Teamwork

Samantha and Anthony were supposed to be working on the project together. Supposed to, being the key word here. In reality, Anthony did the overwhelming bulk of the work. He researched France, he planned out the poster, he wrote the report. He went to Samantha every week, asking her to get her ass to work on it, but every time she had some excuse or anther as to why she couldn’t. She had to go see family, or race with her stupid horse, or go see a movie. And so Anthony did the project. Almost all of it. The one part he hadn’t yet done, wasn’t done because he didn’t want to do it, but because he physically could not do it. If Anthony had his way he’d give her a piece of his mind. He certainly would, if he weren’t currently having the air squeezed out of his lungs by a finger several times his size.

From an outside perspective, this would probably be hilarious. A tiny figure little under an inch in height, limbs sprawled out on the table, barely poking out from a pinky finger around 4 times their height, easily dominated by the smallest finger of a teenage girl as if a common spider. Absolutely fucking hilarious, probably for anyone except for the poor guy stuck underneath. One thing that struck Anthony was how, well, huge it was.

He spent most of the time staring from afar at giants, but it was hard to gauge the actual scale outside of moments like these. It was just an absolute tank, about as tall as he was, and it weighed a ridiculous amount. She wasn’t even actively weighing down, she was just casually reclining there, and even then it was still enough to almost crush him like a bug. He certainly felt like a bug, legs flailing out to his sides wildly. It wasn’t fair. He did the work, he went nicely to go ask her to do the last part, but he was the one who got punished for it. He always was.

It was unfair. But Samantha was one of the big ones, and Anthony was one of the small ones. It was a fact that Anthony had to accept early on in life. He picked the short straw, and now he was stuck with Beth on this shitty project. Not that Anthony was thinking anything else at that particular moment but pure absolute panic. He couldn’t tell what was happening. He could make out some of her other fingers in his peripheral vision, naturally reclined on the rest of the table, making a slight arch that he could probably crawl underneath with room to spare.

She was tapping. Every time she tapped, her fingers shook, and her index finger hit the table with a dull crash that sounded somehow both muted and loud. That was it. At that moment, that was his world. Just the edges of his vision, the darkened table, the shake of her fingers, the constant tapping, and the unrelenting pressure of her pinky. It was hard even to be angry at Samantha. He had arrived at her house ready to scream his lungs out into his microphone until both of their eardrums burst. But then he stepped through the tiny door. Unlike most houses these days, it emerged from the floor. And something about looking around there, dwarfed by distant sneakers the size of mansions, dwarfed by a carpet that came up to his hips, gave him serious pause. And something about watching Samantha there at her computer about a mile or so away, more background than foreground at this point, a literal mountain of pale skin and dandelion blonde hair, took any desire to scream right out from under him. At least, any desire to scream in anger. A thin rasp left his lips, unheard to any soul. And then she slowly rose to her feet. He could literally barely take in all of her at one time, up from her thin legs, covered in a thin sheen of black, to the casual sweater perfectly outlining her perfectly formed… torso, to the locks of hair on her shoulders, to her pure, perfect face, uncaring, unconcerned. That’s when he did scream. She looked down at him, opened her mouth to scream at decibels that still rang in his ears right now, and well, here he was. Slowly having the life crushed out of him.

Tap. Tap. Tap. It was basically all he could think about. He could smell Samantha, he could feel Samantha, he could see Samantha, hell if it were any hotter he would probably be tasting Samantha. She dominated his thoughts, his vision, his, well, everything. He couldn’t stop thinking about her if he tried. He hated her. Her sour demeanor, her bitter, sarcastic attitude, her gossipy nature, her smug, self-satisfying grin whenever she knew she had won something. He also had a decently sized crush on her, for more or less the same reasons. She was just too much to deal with, too much for someone like him. Case in point, the unrelenting pressure of her pinky finger that was just about ready to crush him completely, wiping him out of this shitty existence.

DING. DING. Anthony would have covered his ears if he could. A sharp light cut into his peripheral view. It was followed by a wave of heat. A series of crashes and rumbles that sounded like elephants playing with oversized power tools overwhelmed his senses for a few agonizing seconds, followed by a final crash. Suddenly, there was a feeling of lightness. Almost as if he wasn’t being crushed to death. Slowly and painfully, Anthony rolled over on his side to see the vast empty nothing of Samantha’s kitchen. A large shadow cast over him as Samantha’s face overwhelmed his vision.

“Oh wait, you’ve been under here this entire time?” she boomed, barely restraining a chuckle. She covered her mouth. “That’s freaking hilarious. Anyways, I baked the stupid cream puffs you kept yelling about. I mean, I guess it wouldn’t be yelling, coming from you.”

She laughed openly, both hands now operating a skyscraper phone a few hundred feet off from the table. He turned to see the vast plains of stovetop to his side. Oh. She was cooking. He’d make an apology, but he couldn’t quite get the air into his lungs what with all the choking.

She turned to look back down at Anthony. “Are you doing the presentation or am I?”
Anthony looked at the cream puffs. If he tried to grab one it would definitely rot before he finished. He looked up at Samantha. She didn’t realize it, but he could feel her breathing ruffling his shirt like a soft, warm breeze. He looked out at the endless expanse of Samantha’s house. It’d take him a day if not longer to get back to the front entrance from here. He looked at all this, and took a deep, long sigh.

“Yeah, I guess I will!” screamed Anthony, barely audible enough to hear. Her grin could swallow a bus. He shivered.

It wasn’t exactly like he had a choice in the matter.