Shrouded in darkness, Jeff woke up to the blaring sound of rock music. The mini-metalhead had spent the night in Sasha’s boot. The woman was so worn out after the concert that she forgot about the strange sensation she felt on her foot and unknowingly trapped the tiny man when she removed her footwear back home. Jeff, too drunk to do anything constructive, lied down on the comfy, well-worn insole and fell asleep. Now that he was sober, and slightly hungover, the boot’s pungent aroma was a lot more noticeable. Sasha was the kind of person whose idea of washing her feet was simply letting the draining shower water flow past them. Even hours after Sasha took it off, the boot’s inside was damp with lingering sweat, covering the tiny who drunkenly decided to sleep in it. It lathered his shaggy, brown hair, sticking it in all different directions. His long-sleeve shirt, already stained with his own sweat, was a sopping mess. Jeff’s dank, musty prison should have grossed him out, but knowing it all came from a pretty lady made it much more tolerable.

            Jeff looked up through the boot’s only exit, shielding his eyes from the harsh light. He recognized the song playing, “Teardrinker” by Mastodon, and was grateful that his captor had good taste in music. The boot’s shaft stretched up seven inches, a lofty height for a tiny that’s never left the tiny district. His saving grace was a shoelace dangling over the lip, but it hung four inches above the boot’s floor, putting the aglet out of reach for the two-inch man. Jumping straight into the air didn’t get him high enough to grab it, so it was time to pull out his latent parkour skills. Jeff dashed to the heelside wall and kicked off it in a leaping motion towards the aglet, a maneuver he learned from watching Tiny Ninja Warrior. He aimed for his salvation, stretched out his arm, and collided face first with the tongue of the boot, landing backwards onto the dampened insole.

            Jeff could hear Sasha in the distance singing along to the music. Honestly, she wasn’t very good at it, but her tone deaf belting was cute in an awkward sort of way. He got up and tried to wall hop again, this time failing to get any lift and faceplanting into the floor, splashing deep rooted sweat into his mouth. He got up and tried again. And again. And again.

            Each time he hit the tongue, the impact shook the shoelace a bit further down. On his sixth attempt, the aglet was low enough to be in reach. He leaped up and grabbed, pulling it to the bottom of the boot as he smashed into the tongue one last time.

            “First try!” Jeff celebrated, pumping his arms above his head. He grabbed onto the lace and pulled himself up, making it a few centimeters before sliding down to the bottom. Back in high school, when Jeff flunked Phys Ed, he scoffed that he’d never have to use rope climbing in the real world. This time he at least had the excuse of being covered in a giant woman’s sweat, thus being too slippery to get a good grip. He went at it again, getting a few centimeters further. He tried again and again and again, and eventually he leveraged himself over the boot’s lip. As he was catching his breath, he lost his balance and fell over onto the tile floor, knocking what little air he had out of his lungs.

            Sasha’s apartment was now visible to the miniature man. It was extremely cramped, not that Jeff could tell. Sasha left her boots near the entrance which sat a yard away from the kitchen. The kitchen and living room inhabited the same space, divided by nothing but the living room’s carpeting. There was a hallway that led to a bedroom and a bathroom, and that was the entirety of Sasha’s apartment. Sasha was standing in the kitchen heating up a burrito in the microwave. Her phone was blasting music on the kitchen table while she danced and hummed along. There was no visible rhythm to her movements, she just flailed to the beat in her mind. All she had on were a light blue pair of panties and a white, sleeveless undershirt. Jeff got distracted watching the fat on her arms and legs jiggle along to her convulsing, forgetting for a moment that he was trapped in an apartment with an unaware, 200lbs woman.

            Snapping back to reality, Jeff weighed his options for getting her attention. There was no way she would hear his tiny voice over her music, so shouting at her was out of the question. His phone was dead, having misplaced the charger he was borrowing the week prior, so there was no calling for help. He considered sneaking through the crack under her door and bailing the apartment all together, but traversing the big people’s world by himself seemed a bigger risk than trying to get the attention of one giantess. Next option was walking up to her and nudging her bare feet. Simple, direct, extraordinarily high chance of getting stepped on. Ideally, Jeff wanted to be off the floor as soon as possible. The only other plan he could formulate was to climb up on the table and turn off her music. He could climb up one of the chairs and reach the tabletop that way. The only danger zone was crossing the seat. Jeff looked over at Sasha’s gigantic ass shaking menacingly in the distance; it was a risk he was willing to take.

            It took some time for Drew to reach the table a few feet away. Sasha’s burrito had finished microwaving; now, she was toasting Pop Tarts. He stood under the rim’s edge and debated which of the two chairs Sasha was less likely to sit in. They were both pushed in, and both were equidistant from the woman’s current position. As he stood around pondering, a slower paced song popped up from Sasha’s phone. Groaning, Sasha walked over to the table.

            “Why did I put this on this playlist? It’s a fucking vibe killer.” Her feet came crashing down next to Jeff. He recoiled back as the clapping of flesh on the tile floor sent his ears ringing. Had he been standing an inch to the right, his body would be paste now. She skipped ahead to “Obsolete” by Of Mice & Men before returning to the toaster on the other side of the kitchen, none the wiser to the tiny she almost crushed. Jeff wanted off the floor now.

            Approaching a chair, Jeff craned his neck to see the top. It was a two and a half foot climb to the top of the table, but the chair’s legs had a spiral pattern carved in them, making it significantly easier to crawl up than inside the boot. He sidled along the spiral and clambered onto the front edge of the seat, crouching down for a quick breather. This was the most exercise he had gotten in his life; he was only as lanky as he was because of a high metabolism. He didn’t want to get up, but Jeff was desperate to fill his stomach with something other than beer and foot sweat. As he walked across the center of the chair, the toaster’s ding rang through the kitchen. Sasha piled her Pop Tarts onto her plate and returned to the table. Jeff stumbled backward as the giant woman pulled the chair out. Without looking down, she set her plate on the table and sat down.

            A booming thud roared all around Jeff as thick walls of flesh fell to either side of him. He was caught between her bulwark thighs, inches away from her crotch. Her feminine odor wafted from her groin, consuming Jeff as he tried to keep his mind off the camel toe formed in her panties. Looking up, he couldn’t see her face past her protruding breasts, meaning she couldn’t see him either. But as long as she didn’t squeeze her legs together, he was safe for now.

Sasha turned her music off as she ate, turning her focus to the TV in her living room. This was the tiny’s best chance to get her attention, yet he hesitated. She’s not going react well if she finds me down here, he thought, peeking glances at her camel toe. How do I explain myself out of this one? While Jeff contemplated his best course of action, Sasha lowered her hand on top of him. She felt something strange near her thigh and was going to scratch it. By the time the tiny realized what was happening, it was too late. Sasha’s fingers slammed into Jeff, knocking him on his butt.

“Huh?” Sasha craned her head forward and looked down at her lap. The tiny met her gaze like a fawn caught in the middle of the road.

“I can expla-”

“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh!” Sasha jumped back, sending the chair tipping backwards. As the woman collapsed onto the floor, Jeff was flung off the seat and onto her crotch; a thin layer of fabric was the only thing separating him from Sasha’s cavernous pussy. Sasha sat up, rubbing her head and back as she recovered from the fall. Seeing the tiny man on her crotch set her off. “The fuck are you doing in my home!? Get off me you perv-ass worm!” Jeff pushed himself off her and trembled in fear as Sasha stood up. She wanted to step on the little creep, but her better judgment kept her from killing him. “I’m calling the police.” She approached the table to grab her phone.

“Wait, this is all a misunderstanding! I swear!” Sasha paused. She recognized that voice from somewhere. She turned to the tiny and got down on her hands and knees, her face hovering above him as she took note of his appearance.

“I remember you,” she said. “You’re from the concert last night. Jeff, right?” He was glad she remembered his name.

“Yeah, that’s me,” he said, looking away as he spoke. In Sasha’s current position, her cleavage, spanning several times the length of Jeff’s body, was in full view. She sat back up and crossed her legs, embarrassed by the sudden realization that she was half-naked with a man in her apartment. “Listen,” Jeff continued, “I know it’s crazy, but this is all one big accident…” He explained how he wound up in her boot, how he spent the night in there, why he was on her chair, etc.

“Shit, man. I guess this is all my fault,” Sasha apologized. “Sorry I put you through all that.” Most of all, she regretted calling him a worm. She had been trying to break free of that mentality, but her dormant bias liked to rear its ugly head in fits of rage.

“Don’t worry about it. It wasn’t that bad.” Sure, he could’ve died at multiple points, but he didn’t. Now, he finally had an interesting story to tell at parties.

“Really? You were stuck in my boot the whole night. It must have stunk like hell in there.”

“Nah, I didn’t mind,” he responded. Sasha narrowed her eyes. She brought her foot closer to the tiny, wiggling her toes before his face. Jeff turned his head away, taking a few nervous glances towards them as he pretended to not be interested.

“Ah-ha! You have a foot fetish,” she declared, pointing at him. “I knew all you tinies were foot freaks.”

“We are not! That’s just a stereotype.” Sasha pushed the ball of her foot closer towards Jeff, goading him into worshipping it. Jeff was tempted, but he could tell she was just teasing him. “Ok, fine. I admit I’m into feet, but don’t pin my kinks on the rest of us,” he said blushing. “And sure, sleeping in your boot was nice, but everything after that was pretty scary.”

“Oh yeah, I’m sure my thighs were nightmarish. That’s why you were clinging so tightly to my pussy, right?” she mocked. Jeff wanted to protest, but he chuckled along with her, recognizing how good he had it in hindsight. “Whatever, I’m glad I didn’t traumatize you. Or crush you; I can’t afford the fine for that.” An intense gurgling emanated from Sasha’s gut. Jeff quailed at the sound, thinking a wild animal had gotten loose. Sasha’s breakfast was growing cold on the table. “You must be hungry too,” she said, reaching her hand out to Jeff, “I don’t have any tiny food, but I can share some crumbs if you want.”

She placed him onto the table, not wanting the tiny to touch her plate, and broke off a corner of a Pop Tart for him. Jeff bit into it, the crumb being larger than his head. It was like chewing on a brick of sand. Jeff assumed big food would be overflowing with flavor, but he could barely choke the dry breakfast pastry down. Sasha slammed down the rest of it, the part that was actually frosted and flavorful.

“I’ll take you home after breakfast,” she said with a mouthful of food. “It’s only fair since I brought you here.”

“Thanks, I appreciate that.” He sat silently and stared at her chew her food while he worked up the courage to ask her something. “Maybe we could hang out again sometime, just the two of us.” Sasha fell into a coughing fit, shocked by the two-inch man’s confidence. “I owe you a beer for last night. The concert, not your boot,” he clarified. “I was thinking we could go to a bar here, and I could get you something your size.” Sasha combed her mind for a witty retort, emotionally incapable of addressing the situation with a genuine response.

“This your trick with every girl?” she stammered. “Fall down her shoe and apologize with a beer?”

“It’s worth a shot,” he shrugged. “I know I’m not, y’know, enough for you, but you seem cool and I’d like to be friends. But if you never want to see me again, that’s fair.”

“You definitely need better friends,” she said, thinking about sweat-licker and the personification of male gaze.

“Lenny and Kurt? They’re not so bad when they’re sober. Not that they’re ever sober.” She chuckled at his joke. Dating a tiny was inconceivable to her only a few months ago, and the thought still kind of grossed her out. But Jeff seemed nice. He was a dork. She liked dorks. If he was taller, she’d probably be interested, but if he was taller, then they never would have met in the first place. They could be friends, right? She was friends with Drew; same thing. But Drew wasn’t attracted to her, and she wasn’t attracted to him. Was she attracted to Jeff? Oh God, was she falling for a tiny? No, no, no, that’s gross. It could never work. There were too many obstacles. It was a logistical nightmare, perverse and unnatural. Jess and Drew sure were cute together.

“I’ll think about it,” Sasha concluded. As if to rescue her from the labyrinth she was constructing in her mind, Sasha’s phone vibrated against the table, a text from Jess popping up on screen.

Turn on the news. Channel 3.

The TV remote was sitting on the kitchen table. Sasha grabbed it and turned to the correct channel. She tuned in to the news just in time to catch b-roll of her “dancing” at the concert. Sasha’s mouth was agape; in all the confusion, Jeff hadn’t considered how silly she looked trying to swat the tinies off her. The footage cut to an interview with Lenny and Kurt filmed after the incident.

“Yo, Sarah, mah gurl!” Lenny shouted into the camera. He was covered in bruises. “We go way back. We’re always fooling around like this.”

“Yeah, she knows how to get it on!” Kurt chimed in, beating his chest. “Like Donkey Kong!”

“We’re having a party at our pad next Tuesday. She’s gonna be there tearing the roof off the place.”

“Not literally though,” Kurt interrupted, “we’ll get evicted.”

“She’s gonna tear the roof off the place and then put it back on, and no one’s gonna spot the difference because that’s how she rolls.” The footage cut back to the newsroom where the anchors resumed their report.

“Man, it must be a slow news day,” Jeff commented. Sasha was frozen still, having cringed so hard that she paralyzed herself. “At least they got your name wrong.”

“Sorry, I can’t take you home,” she muttered, her dead eyes locked on the TV screen. “I’ll have my friend come over and grab you. I’m going to lock myself in my room for a month.”

“Can’t say I blame you,” Jeff said, pulling out a pen and a crumpled napkin from his pocket. “I’ll leave you my number, so you can reach out whenever you’re ready to go outside again.” He wrote out his number and placed the note on her fingertip. The piece of paper was no bigger than a microchip; even squinting at it from a nose lengths away, Sasha couldn’t make out that there was even any writing on it.

“Just read it off to me.” She tried to scrape the note off her skin, but surface tension kept sticking it to the finger she scraped with. After plenty of frustrating attempts, Jeff pulled the napkin off and read his number to her. “Cool. I’ll keep in touch, but you’ll have to come to me. I’m never going back to the tiny district, not ever.”

The two sat around and chatted while they waited for Jess to come over. Sasha put on pants in the meantime. As strange as their meeting was, she enjoyed the tiny man’s company. They had a lot in common beyond their shared music preferences. From shamefully enjoying trashy reality shows to persisting almost entirely off Chinese food, the two felt seen more than they had with any prior partner. If only he was taller, she thought.