaly and she was the normal. It wouldn’t help anyone to be humiliated by his mother’s fury in front of the principal.

                Instead, he kept his mouth closed and accepted the curling embrace of his mother’s giant hand. He pulled her thumb tighter across his stomach. Half out of security, and half out of resigned sadness at the possibilities.

                Plus, he was still more than a little chilled after his plunge into the ice-cold toilet, even after he’d changed out of his sopping outfit and into his gym uniform. The defense of his mother’s massive hands on all sides of his body wasn’t all unwelcome.

                It seemed Suzanne was finally releasing some of the stone tension, at least in the muscles of her fingers and her overall posture. Peter watched her tightly sealed lips shifting from side to side above, weighing possible comebacks. The silence, if anything, made him more uneasy. She hadn’t looked down at him for several minutes now.

                He wondered if she was too afraid to do so.

                “So what’s going to happen to this girl?” Suzanne breathed heavily at last, seemingly shifting the subject. “How are you going to reassure me that my son will be safe if… if he continues to attend your school?”

                Peter had to fight the urge to break free of the gentle tangle of his mother’s fingers and jump for joy. It wasn’t exactly an optimistic question on Suzanne’s behalf, but the mere fact that it wasn’t a done deal already was enough to empower the boy. By some miracle, he hadn’t lost yet.

                “She’s being handled in the other room with a counselor, the campus security officer, and two other administrators,” the principal said calmly, refolding his hands back in his lap. “This young lady has had many prior behavioral problems. From the brief conversation I had with them before you arrived, Mrs. Clark, it’s my expectation that she’ll be suspended for at least two weeks while a final decision is made about whether her attendance here is terminated permanently.”

                “I see,” Suzanne said, nodding in measured pace. Her fingers had taken to petting Peter’s back as she worked through each and every carefully chosen word of the principal’s explanation.

                Motionless, the boy sagged forward, allowing his parent to stroke his shoulders and hoping she’d stop consciously thinking of his physical size pathetically occupying her hand, and instead see the logic of it.

                Mandy was almost surely going to be taken out of the school. That made sense, didn’t it? The whole threatening-to-possibly-murder-another-student thing? If the principal felt it wasn’t likely, it seemed impossible he’d even suggest the possibility of expulsion, after the wringing he’d received by Suzanne. But he had said it.

                For Peter, it felt like the healthiest thing to put today behind him and focus on the positives. His greatest threat under this roof would finally be leaving. All he needed now was a few more days of school without incident, just as he’d exhibited for two whole months, to claw his way back into Suzanne’s semi-good graces.

                “Mom,” Peter said. On the next pass of his mother’s soothing fingers along his back, he wrapped his arms around her index finger, and pulled it closer to his chest again. It got her attention. “Mom?”

                “Yes, honey?” she responded smoothly, mustering a smile for show as she looked down at him curled up atop her palms in her lap. Her demeanor had switched like a light from the poisonous front she presented to the principal.

                “I’ve got the play tonight and tomorrow,” he said. Peter didn’t bother interjecting with whiny syllables or a fake-cry pout. He simply kept the woman’s finger embraced to his torso, and looked her straight in the eye, speaking in a steady tone. “I’ve worked really hard. So have all my friends in the play. I can’t let them down after all this time.”

                Suzanne shut her eyes, which for an instant seemed to glisten. She grimaced and looked back up to the principal, bobbing her head to clear away a stray tress of blonde hair that had fallen over her eyes, so she wouldn’t have to free up a hand from under Peter to correct it. Her lips budged.

                “Then I suppose he’s got to keep coming for two more days, at least,” she said with some difficulty to the principal. Her fingers resumed their petting of her persuasive little son. “He’ll finish up today and tomorrow night, and then we’ll just go from there. Providing that… that freak-girl is kept away from the perimeter of this building, and there are eyes kept on him at all times.”

                “That sounds more than fair to me,” the principal said neutrally. “Peter, what about you?”

                The boy sat back upright as his mother hoisted him slowly toward the upper level of the desk and opened her palms atop it. Remaining perched on the ends of Suzanne’s long digits, Peter bit his lip and looked the man, too, square in the eye.

                “Yes,” he said, clinging to that last shred of hope. “I think it sounds fair.”

                Scribbling madly across his miniature notebook page, Peter almost forgot to blink as he took in the half-filled dry erase board of the English classroom. He was sitting cross-legged on his desk now and feeling especially precarious, even with one of the office secretaries assigned to follow him around to all his remaining unsupervised classes and monitor his safety. If prior conversations were to be believed, today just might be his penultimate day of public high school. He knew taking even more precocious notes than normal wouldn’t do much to help matters, but it was comforting in this moment to remind himself how badly he wanted to remain here.

                The impromptu emergency conference between the principal and his mother, the two parties who each had the distinct power to shatter his dreams of educative normalcy, had taken up the entirety of his lunch period and almost all of his algebra class afterward. Suzanne had insisted at first on accompanying Peter to all of his remaining classes for the day, but after she’d already had to walk out of a real estate meeting to come see him post-toilet dive, he’d urged her with everything he had to return to her work. Finally, she’d relented, possibly because she might start crying if she had to spent too much more time with him after the ordeal.

                And after he’d had his agency so thoroughly robbed of him today once already by the former biggest and creepiest bully in the school, Peter didn’t think he could stand being lorded over in front of his peers by his mommy. He’d never live it down. Never.

                At least he’d had the chance to see Lisa after the stomach-churning uncertainty of the meeting. Just as Suzanne was curtly saying goodbye to the principal, the office door burst open to reveal the short, slight frame of the redhead, wild-eyed and heaving on the verge of tears. The woman working the front desk had followed fruitlessly behind, unable to stop the young girl from passing all obstacles to find Peter once she’d heard the story of his brief capture through whispered rumors in class.

                Suzanne even had the kindness to pass Peter over to Lisa, who was clearly now more terrified than he was, hugging him to her cheek and letting loose the tears almost as soon as she had him enclosed in her fingers. If he was soaked before by the toilet water, his girlfriend’s saltwater deluge was giving it a run for its money. Getting her to hand him back over to his mother again for the trip to English class took more than one request, which by Lisa’s usually rule-following sensibilities, was herculean.

                And so, with the watchful eye of the secretary on him throughout the English hour, Peter diligently recorded notes on independent and dependent clauses in declarative sentences. Eventually they were given open work time to construct their own examples of sentences from the pieces on the board, for which Peter was grateful: some solitude to prove his mettle. To the boy’s subconscious desire, if he could just demonstrate how easy it was to reintegrate into a classroom after being threatened with toilet death, then maybe he’d be allowed to stay.

                “I’m glad she didn’t flush you, shortstuff.”

                There she was, right on cue: the girl who, in all likelihood, talked an unstable fifteen-year-old into nearly drowning him this morning. But Peter didn’t flinch at the sharp whisper in his ear from behind. Not even Sharon would make him lose his cool now, with so much at stake. He couldn’t help but allow himself a half-smile, even as his heart thumped at her casual admission of just how much she knew.

                “Me, too,” he said, not missing a beat.

                “It would’ve been awful lonely in this class without you to talk to,” Sharon continued. She drummed her fingers on the back of his desk, half a foot away from where he sat. Her fingernails landed with an especially hard clack, ringing in Peter’s ears. “Or history. Or P.E.”

                “Thanks for saying so,” Peter said. He hadn’t yet halted his pencil on the pad.

                “Don’t you want to turn around and talk to me?” As usual, less a question than a command.

                Peter noted the familiar feeling of her eyes boring into the back of his scalp. He could tell she was leaning further and further across her desk. The drumming of her fingertips continued, inching ever closer to him.

                “Maybe another time,” he answered. The pencil kept in motion. “We’ve got to do these examples, after all.”

                “Aw, something I said?” Sharon sighed. Her graceful hand paused in its scuttling walk across the desk toward him like an oversized crab. “We haven’t had a good little chat in weeks. What, is your little girlfriend not letting you make other friends?”

                “I really think we’d be better off getting the work done,” Peter said.

                “I’m just saying. If your little girlfriend is going to stick her fingers into your friendships, you’d think she could at least do you the favor of not letting you get flushed away like a turd.”

                That hot, cinnamon breath was floating down, clinging to the back of Peter’s neck. He knew she was close now. And, like the flinty creature of myth she was, she seemed to snake closer and closer to him beyond fear of reproach from the teacher. The secretary still had a close eye on him, but too seemed accepting of the girl’s proximity.

                Good old Sharon. For all her self-important attitudes, they weren’t exactly bluster. The world seemed pretty content to ignore her as she danced along the line of the appropriate. Rules were just suggestions to someone like Sharon. Peter gulped.

                “Sharon,” he breathed. He still didn’t turn around; she could hear him. “I’m asking… I mean, I’m saying nicely now. I don’t want to talk about Lisa or what might have happened today.”

                “Oohh. It sounds like somebody is growing up,” Sharon said with some token mocking, though the heat of her spicy gum-breath became less severe in the intervening seconds as she retreated further back into her chair. “It’s really cute, shortstuff. I’m sure it does it for the girlfriend, too, who shall not be named.”

                Peter rolled his eyes and continued writing. His sentences had run just a little outside the notepad lines while Sharon talked, but he seemed to have come out more or less on top. There weren’t so much victories against Sharon as lesser defeats.

                “Well, I just wanted you to know…” Sharon slurred. “…I don’t think it’s cool how she just picked you up when you didn’t want her to.”

                Raising an eyebrow, Peter kept on with what he was doing. That was new. Not to mention unexpected.

                “Thanks,” he said neutrally.

                “I mean it,” she continued. The tapping of her fingernails continued, this time on her desk. He could also make out the rubber thump of her pencil eraser against the edge of the surface. A bass line.

                “I’m glad.”

                “…it’s just not right, you know?” Sharon said. “If it were me, I wouldn’t pick you up until you asked me to.”

                And there it was.

                “And I’d be real gentle, too,” she explained in what was probably her closest approximation of a soothing voice. To Peter, it felt more like the silver-eyed vixen was trying to chloroform his ears. “You know. I’d make sure your arms were nice and still at your sides, so you couldn’t move too much and distract me. That’s how I’d keep you. Safe.”

                Peter mustered a nod. His sentence writing had fully left the demarcated lines by now, descending into awkward doodles.

                “But what can I say?” Sharon sighed, leaning further back in her chair. She tossed her platinum locks up with the back of her hand. “That’s just the kind of person I am.”

                Well, wasn’t that the truth. The five-inch freshman thumbed his pencil tip, watching the ashen tone of the lead paint his hands. Mandy may have been all but gone from his life now, but he wasn’t exactly out of the woods yet. Somehow, he doubted he ever fully would be.

                “Oh, shortstuff?”

                “What?” he responded before he could stop himself.

                “Good luck in your little puppet show.”

                Peter had a hard time looking his sister in the eye when she laid her hand down on the desk in English to ferry him to the final period of this inordinately long day. He knew she’d been taken out of class earlier and briefed on what happened by Judy, but hadn’t yet seen his elder sibling since the dunking.

                The exit from the room was the silent one. The boy leaned into the heel of Erica’s hand and fiddled with the straps of his backpack. For her part, she kept him steady and even centered by curled fingers. From behind, the office secretary followed at a distance through the quickly bustling hallway.

                “Hey,” Peter muttered, still without looking up.

                “Hey,” Erica said back.

                “Did you tell Mom anything? About… you know-”

                “Nope.”

                “Okay,” he said, deflating with relief. “T-Thanks.”

                “We’ll just add that to the pile of IOUs.”

                “Y-Yeah. I guess so.”

                Peter slowly let down his guard as they neared the broad gymnasium hall, having been expecting a reaming somewhere on the trip between here and P.E. Certainly he’d grown accustomed to them from his sister when things went south, and he knew for a fact she didn’t enjoy delivering those speeches any more than he enjoyed receiving them. He stewed, studying the deepest crease in the palm of the girl’s tan hand.

                “Is that all?” he asked.

                “Uh-huh.”

                “Really?”

                “Are you still in one piece?”

                “As far as I can tell.”

                “Cool,” she said curtly. “Just try to keep it that way.”

                Peter nodded, giving his sister a pat on the thumb, but ultimately resolved to hang onto it once he’d placed his hand atop her slender nailbed. It was nice not to get a lecture from someone today.

                “Thanks, sis.”

                “Stop trying to have a moment, twerp,” Erica snorted dryly as they entered the brightly lit sanctum of the gym. She lightly flicked him in the shoulder, earning a punch in her knuckle back from his eager fist.

                Peter had his eye on the prize. He’d accepted mother’s mandate not to participate in any way in Phys Ed today, instead forcing him by way of compromise to observe some jogging drills and obstacle course work from afar, on the bleachers beside the secretary from the front office. But he’d been weathering the boredom and embarrassment of being babysat with a determined smile.

                After all, there were bigger things to work himself up for. His questionable standing as a continuing student aside, he had two shows to perform tonight and tomorrow, and likely that one chance to prove to his mother with surefire evidence that he belonged in the halls of this school. Without high spirits, such a task was going to be all the more difficult.

                Tom Thumb was a spritely lad, after all.

                So, he watched his peers leap and sprint their way around the colorful obstacles that obscured the path across the gleaming plain of the gymnasium floor. He hardly even felt the usual envy for their ability to act with strength and reach he could only fantasize about; today, there was so much more on the line. If anything, he was better off reminding his mother how secure he was in the one room truly liable to inflict injury by generally not being allowed to participate.

                The boy watched Lisa, struggling somewhat due in part to lacking in the muscle mass of some of her similar-sized classmates, most of whom still towered above her. However, it also wasn’t helping her effectiveness to be shooting glances his way on the bleachers every six seconds or so, diverting her attention away from the task at hand. Whenever this happened, Peter only smiled, waving away at her in attempt to shift her attention off his miniscule form.

                Not that he minded the glances. Those green eyes peering so directly at him across the expanse, picking him out amidst the grandeur of the space despite his scale, was a useful reminder of his significance, to himself and to her. It was a source of strength for Peter, when he was so devoid of the actual, physically useful variety of strength. For his own part, he couldn’t help but blush whenever he let his gaze linger for especially long on Lisa’s pale, slender legs pumping as she ran.

                “OhmyGod… Peter!”

                He didn’t need to look in the direction of the shriek to know who’d originated its shrill note. The pattering of inexpertly placed rubber heels sounded after Kimmy’s call, followed by the heavier footfalls of an athletic body intentionally pounding the earth to make her presence known, and finally an almost silent punctuation mark of shoes stealthily bringing up the rear.

                “I couldn’t believe it when Sharon told us!” Kimmy squealed. She wrung her hands she stood over the bleacher seat upon which Peter was camped. Behind her, Amy made a skyscraper of herself as usual, crossing her toned arms over her chest while a thin smile creased into her lips. Peter couldn’t see Sharon behind her, but he knew she was there.

                His heart fluttered to find himself suddenly in the presence of the three crones who’d likely orchestrated his commode plunge this morning; however, Peter peeked back over his shoulder as he stood up to lessen the height differential between them, looking to the middle-aged secretary, who’d folded her phone back into her lap in favor of casting a stern eye on the newcomers. So there was that at least.

                Peter allowed himself to relax as he looked up toward the towering form of the short, pudgy strawberry-blonde. If she in fact was privy to the outcome of that hallway conversation with Mandy, she was putting on a good act. The broad wall formed by her soft thighs jiggled in her shorts just beyond. Her fingers, with nails painted a chipped glitter-silver, trembled as they hovered a few inches over him, clearly desiring more than anything to snatch him up for the first time, but well-aware of the quietly authoritative woman beyond. Peter was willing to bet Kimmy hadn’t been granted full security clearance on whatever it was Sharon said to Mandy.

                “Peter, is everything all right?” the secretary questioned dryly. She raised an eyebrow.

                He held back a smirk. Nervous as he had reason to be today, and embarrassed as it made him to require such protection, there was a certain satisfaction to having such absolute security seated watchfully behind him. At least he could count on getting through this hour without another pair of unwanted hands plucking him into dizzying air.

                “I guess so,” Peter sighed. Guilty as the trio might well have been, it still wouldn’t do to demonize them completely when he was at such a critical juncture in his education. Not when he already had so many eyes both parental and administrative on him. And not when his mother might have some new pressing questions about the silver-eyed girl who once, circumstantially, saved him on a field trip.

                “It must’ve been so scary!” Kimmy croaked. She seemed to be unconsciously re-enacting a rough visualization of drowning in an invisible body of water by holding her hands above her shoulders with worming fingers, either for Peter’s benefit or for her own sense of compassion. “Stuck in the gross water like that! I’d hate it.”

                “I don’t want to do it again,” Peter said flatly. He folded his hands at the level of his waist.

                “Maybe you just haven’t had enough practice,” Amy offered, her voice a deep and mocking contrast to Kimmy’s bird-like cawing. Her fingers drummed over her crossed arms, the light sheen of sweat which glossed her skin glinting under the harsh gym lights.

                “Um…” Peter coughed.

                “At swimming,” Amy corrected, though behind the fist she positioned conveniently over her lips, Peter could see her sly smile curling higher. “Practice at swimming. It’s a good thing to be able to do. Whether you’re a shrimp or not.”

                “Thanks for the tip,” Peter said, not bothering to conceal his distaste for the conversation. He felt the sneer palpably shape his face as he answered.

                Amy’s dark eyes widened, an amused grin broadening. “Ooohhh. Looks like you’ve grown some teeth finally. I like it.”

                “Don’t make fun of him!” Kimmy defended, her milky-orange curls whipping around as she craned to address her friend. Her hands still anxiously loitered above Peter’s head, her sweaty palms and uneasy fingers giving him only the slightest cause for discomfort at the unavoidable thought of becoming trapped in them. He hoped the office secretary didn’t return to her phone.

                “I wasn’t. It’s cute,” Amy smirked. She gave her ponytail a carefree toss. Her gaze shifted with conviction from Kimmy to Peter below.

                Great. Cute. There was something else he needed. His self-assertion being taken as the winging of a hapless baby animal by this amazon of a teenager who probably still harbored no moral gray area with the idea of snatching him up from where he stood. He’d have to work on that, assuming he was even given the chance to, after this week was finished out.

                “Hi.”

                Both Kimmy and even Amy parted ways from where they’d cloistered themselves so claustrophobically above Peter, turning around to see the petite redhead standing behind them, still thoroughly dwarfed as ever by the volleyball star, but the look of determination in Lisa’s face and two curled fists made up for it.

                She looked instantly to Peter as she stepped forward. Silently Lisa confirmed his safety with a shared nod, though her shoulders truly seemed to relax somewhat only as she looked to the secretary seated nearby and made sure someone else was monitoring the exchange. The girl shouldered past Amy, who had no intention of relocating any further from where she’d planted the boat-sized masses of her tennis shoes.

                “Is this time-out?” Peter questioned pleasantly to Lisa, intent on maintaining a cheerful air for the rest of the day.

                “Yeah. Or I just took one,” Lisa shrugged. Her voice was lower in tone but certainly more present than normal in volume, ensuring the trio could hear her response as she took a seat on the bench beside her miniature boyfriend.

                Peter watched his protector’s palm flatten against the surface of the bleacher, fingers curved around the lip of the metal seat. Knuckles turning white. Her lip stiffened upward, as did her chin, as Lisa eyed Amy with unblinking ardor. The fifteen-year-old titaness, for her part, seemed to relish the wordless challenge, and planted her hands on her hips, staring down the ginger with predatory entertainment. Which at least gave Peter a break from having her hungrily eye him, though it made him just as nervous to have that same energy focused on Lisa.

                “I guess everyone’s growing some teeth today.” The chilly whisper emanated from behind her friends, at last confirming Sharon’s presence to Peter despite his inability to see her past the mountain that was Amy’s body.

                “Shouldn’t you girls be running through the obstacle course?” the secretary prodded in the same deadpan tone.

                “Maybe we should,” Amy smarmed, still not yet breaking focus on Lisa, though she reversed several steps backward, every move intentioned and steady, planting her full weight into the ball of her foot through the tightly laced pink-mesh shoe before shifting to her other leg.

                “We only wanted to make sure Peter was okay,” Kimmy insisted to the secretary with a sniffle. Which, for all the ghostly guilt he was attempting to place, made the boy feel a twinge of appreciation. It certainly sounded genuine.

                “Well, that’s very nice. As long as he’s comfortable,” the woman responded.

                “And we wanted to remind him that he’s got friends, whenever he needs us. Friends who he can trust,” Sharon said with such venom knitted into the syllables that it sounded as though she were condemning the murderer of a cherished loved one. At last she inched forward with silent footsteps, putting herself between Amy and Lisa, simultaneously ending the pair’s estrogen-fueled staring contest and re-centering everyone’s attention squarely down at the five-inch freshman. The platinum teen-queen seemed to draw all light in the room toward her body, at least in Peter’s sight, such that a humbling glow shone from around her hands and eyes. She cocked her head, demanding a vocal bow through sheer force of will.

                Peter folded his arms behind his back now, emboldened by his proximity to the edge of losing his dreams in one fell swoop. There was no quaking in his knees. No tongue-tying. Not a hair standing up on his neck. He smiled, daring himself to stare directly into the eclipse that was Sharon’s gaze.

                “Thanks,” he said. “But if it’s all the same to you, I think I can trust myself to know who my friends are.”

                Amy raised an eyebrow, the muscles in her forearms rippling as she stepped back. Kimmy cupped a hand over her pouted lips, clearly affronted and dismayed at this unforeseen reaction, her eyes widened to tea saucers. Lisa nodded, extending a finger, the tip of which she lightly placed on Peter’s shoulder in a show of support.

                Sharon’s nostrils flared. No other part of her body flinched at first.

                “It’s your life,” Sharon uttered with distilled chaotic neutrality, the words practically lost to the comparatively deafening click of her tongue. The sentence was so low, so constricted by the space between them and the distant pounding of feet beyond and echoing shouts around the gym, that somehow Peter was confident he and only he could make out Sharon’s quicksilver voice.

                But he still didn’t shake.

                “Go on, girls. Run along,” the secretary suggested in an increasingly stern tone. “Do I need to start taking down some names?”

                “No!” Kimmy gulped, darting back toward the rest of the class near the center of the gym. Amy followed behind her at a comfortable pace, unbothered by the thinly veiled threat of office persecution. Even Sharon responded without further prompt, though not without bestowing one last glower down upon Peter, the very essence of her gaze looped invisibly around his body like a silver halo.

                Not a warning. A vow.

                Unknown as it was, even to him, Peter understood then that he’d made a choice for himself. One he was going to have to answer for someday.

                Lisa didn’t offer any further comment, but kept her fingertip draped over Peter’s shoulder as the remaining minutes of the class waned by. The secretary returned to her phone in her lap just as soon as the trio had distanced themselves past a stone’s throw.

                The boy, still confident in his choice of words despite the sick feeling of foreboding the trio had left in their wake, placed a hand upon his girlfriend’s comforting fingernail.

                The five-inch freshman steeled himself again his usually uncomfortable surroundings as he stood on Ms. Watson’s desk at the end of his final period of the day. After all, since he’d had to change into his P.E. uniform after Mandy soaked his other clothes in toilet water, there was no need to change out of them. A small blessing, in a depressing kind of way.

                If he could survive a face-forward encounter with Sharon like he just did and walk away from it relatively unscathed, surely he could weather another of these one-on-one exchanges with Watson.

                The dim mirror of the P.E. teacher’s desktop computer loomed above, offering a distorted image of the metallic private space which constituted her office. Only when he saw the door handle turning did something activate in his throat, though he couldn’t have said what it was.

                He felt like a dog who’d caught the scent of an oncoming tornado.

                The middle-aged woman stood above him in her over-tanned, slightly leathery glory - specifically self-imposed glory, as her sculpted arms were a little more swollen than usual, probably from one of those lunchtime workouts she was so fond of mentioning to her shortest student for some reason. Her broad hands were planted on her hips, the dense fingers tapping patiently at her waistline. It seemed to Peter she’d recently gotten a haircut, possibly by her own hand, as her short chestnut locks were ruffled at some creative angles.

                “Oh, sweet pea,” Ms. Watson sighed. She shook her head and clucked her tongue against the roof of her mouth as though she’d wandered into her office to find a newborn infant swaddled up on her desk.

                “Hi, Ms. Watson.”

                “I just couldn’t believe my ears when I heard what that little brat did to you,” the woman said. She crossed the short distance from the door to the desk in three delicate footsteps, her tightly knotted running shoes thumping insistently in Peter’s ears nonetheless.  Once she was truly above Peter, she reached over his head and snatched up a plastic water bottle beside the computer. As usual, she took her time arching her hand out, giving him a lengthy view of her dumbbell-weather palm and softly calloused fingers.

                “Yeah,” he said blankly. Peter twiddled his thumbs, only occasionally chancing a glance up at Ms. Watson’s strangely earnest eyes.

                “Let me just tell you, if something like that happened in this class, she would never have gotten as far away as she did. And she definitely wouldn’t have had the chance to drop-”

                “-I… remember what she did…” Peter interrupted. He’d had his watery voyage repeated back to him enough times today. Odds were, it wasn’t going anywhere in his memory anytime soon.

                Ms. Watson placed her fingers gently against her cheek, her lips parting in a feigned swoon. “Oh, I’m sorry, sweetie. I didn’t mean to… well, make you live through it again. I’m sorry.”

                “It’s all right,” Peter said numbly.

                “Well, just know, in Physical Education, we keep a much closer eye on our students. Especially those with special needs. Anyone comes near you in here, I’ll have you back to safety before you can say Bob’s your uncle,” Ms. Watson declared. She unscrewed her water bottle and took a long swig.

                Peter wrinkled his nose. How old was that phrase? Not that it mattered. He was far too busy feeling more than a little creeped out as he watched his gym teacher’s hand unfolding, her fingers curling against her palm in a demonstration of her proposed rescue of her five-inch pupil under dire circumstances.

                How many times today would he have to listen to someone explaining how they would’ve rescued him from capture by capturing him themselves? It was becoming less funny each time. And it wasn’t funny to begin with.

                “And you know…” the teacher continued with a broad sweep of her hand in midair for emphasis. She still hadn’t pulled out her seat to sit down, instead choosing to remain towering above Peter. “…it pained me even more to hear, when I remembered that day I came in here to find you…”

                A siren in the freshman’s skull went off.

                “…oh.”

                “You were trapped down in the sweaty uniforms, sweet pea, completely helpless. Thank God I was able to save you when I did.”

                “Yeah,” he agreed with a stinging swallow. “Good thing.”

                “But today just got me wondering again,” she admitted with some hesitation that Peter realized was only being put up for show. She gnawed her lower lip, her fingertips tapping the plastic cylinder of her bottle. “If I’m doing the right thing… in not doing everything in my power to keep you absolutely safe.”

                “Ms. Watson…” Peter said, taking a deep breath. “It’s all taken care of, honest. Nothing else bad will happen. I’m… pretty sure the girl that did that to me was the same one who put me in the… you know. So really, it’s taken care of.”

                “Is it?” the woman questioned. She leaned in over the desk, her volume dropping down to a rasp. Her eyes seemed to have grown twice as large on the descent as she studied Peter with whatever she approximated as fearful pity. “Sweet pea, I hate to say it, but… thinking about all this… what it’s doing to my conscience, well… I’ll be honest, too. It’s putting some undue stress on me.”

                No mention had been made of it yet, but the boy’s gaze was instinctively invited over the edge of the desk. He crept forward, peering downward, and realized that his gym teacher had already pried both tightly socked feet out of her training shoes. Her digits were wriggling against the frayed white cotton. Their warm, mealy aroma was already wafting up from the ground and tickling his nostrils.

                Peter backed quickly away, looking up at Ms. Watson in time to witness a broad smile of recognition. A nod, oddly humble. He felt his liver rotate, and not just from trying to filter the rising scent.

                “Oh,” he exhaled. His arms hung limply at his sides. “Right.”

                “You catch my drift, honey?” Her voice actually dared to be playful. She took hold of the desk chair and dragged it steadily out from under the cold metal altar and deposited her overly toned rear end into it. The wheels groaned.

                “Y-Yeah.”
                “I see it as a mutually beneficial situation,” she explained. Ms. Watson placed her water bottle gently back on the desk and reached below the field of Peter’s vision, her bulging forearms fidgeting at ankle height. “There’s a way we can both be free of stress. You know, just doing a favor for each other. And it would mean so much to me, too.”

                “Uh-huh.”

                Peter didn’t allow himself to feel fear, though the revulsion was a little harder to withhold as his grinning gym teacher leaned back on the pad of her chair and hoisted both unfortunately bare and balmy feet up onto the tabletop. She slapped her palms down against her shins, indicatively massaging as her heels slid forward with a soft squeak. In a few seconds, she had each damp ped straight up and dwarfing Peter like a pair of linebackers.

                “Go on, sweet pea,” Ms. Watson encouraged. Her toes scrunched and flexed above. In turn, her entire sole to waned and stretched, gleaming dully with leftover perspiration. “Let’s get you a little exercise.”

                Plucking the neck of his shirt up higher and tugging it over his nose to impede the odor, Peter marched forward. He knew the score. Disgusted as it made him, now was not the time to be backing down in the face of adversity, no matter how angry it made him. Not after the hoops he’d had to jump in that office with his mother and the principal. This was for his friends, his costars, and the teachers who hadn’t decided to take advantage of their toy-sized student.

                And of course, this was for Lisa.

                Peter hooked his fists into the spongy sole of Ms. Watson’s right foot. Instantly his knuckles came away wet with salty sweat, but he didn’t pause. He plunged his fingers hard against the stippled wrinkles and began to knead. Bunching the thick, rubbery skin as close as he could against his fists, he punched it into submission, or as near as he could manage.

                “Mmm… that’s the spot, sweetie,” she said just a little too dreamily.

                Almost more grossed out by the woman’s sultry, nicotine-flavored commentary than he was by the landscape of sweat, Peter pressed on. He attacked the fleshy divets of her sole as high and as wide as he could reach. After a couple of minutes of solid work, a steadily formed droplet of sweat trickled down from her arch and along his thin wrist. The boy put his own legs to work as well, alternately kicking at her heel and digging the tips of his miniature shoes into the broad, rounded base of the woman’s sprint-swollen foot.

                When he was sure he’d covered every reachable square centimeter of the woman’s right foot, Peter regretfully turned his gaze to the untouched left one. It bobbed from side to side, as if trying to get his attention. Stifling a grunt, he coughed through the muted sourness of the air and took hold of her left instep.

                “Wait,” Ms. Watson said softly. “Sweet pea, go ahead and step back for me.”
                Unsure, Peter did as he was told, hoping to get through this as soon as possible through cooperation.

                “And you might want to get down, so I don’t knock you over.”

                “Get down? What fo-”

                Peter dropped to his knees, cowering just in time as Ms. Watson’s foot plopped over top of him. It didn’t go so far as to lay its full moist weight on the desktop with him between, but it was awfully close. A couple of inches of wiggle room was left underneath the woman’s musky sole. She chuckled, shifting her ankle as the ball of her foot settled heavily against Peter’s waist.

                “See, that’s the ticket,” she congratulated. “Now you’ve got all kinds of access.”

                Peter wriggled somewhat unsuccessfully, attempting to wrestle his way as far out from under her foot as he could manage. For leverage, he was forced to plant his hand between two of her middle toes. Promptly, she clenched both muscular digits together, entrapping him by the wrist.

                “Oops,” she snickered. “Sorry, sweet pea.”

                The toes relented their pressure after a few seconds, and Peter was able to wrench himself just far enough to free up his arms. His legs were still lodged awkwardly under his teacher’s bare, sticky sole. Of course, the commotion had easily caused the makeshift gas mask of his shirt to be tugged off his nose. Squeezing his cheek past the circled pad of the woman’s big toe was impossible without a firm greasing against his face.

                Shoving down his primal preoccupation with self-preservation, Peter resumed work. He rolled the rough weights of Ms. Watson’s toes against his palms; he dug his fingers into the tire-like grooves; he fished into the crevices when she parted them, coming away with gooey flecks of toejam smeared on his skin. The young man even went so far as to press his knees up as high as the heft of her sole would allow, compressing and undoing the athletic knots in her flesh. The boy tried to tell himself it was like working on a car, though of course that self-deception didn’t last long.

                By the time the final bell of the day rang, Peter’s uniform was more than soggy with both his own efforts and the imparted residue of his teacher’s extracurricular activities. Her sole peeled away from his legs, leaving the boy huddled alone on the desk, his fists still defiantly clenched into fists.

                “Oh, Clark…” the woman said. Her fingers languished against her cheeks, her thumb playing at the corner of her lips as she reached toward the floor to replace her socks and shoes as if nothing out of the ordinary had taken place. “…you’re such a generous student. I’ll be so sad to see you go someday.”

                A hunk of bread weighed heavily in Peter’s hand. His fingers dug meekly at the crusted texture. He had yet to take a bite out of it and, though he badly needed it in order to keep his strength up during the performance tonight, he doubted he was going to get down more than a few mouthfuls.

                Certainly, the boy had lived through his fair share of awkward mealtimes in the past. That time in the restaurant with the man and woman approaching Suzanne with an offer to turn Peter into the next scientific miracle was a major contender, especially in the flustered silence that followed after his mother shooed them away. There was, of course, the recent example of his little sister babying him to a logical extreme by forcefully spoon-feeding him pizza in front of his girlfriend, lest he burn his tongue on a bite. Then there was that time when the three siblings were all too young to know better and Erica had flicked her tiny brother into a bowl of lukewarm soup, wherein he’d lost more than a few soggy articles of clothing before their mother fished him out between a thumb and index finger, to the amused delight of his gawking sisters.

                But this dinner. This dinner was vying for the top spot.

                The Clarks’ evening meal was mostly silent, save for the hesitant chewing from both Suzanne and Erica, neither of whom looked any more interested in eating than did Peter. They seemed to just be making an effort to provide a good example for their little thespian. So far, it wasn’t working. Other than these soft tooth gnashings and gulps, the only punctuation to the hush was the occasional flare-up of Jessica’s sobbing.

                Just when Peter thought his younger sister, red in the face and puffy-eyed as she was after an hour of crying in her room earlier, was out of moisture, she seemed to produce more. A visible little puddle was pooled between her elbows on the surface of the table as she rested her fists against her temples, eyes clenched shut as she descended back into mournful reverie.

                She hadn’t said a single word to Peter since the toilet incident. And he wasn’t sure whether he was grateful or not for it.

                Each time Jessica’s crying rose back up to an audible, choking level, without fail Suzanne extended a hand to her daughter’s back, massaging the girl’s arms and gripping her hand until the moaning lowered in volume again. Erica, meanwhile, was mostly folded into herself, nowhere near as tense as her mother or sister, but making no attempt to engage.

                Peter set his bread hunk back on his tiny plate set and dusted the crumbs from his palms. All he wanted was to get to the show, so he could visibly demonstrate for his family his capacity to function in the world without 24/7 surveillance. As of now, he doubted any of the three women would’ve felt inclined to even let him leave the kitchen on his own. Not without a chaperone, just in case he encountered a killer gnat in the hallway.

                He sighed, then took a deep breath, embracing the painful delicacy of the table’s atmosphere.

                “Hey… um…” Peter began. Instantly, his mother and both sisters all locked their attention to him. Somehow it was much easier to feel intimidated with the three women who cared about him most in the whole world watching him with varying degrees of fear, even compared to the crowd of students and parents he’d be facing in a couple of hours’ time in the high school auditorium. Those people were nothing. This was the real show.

                “Yes?” Suzanne spoke up.

                “I just… I know everyone’s… freaked out. And I understand,” Peter muttered, mustering confidence and diplomacy from nowhere. “But… I’ve also worked really hard, and so have all my friends. I just… don’t want anyone to… you know, be hating seeing me up there, when… when I’ve…”

                Desperately, the boy shifted his gaze from Erica, who averted her eyes, to his mother, who, against all odds, actually provided him with a warm smile. She bobbed her head.

                “Of course, sweetie,” Suzanne managed, even as a single quaver rippled through her first two words. Clearly, she had yet to even begin recovering from this day, albeit handling it better than her youngest child. “And we’re excited to see you perform. We’re… all happy you’ve had this chance.”

                Peter sunk further back against his chair, relieved at his mother’s decree. Whether or not she fully believed those words herself, she was still willing to give this two-day trial period a fair shake. Which was all he needed.

                “Aren’t we?” Suzanne said, clearing her throat and aiming most of her volume at Erica.

                “Sure, twerp,” the girl said. She shrugged, and actually allowed herself a tired smile, which caught Peter by surprise. It was enough to give him a case of the warm and fuzzies, seeing that single corner of his older sister’s mouth tipped upward in a friendly-type gesture.

                “Jessica?” Suzanne whispered gently. She laid her hand back on her daughter’s narrow shoulder. “Aren’t you excited to see your brother on the stage?”

                Dragging her soft knuckles across her tear-stained cheeks, Jessica rubbed her pink eyes and sharply sniffled again. Her breathing was still irregular, bookended by gurgles from her throat. She gnawed on her lower lip. Only then did the distraught blonde extend a hand, her fingers outstretched, reaching across the table with only the slightest tremble. Her shadow arced over the plates and glasses, engulfing Peter and his place setting with the shade of her palm.

                At a speed just low enough to avoid blunt force trauma, Jessica’s hand plopped down. Her fingers cinched easily under Peter’s chair, securing him up against the bulwark of her tender palm. With her tiny older brother and his seat clenched in a clumsy handful, the teen hopped from her seat and shuffled at top speed for the front hallway and the staircase.

                “Jessica!” Suzanne called, rising from her seat but not giving immediate chase, either too taken aback or too understanding of her child’s gesture. Frankly, Peter was willing to bet the only reason his mother hadn’t done this exact same thing to him herself was the precious extra time she’d had today to process the event. He couldn’t bring himself to be shocked as he found himself squeezed against his sister’s damp, tear-soaked skin. The jostling of her escape didn’t let up until she’d double-hopped up every one of the stairs, sprinted down the carpeted upper hallway, and slammed her bedroom door shut with only a single flick of the lock before flinging her body into the bed.

                Peter was saved the impact, of course, by his sister’s conscientious clutching of him up against her stomach as she dove for the mattress. Still, it was a rockier ride than he was used to in the comfort of Jessica’s usually steady and accommodating palm.

                Retreating beneath the covers, the thirteen-year-old drew her miniature brother up toward her face as she curled into the blankets and her sorrow. There was a knock at the door and a soft call from Suzanne, then another, but no follow-up.

                “Jessie,” Peter proffered gently as he was smooshed with equal affection and desperation against the cushy pad of his younger sister’s cheek. A fresh tear trickled into his hair from above. It was tricky getting agency out of his limbs, as Jessica had him pinned fairly possessively up against her chin by all ten fingers. His clothes were wet now, and it was hard to say how much of it was the clamminess of her skin and how much was saltwater. Her palm cupped under his rear end, contouring his body naturally into the curvature of her head and into the folds of her now-matted hair.

                “Jessica?”

                The only response was a hard sniffle and a snort.

                “Jessie…” he repeated in his best lullaby voice. The boy managed to wrestle his arm free from under his sister’s enormous thumb and stroked the back of his hand down as much of her cheek as he could reach. He came away with a forearm almost sopping in her tears. “C’mon, talk to me. What’s up?”

                The girl’s head turned slightly. Jessica regarded him directly at last, blinking the water from her eyes. She was still attempting only semi-successfully to gulp air through the dregs of tears. Then her lips parted.

                As her mouth puckered loosely around the side of her brother’s head, warm air puffed in rough patterns from the back of her throat. She kissed him hard, soaking what little of his hair had avoided her tears with sticky spit, then pulled back, as if to distinguish the gesture as its own statement, then leaned back in for another. The girl planted six more rough, moist smooches upon her tiny sibling’s face, ensuring to draw back each time with enough force of suction that Peter’s neck was forced to brace. On the final kiss, a string of saliva dangled pathetically from her lower lip and onto the boy’s cheek: a phlegmy reminder of how long she’d cried today.

                “I appreciate it, but that’s not talking,” Peter insisted. He wiped the gooey strand off his face, though the moisture seemed to cling to his hand. Figured. Just to show he was sincere, the boy leaned up as far as he could and landed a light peck on the girl’s broad cheek.

                “We don’t need to talk,” Jessica groaned throatily, uttering her first words in probably hours.

                “Why not?”

                “Why do we?” she mumbled. “I’m just gonna keep you safe from now on. All the time.”

                “I’ve got this show in two hours, though. I know you want to see it. Don’t you?”

                “I did.”

                “But not anymore?”

                “Not as much as I want you to be safe,” Jessica replied. She lifted an index finger, planting it atop her brother’s head. With only the slightest pressure, she ushered him lower into the sandwich between her palms and cheek. Due to all the tear moisture, he slid easily back fully into her grasp. Her breathing was heavy as her lips hovered open, clearly contemplating landing some more soppy kisses on his head. “We’ll just stay here, in my room, for two hours, and they’ll have to get someone else to play you.”

                The boy studied her face. As childish and impetuous as the claim sounded, even for someone of her age, she was serious. Almost deliriously so.

                “And tomorrow?”

                “We’ll just stay in here until tomorrow night, I guess,” she croaked. Her eyelashes batted. “I have snacks in the drawer. And water. And you can sleep right here, with me, where I can watch you.”

                “Hate to break it to you, but you’ve got a whole life of your own, too,” Peter reminded her, patting her finger where it resided atop his head. “You can’t just pause everything cuz I had one little mishap.”

                “I can have my whole life and still keep you safe.”

                She said it with such unrelenting promise that the boy had no doubt that, if Suzanne and the general bounds of society allowed it, the girl would reshape her entire existence if it meant she could keep him clutched in her hands until the end of time. After the kind of day he’d had, for a fleeting instant, that didn’t seem so bad.

                But he was the big brother. And it was moments like this that his role as such became more important than ever.

                “Jessie…” he said. “Do you remember what you did for me back before I was even in the play for sure?”

                “What did I do?”

                “You… offered to quit dance lessons, just so Mom wouldn’t have an excuse not to drive me home from school. You were willing to give up what you love for long enough to let me have a chance at finding something to love. You know?”

                Jessica shrugged mutedly, batting her eyes some more, and wiping away a stray tear with her thumb before it could plunk onto Peter’s face.

                “I thought that was… super cool of you. But it wasn’t just then. It was before school even started. I mean, before anyone else… before anyone else… you were believing in me. Just you.”

                “I… know.”

                “And… I guess now, I need you to… try to remember what that felt like again. To believe in me that much,” Peter said, chewing his lip. His head slumped against the wall of his giant sister’s curled fingers. “That I could take care of myself well enough to… be something.”

                Jessica nodded, or at least what Peter interpreted as a nod as her entire body seemed to lurch deeper into the covers. Her other hand formed a ceiling above his primary source of light and air, trapping him into a cocoon of her fingers as she pressed her head deeper into the pillow.

                For an instant, Peter was deflated. That was basically his ace in the hole.

                “Can we at least stay here a little longer?” Jessica piped quietly. “Just until it’s time to go to your show?”

                Almost laughing aloud with relief, the freshman shook his head until he thought it would come detached. He aggressively stroked his sister’s chin in the dim light.

                “Of course we can.”

                Putting on a smile for what seemed the first time in ages, Jessica cleared her throat, then plastered her brother’s face into the plush mound of her sticky lips for one last thick, mushy kiss of reassurance, which Peter was only too happy to endure. He suspected this bargain he’d struck would also include some increased mealtime supervision and probably a couple of sleepovers, but he didn’t even care about that. In fact, he even allowed himself to get comfortable in the pocket of fingers and palms that surrounded him on all sides, leaning his cheek down against the soft pad of his little sister’s hand and closing his eyes.

                Maybe, just maybe, there was a way to correct all of this mess after all.

                The Friday night lights of the public high school’s auditorium bathed Peter in the burning-hot luster of the glorious acceptance he’d been dreaming of. Admittedly, a lot of that nonsense was probably his own value assigned to the feeling of standing up here on the final evening of Grimm-a-Palooza. Still, it felt pretty damned good. Up there with his first kiss with Lisa, though obviously not quite there.

                The crowd was still on its feet applauding as the rest of the cast and crew filed out onto the stage for bows. Shimmering gowns and homemade tunics, feathered caps and plastic knives, all shuffling into a flurry of color and generosity, most of them casting a glance to their tiny costar where he stood on the outstretched palm of Rapunzel.

                Peter didn’t want to get carried away with his minute share of ego in all this, but the reaction was even bigger than it had been the night before. Longer laughs, even howls, at the terrible fairy tale puns, nearly every joke landing so heavily that the cast had to take pauses, holding back smiles of self-satisfaction at their work. The toy-sized Tom Thumb found it miraculous how many he received, especially with all his prior worries about his incredibly small microphone hooked around his waist being able to carry his voice.

                The first time he heard his lines boom out across the entire room with nearly the same pitch as his titanic classmates, it was a personal culture shock, to be sure. He’d never commanded a room so thoroughly as he did last night and this.

                His mother and younger sister, of course, were wonderfully ingratiating after the Thursday night performance. Apparently his pep talks to both before the show were just the ticket. Suzanne couldn’t stop beaming all the way out of the crowded auditorium and out to the parking lot: a stark contrast to her grim mood earlier that day. And Jessica, having made perhaps the widest emotional leap after earlier threatening gently to keep her brother hostage in her bed until the show was over, went back to her normally bubbly disposition, chattering on and on about all the best jokes from the play as she cradled him in her palms on the walk back to the car. Of course, Lisa began what was to be a day-long gushing etude to Peter’s act of playing a comically timed and magically tiny fairy tale figure.

                And the reactions on Friday during the school day were just as promising as he’d hoped. Dozens of students congratulating him on the journey up the sidewalk from the bus, a handful more in each class. Even teachers coming up to him after the period ended to congratulate on his achievement. Lisa still giggling and carrying on about the best parts of the show. Alita almost speechless with snickering in memory of her three art class comrades. Even better, the school was distinctly and wonderfully empty of Mandy. And, perhaps the best reaction of all, he received utter ignorance of his presence from Sharon, Amy, and Kimmy. Not even a glance. Peter could’ve just about kissed every single last one of them. Maybe not that far, but it was nonetheless the best mood he’d been in these past two rather trying days.

                And so he stood, chest puffed up, chin toward the ceiling, arms broad and grateful to the audience as Peter stood in the hand of his lovely costar, balanced on the skillfully still plank of her willowy palm. The lights narrowed down onto the line of cast members and stage crew stretched from one end of the stage to the other. Peter was near the center of it all. Dozens upon dozens of eyes laid on him and all his hardworking friends. Even while standing directly in the palm of someone’s hand, the boy hadn’t felt quite so tall in a while.

                He didn’t need a normal-sized stage. This one, the one tailored to his unique traits, was plenty.

                Peter hadn’t caught himself feeling that way in months.

                Through the blinking flash of cameras from the audience finally allowed to capture the moment in photos, Peter squinted into the harsh mélange of lights from above and beyond. Many of the student faces were ones he knew, or at the very least recognized from the daily trudges into the school upon his sister’s palm. Near the middle, he could make out his entire family: Suzanne and Jessica back again and clapping up a storm, of course, and Erica, just as promised; even she had managed a smile to accompany her modest applause. Beside her sat Lisa for the second time, also as promised, grinning ear-to-ear and looking intent on turning her palms red from aggressive shoulder-width clapping. Peppered throughout the rest of the crowd, Peter could spy others: some of the seniors who shouted advice to him at the bus stop, Jason from algebra, and Alita back again, with both fingers at the corners of her mouth to whistle.

                Then Peter’s eyes fell to the front row for what he realized was the first time tonight.

                By the center aisle, all seated with legs crossed, hands folded in laps: Sharon, Amy, and Kimmy. Perhaps the only ones in the theater not standing for the ovation. The squat strawberry blonde more than once lifted her hands, as if about to join in the applause, but Amy quickly halted this gesture by stretching an arm over her much smaller friend’s stomach.

                Though the trio fell below the line of the beaming lights from the back of the theater, Sharon’s missile-targeting pupils glowed with moonlit purpose. They were aligned perfectly with the boy’s skull. She smirked.

                Peter snapped his attention away from his opponent and forced the smile back into his expression. He waved in all directions, bending to bow on his costar’s hand, and was careful not to look back at Sharon during this particular act lest she get any crude ideas about its intention. Genuflecting didn’t necessarily seem inappropriate where that group of girls was concerned.

                Bluebell did her best to bow halfway down without compromising the steadiness of her hand: something she’d practiced multiple times more than was needed, in Peter’s opinion, to get it perfect. Calvin, standing just next to the girl, laid out his hand for the planned pass-off. Tom Thumb stepped nimbly from the slender fingertips of Rapunzel to the waiting palm of Jack and the Beanstalk. Once there, Bluebell could make her full bow, and Peter could join in the rest of the cast and crew for a final bend. Save for his silver-eyed tormenter, no gazes lingered any longer on him than the rest.

                He’d made it. He wasn’t just the odd limb; he was a part of these people. Peter knew it in his bones.

                “Peter, that was so… so…” Lisa mumbled, star-struck.

                “Familiar?” the boy chuckled as he stood on the changing room desk. He was mere minutes away from being carpooled over to his girlfriend’s for a late movie night which was sure to include ample amounts of popcorn and making out. As if the evening couldn’t get any more phenomenal.

                “No! Stop it,” Lisa joked. She extended her index finger, pressing it up against Peter’s open palm, which he happily accepted. With her other hand, she delicately patted the colorful bow she’d tied into her fiery hair.

                “Well, wasn’t it? You saw the show twenty-four hours ago.”

                “And that was long enough for my tastes.”

                “Uh-huh. I bet you wouldn’t have said that if it went all week.”

                “If you say so. I could’ve worn some funny-colored glasses, just to shake it up,” Lisa said.

                “I bet you’d be cute in funny-colored glasses.”

                Lisa blushed, holding back another giggle as she traced a fingertip down the boy’s back. She peeked over her shoulder at the door to ensure they were alone in the cramped, prop-littered room, then leaned down in one windy swoop, planting a kiss upon his face.

                “I should suggest funny-colored glasses more often,” Peter chuckled, wiping his mouth.

                “Hey, I suggested those, you thief.”

                “Did you? I don’t see it in writing.”

                Lisa set down her hand for Peter to embark, which he cheerfully did, careful not to stretch the hand-stitched pants of his miniature costume on the way up. It took the combined effort of the costumer plus his mother’s intimate knowledge of how to knit clothes for someone so small to craft this thing. Even though the show was over now, Peter couldn’t help but feel a certain attachment to the goofy green-and-red tunic with its shimmering faux-crushed-velvet appearance which helped him stand out better on such a large stage.

                In some goofy way, he’d be attaching the joy of this night to the feeling of wearing this costume for a while. Part of him wondered if he’d be allowed to keep it. Not to wear again, necessarily, but at least to hold up against himself in the mirror for the occasional reminder of the day he’d truly been fully accepted and integrated into the school populace. It wasn’t like they’d ever be able to use it for another cast member, after all.

                He shuffled playfully in Lisa’s palm until she’d taken him up to her lips, where they engaged in a couple more quick, wet pecks, all while each kept a glancing eye toward the open door since the occasional half-dressed cast member still dashed by.

                “Lisa. Lisa Carol.” The voice crackled from the ceiling-mounted loudspeaker just outside the dressing room in the same tone that the entire school building now heard. It sounded to Peter like the office secretary who’d watched over him for the last day and a half of classes. “You have a call waiting in the front office from home. Please come to the front office. Lisa Carol.”

                “That’s weird,” Peter said.

                “Yeah,” Lisa said. Her brow furrowed. “Must be my mom. She… knows where I am, I thought. She was supposed to pick us up and take us to my house. Right?”

                “I thought so. My mom said she’d pick me up afterward,” Peter said. He shrugged. “Guess you better go.”

                “You… wanna come?”

                “Nah, I have to get out of the puffy shoulder pads,” Peter said, prodding at the rainbow adornments he still wore. “Unless you want me to wear them for movie night.”
                “I think I’ll just take the regular you,” Lisa smarmed. She delicately lowered her hand back atop the desk, where a series of folded cloth and jewelry boxes had been stacked by the stage crew to give Peter his own miniature private changing space. “Unless you’re just dying to-”

                “Go answer your mom,” Peter laughed, waving his girlfriend off. He tugged at the neck of his tunic. “These things are starting to get hot.”

                “Okay. I’ll be back in a couple minutes,” she said. “Hottie.” The redhead pressed two fingers to her lips, delivered a gentle air kiss with one last wistful glance, then backed out of the room and into the thin hallway along the rear of the auditorium.

                Peter shook his head in disbelief at his continued good fortunes. He yanked his arms into the cloth sockets in preparation to begin the laborious process of removing his costume. Already half-disappeared into his dressing room, he made due with what little light could trickle in behind the obstacles placed up to give him some privacy. They really were a thoughtful group.

                Footsteps entered the room. Heavy, purposeful, insistent. Probably one of his castmates who had to wear large strapped-on clogs to gain some height for playing one of the giant or ogre characters. Frankly, he was surprised he hadn’t heard any of them come in sooner. The night before, this hallway had seen much higher foot traffic as everyone busily tugged off sweaty costumes to head home.

                “Hey!” Peter yelled out, half-laughing. “This space over here is occupied!” He’d learned to make this call after Bluebell had accidentally stepped above the desk and seen him just in his skivvies during a dress rehearsal. It was worth announcing his presence to avoid similar blushing disasters.

                The footsteps continued, actually growing quieter despite their increased proximity, as the desk was wobbling softly enough to let him know the owner of those falling shoes was approaching his changing station.

                Glad he hadn’t yet pulled himself out of the costume, Peter peeked casually out of the opening in his makeshift changing room. He wasn’t met with the sight of a costumed giant made-up with dirt, rags, and unibrow, nor an ogre with false teeth and plastic club dragging behind like a vow of oncoming war.

                No, what he saw was far more frightening. Something that, in spite of the lingering brow heat bestowed by the stage lights, had drained the color from the boy’s veins.

                A figure of average size towered above, a hoodie drawn over her head, strings pulled tight. In the shade of the facial opening, though, a few tangled strands of auburn hair draped through. A feminine hand poked from the sleeve and arose, hovering at the neck, as fingers twirled through her hair in a manner Peter had only become far too familiar with. Like a concert violinist, warming up for her solo. He could’ve recognized her from that movement alone, even without seeing her face, though of course now, at such near distance, he could see her face. And he wished, wished more than anything else in the whole world right now, that he couldn’t see it.

                Mandy.

                “Well, hey, little boy,” she hissed, a crooked grin greasing her lips.

                “HELP!”

                Peter didn’t even have the time to fire off a second scream before her hand was coming down, far more emergent and forceful than the day before. In one swift flight, her fingers had clamped like steel around his limbs, locking him into a ball-shape against her clammy palm. A flash later, she had him stuffed into the deep two-sided pocket of her hoodie, which she was easily able to block off with a hand on either side. The boy tumbled from palm to palm as she ran, fruitlessly thrashing and yelling until he found her thumb pressed against his mouth, muting his cries.

                He heard the metallic creak of the backstage door and the thundering of footsteps muffled by grass as Mandy sprinted off into the dark November night, somehow unseen by a single soul.

                “Okay, that makes sense,” Peter said as he stood in the low forest of grass by his sister’s ankle. “If somebody just grabs me, get them to open their hand first so I can get out. But… I mean, I can’t do that anywhere.”

                “Duh,” Erica said, rolling her eyes. “Like when they’re standing up.”

                “I could try and land on something soft.”

                Erica extended her index finger, nudging her tiny sibling in the forehead in lieu of a sporting smack. She snorted. “C’mon, be serious, twerp. If I’m gonna be able to help you, you can’t be thinking like you’re Superman. You’d break half your bones.”

                “So what am I supposed to do, then?” he asked.

                “Use your head. Limit the panic. If somebody’s holding you and you’re way above the ground, you’re probably gonna freak out a little bit. It’s kind of inevitable, and it’s not cuz you’re not brave enough or whatever, it’s just cuz of what’s happening and it’s a long way down. So the first thing to do is just get calm. As calm as you can get.”

                “Right,” Peter said, intaking a deep breath as he awaited his sister’s fingers closing around him again for another practice session. “Just get calm.”

                Peter clung firmly to the dense folds of Mandy’s hoodie pocket. His body was surprisingly loose otherwise, considering he was hidden like a kangaroo joey on the person of someone who was riding one-handed on a bicycle down the side of a gravelly road. The clothen tunnel of her pocket was dark, as the girl had one hand cupped around his body inside her oversized attire. What little creeping light managed to make it in between her fingers was only offered by the passing street lamps, as the sun had set nearly two hours earlier. The November chill certainly made itself in, though, and in that way, Peter was in fact fitfully grateful for the warmth offered by his captor’s clammy palm.

                His heart was hammering, as he’d imagined it would on those rare but nauseating experiences throughout his life when he’d conceived of this scenario. Not this exact scenario, obviously; when he was seven years old, having nightmares about being grabbed when his mother wasn’t looking, it was always a vampire or demon from one of those cable horror movies he’d accidentally seen when Erica left the channel on.

                Not an emotionally unbalanced fifteen-year-old with anger issues and a squeaky bike wheel.

                Incredibly, Peter realized he probably would’ve preferred a vampire or demon right now. At least with those, you could most likely predict what was going to happen. Blood suck or soul theft. Straightforward stuff.

                With Mandy, there was never any knowing for sure, and that was when he was in the relative safety of the high school with witnesses surrounding him on all sides. Right now, what was more frightening was the prospect that whatever thinly mustered social manners the girl displayed in public had finally been abandoned.

                Erica’s words rang in Peter’s ears, louder even than the zing of the bike spokes and the spitting of pebbles out from under the spinning tires.

                Calm. Calm. Calm. Panic wouldn’t do him any favors. And in this moment, when didn’t have control over his own body, keeping a stable grip on his mental state was of paramount importance. That much made sense. Peter exhaled, resting his back muscles as he sunk against Mandy’s waiting palm still cozied rigidly around him up against her stomach. A low gurgle sounded from within as he pressed his ear to the fabric.

                Get calm.

                Subconsciously, Peter had busied himself with trying to keep track of how long they’d been riding, and in what direction. Initially, he’d done so for his own muscle memory benefit, in case Mandy stopped nearby and, by some lottery odds, accidentally offered an escape opportunity. In that instance, he’d want to know which direction to run and roughly for how long. After they’d been riding for almost ten minutes, though, Peter had to abandon that idea, and instead take mental notes, in case another chance arose that didn’t involve him being forced to run for probably the equivalent of a week straight without stopping. If he couldn’t beat her hand into submission for fear of gravity, it would be helpful to gather all the data he could for alternate use.

                The gravel crunching beneath the tires gave way finally to quieter earth, probably concrete. Frequent bumps still dotted the ride. On these punctuation points, Peter was thrust upward in the pocket, but kept restrained by Mandy’s fingers, which tensed whenever she felt the next one coming. The boy resolved to keep still and let her do her thing on these occasions. He had more pressing matters to worry about (left turn, right turn, right, left, right), and if he knew one thing about Mandy, he knew she wasn’t going to waste this alone time by allowing him to tumble out of her pocket at fourteen miles per hour.

                At last the bumping of the road fell away, replaced with a consistently uneven path that rattled Peter’s innards, vibrating his entire body in teeth-chattering pace. The massive palm surrounding him tightened in response, keeping in the center for safety, or maybe just for restraint. If he had to guess, they were riding on grass. Mandy’s bike came to a stop less than a minute later.

                Peter felt the rocking of Mandy’s shoes hitting the dirt on either side of the vehicle. The thrust of her hips as she punted the bike’s kick stand into place. Her palm cupped beneath his body now, bundling him into a fuller grasp. Her broad thumb plied against the underside of his neck, keeping his head held high. No new words had been exchanged since she snatched him from the table twenty minutes ago with a simple, slimy greeting and one of her trademark bone-curdling smiles.

                Which Peter didn’t necessarily object to, but in the stillness and relative solitude of this night, he was beginning to wish for some communication. Even if it was with the girl who, forty hours before, dropped him in a toilet and threatened to flush him to Kingdom Come.

                They were walking now. Mandy was in no hurry, it seemed. A fence tittered as its wooden spokes were dragged along overgrown crabgrass. The girl’s footsteps landed unevenly in the earth as she meandered at a steady stroll through what Peter assumed was the yard of her house, but of course, there was no way to be sure of that yet when he was still in the dark, literally and figuratively.

                Peter thought of Lisa. He had to imagine she was looking for him now for their planned movie night date. Not in a panic. Not yet, anyway.

                Which was good; he wished that preliminary time would last as long as possible, to avoid straining her heart and mind. Probably, Lisa assumed either Jessica or his mother had gone into the dressing room and collected him. Probably she was looking for him right now, mere minutes away from going from curious hesitation to distraught horror at realizing he wasn’t in approved hands while she took the call in the office.

                The call.

                It certainly was conveniently timed, Peter decided. Sure, Lisa didn’t have a cell phone, which explained why her parents would’ve needed to reach her at the school’s front office in a necessary situation, but it didn’t explain something else. Mrs. Carol was supposed to pick the pair of them up and carpool them back to Lisa’s house. She knew when the show ended; in fact, Lisa had confirmed the exact time on three separate occasions during the day. Why could she have reason to call, when she was probably mere minutes from pulling up to the curb of the school?

                Peter shook his head, rapping a knuckle at his cranium. That had to just be the latent panic building. Paranoia. He was likely to experience a rush of conflicting emotions in a situation like this; that was what Erica had told him, and he believed it. Best not to think of those things too much in this moment. They weren’t important in the immediate future. Right now, his only job was to collect information and keep Mandy from becoming upset.

                Easier thought than done, of course.

                Light trickled into the pocket now. A screen door slammed hard against its frame. The air was considerably warmer, stuffy almost, and Peter knew they were indoors now. Mandy’s fingers shifted to and fro along his back, scrunching the fabric of his costume which he had unfortunately been unable to change out of before being kidnapped. Her thumb ruffled his hair, then ran down to his shoulders, rubbing the itchy fabric hard into his skin. Peter heard the popping of the delicate threading coming undone thanks to Mandy’s pulling.

                In one swoop, the dim lighting between the cracks of Mandy’s fingers was traded for bright, blooming kitchen bulbs. Peter braced himself as the girl’s hand drew her prize fully from her hoodie pocket. He focused on draining away the fringes of the terror, displaying a face of cool collectedness.

                She could make him afraid, but she couldn’t make him show it.

                Mandy remained silent for another minute or so as she held him with surprisingly gentleness in upturned palms, at least compared to the prior times Peter had spent in her grasp. She wasn’t exactly cradling him as she rested her arms on the table of the narrow kitchen and sunk into a chair. Her fingers were working him over still, toying with the sleeves and hems of his Tom Thumb costume, simultaneously keeping him pinned to her hand; still, it wasn’t painful, and he could breathe.

                Data. Data. Data.

                Peter tried not to be too obvious as he centered himself in the space. A quick glance around the cramped room, countertops piled high with miscellaneous junk, and Peter realized the dining space of Mandy’s house was smaller even than his own bedroom. The aging light bulb overhead cast a macabre halo around the crown of his captor, but morphed a darkness beneath her eyes. Her index finger pressed to his cheek, forcing him to refocus his gaze squarely on her.

                “Okay, my little Peter Rabbit,” Mandy intoned softly. “What should we do together?”

                Peter blearily cupped his hand over his eyes to shade from the dusty kitchen light above. Laid against Mandy’s cold fingers, he drank in the last details of the meager kitchen space, then looked into those chemically imbalanced hazel eyes above.

                “Uhh… could we maybe go back the way we came?”

                “I don’t think so.”

                “You sure?”

                “I’m sure,” Mandy snickered almost playfully, which was more than a little unsettling to hear, but to Peter’s ears, it was infinitely preferable to that darkly stern tone she occasionally snapped in and out of like a light switch. “Happy” wasn’t necessarily “good” when it came to Mandy, but it was tenfold times better than “angry.” Yes, angry was a thing to avoid.

                “Um…”

                “I’m still waiting for suggestions. Good ones, not stupid ones like you just said. And don’t try and say you want to meet my mom or something sneaky, cuz she doesn’t get home from work ‘til like two in the morning. And I wouldn’t let you meet her anyway.”

                Great. That little tidbit wasn’t inspiring much confidence in his odds of enduring the night.

                “Suggestions…” Peter breathed. “…for…”
                Mandy beamed as broadly as possible; her grin reminded Peter of a small child trying to ruin a family portrait with the most literal interpretation of a big smile. Each of her index fingers took turns bopping the top of Peter’s head, not hard enough to jar, but plenty present to remind him that he was currently laid between her two hands with no witnesses around.

                “It’s just that I’d been thinking super-hard after they suspended me yesterday. After the stuff you said about me. Maybe we… you know, kinda got off on the wrong foot as friends.”

                Peter raised an eyebrow. Unexpected. He could work with this.

                “Okay.”

                “Don’t try to say you didn’t call me crazy again, or I’ll be unhappy with you,” Mandy said, her voice a momentary hiss before she replaced it with another cheery smirk. “You did some things to me, I did some things to you… but that doesn’t matter right now, because we’re starting over.”

                “I see.”

                “I mean, it must be super weird for you, being the only teeny-tiny boy in a giant school full of giant people,” Mandy continued. “I get that maybe you think you’re special enough to be mean to people just cuz you can get away with it, cuz no one wants to hurt the precious little teeny-tiny boy.”

                “I… I don’t think that-”

                “Don’t interrupt me, please,” Mandy coughed. Her thumb nudged Peter upside the head, compressing his Adam’s apple a little rougher than was comfortable. He couldn’t quite complain, though, as it was maybe the first time he’d heard her say please; it sounded unnatural.

                “Anyway,” she sighed, “I’m kinda like you in a lot of ways. I can see that now. That was sort of what the school counselor lady was telling me yesterday. She wants me to think of us as... being in the same boat, I think she said. See, you’ve got your super tiny-ness, and I’ve got my medicine and… well, my own stuff. But it makes it harder for us to make friends sometimes.”

                Peter made a mental note to send that school counselor a fruit basket, assuming he got out of this alive.

                “So I figured, since you’re too small to take yourself anywhere to try and make new friends again, I’d just take care of it for you. And now we can!” Mandy cocked her head like an expectant animal, awaiting a treat to drop. Her tangled auburn knots fell over her cheek.

                “That was… nice of you,” Peter said. For the first time ever with this girl, he wasn’t quite 100% lying. Close to it, but not quite. Enough of his psyche was impacted by the girl’s utter turnaround thanks to the miraculous healing power of high school guidance counseling. Somewhere deep down, he felt some pity for this girl who was clearly going through a real trip this semester, absurd as it was to feel bad for her.

                “I know!” Mandy stood back up without warning, keeping Peter pinned by his wrists into her palm. His legs were flung awkwardly upward on the ascent, but she kept him in place. The legs of her kitchen chair grated like nails on a chalkboard. “And just to show you that there’s no… what’s the words? Hard feelings. To show you there’s no hard feelings, and that I really wanna start over, you’re gonna pick our first thing we do together. Cuz that’s what I’d want to do. You know, the gold rule, like the counselor lady was talking about.”

                Peter gnawed the inside of his cheek. He’d been in more than a few situations in his life where a seemingly well-meaning but ultimately self-serving giant had offered him a false choice only to reveal there was, in fact, a correct answer to a rather selfish question. Despite all Mandy’s explanation of turning a new leaf, she was still a fickle leaf who could probably blow right back over at the slightest breeze. And either way, he had no real reason to believe she wasn’t faking anyway, just to pull a rug out from under him. Picking a kosher activity would be vital.

                Something to give his hopeful rescuers time to track him down.

                “I’m waiting, Peter Rabbit.”

                “Uh… how about… that movie you… wanted to watch?” Peter offered awkwardly. “The scary ones.” Scary or not, anything that got Mandy to sit still and refocus her attention on a screen instead of his body sounded like the optimal choice.

                “Ooohhh…” she murmured, emphatically bobbing her head. Her locks whipped up and down past Peter’s cheeks as her fingers continued idly prodding at his head. “You mean the ScreamSight movies.”

                “Y-Yeah. That’s it.”

                “So now you wanna see them, huh?”

                “Well, uh… we’re here, after all. Might as well.”

                “You’re right,” Mandy confirmed brightly. “We are here.”

                As his eyes wandered nonchalantly from side to side, anywhere but centered on his captor’s waiting catlike irises, Peter spied something in the corner, past the threshold of the cramped kitchen. A dimly lit, tightly angled offshoot more akin to a broom closet, though just along the edge of the door jamb, surrounded by littered shoes, he could make out the skeletal frame of something. A cage, made of cheap black-painted metal, and probably tall enough to reach Mandy’s stomach. Dog cage? A dog was definitely going to complicate things.

                Not that things weren’t already so hopelessly complicated that even throwing a Bengal tiger into the mix wasn’t necessarily going to make things any better or worse.

                They were, indeed, here.

                “I hope you don’t get scared easy,” Mandy said with a shrug. “They’re pretty freaky.”

                “I’ll bet,” Peter said. “But I’ll be all right.”
                “I hope so,” she snickered, leaning back against the grimy kitchen counter. She rested the fist containing her five-inch classmate against her stomach, staring down at him along the length of her abdomen. “Lucky you got me here to protect you if it gets too rough, ya know?”

                “Better than being alone, any day.”
                “I’m glad to hear you say that, little guy,” Mandy slurred. Her fist coiled ever so slightly more firmly around Peter’s ribcage, clenching his chest against the broad plain of her gelid palm. “Obviously, we’re gonna need snacks if we’re gonna watch a movie.”

                “That’s… um, true.”

                “What d’you think you’d want to eat, huh?” Relievingly, Mandy’s fist arose from its perch on her slanted stomach and came around overtop of the countertop. An inch from its surface, the girl’s fingers parted at last, and Peter was released onto the gritty surface, speckled with soap scum and old food grease. It looked like something out of an abandoned army barracks mess hall. Stacks of only half-cleaned plates were lined behind where he stood.

                Peter shuffled his shoes against the cheaply tiled ground, reminding himself of just how limited his range of motion was, given that he was still entrapped in his theater costume. He could stretch his legs most of the way, but the tunic wasn’t especially forgiving. If an opportunity to run presented itself, unlikely a chance though it was, his full sprint speed wasn’t going to be available to him, not unless he found a way to lose the costume.

                The wall of Peter’s stomach was becoming so lined with knots he could hardly process new ones anymore. Odds were, even if his clothes came off somehow or other in Mandy’s vicinity, he was likely to have much bigger problems then. At most, he could begin to stealthily form tears in the cloth to give him a better range of motion for escape, but that would be a tricky order with Mandy so near.

                “Well?” Mandy piped from over by one of the cabinets where she’d moved. Her hands shoved roughly through near-empty boxes of oatmeal and crackers. Just as a secondhand reaction to gaining geographic distance from her, Peter’s heartrate settled down by a few beats per minute. “I’m waiting. What do little fairy boys like you eat, anyway?”

                “Uh… any… anything you’ve got,” Peter said. He shoved his hands in his pockets, busying himself with exploring the possibility of amending the stitching of his tunic with some silent plucking. As precise a seamstress as his mother had become over the years, even her needlework was only as fine as her fingertips could allow, and Peter could feel the delicate stitching with his fingernails. With some work, they might be severed. But he needed time.

                “Here.”

                Peter flinched as Mandy came barreling back toward him from the opposite counter, her hand extended, fingers pinched around something tiny and fire-engine red, the size of a small pill.

                “What?” Peter almost gasped. He winced, taking a step back to reclaim the same spot on the counter as the girl’s enormous cupped hand lowered toward him, with a veritable heap of the tiny red pods piled in her palm.

                Mandy giggled. “You gotta start relaxing if we’re gonna be friends, little guy. If I was gonna hurt you, I coulda done it super easy when I first got you at the school, you know?”

                “That’s true,” Peter almost choked, deciding to keep to himself the fact that this little tidbit meant almost nothing when it came to someone as emotionally changeable as Mandy. “What is this?”

                “It’s our snack, since you took so long to vote. I just picked it myself. It’s good.” As if to demonstrate she wasn’t trying to force-feed him rat poison, the girl scooped up a few of the evidently sticky crimson spheres in her fingertips and drew them into her lips with a satisfied crunch. She wiped her mouth. “Go on. Eat one.”

                “Oh… r-”

                “Now.”

                That was enough of a rhetorical argument for Peter. He leaned forward, careful to only put minimal balancing weight on the ends of Mandy’s long fingers as he grasped for the smallest red ball he could reach in the pile. The shell of it felt spongy in his palm as he held it like an apple and pressed it against his teeth, ever-watchful of Mandy’s instantly imperious eyes above.

                Peter coughed, feeling as if someone had poured a combination of cinnamon and chili powder directly down his throat via intubation. The insides of his cheeks burned, only subtly at first, in the way of over-spiced food, but after a few seconds it turned to outright stinging. He felt his shoes involuntarily dancing, the discomfort rising by the instant as whatever variety of spicy candy the girl had just insisted on wracked his jaws.

                Mandy was reduced to fits of cackling laughter. With a single scoop, she tossed the remaining pile of hot sweets over her teeth, crunching hard on them with her back molars as she leaned back on the counter for support. She nearly crumpled to the ground on her knees with sheer eye-watering mirth at the joke, though Peter suspected at least part of the reaction came from all the candy in one bite.

                “What…” he hacked meekly. “What is that?”

                “Hot Heads. Spiciest candy you can get in this stupid town. I don’t think they’re hot enough, though, so sometimes I put in some extra with the little needle in the cabinet when I get bored,” Mandy explained between remaining peals of giggling. She rose back to her feet, slapping a red-stained palm hard on the counter a few inches from Peter. “How do you like it?”

                “It kind of hurts,” Peter mumbled, massaging his lymph nodes.

                “Don’t be such a baby,” Mandy insisted. “You barely ate half the one I gave you. You better finish it by the time we get downstairs, or I’ll put even more stuff in them and then you’ll wish you’d tried them when they weren’t so bad.”

                Glumly, Peter nibbled on the rind of the candy, feeling his lips resisting anew to the unnatural sensations. His smaller and thus more sensitive olfactory nerves were not taking the girl’s mandate especially well.

                He felt the shakes returning as Mandy’s sugar-and-spice streaked palm opened back up. She snatched him roughly back between cool fingers and smeared the sticky crimson remains into his costume, treating him to an ensconcing aroma of the stuff as she scooped up the full bag of candy and made for the narrow hallway.

                Peter shook his head, trying and failing to work through the brunt of the spice as Mandy swung the creaky basement door open in the shadow-shrouded hallway, too deep and narrow for him to see the end. He knew he should count himself lucky if high Scoville scales were the most painful treats awaiting him this night, but that just seemed like foolishly wishful thinking.

                Mandy clomped down the wooden stairs in pitch black, knowledgeable of the steps’ locations beneath the soles of her shoes by heart without sight, but leaving Peter to wonder if, at any instant, she’d go tumbling down the winding case with him still in hand. That feeling still lingered in his beleaguered throat as she reached ground floor again and flicked on the lights.

                “You know what park rangers tell people when they get lost in the woods, right?”

                “No,” Peter told his older sister. He flashed her a sideways smirk, shrugging his shoulders. “Never been lost in the woods. So I never had the opportunity.”
                “Look, smart aleck, you know what they say. STAY WHERE YOU ARE. And you need to think of that as applying to you, too, if something ever happens and you’re with someone you don’t really want to be with,” Erica explained. She shifted her leg in the grass of the reservoir hill, planting her hand between her tiny brother and her shoe to keep him shepherded back. “Got it?”

                “How am I not going to stay where I am if someone has me?”

                “Because I know you. You’ll be plotting something.”

                “Who, little ol’ me?”

                “The jokes aren’t making this go any faster, you know,” she groused, drumming her fingers on her knee. “Just don’t be making plans. There’s no need to make a situation worse if you’re in a bad spot. Just go with the flow. And if you can, do something to keep them there. The person who has you, I mean. Whatever it is.”

                “That sounds like a plot to me,” Peter said, elbowing his sister in the ankle.

                “Call it whatever you want,” she said, prodding him right back in the shoulder. “Just stay put.”

                Just as predictably as the sun rising, Mandy had changed her mind about Peter’s movie suggestion within a minute of setting foot in the half-finished basement. Albeit, her selection process for new activities was usually anything than but predictable.

                “You know what, Peter Rabbit? I don’t think I’m into seeing the movie yet. It’s too early at night. You gotta watch scary movies late. Late-late. You know?”

                “I think I do,” Peter said. Just so long as they stuck around in this area, his odds of rescue went up.

                The tiny freshman, still recovering at an atomic level from the Hot Heads candy she’d forced him to take, propped his head back against Mandy’s tightly coiled thumb and tried to drink in as much information as he could while he had a broad view of the space.

                Rafters in various stages of decay and repair stretched the length of the irregularly rectangular basement. The walls were painted asylum-white, but the level of chipping suggested it was done long before either of them was born. As he guessed, a rabbit-ears TV on an old dresser occupied one side, with a mealy-looking couch facing it. To Peter’s surprise, a computer, ancient and bulky as it was, rested on a desk in the corner. Various boxes of machinery marking the last couple of decades of technological progress rested atop one another in dusty black towers along the wall, though much of it littered the floor. Cardboard boxes dotted the ground behind the couch in random patterns, most of them stuffed with various household paraphernalia, and some completely empty.

                Peter couldn’t help but note the sheer amount of cover present in the room. Boxes, cables, computer devices, shriveled plastic Christmas trees, and stacked lawn chairs missing legs. While still dangerous, it wasn’t inconceivable that he could find a hiding place in here, if fate decreed he was to receive another chance at freedom. If only Mandy let her guard down. Where he’d go next was anyone’s guess, but it was a start.

                “Here it is. The movie theater,” Mandy announced with a soft snicker beneath her breath. She recollected Peter into her hands, awkwardly kneading him between both palms like a piece of clay. It was a unique sensation, and the boy decided pretty quickly he wasn’t a fan. “What do you think?”

                “It’s definitely bigger than my theater,” he said, his breath catching in his chest as the heel of Mandy’s hand caved down against his stomach.

                “I’ll bet it is. Most stuff is bigger than your anything, though,” she suggested.

                “That’s probably true.”

                “Of course it’s true, little boy,” she said. The towering teen seemed to lead each step with her toes, dragging the heels of her sneakers along behind as she trekked deeper into the field of junky disarray she called a movie theater. “I wonder what we should play until it’s late enough to watch the first ScreamSight?”

                That’s when Peter’s eye snagged on the telephone. Conveniently located down on the floor, like much of the storage materials Mandy’s mother had apparently seen fit to mercifully leave forgotten around the room. It was an old landline, though thankfully not a rotary. A small enough handset that he could kick it off the stand. The phone’s cord wound around behind the dresser along with the TV plug and the video player beside it in the tangle of cords plugged to the wall, suggesting the phone, unlike the rest of the dinosaur technology on the opposite wall, was still functional and drawing power from the socket. The landline cord draped beneath the dresser, coiled into the knot.

                Peter was careful not to stare too long in the direction of this potential saving grace. All he needed was some time alone.

                Mandy slung the twist-tied bag of chewy death-candy over the arm of the couch, where it slumped depressively upon the cushion over the partially broken springs. Resting her knees into the plush surface, she leaned backwards over the couch, extending her hands containing Peter over the back so he could stare across the field of boxes.

                It was tough not to think of the last time a different girl in his school had carried Peter down to her basement. The evening when he and Lisa had their dinner-movie date, then accidentally overheard her parents and, ultimately, declared their dedication to whatever kind of relationship they’d formed against the odds. Then, of course, the magical matter of Peter’s first kiss. The comparison of this event to that day was almost enough to make the boy choke up.

                “Oh! Oh! I’ve got it!”

                Mandy’s fingers loosened around Peter with the sheer focus of her excitement. He felt his stomach turning as, just for an instant, gravity nearly took greater control of his frame away from the girl’s wresting digits. However, she quickly recovered, and snatched him back into a firm fist. Peter heard his spine pop quietly, though thankfully not due to a shattered vertebrae. More like accidental chiropractic work.

                The pair whisked back around the couch. Mandy, with surprising delicacy, deposited Peter up on the arched back of the couch, and began to rummage through the nearest box. Patiently, the boy concentrated on staying balanced so he wouldn’t fall toward either the concrete in front or the broken springs behind. In reality, his greater concern was that his host might accidentally forget where she’d placed him and turn around with such forced, hands outstretched for balance on the couch, that he’d be flung into the TV screen like a bug on a windshield.

                “This was Sparky’s ball,” Mandy explained as she turned back around. She held a mostly-translucent hamster exercise ball in her hand. “Sparky was my hamster.”

                Peter was just surprised Sparky wasn’t a tarantula, though he kept this to himself.

                “He was definitely a really good pet,” she continued, palming the plastic containment sphere from hand to hand. “He listened to me and stuff when nobody else would take me seriously. I was pretty sad when he died because he got out of his cage and I had to put him in the microwave for punishment.”

                Mandy’s expression took on its usual stasis of mortal sincerity. For a few intervening instants, Peter considered whether he should just let his bowels go loose so he could get over the almost-inevitable pants-wetting now so she could humiliate him and move on. Still, it wasn’t exactly a shock to hear how Sparky kicked the bucket. Perhaps for the first time tonight, it occurred to him just how real and raw the situation was.

                “God, look at your face. Like you saw a ghost-hamster. No, I didn’t really microwave Sparky, you dumb little Peter-Rabbit,” Mandy laughed, finally doubling over from the effort of holding steady in her practical joke. She tossed the hamster ball up in the air without looking and only just caught it, clumsily shoving both arms back out in a cradle, then batted the same fingers through her ruffled auburn locks to defuse the image of her slippery grip. Her shoes squeaked on the concrete.

                Really, though, regardless of the circumstances surrounding Sparky’s demise, Peter was just anxious now that she’d think to try that same blind juggling trick with him.

                “And now you get to inherit the last pet’s favorite toy,” Mandy explained. She unscrewed the hinged door of the sphere, then reached forward, hands clawed for the new pet.

                Peter remained in sure enough control that he didn’t shiver as the girl’s surprise reach closed around him yet again. Those iron fingers plucked him from the couch back and swung him easily over the plastic mouth of the hamster ball. This, at least, wasn’t a surprise to Peter. The instant Mandy stood back up with the ball in hand, he’d known where he was headed.

                He tumbled for only a second before rolling against the curved wall of the hamster ball. The door was snapped shut in the same breath. Doing his best to right himself, only to discover Mandy was actively rotating the ball like a classroom globe between her hands, Peter remembered his sister’s advice and went with the flow.

                For a couple minutes, Mandy didn’t seem to have any interest in making use of the hamster ball’s actual exercise function on the floor, and only leaned back against the couch, rolling the ball back and forth around her palms for her own geometric amusement, leaving Peter to cascade at the whims of her fingertips. Her full-bellied laughter echoed through the air holes of the ball and rattled around the walls like the inside of a bowled diving helmet. All the while, Mandy’s flesh smooshed pale against the glassy sides as though she was gripping a glass of water. Thankfully, it hadn’t occurred to her to add any liquids or additional obstacles for Peter to contend with as he completed slow revolution after slow revolution around the ball.

                Really, the boy had to admit to himself, this was an incredibly doable activity, all things considered. At most, he was getting the same kind of dizzies as he presumed roller coaster riders felt and the ball, while not devoid of the historic reek of hamster urine, was a soft enough plastic that he wasn’t going to come away with injuries after Mandy finished her fun.

                “Round and round he goes…” the girl crooned softly. “…where he stops?”

                Nobody knows, Peter mouthed to himself as he turned head-over-heels for the umpteenth time beneath the shadow of Mandy’s plastered palm above. So far, so good with the whole staying-put idea. Maybe she’d get bored enough soon to start the movie.

                “Tell you what, Peter-Rabbit,” she said at last. The tumbling between her hands came to a stop. “I’ve gotta go take my medicine before I forget, since it’s already past time to take it, and the doctor was all “I’ll know if you haven’t taken them!” so I probably gotta.”

                “Yeah… yeah, yeah, that’s fine,” Peter burped, clutching his temple in a weak bid to regain his sense of balance.

                Mandy’s fingers playfully plugged the nearest air holes for just a second, spreading a smile over her face, before she lowered the entire glassy prison to the concrete below, beside her shoes.

                “I’ll be back in a few minutes, little boy. I hate having to swallow that stuff cuz it tastes like crap and I have to drink a bunch of water, but when I get back, we’ll see if you can do some tricks in this thing, and then maybe if you want, we’ll see what happens when your hamster ball turns into a soccer ball.”

                Left to ponder the probably-concussion-causing consequences of such a suggestion, Peter clambered up and felt the ball roll easily forward beneath his feet on the floor. Getting going wasn’t going to be an issue. His captor and apparently self-appointed owner rose from the cushions and made her way lazily toward the stairs.

                “Stay, now. Like a good boy,” Mandy instructed from the third step. She waggled her fingers in a wave, then stomped heavily all the way up the steps, completely out of sight. Footsteps rumbled on the floor above.

                The landline phone laid on the floor not ten feet away like the golden gates of El Dorado.

                Now. Right now.

                This was the opening.

                This was Peter’s chance to take his fate back into his own hands.

                No sooner had Mandy’s shoes disappeared from sight up the winding wooden stairs, when Peter set to work. Rolling over to the telephone handset in the hamster ball took no more than three seconds, probably faster than if he was moving on foot. Peter pried his tiny fingers with careful precision down into the hinged opening, with focus a hamster would never have managed, and felt the door aching to snap open. The hinges strained.

                Peter gritted his teeth. He’d fashioned himself an adventurer when he was just a young boy. He’d turned the world into his jungle: every surface a track, every height a destination, every door a window. This was what he’d been preparing for. Putting his full, almost inconsequential weight into the effort, Peter gave the door one last yank, kicking his legs up into the air. The door clicked open, allowing the boy to plop out onto the floor on his side.

                He could still hear her pounding footsteps upstairs, a feat that probably took some real effort, as the girl was more on the slimmer side than not. She was truly slamming the ground on each landing and, he suspected, purely for his detriment. A reminder of what she could do at all times if he stepped out of line as he guessed Sparky had.

                Fortunately, it was also a handy tool for motion-tracking the carefree little psycho.

                “Thanks, Mandy,” Peter whispered breathlessly as he took off at a jog, careful to conserve his energy for the post-call push. With each step, he carefully noted the sound of her falling shoes. Before he knew it, Peter was upon the phone, clambering up onto its sloped plain and reaching for the handset.

                This wasn’t a plan, like Erica said. He’d hardly dedicated more than a few brain cells to scheme. This was just a solution laid out in front of him for the taking. All he had to do was take it.

                The phone came unhooked from its resting place even easier than the hamster door. Lowering to his haunches, the boy imagined himself a front lineman preparing to keep the charging blockheads from taking down his offense. Two good shoves, and the phone clunked to the floor. Perhaps a bit costly, to require a sound, even a soft one, that might alert Mandy, but by this point, Peter was all in. There was no turning back.

                Peter turned around and lunged for the “9.” The steps were coming so naturally now. His body didn’t quake. His mind didn’t allow the entrance of “what-ifs” that might derail his efforts. This was for all the marbles. The boy stomped down against the rubbery number pad, watched it light up to recognize his press, then sidled his shoes between the others. He planted his foot down on the “1,” careful to let it rise back up, then stamped again. Two consecutive glows. So easy he could’ve done it tied up and in his sleep.

                Heart in his throat, the freshman dove silently off of the landline’s platform and scurried to the upper speaker of the handset, waiting for the dial tone and the voice of the emergency receiver. He pressed his ear to the nearest opening in the plastic cusp, his hands flattened to the cool concrete below. Only now was he aware that his pulse was thumping like a spooked bronco.

                Nothing. No thrumming tone as the call went through to the authorities. The only sound was the continuing pounding of Mandy’s footsteps upstairs.

                Once again, Peter didn’t allow himself panic. He launched himself in a single bound back upon the platform of the phone. Stomping with greater fortitude this time, he started with the end-call button, then closely examined the numbers to ensure they lit up as he stepped on each.

                9. 1. 1. The same optimistic glow as last time.

                Peter nearly tripped with the speed of his turnaround, planting himself against the floor to listen to the handset.

                Nothing. Not a soul, nor a voice to be heard. As silent as the low twilight he’d experienced with mounting horror in the blind confines of Mandy’s pocket on the ride over here.

                That no-panic mental rule he and Erica had decided upon was getting more difficult to maintain.

                No. No. No.

                There was no folding right now.

                With withering regret, Peter rolled back to his feet and sprinted for the opening in the hamster ball again. It wasn’t pretty, but his odds of being found were still much better if he stayed inside the toy and kept the charade moving, first by rolling around the room for the girl’s amusement, and maybe with a marathon of ScreamSight later. He’d eat his body weight in Hot Heads and watch every damn movie in the horror series three times in a row if that was what it took to keep him in one piece until Mandy’s front door came crashing down with the full force of justice. The boy folded his hands together for the dive into the ball.

                Unfortunately, Peter discovered he couldn’t leap back inside Sparky’s old prison, because Mandy’s ragged converse shoe was resting comfortably between him and the door, conveniently with a leg and the rest of the girl’s monstrously massive body attached as well.

                Peter skidded to a stop, at last feeling the adrenaline and momentum catching up. He smacked onto the floor, his head an inch away from the rubber-rimmed sole of Mandy’s converse footwear. Her foot tapped only once, quieter than perhaps she ever had in his presence. Though for all that silent little thump meant in Peter’s psyche, she might as well have dropped an anvil down on him from the sky.

                Dispensing with subtlety, Mandy gave Sparky’s ball a good, hard kick to the side. It sped through the air, clattering against the wall so hard that Peter heard the plastic crack. The door he’d pried open with such difficulty popped from the hinges as though by depth charge.

                “You know…” she said with a steady sigh, fists planted on her hips. “I don’t know if you learned this in tiny-boy school before you went to real-people school, but stuff kind of only works if it’s plugged in.”

                Peter felt as though his brain was coming apart flake by flake as he watched Mandy crouch down, fish below the dresser, and victoriously withdraw the end of the landline between her thumb and index finger. Present, and probably even functional, but not plugged into the wall. There was electricity, but no connection to the outside world. It might as well have been a paperweight.

                For what felt like the hundredth time in such a short span of time since they’d arrived at the Delaney household, a quietude hung in the air between Peter and Mandy like a full hornet’s nest just waiting to drop and hit the floor. Peter remained crouched on the floor, somehow instinctively feeling it was best to remain here, as if he might avoid whatever was happening inside the girl’s head if he kept close to the ground, and nearer to the stature she seemed to believe he actually held.

                Meanwhile, the dim ovals of Mandy’s hazel eyes might well have been spinning in her skull, preparing to drill outward to their target. Her hands were folded neatly over one another like a resting jungle cat as she, too, remained crouched on the ground beside the dresser, albeit still with a pathetic size advantage over her guest.

                “I guess this is my fault,” Mandy mumbled without blinking. Her soft voice caught Peter so off guard he almost fell off his haunches. “I always get my hopes all high that maybe things will be different now, with anybody who I try and be friends with. I give it my best, and they still do stuff to be mean and make me look bad. Like the people at school. Like my cousins. Like Sparky. Like you.”

                Peter felt as though a sewing needle was passing through the small of his back and into his body, though of course nothing was touching him now but the cold, hard floor.

                “That’s why I have to test my friends sometimes, just to make sure they’re not faking so they can leave me again,” Mandy said. “I mean, who the heck keeps the phone they use on the floor? That’s just crazy. That’d make me crazy. Wouldn’t it?”

                “Uhh… p-”

                “Wouldn’t it, you little piece of shit?” Mandy snarled through bared teeth. She jerked forward on her forearms, bracing herself against the upper edge of the dresser as she suddenly arched higher above Peter’s cowering body. “Answer the question. Wouldn’t it make me CRAZY?”

                “No!” Peter heard his voice crack in that single syllable. He could feel his limbs shaking now.

                “You’re lying,” she accused. Her hands, shaped back into claws, reared again. Their shadows fell hot over Peter’s trembling fingers on the concrete. Peter could hear the froth churning in her throat like a riled animal. “Tell me the truth. Wouldn’t it make me crazy if that phone was actually for using instead of just a way for me to KNOW, once and for ALL, that you’re not my friend, you’re just a slimy little bug who doesn’t deserve my friendship anymore. Isn’t that RIGHT?”

                “P-Please, no! It’s not true, Mandy, it’s-”

                “DO NOT… LIE… to me one single more time,” Mandy threatened. Her hand was upon Peter now, her palm flat on his back and forcing him spread-eagled against the chilling ground. With one ear to the earth and his chest a mere inch away, Peter could hear his heartbeat railing through the concrete as Mandy’s nails positioned themselves at his sides, primed to strike if he spoke the wrong word again.

                “YES!” Peter yelped, more out of fear than even physical pain. “YES.”

                “Good boy,” Mandy said silkily, the shredding intensity of her voice swallowed just as quickly as it began. Her nails flared away from Peter’s body, and instead she collected him back into her fist. Her digits resumed their usual ironclad grip around his sides, this time bracing so hard Peter could feel his sides bruising. “Oohh, somebody’s shaking. See, I told you you wouldn’t last through the ScreamSight movies. I told you! But I guess you were lying about that, too, huh, just like you lie about everything that comes out of your stupid little freak mouth?”

                Mandy’s fist collapsed with one final clench around Peter’s body. Her fingers drove deeper and deeper around. It was, without question, the hardest the boy had ever been squeezed in someone’s hand.

                Harder than Amy, for all her possessive grandeur and shows of strength; harder than Stella, as she changed the rules of double dares for the sake of standing on him; harder than any of the curious, conniving little kids who’d ever snatched him up like a toy throughout his wretchedly dangerous life.

                Peter screamed. He felt the tears welling against his will around his eyelids.

                “Hey, I guess we’re getting to the truth now, huh? Finally! You get scared AND you can hurt. Just like me.” Mandy softened her grip and opened her hand, allowing Peter to splay out into the pair of her open palms. The boy moaned, shaking as he massaged his sides, his cheek laid against the very fingers which just finished coiling him. He didn’t felt any bones break, though he was fairly certain it was only by a hair. His vision swept into swirling dizziness again, much worse than when Mandy had tossed him around in the hamster ball.

                “So much for starting out fresh, Peter-Rabbit,” Mandy said. She lowered an index finger over Peter’s face, causing him to flinch with the expectation of having his oxygen deprived by the pad of skin. Instead, she began to stroke his hair, and next his cheeks, in a show of bizarre soothing. “But it’s okay. If I can’t use you as a friend, I still know the next-best thing.”

                “Sounds like I’m squared away. I can take on the world,” Peter announced proudly up toward his sister above. He pressed his hands into the dense folds of her crossed jean leg. “Is that all?”
                “No, duh, it’s not,” Erica snarked back. She patted her shins, flicking her brother’s tiny hands away again. “Even if you do all that stuff. Fight back if you have a chance to be seen, keep calm if you don’t, stop planning, and stay in the same place. You do all of that, and it still might go completely shitty.”

                “Well, gee, thanks for the confidence boost.”

                “It’s not about you, twerp. You might do it all right, or at least okay. It still might not matter if the right person gets you.”

                “You mean the WRONG person, right?”

                “Stop it,” Erica commanded softly, and as it was once in a blue moon, the seventeen-year-old was utterly serious without a single drop of sarcasm. “Just listen.”

                “Okay, okay, sorry. What is it?”

                “If all of that goes wrong…”

                “What?”

                “…don’t give up.” Erica’s eyes held unblinkingly above. Her fingers curled down in the grass for Peter to embark. The palm rose like an elevator toward her face, where she held his stare for several seconds in the misty peace which surrounded them. “Don’t you fucking dare give up.”

                The spokes of Mandy’s bike tires were in dire need of a good oiling. Every few seconds they’d creak as though the grim reaper was trying to manually open a garage door. Indeed, not much in Mandy’s possession was well-maintained, meager as it was.

                That much was clear to Peter at this moment as he found himself once again bundled into the girl’s hoodie pocket and awkwardly caged by one hand he had stowed with him inside the fabric prison. It felt good to be able to focus on things he did know as Mandy fled from her house once again with him hidden “safely” in her fingers. Because, at this particular moment, he didn’t know anything else: Where he and his kidnapper were going. If anyone he loved had any clue where he might’ve disappeared. What kind of mad fireworks display was taking place in Mandy’s skull.

                If he would be alive by the time the sun rose again.

                That last one felt hollow in his mind, not quite real, which he supposed was a positive. It was good not to have the realization of impending death clouding his judgment. Though, of course, his judgment had been plenty clouded anyway, even with Mandy at her sweetest, when he’d made the attempt at the emergency phone call. What good was he either way in the cause of freedom?

                More and more, it seemed that whatever was going to happen to him, was just going to happen to him. Which, when he really got down to it, wasn’t so much different from his regular day-to-day life anyway.

                Peter listened, as he had on the initial ride to Mandy’s house from the school, to the textures of the biking terrain, coupled with the level of rattling that rose up through the girl’s person. He was able to recognize smoother, newly laid cement or other clear ground. Passage over rocky gravel sent Mandy’s body into near-convulsions as she tried to stay steady on the bike, her fingers closing ever-tighter around Peter to keep him from sliding out the opposite opening of the pocket. Riding across grass was still bumpy, but less violently so than the sea of dusty pebbles.

                Even with these observations made, though, Peter could feel the seeds of apathy in his gut. Before he’d gathered information with rigid attention to detail, as if it could come in handy to the police, or the even sillier idea that if he somehow escaped out into the night, he could retrace all their steps back to the school and be rescued. He wasn’t a damn detective or a wilderness explorer.

                He was Peter Clark. He was a five-inch-tall high school freshman who had no idea what was going to happen to him or if he could do a single thing now to prevent it.

                How long had he been with Mandy? An hour, at most. It had to be. But then again, he’d been stowed in near sensory deprivation as they rode toward unknown destiny. Next he’d been tossed around a hamster ball until his brain was oatmeal, squeezed nearly to the point of snapping a rib, and pocketed once again for a ride which seemed to last even longer this time. For all he could be sure, this wasn’t even the same day.

                At regular intervals, the girl’s palms clamped closed over Peter again, her fingers curling demonstratively around his arms and neck. On each repetition, he mentally braced for another squeeze like the one he’d endured in her basement after the initial rage of his betrayal became apparent. The next clench of her digits could be the one that slipped a disc. Luckily, she had yet to repeat the trick. The idea of losing her new pet even sooner than Sparky had, hopefully, occurred to her, and she’d chosen to only hurt him in less permanent ways.

                Of course, that still left an awful lot of options open.

                Peter felt an incline in the earth below. His body was rolled against the wall of the pocket, into Mandy’s flat stomach. Her palm came over him again, warmer now from all the effort of pedaling, her clammy fingers pinching him into the fabric to keep him secure. Through the grinding of the tire spokes, with his head pressed to the surface, Peter could hear gentle gurgling emanating from Mandy’s stomach.

                Hopefully those Hot Head candies had tided her over for now. A hungry Mandy wasn’t likely to be an agreeable Mandy. And he’d already pushed her well past the point of reason, or what little she might’ve once possessed.

                There was another hill, followed by a descent, whereupon the bike lurched into relatively high gear. Mandy’s fingers collected him again, this time keeping him contained by his ankles. However, just when Peter was feeling comfortable with the safety of his position, he noticed movement in the pads of skin clamped around his shins. She was pulling him. Pulling him out of the pocket.

                “Wait… wait… n-” Peter took one last gulp of air before staring down at the abyss of the stony descent down the hill.

                The bike was rolling fast. Far faster than she could’ve pedaled; the girl’s legs stretched to the sides, letting the series of gears and spokes whiz out of control. Mandy’s fist brandished him, keeping him pinned to the center of her palm only by a very firm thumb squeezed into his waist. High as he was above the ground already as the girl’s arm lofted him above the level of her head for the ride, it was little compared to looking down the careening distance below as the bike barreled along by gravity. Peter felt his stomach turn completely over, though maybe that also had something to do with Mandy’s finger prying harder against his abdomen again. All that kept them rooted to the machine was the girl’s opposite hand, loosely gripped by the ends of her fingers.

                Mandy cried out with unbridled delight. The bike sped down the slope and finally leveled off again on even ground. Satisfied, she cast a triumphant glance at her prize once again before shoving him back into her pocket, with far more force than was warranted. Peter found himself squeezed upside-down against her stomach again, where he was treated to ever more songs from her rumbling stomach while her fingers wedged themselves over his tired limbs.

                A little longer on the pavement, then a quick few seconds of gravel, then nothing but grass for several minutes. Peter began to wonder, with what limited cognitive function he could muster in this position, if she was taking them home again. As much as his relationship with her had deteriorated over the course of this evening, it was still a plus to be within range of Mandy’s home.

                But of course, that’s not where they were.

                When Peter was finally given a new gulp of fresh air and a chance to let the blood rush back to his other extremities, he was gripped around his sides by Mandy’s fingers and drawn out into the open air of unfamiliar territory. Decades-old trees, weathered with age and knots, stretched like Olympian pillars into the distance. Loping hills ran past where mist clouded over the dark ground, and well beyond where Peter’s squinted vision could make out. Crickets and cicadas fought for musical supremacy.

                “All right, Peter-Rabbit. I guess this is it,” Mandy said. Swinging her leg over the bike seat, Mandy nudged her shoe at the kick stand, which refused to inch. Shrugging again, she simply let go, allowing the entire vehicle to clatter into the grass.

                “What?”

                “If you want to leave me so badly, then I guess I should be the bigger person and let you do it,” she shrugged.

                Peter felt his heart flutter, if ever so briefly, but quickly reality checked himself. It would be unwise to experience joy just yet. He rested his arms down against the firmly wrapped fingers stretched over his chest.

                “You… you really…”

                “Stop asking stupid questions. I said I’m going to let you out there, and I’m going to do it. See, not everyone is a big fat liar like you.”

                “Okay,” Peter breathed. He chanced a glance over the edge of Mandy’s fist, down toward her shoes below. This, like so many other moments this evening, was not a good time to try the wrestling moves he’d practiced with Erica. The jump would definitely snap something important in his legs at the very least, and that was only if he was lucky.

                Peter clenched every muscle in his body, preparing. It occurred to him that she could simply drop him and leave him, crippled, this far out in the grass, possibly to die, either as a snack for the coyotes or simply from exposure to the elements. Barely into November, but the air was insistently, almost stingingly cold. If he was made to stay out here without a source of warmth, it would only get worse.

                But she didn’t. Another surprise, and this time, just a little less sick.

                Mandy’s hand lowered toward the ground and she released Peter less than a foot from the earth. He tumbled, nearly tripping, but managed to stay standing and avoid a twisted ankle. Not a comfortable landing, compared to his usual disembarking, but surely the best he could possibly hope for from this mentally and morally askew teenage girl who he’d foolishly made the mistake of antagonizing this evening when, if he’d simply stayed still, he might’ve been just watching a cheesy horror movie with instead, awaiting the cavalry of police and his family.

                There were several decisions made this evening he wished he could do over. In fact, there were several from over the past few months he might’ve changed as well.

                “Go,” Mandy ordered, her voice as uneven as the road they’d taken here. The rubber toe of her converse nudged forward, prodding Peter in the butt and almost knocking him over again. “Get out of here. Run toward the trees.”

“And…” Peter stammered. “And then… I can go?”

                “Yes, what did I just say? Go.” Mandy scowled.

                “Right!” Peter took off, keeping to a modest jog, aware that Mandy might very well change her mind if she chose to be insulted by the pace he moved.

                The trees appeared to stay the same size, even after he’d run toward them for a full minute. This was going to take a while. The grass bands folded with soft crunches beneath his tiny shoes. When passing by overgrown dandelions, Peter threw up his fist, careful not to slow. He hadn’t bothered to look back yet, for fear of inciting Mandy to reconsider yet again.

                Toward the trees. Toward the trees. He could do that, right? It was a long way, but with his miraculously unbroken legs, he had options. He could find shelter. He could wait until daylight and get someone’s attention. Put an end to this nightmare once and for all.

                Oddly, it was only now that Peter allowed himself to really think of Lisa. To fully form her face in his mind’s eye. He’d avoided thinking too much of her earlier, anxious of becoming distracted or demoralized at the idea of never seeing her again. But now, she was a goal. An angelic face to strive toward. When he really concentrated, Peter could almost picture her appearing before him.

                God, what he’d give to see her coming from between those dark trees now: perfect emerald eyes glued to him, hands outstretched to receive her best friend in the whole world. She could wrap him in her coat pockets and hands, generating heat for the both of them, promising to never let him alone again when she didn’t have to. What that would feel like, Peter almost couldn’t imagine now, as he forced himself to ignore the stinging pain of his bruised hips and sides and lungs burning from the wind chill.

                On he ran, for at least ten minutes now. The trees might well have gotten larger and closer, but for all the good his perspective did him, down in the grass, amongst the healthy weeds and flitting moths, Peter felt he was in a dream, running in place. If he sprinted forever, he might still never reach his destination.

                The earth below him rumbled. The screeching of tire spokes, growing louder in his ears.

                Peter dove to the side as Mandy’s bike rocketed toward him, feeling the blast of November air and a fresh dust storm of dry soil kicked up into his atmosphere. He only just made it, at least as far as he could tell. Barely maintaining his stance, the boy was bowled over onto his back. He lay still in the grass, eyes to the sky, half-hoping beyond the bounds of human rationality it was just a mistake and Mandy was simply headed this way too, on her bike, right in his same direction.

                The bike was dropped loudly back in the grass and his mighty tormentor, like a golem in the darkness, stood above again, planting each of her shoes hard into the earth such that they flanked Peter on either side. There was no running anymore.

                “Oh, don’t look at me like that. All stupid. If you can lie about everything, I should get to do it once,” she scowled. “Didn’t you hear what I said before we left?”

                I was trying not to snap in half, Peter thought bitterly.

                “Yes,” he said.

                “I said if you’re not going to be my friend, then you’re going to be the next-best thing. Which is a thing,” Mandy declared proudly. In an almost needless show of power, she dug her shoe into the earth and kicked up a bundle of grass and soil, allowing it to shower overhead and into the middle distance. The wind of her swinging leg whipped against the boy’s neck. Peter spat a few more cloudy mouthfuls of silt from his lips and covered his head, just in case she reared up for another punt in his direction.

                “And I guess if you wanna be specific, then you’re gonna be my pet, little Peter-Rabbit,” Mandy continued. Hands on her hips again, she loomed above: a mighty titan against the drearily starless sky. “My naughty, stupid, ungrateful little pet. And do you want to know something about pets?”
                “What.”

                “They look awfully weird in people-clothes. Even little people clothes. Don’t you think?”
                Peter’s spine shivered, more from cold at this point than straight fear, after all he’d endured this evening. It was as if the cold had only truly occurred to him in all its frigid attention now, in this moment, when he realized he was about to lose what little protection from the chill that he had: this ridiculous, spice-and-spit stained, tightly-stitched fairy tale tunic.

                “Mandy… I… it’s just that it’s so…”

                “What?”

                “It’s so cold,” Peter whimpered, and as soon as he’d said it, he realized what a pitiful little cliché he sounded like and, more than likely, looked like. His quaking shoulders made him a mewling rodent. He almost made himself sick with the pathetic tone in his voice. It was the voice of a begger. A pleader. He wanted to vomit.

                Of course, Mandy was entertained as he’d expected. She threw her head back, hair whipped over her shoulders, and clutched her chest, cackling in the silent darkness.

                “Ha! HA! That was… actually super funny and cute, Peter-Rabbit. I think it might work on me if you try another couple times. Seriously. Go on. Tell me it’s cold.”

                “It’s… cold.”

                “Mmmm… nope. Not quite. The first one was much better.”

                “It’s cold, Mandy. I don’t know if I can-”

                “Still not it. C’mon, little boy. I know it’s in there somewhere. Impress me,” Mandy giggled.

                Peter opened his mouth, but quickly stopped himself. She’d almost fooled him. Of course she wasn’t going to let him off if he debased himself. No matter what he did, his clothes were coming off. That much was certain. If anything, a good enough performance would ensure she’d make him do it twice: once so she could just savor the victory, and twice to remind him of what he was now to her.

                “No,” Peter said.

                “Oh, look, the little pet boy is already learning,” Mandy said with what sounded like genuine respect, in the same way one might respect a dolphin who could sing on cue. She golf-clapped her palms together, then stuffed both arms into her hoodie pocket, clearly noting the descending temperature as well. “Isn’t it so much easier talking to each other like this? Honest and stuff?”

                “I guess that depends how you look at it,” Peter said. His molars threatened to chatter as he spoke his longest sentence for a while. Obviously, any further long speechifying was going to be undercut by his goofily clacking teeth. Not good.

                “Probably,” Mandy agreed with a nod. Her Chucks shifted from side to side in the grass, inching nearer until she had Peter wedged on either side of the scuffed rims. At least she didn’t have the gumption to squeeze. Even so, the rubber was cold on Peter’s exposed forearms. He huddled into his papery tunic, trying to dredge as much warmth from it as he could while the option still existed.

                “Definitely,” Peter spat sourly. He stared up the length of Mandy’s legs, up toward her face, which he could barely make out against the dark sky behind her auburn head. His eyes watered again, the liquid cool on his already half-senseless cheeks.

                “In that case,” Mandy said. “I’ll be honest with you, and I’ll just say that if you don’t take off all your stupid little clothes right this second, I will fucking stamp you so hard into the ground that they find you on the other side of the world.”

                Peter bit his lip. It didn’t get more honest than that. He had to admit that much.

                There was no more thinking around this. He could be cold, or he could probably-die right now. Those were the hard facts. All there was to do now was pick the more logical of those.

                He took his time, at least as much as he was allowed in the silence. Eventually after he’d fumbled with the arm holes of the tunic for more than a minute, Mandy lifted the instep of her shoe up from the earth so Peter could see the dirt-clogged treads beneath. Possibly so he could imagine all that muck intermixing with the mess inside his body she was threatening to open up if he didn’t get bare. He fumbled a little faster. First the shirt, then the shoes, then the pants, until he was down to his underwear. The last desperate bastion against the cold.

                “I said take off all your clothes, stupid, not just some,” Mandy said sternly. She thumped him on the head with the rim of her shoe. It was clearly intended as a helpful reminder. To Peter, it very nearly sent him back into the same dizzied lack of focus as when she nearly squeezed the bones out of his body in the basement. However, he righted himself, before he could topple over.

                “I know,” he said.

                “Just take off your dumb underpants so I don’t have to do it for you, and then stomp you anyway.”

                Gnawing past what niggling humility remained for him this night, Peter tore the underwear down his legs and cast it in the same pile as his other clothes. Finally, he was utterly, completely naked, in just about every possible way. At least in this moment, he was grateful for the darkness and grass, which made it harder for her to make out his details. And just as he suspected she would, Mandy’s hand descended, collecting his clothes into her fingertips, and greedily storing them in the massive expanse of her pocket, where she’d been comfortably keeping her hands warm.

                “Good,” Mandy purred, happier than she’d sounded all evening, despite the increasing chill of the air as it obviously affected her as well. Next she stooped over by her fallen bicycle, rummaged through the transport pouch she kept hooked to the front of the handlebars, and withdrew something from its lumpy form in each hand.

                Peter only huddled on the earth, closing into himself. Arms over his chest, hands on his shoulders and passing from his stomach to his biceps. Head bowed into his knees. He just had to keep warm until Mandy finished having her cruel laugh, and then he could be “safe” again. At this point, just about any change in the situation would be an improvement to his bodily security. Even her greedy, giant hand closing around his nude form. The freshman quivered.

                “Now stand up. Stand up now.”

                Nearly unwilling to budge a single muscle, the boy complied, staggering up to his feet, fully exposing himself for the first time to Mandy Delaney. She crouched down, kneeling in the cool grass. For a moment, she simply chewed over the sight of him, naked and sprawled between her shoes, at the mercy of her every whim. Her fingers twiddled the pair of objects gripped in each.

                “Put these on,” she said. Pinched in the fingers of one massive hand was an object too difficult for Peter to make out in the misty blackness until it was flicked into his face. Clumsily, he caught it, trembling at the additional weight as he stood against the cold. Blinking, the boy just managed to comprehend what he was holding, though he sorely wished, just for this minute, that he could be blind. A fresh tear traveled down his neck and, at last, it wasn’t from the cold. In his hands was a pair of tiny hand-stitched, sparkle-painted fairy wings equipped with arm loops, perfectly sized for someone of his exact size to wear.

                A digital camera dangled like a ticking pendulum by its strap from Mandy’s opposite thumb.

                Bitterness coiling in his heart, Peter was fairly certain that most first-time models, even, didn’t feel quite as violated as he was feeling now. He likely would have cried more if he didn’t also feel absurdly ridiculous, and also wasn’t certain the tears might start to freeze on his neck in the November air.

                For twenty minutes now, he’d lain obediently on his side upon the hard, frigid earth amongst the bowed grass, totally naked save for the customized fabric fairy wings looped over his shoulders. Beyond, layered against the backdrop of the night sky, his titanic tormentor and the rubbery altars of her Converse shoes occasionally came back into view via the blinding flare of her camera flash. And she certainly had taken a lot of pictures.

                “That’s it, little guy,” Mandy giggled, and at the odd interval, her vindictiveness was actually laced with genuine, selfish joy at the scene she’d designed. Her eyes glowed with the triumph of recreating her unfortunately lifelike drawing of a naked fairy that looked remarkably like Peter. “Work it. That’s what they say to models, right? Well, since you’re mine now, that’s what you have to do. So work it for me.”

                Peter didn’t dare verbally answer. Not just because Mandy might not take kindly to commentary from her fairy subject, but also because he was so cold now, any words would just clam up into teeth-chattering, and then instead of a dialogue with his unfeeling captor, he’d just be made the subject of yet more raucous laughter. He bit so hard on his tongue he nearly drew blood and, remembering the last piece of repeated advice from the auburn demoness, he did his best to strike a pose.

                Again and again the light flashed, illuminating his bare body amongst the grass. The time for the photo shoot crawled to half an hour. As he relentlessly shivered, feeling his blood cooled faster by the minute, Peter was at least comforted by the far-fetched fantasy of being rescued at this exact instant. Though the boy had never been one to advocate violence or senseless vengeance, it was a little satisfying to imagine the reaction which might ensue if, say, his family, Lisa, and the police were to appear here and witness what was undoubtedly the worst thing he’d ever been made to do.

                Then he took another look down at himself, remembered just how absolutely exposed he was, in fairy wings to boot, and decided again that he was much happier keeping this zenith of disgrace hidden away. Well, “happier” was a strong word.

                Ghostly green shapes floated at the corners of Peter’s eyes, after all the cornea abused he’d suffered. At some point, he stopped keeping his eyes open when Mandy took another picture, and she didn’t seem to mind. It was too bad the shame of this warming his cheeks wasn’t even enough to defend his head against the cold.

                “Mandy,” Peter blurted, careful not to let his first word be interrupted by chattering.

                “Peter?” Mandy snorted cutely. She paused in her trigger-happy photo shoot, and lowered herself fully into the grass, lying on her stomach. For an instant while Peter gathered his thoughts, she ravenously looked his five-inch body up and down, a special sparkle in her irises.

                The boy had to guess that, simultaneously with the lowest point of his own life, Mandy was reaching her highest. Hopefully that gratitude would buy him some mercy later. Gingerly, afraid of being flicked back into a model-pose by giant fingers, he rolled onto his feet. Keeping hunched to conceal his junk as much as possible, Peter tried to effect the most serious voice he could muster while naked and dressed in little fairy wings.

                “How long are we going to do this?” Incredibly, he made it through the sentence without a chatter, or even the hum of a whine.

                “Awww… is my sweet fairy getting sleepy?”
                “The sweet fairy’s getting cold, actually,” Peter retorted. It was amazing what hitting rock bottom did for his self-confidence. He didn’t even feel frightened now talking to her like that.

                Mandy frowned, processing the sudden re-emergence of Peter’s hardiness. She set down the digital camera in the dirt and reached out a hand. In a display uncommon for the grabby girl, her palm extended carefully, fingers outstretched. Rather than grabbing the tiny boy, however, she instead pinched a thumb and forefinger around one of his fairy wings. By lifting them just two inches higher, she effectively forced Peter to stand up straighter, making it harder to hide his valuables. Mandy’s eyes glowed again.

                “You don’t like this, do you, my little pet?”

                “No. I don’t.”

                “Well, sometimes we all have to do things we don’t like,” Mandy sighed. She let her wrist hang limply, thus causing Peter to be staggered off balance, but she kept him standing by retaining her long fingers around his wings.

                “I’m getting that now,” Peter said, fighting to keep from sounding so sarcastic that he earned himself a fairy flight into the middle distance. He was well aware of the girl’s fingertips noosed around his wings, threatening him in much the same way as a loaded handgun pointed at his temple. “But the thing is, if we keep doing this, I think I’m going to pass out. And I might not wake up, if I stay this cold.”

                “Oooh, somebody’s all business, aren’t they?” Mandy taunted.

                “Yes. And you should be, too. If you’re going to keep me as a… pet… then you’re probably going to have to make sure I’m not unconscious or dead. Seriously, what good am I to you if I’m either of those things?” Peter felt disconnected from the very words coming from his mouth, which may have been a good thing, because he didn’t disagree with the ultimatum his subconscious was laying out. He pondered whether this is what it felt like to go for literal broke over a high stakes table in Vegas. Since, assuredly, this was likely the biggest gamble he could possibly make in Mandy’s presence.

                Especially because he was probably vastly underestimating the number of things Mandy could and would do with his unconscious or dead body.

                The hazel in Mandy’s eyes seemed to revolve. Her lower lip bucked as she clicked her tongue against her palate. Her fingers were rising from the ground, and with them, her human toy like a hand puppet. Still, if Peter didn’t know any better, she was actually considering the logic in his words. But by this point, of course, he did know better. Even as the boy held firm, straight-faced and unblinking, he tensed his musculature in case Mandy answered by simply flinging him off into the darkness.

                “Okay, Mr. Lawyer. We’ll do what you want for a little bit, since you probably understand the lesson now,” Mandy said. “You do understand the lesson, right?”

                “That… I’m your pet.”

                “Bingo-bingo-bingo. Good boy.” Her hand closed around Peter’s body, and while he was repulsed at the sensation of his foe’s exploratory fingers closed over his bare back and front, euphoric warmth from her smooth skin rippled over his body. Guiltily, he smiled like a Stockholm victim. Currently he was feeling the creamy flesh of Mandy’s soft palm squeezed over every surface of his body, and he didn’t care at all. He’d bought himself a little more life, which, at his lowest point, was an undeniable victory.

                “It’s getting kinda late, and I want to get up early and keep playing with you,” Mandy said to the naked fairy in her fist. “So maybe we should go find you a place to sleep.”

                Peter’s heart thumped with fresh zeal, owing mostly to the feeling restored to his numb body, but also the fleeting anonymity of his fate for the evening. Were they actually returning to Mandy’s house for bed? Surely there’d be someone waiting for her to come back, after they discovered she was gone? If they’d even thought to check her house at all?

                In no particular hurry, Mandy turned her rusty bike back upright, swung her leg over, and began the journey back across the unkempt grass. Peter’s bones rattled again as he gripped inside her hoodie pocket again, but he didn’t complain, as the girl had the “courtesy” to keep him locked in her warm hand for a thorough return to average human body temperature. In almost no time at all, the terrain flattened out when Mandy’s bike tires reached the asphalt again. Peter was almost embarrassed to realize they’d crossed the distance of his initial fake-out escape route in less than a minute.

                A quarter of an hour passed. The terrain went bumpy, then smooth again. Peter didn’t bother trying to learn the route. It just made him feel foolish to latently believe, should the nonexistent opportunity to flee arise, he could use the geographic information learned while inside Mandy pocket. Especially after that humiliating reminder of just how insignificant his footprint was in comparison to the girl’s bike tires. So, he waited.

                When Mandy’s fist next withdrew her prisoner from her pocket, there was much more light than the clearing by the woods, but it was definitely not from the lamp outside her modest home. Peter blinked, readjusting to the glow, and found he was looking up at an undersized street light. Though his movement was restricted in the girl’s closed fist, by craning his neck he could make out a trail, some rundown picket fencing, and the overhang of a stone arch above their heads.

                They were under a bridge in a park. Very nearby to the high school, in fact. Closer to it than Mandy’s house. Though vague in his memory, Peter had subtle recollections of visiting this place with his mother and sisters in his childhood. It was tough to summon a clear picture of those days, as his circumstances now were so violently removed from more nostalgic times.

                Wait. What were they doing here?

                Without speaking, Mandy reached back into her handlebar knapsack and retrieved a glass jelly jar, with the label ripped away. Then, reaching both hands up toward the shelf of a brick support along the bridge, Mandy set both Peter and the jelly jar down on the surface five feet off the ground.

                “Don’t think about jumping,” she snapped, unscrewing the lid of the jar and setting it aside. “You’ll break your little legs, and I’m not taking you to a hospital. I’ll just tape ‘em back together. Got it?”

                “Got it,” Peter repeated. The thought had, indeed, crossed his mind in passing as soon as his feet touched the elevated brick shelf flanking the bridge support. Then again, it was likely just an instinct now when he was briefly out of Mandy’s clutches. Robbed of the warmth of the girl’s unfortunately-comforting fist, Peter curled his arms back over his chest.

                “Welcome to your new bedroom,” Mandy said. She reached back for Peter, snatched him up, and deposited him directly into the glass cylinder. “You’ll sleep here. I’ll be back for you bright and early tomorrow morning.”

                The five-inch boy plunked awkwardly on the basin, but was at least spared a dangerously high drop, as his captor had jammed most of her hand inside the cell before releasing her grasp. Uncaring how pathetic it probably looked, the naked fairy pressed his hands to the glass and gazed out at the partially distorted face of his ruthless “owner.”

                “Seriously?” he wheezed.

                “Well, duh. If I take you back to my house right now, they’ll probably find you and take you away from me. Geez, I thought you were supposed to be kinda smart sometimes.” Mandy crossed her arms and simpered at him like an idiot schoolchild.

                Peter bit his lip. She wasn’t wrong.

                “Don’t worry, this isn’t like, a permanent thing. Cuz there’s no way I’m gonna ride back and forth between here and my house all the time just for you. No, once everybody calms down about you being gone, then we’ll move you back into my house. And we’ll find a nice, safe place for you to sleep every night in my bed.”

                Nodding with defeat, Peter observed his surroundings. The jar at least kept the wind at bay, which was a huge plus. However, the feeling of the cold glass on his feet was already inspiring fresh shivering. Could he last a whole night out here like this?

                “Can I have my clothes back? If I don’t have them to keep me warm, I might not make it to morning,” he said. Why beat around the bush?

                Mandy rolled her eyes and groaned dramatically, obviously finding the question to be a massive imposition on his part. However, after studying the miniature nude teenager quivering like a leaf in the jar, the girl reached back into her pocket and retrieved his play costume. She flicked the dirtied garments into the open jar mouth.

                Gratefully, Peter started pulling them on almost immediately; they weren’t as warm as the cruel giant’s fist, but they were better than nothing, and likely meant the difference between a hypothermic coma overnight.

                “I thought about singing you a lullaby or something, since you’ve been such a good pet tonight, but I think instead we’ll do a bedtime story. How’s that sound?”

                “Okay.” Peter was prepared to agree to anything at this point if he meant keeping his clothes on. Just to make her happy, he pulled the fairy wings back on over his newly clothed shoulders, a gesture which almost made him sick.

                “Here goes, then,” Mandy said, her face now looming ever-closer to the glass jar so Peter could make out every twitch and gape in her lips. “Once upon a time there was a girl who mostly had to take care of herself, cuz her mom was usually too busy smoking stuff or doing creepy guys in the bathroom. She’s our hero in this bedtime story. Anyway, the girl’s mom left her with her big cousin most of the time. But the cousin wasn’t super-duper nice. He made the girl get him things and clean up for him and stuff, and he still called her a little bitch.”
                Peter kneeled in the jar, watching Mandy’s lips flapping and the words unfurling.

                “Well, here’s the thing: the girl wasn’t anybody’s little bitch. She decided that she was sick of people not caring about her, or making her feel like garbage. So you know what she did, little guy?”

                “What?”

                “She let her big cousin get super drunk, then locked him in an old dog cage in her house and sprayed him back and forth with really cold water and then really hot water until she got afraid his screaming would wake up the neighbors. Then while he was sitting there, all wet and burny, she made him promise that he’d learned something from her. You know what he learned from her, Peter?”

                “That she wasn’t a little bitch,” the boy said hollowly. He recalled the dog cage in Mandy’s house. Evidently there was indeed no dog.

                “I guess somebody’s paying attention, aren’t they? So the moral of the story is: I’m not anybody’s little bitch. I’m not a piece of garbage. Instead, you’re my little bitch. My little pet boy,” Mandy concluded gravely. “And you’re never, ever going to get away. Say that back to me now.”

                “I…”

                “Say it now.”

                “I’m never going to get away-”

                “Never ever.”

                “…never ever.”

                “That’s the spirit,” Mandy said, her lip curling into a grin, as she whipped out a red-handled pocket knife.

                Peter recoiled, clambering back against the glass wall of the jar. He swallowed down a cry for help, knowing none would hear it, and instead helplessly watched as Mandy’s hand bearing the knife rose above the opening of the jar again. However, instead of plunging the flinty blade down into his prison cell, she slammed the checkered jelly lid back over the opening and sealed him inside. She cranked the sides, tightening, and then commenced stabbing the lid.

                Air holes cracked into the roof in quick succession. The tiny freshman cowered at the bottom of the jar with his eyes closed, receiving the promised lullaby in the choral form of Mandy’s blade sliding again and again into his jail. Metal jutting inside the dark-lit glass circle. When at last the girl was apparently satisfied she’d provided him enough air holes to survive, the knife was closed and pocketed again.

                “Sleep tight, little boy,” Mandy snarled. With the last lines of her story and its moral bestowed, she hopped aboard her bike again, and pedaled off into the night, leaving Peter trapped inside his sealed jar five feet off the ground in the abandoned dead of night.

Peter imagined he looked a little like a fetus, curled into himself at the glass circle base of the jar in which he was imprisoned.

                It was almost laughably ironic; as small a person as he was, he was just large enough that there was no conceivable way to lie comfortably within the repurposed jelly jar Mandy had stuffed him inside for the night. If only he was a little smaller, say two or three inches, then this would be a cinch. Not that sleep would’ve been possible, anyway. But after all the wearying activities of this incredibly long evening, a simple repose would have at least allowed Peter to decrease the pressure on his bruised ribs and limbs.

                Eventually he worked out a way to press his back against the curved, translucent wall of the jar and keep himself propped up by his feet. To Mandy’s credit, she’d at least given him an interesting view of the park from here. He was high enough up from the ground that there was no need to fear raccoon inquisitions. Fireflies occasionally flitted by his glass jail. Dimly glowing street lamps, too far away to illuminate his position to any passerby, made the grassy expanse and worn-down cobblestone paths visible to the tiny freshman.

                In a stroke of bizarre accidental kindness, the jar was still mildly scented of grape jelly. A sweet comfort, in a tangential way, even if it just meant Mandy was lazy while washing the thing out to eventually contain him like a firefly. It was a reminder to Peter that PB&Js, similar to the miniature ones his mother would make for him, still existed out there somewhere, which also meant other good things existed, including his mother, his sisters, his friends from theater and class, and of course Lisa.

                Regardless of the awkward spine bend, fleeting sleep did eventually find Peter, which he only realized when he was startled back awake by a flash of what he first mistook as fire. Darkness still colored the sky. After the boy rubbed his eyes, just to confirm that the bridge wasn’t in flames, he was relieved to find it had just been a trick of a light.

                The other discovery he made was Lisa: five inches tall, standing in the glass prison above where he’d crumpled. Though Peter kept enough lucidity to know instantly that this wasn’t real, such was his desperation for a glimmer of hope in this horror show evening, he practically melted with joy. Had his rational side tried to dominate his mind at this moment and remind him this was just a feverish daydream, he’d have told himself to shut up. He couldn’t even find the words to speak. There she was, right in front of him, radiant and smiling, a tiny reflection of her real petite self that was somehow fitted exactly to her doll-sized boyfriend’s scale.

                “Lisa,” he breathed. Peter tried not to move too much, for fear of making the comforting visage of the redhead vanish, like a dream he’d suddenly become aware of. It was a non-issue either way, as his muscles had turned to jelly at the mere sight of the girl.

                “Hey there,” she whispered. She took a step forward across the narrow diameter of the jar, and abruptly closed the distance. Gingerly as a passing moth, then, Lisa knelt down in front of Peter.

                “Y-You’re, um, not…” he started. “You’re not… here. Not real.”

                She nodded solemnly, though her calming smile remained. “That’s true.”

                “So I’m just dreaming?”

                “Maybe,” she shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. Isn’t this better than just sitting here alone?”

                “Yes. God, yes.”

                “So, is it all right if I stay with you a minute?” she tenderly questioned. Lisa leaned forward on the perch of her knees, wringing her hands in that adorable way she had.

                “P-Please.”

                “Okay.” The tiny Lisa at last hunkered next to Peter, coming so near that the boy could’ve sworn he sensed her body heat radiating amongst the chill of the jar.

                For several minutes, neither said anything. Peter consciously avoided leaning too far next to Lisa. While he wanted to reach out and touch her more than anything, he was half-certain she’d disappear once he had a tactile reminder that it wasn’t real. Without warning, though, Lisa’s head lolled to the side and came to rest on Peter’s shoulder. Yet she didn’t fade; he felt her there. A jolt shot through his limbs. Receiving such a dramatic hint, fictional or not, that the world wasn’t over, the boy felt the urge in his throat to croak again. Determined, he muscled through that reflex, and held firm, instead leaning into the fiery cushioning of Lisa’s hair. After all, he supposed, this was likely his only opportunity in life to interact with another person in this precise way, so he might as well savor it.

                The illusion of his wonderful girlfriend, unnaturally small and scaled to fit in a jar too, may have been just that, an illusion, but she certainly came with many of the features of the real thing. Physically she was identical to her much-larger and genuine counterpart, though admittedly viewing her from such an altered perspective did make her look slightly different to Peter, the same way viewing a landscape from a plane was different than seeing it from the ground, albeit just as beautiful. She wasn’t just the same in appearance, though, but the smallest of expressions and tics as well, from the way she held her legs up to her chest to the idle pattern of her thumbs fidgeting against one another.

                “H-How long will you stay here?” Peter said, after spending a solid half hour just summoning up the courage to speak again. He felt the Lisa-facsimile’s shoulders rise briefly in a gentle shrug, then her head burrowing more firmly against his neck.

                “However long you want.”

                That was nice to hear, but Peter didn’t dare believe it too hard, because otherwise it would break his heart even worse whenever the mirage faded and he was left stranded alone in the glass cell again. Still, he couldn’t help but feel the goose bumps ticking up his spine. This night had been such a descent from his former high of the play and an upcoming date, that even deceiving himself by building up hopes and letting himself get deeper into the imagined scenario was worth the inevitable disappointment later, just for the temporary yet extreme comfort it offered him now.

                “Oh. T-Thanks.”

                “Of course.” She reached out and took hold of Peter’s hand, another life-affirming textural detail that he went with, despite knowing it wasn’t real. Their fingers laced together: an act that would’ve been impossible to achieve in anything but a delirious fantasy like this. He adored it.

                “Lisa?”

                “Yes, Peter?”

                “Why does this keep happening to me?”

                This time it was the dream-Lisa’s turn to pause. Peter could feel her heartbeat increase, pressed up against his side where she’d snuggled. It was disorienting, to say the least, for the freshman to cuddle up with someone who was just a little smaller than him.

                “You mean…”

                “This,” Peter sighed with the full resignation of his short but exhaustive years. He lifted one weary hand and touched the side of the imprisoning container, even rapping his knuckles on the curved surface until he heard the dull clink.

                “Some people, just a few of them, out of all the good ones, went wrong somewhere in their life,” Lisa said, though her tone suggested she was just as unsure as Peter. “And they think because they feel powerless in some ways, it’s okay to find other ways to feel powerful instead.”

                “I know,” he agreed. In fact, he’d reached that same conclusion and believed in it with sincere certainty sometime during this nightmare of an evening, if only because that was the only explanation for why someone like Mandy could exist, and be the way she was: a mess of obvious mental illnesses and prior ugly life experiences that, while they’d turned her into an agent of cruel chaos, were only partially her fault. “That’s not even… completely what I meant. I know there are people out there who are just trying help themselves feel better whatever way they can, and some just do it in ways that… well…”

                “What did you mean, then?”

                “Why does this keep happening to me?” Peter repeated in a more fragmented voice, his inflection conveying an entirely different meaning despite the words remaining almost unchanged. Though he was still technically taller than illusion-Lisa, he could practically feel himself shrinking under her supportive lean. “Why did I have to be me, like this, in this body? Why couldn’t I just be someone else?”

                Again an uncertain though still peaceful silence followed. At last, when Lisa next audibly inhaled, she began shifting away from Peter, removing her head from the crook of his neck and unlacing her fingers from his. She propped herself up, no longer cradled to Peter’s hip, and rose slowly to a kneel. Immediately the boy regretted having opened his mouth, let alone allowing it to dispense his pouty inner philosophies. Now the dream might be ending, because he’d made it too real, and then he’d be abandoned again, until a certain gigantic someone came back to claim him forever.

                “I’ll tell you why you had to be you in this body,” Lisa said.

                Her silken voice was as lilting and lullabied as ever, her tone in fact standing in sunny contrast to the bitter question she’d been asked. As if she hadn’t even heard him. The redhead turned herself around, now crouching in front of her equal-sized boyfriend. She reached out for him, just as she had so many times before, except not from a scale where her relatively-small hands could still wall him in like a peach canyon. Instead those soft palms cupped his cheeks alone, rather than his entire five-inch body, and refocused his attention exclusively to her countenance. With the smallest of smiles and twinkles in her eye, Lisa exuded such melting compassion that Peter almost forgot he was still trapped in a jar.

                “Because it’s yours. Everything about you is… yours,” she said. Her hands didn’t budge from around his face. “Your kindness, your smartness, the way you make jokes, your creativity for making the best of the world when that world was rude enough to not be built for someone as unique as you to use it very easily… all of that is part of you, and so are the things you think are wrong. The things you wish you could change. You can’t change yourself, Peter, not like that. Just from the inside. But I don’t think you need to change any of that, either, except maybe the way you sometimes forget the most important thing when you’re in a place like this.”

                “And w-what’s that?”

                “To not give up.”

                It was the same thing Peter’s elder sister had told him that afternoon seated by the water, only with less profanity now, but illusion-Lisa’s words landed at the same place in the back of his brain, lodging themselves there, pulsing and necessary. But was that really all he had to do? Just keep on blindly believing he could make it through an impossible situation like this with nothing but hope? Yes, similar faith had seen him through a few other jams during this new public stage of life, but nothing on this level yet. Nothing so grim. Surely belief alone that there would always be a light at the end of the tunnel wasn’t enough? If he was to become gratuitously realistic with himself, Peter knew the only light at the end of the tunnel he was absolutely guaranteed while in the clutches of this jar’s owner was the kind you saw just before the final rest, on account of giant fingers accidentally squeezing you too hard.

                “I don’t know if I can do it,” he admitted. Peter’s forlorn state was just barely superseded by his joyful shock that the redheaded mirage was still crouched in front of him, that her warm palms and fingers were still pressed to his cheeks and counteracting the chill of the jelly jar. That perception alone, however fictional, was almost enough of a miracle on its own to allow him to pretend he could believe in illusion-Lisa’s aphorism. But not quite.

                “That’s all right,” Lisa assured him, and mercifully had nothing to add to that thought. No “but” statement. Secretly ashamed of himself for it, Peter gushed with prickly relaxation, his former guilt assuaged.

                “Really?”

                “Yes. Everybody just has to do the best they can do. Just like how everybody you love, who loves you right back, is doing their best and working very hard right now to find you,” Lisa reminded him. “You know they are. They wouldn’t give up on you, so why should you? I know it’s hard. But just try, Peter. Try to hold on. That’s all it takes. Can you do that for me?”

                Her soothing hands uncupped from Peter’s face, a gesture which was almost as emotionally painful to him as the variety of physical torments he’d undergone in Mandy’s thrall. As Lisa’s hands moved away, so too did the girl. Instinct made the freshman wanted to leap out and throw his arms around Lisa, begging her through his own almost-inevitable tears to stay longer, to not withdraw, but he was too tired to try that, and fairly certain anyway that he couldn’t compel an illusion to stay. Even one this lovely and remedying.

                “Yes, I will,” Peter mumbled, too sorrowful at her lack of contact now to continue looking up. It wasn’t a lie, though. “Will I see you again? The… the real you, I mean. N-Not that you’re not real, but-”

                Lisa studied him, neither smirking nor frowning, with both arms folded behind her back.

                “Do you want to see me again?”

                “More than anything.”

                “Then you will.” She said it so easily, yet modestly, the way she brilliantly whipped out answers in class at a moment’s notice despite her shy disposition. Even knowing this wasn’t real, even knowing this illusion of a girl didn’t possess any more information than Peter’s own troubled mind did, her conviction was enough to bring him around. Then, before he even had to ask, when the boy had gathered just enough bravery to look up again and blink his way through a couple of crippling tears that water-logged his vision, he saw Lisa leaning in again.

                With pleasant force, showing much more aggression than she was usually self-confident enough to show in real life given their size disparity, Lisa’s visage bowed to Peter’s level again until their lips met. There was no need to be afraid of knocking him over with her mouth. They locked together, warm and wet, and the set-upon young man almost felt as though he was being rejuvenated from the outside in. The usual effect of her gentle pink lips, sticky and sweet-smelling and pillowy, was concentrated down to a perfect microcosm; the usual texture that blanketed his whole head was narrowed just to his own two lips. Was this what it was like to kiss someone your own size all the time, Peter wondered? Who even cared now. He kissed her with every ounce of energy he had left on this near-sleepless night, which wasn’t much, but he knew it might be now or never. Then again, it might be now or later, if her dreamy promise was to be believed, and Peter was inclined to believe her, though he didn’t know precisely why. Just like he was inclined to try to hope. Full-on hope was still a lofty pipe dream, but he could at least try. He’d made a vow, after all.

                Peter didn’t notice when the kiss ended, nor when Lisa’s imaginary image vanished from inside the jar, as he slumped back into a slumber more peaceful and contented than he might’ve dared think possible before this encounter. Then again that, he supposed, was just part of doing his best.

                Sunlight trickled through the curve of the jelly jar glass. However, this wasn’t what brought Peter back to wakefulness, but rather the incessant droning thunk of Mandy’s middle finger flicking the side of the container again and again and again. Rubbing his aching neck, and blinking as his vision cleared up after a bleary night, the miniature freshman watched the girl’s longest digit continually curling back against the spiral pad of her thumb, bracing, then ejecting the pressure and striking blows that made the whole jar shudder. Accompanying this act, just above in his distorted view through the glass, was the countenance of the girl herself, standing under the park bridge before the hiding place, with a familiar expression of smug glee molded to her deceptively cute features.

                “Wakey-wakey, eggs and bakey!” Mandy sang, though still in a low enough voice that her taunting wasn’t projected too far away, as they were still in public. It was early enough that there wasn’t another soul visible on the green horizon. The sky was still a fuzzy enflamed hue, suggesting the sun hadn’t been up for long; Mandy had gotten an early start. Her bike lay discarded on the path nearby.

                For a final blow, having noted that her chosen pet was indeed awake, Mandy pulled back her middle finger across her thumb as though readying a bow and arrow, then let it rip with a flick that caused the jar to bounce backwards by a whole inch.

                Despite the fury of this hit, though, Peter remained remarkably still. His breathing kept relatively steady, hastening for just a moment, before he got ahold of himself. At any point during his horrible previous evening spent with Mandy, if she’d so much as lifted a finger to him, let alone fired it in his direction, his every muscle would’ve flinched in unison, earning a cackle from his cruel classmate and likely another round of whatever-it-was she’d done to earn such a hilarious reaction from the toy boy. But he didn’t this time. It took him a moment to understand why, but once he did, the pain in his neck and the lingering chill he’d experienced through the night seemed to all but dissipate.

                There was a flash of disappointment in Mandy’s face upon realizing that Peter wasn’t going to wince at her rude wake-up call. She grasped the punctured lid and unscrewed it, setting it aside, and wadded her hand through the created opening above, though stopped short of grabbing him, which the little fellow knew must’ve taken incredible willpower on the part of someone so tragically unhinged. Instead her fingers dangled around him like vines, batting gently at his head but otherwise simply balling and unballing until her knuckles popped.

                “So you wanna come out of there, or what, Tom Thumb?”

                For a peculiar instant Peter just thought she was sarcastically throwing his theater character’s name back at him, until remembering he was still wearing his itchy costume, which she was “gracious” enough to give back to him after the naked fairy photo shoot. Much as he’d come to resent this odd old-timey fantasy garment during the dress rehearsals, it was now worth double its weight in gold to him, compared to the very-real threat of the girl taking away his clothes again to emphasize his animal nature to her.

                “Yes, please,” he said, placid. “Ma’am.”

                “Wow, you even have manners now. I guess maybe you’re starting to learn, kinda, after all,” Mandy remarked. Her fingertips gathered the boy up against her palm, about as roughly as before, though Peter could feel signs that she was at least partially becoming educated herself in the art of holding a tiny person in her hand without inflicting injury. It wasn’t a skill he was exactly keen to have practiced on him, but seeing how it was starting to look like he’d need to get used to Mandy performing it on him for the foreseeable future, it was good that she was improving.

                Mandy withdrew her firm fist from the jar and brandished Peter in front of her cheesily mugging face. Her serpentine digits rippled around him, not quite squeezing, but demonstrating the more-than-sufficient musculature lurking beneath the skin; her palm, a touch spongy, cushioned at his back. As Peter wasn’t accustomed to being gripped in a closed hand much before this school year, it was a bit alien still, feeling flesh and muscle folded all around him in a tube. Yet the boy avoided shaking, as though the dawn itself had reinforced his whole constitution.

                “So, did ya learn your lesson last night, midget?” Mandy questioned. With her back to the path that crawled beneath the bridge, she hunkered down and sat in a patch of dew-crusted grass. Her ratty-denim-clad legs crossed pretzel-style, and she bowed slightly, ensuring it was impossible for any passerby to see what she had in her hands without coming in right over her shoulder. Though there still wasn’t another person in sight, anyway.

                “Yes,” Peter answered, without stammering, and without an ounce of attitude either. Realizing, again with surprise, that he had such steady command of his voice, a skill especially honed in his limited yet condensed acting lessons for the previous weeks, the seeds of a quasi-plan formed in his mind.

                “And… what’s the lesson, huh? Tell me.”

                “I… learned it would be stupid for me to keep on not… you know, accepting this.”

                “Accepting what?”

                “That I’m… yours now.”

                The girl’s eyes, normally in an eternal scrutinizing squint, widened suddenly to shell-shocked white saucers. Her lower lip quavered then, but swiftly fitted back up against the upper. For an instant, Peter saw she’d been thrown off balance, at least in part if not in whole, which was an impressive feat, considering the girl herself was such a living embodiment of chaotic unbalance. This whole ploy was a gamble that might fail before it even started, yes, but then again, even speaking to Mandy at any given time was a gamble dependent on her ever-fluxing physiological chemistry, and either way, all Peter’s remaining moves were gambles. The teenage demoness puckered her lips, inhaled sharply, and blew a stream of muggy halitosis-flavored wind right into the tiny creature’s face, though he did little more than blink.

                “You think you can trick me again? Seriously, is that itty-bitty brain inside your itty-bitty head actually that itty-bitty? Maybe I’m not some lame genius person but I’m not stupid, either. So don’t try it. It’s not gonna work,” she warned.

                “I understand why you wouldn’t believe me,” Peter sighed, ever-so-subtly layering his performance. He threw in a defeated shrug. “I was an idiot. I thought I could get away from you yesterday, but then I saw that, obviously, you won’t let that happen. So, I know I have to earn your trust. It might take a long time.”

                “It will,” she spat, though more due to being flustered than her usual bipolar rage. The girl was conditioned to see everyone as an enemy, and was less equipped to function when that expectation was subverted. Her fist trembled, but luckily still didn’t clench.

                “I know,” Peter said. “That’s fair. I just had to say that to you, so that… as soon as possible… maybe you can accept me again, too, as someone worth… taking care of. Because you’ve won. I’m yours. And I just have to… accept it. That’s all I want now. It’s better, like this. For both of us. Right?”

                “Yeah, um… right…” Mandy drawled suspiciously, clearly still trying to puzzle out how she was being bamboozled. Nevertheless, perhaps against her will, the girl’s body language had changed. It relaxed. Her hand turned on its side and rested against her jeaned thigh, gradually unclenching her fingers and allowing the five-inch lad to crouch in her palm. With her opposite appendage, she idled in her usual pastime, twirling a finger through that light-brown ponytail, a tad frizzier than usual. Those hazel-gray eyes pierced and probed the visage of the boy in her hand, though Peter was unaffected still, at least on the inside. “So, what you’re telling me is… you’re ready to be-”

                “Your pet,” Peter finished for her. Now that he was free to move of his own accord, he knelt in a royal bow upon the altar of the girl’s clammy palm. Even as recent as last night, just before sleep, having to say these things or stand like this might’ve made the boy start to choke up, but not now. “And… if I’m going to be a pet, I thought, it’s for the best that I try to be a good pet. Not a bad pet. Isn’t that right?”

                “Okay…” Mandy looked incredibly befuddled at the sight of Peter bowing, both uncomfortable and yet simultaneously joyful. It was clear she expected the rug to be pulled out at any instant. Her fingertip stroked the top of his head. “You’re so dirty.”

                “Sorry,” Peter said.

                “Well, whatever. We’ll clean you up. You can’t be a good pet if you smell.”

                “I agree.”

                “This is so weird,” Mandy blurted. Her fingers curled almost protectively around the still-kneeling form of her living acquisition, much like his family did. She cocked her head and increased the velocity of her ponytail-twirling. “Why couldn’t you say this stuff last night sooner, huh?”

                “I just wasn’t ready. Just like you said, I… had to learn my lesson. It was hard, but I don’t want to be unhappy with you. And I know you want to be happy, too, and you probably can’t be happy if I don’t agree to be yours. So… yeah.”

                The enigmatic brunette sadist looked Peter over once more, turning her hand from side to side to examine him in his cheap Tom Thumb uniform. She nudged a pinky finger against the boy’s stomach, ordering him back to a stand, which he obliged.

                “This means you’re not gonna freak out anymore when I wanna do fun stuff with you, right?” Mandy reticently asked. Two of her fingers rested at Peter’s shoulders.

                “Right.” He had to suppress a gulp.

                “Huh.” The girl nodded, clearly mulling over the possibilities anew, as the catalog of games surely expanded when her subject was actually willing instead of whining and rebelling through every horrific stage.

                “Ma’am?”

                “You sound so lame when you call me that, but I like it, so whatever. What?”

                “Do you think… once I’ve proved to you again that I mean it this time, that I’m here to stay and be yours… you could … you know, be gentle with me? Please?”

                Mandy’s fingers tapped at Peter’s shoulders, alternately massaging and bopping. One of them curved inward, stroking the side of the boy’s head. “I guess so,” she said with bizarre calmness and honesty. “But you still gotta prove it first.”

                “I know. And I will.”

                “So you’re not gonna cry every time when I’m ready to pick you up.”

                “No.”

                “And you’re gonna eat and drink what I give you, and sleep where I tell you.”

                “Yes.”

                “And you’re gonna wear the wings more for me when we’re back home again, so I can draw more and take more pictures and maybe make some secret movies too?”

                “Yes.” This was a particularly hard answer to deliver without stuttering, even in his actorly mode, but Peter was this deep already. He didn’t intend to throw away the work he’d put in already. Readying himself, he then took a calculated risk: “Are we… going back to your house now?”

                “Why do you want to know THAT?” A hint of her usual paranoia flared up, but didn’t take over.

                “I’ve just been out here a while, and it’s… still cold.”

                “Oh, yeah, that’s right,” Mandy replied, suddenly recalling that she’d left him out in the late-fall weather for a whole night. “Well, we’re gonna go back and do stuff, but we can’t yet. I think they’re gone now, but there were people looking for you, like police people, at my house. They were actually there when I got back from leaving you here yesterday. My mom got all mad and after they looked through everything, they left, but came back one more time this morning. Only they weren’t allowed to come back in, my mom said so, so it’s probably almost safe.”

                Peter’s heart pounded, but he didn’t let his face change. The Lisa who’d visited him in his dream-delirium was correct. The people who cared were working hard to find him. And they’d only just missed him last night. Which meant he just needed to rely on his unique talents, the parts of “him” that made him “him,” as illusion-Lisa had called it, for a while longer until the storm clouds of the last wretched twelve hours cleared.

                “Okay,” Peter said. “Just… can I please stay with you now? It’s… warmer with you, and I know I’m safer than out here. I really do see that now. Please? I’ll do whatever you say from now on.”

                Mandy paid him a surreally bug-eyed look, unnaturally pouting her lips. It took a second for the boy to decipher that he was staring at the girl’s best stab at showing compassion. Her version of it was a bit nightmarish, but this was a good sign, all things considered. She was moved, somehow or other.

                “Yeah, yeah, you can,” Mandy relented. Still, it was obvious that whatever microbial capacity she had for empathy, buried under all the selfish sociopathy, had been contacted. Her fingers gradually closed back around his body, holding him surprisingly tenderly, which would’ve been comforting to Peter if it wasn’t Mandy doing it. “Those people might come back looking for you again, though, so we’re gonna have to hide you at night for a while. Still in your jar, but probably under the part of the floor wood that comes off when you pull it. I can give you a tissue or something so it’s softer, though.”

                “Thank you.”

                “Are you still cold now?”

                “A little.”
                “I bet we can fix that, too,” Mandy said, her chapped lips widening back into a more familiar Cheshire-cat grin. She remedied this by slaking her tongue from one corner of her mouth to the other and back, double-painting her pinkish skin in glossy saliva.

                This sight, too, Peter endured without flinching, though it was getting trickier now.

                “Plus, you’re dirty from all our playtime last night,” she added. “We need to get you cleaned up good. But… I think we can do both at the same time.”

                Peter nodded, already having some idea where this was headed, yet even with this foresight, and the knowledge of Mandy’s near-insanity, it was a tough concept to swallow for him. Any other day of his life, being ensnared in the girl’s fingers like this, with no absolute promise of rescue on the horizon, and the increasing threat of what he thought was coming, Peter would’ve fallen to hysterics. He wouldn’t have been able to bear it before: crying, quaking, descending into the madness of self-worth and human identity. But this was a new day.

                He was going to see Lisa, and everyone, again.

                “So I think I’m gonna put you all the way in my mouth,” Mandy announced. “And that way, we’ll wash you off and keep you warm.”

                Having just been told he was about to be inserted into his self-proclaimed owner’s mouth, Peter kept his face stoic as a sphinx.

                “All right,” he said without blinking.

                “Really?” Mandy uttered, raising her eyebrows. She was so flabbergasted by his apparent peace with the situation that she, for a split-second, seemed to entirely forget that she was fully in control, regardless of his wishes. Her tongue clucked against the roof of her mouth, her lips held agape to show it off. “You’re telling me… if I put you in my mouth right now. Where I eat stuff… that you’re just gonna do it? You’re not gonna complain and yell and turn into a little sissy scaredy-cat baby all over again like last night?”

                “Yes,” he humbly replied.

                Yet again Mandy needed a moment just to get her bearings, but she recovered faster this time, too eager to both test his mettle, and then actually experience the thing she was threatening. Her head was clearly spinning with the enhanced array of activities now at her disposal. The creativity of it all seemed on the verge of making her dizzy enough to pitch forward, but she kept her cool, lifting Peter closer toward her face, until he could feel her hot breath wafting stickily around him in the mid-morning chill.

                “Doesn’t it make you afraid, though, that I’ll accidentally swallow you? Huh?” Mandy’s voice rose, aggressive and passionate all at once, laying all her remaining cards on the table at once. Her wild eyes boggled anew like small wet moons. “C’mon, Peter Rabbit, admit it. Aren’t you at least a little bit scared that I might chomp you into bits on accident, or beat you up with my big tongue, or just gulp you straight down in my belly, where it’s all burny and gross and you’ll just pop out at the other side?”

                “I am scared,” Peter admitted, which was the least deceitful thing he’d said to her this morning. Coming that close to the literal belly of the beast was nothing to discount. Though frankly, he was much more apprehensive of her instead simply gagging on his body and likely killing them both in the process of choking. However, he had to admit, if anyone possessed the requisite combo of dogged determination and animalistic tendency needed to actually swallow a five-inch-tall being, it was Mandy Delaney. Didn’t bad guys do it with drug balloons on late-night crime shows all the time? “But I meant what I said. I’m yours now. I have to do what you say, so you’ll see that I want things to be good from now on between us. That I want to be a good pet.”

                “I think if you keep this up, you will be a good pet. And maybe good at some other stuff too, after we turn you back into a fairy,” Mandy hungrily whispered. She held Peter’s face an inch from her gummy lips, which she continued to obsessively lick while huffing out stale morning breath. Another shade of unfamiliar emotion manifested in her tone which Peter didn’t recognize, until he judged by the needful gleam in her eye, and the sweep of her opposite hand across her thighs and over the union zone between them, precisely what type of feeling was infecting the girl’s voice. In case it wasn’t already excruciatingly plain to both of them, Mandy’s interest in fairy’s definitely extended beyond the artistic.

                “Thank you,” Peter said, two of the hardest words he’d ever had to speak aloud in his life. But at this point, he had one very particular image locked to his mind’s eye, guiding him forward, and nothing would break him now. Well, unless of course Mandy actually did manage to swallow him on accident. That might break him, then dissolve him, then… nope.

                With a final winning smirk, the girl separated her jowls as far apart as they’d go, and to her credit, she managed to get it pretty far: more than enough space to cram Peter inside. She started with his legs, sliding them down the waiting slimy plank of her tongue. Her cushy yet wind-flaked lips scraped squishily past with every move. Instantly his tunic fabric became soaked with saliva and clung to his legs, darkening and thinning as the liquid sopped through. Sensing a presence in her mouth, possibly something edible, Mandy’s salivary glands started seeping. Her fingers expertly fed him into her wide-open maw a fraction of an inch at a time, almost surgical in her precision. Taking him deeper, spit started flooding up around the boy’s ankles. The walls of her cheeks quivered as Peter’s heels reached the back of her tongue, threatening to kick her uvula and activate a reflex, but Mandy was prepared for this. She suppressed the instinct, then used her thumbs to bend the boy forward into a more fetal position, making it easier to fit him inside. This prevented him from touching the back of her throat, while still allowing more and more of the boy’s five-inch frame to vanish into her steaming, smelly jaws.

                This experience was just about as unpleasant as Peter had imagined and steeled himself for, though there were still nasty sensory surprises to be made in the act of living through it. He had been up close with many normal-sized human mouths in his time, and learned to ignore the warm mist and post-meal stench that only a tiny person could notice; he’d even been licked before, not often, but generally against his will, with his own little sister cheekily numbering among that list, and that gesture too Peter had managed to compartmentalize. It was just a big pink rubbery bumpy soggy sea creature, right? However, with those sensations were combined now, amplified to a hundred, and coupled with the haunting imagery of Mandy’s face becoming less and less visible, while the abyss of her mouth gradually consumed him. Even with all his willpower and inspired hopes of outlasting the maniac’s games, it was a bit much to handle.

                He could hear gurgling from the opening at the back of Mandy’s throat, bubbling sputum and pockets of air fighting to get through. Indeed, while Peter was a small lad by any metric, he wasn’t exactly the size of a gumdrop, either. Five inches of height filled up fast in a standard mouth, even one that opened as wide as Mandy’s while expertly immunized against gagging. This again reassured Peter, as his head finally entered the hole, that it was impractical to “accidentally” eat someone of his size without either first chewing or focusing very hard. Though on the other hand, there was nothing guaranteeing that Mandy, like the lifelong wild card she was, wouldn’t decide that, having evidently won Peter’s soul and devotion, it was best to go out on a high note and just swallow him whole to clean all the evidence away. With a vision of Lisa plastered in his brain, though, Peter elected to believe, against all odds, in the best of outcomes until such time as it became absolutely impossible to do so. Cheeks puffed out to accommodate Peter’s cramped limbs, and his body folded into a tight ball, Mandy put in the effort and slid her lips closed over the boy, where they rested gooily atop his head.

                All Peter could see now was dark, but he had to guess that anyone hypothetically looking at Mandy now from outside would see a girl who’d voluntarily shoved an entire jawbreaker inside her foolish mouth. Not only was there nothing but blackness in the claustrophobic hovel, but oxygen became rare in record time. All he had to breathe was the stale, recycled fog from Mandy’s bacterial throat. From every conceivable side, the spit-sludgy flesh jittered, in a constant state of creepily living motion. Those sides squeezed and receded in every geometric combination, nonviolent but still revealing their strength, as though the ruddy interior walls of the girl’s mouth were molding Peter like a piece of clay. Groping, in their own inelegant way. Had the freshman not kept his focus, this would’ve been the ideal and entirely reasonable moment to have a yelping flailing breakdown.

                Mandy had kept her word in two respects, though. It was significantly warmer in here than outside, sauna-like, where the heat clung to Peter’s skin and then took liquid form. He couldn’t say where his anxious sweat ended and where Mandy’s greedy spit began, though he was willing to bet the majority of the fluids belonged to the giant girl. As for her other vow to clean him, that rising moat of saliva flowed freely enough that every square micrometer of the boy’s clothes and even body was now acridly sodden through the skin. Was this what it felt like to be pickled? Maybe a comparison to a sardine in a can was more accurate, Peter thought with cool collectedness that surprised even himself.

                The walls began undulating. In and out, like a pulsing heart, Mandy clenched then flared her cheeks. This not only generated additional saliva that now pooled so high Peter had to keep his eyes shut tight to avoid it getting in, but created a bizarre suction effect. The small boy’s ears popped like he was on an airplane changing elevation, and those cheeks kept right on billowing. She was sucking on him.

                To distract himself from the alien feelings assaulting his body, Peter walked himself through the mental path of fire. She was cleansing him and keeping him warm in her own trademark psychotically twisted manner, yes, but also testing him. Experimenting. A predator with its prey who, for once, was more interested in absorbing the helpless thing’s reaction than just boringly turning the critter into calories. Mandy drew her strength like some ancient crone from the misery and subservience of others, with Peter her most valuable target ever, because she put him in his place so easily. Or at least she used to. The girl hadn’t caught on yet, too drunk on her own evolving power over him, but she owned less of Peter now than she did even on that first day of school, when she’d dunked him in the water bowl. He understood that, and nothing Mandy did now could take it away, even if those super-powered esophageal muscles of hers managed to rip him down to the acidic depths.

                Peter would never have pictured himself achieving relative enlightenment while his whole abused body was imprisoned inside the hot, oozy mouth of the school bully who’d just joked about the possibility of eating him alive right after forcing him to commit ownership of his life to her forever. But then again, Peter had never done things the traditional way. Why start now, he wondered?

                When Mandy messily pried her jaws apart again after God-knew how long, gasping and spraying pressure-triggered saliva blobs all about while stretching her lips to make the transition easier, Peter too drew renewing breath. He was congealed from head to toe in a layer of viscous digestive fluid that reeked worse than Mandy’s exhalations; his body was sore at a bone-deep level from the cramped conditions of his overnight jar and then the even more confining quarters of his devotional bath; his handmade Tom Thumb costume was so riddled with saliva that the slightest tug would’ve ripped them all away and left him bare in the girl’s clumsy maw. In spite of all that, Peter allowed himself the strangest of indulgences: an autonomous, half-concealed smile of triumph.

                Mandy’s fingers wadded in around him and the elastic seal of her pink lips, grasping for purchase, though it was harder now than ever after how thoroughly her suckling had lubed Peter up. After several attempts, however, plus the aid of gravity and writhing cheeks, the girl deposited her alleged prize into both cupped palms. As Peter came out and landed in a sloppy pile, he was followed by a train of her drool, looking very much like he’d just been ejected from a science-fiction birthing pod. Peter and the gunk formed a puddle in the girl’s hands, which she lowered toward the grass and set down at arm’s length in front of her crossed legs. Through the layer of spit gelling into a plasma-like solid across his eyes, Peter spied that same scarce expression on Mandy’s face. She was not only tentatively knocked askew this time, but elevated into another mental stratosphere. Her eyes flitted hazily between the boy she’d just held alive in her mouth, and the stone wall of the bridge underhang, which she seemed to stare right through with a thousand-yard affinity. It seemed to Peter that he wasn’t the only one becoming enlightened, even if Mandy’s turn was entirely based on the con he’d just pulled on her.

                  The boy lay in the grass, coughing but conscious. Compared to the worries he’d had just last night of remembering his lines and being heard by the audience, this morning was in a different dimension. But he was still here. Which had to count for something.

                He sighed, not sure what he’d do next, but gratified to have at least extended his lifespan long enough to keep thinking. Every minute awake and wondering was another minute he hadn’t been snuffed. Then Peter looked above again at Mandy. The dark-haired kook was still heavy-breathing and getting ahold of herself in a soothing yoga pose while lapping her lips and dramatically gulping, likely savoring the last remnants of the five-incher’s funky flavor. More than likely, she was again reflecting on the promise she’d made about his fairy costume while conspicuously indicating to her crotch.

                This was slightly alarming to Peter, though not nearly as alarming as the instantaneous light-speed rate his heartbeat reached when he saw none other than Erica, his big sister, standing behind the blissfully serene Mandy. He wasn’t dreaming this time.

It was her. Erica. For real. Standing silently, just over Mandy’s shoulder.

                Time crusted to a standstill then, just for the length of a couple inhales. Peter locked eyes with his towering sister. Her pretty face, weary and furrowed to a stressed-out mask after a whole night awake searching for him, remained almost unchanged after she’d successfully snuck up on Mandy. Only the elder Clark sibling’s eyes changed, widening and lighting up with recognition of her brother, the fact that he was alive, and the exact activity he’d just been through. In an instant she understood everything.

                Erica’s mouth opened, not to scream out in horror, but to let loose a focused war cry the likes of which her tiny brother had never heard, let alone thought possible to come from his sister. In the same moment, the seventeen-year-old angel’s hand took a death-hold on Mandy’s omnipresent ponytail, a feature as characteristic of the psycho as her actual facial features, but which now betrayed the girl; Erica yanked Mandy back by her long hair so hard that both teens were thrown onto the path, and intentionally on Erica’s part, well-clear of Peter. Disbelieving what he was seeing, even while his heart sang, the boy scrambled to his feet. He watched them rolling over one another, a pair of mighty titans in comparison to him.

                Mandy, junkyard scrapper though she was, got a handle on the situation fast enough to start throwing all four of her limbs every which way, indiscriminately punching and kicking the air. Like an infant, she wailed for blood. The sight of Mandy, the monster in a state of screechy panic as though something had threatened her young, made Peter afraid for his sibling for just a fleeting gasp.

                At least until he decided to focus on Erica instead. His sister didn’t make another sound, but moved efficiently and brutally, pinning the younger girl’s legs down, then crossing her arms over her chest to prevent further retaliation. Only then, Peter’s sister took a breath to look Mandy dead in the eye before cocking back her fist and punching that same eye so hard that all three parties heard the bruising thud like a rock striking meat. When Mandy squirmed, Erica blocked her escape attempt with her own leg, then leveled six rapidfire slaps across the girl’s cheeks. Each contact of her palm generated a thunderclap noise that echoed across the still-deserted park.

                These blows tranquilized Mandy considerably, but she hadn’t given up. Her shrill whines rang out in spooky non-patterns. She lifted her head, blearily shaking it, then looked straight in Peter’s direction ten feet away. Though dazed, her expression was one of forlorn yearning for him, perhaps even whatever mangled version of affection Mandy could personally conjure. Likely seeing this as her last chance, Peter’s chosen owner started trying to wrestle out from under Erica again, and actually succeeded in freeing her legs. And then she started crawling toward him.

                Erica, while catching her breath, first noticed this glance toward Peter on Mandy’s part, herself darting glances between the culprit and the saliva-drenched boy. When she felt her opponent wriggling away, though, and reaching shakily out in Peter’s direction, Erica didn’t waste a moment and balled another fist. Just before Mandy could take the final lunge and snatch the tiny boy up again, Erica's right hook landed clean across the girl’s nose with the stopping power of a freight train. This time rendered a quiet pop and a lingering squeal of pain as the bone broke. After that, at last, the defeated madwoman lay still to whimper and nurse her face, while Erica massaged her own bruised knuckles.

                Peter stumbled back in the cold grass, now with a closer view of the carnage after Mandy had made her last attempt at him, only to be stopped halfway by Erica’s finishing blow. His heartbeat, still railing, did its best to settle back down to a mere mach-3. Even when everything had come to a standstill, his body ached, expecting something else awful to happen. Trembling, welling up, the boy looked on in reverence and gut-busting love for his giant sister as she crouched over her brother’s kidnapper with a killer’s eye far more savage than any Mandy had ever pretended to have. The angsty creep may have professed to mean business, but having now seen the genuine article reflected in Erica’s face, Peter knew she was just a fraud.

                “Listen to me. Hey, hey, hey, look at me,” Erica whispered to Mandy. Her voice was shockingly kind and mellow, the way one might talk to a half-asleep baby: a tone Peter had never heard unsullied by heavy sarcasm or distaste. This was the gentlest he’d ever heard his big sibling speak to anyone. “I’m gonna say this really slow, so you understand it, okay? Just listen carefully: If you ever come near my brother again… if you touch him, if you talk to him, if you look at him, I will break so many things in your face that you’ll be hooked up to machines for the rest of your life. And if you’re really, really, I mean really lucky, you will not wake up ever again. Do you understand? I need you to look at me, and tell me you understand what’s going to happen to you, what I’m going to do to you, if you so much as THINK about him one more time in your whole goddamned life.”

                Struck so dumb he could barely stay standing, Peter watched Mandy, the girl who’d spent the better part of a semester and particularly this previous day tormenting him like a bug under her boot, reduced to a blubbering pleading cretin. Through the tears, snot, and deviated septum, she mustered just enough gusto to bob her head and squeak out a yes to Erica’s crystal-clear question.

                “Yes, what?”

                “I… u-understand.” Her words were barely audible through the sobbing, but there.

                “Good,” Erica murmured. She patted Mandy’s cheek, then stood up, nudging the girl in the ribs with her shoe while climbing off of her. Though the victor didn’t totally turn her attention away from the snake in the grass behind her, too aware of what she was capable, Erica now devoted most of her attention to her tiny sibling cowering a short distance away. She crouched slowly, as though approaching a wounded bird, and extended both hands out to Peter. Her stern tight-lipped expression had yet to alter itself.

                More grateful than he could ever remember feeling in his life, Peter stumbled forward, practically tripping into the warm sanctity of Erica’s palms and fingers. Her hands curled around him in the heart-breakingly familiar way, and then they rose, side-stepping around Mandy’s prone form with plenty of space, just in case the wild child tried any last-ditch resorts. But she didn’t. On the brief passage out from under the bridge, Peter crept toward the edge of his sister’s hands to witness his fallen foe. Below, he saw the purple bruise forming around the girl’s eye, her nose angled slightly to the side, and tears streamed on her raw cheeks. Even once they were clear, Erica had the foresight not to turn her back on Mandy. Somewhere behind them on the trail, Peter could hear multiple police sirens entering the park beyond, though he didn’t need to see the red-and-blue lights to feel safe; he trusted Erica alone more than a whole battalion of cops.

                Having escaped from the literal jaws of death, Peter cuddled to Erica’s thumb and braced himself happily for the inevitable stream of curses and scoldings he was about to receive from his snarky, no-nonsense sister. After all, much of what she’d warned him about long ago had finally come to pass, and while he’d gotten through in one piece thanks to his own wits plus a “little” help, he’d still landed himself in the deepest trouble of his whole miniature life. There was no way to sugar-coat that. He’d seen the look on her face a minute ago, the anger and resentment and exhaustion; that couldn’t have all been reserved for Mandy. Whatever it was she had to yell at him, though, he was prepared to take, and then some. He deserved it, he knew, and any amount of her punky wisdom was worth enduring instead of another instant in Mandy’s claws. Erica could hate him from now on for his stupidity, and he’d still love her forever. Feeling her hands rising and lifting him up toward her stone-cold face, Peter knew it was time.

                “I’m so sorry,” he wheezed. He felt a good hard cry rising in his throat, and wanted to say his piece while he still could. “I should’ve listened to you. I couldn’t do anything, and then I… I…”

                When the boy turned in his sister’s palms to look at her, though, he wasn’t met with a wall of foaming rage or I-told-you-sos. Erica wasn’t even frowning anymore. Instead her eyes, ordinarily the first to roll in annoyance, were glistening with moisture. Peter almost couldn’t believe it. She was…

                “Don’t you dare say it. Shut up. Shut the fuck up right now, you stupid… little… beautiful… amazing… perfect… twerp,” Erica cooed in an angelic low, but could hardly get the last syllable out, as she yanked her tiny brother toward her puckered lips. Her voice had cracked anyway when the gathered tears started pouring down her face.

                Having never actually kissed Peter before, at least as far back as the boy’s memory reached, Erica now hammered him with a lifetime’s worth of pent-up wet smooches. It was as though she had lost control, going entirely on autopilot, while her benevolent yet stiff pecks hit a rhythm, each one entirely coating Peter’s head across both huge lips. Between sloppy kisses, Peter could’ve sworn he heard her adding more irritated adjectives to the list of descriptors, all spoken in a confusingly loving voice. None of those words, though, were heard through the desperate smacking of Erica’s mouth, with each plush impact silently giving thanks.

                The sirens blared louder. Officers rushed to Mandy, while two paramedics cautiously approached Erica and Peter. Upon their offering, though, she grunted a flat refusal to surrender her little brother to anyone else’s hands, which the boy was just fine with as he let himself enjoy the surreal, sappy aftermath of all the madness. He’d been through so much in the past day, it almost seemed inhuman to smile, but he couldn’t suppress it anyway, even laughing despite himself. Meanwhile the boy’s sister carried right on unabashedly kissing his head until it was just as damp as before, a fact that Peter didn’t mind in the slightest, either.