(Andrew’s P.O.V)

I raise my head warily to stare up at the giantess of a sick girl with an equally giant pole on wheels beside her. Emily’s mouth hangs agape and her hair is a black bird’s nest. I wonder whether she can even see me properly without her glasses. She wears plain pyjamas that drape over her anorexic thin form almost scarily. There isn’t much of her, even though there’s even less of Andrew Lawson without the Jr. part on the end.

“S-s-s-sh-h-h-hit…” Emily breathes. Her bony fingers tighten around her IV pole above me. I stand awkwardly inside my glass prison. To be honest, this whole situation… I’m hardly scared. Actually, I’m just worried about what Emily will do to my exterior if she realises who I really am. All the interior, all I can do is wait for her to begin the interrogation… or call the police.

Emily doesn’t move for a long, long time. And then with a slow, exaggerated breath, she bends down, the bones in her knobbly knees cracking in protest. I wince, seeing as the amplitude is much louder at my scale. She raises a hand tentatively and extends it toward my glass. Its shadow slips over me and I back away, so I’m pressing hard against the far side of the glass. I close my eyes and look away from the giant.

“Who are you?” Emily asks, retracting her hand at my reaction. She lets it lie still in her lap. Her IV still whirs in the background. I open my eyes, ashamed at my fear and let out a huff under my breath. So she can see me without the glasses.

“Isn’t it obvious?” I ask her from inside the glass. “You got me. I’m the tiny guy.”

Emily frowns, her features creasing up like material due for an iron. “What? I can’t hear you.” I then realise that my voice is probably much too small for her to hear, with the glass around me muffling everything. I sigh, folding my arms and say nothing more. Emily slowly withdraws her hand from her lap and raises it directly overhead. I find myself crouching a little in shock at its size. Slowly, she raises the glass so I’m no longer trapped. Suddenly, without the usual feeling of a shield around me like Andrew Jr., I feel incredibly exposed and weak.

I back away from the giant and hold out both hands. “Please let me explain…” I can’t help but feel frightened about all of this. It’s been four years; four terrible, long years of being an interior and I’ve still got the mental capacity of a scared baby. I’m a wuss.

“Don’t tell me she…” Emily begins, eyes widening a little. “Megan wasn’t crazy… holy shit.”

Her words shock me and I wince, out of habit. I force my legs to stop walking away. Maybe I should just… “I-“

Tell her.

I take a deep breath. “I’m the tiny guy.” I say in a rush. “I’m Andrew Lawson.”

~

(Emily’s P.O.V)

He certainly looks like the Andrew Lawson from my photo; scratch the fact that he’s aged quite a bit since then… and shrunk, too. I had a hunch that he was the one. Just by looking into his golden eyes, I could tell he had a secret. What I didn’t expect was for my sister’s hallucinations of tiny guys to be…

Real.

How does he even manage to pull it all off? I mean… if Megan was right all along and the doctors misdiagnosed her, then Andrew Lawson really does live inside himself. The motionless and unmistakably headless robot that looks remarkably similar to the miniature version of Andrew before me is proof.

“Um…” Andrew pipes up, shifting on his heels. I move my head forward a little so I can see him better, particularly without my glasses. Andrew Lawson stands about three or so inches tall. I can see all the way up his tiny body down to his ankles, which sink into the carpet like he’s standing upon a bed of grass. He wears a loosely fitting navy jumper and long pants. His hair is a wavy brown. I want desperately to reach out and touch him, just out of curiosity. But judging from the way he flinches when I move, I decide against it. He may have put my sister in hospital, but I’m sure he’s got reasons.

“Okay.” I say aloud, without realising. “You’re the guy.”

He nods. “That is correct, yes.”

I wonder why Andrew is so calm about all this. Why isn’t he making a run for it while I’m weak, sick and pretty much distracted by my own thoughts? Suddenly it hits me. Andrew must be tired of running.

The Andrew Lawson Disorder is a mystery. Megan was just about the first to get it, and it became a legitimate thing a few months later, when it was reported that seven other girls went insane from an unknown source. The thing is, scientists tried to track the spread of the disorder and have, in recent months come to a conclusion. The Andrew Lawson Disorder is completely random. Every so often, whether it be a week’s time or a month, you get another girl gone mad. Every single time this happens, a boy called Andrew Lawson vanishes from the radar. Every single case of the disorder occurs only once in a town of Australia.

“You’re the reason girls scream themselves to death.” I say under my breath, not intending for the small version of Andrew Lawson to hear. He does anyway, and frowns sadly.

“I thought they loved me…” He says. “I didn’t mean for any of it.”

“Why do you do it, then?” I ask. “Why do you scare them?”

Andrew Lawson doesn’t reply for a long time. His tiny face pales and he shoves his hands under his armpits. He drops his gaze so he stares down at the ground.

“The thing is, I’m cursed.” The tiny guy says.