Posts made by Kisupure

Never seen the show but I love these two~

@tiny-ivy Thank you! They are so not my usual characters, it’s a fun change of pace. Thanks for the unintentional writing prompt.

Just gotta finish it… I’m mostly over being sick, but my energy is still flagging pretty badly and now that I’m back at work I don’t have the brains for much else when I get home.

CHAPTER 11: THE JOY OF SEX

Keith’s bedroom was, by his measure, the least interesting room in the loft. Even the guest room, because it was original to the building, had more character. But, being on the southwest corner, it took him only one summer to decide he couldn’t live there, and with permission from the landlord had this this built. It was closer to the bathroom anyways.

He set Dawn down on top of the wall of low bookcases and found the switch for the ceiling fan by more ambient orange streetlight. The room was simple: a bed against one wall, a wardrobe against another, a vintage leather egg chair in the corner, a nightstand, and more books.

The floor creaked as he went to the window to turn on the fan perched on the thick, brick sill. Then he sat down and watched as Dawn carefully, playfully, let herself down the three-shelved case to land solidly on the floor with a little squeak. He smiled at her ability to manage that in such a horrible garment.

“I see you like red?” she said, stepping over to the bedding. Her eyes kept wandering, though, because before he could answer she had darted over to a small pile of books underneath the nightstand. “Oh, what’s this?”

He crouched behind her and made a little face as she discovered his small collection of books on the art of lovemaking. He blushed fiercely but wanted to see what she would do.

Dawn yanked out his Joy of Sex book and started flipping through it’s great big pages. “My mother has one of these,” she said, and Keith’s bud of embarrassment bloomed. She was trying to push his buttons, he knew that, and for a moment he decided he was going to let her.

He reached right on past the tiny woman and grabbed one of the slimmer volumes from the middle of the stack, plopping it down right on top of the classic text and opening it.

“I’ll bet she doesn’t have this one.”

It was two-page spread after two-page spread of baldly erotic black and white photography. It was a woman posing–and playing–with a bunch of large geometric shapes and overlaid with suggestive shadows against a psychedelic background of undulating checkerboard. There was a Bacchic mask on her face, alternating Comedy and Tragedy depending on the composition, and it was all wildly, deliriously sexual, right down to the photo of her fingers lifting a thread of liquid from her beautifully uncensored vulva.

He knew he’d caught Dawn off-guard by it, and she gazed at the lewd images for a wordless moment. Eventually, she looked up at him and nibbled her lip.

“So you do have some sizzle in there,” she said, then flicked her eyes down for a moment. Then she pointed between his legs. “There, too.”

Keith realized he was sporting the beginnings of a hardon, and some part of him was not at all surprised when Dawn daintily closed the distance between the books and stood inches away from the tenting in his boxers. He sucked in a sharp breath when she touched it, and if he thought there’d been electricity when she touched his fingers yesterday, then it was nothing compared to this. His cock bobbed in its cotton prison.

He opened his mouth to say something, he wasn’t sure what, but Dawn made sure to cut him off.

“I don’t want to hear it, Keith. I don’t want to hear any more moralizing, no more excuses, no more clever dodges.” Dawn then pulled her arms out of the holes of the Cabbage Patch dress and it fell away from her. “I want you, all of you, and I want you right now.”

To hell with it.

Keith caught her waist between his fingers and pulled her out of the dress to set her on the bed, where he pushed her into the mattress with his lips. He gently assaulted her mouth until he could feel her little teeth on him. He gave her chin a lick and planted a few more sloppy ones before letting her take a breath.

“Oh, Keith… I knew you had it in you,” she said, chest heaving and looking positively stunning.

He kissed a short patrol to her breasts as his thumbs brushed along her smooth little thighs. At this size, the “girls” did all but defy gravity, and he guessed that they would have been a handful each had she been her normal height. With delicate fingers he traced around the curve of one full little globe, quite enjoying the harsh tan line that encased her nipple in a triangle of paler skin. When he pressed the pad of his thumb over the top, he could feel the tiny thing had puckered up and Dawn moaned. The sound set him on fire.

“You should come up here, there’s room for one more,” she teased, and Keith realized that he was still kneeling on the floor. He kept kissing her as he rose up and slipped onto the bed, wrapping his lips around one lovely breast and then the other. They were like little candies and he wanted to keep licking until he got to some soft, molten center.

“Look at you,” she giggled. “You’re like a man possessed.”

“Mhm,” he grunted into her belly. Dawn gasped loudly.

“Do that again.”

He pulled away. “Do what again?”

“That, that sound. Put your mouth on me and do it again.”

He did. “Mmmmhm?”

“Ohh…”

Keith realized what had happened and shifted his voice down an octave. “Mmmmmmm…”

Dawn panted, and it was clear that the vibrations weren’t just tickling her stomach, they were reaching her core as well. His boxers were pulled as taught as they were going to get, and he felt that he’d pop off a button at any moment. But that was no matter, he could worry about himself after this.

When he pulled back to see how undone she’d become, Dawn spread her legs for him, pulling her knees to her chest, pointing her adorable little toes, and hooked a finger at him. He was happy to see that slit again now; he could think about how gorgeous it was all he wanted this time.

“Would you mind, big fella?”

Keith licked his lips and bent down low again to finish her off.

He breathed on her to get her shivering before he touched his tongue to her heat. And she was hot! Wet too; he was surprised that the amount was noticeable, but he could taste her as the tip of his tongue massaged at her, up and down.

“Oh, yes, oh Keith, you big hunk of–”

He started humming again, partly because he wasn’t sure if he wanted to know how that was going to end, and partly because he just wanted Dawn to shut up and enjoy it; what he really wanted, though, was to see her lose all sense of herself again, like she had when he picked her up that first time. He wanted her to gasp and moan and be unable to think of anything to say.

Her cries were, in fact, exquisite. Even at her volume, they filled his ears, and the higher register of her little voice gave her a fairy-like quality that felt very taboo. This entire thing was unthinkable as far as society was concerned, but as an artist, well… he wasn’t exactly one to follow convention, was he?

“Mmmmh…”

'Oh god, I’m close," she whimpered. “I’m…”

There was no way he’d be able to fit anything in that pretty hole of hers, but it didn’t much matter as he continued his attack on the microscopic little bud just above it. Her back bowed and she bucked into his mouth as her hands braced against his nose. He chuckled into her, not letting up as she began to crest that wave, and soon she shuddered and shook in his hands, screaming out her orgasm. Keith was surprised to be able to feel–and taste–the gush of juice that came out to wet his tongue.

When he pulled away, Dawn was pink everywhere and breathing like she’d run a marathon. Meanwhile, he’d barely lifted a finger, and still managed to have such an effect on this worldly, experienced woman. The thought went straight to his now painfully-sensitive cock.

“Aw,” he teased, sitting back on his heels, “What happened, burn some calories there?”

“Holy shit,” she panted.

“You’re glowing.”

“I’m downright radioactive. My god, I could I could feel your… your tastebuds on me! And your voice, at this size, is… wow. Something else. If you get a chance, you should really try this.”

“I dunno, I’m kind of attached to being five-eleven. And I’d hate to have to change my driver’s license; you know how shitty the DMV is.” He smiled and flopped onto the bed next to her with a sigh.

Dawn sat up. “Hey, what are you doing?” she snapped.

“Winding down for bed?”

“Oh no you don’t. Not on my watch.”

“What are you going to do, give me a handjob? You’ll be at it all night.”

The little lawyer jumped up and stormed over to stand next to his hips, armed folded under her generous bosom. “I told you I liked a challenge.” That she did.

“I tell you what, I’ll take care of myself and you can help out if you’d like.” When he reached for the shape straining against the front of his boxers, she slapped his hand away. “Ow!”

“I’m not playing second fiddle to your fist!”

“Fine. Have fun and let me know when you get tired.”

Dawn smacked her lips together in thought, ignoring him for now. She was already preoccupied with formulating her plan of attack, slowly circling him, and he honestly couldn’t help the little twitch of excitement at having her single-minded attention. If nothing else, this would be… interesting.

Eventually, though, she climbed over his leg to stand between his knees, evaluating the beast.

“Well?” he asked with a smirk. “Little bigger than you thought?”

“Hardly,” she said, and proceeded to dive into the leg of his boxers. He was almost startled, but immediately the sensation of her sliding along the inside of his thigh, and the sight of her disappeared into the fabric was much more exciting than he was prepared to admit.

“…uhn.”

Then there it was. Little hands against his thick heat, and Keith nearly bucked.

CHAPTER 10: THE VISIT

The artist was very apologetic when he had to excuse himself to get at least a little work done, but Dawn assured him she would have done the same thing if she could.

He left her on the couch to play the Price is Right while he disappeared into the studio to make phone calls. She tried paying attention to the tired old game show, but found her ears wandering instead. Dawn listened to him as he spoke with a customs broker of some sort, and liked the way that he was firmly instructing them to get to the bottom of some misplaced shipment of KEMO commercial pieces on their way to Paris from the woodshop.

His next phone call was to someone who dealt in lumber, it seemed, and Dawn was amazed that he didn’t have an assistant to make all these calls for him. She would try to remember suggesting it later, and go through her Rolodex to see who might know someone to suggest for the job.

Otherwise, the minutes ticked by with grueling slowness and Dawn couldn’t stand it. She paced in front of the TV until the buzzer sounded by the door on the wall. It was so loud and so sudden that she couldn’t help the yelp of surprise. Keith came bounding out of the studio

“Yello!” he said into the speaker.

“It’s Beverly, is this the right place?”

“It is, come on up.”

“I brought mace, so don’t try nothin’!”

Keith just buzzed her in and stood with his back against the door as they both listened to her climb the stairs. When the creaking stopped, he counted down from three and after one, Beverly knocked.

Dawn dashed behind something, wanting to give Keith a chance to butter her up before revealing herself.

“Hi there, mornin’,” Keith said as he opened the door. “Welcome to, uh, Studio KEMO.”

“Yeah, yeah. Where the hell’s my friend?” She started walking around. “Dawn? You here?”

“I’ll show you in just a minute but I-I have to just… reiterate what she told you, alright?”

“Whaddya mean, reiterate?”

“No screaming, OK?”

“Why the hell would I scream? What’s wrong with her, she disfigured or somethin’?”

“Oh no,” she heard Keith chuckle. “She’s still figured alright. She’s just um… you know.”

“I don’t understand what that means with the hands.”

“She’s, uh…”

“Would you stop gesturing and tell me so I can hurry up and see her?”

“Dawn’s been shrunk, alright?”

“Shrunk? What kinda shrunk, like in the dryer?”

“No, like like in the Incredible Shrinking Woman!”

Beverly gasped. “But that was a harrible movie.”

Dawn took the opportunity to step out of her refuge behind the big statue of Ganesh, and much to her chagrin, Beverly did scream. Keith grabbed her by the arm to keep her from running out the door.

“DAWN?”

“Yes, it’s me!”

“Holy shit, girl, w-what happened to you?” The platinum blonde got down onto the floor to gawk, and Dawn dared creep a little closer. “What on Earth are you wearin’?”

“Keith got me a Cabbage Patch dress. Look, I have no idea what happened. I-I was about to let myself into my apartment Thursday night after grabbing a bite with a client, someone comes up behind me and bam. Next thing I know I wake up on his couch Saturday morning all the way out here.”

Dawn looked to Keith and he shrugged. “I found her in the trash outside.” In fact, they all took a moment to listen to the rumble and hiss of the garbage truck a block away. Monday was trash day. “Glad they didn’t dump you last night.”

“Wait, I thought you two knew each other?”

“Yeah, that was to keep you from hanging up on me.”

“This guy’s treatin’ you right, right?”

“He’s been a perfect gentleman. I’d be dead without him!”

“Good, because otherwise I’d have to send over my cousin Frankie to check up on you. Oh! I almost forgot.” The woman reached into her purse and pulled out a water bottle filled with something that wasn’t water. “Brought you some of your favorite juice, hun. It’s carrot and celery, made it just before I left.”

“Oh thank god!” Dawn cried, running over to twist the cap off and tilt it carefully over so she could take a sip. “I can’t tell you how much I’ve missed these kinds of creature comforts.”

“She was going to ask you to bring her juicer,” Keith said with a shake of his head.

Beverly laughed in that nasally, tittering way of hers. “What are you, movin’ in?”

Dawn’s cheeks turned red and she looked away. “About that…”

“Would you like to sit down, Beverly?” Keith offered with his outstretched hand. In a few moments they were all seated on the big red sectional.

The artist spoke first, raising his brows at Dawn. “I guess this is a good a time as any to figure out how long you needed to stay here.”

“Yeah, where were you gonna go?”

“Well it’s obvious I can’t get along by myself, I need help. I’m like a geriatric, guys. I… I haven’t thought about it too much, I’ll be honest…”

“What if you got like, a seein’-eye dog?” Beverly said.

Dawn blinked. She hadn’t considered a service animal. They could be trained to do all kinds of things nowadays, why not this? All she’d need then is maybe a housekeeper to keep the apartment in order, prepare her little meals…

“Wait, no. No, the goal here is to get back to normal. I have to. I’m not staying like this forever. I can’t.”

“Well your next step should be to see the doctor, then,” her friend shrugged. “Maybe he could tell ya what to do.”

The doctor… doctor. That was… surprisingly actionable. Yes. Yes, she’d make an appointment, explain everything. Her case was so unusual that she’d surely get the best care possible, be treated by the world’s leading experts on whatever the hell this was. Maybe she’d get to be someone’s Nobel Prize-winning research.

“Beverly, you’re brilliant.”

“Nah. If I was smart, I’d have gotten out of the restaurant biz years ago.”

The two women laughed at that. Beverly owned a small chain of Italian restaurants and was making just as much money as the lawyer. She was probably putting in fewer hours, too.

“And what about you, huh?” The New Jersey girl cocked her head at Keith. “Who, exactly, is Keith Morgan?”

“Well,” he said, “Let me tell you.”

The trio chatted for a little while, but Beverly had to leave before too long. She and Keith exchanged numbers, and she promised to keep in touch. Dawn gave her a list of things that she needed from her own apartment, and later that evening, she came by to drop off the small box.

“You know I talked to my aunt–the one who collects dolls–and she gave me the number of the lady that makes all her outfits. That’s all she does, you know, is doll outfits. I can probably get her to whip you up some clothes in a jiffy.”

“Oh could you!”

“Sure thing, hun.”

Keith quickly found a tape measure and they began to collect a few measurements.

“I’d like some shorts and a sleeveless shirt for this weather. And some linen slacks… and maybe a tee-shirt. Oh, do you think she could make me a suit, too? Navy. A pencil skirt should be fine. Don’t know where I’ll get hose, though… Does she do shoes?”

“No, but did you want any panties? Not sure if she can do anything but bloomers but I’ll ask.”

“I know a bra is out of the question but what about something to, you know, keep the girls tidy?”

The man cleared his throat but they ignored him.

“Honey, you’ve got the world’s smallest A cups. I hardly think you’ll look like Jane Fonda.”

“I’m not putting a suit on without a bra.”

“I donno, sounds like a power move to me.”

In the end Beverly could only sort of promise a single outfit by the next day on a rush basis, and Dawn gave her a blank check for it, which she folded up and put carefully away in her wallet.

“I’ll be calling my bank to make sure you didn’t go to Atlantic City with that!”

After she left, the pair finished up the leftover pizza, and in small celebration cracked open a couple wine coolers again. Keith limited himself to two tonight, and swore up and down that that would be all.

After eating they both lounged on the couch together and listened to the sounds of the city coming in through his big open windows. They were bathed in the bright orange light of the streelamp outside; he tried keeping the place dark in the summer because the hot bulbs only made things worse.

Eventually Dawn rolled over onto her stomach and propped her chin up with the heel of her hand. “How cool is your room at night?” she asked.

“It’s not awful,” he mumbled lazily. She liked the way he looked when he was lazy. Like a sleeping animal she wanted to give him a poke. “I’ve got a couple fans in there.”

“Fans!” she exclaimed. “There’s no fans out here. The air flow is terrible.”

He opened one eye and looked at her.

“Could I stay in your room tonight? This sofa is hell on my back, too. I’m sure you’ve got something much softer in there.”

“We’re doing this again, eh?”

“What do you mean?” Dawn rolled over onto her back and looked at him upside down with her spine arched. “We never stopped.”

He leaned over her and god she loved being able to see nothing but his face and shoulders. “It’s 'cause you’re nervous, isn’t it. You do this when you’re nervous.”

“Actually, Michelangelo, I do this when I know I have something to look forward to.”

He studied her for a beat before sliding his great big hand under her and lifting them both away from the couch. “I guess that’s what I was hoping you would say,” he said and crossed the floor to the last room of the apartment she hadn’t caught a glimpse of yet.

CHAPTER 9: THE PHONE CALL

Night fell without much more incident, as defeatist as that sounded to Keith. But it was for the best, he reminded himself. His world had become embroiled in high strangeness, there was no sense in letting Bethlehem Steel make any decisions here. No tongue, no groping, no boners, no problem.

But he did manage to get her to talk a little bit more, which was good. He found out that the firm liked to get bit wild for its annual Christmas parties, that her family was from Milwaukee, the best dinner in town was at Restaurant Nippon, and that she couldn’t stop watching that new show, Matlock. That last one he make fun of her about.

With the cheese board dwindling to its last crumbs and his pop can long empty, it was time to clean up and go back inside. Dawn he brought down first, though this time he was able to clutch her more shamelessly to his chest as they descended the two stories of grating.

He put everything away while she poked around a little more. Keith liked to shower twice on days like this and Dawn agreed, so they went their separate ways to clean off. (And he was of course sure that it crossed both of their minds to bathe together.) When he was done, and done cleaning up the earlier mess from the bathroom floor, he found her nosing around his studio.

He had four work-benches in the space, racks of shelving holding wood and scrap, a washout sink, and behind a clear bath curtain in one of the partition boxes was his little office, protected from the dust. He used power tools quite frequently in here, and the jury-rigged ventilation only removed so much of it.

“I have to admit, when you said you designed furniture, I was imagining something obnoxious,” Dawn said, her hands running along the legs of a side table.

He pulled a catalog of his '84 work of a shelf and blew the dust off. He opened it to one of the pages with photos and set it down on the floor for her to look at. He was pleased when she did. KEMO, Inc. had done six large commissions that year for residences, three for offices, and sold a decorative sculpture at auction for $4,000.

Dawn looked genuinely surprised. “This stuff is so much more interesting than that coffee table! It’s…”

“A little mid-century, a little nouveau, a little Calder, a little Nakashima…”

He almost forgot that she wouldn’t know what any of that meant. She didn’t seem to need to know to be impressed, though; what was important was that he sounded confident, he supposed.

“And all in bronze!” she gaped.

“I started working with a foundry about ten years ago. It’s been a complete game-changer.”

“Now Nakashima… Nakashima… Where have I heard that name before?”

“You mean George?” Keith asked, grabbing a magazine. “Surely you know George.” He fwapped down the two-page feature on the lauded Japanese-American master.

“Aha!” she practically squealed, pointing at the pages. “Vincent–Vincent Thurlow–has a table of his!”

“He does? I’m jealous.”

“You know if I never change back, I should hire you to design all the furniture that’ll have to go in my new dollhouse.”

“Just think how inexpensive rent will be. You could be making the same figure and living at a fraction of the cost.” He scooped up the reading material and put them away.

“That would be nice…” Dawn’s voice trailed off as she thought about it.

He yawned, stretched, and she looked up at him. “Bedtime already?”

“M’fraid so. You should get to sleep too, you’ve got a phone call to make at 8:30 sharp.”

“Don’t remind me.”

Back outside, he crossed the floor to turn the lights off, leaving the Christmas strand on again.

“Carry me to bed, would you?” Dawn said effetely, and he obliged.

Keith set her on top of the pillowcase and she slipped in. Without taking her eyes off him, the tiny woman pulled off the doll dress, pushed it beyond her head, and twisted a little under the fabric. It was hardly enough to cover her breasts, and stretching her arms above her head brought them tantalizingly close to the edge.

“Kiss goodnight?”

He caged her in and bent down low. “Try to get at least a little sleep, alright?” Keith gave her a short peck on the mouth and chin, a wink as he lifted away, and retreated to his bedroom where he tried to fall quickly asleep.

But the artist tossed and turned, unable to get the image of her in that thin pillowcase out of his head; with a growl reached over to his nightstand for a squirt of body lotion and got to work on himself like a damned teenager.

The mood was very tense in the morning. When Keith checked in on Dawn, she was already clothed and sat on the couch, her body language guarded. It was around 8am, they had half an hour to go. He turned the TV on to help kill the time and stuck a bagel in the toaster for them.

She wasn’t much for talking this morning either, and he didn’t press it.

A 8:29, he showed her to the phone, lifting her up to the side table and keeping an eye on his watch for the moment 8:30 rolled around. When it did, he set the receiver down face-up and dialed the number she gave him. Dawn was wringing her tiny little hands as they both leaned in to hear.

“Good morning, Raymond Thurlow, this is Crystal speaking.”

“Crystal!” Dawn blurted into the receiver. “Crystal, it’s me! Dawn! Dawn Cooper!”

There was hesitation for a moment.

“Crystal, please, don’t hang up!”

“Miss Cooper? Miss Cooper, is that you? Y-you sound… far away, I can barely hear you! Is everything all right?”

Relief seemed to flood the tiny woman and she wiped her eye.

“Everything’s fine, Crystal! I-I want you to take a message for Vincent, James, and Emily. I want you to tell them that I’m alright, that there’s been… there’s been something of an accident, an embarrassing one. I’ll need to go on medical leave f-for a little while.”

She put both of her hands to the holes on the mouthpiece. “Do you have a fax machine?” she hissed up at Keith. He nodded.

“What hospital are you at? You might have some visitors.”

“No! No… I’m…” She wracked her brain for a precious moment. “I’m upstate. Look, Crystal, if there’s any paperwork you need me to finish up before transferring my caseload, there’s a fax machine here. I won’t be able to come to the phone very often.”

“O-OK, Miss Cooper. I’ll pass the note along to Emily. Are you sure you’re alright? You don’t need anything?”

“No! Totally fine, here, I’ve got everything I could possibly need,” she tried giving a laugh but it sounded like it hurt.

“What number can we reach you at? I’m sure Emily will want to talk to you, and to find out how long you’ll be away.”

“Right, right, of course, ah…” Dawn made a pleading gesture at him. “It’s…”

He tore open the side table drawer, looking for a business card. In his panic he knocked a few pens to the floor and grimaced silently. But there was nothing.

“Miss Cooper?”

“I-I’m just looking for it, I wrote it down here somewhere…” She mouthed his name, eyes wide.

Without any other ideas, or even a pad of paper to write on, he started holding up his fingers. 7-1-8…

“Seven, one, eight…”

“Hey, Miss Cooper, isn’t that a borough area code? Did… didn’t you say you were upstate?”

Dawn slammed her fist down on the switchhook with a tiny woman’s growl and stood there, clenching and unclenching her fists.

Keith swallowed. “Well, mission accomplished?”

She stood there until the off-hook tone started yelling at them. He hung it up for her.

“I need you to call Beverly.”

“Who?”

“My girlfriend Beverly. She won’t be at work yet. You need to tell her that you’re a friend of mine and… and that she needs to meet you here ASAP.”

“A-are you ready for someone else to see you like this?”

“I don’t exactly have a choice.” A pause. “She has a car, tell her to bring my juicer.”

“Your juicer?” He wasn’t sure where this was going.

“I just have a craving for carrot juice. It’s a Panasonic, very easy to operate. Won’t take up hardly any room on the counter, I promise.”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, alright.”

“Go on, pick up the phone. She’ll be out the door any minute now.”

Keith sucked in a breath and did as he was told. Dawn gave him the phone number and he waited while it rang a few times.

“Hello?” came the clipped greeting on the other end. He could tell she had a thick Jersey accent already.

“Uh, hi, good morning, uh, Beverly, is it?”

“Yeah, who’s this? I’m about to leave for work.”

Keith switched ears. “Uh, hi, my name’s Keith Morgan. You might not’ve heard about me before, but–”

“Look, guy, whatever you’re sellin’ I don’t want any.”

“W-wait wait wait! Don’t hang up! I-I know where Dawn is!”

Dawn smacked her forehead.

“Oh my god,” came the startled voice on the other end. “Ohmygod. Ohmygod ohmygod ohmygod, who is this??”

“I’m Keith Morgan,” he said slower this time, enunciating. “I’m a friend of Dawn’s. She doesn’t talk about me much, we’re not very close, but I know where she is.”

“W-w-well where, buddy! Talk! She’s been missin’ since last friggin’ week!”

“She’s with me! Look, there’s been an accident, and she’s suffering from a very embarrassing injury. I happened to be close by when it happened, so she’s been recovering at my place. She didn’t want to go to the police, so she asked me to call you.”

“Put 'er on the line.”

Keith looked to Dawn with wide eyes. ‘She wants to talk to you!’ he mouthed. Dawn made X’s with her arms and shook her head.

“I said put 'er on the line if she’s really there!”

“A-alright, will do. Here she is.”

He shrugged and thrust out the phone.

“Beverly, hun, how are ya?” Dawn said, trying not to sound like she was shouting.

“Jesus, girl, what happened to your voice? You sound like you swallowed a balloon.”

“Well, see, Bev, that’s the, ah, embarrassing part of this whole thing. I’m sorta… stuck like this for a while. Something happened and I don’t really want anyone to see me.”

“Wait, if you’re fine, then what the hell happened Thursday night? Cops tore your place apart and said you never came home.”

“I didn’t. Look, can you come see me today? I’m stuck out in Flatbush and could really use the moral support.”

“Well I guess… business is slow right now. What’s a few hours? I’ll be there in forty-five minutes. Where am I going?”

“I’m at Keith’s studio, he’s on Avenue D and Foster, right across from the station. Big place on the corner. Buzz the third floor. Thank you for coming. And please, whatever you do, promise you won’t scream when you see me?”

“I don’t know what the hell you’re talkin’ about but I don’t make promises I can’t keep. Love you, hun. Glad you’re safe. See ya in a bit.”

Click.

Keith gently hung up the phone. “You forgot to ask about the juicer,” he said.

She ignored him. “I don’t know what I’m going to do, Keith. I don’t know how to sugar-coat this!”

“Just calm down, it’s going to be fine. If she’s really your friend, she’ll get over it quick.” That was bullshit he just made up, but it sounded right.

“Oh god Keith I think I’m going to be sick.”

“Oh no you don’t, c’mon. Deep breaths, deep breaths…”

Dawn sat down on the table and hugged herself, sighing. She appeared to be alright after all.

“Would you like a real hug?”

“Maybe.”

“Well all I have is the extra-large size. Hopefully it fits.” He picked her up and held her up to his shoulder while he patted her little backside. He sighed too, eyes on the ceiling. He had to try and figure out how to get forty-five minutes of work done today.

CHAPTER 8: THE SKYLINE

Dawn wished that she could say that the kiss caught her by surprise, but she knew that look in his eyes, and even this small it was obvious his eyes were flicking down to linger at her mouth.

What did surprise her, though was the sheer thrill of it. His face was enormous, the size of a sedan to her, and it came close with such precision. Instinctively she held out her hands and they came to rest on his stubble-shadowed cheeks just before his lips pressed to the bottom half of her face.

She kissed him back, or tried to–Dawn wasn’t entirely sure he could feel her, so she made sure to throw her back into it. Keith’s hot, wine-cooler-flavored mouth found purchase along her jaw, and she supposed that was some geometry that he could settle on without swallowing up her nose.

Warm breath flowed over her and she felt like she were kissing some mythical beast. When he pulled clumsily away, the lawyer felt altogether like she was 16 years old again. How did that happen?

Dawn had been turned around and backed up his leg, and she couldn’t tell if she’d slid up herself up the fuzzy limb of if he’d pushed her that way, but in a calculated move she let her derriere come back down to rest in the crook of his thigh, making sure to keep her dainty legs away from the second brain surely smoldering away in those silly technicolor shorts of his.

This was a game of wills, she wanted to make him repeat for her. But somehow the idea of losing didn’t sound so bad. Not at twelve inches tall, at least. She didn’t have as far to fall at this size, and felt easier to catch.

“You’re drunk,” she said with a grin.

“I’m not the only one.”

Peter Gabriel played softly in the background, but it wasn’t exactly a soft song. “I wanna be… your sledgehammer…!”

Keith beamed in the long New York summer twilight. “Each of those shotglasses must’ve been like a fishbowl’s worth of drink for you.”

“I can hold my liquor,” she insisted.

He chuckled. “Sure, at 140 pounds, maybe. But three? C’mon, Dawn, do the math. The numbers don’t lie. You’re hammered.”

She found herself sticking out her tongue. “Are you always this much of a tease?”

“Oh, so now I’m a tease because I haven’t rushed you off to the bedroom yet, is that it?”

She watched him stretch and put his arms behind his head, well out of her reach. It was all the same to her, though, because his lean frame looked much broader this way and she could clearly see the outline of his biceps.

Dawn kept wanting to push him, goad him into acting out, but it was looking like the kiss was all she was going to get for now. She experimentally pressed her foot into his belly button and felt his abs tighten in response. It was like pushing a lever on a great, powerful machine and seeing what would happen.

“That’s not how all of my dates end,” she added with a little haughty defiance.

The song continued: “I kicked the habit… shed my skin… this is the new stuff… I go dancing in…”

“You should trying dating more artists,” Keith decided, returning his gaze to the view. “We can tease you for weeks.”

“And let me guess, “artists do it with style” or something.”

“No, we do it with longer strokes,” he said with a hint of bedroom voice she hadn’t heard before. It sent tingles down into her toes. When she looked up, he was looking at her with a bit of a self-satisfied smirk that she wanted to wipe off his face with a taste of her own sexual prowess.

Instead, she wiggled her toes among the dark hairs on his belly. “Don’t shorten them for me now, darling. I like 'em long.”

He just laughed, and it shook her in a pleasant way. Dawn decided that she liked playing with a giant like this. It was fun pulling his strings and feeling him tug back. A game of wills indeed!

“C’mon, turn around and enjoy this view with me.”

“I’m enjoying the view just fine from here.”

Keith rolled his eyes and leaned forward to adjust the beach chair further backward as she balanced on his activated rectus femoris. Then, not appearing to hesitate at all this time, he wrapped his thick fingers around her middle, tearing her away from her perch, spun her around, and set her in the crook of his arm. A relaxed pectoralis major was underneath her butt this time, and her view was of his long legs stretching out before her, the expanse of roof, still radiating heat, and beyond the river, the World Trade Center loomed and twinkled against a great backdrop of pink and orange sky. A plane hit a waypoint overhead, its engine dropping to a lower note as it prepared to circle around to JFK, and a siren wailed in the distance. The radio began playing Papa Don’t Preach.

“There. Let’s just enjoy this for a little while, alright?” He took another slurp of 7-up and held the can to his cheek, forcing a sigh of contentment.

Dawn brushed a lock of hair behind his ear, but it was too short to stay there. “What’s this about, now?”

“I don’t like to rush things, that’s all.”

“You don’t like to follow your passion while it’s sizzling hot? C’mon Keith, don’t tell me you prefer lunchmeat over a filet mignon right off the grill.”

“You’re not sober.”

“And it wouldn’t be the first time.”

“I’m not sober.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time either.”

“This doesn’t bother you? Like, at all?”

He gestured with the can to her and then to himself, looking at her expectantly. Dawn grinned and leaned in toward his ear.

“I like a challenge.” When he made a frustrated sound, she doubled down. “Have you ever had one-night-stand?”

“Yes, I have. But that’s besides the point. The point is…” He made a handsomely befuddled face for a moment. “That you’re, frankly, barely bigger than my swack, and necking a drunk girl is bad enough without her being small enough to stuff in my pants while I’m at it.”

Oh, Keith, she thought. Those were the words of a very interested but very conflicted man.

He continued. “Look, I have no idea what this week is going to bring for either of us. But let’s not do anything that can make stuff worse for you. You’ll have enough on your plate tomorrow as it is.”

“I guess you’re not wrong,” she conceded with a huff.

“Do you know what you’ll do after you make that phone call?”

Dawn sighed and reclined against him, her head not even reaching his collarbone. It must’ve been more comfortable than his own sun-bleached beach chair, though. “I was going to call up one of my girlfriends, have her stop by. I can’t hide from everyone forever.”

“Could you stay with her?”

“No can do. She has three Great Danes.”

Keith’s chest swelled underneath her. “You can stay with me as long as you need to, I guess. You’ll need to hide when I have anyone over, though.”

“How often is that?”

“Couple times a week. I usually see clients on Thursdays.” A pause. “You’ll have to cooperate with police eventually, you know. There’s going to be an investigation.”

Dawn just groaned. She knew exactly how long and how stupid police investigations were, and she was not looking forward to getting caught up in one like this. Sure, she’d filed a half-dozen restraining orders in her time against unhinged clients who…

A little light went off in her head, then. Dawn remembered now a man she defended back in '82 who had killed a neighbor’s dog with some odd machine, and was found to be quite the all-around nutter. He was up for parole last year, and when he didn’t make any appearances around the firm, Dawn thought nothing of it and got on with her life. Looking back, though, he was an extremely difficult client. When she tried talking to him about the purpose of the machine, he said nothing. He’d taken no notes, wrote in no journals. The only details they could get out of him were what they could find in the stacks of loose papers he referred to as “the plans”, full of schematics and nonsense math that not even forensics could make heads or tails of.

“Dawn?”

She jumped up and turned around, planting a big wet one on his lower lip. His hand flew to where she was in case she fell. “Keith, you’ve just reminded me that I might have a lead after all.”

@olo I know, the mechanism of shrinking was always the least interesting thing to me. I hope I can continue sidelining that part of the story lol.

CHAPTER 7: THE PENNY-WAGER

The tile floor of the bathroom was a pittance cooler than the rest of the loft, but being on the north-east end of the building, it would more or less stay this temperature as the rest of the apartment baked in the setting sun. He plugged a fan in and angled it upwards so that it wouldn’t disturb their game, shed his shoes and shirt, and when everyone was settled in he cracked open a wine cooler from the bowl of ice he brought down from upstairs, pouring Dawn her shotglass’ worth.

They clinked their glasses together, toasting nothing for the heat and eager to drink something cold.

As Keith dealt, he glanced over at Dawn, trying not to let his eyes linger. He was trying to figure her out, mostly. She was a woman of uncompromising extremes; blasting hot one minute and frigidly cold the next, and quite hazardous to handle. Keith, always the diplomat, took an Alan Watts approach to life, gently setting boundaries, but always being generous with the latitude he gave others. It was more his style to watch, listen and learn, acting moderately and moving lightly, in most things. Even his chosen artform was thoughtfully measured. It was why he was drawn to designing tables: innocuous pieces of furniture whose job it was to simply hold up other things. Truly the unsung hero of human civilization, he always thought.

But even in that absurd doll’s shift, he couldn’t help but be reminded that underneath was indeed a grown woman. In miniature, of course, but a grown woman all the same, with a mind to match. He caught the curve of her naked shoulder, and took a long guzzle of his bright red drink as he focused on his pair of cards.

“Well?”

Dawn gave him a sly look and bit her lip. That, he knew, was fake. At least she was kind enough to make it obvious.

She slid two pennies into the blind.

“Hm.”

He dealt the flop. It wasn’t kind to him, and he bet two cents as well.

Dawn hefted a nickel from her pile of change and dropped it in. He gave her a look, and she batted her lashes at him. He dropped his hand.

“You can’t possibly be this transparent.”

“Oh?” she said sweetly, sipping on her shotglass. “Am I being transparent?”

He sighed and smiled, meeting her bet. He dealt the fourth card.

“You’re exhausting.”

She popped in another penny.

“Then maybe you should leave the grown-up games to those of us with some… verve.”

And baffling, he thought. And frustrating. And mesmerizing. For the hell of it, he put two pennies in his blind before drawing a last card and downing the rest of his cooler.

“Oh sweetie,” she said with a coy, but wicked little grin. She threw in a dime.

He called her bluff and slid in a dime and a nickel. She took a peek at her cards again, a hilarious thing at her size to begin with, but she managed to look cool and casual as she lifted the posterboard-sized cards an inch from the ground and set them back down again. Her shoulders slumped, she looked at him coquettishly, and for a fleeting moment he thought he might’ve had her.

Dawn threw in two more dimes. Keith did the same, just to see what would happen.

Her pair of jacks obliterated his four and nine.

“Good god,” Keith laughed as her little arms scooped all the change into a pile. He helped push a stray dime her way.

“We should play strip poker,” she said, finishing off her little glass of wine cooler. “I’m only wearing one thing and I’ll still have you naked first.”

“Now look who’s flirting.”

“Not flirting. It’s merely a statement of fact.”

“I object, your honor.”

“Overruled.”

Keith cracked open a second cooler and dealt on her behalf.

They played at least a dozen rounds, and Keith lost all but two. Dawn seemed to be making some kind of effort to be nicer; she’d at least cranked up the charm, and, well, he couldn’t exactly say it was unpleasant.

When the sun began to set, he was already four wine coolers in, and the tiny lady already two shotglasses in herself.

“We should probably eat something,” he said, looking at his last four pennies.

“Please, no cold pizza. I want something Zagat-rated, darling,” she said dramatically, falling over and lounging on the floor as if it were a chaise.

A belly laugh welled up in him. “You won’t find anything Zagat-rated here in Flatbush.” He thought for a moment, and snapped his fingers. “Wait for me by the door by the studio.”

He got up and stepped over her, feeling much more tipsy than he initially suspected. Oh jeez. Well, it was nothing a little baguette couldn’t fix.

Keith bounded across the floor, up to the kitchen, and dug out a slice of pizza while he worked. He set out a cutting board and tore through drawers and refrigerator, slicing bread and cheese, gathering a jar of olives here, dolloping a bit of jam there, until he’d managed to assemble something that might’ve looked like a charcuterie board if he squinted. Now to make it to the roof without dropping it.

“What is taking you so long!”

“Coming!”

He undid the enormous bolt on the old door and it swung outward with a metallic groan, revealing a substantial fire escape. He had a few potted plants languishing on the landing, and made a mental note to water them in the morning before he started work. Inside, he slipped on an old pair of flip-flops.

“I can’t climb all those myself, you know,” Dawn said, peering out.

He laughed. “Well I’m not bringing my books out here.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

He blinked. “You mean you…”

“Yes, you’ll have to pick me up.”

Keith bought himself a minute by rushing up the stairs and situating the board safely on the roof before coming back down again.

“Now, maybe it was the wine coolers, but I thought I hear you say that you wanted me to pick you up.”

“Want is a strong word,” she said in that beguiling way of hers.

“Well that’s funny, because that’s the word I need to hear.” He bent closer and cupped his ear toward her.

“Oh no. You’re not doing this to me again.”

“Keith, I want you to pick me up,” he mimicked. “I need to hear it.”

She folded her arms and cocked her hip under that shapeless gown. God, he wished she’d put on the Barbie clothes.

“C’mon,” he teased. “It’s easy. Keith, I want you to pick me up.”

Dawn mumbled incoherently.

“Come again?”

Oh he was definitely a little drunk.

“Keith, you giant moron, I want you to pick me up and whisk me away to the damn roof.”

“Much better.”

For all his newfound confidence, he still wasn’t quite prepared to handle her again. He knelt and she stepped closer, hands on her hips. Dawn looked up at him expectantly.

“Well?”

“Uh…” He tried what came naturally. He cupped his hand and held it out behind her, which she promptly sat down in. With his other hand, he supported her back, and carefully, carefully, rose to his feet. “I-is this OK?”

He didn’t anticipate the electricity when she grabbed hold of his fingers with her tiny hands. And judging by the look on her face, neither was she.

“You’d um… you’d better leave a hand free to hold onto the railing,” she said.

Keith nodded, brows furrowed in concentration as he brought her to his breastbone. For some reason his heart was pounding. “How about this?” He tucked his chin in to look at her.

“This is… nice.”

For a very brief moment Dawn met his gaze without pretense, guard down. She looked like a strange little princess from a fairy tale, self-unaware and unencumbered by the world, and Keith felt a jolt of recognition: that, THAT, was the Dawn he wanted to see.

He cleared his throat and fixed his eyes on the wrought-iron steps of the fire escape as he began his ascent.

“Hang tight…”

In the end he needed to make one more trip downstairs for a can of 7-up and, he decided, the radio. A little music made everything better.

Up on the roof he already had a few folding beach chairs, which he plopped into as Dawn busied herself with the little spread of snacks. As she worked around the pit of a kalamata olive, he piled a few slices of cheese onto a baguette and smeared it with jam.

Off to the northwest was the downtown Manhattan skyline, a beautiful sight that he would never get tired of. He and his friends spent quite a bit of time up here, and nights often ended with a number of chairs arranged in a circle on the roof, talking and laughing. Keith wondered what his friends would think of Dawn.

“Ow,” he heard his guest say under her breath. When he turned, she was picking something off her bare foot.

“I’m sorry, I forgot you weren’t wearing any shoes. Uhm…”

“If I have someplace to sit, it shouldn’t be a problem.”

“Would you like a chair?”

“Not necessarily…”

He cocked his head at her while he tried to figure out what that meant. “Don’t make me make you say it again,” he said.

“Oh, I don’t think I need to say anything…”

She padded over to him carefully, swaying as she did, and his stomach did a little thing when she climbed up onto his thigh and reclined against his hip.

“Com…fortable?” he rasped. It took every fiber of his being not to adjust his shorts right then.

“Mm yes, thank you.”

“Is that flirting or a just statement of fact?”

She pretended to be scandalized. “Mr. Morgan. If I want to flirt with a man, I would not need to hide behind double meanings and feigned innocence.”

Keith took a long sip of his pop and pondered the situation. She was asking something of him, he could tell. There were nickels in her blind and she was asking him to play dimes. He set down the can and sat up a little straighter in his chair.

“Alright, spit it out,” he said suddenly but warmly, surprising even himself. Dawn whipped her head up and around to look at him. He took the opportunity to capture her chin between his thumb and forefinger, and her eyes grew wide for a second. “Keith, I’m flirting with you and I want to see how far it’ll take me.”

He had her. It was that look again, and in the dim light he could see her blinking in surprise. She licked her lips.

“Keith,” she began slowly, “I’m flirting with you and… I want to see how far it’ll take me.”

@olo Well, last time I left the couch to water my plants the fever came back, so I guess the universe is telling me to do nothing but write until I’m over the damn rona.

And truly, I’ve learned from some of the best in this community

CHAPTER 6: THE JACKASS

Dawn was furious. Insulted. Positively annoyed. Keith–her gigantic and all around lackadaisical tease of a keeper–was really beginning to get on her nerves. Why couldn’t she have fallen into the hands of literally anyone else in New York? A banker would have been nice. They’d at least be able to see eye to eye.

It was as if he didn’t have a care in the world. No schedule, no responsibilities, no sense of urgency for anything. How could someone get through life like this? Surely he wasn’t the financial brains behind his so-called business?

And now he was determined to make a damn fool of her. Dawn’s “kind” weren’t often appreciated until one was in a tight place, she knew that. And she didn’t care. Everyone swears against the devil, but as soon as you need to strike a deal with him, it’s funny how quickly the song changes. As they walked through the park she imagined Keith groveling on her office rug, begging her to represent him in a ludicrous and predatory lawsuit. Poor thing! You couldn’t afford me, she’d tell him, and slam the door in his handsome face.

Handsome?

Well, he wasn’t half-bad looking.

As Keith waved his membership card at the admission both, they strolled in and he said in a low voice: “Now remember, this is a date. Try to enjoy yourself.”

This wasn’t a date and she absolutely would not, thank you very much.

It was afternoon by now and possibly the hottest part of the day. He should have gone to the gardens first and finished with the museum, she thought balefully. However, the trees cast decent shadows and there weren’t as many people about as there could have been, she imagined. He took them to the Japanese garden first, and she had to admit that it was beautifully manicured. She always felt she had some spiritual quality in common with the Japanese; their pursuit of perfection, rigor, and straightforward utilitarian aesthetic struck her as sensible. And she found the ritual of the sushi restaurant to be one of life’s finer pleasures.

“Have you ever eaten sushi?” she called out, mostly out of boredom.

“Raw fish and horseradish? No way,” he said back.

Dawn smiled to herself, a sharp little expression that she was often fond of weaponizing. Finally, she had something on him.

“You mean to tell me that in all your cultured explorations, you’ve never once even thought about it? Didn’t think anything was too highbrow for you.”

He stopped in a particularly nice bit of shade as a little breeze picked up and brought cooler air off the pond. It was heavenly.

“It’s just not my thing. Now isn’t this nice?”

How dare he just… brush her off like that! If she was her normal size and this was a real date, she would have command of the conversation. She would have him wrapped around her finger by now. He’d be eating whatever she told him to eat.

She was jostled again, though, as he set her down on the ground to take a peek inside with a quizzical look on his face.

Dawn frowned and blinked. “What?”

“I was expecting some acerbic response and didn’t get one. Wanted to make sure you were still with me.”

“Some acerbic–! You know what, how about you try being attacked on the landing to your apartment, shrunk down to however the hell tall this is, thrown in the fucking garbage, and then dragged around Brooklyn in this heat by some strange man who’s trying to flirt with you without getting a little frustrated!”

A crease formed between his brows as he looked down at her. “So you didn’t want to come after all.”

“That’s not what I said! You don’t get it.”

“No, I think I get it perfectly well. Come on, I’m leaving. This isn’t going to be as nice of a walk as I was hoping it would be.”

Dawn knew his mood had changed when he hailed a cab home. The backpack was handled roughly as he slid into the back seat of the air-conditioned Crown Vic and told the driver his cross streets. They were back at his place in a matter of minutes, and in no time he was taking them up those horrible creaky stairs to the third floor. Key in lock, door open.

The backpack was put on the floor, and he opened it rather brusquely, in her opinion, before walking away to go to the kitchen. She heard water running as he filled a cup.

Dawn was left to pull herself from the bag and straighten out that horrible dress. She was going to follow him and demand to know what his problem was, but she was too small to make it up the stairs to the kitchen.

“What was that all about?” she yelled up at him.

The artist took a long swig of water from what looked to be a beer pint, and she watched as his pronounced Adam’s apple bobbed high above her head.

“You don’t have the faintest idea of how rude you are, do you?”

Keith leaned against a wooden guard rail that looked like it’d taken at least 100 coats of paint over the years and had that bloated look to it.

“Being nice doesn’t exactly get you anywhere in this town.”

Exasperated, he disappeared from view and poured himself more water. “I was trying to help,” he called down to her. “I was trying to take your mind off how damned awful your situation is, and boy am I sorry for trying.”

“Well maybe you shouldn’t have let someone see me and then pretend I was a goddamn ape!”

“You’re human! You are an ape!”

“I don’t think you appreciate how bad this is for me. If I can’t get back to normal, then I’m out of a job! Everything I’ve worked for, my client base, my position, my… my figure! All of it, wasted!”

There was silence for a moment.

“How come you said you didn’t want to be alone?”

Dawn opened her mouth and closed it again. Eventually, Keith appeared at the top of the stairs and in that easy way of his, ambled carefully down, eyeing her.

“I’m not used to spending much time by myself, I guess,” she said stiffly. “I’m rarely home.”

Keith held up a finger as he crossed the floor to the couch and sat down. His back was to her. “That’s not what I heard in your voice this morning.” He grabbed one of the expensive art books and began flipping through it.

“Oh? And what did you hear?” she snapped.

She heard him suck in a breath. “I heard a woman who was terrified to be stuck alone with her own thoughts and was begging to be distracted. Maybe to feel a little taken care of.”

Dawn couldn’t help the snort as she folded her arms and blushed deeply. “Don’t be ridiculous… I can’t believe I’m listening to a man tell me how I feel,” she huffed incredulously.

He flipped a few more pages. “Am I wrong though? I mean, I’m happy to be wrong if that means you’re just a jackass instead.”

And just like that, he had her cornered. Her shoulders slumped and she fingered a lock of hair. But after a moment her frown turned into a smile; maybe Keith was a little more clever and ruthless than she’d first imagined.

Dawn crossed the floor as he continued busying himself with the book and appeared beside the end of the sectional, where she stood near one of his huge Chuck Taylored feet and looked up, up, and into that face she had evidently underestimated. Alright, so he was handsome. Sue me, she thought.

“I’m not used to being called a jackass,” she said quietly.

“I don’t like the word bitch.”

“Oh I hear it all the time.”

He smiled a little and shook his head.

“It’s not often someone can beat me at my own game like that.”

He quirked a brow at her, then gently closed his book and leaned back. “And let me guess, you like that in a big, stupid man?”

She didn’t answer, and it was Keith’s turn to blush. He looked away and stood up quickly, and she gasped at how big he suddenly was, then wanted to laugh at catching him off guard. He went to the kitchen stairs again and clapped his hands together. “How about, ah, wine coolers and a game of poker? You can play Hold 'Em, you think?”

“Sounds great,” she said. “But could we go someplace cooler? I’m dying out here.”

@olo Glad I got out of the legal industry when I did

@tinyborrower Glad you’re enjoying it! Out of all my years in the kink, I have to say - this is my first straight-up SW story I’ve ever written, believe it or not. I can’t believe it’s taken me this long, but it’s so far a very fun change of pace.

Now let’s see if I can finish it before I recover!

@olo Ah yes! The majestic Zebu! I hear they have issues with their, uh, glands? Fur? Something like that.

And I’m sure Dawn would MUCH prefer to do the shrinking, if she had her way. Though I’m sure she can make an assistant feel inches tall with a word and a look.

CHAPTER 5: THE MONKEY-TRAINER

Keith sat down in the crowded cafe attached to the museum. He sat with his back to the wall, and carefully placed the backpack next to him. A waitress came by to bring him water and a menu. He decided he was in the mood for brunch.

“How long are we going to be here?” came the small, muffled voice from inside his bag.

He zipped the bag open a little more, startling Dawn–her feathers were surprisingly easy to ruffle, he was discovering–and she ducked down as his hand brushed past her to reach for his book. “Why, you need to be somewhere?” he said so that only she could hear. Keith watched her indignant expression before grinning and tugging the zipper shut again. “Gimme half an hour. In the meantime… here.”

He turned the backpack so that she could just see out over the table and into the busy cafe. Surely Dawn knew how to people-watch?

When his eggs benedict and glass of house white came, he set the book down and, grabbing a knife and fork, carved out an appropriately-sized bite of bread and egg, giving it the smallest dollop of hollandaise, and went to share it with his guest.

“Psst.”

He placed the bite of food at the edge of the table just in front of the hole in the backpack, and watched as two little arms reached out to snatch it up. It was, for lack of any better word, quite adorable.

As he ate, Keith did some reading (Michael Crichton was one of the few popular fiction writers he trusted with his time), and he did some listening. There was a family of tourists in the corner, a frumpy looking couple and their two children who might’ve been from Cleveland (they couldn’t possibly have chosen a worse time to visit the Big Apple!) and he smiled to himself as he listened to them try to make sense of Georgia O’Keeffe. The wife liked the flowers, but the husband thought the rolling landscapes resembled the sensuality of human flesh a little too much. By his breadwinning measure, the western scenes were more stimulating for the whole family.

A few seats away was a couple who appeared to only be here to have an argument. They leaned in over their plates at the small table like two alley cats standing off, staring intently at the other and speaking in hushed voices as they angrily shoveled sandwiches into their mouths. Keith guessed a divorce was imminent, if not already underway.

Beside him was a businessman shaking out the crisp pages of the Sunday Times every few minutes in a rather uncivilized way. There were several different ways to read a paper, and this man had apparently mastered none of them. He fought with the thing like a knight with a dragon, forcing the newspaper into various contortions as he poured over some bit of text, then grumbling to himself and jotting notes down on a napkin, started the process all over again.

Keith quite enjoyed watching people in this town, it was something of a hobby of his. There was just no shortage of interesting people doing interesting things, and if one couldn’t strike up a conversation to learn more about a stranger, then letting them talk about themselves through their behavior was almost as good.

In the back of his book were a few blank index cards, and he fished a Bic pen out of the pocket of his shorts to begin a little doodling. With simple, confident lines, he followed the contours of his half-eaten brunch, the plate, the empty glass of wine, the salt and pepper shakers, the little box of sugar packets…

“Hey that’s pretty good,” the businessman said. “You an artist?”

“I am,” Keith replied, quite skilled at graciously taking random compliments by this point in his life without letting them effect him much. “And thanks.”

“Whaddyou, uh… you do drawings or somethin’?”

“Sculpture, actually. Mostly furniture, though. I do a lot of tables.” He grabbed a business card from his wallet and handed it over. KEMO Inc. it read.

“Ah, shame. Was lookin’ for somethin’ new for the office, yannow?”

“I’ve gotta friend showing on 37th right now, at the Stanley Greer Gallery. She’s popular with the corporate crowd. You might check her out.” He knew the businessman wouldn’t, but it never hurt to mention these sorts of things.

“Hey, thanks. And say… you mind me askin’ whatchu got in the bag?”

Keith stopped and the back of his neck suddenly prickled with heat. His eyes darted down to the navy blue backpack, then back up to the man, and Keith found himself laughing nervously to buy him a moment.

“What, uh… what makes you think I’ve got something?”

The businessman smirked and adjusted himself in his seat so he could lean in and speak low. “C’mon… I know a monkey when I see one. You got a monkey in there, dontcha? One of those little guys, like in the movies.”

Keith laughed harder, relieved. Dawn must’ve been furious, if she hadn’t fainted from panic.

“Not so loud,” Keith whispered, playing into it. “I’m still training her. Don’t want the staff to know I brought an animal in here.”

“Gotcha, gotcha. Can I uh… can I see 'er? Just a peek? Only time I seen a monkey was at the Bronx Zoo when I was a kid.”

“No can do, I’m afraid,” he said sagely. “The… the Madagascar, uh, Doll-Faced Monkey is very sensitive to… to socialization. I’m getting her used to voices, right now.”

The businessman blinked and nodded, pretending he understood. “Oh yeah, of course. Of course. Don’t let me throw off your training.”

It occurred to him then, though, that he had the perfect opportunity to make a defense attorney squirm. And dammit, he couldn’t pass it up. Keith leaned over the backpack and gave it a pat.

“She’s doing really well though. Aren’t you, girl? Here, let me get you another bite.”

He broke off a piece of ham and balanced it on his finger before holding it up to the gap in the zipper.

“Come on,” he teased. “You know you want some…”

He pushed his finger just inside, when he felt her snatch up the ham and give him a hard slap.

“Ow!” he laughed. “She’s in a mood today. I think I’d better get going soon. It was nice meeting you.”

As soon as they were outside, Keith had barely adjusted his cap and put on his shades when there was movement coming from the backpack. Angry movement, it seemed. Like something was trying to hit him through the fabric.

“Hey now, hold on,” he said, looking for a secluded spot in the park behind the museum where they could converse. It took him a few minutes, but eventually he found a patch of lawn by some lilac bushes where he could set her down and unzip the bag.

“What the hell was that!” Dawn yelled as soon as she could see him. “You almost gave me a stroke!”

Keith laid down on his side in the grass next to her, and shrugged. “It was just a little harmless fun.” You could really learn to lighten up, he thought.

“Harmless?” she barked in that squeaky voice of hers. “More like humiliating! My god, to add insult to injury…”

He frowned. “Now don’t be like that, I saved your butt just now. Better a pet monkey than a twelve-inch Dawn Cooper, attorney at law, don’t forget.”

She fumed as some people walked by and Keith pretended his attention was elsewhere for a moment.

“Honest question, Dawn.”

“What.”

“What’s your idea of fun?”

“Oh don’t start with me.”

“No, really.” He rolled over onto his back and looked up through the leafy canopy above. “What do you do to cut loose after a long week?”

“I don’t ‘cut loose’.”

He snorted. “So, what, you do lines of coke and just get more work done?”

“Of course not!” she huffed, also quite adorably. “I like exercising.”

“Exercising? That’s not very relaxing.”

“It is to me!”

“What else?”

“I… I cook, sometimes.”

“Sometimes?”

“I try to make dinner once a week.”

“Uh huh. And what else?”

“What am I, on the stand?”

He grinned up at the tree. “Yeah, sure.”

“I…” Now this one she hesitated with. He knew it was going to be juicy. “I enjoy going on blind dates.”

Keith couldn’t help rolling over again to face her. His expression was one of raw amusement. “Oh! Now we’re getting somewhere!”

“Oh, stop it. I’m a grown woman, I can do as I damn well please.”

But he couldn’t wipe the grin from his face, and the next thing that came out of his mouth surprised him. He could possibly blame it on the wine, at least. “Well, you barely know me, why don’t you pretend this is all just one blind date?”

Dawn looked at him like he’d grown a second head. “Why in the world would I do that?”

“Might have a little more fun that way.”

“Fun, you big, stupid man, is standing six-foot in red heels, and convincing someone you just met that he can’t possibly go on living without you.”

He stroked his chin and grinned wider. “Ah, so you do like 'em big and stupid, then?”

“Ugh! You’re impossible.”

“Incorrigible, I believe is the word.” He zipped the backpack up again. “Now come on, let’s see if you can convince me that I can’t go on living without you by the time we’re done here.”

All I can think of while I write this

@olo

holy shit I’m tired now, goodnight