Wilma stepped out of the room for half a second, only to return with a vacuum cleaner.  Gabriella tried screaming up at her to get her attention before she turned on the noisy vacuum, but she didn’t have a chance before the machine whirred to life.  The vacuum surged forwards.

Gabriella ran.  Her custom made high-heel shoes were hardly fit for running with, so she kicked them away and sprinted off.  She looked behind her to see the mechanical monster devour her shoes and make a beeline for her position.  The vacuum reached her in short order and gripped the edge of her dress.  The vacuum tried to pull her in, but as long as Gabriella stood up straight, it couldn’t suck her in.  While two inches was certainly small, it wasn’t that small.  But a new problem emerged as she was violently dragged backwards Wilma brought the vacuum back so she could get into a tight corner.  In Gabriella’s haste to get away, the part of the dress caught in the ravenous cleaning equipment ripped away from the rest of the dress.

The vacuum didn’t come forward, but instead turned.  Gabriella had a moment to breath until she saw a large shadow rise over her as Wilma’s foot came over her.  She kicked into gear, but wasn’t able to get away.

Part of the safety stipulations proposed is that Wilma would wear snow shoes as she cleaned the house.  That way, her weight would be spread out along a greater surface area and would potentially reduce the pressure her weight would cause if she accidentally stepped on a shrunken person.  This decision saved Gabriella’s life as she was only pinned by the snow shoe instead of smashed under it.

The second Wilma stepped off of her, Gabriella scrambled away to her bed again and hid beneath it.  The bed was a bit low to the ground, so she figured the hungry metal beast wouldn’t be able to reach her beneath it.  From there, she planned to wait out the cleaning and try to get Wilma’s attention afterwards.

As Gabriella watched the floors get vacuumed clean, Wilma made her way to one of the chest of drawers.  She realized exactly how precarious her position was when Wilma brought the vacuum hose to clean beneath the drawers.  The vacuum proper was built not to suck in larger pieces of debris, but the hose wasn’t.  The reason all the sheets were taken off the bed and not replaced was so her bed linens wouldn’t be sucked into the hose.  She knew if she stayed put, then she would be sucked in.  

Taking her opportunity to leave as Wilma cleaned beneath Teddy’s nice chair, she made a mad dash for the already cleaned chest of drawers.  Wilma almost stepped on her again, but she dodged the oncoming foot and got into a safe, clean hiding spot.  A shiver went down her spine as she watched Wilma clean beneath the bed.  Gabriella felt lucky to be alive.

When Gabriella finished vacuuming, she went to go get the replacement sheets for the bed when she saw a strange man coming down the hallway.

“Oh hi!  You must be the new cleaning lady!  Nice to meet you!’

“Hello, er…”

“Theodore.  Theodore Snoww, I think we talked over the phone the other day.”

“Oh, so you’re Theodore, I imagined you would be … well … smaller?”

“Yeah, you don’t really see many 6’4” people around places that aren’t basketball courts.  If you want to see somebody small, you should see my wife.  I think our friend told you about it, right?  Huge industrial accident.  Shrank her down to only about this big.” 

Teddy put his hands almost together showing how small his wife was.  Wilma froze in place.  Teddy, meanwhile, was admiring the job Wilma did with the fresh bed linens.

“Wow, would you look at that?  I don’t think I’ve ever gotten these sheets this white!  It’s like they’re three whole shades brighter!  What sort of cleaner did you use?”

It was true.  The sheets were almost as white as Wilma’s face as every speck of color drained out of it.  Wilma only realized now how badly she screwed up.  Disaster scenarios played in her head until she finally couldn’t take it any more.

“Um… Maybe I should go check on Mrs. Snoww, you know, just to introduce myself.”

“Sounds like a great idea!  If you’ll need me, I’ll be in my office.”

Wilma ran the vacuum back into the room and slammed the door.  Gabriella watched from beneath the chest of drawers as Gabriella ripped the vacuum bag out of the vacuum and desperately scanned its insides.

“Mrs. Snoww, I am so sorry!”

Gabriella realized that Wilma finally figured out her mistake and ran up to her trying to get noticed.  Prodding her ankle, Wilma almost jumped out of her skin.  She saw the miniature woman standing at her feet with a ripped dress and no shoes and turned a bright red.

“Mrs. Snoww, I …”

“I want to speak to my husband.”

A few minutes later, both Gabriella and Wilma were standing in front of Teddy, both clearly embarrassed as he sat there guffawing at the situation.  

“Well, at least it sounds like the safety precautions we put in place worked.  Good job, Wilma!  I look forward to seeing more from you in the future.”

To say that Wilma was shocked to hear she still had a job.  The only person more surprised was Gabby.

“I’m sorry, what?  Teddy, I was scared for my life!”

“You’re being over-dramatic.  It was an innocent mistake and she apologized already.  It wasn’t like you were in any real danger, since we had so many safety features in place. She did an excellent job with everything else, and I think you should be willing to give her a second chance.  Besides, if you were really scared, you should have made more of an effort to let Wilma know you were there!”

Gabriella was livid.  She had done everything she could think of to make Wilma notice her, and the danger certainly felt real to her, but Teddy wasn’t having any of it.  Wilma awkwardly shuffled out of the room to prepare lunch as Gabriella stood on Teddy’s desk in a cold sweat.