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beansthough · 9 months ago

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{The Eternal Light of our Love}

(Content warnings): thoughts of self harm, suicidal thoughts, violence, bodily harm, unintended self harm, mention of death.

A Ghost Oc Fic

4.2k

Ch.2 A New Existence

Hot steam rose from the bubble filled basin. The smell of tropical fruits calming the ghoul’s every sense.

Aether and Mountain led him here. His very own room with a bath attached.

The tub was already filled and warm. With a quick explanation and him promptly being shoved inside the calming room, he submerged himself in the bubbles, and they suddenly understood the appeal of being a water ghoul.

They scanned the bath’s surroundings, noting the care in every detail. Fresh cut honeysuckle was placed delicately in a small flower vase. Not a speck of dust was to be found.

For as perfect as this room was, it was still quite cozy and the ghoul basked in its comforts. The warm candle light flickering on the white marble stone was a sight to behold.

His air and quintessence mixed together and bleed out into the room, creating a calming scent mimicking the fresh night air as they relaxed.

The ghoul had promptly soaked in that sweet tropical water until every ache and pain from the summoning melted away.

They reached their clawed hand to the bottom of the tub, pulling the stopper and letting the water slowly drain away along with the unpleasant sensations that had arrived into this world with him.

Maybe this plane of existence wasn’t as unpleasant as he first thought.

As the last of the water drained away, he stood and reached out to turn the handle in front of him, letting cool refreshing water trail down his face and scarred skin.

After a quick rinse, they flipped the handle back in place and stepped out of the tub. In front of him stood a mirror, elegant and showy with a golden lining and gothic in design.

The ghoul’s eyes traced over the figure in the reflection. It was like looking into a fun house mirror. Their body familiar, but it wasn’t them. Not their true self.

Warped and concealed, hidden away. He could feel it right below his skin, but it would never break the surface.

What stood before him now was mortal… it made his very soul ache.

A dark thought suddenly crossed the ghouls mind. He imagined his clawed hand slicing through his bare chest, pulling and cracking ribs until his bound magic poured out of him.

He shook the thought away, even as he left one finger trace softly down his sternum. It wouldn’t work, and he’d face serious consequences for damaging his new mortal body that the clergy had so gracefully gifted them.

They instead averted their gaze, now focusing on the pile of fresh soft towels next to what the ghouls had described as clothing. A mortal custom… He ignored it for now. Instead grabbing just the towel.

He wrapped his skin in the plush material, and softly combed his claws through his long wavy blonde hair, pulling gently at the small tangles until his fingers glided through with ease. He shuddered out a relaxed sigh, turning and making his way to the rest of his quarters.

Three large windows looked out onto the ministry grounds. A once pristine garden now overgrown with nature. A small lake sat farther back before the tree line, the moonlight reflecting beautifully off the small ripples breaking the water’s smooth surface..

They turned and gazed upon their new nest. A large plush bed with a flowing canopy. Large fluffy pillows were stacked to the very top of the headboard.

Two nightstands sat on either side of the bed. Each decorated with blood red candlesticks, burning beautiful in their holders. The flame made Lumin’s fire element purr.

The ghoul let the towel drop to the floor and crawled into his newfound paradise. The soft cushions creating the perfect cradle for their battle worn body. Their tail wagging happily at the sense of security.

The multi ghoul nuzzled and turned their head in the soft pillows, before their eyes locked onto something shining in the candle light.

A raw cluster of amber, along with sage and thyme twined together in a beautiful display. Luminous’s heart flutter at the realization that it was his offerings. The others must have brought them here while he was in the bath.

If Lumin focused hard enough, he could still feel that little warm pulse left behind from his summoner on the offerings left to him. It made Lumin’s chest rumble in appeasement. A small comfort in this new existence.

The ghoul flopped back down into the cozy sheets. His eyes heavy with exhaustion from the summoning. They let them flutter close into a peaceful dreamless sleep.

—————————————————————————

They awoke to the dawn. Sun sneaking in through the paneled windows and onto their plush face. The light tickling their nose.

The protector roused from sleep. Stretching their tired bones. Stumbling back into the washroom finding the abandoned pile of clothing from the night before.

The ghoul was then put to the challenge of wearing them.

Luminous found it slightly difficult but after a few trials and errors of trying to button a shirt, they finally succeeded without cutting more holes with his claws. It was tight, definitely meant for a smaller or glamoured ghoul.

With some more tugging and pulling, the ghoul looked to the final piece of the outfit.

A metal mask…perfectly sculpted and polished…

It appeared to be loosely based on the appearance of a ghoul. This one was more masculine in appearance, with slicked back hair and two small devil horns protruding from the forehead.

Lumin was slightly worried about his own horns being able to fit, until he realized there was room modified for them to fit.

There was also a small cutout for their mouth. Perhaps for easier communication without a metal muzzle muffling their voice.

His fellow ghouls explained the rules of the mask. It was to be his new identity. They were to be a nameless face in the pack. A loyal and devout servant to the ministry and his summoner to help spread his majesty’s influence and message in the mortal world.

But if the ghoul chose to reject his duties, the clergy that had so graciously pulled him from the pit would not hesitate to punish him and send him back…

Or something worse… They had tried to get the other ghouls to elaborate more on the subject last night, but that seemed to only make them uneasy.

It was extremely unpleasant, They had said. Worse than being sent back, and even that is excruciating pain, more than a ghoul has ever known.

Lumin had decided not to push them anymore on the subject, instead switching his interest to basic mortal interaction. The ghouls tried not to show it, but the change in topic definitely put them at ease.

At least Lumin learned some more basic rules of the Ministry. He wasn’t to attack any human being, church member or not unless given specific instructions from the higher ups themselves.

That of course meant they couldn’t taste human flesh just yet, which he was only slightly disappointed in… They set his prey drive wild in a sense that he didn’t quite understand yet. He let the knowledge burn gently in the back of his mind for now.

They also learned that they were not allowed to leave the ghoul quarters with his mask and uniform. His ghoulish features were to be hidden away, even in a glamoured human form.

Apparently not all of humanity knew of ghouls' existence or even Hell's existence, and that could greatly frighten humanity.

So ghouls were left with these disguises to spare unwanted human distress. It also seemed the church just greatly admired uniforms. More clothing customs that Lumin couldn’t care less about, but if Luminous was to remain here they would have to follow the ministries rules.

No matter how ridiculous and useless Lumin thought some of those rules were.

They held up the mask, lingering slightly before placing it on their face. The cool of the metal was actually quite soothing on their skin.

Luminous was suddenly met with a sense of calm. His senses were suddenly dulled, and the strange new world seemed a little more bearable. It was as if it was enchanted with strong quintessent magic. Stronger than any that Lumin could ever conquer, mortal form or not.

With a new sense of peace, the ghoul stepped out of the room and made their way to where the others of his kind gathered.

Two familiar ghouls sat on the curved couch, facing a lit fireplace, warming the room to a comfortable temperature.

The curtains were partially drawn, letting the dawn light seep through. Illuminating the dim room. Lumin then noticed that the ghouls were no longer glamoured, looking more like how a ghoul should appear. Definitely not their true forms, but something closer.

Despite the more relaxed state, they all wore their masks. It seemed like a common custom for these ghouls to only have them fully removed in the privacy of their own rooms.

Maybe the masks allowed them a sense of privacy. After all it seemed like they were never out of the watchful gaze of the clergy.

One unfamiliar ghoul sat curled up between the others. A confusing scent met Luminous’s nose. It was as if a burning forest fire was at the bottom of an ocean. This wasn’t like a multi scent of different elements, like wet embers or starfire… it was a transitional scent. One that seemed very uncomfortable at that.

Now that Luminous was closer, he could feel the aura of discomfort that expelled out of the small ghoul. Elemental changes were no joke when it came to ghouls.

They were sudden, often caused by extreme grief or distress, and they could deeply scar a Ghoul’s elemental form to their core. It also hurt like hell to transition between elements…

Luminous could only imagine the agony this ghoul was going through, and here they thought they had it bad being forced into a mortal body…

He stood off to the side, waiting for them to notice his presence, shuffling awkwardly from side to side as they preened the small ghoul between them.

Aether noticed him first, the ghoul running his hand through the small ones long hair, before catching the large frame in the corner of his vision.

His mask tilted up from looking at the smaller, and his eyes met with the protector. Luminous fiddled with their hand, feeling as if they intruded on a personal moment.

A wave of reassurance bleed out into the air as the quintessential ghoul got to his feet to greet the freshly summoned.

Luminous appreciated the ghoul’s efforts of making him feel welcomed, but unease was still thick in the air.

Unease that wasn’t just from an unfamiliar ghoul being summoned. This distress went much deeper, deep enough to hurt the whole foundation of this ghoul pack.

“Good morning sleeping beauty, you sure clean up real nice!” Aether tried to break the tension. The two others stayed silent, watching the unfamiliar ghoul closely. “Is the mask bothering you at all?”

At its mention Luminous reached up involuntarily to adjust the cool metal. They then tried to remember how to speak this strange new tongue.

“No it’s actually quite nice…”He finally ushered out. “It’s helping me adjust a lot easier.” The multi ghoul then let his hand fall back down to his dress shirt and pants, tugging at the tight material. “This on the other hand…”

Aether gave an amused laugh. “Yes, unfortunately the ministry only had a limited number of uniforms for the new summons. When you get more settled in with life here, there will be an outfit tailored just for you.”

Luminous head perked up in curiosity at the mention of other newly summoned ghouls. “There’s more new summons?”

A frustrated growl came from the small ghoul, now clinging to Mountain on the couch. Luminous grew slightly on edge at the small burst of aggression. He let out an apologetic noise to the small ghoul, not wanting to offend anyone so soon.

Aether’s face dropped, a wave of defeat coursing through him. They then made a motion for the warrior to follow them out into the hall, his tail dragging sadly on the marble floor. Once the door was closed, he let out a long tired sigh.

“Forgive him… he’s been through a lot in these past couple of weeks… You’ve unfortunately been summoned into a less than ideal situation.”He ran his hand frustratedly over his mask.

Lumin gave a nod of his head in understanding. “I could sense something was off, but I didn’t wanna overstep and assume anything…. Being a new summons…”

Aether gave a thoughtful smile and rested his hand on Lumin’s shoulder. “For this being the first time you’ve been out of the pit, you’re adjusting very well. I guess that’s just how protectors are. Always ready to face and adapt to a new challenge.”

Luminous snorted in amusement and shook his head. “I don’t think adapting is the right word for it… I think survive would suit it better.”

The quintessent ghoul gave his shoulder a small squeeze before pulling back. “Well, you're doing great.”

Luminous preened under the compliment, “I appreciate your hospitality for me, even under all this stress.”

Aether let out a nervous little chuckle. “Someone had to keep the pack together… Well what’s left of it anyways…”

Luminous felt the hurt behind those words and they instinctively wanted to take it away. “Perhaps I could help keep it together too, so it’s not up to just you.”

The other ghoul had a wave of relief wash over them, and Luminous even noticed the other’s shoulders fall in a more relaxed position.

“That would be very helpful…” The ghoul then tensed up, his gaze averted to the floor, one hand coming to wrap around his upper arm, squeezing gently to mimic comfort.

“We’ve just lost our original summoner….Terzo.” It was distant and hurt. Lumin wondered for a split second how a ghoul could get attached to a human before focusing back in on the story. “We were very close to him, but the clergy had other plans.”

The ghoul’s tail lashed behind him. “They decided he wasn’t fit for the position he was in anymore. That he wasn’t the right image that the church wanted to portray for the project…”

Luminous quirked their brow at the mention of the project, it was to be the main means of spreading his majesty's influence. They were to spread it through music and song… a band is what the mortals called it. Lumin didn’t understand all of it right now, but let the ghoul continue his speech.

“So they ordered for him to be taken care of…” Aether gripped his own arm even tighter.

“We were the most recently summoned at the time…. But even then we’ve been with him for more than a year… I guess they didn’t expect us to be so attached….” The ghoul got choked up on his own words.

“W-We were the ghouls ordered to do away with him…”Aether dropped his head in shame. “For all of the past leaders in fact.”

“We couldn’t disobey… our summoning bonds wouldn’t let us…” He was rambling now, taking quick panicked breaths. “We didn’t want to… but we didn’t have a choice…”

“We wouldn’t just be sent back to the pit if we rebelled against the clergy… we would be expelled out of existence.” The ghoul breathed in sharp and deep.

“But we tried to warn him, to at least give him a chance…” Aether let out a defeated cry. “We told him of the clergy's plans, but he didn’t even seem surprised by them. He just accepted his fate… He didn’t even tell his own mates…”

Aether crumbled in on himself and Luminous came and gently held the ghoul’s hand. “It’s okay, you don’t have to go on if it hurts too much.”

Aether returned the grip on Luminous’s hand. “No. I need to get this out.” The quintessential ghoul’s deep purple eyes met the Multi’s amber.

“Dewdrop was the one called upon to take out Terzo. Mountain and I had to take care of the others. His older brothers… The past leaders of the project.” Aether let out a frustrated sound. “We handled it better than Dew… He’s been blaming himself for the whole situation. The loss hurt him so much, he’s having an elemental transformation because of it.”

“We never even really got a chance to mourn before the Clergy threw us to a new master.” Luminous’s eyes narrowed.

“My summoner?” The protector drawled out, brow narrowed. The cogs turning over in his head.

“Yes…the cardinal.” Aether rested his head in his hand. “He was thrown to us as much as we were to him. The clergy immediately put him in charge at the death of Terzo.”

Aether’s eyes grew more tired. “You are not the first ghoul he summoned…. He was made to summon a ghoul as soon as possible. The others of our pack were split up between different ministries, some even sent back to the pit….so our numbers have severely diminished.”

Luminous could tell where this was going, a pit grew in his stomach. “He was ill prepared… I don’t think he knows much about ghouls at all, but the clergy forced him to act.”

It was a cold night, a strong storm was raging outside. The wind whipped against the stained glass windows of the church. Aether stood uneasy in the corner, watching unsure as the many siblings of sin put down the finishing touches on the summoning circle.

The man in red who he had known less than a month stepped forward and set down an offering of sea glass and herbs, along with his own blood. Cutting a slice into his hand and letting it splatter to the chalk circle below.

Then the chanting began, it was like any other summoning, Aether had attended at least two before this. Nothing was out of the ordinary so far except for maybe the Cardinal’s nerves.

It seems that their calling went on for hours with no answer, many of the siblings growing tired of the endless standing chants. The cardinal however refused to leave his post, desperate for an answer. The need to please the clergy was too high.

Just when Aether thought this summoning would be a failure, the chalk circle dissolved in a pool of black water, it resembled that of a whirlpool. The air grew humid and sour, something was wrong.

The portal spit out a water ghoul. His gills strained against the air, like the mortal body that formed with the ghoul was forced too soon to answer the call.

“That’s how we got Rain.” Aether’s eyes saddened as the memories of the first summon came to mind. “We could tell something was off immediately. I think that maybe the portal or the sacrifice didn’t quite fit the ghoul that was summoned. Or maybe he was forced into it.”

“The mortal body that formed with the ghoul didn’t adjust well to the new plain of existence. He couldn’t breathe the air well, still needing water.”

The water ghoul desperately splashed the water onto his neck, his face turning dark blue from a lack of oxygen. The cardinal stood stunned, frozen in shock at the situation before him. The water ghoul thrashing violently in the sealed circle.

Aether watched in horror as the ghoul brought his webbed clawed hands to his throat. He remembered screaming at the cardinal to break the circle, running up and shaking the small man out of his daze, claws digging into his shoulders.

It was definitely out of line for him to treat his new master like that, but ghouls couldn’t break the protective barrier and he couldn’t let this new summon die.

Aether sucked in a deep breath. “He tore into his own throat….Desperately trying anything to breathe.”

The cardinal immediately stumbled forward, swiping the chalk away. Water poured out into the room, but the ghoul continued to thrash and shake. Their own blue blood dripping down their shredded throat.

Aether dove into the circle and grabbed the ghouls hands, forcing his quintessence into every fiber of this water ghouls being. He watched as his magic stitched his throat back together, he could subconsciously feel the ghoul’s mortal lungs being completed as well. He forced his magic to make the ghoul breath, their throat raw with the freshly healed skin.

He stayed with them for what felt like hours, until the water ghoul was breathing on their own, even if they were small pained breaths. Aether immediately fell unconscious, their elemental magic completely drained from the near death experience.

The Quintessent ghoul apparently didn’t wake until two days later. He awoke to Dewdrop curled into his side and Mountain’s top half leaned over the bed, snuggling into his chest.

Aether immediately shot up, the water ghoul being the first thing on his mind. The two others of his pack jumped up as well, relieved purrs and chittering leaving their mouths.

Where’s the water ghoul? Did he make it? The others informed him that he had…but not without any hiccups.

The ghoul couldn’t speak. His vocal cords completely shredded, even with the healing magic they were damaged beyond repair. He could, however, sign… and sign he did. Angry violent gestures and short sentences, a mix of different ghoul and human signs, still trying to learn the new way of communicating.

Aether learned that he could also communicate through the quintessential bond he had created between them, with the excessive healing. It was weak, but the water ghoul could link their minds temporarily if they couldn’t find a way to communicate with the signs they knew. It was challenging and extremely stressful.

Not to mention Dewdrop seemed to have an irrational hatred for the new Ghoul simply because he was a water ghoul. Aether knew he felt like he was being replaced and the pain of the transition wasn’t helping, but it seemed like whenever the two ghouls were even near each other a fight would break out between them.

It was exhausting…

The water ghoul revealed that his name was Rain. Fitting for the state of the night he arrived on. He also made it well known that he was extremely unhappy with being summoned. It seems that the ghoul was forced without warning from their realm in the pit, and he was taking it out on everyone, especially the humans, and most especially of all… His summoner…

The cardinal had apparently tried to go and see his new ghoul while Aether was unconscious, without a ghoul escort.

Rain had let the man know just exactly how he felt about the whole situation, and apparently tried to take the Cardinal’s throat out in revenge.

It took five siblings just to get the water ghoul off of him, and luckily the cardinal got out with minimal damage. A few cuts, bruises, and bites, of course. But that was infinitely better than the human's jugular being torn out and spit onto the floor.

It was pure utter chaos, and Aether was so tired.

“Since his summoning, Rain has been in their recovery room. He’s allowed out, but he prefers to be left alone. He never really leaves the ghoul quarters, because he has to have a ghoul chaperone at all times to make sure he doesn’t harm any more humans.” Aether growls in frustration.

“He hasn’t really warmed up to us yet, so we do our best to leave him be. Dewdrop is also having trouble accepting him as his old replacement, I think the elemental change is making him more reactive than normal.” Aether clasps his clawed hands together tightly. “I’d say he’s the closest to Mountain so far, but even then he’s very short with him.”

Luminous let out a hum, trying to take in all that was said to him. “Maybe I can go introduce myself to him. Show him that he’s not the only one new to this.”

Aether nodded his head in agreement. “That might make him feel better. The fact that you're a protector should put him at ease as well…” The Quintessent ghoul signed in relief. “The dark lord answered our calls, sending you to us.”

Luminous laughed, giving Aether a gentle nudge in the shoulder. “Whatever you say…”

Aether gave him a cheesy grin under the mask in return, lifting the mask slightly to wipe the dried tears from his eyes. “It’s true!”

Lumin shook his head at the notion, a smirk on his face. “You should go rest with your pack…” Lumin closed his eyes and focused on the auras of the two ghouls in the room over. “The smallest one is missing you.”

At Lumin’s words Aether reached out with his own quintessence, letting the smaller known he’d be back soon. His eyes turned to meet the Protector. “Are you sure you’ll be alright on your own?”

Luminous bowed his head in a single nod then notioned to the door that held the other ghouls behind it. “Fine! Fine!” Aether began to make his way to the door. “But if you need help with anything just come find me.”

With that the Quintessent ghoul went through the door closing it gently behind him. Leaving Luminous to find the Water ghoul.

#non g/t

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beansthough · 9 months ago

Text

Finally posted the first chapter to my ghost fic! Y’all go give it a shot lol

{The Eternal Light of our Love}

•A Ghost Oc Fic.

•2.3k words

Ch.1 Your Warmth calls to Me

It was a sudden shift that brought him here.

If they were being honest, they had felt the call for a little while now.

Though at the time it was faint, but it was there in the back of his mind, making its presence known.

Gentle at first… Like the warmth of Luminous’s own multi-elemental light, but different….more corporal. It was almost a quiet buzz, creating small ripples in the very magic of their element.

In the way that Lumin’s multi quintessence could subtly influence other ghouls. Comforting and Calling…

It wasn’t disrupting his power, it was simply letting Luminous know it was there.

He paid it no mind at the time. Why should corporal callings matter to a ghoul of the pit?

He had no corporal form of his own, nor did any being of the pit. It was simply the nature of it all. For no demon’s form is bound to flesh, but more in spirit.

Of course ghouls can be summoned, but it was a rare and sometimes dangerous thing. Only the truly devout and knowledgeable can attempt to call to them.

If a summon is done incorrectly, it can damage the very nature of a ghouls element. Not to mention the possibility of the summoner being ill prepared for a monstrous being of hell itself…

A Being that was new to everything that a prison of flesh has to offer. Sight, scent, touch like an ethereal being has never experienced before.

It was a completely new way to experience existence….

Luminous really didn’t even think of the possibility of a summons. He rather focus on the purpose he was made for in the pit.

A Multi Protector kept peace between elements, punishing those who hurt the weak and unprotected. Scars littered their spirit, but it wasn’t an unwelcomed sight. It was proof of a strong warrior of his majesty, success in survival is a matter of pride.

He was a simple creature in the pit. They were to hunt, protect, and survive.

And of course to live in his desires, like all ghouls do.

So when the gentle buzzing warmth in the back of his mind, suddenly overwhelmed his every thought it was a surprising thing.

This call wasn’t gentle anymore, it was insistent… like he needed to follow it right away. No they didn’t need to follow it… he had to…

For in the flash in time and space itself, that call became Luminous’s every wish and desire. If he simply willed himself to become one with it, Luminous felt their very soul would be fulfilled until the end of time itself.

Luminous willed his soul to decide, and in a sudden shift there he was.

Mortal raw flesh clawed its way out of the summoning portal. Long claws gripping the cold stone floor. The smell of blood and uncertainty were in the air, as Luminous struggled to pull themselves out of the pit.

His breathing ragged and loud in the stone room, growling in desperation, surrounded by cloaked and masked strangers.

The room was almost void back, except for the faint glow of candles from the summoning circle.

The portal began to close underneath him and the demon laid against the cold stone, whining at the sensation. He was overwhelmed by everything. The dark, the light, the cold, the soft murmurs of the crowd surrounding him.

They let out a deep guttural growl. One that reverberated into the chests of every being in the room. It was laced with his multi elemental magic, a warm electric buzz in the air that made your hair stand on end.

A warning to stay back or face the consequences.

The room quickly grew dead silent and Luminous desperately tried to let his eyes adjust to this new plain of existence. Their irises casting an eerie golden glow to the darkness around them.

And there it was again. That gentle warmth once more. The one that had called him here.

Not in his mind but standing outside the circle…

His head snapped upward, desperate to find the source.

A human man… standing awkwardly with his hands clasped together, dressed in a red cassock and hat. A circle of black paint on both nervous eyes, and a small well groomed mustache on his lips sealed tightly together.

And the ghoul, overwhelmed by the summons, was panicked. Trapped between the bounds of the circle, he felt as if the invisible walls would collapse around them.

Animalistic noises left the ghouls throat as he tried to move, to stand, to do anything. It was incredibly frustrating. His magic was weak and was useless for his protection. The ghoul didn’t notice a lot of the crowd stepping back at the sight of them.

His sandy blonde tail whipped wildly behind him and his long strands of hair stuck to the sweat of his face. He clawed it away, the sensation driving him mad.

The cardinal suddenly stepped forward and met them right outside the circle, not daring to cross the protective ward placed to make a barrier.

His hands had a soft tremor to them, even as he wore gloves.

Luminous stood his ground, still trying to adapt to the strange new world he was forced into… the body he was forced to have to exist on this plain.

He felt all of his magic shoved away. Buried very deep within. Everything that he once was, now felt like it was locked away. Chained and bound far away on a plain of existence he once knew.

Their eyes locked onto the human as he sat crouched on the ground, peeking up through the strands of hair that hung in his face, head tilted ever so slightly to the side.

The ghoul was carefully calculating just how easy it would be to tear into the human’s neck, if only he fell a couple inches inside the circle.

The human wore an expression of uncertainty and fear. The ghoul reveled in the man’s unease, until that persistent little call suddenly pierced the ghoul’s every thought.

The portal was now fully closed beneath him, and that persistent call was no longer in his head. It wasn’t a call at all.

It was now a presence.

The ghoul rumbled with confusion as he realized it was the mortal man before him. His elemental core burned, feeling the bond that now connected him to this human.

Everything that the ghoul once knew was suddenly far far away. His once great magic was barely a spark in the vastness of space, compared to its once bright and burning power of a star.

He was no longer a warrior on the battlefields. He wasn’t facing the enemy with all his majesty’s strength that was blessed upon him.

Now he was nothing but a scared weak little kit. All alone without a pack for protection.

The once great warrior Luminous was afraid, and all he had left of what he once knew was that warm presence he felt in the pit.

So the ghoul, desperate for comfort in this unfamiliar place, bowed his head and crawled to his summoner, as close as he could get without disrupting the barrier. Trying to find any sense of familiarity.

The room sounded with more nervous muttering at the sight of submission from the wild beast. “A protector…” The cloaked forms hissed in the dark.

“Why has Lucifer sent us a warrior?” A few others exclaimed. “This can only mean the Ministry will fall into great misfortune…” Worried chatter echoed off the walls.

The ghoul paid them no mind. Exhaustion and dread eating away at them. They felt like they were going to pass out.

“Hello there….” This voice was different from the others. Softer and closer. Warm.

The ghoul looked up once more to see the man dressed in red peering down at him with a soft gentle look. Fear was still every present in his face and scent.“You must be quite exhausted from your journey…”

Luminous wasn’t sure what the man was talking about. He went on no journey. One moment he was in the pit the next he was here. Wherever here was.

The human must’ve noticed his confusion because he gave a gentle nervous laugh.

The human man stood to his full height, seeming to hesitate just a moment before bringing his foot forward, dragging it across the salt and chalk lines of the circle, freeing the ghoul from the ward at the sight of his exhaustion.

It was too soon.

The demon's pupils slit into thin lines at the sudden realization of freedom. The ghoul lunged forwards, causing the human man to suddenly fall back into the crowd. A tall masked figure caught the man, the scent of earth deep in his veins.

The rest of the crowd let out sounds of panic, backing away from the feral demon.

As Luminous continued his way out of the ring, finally making it to his feet , a viscous cry left his throat as he scanned the threats around him. They were still unsteady on their feet, like a fawn learning to stand.

A different figure suddenly came forward, his silver mask shining in the candle light. A nasty war cry left Lumin’s throat, seeing the approach as a challenge.

The protector immediately started to measure the figure up. Even though he was taller than the human man, Luminous still towered over him. He’d easily overtake him in battle.

Just as he was about to pounce, a rush of calming static seemingly from the void itself eased into his mind…A quintessence Ghoul… An element that belonged to his own multi elemental ability.

Luminous almost didn’t realize that the two masked figures were ghouls in the first place. He inhaled deeply, trying to let his own gentle Quintessence reach them.

Their elemental magic was dulled, and if Lumin couldn’t smell it on them he wouldn’t even think they were ghouls.

They appeared human, tails and horns hidden away. Their bodies were less animalistic as well, appearing smaller, lesser, weaker…

Restricted to the mortal body just like himself, but glamoured to hide more demonic features.

They let out an apologetic noise to the two other ghouls in the room, letting off his own calming warmth in return. Forever the peacekeeper being a protector.

His eyes glanced at the one that had caught the human. An Earth ghoul. They immediately set the human back on his feet. The small man scrambling to give the Earth ghoul his space, Lumin could vaguely hear the human’s heart pounding in their chest.

He ignored it for now, even if it made his more predatory instincts flare, instead focusing back on the Earth ghoul.

This was the only ghoul to mirror Luminous’s height, and maybe even his strength, but earth ghouls weren’t known to be rowdy. They’d much rather keep the peace, a steady rhythm in the pack.

“Welcome…” The quintessence ghoul greeted. His voice was deep, but lacked the reverb that many quintessence elements had in the pit.. “This is the ministry… your new home.”

As the ghoul spoke, Luminous suddenly realized that the language that the ghoul uttered was not any native ghoulish, but the freshly summoned understood what was said anyways.

The Protector Ghoul opened his mouth. With a raspy growl, the ghouls mind began to form words. Not Ghoulish…. Something new….

He dared to speak…

“Forgive me..” It was gravelly and harsh. His voice was deep and strained from being unused. The foreign language was strange on his forked tongue.

Unknown to the ghoul, the human man had a sudden flash of relief on his face. The crowd of siblings letting out a breath of relief as the Warrior ghoul acted more humane.

“This is all very new to me…” The ghoul clenched and unclenched their hand, their claws pressing into their palm.

For just a moment he felt that gentle warmth pulse again as he spoke, the ghoul whipped his head back to the man in red, locking eyes with him.

It wasn’t a vicious look, more calculating as he examined the man’s wide-eyed stare. He wasn’t sure what to think of the bond, they only knew that it was a tether to this plain of existence.

Luminous continued to stare, even as the human’s breathing increased ever so slightly.

The human man broke the gaze first, finding the floor much more interesting than the creature of hell standing before him.

The Earth ghoul seemed to sense the human’s distress, so he slowly stepped in front of the man, pushing him gently behind, giving the mortal a small act of mercy against the Protector’s sharp predatory gaze.

“I am Mountain.” His voice carried the weight of the world. “The quintessent ghoul is Aether.” The blank metal mask hiding any facial expression that might’ve been shown.

“I am Luminous….” The ghoul’s eyes tracking the figure behind Mountain ever so slightly.

“There are more of us,” Mountain bowed his head, “but they could not attend your summoning. Great changes are occurring…”

That last part was said in a mournful tone, and the Multi Ghoul then understood that he was summoned into a pack with very fresh wounds. He could taste the distress in the very air itself.

The quintessence ghoul now known as Aether cleared his throat and rubbed his hands together, trying to defuse the tension in the room.

“We should probably get you cleaned up. I’ll lead the way to the Ghoul quarters and I’ll explain how things work up here.” Luminous nodded his head and followed behind Aether, stumbling slightly with Mountain right behind him.

Leaving the human man exposed in his old hiding spot behind the Earth ghoul. Luminous let his eyes linger on him as they left the room.

The chattering of the robed figures started once more as they walked away. Luminous noted that the farther down the long hallway they went, the farther away that gentle warmth was….and for some reason it left a small ache in his soul.

#the eternal light of our love #ghost fanfiction #ghost fic #ghost oc #ghost oc fanfiction #nameless ghoul oc #nameless ghoul oc fanfiction #lumin oc #lumin #lumin ghoul #non g/t

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beansthough · 10 months ago

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Hey guys, I know I haven’t posted in a while, but I’m here to promote my ghost fic lol<3 new hyper fixation took me by storm and even though this isn’t what I regularly post, if you guys enjoy my writing this is the new thing I’m working on. :)

Hey guys, here’s a teaser on my new fic that’s centered around my ghoul oc Lumin and his summoning during the beginning of the Prequel era. Mostly Lumin and Copia centric, but also ghoul dynamics and ghoul packs. I love these little guys.

Lots of angst but also hurt/comfort. It will have mature themes.

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#non g/t #nameless ghoul oc #ghoul oc #the band ghost oc #ghost bc oc #lumin #lumin oc #oc fic #the band ghost #nameless ghouls #oc fanfiction

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beansthough · 1 year ago

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beansthough · 1 year ago

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New g/t fic Concept:

A borrower grows up and currently lives in a western themed antique shop.

He lost his family at a young age and with what little survival skills he had he learned to survive and has been on his own since.

The only skill he knew for sure was to stay hidden from Beans, because if you got caught then surly you would meet death or worse. His family had made a fine example of that.

But the one constant in this borrowers young life without parents to raise him is the never ending playing of old westerns on the many retro t.v.’s He sees these characters in himself and the many ways the these hero’s survived the Wild West.

His favorite film was about a simple boy named Jessie. Jessie just like the borrower grew up with very little and no family, he lived a very hard life.

But when Jessie was falsely accused of stealing the towns cattle and money, the boy has to go on the run and become the ultimate gunslinger, cattle roper, and hero to prove his innocence and find the real culprit to save the town.

And the borrower swore there was no better film on this earth. Jessie could do anything and be anything. Not to mention Jessie’s actor was in many other western films where he was this unstoppable hero.

So from then on the young Borrower decided he himself would be called Jessie, and he would live up to his name. He dressed like him, talked like him, and tried his best to live like him, while all the while hiding from the many beans who entered the shop.

And so the Cowboy Borrower was born…

—————-

Katie is a young woman who had just recently inherited a small amount of farmers land and the simple cottage that came with it. She’s ready to start her new life with her college friends the town over to help support her.

After living in her new home for about three months she has managed to start to raise chickens, a single dairy cow, of course her trusted barn cat Lucy.

It is after these three months that her college friends invite her on an outing to go antique shopping, and with at a glance at an empty shelf and her friends calling her how could she decline on a fun outing.

The group had just finished walking the square of this small town when a certain antique shop caught the young women’s eye. It was almost completely western themed.

It was no secret that Katie’s house was decorated in almost every fashion imaginable, but she did have a western collection that she would like to grow, and what better place to do that then here?

It was in that shop that she found truly the best find. A whole set of cowboy themed tea cups with a matching picnic blanket and basket, and the best part yet was the adorable tiny cowboy doll inside.

;)

My good people I give to you:

The Antique Cowboy

#g/t fic #g/t #giant tiny #giant/tiny #tiny hollywood cowboy #giant/tiny fic #giant tiny fic #g/t ocs #jessie #katie

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beansthough · 1 year ago

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…no. Doctor Avery wouldn’t do that, would he?

[ The Art of Love and War - Chapter 7: Unmarked.] @fireflywritesgt has captured me with their story and universe and characters and there's no stopping this madness.

First draft + final lineart. I'm not extremely happy with the final result, especially since they don't look like Harry and Joe at all. But here we go :')

#this is amazing #omggggg #I love this so much you’re style <3

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beansthough · 1 year ago

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House on a Hill

Part 27 of my story! Read the index and content warnings here.

"Look for the big house on a hill. Castle Hill, they call it. You can't miss it." Were the directions the professor had given to Joe.

The directions had hardly been necessary. As the two reached the base of the great hill, Joe could immediately smell the scent of the tulips and marigolds that carpeted it. Soon, from where he hung out of Harry's pocket, he saw the garden come into view. Thousands of delicate flowers nodded sleepily in the late spring breeze, shuddering and swaying in the sunlight. Then as Harry climbed upwards one tower shyly emerged from the sea of flowers, and another, like the mast of an approaching ship. As if making a grand entrance in its own right, the entirety of Castle Hill finally revealed itself to the guests when they reached the top, and Joe was greeted with a sight that hardly seemed real. When professor Hill had said the word house, he had imagined a regular house much like his and Harry’s, not something nearly so bizarre as this: high upon the hill it sat, a mass of stone parapets and arches, incomprehensible in its scale and immensity to poor Joe, for whom even the Stinson House was unthinkably vast.

He wished he had brought some charcoal and paper.

When their journey up the sweet-smelling hill was complete, Harry stopped short at a stone wall with a wrought-iron gate fused into it.

“This looks like Castle Hill all right.” Said Harry.

“So how are you supposed to get in? Is it locked?” Asked Joe.

On the wall next to the gate sat a box sleek and modern, one that reminded Joe of the telephone at home. He kicked his legs backwards and jabbed Harry in the chest.

“Try picking up the phone.” He added.

“I will, I will.” Harry assured him. “Just… give me a minute.”

“To do what?”

“…I’ve never been to a castle before.”

Joe tossed his head back in frustration.

“You think I’m any different? Think I got some secret hideout you don’t know about? Come on, Harry, hurry up!” He said.

Joe felt Harry shift uneasily, then finally he picked up the mouthpiece.

“Hill residence.” Said a starchy voice from the box.

“This is doctor Avery for professor Hi-”

Harry hadn’t even finished speaking when the electric gate began to open.

“Welcome, doctor. I will be down with the papers in a moment.” Said the voice from the box.

“Papers…?” Said Harry.

The man behind the box hung up abruptly, and Harry and Joe were left with nothing to do besides cross the gate and speculate.

“Maybe you should hide.” Harry whispered.

Joe, one step ahead of him, had already slid into Harry’s front pocket out of view. Within seconds it grew stuffy – Joe had decided to give his nice suit a break, and opted for wearing his good borrowing gear to the occasion, a notable miscalculation in the rising heat.

Harry made it ten steps in when the starchy voice returned.

“Not another step until you sign the agreement, doctor, if you please.” It ordered.

Joe braced himself as Harry lurched to a stop.

“Agreement?” Harry said.

“Professor Hill requires all visitors to the grounds to sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement.” The stranger explained.

Joe heard the shuffling of papers from where he was hiding.

“Right… my apologies. I’ll have a look.” Harry said.

“And Mr. Piccoli, too, if you will.” Said the strange voice.

Joe couldn’t resist the urge to poke his head out from Harry’s pocket at the mention of his name. He was greeted with the sight of a sullen, dark-haired man in an even darker suit. His face contorted in confusion as the man in the suit, in cool and businesslike fashion, handed him a stack of papers that were more or less his size. He stared at them in wonder as Harry motioned for him to crawl out of his pocket. Sitting on Harry’s hand, he shuffled through the agreement intensively.

“You have a pen?” Harry asked the strange assistant.

“Wait, wait, wait!” Joe barked. “Don’t sign a thing until you’ve read it all the way through.”

“I’m sure it’s fine, Joe...” Said Harry.

“Miniatures love to do this, don't they?” The man in black mused.

Joe suppressed a scowl as he scanned the boilerplate and contemplated the agreement’s definition of the word “disclosure.” So intently did he read that the voice of professor Hill behind them came as a surprise.

“Geoffrey, Geoffrey, please! There’s no need for that today. Save it for the media.” Professor Hill said the last word with no small amount of disdain.

Joe watched as the professor politely confiscated the agreement from Harry. Cautiously he turned in his as well, and professor Hill handed them back to Geoffrey and sent him on his way.

“Go set the tables, will you?” Joe heard the professor mumble to the sullen assistant.

Joe’s ears pricked up. He had been dreading coming to Castle Hill to discuss Tiny Town, for he had imagined it would be a depressing occasion. The prospect of free food certainly lightened his mood.

With his sleeves rolled up and his jacket tossed over his shoulder, the ebullient professor led the two up the hill to the main entrance. Joe, now perched on Harry’s shoulder, was treated with a bird’s eye view of the garden and the street below.

“This was my father’s estate.” Professor Hill explained. “He struck it rich selling greeting cards of all things... before getting lost in Antarctica, that is.”

Harry and Joe were both much too in awe to speak as the professor led them through the tall, wooden doors and into the main foyer. A seemingly endless wooden floor stretched ahead while an elegant archway towered above, and mere feet away from that a chandelier hung from the ceiling. A strange, wooden trim jutted out several inches from the walls at what was slightly below the height of Harry's shoulder, though that was not the strangest thing about the Hill residence. Already Joe could see a number of odd giant artifacts, namely the skull of a large beast with two very long, pointed tusks that sat casually on the hallway table. Next to it more mounted animals guarded the area – what Joe could recognize as an upright bear, and another large, striped creature on all fours he had never encountered before. Before he had a chance to ask about any of the oddities that greeted them, Harry gently took him down from his shoulder and placed him next to the skull on the table. The coolness of the interior came as no small relief to Joe. Meanwhile a maid heckled Harry into giving her his jacket, though Joe wouldn’t let her anywhere near him when she approached. To Joe's surprise, when he backed away she let him alone without question.

With the crisis averted, he craned his neck up and admired teeth on the skull that were several times as long as he was.

“That is a Smilodon.” The professor said to Joe.

“Makes sense. It’s sure got plenty of teeth to smile with.” Joe said as his skin crawled.

When he was done being badgered by the staff, Harry began to extend a hand to Joe to pick him back up again, before the professor rapped on something that protruded from the wall.

“You can take the walkway if you like, Mr. Piccoli.” The professor said.

“Walkway…?” Joe mouthed.

Turning around, Joe could see that what he had initially dismissed as a trim along the walls was actually a platform with a guardrail. As he scanned the room, he spied a number of ladders and steps leading up and down from them, allowing him to move about without fear of being stepped on.

“Oh, I am definitely taking the walkway.” Joe said, leaving a dejected Harry in his wake as he climbed up onto it.

“Are there miniatures here, professor?” Harry asked hesitantly.

The professor simply chuckled.

“We get all kinds of guests, I’ll put it to you that way.” He said. “And please, call me Billy! My ah, colleague will whether I like it or not, so may as well get used to it.” He grumbled.

“Okay professo-er, Billy.” Harry said.

“I must apologize for my wife’s absence, too.” Said Billy as he spun the wedding ring around his finger. “She’s been very ill lately. Out in Nova Scotia taking in that good sea air.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. Wish her well for me.” Harry responded.

Joe was so preoccupied with the novelty of seeing the giants at eye level that he was only half-listening. He didn’t speak up until they turned down a long hallway and something amusing caught his eye.

“Watch out, Harry! There’s a naked lady!” He crowed.

Before them in the corner stood a sight that delighted and perplexed Joe in equal measure: a marble statue of a nude woman.

“Joe, mind your manners!” Harry scolded him.

Joe, who was minding his manners perfectly well as far as he was concerned, kept on going.

“Hey professor Billy, why are you giants so afraid of naked people?” He asked. "And if you're so afraid of 'em, why do you have statues of 'em?"

“It's artistic nudity, Joe! And you can’t just ask him that!” Harry hissed, bringing Joe to a dead stop for a moment – it was one thing for Harry to scowl at him from high above or from across the room, but quite another for him to do it while making direct eye contact.

Billy simply chuckled.

“Why are you miniatures not afraid of naked people?” He countered.

Joe thought long and hard for a moment, then answered honestly.

“I don’t know.” He said.

“That’s culture, my friend. We all have it. If we were fish, it would be the water we all swim in.” Billy replied.

“Culture?” Joe repeated.

“The values we share. The things we have in common. The things we consider to be right or wrong. Our traditions… here’s one of mine.” He said, leading the two of them into a large parlour half-filled with cardboard boxes.

Billy Hill gestured to a portrait above the mantle. It was of a man dressed entirely in a light brown uniform of sorts on a grassy knoll. He wore a funny hat that was egg-shaped at the top, with a wide brim at the bottom. He knelt down with a gun in hand, holding the limp body of another strange animal by the scruff of its neck. Standing beside him was a wiry young boy dressed identically to his father, who gazed solemnly ahead.

“My father wanted me to be a big game hunter just like he was. Took me on my first safari when I was nine.” Joe could sense disdain in the professor’s voice as he told the story. “…but culture changes, Mr. Piccoli. We are the ones who determine the culture, culture does not rule us.”

Joe leaned against the walkway rail and nodded. Something about the professor’s words rang true, spoke to the sight in Tiny Town that had so disturbed him. He was contemplating this newfound concept of culture and how one could possibly change it when Harry bumped into one of the cardboard boxes and jumped, causing him to lose his train of thought.

Harry let out a string of apologies then asked,

“…what are these for, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“The family collection.” The professor said. “My father brought back a lot of ah, souvenirs from our trips. I’ve decided to return them... if I can find out where on Earth they were taken from.”

“Why would you do that?” Harry studied a wooden mask that jutted out from the box. “These look very rare. They must be quite expensive.”

“Good anthropology has a way of changing one’s point of view for the better.” Billy declared. “Bad anthropology… well, there’s plenty of that in the world. I’d rather not add more of it… though I’m hardly an anthropologist myself.”

“What are you talking about?” Harry laughed. “You’re a professor of anthropology, aren’t you?”

“Oh, we’ll get to that.” Hill assured him.

Joe scurried along as Hill took Harry by the shoulder and led him down another turn. As they neared the end of this hallway, something caught Joe’s attention. A peculiar sound that chortled and wavered, but one he recognized instantly. It was the sound of voices. Not the hearty trumpeting of exuberant giants, but the more muted, yet no less boisterous tone of his fellow tinies in high spirits.

“So there is miniatures in here!” Joe exclaimed.

"Joe!? Joe!" The professor called from behind him.

Joe took no heed as he raced further down the walkway in search of the miniatures. The professor, now unsettled, chased after him and as the three approached the rear of the house, where the hallway they were traveling down merged with another, they reached a door that read: AVIARY.

“No no no!” The professor stammered. “Those aren’t miniatures, Joe, those are just… birds. Endangered birds that mimic the sound of human speech.” Joe stopped where the walkway ended and tilted his head at the door as the professor continued. “They scare very easily. Come along, this way now!”

Harry, meanwhile, crossed his arms and shot him a glare that was even icier than the last one.

"Don't be rude." He ordered.

Joe looked from Harry to the professor to the door then back again, plainly skeptical, but at Harry's bidding he ultimately followed the two over to the doorway across from the Aviary. Billy stood before this door with one hand on the doorknob, and right as he was about to open it he turned around to face Harry and Joe.

“...I have a confession to make.” Hill said. “I’m not the real professor Hill, and we aren’t really meeting my colleague. It’s the other way around. I’m her colleague.” Joe exchanged a puzzled glance with Harry as Billy continued. “Gentlemen, I would like to introduce you to the real professor Hill.”

Joe climbed the ladder from the walkway down to the floor and crossed the threshold onto marble tile that was so well polished he could see his own face in it. The room below, palatial in appearance, was set deeper into the ground, and he scurried over to another small staircase built just for him and climbed down the curved steps to the meeting place below. Looking up, he could see the room was lined with shelves upon shelves of books, though not giant-sized ones. In the center of the white-walled study sat two giant-sized chairs, and a circular table, on which another, much smaller set of chairs and tables had been set out. As Joe raced down the staircase he could see that the centerpiece of the table was a vase of firey orange flowers, and leaning against that vase was a fellow miniature.

He couldn’t get a good look at her at ground-level when he reached the bottom of the staircase, so he whistled for Harry to pick him up. True to his training, the giant did so, and from where he crouched in Harry’s palm he eyed the woman with no small amount of suspicion. If ever there was an archetypal hotshot borrower, this woman was it: she was stocky and muscular in build, farmer-tanned and decked out in the best borrowing gear money could buy. Enviously he counted the pockets on her cherry red jacket, as all career borrowers did when sizing one another up, and noted that hers had precisely two more pockets than his did. Normally this would have been a non-issue, he would have paid her proper respect and went on his merry way, but there was one glaring problem Joe had with this woman: her auburn hair was twisted back into a braid and tossed over her shoulder, revealing a missing left ear.

As Harry carried him closer and closer to her, Joe wanted nothing more than to scurry away. Her mere presence felt like a threat somehow, an indirect admission of something on Joe's part by proximity. Joe had not feared marking at Calloway’s, and the incident outside of Tiny Town was one he could swiftly put out of sight and out of mind, but here, now, seeing a real marked tiny in the flesh and being expected to commit the unforgivable sin of fraternizing with her? It threw everything inside of Joe off-kilter.

She only smiled at him as he wore his unease all over his face.

“Welcome to my study.” She said with open arms. "Ain't it grand?"

Something about the smile on her face told Joe that she was expecting a showdown, and Joe was reluctant to give her one.

“Harry, don’t put me down there.” He begged under his breath.

“Why not?” Asked the oblivious giant.

“I can’t talk to her! She’s a pet tiny!” He spat.

“Be a good guest, will you!?” Harry chided.

The woman on the table threw her head back and cackled.

“Oh, don’t worry about it, kiddo! I don’t bite. I’m very well trained.” She sneered.

As Joe fought with Harry to get away, he saw the real professor Hill beckon to the fake professor Hill. They launched into a cryptic whisper-fight for a passing moment until Joe was finally overwhelmed by Harry and deposited onto the table. Billy backed off, and the woman closed in on Joe like a cat to a mouse as he drew back in fear.

“Well well, look at you.” She said. “You look different than I expected. From what Billy told me I was picturing a dockie.”

“I’m not a damn dockie!” Joe said, swearing at a woman the way a damn dockie would.

“What’s a dockie?” Harry whispered.

“It’s miniature slang for a criminal.” Billy explained.

When Joe backed into the edge of the table and teetered over it, the lady in red snatched his left ear and wrenched him forwards, causing Harry to flinch as Joe let out a squeal.

“You don’t like pet tinies, huh?” She growled into his ear, then released him. “Tell me, who’s that over there, huh? Who brought you here?” She gestured over to Harry while Joe fumed at her, then, feeling betrayed by the giant, he turned his scowl to Harry as he rubbed his sore ear, who quickly averted his gaze.

“Lorraine… easy now. He’s still new to this.” Billy coaxed her.

The pet tiny, Lorraine, looked Joe up and down with an expression equal parts smugness and scorn. Then she reached out a hand to him.

“You better start liking pet tinies real fast at the rate you’re goin’.” She said. “Name’s Lorraine. Lorraine…”

Before she could finish her greeting, Billy erupted into a flurry of more esoteric gestures. She mouthed what Joe guessed were the words I won’t at Billy, before casting him an exasperated glance and turning her attention back to Joe.

“…Burroton.” She concluded as Joe reluctantly reached out and shook her hand, nearly losing it to her death grip in the process. “Lorraine Burroton.” Joe massaged his sore hand once she freed him. “And you, what’s your name big guy? Come here.” She beckoned to Harry who tensed up, then offered her his pinkie.

“Harry Avery.” He said.

He too gripped his pinkie once it was shaken and freed.

“Pleasure. All right. Joe, Harry, I understand you guys have some questions about Tiny Town, which is great because I’m the one who invented Tiny Town. Ask away.”

Lorraine pulled out her miniature chair and sat at her miniature table with chin in hand as the waitstaff tended to the giants, seemingly relishing in Joe’s discomfort. As Joe sat down, he barely noticed the pitcher of lemonade before him or the impeccably made little cakes. All he could focus on was Lorraine’s missing ear.

“You're the one who invented Tiny Town?” Harry’s voice was incredulous.

“I did. I could tell you the whole story.” She said as she poured herself a glass of lemonade.

“Please do.” Harry said.

Joe then watched in sickened fascination as Lorraine did the most giantlike thing he ever saw a fellow tiny do: she reached into her pocket and pulled out what appeared to be a hand-rolled cigarette. She lit it and puffed away as she launched into her tale while Joe took note of the strange ring that glinted from her left finger.

“So here’s the story.” Lorraine began. “Long, long ago, about ten years ago now, Billy and I got talking philanthropy one day and I thought, gee, wouldn’t it be nice if us tinies could have homes of our own? A happy place to be where we don’t have to live rough and worry about all the thousands of things out to kill us?”

Joe looked over to Billy, who was nodding along and smiling at Lorraine as her story continued. Something about the fondness in the man’s smile made Joe all the more uneasy. He knew what a smile like that meant in a giant. He had daydreamed about a giant smiling at him that way as a boy. Some part of him deep down knew what this miniature woman and this giant man really were, but he was too afraid to articulate it even to himself in the privacy of his own head.

It was real now. There were others like him. Rather than being elated or relieved, all Joe felt in their presence was his own internalized shame.

“…so I started drafting up the plans for this place called Marigold Acres.” She gestured up to the vase of flowers on the table. “It’s my favourite flower, in case you were wondering. Anyways – Billy manages to pitch it to the university as an experimental housing project and drums up enough support. The only problem is securing the land. Nobody wanted a bunch of miniatures in their back yard. They all thought we’d come into their houses and steal things… never mind the whole idea was for us to have houses of our own, but anyways…”

She flicked her cigarette and took a sip of her lemonade as Joe and Harry took in the tale with fascination.

“…the only place the city will let us build it is in the park, by the zoo, on land we’re renting from them. They won’t let us buy a plot for it. Originally they wanted to make it an extension of the zoo, but the owner of the zoo wasn’t having that and we weren’t either. So Marigold Acres gets built, close-to-but-not-part-of the zoo. Nobody actually calls it Marigold Acres, because giants are assholes. It gets de-facto renamed to Tiny Town, which is so pejorative. …still with me?”

Lorraine eyed Joe and Harry as they nodded, then launched back into her lecture.

“Okay, so the thing about this first Tiny Town, Tiny Town One, is it had no security. Nada. Zilch. We kept bugging the city over and over to at least post some guards around it – something. Tinies were getting snatched left and right! According to the original agreement we signed with them, it was up to them to keep Tiny Town secure, but they weren’t living up to their end of the bargain, and can you guess what happened?”

Joe sat up straight in his chair.

“Some giant kicked all the buildings in?” Was his educated guess.

“No, but close! Some drunken asshole sped right through the park and drove a motor-car into the entire thing. Killed hundreds, maybe thousands of people in a split second. Finally after all that bad press we’re able to convince them to beef up the security, but they’ll only agree to it if we renegotiate the agreement and put Tiny Town completely under their control. …and people were dying, and everyone blamed me for the incident to the point that they… y’know.”

To the point that they marked her, Joe presumed, as he watched Lorraine’s hand hover around her left ear. Something softened in Joe as she appeared distraught at the memory when it hit her, then steeled herself again.

“…so we renegotiated.” She said. “After that, they rebuilt it into the fire hazard it is today, and that’s how Tiny Town Two was made.”

“The city set up a new board of directors to oversee the second Tiny Town after we gave up control.” Billy added. “Now it consists of a number of chairmen for right-wing public interest groups who are paying the city good money under the table to stay on the board, each of them with a keen interest in shaping how the public behaves and thinks. Lately they’ve been using Tiny Town as a testing grounds, a social experiment if you will, to see which tactics work best for spreading certain unsavoury ideas. Meanwhile, as part of the new agreement, I’m forbidden from speaking ill of the Tiny Town project whenever our students ask me about it. I have to sit in my office and preach the good word of Tiny Town to them while knowing damn well what’s going on underneath.”

“Unsavoury ideas? But why here? Why miniatures? Why would they want to teach anyone such a thing?” Harry asked.

“Why not miniatures?” Lorraine cut in. “Think about it: they have little frame of reference for how the giant world works. If these groups find something that works to divide tinies at a small scale, they can start using those tactics on giants at a large scale. Hell, if they used the same tricks on schoolchildren they could raise a whole generation that’s falling over itself to march off to war.”

“War… I see now.” Said Harry. “They’re trying to avoid another conscription crisis.”

“Bingo.” Lorraine replied as she snuffed out her cigarette on the tabletop. “The government was none too impressed with that fiasco. The next time a world war comes around – and another world war will come around – they wanna be ready. They want to raise a generation who’ll hop right into their uniforms with no fuss about it. Now, I dunno what conclusions they’ve reached since kicking us outta the project, but if you want my educated guess: they’re cooking up a bunch of tactics to get one group of people to hate another group of people. From what I’ve heard, they’ve already done a fine job of recreating the Irish-Italian mob wars going on in the states.”

Harry looked utterly stunned. As Joe sat there with near uncontrollable energy coursing through him he couldn’t help but envy Harry, and Lorraine and Billy as well. They all seemed to know what they were talking about. Joe had no idea what “mob wars” were and he had little interest in finding out.

“A social experiment like that, here in Canada? With all due respect, professor Burroton, that sounds like something the Americans would do, not us.” Harry said.

Billy eyed him and gave a sad smile.

“Well, it is true that many of these interest groups at the helm are based in the states.” He said. “...but let’s not kid ourselves, doctor. Plenty of them are Canadian too.”

Harry appeared downright scandalized for a moment, then fell into deep thought. Joe was so full of nervous energy now that he nearly launched out of his seat. Nobody was asking the real questions as far as he was concerned.

“So why isn’t anyone doing anything about this? You can’t just let it go on like that! You’re the ones who made it, aren’t you?” Joe said.

“We are doing something about it. We’re fighting it in court. That’s where these battles happen, I’m afraid.” Billy explained.

“Well, why not go there and talk to them in the meantime?” Joe insisted. “Tell them they’re part of some experiment! Maybe if they know they’ll go somewhere else.”

“Tried that too.” Lorraine remarked. “They don’t believe us. Even if they did, most of ‘em don’t care enough to leave. Some of them benefit from it too much to change… others just wanna punish anyone who they see as inferior to them, and Tiny Town gives them an easy way to do that. Either way their minds are made up, there’s no reasoning with these people.”

Joe didn’t want to believe what Lorraine was saying. He wanted to live in a world where things were simple, where people were reasonable, where the evils of the world would fall away when confronted with good, keen sense. He made a mental note to swing by Tiny Town later to find out for himself whether or not what she was saying was true.

“Where do I go, then? Where does anyone go?” Joe asked. “Tiny Town is bad, colonies are hit and miss, the wild life is brutal… do I just hop into a gilded cage and sacrifice my dignity at the altar of petdom or something?”

“What’s so bad about living with me?” Harry murmured.

Lorraine rolled her eyes at Joe. Billy, meanwhile, leaned in and mouthed something to her that resembled the words tell him. She scowled at him once again, shook her head, then looked Joe up and down as though she were sizing him up. For a hot second she and Billy appeared to be on the verge of another whisper fight, but instead he leaned away and looked on expectantly.

“…what was that about?” Asked Joe.

Lorraine sighed and locked eyes with him. Joe could see the mistrust written all over her face, so he was surprised by what she did next. He watched curiously as she tossed her braid, bent down in her chair, and rolled up her right pant leg. Harry immediately looked away as she undid her boot for good measure, but Joe, who was not afraid of naked ankles or the people attached to them, craned his neck to see a scar not unlike like the one that had been around Totsy the elephant’s leg.

“I know a thing or two about escaping cages.” She said dryly, not taking her eyes off of Joe. “What you’ve got going on with your giant ain’t it.”

“You were…” Joe began, though he didn’t know how to phrase the rest of his question.

Lorraine simply nodded, did her boot back up and sat up straight as Joe gazed into the center of the table with a sinking feeling. Now he felt deeply sorry for this pet tiny he had initially spurned, though he was unnerved in no small part by the fact that everything about this woman was an unwelcome reminder. It was as if she were the physical manifestation of everything Joe was afraid of becoming, and he didn’t like that. He wanted to live with Harry without all the baggage and social stigma it came with. To have his giant and his left ear, too.

“Yeah, well… some giants are nice, sure, but we’re still so different. He’s always gonna have power I don’t. Even he was saying that, weren’t you Harry?” Joe said.

“I was…” Harry admitted.

“Having power isn’t the same as abusing it.” Lorraine said. “Hell, we’re not even that different when you get down to it. Look over there.”

Lorraine pointed to a diagram on the far wall. On it Joe could see drawings of what appeared to be three skeletons of primitive humans in varying degrees of upright posture. In front of them was a fully upright modern skeleton, and leading the procession in front of it, so small Joe could barely make it out from where he sat, was the skeleton of a modern miniature.

“Don’tcha think it’s a little messed up how, whenever people talk about us and them, they call the big people the humans and the tiny people the tinies?” Lorraine asked him, and Joe nodded in agreement. “Well here’s a little secret: the only thing that really separates us and them is a chemical here and a lump of cells there. Aside from that, we’re the same damn species when you get down to it.”

Billy lit up at the reminder.

“Ahh, yes, I was meaning to ask you about that, doctor. I was wondering if you had encountered any recent discoveries in your journals about the mac-”

Joe’s mind immediately tuned out the medical jargon he had no hope of understanding. Meanwhile, as Harry launched into a doctorly diatribe about strange chemicals, Joe struggled to pick up what Lorraine was putting down. What did species have to do with it? Lorraine seemed to sense what was going through his head as the doctor and the professor chattered away. She leaned across the table, clapped him on the shoulder and in a voice so low neither the professor nor Harry could hope to hear she said,

“Tell me something: is your giant nice to you?”

Joe nodded. Of course Harry was nice to him! He had been nice from the very start.

“Does he listen to you?” She continued.

Though that battle had been hard won, Joe nodded again.

“Here’s the most important question: when you say no, does he respect that?”

Joe thought long and hard about the last question. His mind wandered back to the trinket box, to sleeping in the kitchen, to the way Harry fretted when Joe had said yes after he had said no. How Harry worried so much about Joe’s capacity to say no that the man shot himself in the foot sometimes. Taking all that into consideration, Joe nodded again and added,

“I think he listens a little too well sometimes.”

“Then cherish that!” Lorraine said, shaking him as she spoke as if to shake the words themselves into his brain. She released him and sipped on her lemonade. “It’s not every day you find that in a giant. You’re not a pet, Joe. I’m not either, not really. We’re just lucky.”

In the background, Harry was laughing at something Billy said to him, a laugh deep and lovely.

As Joe stared into space, he accepted it was a sound worth being mutilated for.

Joe scoured the grass along the grounds of Tiny Town for the hole he had crawled through only days before. As he ran his foot along the inner fence, what surprised him was not a sudden dip in the ground, but the hardness of pure concrete. Bending down to look closer, he could see what he swore were the remains of the hole, clearly filled in after he had left.

Of course lightning wouldn’t strike twice. He got up and tried his best to peer through the gaps in the wooden slats as evening grew near, trying to devise some other way to get in, or at the very least catch O’Grady’s attention. He was about to give up when a whistle blew, and the deafening sounds of hundreds of footsteps filled the streets. Shadow after shadow passed through the gaps in the fence. Maybe if he was lucky one of them would be O’Grady’s, Joe reasoned, and he whistled as loudly as he could then started shouting for good measure.

“O’GRADY! OH-GRAY-DEE! YOU IN THERE, PAL!?”

Soon enough an irritable brogue could be heard through the mass of marching feet.

“Joe!? What are you doing here? I gotta get home.” O’Grady complained. “Let’s walk and talk.”

Now he could see O’Grady’s green eyes through the fence. Like a little dog he trotted along as O’Grady made his evening commute.

“O’Grady, you gotta leave Tiny Town. It’s not safe. It’s an experiment! The whole thing is – it’s evil, Tim!” Joe jogged along the fence, trying to keep tabs on where O’Grady was – he couldn’t tell if he was too far back or too far ahead.

“Experiment? What are you talking about!? This the latest borrower rumor going around?”

“No, it’s not a rumor! I heard it from the lady who made Tiny Town herself! A buncha giants took it over and now they’re doing all this weird stuff to-”

“Psssssh, there’s no lady who made Tiny Town! It was Dawson’s idea, everyone knows that!” O’Grady said, stopping dead in his tracks. “I’m not leaving, either. Ye can’t do that! Dirty bastard got marked the other day trying something like that, digging holes all over the bloody place. Pet behaviour, that is.”

You mean you marked him. He didn’t get marked, Tim. You marked him. I saw it happen. Joe thought, but wouldn’t dare say it.

Joe broke into a cold sweat at the mere mention of the incident. Growing up, Joe had been taught that you never, ever accused someone of being a pet without good reason. A marking could ruin a person’s entire life, so there had to be solid proof and evidence before reaching for the knife. The idea that someone could be marked for a crime as insignificant as leaving someplace they didn’t want to be was unthinkable to Joe. As he processed O’Grady’s words, more questions began to plague him: was Joe himself the reason that man had been marked? Had he drawn attention to the holes by sneaking in? He tried not to think about that as he pleaded with O’Grady through the fence.

“C’mon, Tim! You gotta believe me! We’re Calloway kids! We stick together, don’t we?”

Joe was hoping this would be O’Grady’s secret weak spot. Captain Calloway had been less of a proper father to the both of them and more of an employer. As a result, there were many times in the boys’ lives when they had only had each other to rely on. The notion that O’Grady could abandon him completely in favour of Tiny Town was just as unthinkable as marking someone without evidence was.

“I was a Calloway kid.” O’Grady corrected him. “Now I’m a Tiny Town tiny. Look, I gotta get to dinner. It’s been a long day! Worry about getting that shiny thing, not these stories, will you?”

Just like that, O’Grady disappeared from the side of the fence and into the sea of moving shadows, leaving Joe alone with his deepening sense of unease.

“So how’d it go?”

“Guess Lorraine was right. There’s no reasoning with them.” Back at the Stinson House, Joe buried his hands in his pockets and strolled from the windowsill into Harry’s palm. He sat down for good measure.

“So Tiny Town really is a no-go…” Harry trailed off.

Joe sighed as he looked up at Harry, studying him. He sensed a glumness in the giant’s voice, but couldn’t place the reason why. It wasn’t until Harry spoke that Joe pieced it all together.

“Joe… do you like living here with me?” Harry asked.

The fact that Harry even raised the question was enough to break Joe’s heart. The sad look in Harry’s eyes was even worse. Joe scrambled to his feet in Harry’s still-moving hand, wishing he could see the giant eye to eye again as he had at Castle Hill.

“Of course I do! I never said I didn’t like living here. What makes you say that?” Joe blustered as panic brewed within him.

Admitting that he enjoyed life at the Stinson House was something Joe never would have dreamed of saying to Harry months earlier. Now he said it frantically, as though his life depended on it.

“Well, from the way you were talking, you seemed eager to find someplace else to go, and I know you don’t want to get marked… you were awfully rude to Lorraine about that, you know.” Harry said.

"...I know. I'm sorry." Joe said.

"Say that to her the next time you see her."

Suddenly Joe was furious with himself. Once again, he had been so intent on preserving his own dignity that he had forgotten all about the possibility of it rubbing Harry the wrong way. What a gentle creature Harry was! What a sin it was to hurt him! As Joe shifted uncomfortably in Harry’s moving palm, he realized that there was something he wanted even more than dignity.

"Harry, it's not that I don't wanna be here..." He began.

"Then what is it?" Said Harry.

“I want you.” Joe blurted out, and it was only when the words were spoken that he realized just how forward they sounded.

Harry stopped halfway through his climb up the stairs.

“…run that by me again?” The stunned giant said.

“…I wanna live with you, I mean. More than I don’t wanna be marked. See how that evens out?” Joe’s voice wavered as he sank back down into Harry’s palm and shook with embarrassment.

“Mmm…” Was Harry’s response.

The giant started climbing again.

“Really the whole thing wasn’t because of any problem with you, Harry!” Joe sputtered, digging his grave further no doubt. “It’s just… it’s hard. When the world doesn’t give you a lot of options and you have to make the best of it. Tiny Town ain’t an option, colonies ain’t an option, and you… Lorraine says I’m lucky to have you, if that means anything.”

Harry gently set Joe down on the nightstand.

“Why ain’t colonies an option?”

Joe grew feverish with fear at his question. In order to answer it, he would have to tell Harry the truth, the real truth, to reveal to the giant the secret that had cost him his family and his old community. He swallowed and took a deep breath as Harry turned away from him and slackened his tie, treating Joe to a lovely view of his broad shoulders. He admired them and hated himself for admiring them in equal measure.

“There’s something wrong with me, Harry. My old colony didn’t want me when they found out. My mom took me somewhere to make me better, but it didn’t work.” He said to those shoulders.

Their owner looked back at him, sweet and concerned as he always was.

“What’s so wrong with you that your family would abandon you like that?” Harry asked, in the delicate voice one used when someone was crying.

It seemed he had noticed the tears in Joe’s eyes even before Joe had. Harry sat back down on the edge of the bed and studied him.

"You... you wouldn't get it." Joe said.

It was the best non-answer he could muster.

The giant leaned in.

"Try me." Was all he said in response.

Harry's voice was gentle but firm. Now it was as if Joe were sitting in a portal to two universes. There was the one where he revealed his secret to Harry, and the one where he didn’t. He couldn’t tell which of the two would bring the two of them closer, but he knew which of the two was the most honest one to live in. As he weighed his options he decided that, even if what he said next ruined everything with Harry, he could at least look back at himself with the knowledge that he had told the whole truth.

“…I wanna be a pet.” Joe said out loud.

“You do?” Harry responded, and now Joe couldn’t take what he had said back.

Joe just nodded, curled into a ball in the soap dish, taking the moment in. Harry waited patiently as Joe processed what he had just said.

“Not the way a cat or a dog is a pet. I don’t mean like that.” He clarified, when the words finally came to him. “I wanna live with you giants. The way the pet tinies do. Always have. Tinies… I care about ‘em, sure, but if they all disappeared tomorrow it’d take me a minute to notice. I wanna live with you giants, and it scares me, so that’s why I was giving Lorraine so much shit. It's why I've lived alone all this time. ‘cause there’s something wrong with me, Harry.”

Joe buried his face in his hands and shook. Meanwhile, Harry said nothing. It was a silence that devastated Joe. He needed to hear something, whether it was praise or condemnation Joe did not care; the uncertainty alone bored into him like a drill press. It was paralyzing. Sickening. Maddening. All he could do was hide his head in shame and feel dirty.

Then Harry’s fingers curled around him and swept the feeling away like the waters of the Jordan. He was too afraid to open his eyes and look up as the giant gently held him in his palm. Harry’s touch filled the spaces words could not until finally he spoke.

“I don’t think that’s being a pet, Joe. We all have ways we like to live. I think that’s just being human.”

Human. Now Joe understood the point Lorraine had been trying to make with the skeletons. Whether it was with giants or tinies, Joe wanted the same thing everybody else on the planet wanted.

Joe wanted to be human.

Next part coming soon!

#bro really said : I want you…👁️👁️

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beansthough · 1 year ago

Text

A Like Vision

Part 26 of my story! Read the index and content warnings here. In which Joe introduces Harry to The Concept of Gender Fluidity and Harry reacts... about as well as a cis guy from 1926 could. He's learning!

Harry was supposed to be looking at the art and not at Joe, but as the little man shuffled through his portfolio the doctor simply couldn’t help himself. Seeing him well-groomed in that pristine outfit stirred a near-forgotten joy in Harry. Joe had transformed himself from a borrower into a dollhouse prince; metamorphosed into a being so delicate and refined that the sight reminded Harry of an expensive toy on Christmas morning, something so treasured it was near forbidden, like the dolls his sisters received that Harry in all his maleness had not once been allowed to touch.

He held his breath and waited as Joe, now back on the nightstand, searched through the matchbook for something that was good enough to show to Harry. Joe flipped through page after page, biting his lip and shaking his head, before reaching the end and going back to the start.

“Y’know, I don’t remember my art being this bad the last time I looked at it, but on second glance…” Joe trailed off.

“Come on, you have to show me something.” Harry insisted.

He leaned in as Joe sighed, grimaced, and pulled out a random page with his eyes shut. Deciding it was acceptable, he laid it out on the nightstand for Harry to see.

“All right, I guess it’s gotta be this one.” Joe said.

Harry delightedly examined Joe's work at first, though when he saw what it was he became deeply heartbroken. It was a simple charcoal sketch about the size of a postage stamp; the only colours Harry could see were yellows and reds – where Joe got those pigments from he couldn’t tell. The work itself was grotesque and expressionist in style, more closely resembling a political cartoon than a formal piece of art. The subject of the painting was surrounded by a sea of disembodied arms, all sleeved in colourful circus attire and reaching towards the center of the page, forming a cage of sorts around the chained elephant that sat in the middle and sadly looked up at them. The miserable creature was tiny in comparison.

“I drew it after I had a bad dream. …it’s kinda stupid.” Joe continued.

“It's not stupid, Joe. I think it’s a very powerful image, in fact!” Harry said.

Joe snorted in response. He always seemed insecure whenever he showed his art, though Harry couldn’t imagine why.

“What else have you done?” He asked.

Joe was looking as flustered as Harry had been moments before. Holding back a nervous smile, Joe pulled out another study.

“Here’s some I did of that mouse.” Joe said. “I was trying to get it to look like the ones my dad painted.”

This page was twice as large as the elephant drawing, but the images were even smaller. It was covered in studies of the mouse they had taken into the woods, each in a different pose. Harry narrowed his eyes as his brain processed the delicate strokes, which were finer than the letterwork engraved on a coin. The shapes were simple but lifelike. It struck a pleasing balance between real life and imagination.

“They’re very charming. Did you draw that from life?” Said Harry.

“Well, you saw yourself I didn’t kill it. Is that something you giants do, Harry? Kill things just to make art of them?” Joe’s voice was equal amounts appalled and disbelieving.

“No, no, I don’t mean it like that. Some artists draw from life, and some draw from memory.” Harry said.

“Oh. …well, here’s one I did from memory. This was actually my first one.”

Joe laid down another page. On this one was a minuscule rendition of Ms. Tucker in the park, painting the landscape around her. Everything had been rendered as faithfully as possible, right down to the melting snow. Harry gazed at it in awe.

“You did all that from memory?” He breathed.

Joe nodded and blushed like a school girl.

“Joe… have you ever considered showing at an art gallery?” Harry asked.

“The hell are those?” Joe replied.

“It’s where artists go to show their work. Some of them even become quite famous. You could be one of them if you’re lucky.”

“Yeah right! Nobody’s gonna be interested in tiny stuff, Harry.”

As Harry laid eyes on the pretty little man who sat before him, a light-bulb went on above his head. He could sit there and argue with Joe. He could certainly do that - or he could come up with a clever excuse to see more of Joe in that beautiful new suit.

“…why don’t we go to one and see what people are interested in? How about that?”

Joe’s eyes widened at first, then they traveled to the picture of Totsy.

“…it’s not gonna be like the circus, is it?” He shifted uncomfortably as his gaze then met Harry’s.

“Of course not! It’s nothing like the circus. An art gallery is the polar opposite of a circus!” Harry assured him.

“Well, all right, but first we gotta talk to the professor.” Joe said.

He gathered up the artworks and filed them back into the matchbook, and as he did so Harry could plainly see that Joe hadn’t shown him half of what he had drawn. Every fiber of his being wondered what those other works looked like.

“We’ll do that tomorrow. For now, we should get some sleep.” Harry said.

“Way ahead of ya’” Said Joe, who was already halfway through taking his pants off.

Harry jolted up in shock and covered his good, dubiously Christian eyes.

“JOE!” He exclaimed.

“…what?” Joe said.

It was the voice of a man who had neither shame nor the slightest inkling that what he was doing might be questionable.

“Warn me before you get undressed, will you?” Said Harry.

“…why? Is undressing dangerous?” Harry could tell by his voice that Joe’s puzzlement was only growing.

“It’s not dangerous, it’s just… manners. Giant manners.” Harry said. "Is this something miniatures do? Just run around with their clothes off?"

All Joe did was laugh at him.

“Not with everyone, but we live in the same burrow so who cares? Aside from you, I mean." Joe said. "First the romance novel and now this... You giants are real scared of naked people, huh?”

Harry suspected this would be the first of many cultural differences he would have to navigate in the coming days.

“I’m telling ya’ professor, there’s something really wrong with that place.” Joe said into the phone.

Harry listened in on the one-sided conversation from the dining room as he read the morning paper.

“I know I should stay away from it… …because my best friend is in there, that’s why! Look, all I wanna know is why Tiny Town is going nuts. You had those plans and everything so – yes, actually. Yes, that would be wonderful. Hold on – ”

Harry braced himself for whatever Joe was going to spring on him.

“– Harry can we go to Professor Hill’s house?” Asked Joe.

“What!?”

“He said yes.” Joe lied, then hung up the phone before Harry could so much as stand up. When he reached the doorway to the hall, all he could do was stand there and scowl at Joe, who was leaning against the candlestick phone and looking quite proud of himself.

“Joe, what was that about!?” He exclaimed.

“I made you a new friend. You gotta get out more, Harry. Talk to people. Live a little!” Joe said.

Harry rubbed his face. Like it or not, Joe was right. Harry was hardly an exciting person – though he wasn’t fond of the fact that Joe was catching on to that.

“When is he expecting us?” He asked.

“Tomorrow afternoon. We even get to meet his colleague, too. How about that?”

“That sounds… lovely.” Harry said, in the most unenthusiastic voice imaginable.

Harry could do little more than frown about it as Joe, still smug, simply shrugged at him.

“Hey, if you’re gonna drag me somewhere it’s only right I get to do the same thing." He said. "So where’s this art gallery…?”

The Art Gallery of Toronto was downtown on Dundas street, and a mere twenty years ago it had not existed at all. Already the nascent gallery sported several expansions in spite of that, and it seemed to be growing bigger by the day. It was symptomatic of a larger trend in the postwar Canadian art world, that of a nation in search of an identity that gave way to growth unprecedented.

Neither Harry nor Joe were fully aware of this when they entered this surreal realm of precisely arranged paintings. Joe sounded especially perplexed when he leaned in towards Harry’s left ear and whispered to him from under the scarf he was hiding in.

“Harry… what’s the deal with all these funny looking landscapes?”

In the center of the gallery’s off-white walls, Harry, armed with only an exhibition pamphlet, was now tasked with explaining the Group of Seven.

“It’s... art, Joe” Harry said, trying his best not to attract the attention of the other patrons, “a distinctly Canadian school of art. A like vision, so they say.”

“What’s so Canadian about it?” Joe hissed.

“…I don’t know.” Harry admitted.

He had been following the group for a while, noting its various compliments and criticisms. The Group of Seven were certainly distinct and Canadian, if only because they aggressively branded themselves as such. It was all rather odd, Harry found, though he had grown fond of them nonetheless.

He tensed up at the feeling of Joe shifting about on his shoulder.

"Even though an artist may not necessarily look for the support of approval from his people, it is from them that he must draw his inspiration.” Joe read from the pamphlet.

Harry looked over and saw that Joe was scratching his head. He strolled along and watched the little artist squint at Lawren Harris’s Mountain Forms, scowl at A. Y. Jackson’s Pic Island, and glower at Arthur Lismer’s Old Pine Tree. When Harry asked his next question, he could already guess what Joe’s answer would be.

“Well? What do you think?”

Joe huffed.

“...look. It’s not bad. I’m not saying it’s bad.” He stressed. “I just can’t figure out what makes it so Canadian. It’s just trees and shit. If these guys are so big on finding inspiration from other people, why do they only paint trees?”

Harry tried and failed to contain his laugher, throwing Joe off his shoulder. He swiftly caught his disgruntled friend and returned the poor man to his perch.

“Sorry…” He said, and flinched as Joe seized his earlobe in a death grip. “They are Canadian trees, though, wouldn’t you agree? And Canadian mountains? Canadian landscapes?”

“These could be anyone’s landscapes, Harry." Joe said. "I wouldn’t know they were Canadian if you didn’t tell me. What’s this actually saying about Canada? That it’s a whole lotta nothing?”

“I guess so.” Harry said, contemplating the rolling emptiness of Frank Carmichael’s Snow Clouds as he did so.

“Why do you giants even like this stuff?” Joe groused.

“I suppose paintings of really big landscapes make us feel small.” Said Harry.

“Huh… now this whole thing makes sense." Joe said. "It’s giant art for giants! Of course I’m not gonna get it. I always feel small.”

“Let’s look at something else, then.”

Harry wasn’t expecting to linger in the French Canadian half of the exhibition as long as he did, but Joe seemed to take well to the subject matter. He wondered if Joe’s time in Usine had something to do with it. Miss Emily Coonan’s Girl with Cat was one work he was fond of, as was Suzor-Coté’s Youth and Sunlight. Robert Pilot’s Old Habitant House, Beaupré got the strongest reaction out of him.

“Hey, that looks kinda like our house!” Joe said. “Maybe we should paint our door like that.”

“So you like some giant art after all.” Harry remarked.

“When there’s neat stuff in it I guess. How many times do you think I get to see a cat up close and live?” Joe said. Harry chuckled as he turned down a hallway off to the side. “Also, Harry, I don’t wanna alarm you, but I’m going to take my jacket off. It’s getting stuffy in here.” He added.

“You don’t have to warn me every time you take something off, you know. Only when you get completely naked.” Harry explained to his scarf.

"I beg your pardon?" Said a stern voice from beside them.

The old lady standing next to Harry was quite unimpressed with his statement. With Joe hidden, she clearly thought Harry had been talking to her, and with his soul leaving his mortal body he narrowly dodged her umbrella and ducked into the nearest gallery he could find. Joe, meanwhile, clung to him for dear life.

“Whoa! Hey! Where are we going!?” Joe exclaimed.

“To jail for public indecency in all likelihood.” Harry muttered.

The sound Joe made was snort and laugh in equal measure.

“Was taking off my jacket that big of a crime to you people?”

As Harry rubbed his face and smiled, a strange feeling came over him when he realized he couldn’t remember the last time he had enjoyed another person’s company so much. Ever since the war it had been as though Harry were surrounded by invisible glass walls that cut him off from the rest of humanity, not only physically, but emotionally as well. Now here he was, on an outing with a friend, getting into mischief just like he had when he was a boy. He felt almost normal.

Ever since meeting Joe, for the first time in ten years Harry remembered what it was like to have fun. He contemplated this as he approached the doorway ahead.

A sign next to it read, MINIATURE MASTERPIECES – LENT BY THE ROYAL ONTARIO MUSEUM

“Oh, I gotta see what this one’s about.” Joe said.

Harry could feel Joe wrapping the folds of the scarf tighter around himself as a woman in a long, flowing gown made from a chaotic, abstract print stomped out of the exhibit in a huff. She slowed down as she neared the two of them, and Harry could see that she was carrying a bunch of rolled up canvasses under her arm.

“Don’t tell me you’re headed to the miniature exhibit.” The stranger sighed.

“We—I am, actually.” Harry said.

“Don’t bother.” Was her recommendation.

A scowl crept over Harry's face.

“What’s wrong with it?” He tentatively asked her.

“It’s just a bunch of tiny things in a glass case! There’s no depth, no substance. People only like it because it’s very small. It’s not real art.” She scoffed. “I’ve been trying to get shown here for years, but nobody pays any mind to my work! They only want to stare at more tiny things.”

“…right. Well, thank you for the warning, ma’am! I’ll keep that in mind.” Harry nervously backed away from this absurd looking woman until he was all the way through the doorway and awkwardly waved at her. Without saying another word, she continued her righteous crusade down the hallway, and Harry turned his attention to the exhibit.

“What was that about?” Joe whispered.

“She must have bad taste.” Harry said.

As he approached the crowd in the center of the room, even Harry, who was taller than most of them, struggled to see what was inside the case from behind the small army of downward heads.

“Look at the cute little mice! What does that mean?” One woman commented.

“I don’t know. I don’t think anyone does.” The man who was presumably her husband replied.

“It probably doesn’t mean anything. Tinies aren’t smart enough for that kinda stuff.” Another gawker interjected.

Harry could feel Joe’s fingertips digging deeper and deeper into his earlobe.

“Don’t say a word.” He breathed to the tiny sitting right there on his shoulder.

Joe didn’t say a word, but Harry could tell from the bitter laughter in his ear that the poor man was fuming.

“Now if you’ll follow me into the adjacent gallery here…” The tour guide, an elderly man in a light brown suit, struggled to hold the attention of his audience. Clearing his throat, he tried again. “EXCUSE ME! It’s time for the next exhibit! Come along!”

Reluctantly the gaggle of giants followed, and Harry waited impatiently until the last of them was gone. With the exhibit all to themselves, he reached a hand up to Joe and took him down from his shoulder, placing him right in front of the glass case. He followed along as Joe paced about in front of the case until he stopped at one title card that caught his eye. The two read it in tandem.

Artist Unknown Miniature Maiolica n.d. Tin-glazed ceramics

Like their larger counterparts, Italian tinies have a fondness of istoriato wares, though the symbolism and meanings unique to the small folk remain unknown.

Harry jumped as Joe’s palms collided with the glass.

“WHAT!?” He shouted. “Waddaya mean it’s unknown!? I know what this stuff means! Doesn’t everyone?”

“You do…?” Harry leaned in and peered over Joe’s shoulder at the immaculately decorated little plates.

“’course I do. Like that one there –” Joe pointed to the plate in the middle. On it was a miniature rendition of what appeared to be a selection of meats and cheeses served on a piece of wood bark. Next to it was a bead of wine contained in a leaf. “–that’s to commemorate a wedding. I can’t tell exactly what they’re eating ‘cause it depends on what you borrow, but if there’s wine there, that’s probably what it’s celebrating.”

“So when you get married you paint the food?” Harry raised an eyebrow. “Why not the happy couple?”

“Of course you paint the food! Your partner’s gonna be there tomorrow, but if you’re a tiny, you’re only gonna eat stuff this good a few times in your life.” Joe explained.

He strolled along in front of the plates with all the air of a university professor.

“Now this stuff here,” he continued, “it’s all giardino stuff. Stuff the wild tinies have. They live outside and travel around a lot, so they put art on everything to document things. My dad was one of those. My mom, she was casa, she lived inside and borrowed, so her side of the family didn’t make stuff like this.”

Harry nodded vigorously in fascination. His eyes were drawn to one plate on the right that looked familiar.

“What’s this one with the mice on it? You have one of those too, don’t you?” He said.

“That one’s a family portrait.” Joe said. “The number of mice on it tells you how many people are in a family. Usually it’ll be two big mice and a bunch of small ones representing the kids.”

“What about that really big mouse at the top?”

“Really big one at the…” Joe stopped dead in his tracks and raced over to where Harry was pointing. He clutched his hat to his chest in awe at the sight of it. “…oh. Wow… this plate is something special.” He croaked, and his eyes glistened as he turned to look up at Harry then back to the plates.

“It is?” Harry pressed.

Joe nodded. From the look on his face he may as well have just discovered the ark of the covenant. He pressed his nose right up against the glass as he studied it.

“That big mouse at the top means this family had a grandparent.” Joe stated. “It’s extremely rare to have a living grandparent, especially if you’re wild. It’s… god, Harry, I can’t even describe it. It’s a blessing to have a grandparent." He stammered. "…I wonder what happened to these people.”

Harry’s heart sank. He hadn’t met all of his grandparents – the two on his father’s side were in England, and his grandfather on his mother’s side had passed away. The only grandparent he had met had been his grandmother on his mother’s side, but knowing her had been something he had taken for granted as a child. The idea that miniatures were so short lived that even having one living grandparent was considered a blessing saddened him deeply, yet there was also something deeply touching and human about it.

Once again, he found himself worrying for Joe. Fearing that one day he, like so many miniatures it seemed, might leave someday and never come back.

“…oh. I know what happened. ...that’s a cat.” Joe said.

“A cat?”

Now Harry examined the plate on the left. It was a cat all right, albeit an ugly and abstract one, its ears pointed like daggers and its frizzled whiskers jutting from the corners of its open mouth. It was blood-orange and arched and angry looking.

“We paint those when something really bad happens.” Joe concluded.

Harry didn’t know what to say. He just stood there with Joe and their shared sense of gloom as he thought about these nomadic miniatures who had once lived halfway across the world, with their art and their weddings and their grandparent. How strange it was to see these plates walled behind a glass case and artificially divorced from the people who had made them.

“I’m sorry, Joe.” Was all he could manage to say.

Joe shook his head and shrugged.

“No, you know what? I'm glad I saw this. I get this art. It's like you and your landscapes.” Joe said.

Harry reached out a gentle hand to Joe at the perfect moment. In came another tour group, and Harry stealthily slipped Joe into his pocket as yet more giants flooded the room.

An idea came to him. He hovered around the case as the curious onlookers started talking.

“Look at the little plates!” Someone gasped.

“It says here nobody knows what they mean.” Another giant said.

“Yes, they are quite mysterious.” The latest tour guide concurred. “We’ve yet to uncover the symbolism of them.”

“I know what they mean.” Harry said, as fifteen pairs of eyes fell upon him.

"Do you, now?" The guide sounded none too impressed.

Harry nodded sheepishly and pointed to the mouse plate.

“Well, I know a little bit. That one there with the mice is like a family portrait.” He said.

“A family portrait?" The guide repeated.

He eyed Harry in disbelief over the rims of his spectacles.

"Yes, a family portrait. The big mice represe-"

"A family portrait!?” The museum guide howled overtop of him. “What, did they gather the mice together and tell them to sit very still? How could this possibly be a family portrait?”

Harry looked on helplessly as laughter rippled through the group of giants, immediately taking the wind out of his sails. Without a care in the world, they went right back to gawking at the plates in the case with zero understanding of their context or meaning. With that, Harry realized to his dismay that the woman leaving the exhibit had been halfway right, albeit for the wrong reason. The art did have meaning. His fellow giants just didn't care what that meaning was. Why wouldn't it seem meaningless to the outward observer, then?

A voice tinier than the maiolica reached his ears from inside his front pocket.

“Just forget it, Harry. I've seen enough art. Let’s go home.”

“You know Narcissus wasted away and died from looking at his own reflection like that.”

“Oh, I’d die happy.” Joe sighed.

It was hypocritical of Harry to say, for he was admiring Joe just as much as Joe admired himself. He looked on fondly as the little man turned and spun, taken with his own reflection in the silver lighter on the nightstand. After a few more turns Joe had enough fun, and the little fellow soon grew tired of his own vanity and prepared to join Harry, who was already prepared for bed.

“All right, cover your eyes. I’m getting changed.” Joe declared, and Harry obediently did so. “…do I really have to do this every time I-”

“Yes you do.” Harry interrupted him.

“I just don’t get what’s so scary about—”

“It’s not scary, it’s just… manners.”

“But how is it even rude to be--okay, you can look now.”

Harry uncovered his eyes to see Joe, back in his rags, sitting on the base of the lamp. He opened the matchbook and started flipping through the works inside once again.

“Looks like your art has an audience after all.” Harry said.

Joe did not appear convinced as he shuffled sadly through his portfolio. After tossing sketch after sketch aside he looked up and said,

“Harry… would you giants only like my art because it’s really small?”

Harry froze. He didn’t know what to say to Joe in response. It was true that giants loved looking at tiny things, but surely Joe’s art had more merit to it than that.

“I don’t think so.” He said.

“That lady at the gallery did,” Joe murmured, “and those other giants didn’t care what the plates meant at all!” The tiny artist grew tense as his angst grew in equal measure. “Is my art even worth making? What if she’s right? What if it does lack substance? What if a bunch of giants like my art and I get real famous when I’m not even good, and it takes away from a bunch of other artists and all the real artists hate me!? What then, Harry?”

Harry approached the nightstand and sat down on the edge of the bed as Joe became increasingly frazzled with anxiety.

“She only said that because she didn’t see what you saw. Maybe a lot of people won’t see what you see, but that’s no reason to quit making art.” Harry said.

Joe sighed and stared ahead with his chin in his hands, and Harry stared at him, frustrated with himself. He did not consider himself a real artist, but at the very least, what Harry could do was tell a story. He leaned in.

“Do you know what I wanted to be when I was a boy, Joe?” He said.

Joe looked up in confusion as Harry continued.

“I wanted to be a concert pianist. My mother wanted me to be one too, but my father told me that the world already had plenty of pianists, that it didn’t need another pianist. He said, what the world really needed was more farmers. So I never became one. I didn’t become a farmer either, because I wasn’t going to let my father win that easily. Still, I wonder sometimes what would have happened if I had kept at it. Maybe I would be playing at a picture show somewhere instead of lancing boils and watching families fall apart.”

Harry paused and studied Joe, who appeared to be deep in thought.

“People like that woman remind me of my father. The world does need farmers, it’s true, but it needs pianists too, because no pianist plays the same way. Do you understand?”

Joe nodded, then looked up at Harry with a devilish grin.

“…so you play, huh?”

It was only now that Harry realized his mistake. He felt himself growing flustered once again.

“I used to a long time ago, but I’m very rusty now. Besides, I can’t do much with one hand. I couldn’t play anything if I tried.” He said with great haste, though he could tell by the wry smile on Joe's face that the damage had already been done.

“Let me get this straight. I show you all my art, but you won’t even play a song for me?” Joe said.

It was hard for Harry to say no to him outright.

“Maybe once I see the rest of your art I’ll play you something." Harry proposed. "How does that sound?”

Joe considered his offer for a moment.

“Only if you let me read you more books.” He said.

This seemed fair enough to Harry, who nodded in agreement as Joe sorted through his home library and picked out another romance novel.

“Is that one the spy novel?” He said of the book in Joe’s hands.

“Detective story, actually.” Joe said. “I was thinking you might like this one better. It’s got murder in it.”

Harry chuckled.

“Does it, now?”

Harry braced himself as Joe ran and leapt off the table, landing squarely in his lap. He picked Joe up and sat him down by the pillow, then eased himself into the bed.

“Yeah. I mean, it’s got romance too, I guess. It’s about this hardboiled detective whose health is failing while he’s trying to catch this murderer.” Joe yammered away. “So he hires a guy to be his assistant, and a few hundred thousand words later he finally figures out he’s in love with him.”

“…wait. In this one two men fall in love?”

Harry's astonishment bled into his voice. He sat up in shock and looked at Joe in confusion.

“Well, kinda. I mean, the assistant’s only a man about fifty percent of the time.” Joe carried on.

“How can someone be a man fifty percent of the time? You either are one or you aren’t one... aren't you?” Harry thought out loud.

“Exactly! ...unless you are one and also not one at the same time. That happens too sometimes." Joe's statement made Harry's mind implode. "The assistant is one fifty percent of the time. The rest of the time she's not one. …or maybe they're a man and a woman at the same time, all of the time? I can’t remember.” Joe tossed his hand, then paused. “…why do you look so stricken?”

Harry propped himself up with his one arm as he looked down at Joe in disbelief, desperately trying to wrap his head around the miniatures’ absurd gender politics. The woman in trousers was hard enough to understand, but men falling in love? One of whom was occasionally a woman, somehow? All of it was so counter to everything Harry knew he could hardly parse it. At the same time, however, he found himself feeling oddly safe with Joe in that moment, safer than he had felt around any other man before. Never in his life had he expected to encounter anyone who was so indifferent to things that were, in Harry's culture, incredibly strange if not downright dangerous. It filled him with hope and affection in equal measure.

“You gonna read this thing with me or what? Or should I just lie here and…” Joe’s voice snapped Harry out of his rumination.

Focusing on Joe once again, he noted that the miniature was lying on his back underneath him, gazing up at Harry the way he would a night sky. There was something oddly intimate about it, frighteningly so. He had imagined himself in this position with other boys before, boys who gazed up at him much the same way Joe was doing now. In these fantasies he would inevitably lower himself down and kiss them.

His heart started to pound. Blood rushed to his head. This was getting awkward. He had to say something!

“No.” Harry said, and Joe, still smiling, furrowed his brow in bewilderment. “Don’t… lie there and…”

He let out a great sigh, hoping some of the humiliation would leave his body along with it, and lowered himself back down onto the bed. Joe cuddled right into his neck, and Harry half-listened as his little friend read to him while he tried with all his might to seem as normal as possible.

Georgie smiled at him from across the room all the while. Next to the picture his mother's ring box lay in wait. Much as he wanted to focus on this strange borrower’s tale about men falling in love with other occasional-men, his mind was elsewhere. He thought about Georgie instead, and his mother, and everyone else in his life whom he had failed. He thought about the ring, more poignant than a reaper’s hourglass counting down the rest of his days. He wondered what would happen to Joe when he inevitably had to give it to someone. This in turn made him wonder if his father would be proud of him once he finally did. Did he not owe it to the family to do so after leaving his poor mother on her deathbed? He had chosen his final exams over his own family; he couldn’t allow himself to choose Joe over them now. He thought about June, fast approaching, about Georgie’s birthday, his father’s yearly visit in July, and how everything Harry had come to dread now loomed over the horizon.

He thought about Joe’s art. How Joe himself was a work of art, so beautiful it made his heart ache. He cared for Joe too much to ever throw him away, or so he told himself, but what would the rest of the world have to say to that?

It was then he realized that Joe’s voice had stopped, and in its place there was only the sound of snoring. With great caution Harry propped himself up again and looked at the little man who had passed out on the bed. That familiar tenderness came over Harry, as it inevitably did whenever Joe was passed out. Taking care not to wake him, Harry delicately scooped him up and placed him into the soap dish on the night stand, then folded the hand towel over him. He plucked the book from the bed for good measure, and clumsily returned it to the stack next to Joe’s bed.

Joe was a work of art in his own right. What more could Harry do besides cherish him?

Read the next part here!

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beansthough · 1 year ago

Text

Scared

Part 25 of my story! Read the index and content warnings here. This chapter gets so gay. Warning to readers: a tiny gets injured in this.

“…and now whenever I go in one door, he goes out the other. It’s almost as if he’s avoiding me on purpose! I don’t understand you men, Mr. Piccoli. You have no idea what behaviour like that does to a girl!” Said Miss Wilkins through the phone.

Joe had no idea what behaviour like that did to a girl, but he certainly knew what it did to a boy. Joe eyed the man who was avoiding him from where he sat down the hallway. It was as if his newfound physical proximity to Harry had driven the two of them apart in every other way. Meanwhile, Harry grabbed his medical bag and prepared to head out.

“Yeah… I hear ya’. I don’t understand it myself.” Joe said. “Tell your father the doctor’s on his way. He won’t be long.”

Bidding Miss Wilkins farewell, he hung up the phone and whistled for Harry. The doctor’s back was turned to Joe, who watched as his shoulders rose with what seemed to be unease. Joe tapped his foot against the table impatiently as Harry took his sweet time turning around to face him. When he eventually did, the giant seemed to be downright nervous, which made Joe nervous by extension.

“Do you want down from the table?” Asked the giant who was obviously stalling.

“Well I sure as hell don’t wanna be put on the roof.” Joe quipped.

Joe watched Harry internally panic for a moment until he finally worked up the nerve to reach out his hand. When Joe stepped into it as he had a hundred times before, there was one major difference: now whenever Joe climbed into Harry’s hand, Harry was as fearful as a young child handling a live animal for the first time. Their interactions had been like this for the last three days, and for the life of him he couldn’t figure out why.

“…right. Well… if this is a simple chest cold, I’ll be back in a couple hours. If it isn’t, I won’t be back until later tonight." The second he set Joe onto the floor he started backing away. "I uh—I have to hurry, actually. Take care!” Harry said.

"Harry, wait-"

The floorboards shook as the doctor bolted from the scene like a startled deer, throwing Joe off balance. All the little man could do was cross his arms and look on in disapproval. How rude of Harry to leave so suddenly! Joe didn’t even have a chance to tell Harry where he would be going that day, something that could cost him his life if his last trip to Calloway’s was anything to go by!

The last thing Joe wanted to do was return there but a deal was a deal and fine clothes were fine clothes. Gone were the days of wearing ten year old rags, he had decided. If he had to be a borrower of any sort, he would be an enviable one, a respectable one, winning the approval of tinies and giants alike and maybe even Harry too.

With any luck it might be enough to get Harry to stop running from him.

The month of May was much too fleeting for Joe’s liking, and as dusk fell over the docks he wished there was a way to beg it to stay. Although Joe could hardly enjoy the weather out in the open at his scale, there was something about late spring’s ephemeral nature that gripped him tightly and refused to let go. The last few rays of the sun coloured the lake a beautiful blue, and waters that had once held a monstrosity mere days ago now sat placid and calm, sloshing lazily against the gravel. The scent of fresh grass and spring flowers perfumed the night air as it grew cool and crisp. This giant’s sunset was a borrower’s sunrise, and what a spectacular sunrise it was!

As Joe sat in the dinginess of Calloway’s and waited for the tailor to deliver on his promise, he wished he were watching it instead. The booths were closer to gull’s nests than they were proper tables and chairs, and the twigs always prodded him in the worst possible places. The unpleasantness of it all doubled when a plate of rancid offerings was slid under his nose.

“Say, Cast-iron Joe! You wouldn’t mind taking this off my hands for me, would you?”

It was the voice of Gutters, of course. Joe stared into the plate the way a traumatized war veteran would stare off onto the distance. On it there was a soggy trimming of spinach, an even soggier crumb of bread, and – crown jewel of the dish – egg whites. Two slices of them, each ice cold and utterly joyless.

Joe had no choice but to accept the offering. Anything less would be tantamount to admitting that he was a pet.

“Thanks, Gutters. You’re a real pal.” He said.

The lanky man smirked at him as he slid into the seat across from him, head bobbing with suppressed laughter.

"Saw your owner looking for ya' a few nights ago." Said Gutters.

It took everything in Joe's power to suppress the primordial terror that came over him. He kept his eyes locked onto the sad eggs and prayed that Gutters wouldn't smell his fear as adrenaline surged through him.

"I don't know what the hell you're talking about." Joe lied as his heart thumped in his chest.

"Really? You don't know? Rumour has it there was a big guy on the beach calling your name." He said.

Joe shot Gutters a look of pure, concentrated rage. He stabbed his fork into the eggs and twisted it.

"Must've been looking for his dog or something. The hell is it with you, Gutters? You and your pet tiny conspiracy. Can’t you find something better to do?" Said Joe.

"Hey, easy! I'm just looking out for ya', Joe. I know you won't believe me, but I used to be you." Gutters said.

Something about the way Gutters spoke to Joe reminded him of the circus manager: it was a voice rife with insincerity, one clearly in search of a desired reaction. He knew exactly what Gutters was doing. Gutters was testing him, and Joe wasn't having it. As his fear gave way to calculated determination, he found he wasn't scared of losing his ear anymore. He feared losing his agency, an agency he constantly had to fight for, against regular giants, against Harry, and now against his fellow tiny.

"I don't remember asking for the help." Joe stated.

With those words, Joe locked eyes with the man across from him and saw that they were full of contempt. Gutters simply sighed in response the way a parent would sigh over a misbehaving child. Then a strange sadness seemed to possess him, one Joe had never seen before, and for one ghost of a second all the insincerity left his voice to the point Joe was thrown by what he said next.

"Just remember something for me, will ya'? If they say they love you, maybe it means they love you now, but that could change by tomorrow. They think we're stupid, Joe. They always will. They're evil." Gutters warned.

Joe tilted his head back and looked straight down his nose at Gutters. Oh, Joe knew damn well the giants were evil. He was well aware they thought tinies were stupid, too. What Gutters didn’t realize, as far as Joe was concerned, was that he was treating him no differently than any giant would.

"You obviously think I'm stupid too if you're gonna sit here and lecture me about how to live my life. What makes you any different?" Joe's voice was deadpan as he spoke. “You can sit here and act like you know what’s best for me all you want, pal, but my business is my business.”

Joe could tell by the look on Gutters' face that his opponent was stumped by this response. Victoriously, Joe took one, performative bite of his cold eggs and forced himself to swallow them down as Gutters' once rational demeanour twisted into something ugly and dark. His hand shot towards Joe faster than lightning, but Joe, who was done being talked down to by anyone, for any reason, didn’t break eye contact when it snatched his collar and pulled him in.

“Listen here, you cockroach! You might be able to lie to everyone else, but you’re not gonna lie to me! I saw what I saw.” Gutters growled.

Joe’s hands curled into fists. Joe was not a fighting man, but he was cornered and angry, which in turn made him capable of anything.

“You don’t scare me.” Joe hissed, not blinking once as he stared into Gutters’ icy eyes.

He was on the verge of throwing one of those fists when the tension was broken by a low laugh that drifted over from the bar counter.

"You can't see your own hand in front of your face, Gutters. Everyone knows that." Calloway said without even looking up from the glass he was polishing. "You're just jealous he's got himself a rich boyfriend."

"I saw what I saw." Gutters repeated.

“The hell you keeping tabs on Joe for anyways? You like him? Jealous or something? C’mon.” Said Calloway.

Joe, still halfway prepared to fling Gutters across the table, breathed a sigh of relief when his nemesis released him.

“…fine. Learn the hard way. Idiots like you are beyond helping.” Gutters said.

When Gutters released him unceremoniously and retreated to the other end of the bar, a lead weight may as well have been lifted from Joe's chest. The captain sidled up to Joe’s booth soon after and his presence was as welcome as a breath of fresh spring air. He poured Joe a glass of spills, though after his experience the other day Joe wasn’t about to risk drinking it.

“Don’t let him get to ya’. He’s just taking his own baggage out on you, that’s all. How’s the sweetheart?” Asked Calloway.

“The uh… oh.” It took Joe a moment to remember the lie he had been telling. “Well, he'll let me sleep near him and everything, but now he won’t talk to me.” He explained.

Calloway cackled as he dusted off the twiggy booth.

“That right? Is this guy uh… unseasoned, by any chance?” Calloway's voice was low and conspiratorial, and a raised eyebrow arched over his eyepatch.

Joe nearly spat out his eggs at the question. It was something he had neither considered nor wanted to consider, but now that the subject had been brought up he knew it was going to live in his head rent free.

“I don’t know!” Joe stammered. “Haven’t asked him.”

Captain Calloway nodded.

“Well he’s acting pretty unexperienced if he can barely handle sleeping in the same room as you. See, that’s why the tailor needs to hurry up and get here. Get yourself into something nice, ease him into it, then he’ll be all over you!” The captain said.

Joe, meanwhile, was covering his face in sheer embarrassment and resisting the urge to rip his skin off completely and crawl out of it.

“I didn’t ask for your advice.” Joe groaned.

Captain Calloway gave a half-hearted shrug.

“That’ll still be 200 scraps regardless. I’ll give you the unsolicited advice discount.”

The tailor had arrived just in the nick of time, and Joe had escaped with an elegant fabric bag and whatever was left of his dignity. The lake and the bucket arm seemed to pity him today, for after that dreadful time at Calloway’s they didn’t even bother trying to take his life. Even the snatcher and the turtle were absent that night and the streetcar was calm as could be.

Things were shaping up to be a little too easy, but Joe pushed that thought aside as he scampered from the trolley in a direction he thought led to home. Traveling as a miniature was an inexact art, especially where the streetcar was concerned. Sometimes Joe could head straight home without hassle; other times he would end up in the general vicinity of home and improvise. The latter was the situation he found himself in after getting off on Gerrard Street and wandering onto the edge of Riverdale Park. With the night growing older, he looked for a landmark as he always did. Tiny Town in all its electric glory would do just nicely considering it was very well lit at night.

Lit up with torches, Joe noted.

He squinted at the angry mob of miniatures that spilled out of the town's gates and watched as it descended upon a single fleeing individual. Though he immediately felt uneasy, his feet automatically carried him closer and closer to the spectacle. When he was near enough he could see that a man was running at light speed across the field as the crowd pursued him. So hasty was the target of the crowd's ire that he didn't appear to notice a dip in the ground. It tripped the escapee and he landed violently, too shaken to get up. Joe's stomach twisted into knots as the leader of the gang loomed over the victim. He didn't tear his eyes away until the ringleader of the mob knelt on top of the target, pinched the man's ear, took his knife and-

-Joe could have sworn it was O'Grady wielding that knife.

That was enough for him. He turned around and sprinted as fast as the newly marked tiny had, taking care to watch his footing for fear he might be the next victim. Bolting into the darkness that swallowed him, he fought back tears as he wondered what evil force was possessing his fellow miniature.

When he stopped to catch his breath a new idea came to him. Maybe tinies were just as evil as the giants were. The giants may have invented Tiny Town from what Joe could tell, but it was the tinies who invented marking. Oddly enough, Joe found himself equal parts disgusted and comforted by this thought. It meant he had nothing to lose by living as he did. It re-enforced what Joe had known to be true deep down all along: that he wasn't just a stupid borrower. He could understand the evils of war and suffering just like anyone else. He could look his own potential ruination in the face and decide it was a risk worth taking.

Faced with that grisly sight outside of Tiny Town, Joe had no choice but to make peace with his new understanding of evil.

The clothes were high self-esteem in fabric form. It was the latest in townie fashion: a light blue-grey suit not unlike the ones the giants wore, with a hat and shoes to go with it. Clean as a whistle and dressed to kill, the reflection that stared back at Joe from the blade of the abandoned butter knife may as well have been that of a completely different person. As he tilted his hat this way and that, trying to get it at a perfect angle that would complement his cheekbones, he wondered if Mr. Dawson would be impressed.

With that passing thought, all the horror of the night crept back over him like a cursed miasma. Although Joe had made it back home to the safety of the kitchen, he was still small and alone in a house endless and empty, and an eerie feeling came over him. He kept expecting something, or someone, to find him and attack him, to grab him by the neck or to cut off his ear - the specifics didn't matter. For years he had lived in the Stinson House without this vulnerable feeling coming over him. Then again, maybe it had always been there, and Joe had tuned it out in order to function. Now that he was sleeping in Harry’s room he was beginning to understand what real safety felt like. It was another form of forbidden knowledge, he supposed, another thing he would miss so much in its absence that he could never bear to part with it in the first place.

The sound of Harry’s key in the front door exorcised the sense of trepidation immediately, though Joe still hid behind the cookie tin out of principle. Light after light went on in the hallway, then the parlour, and then finally the kitchen, until the darkness was purged completely and only the giant remained. Although some part of him debated remaining hidden and saving the surprise of his new clothes for later, another more tender part couldn’t resist being with Harry in that moment. For three days now Harry had been avoiding him, but Joe, especially now, couldn’t bear to avoid Harry.

So he stepped out from behind the tin and whistled as the contemplative giant leaned over the sink. As had been the case for the last three days, Harry’s eyes widened and that look of unease came over him. Now there was a new development: the giant’s face turned bright red at the sight of him.

Unseasoned. The word crept back into Joe’s mind. Calloway had a point, he realized; Harry wasn’t acting all that different from some of the lesser-experienced boys of Joe’s own size that he had toyed with. Surely, though, Harry didn’t find Joe attractive. That would be absurd!

When the giant said nothing at the sight of him, Joe took a few more cautious steps forward as the moment grew increasingly awkward. Heart-rate rising, he cleared his throat and said,

“Waddaya think?”

Harry kept on staring.

“Uhhhhhhhhh… I uh…” Sputtered the giant who was not at all thinking.

Harry rubbed his hand over his face and collected himself. Joe’s heart swelled with pride when he saw that a familiar look of wonder had returned to the doctor’s eyes. He felt oddly powerful in that moment, as he so often did at Calloway’s whenever he was drunk and flirtatious. Pretending he was there instead, he gave Harry his coyest smile and took his hat off to the giant.

“I took your advice and went clothes shopping. Thought you might wanna admire the stitching.” Joe said, thoroughly enjoying Harry’s reaction.

Absurd as it was, imagining Harry as just another flustered boy he was hitting on at a bar seemed to be helping. At the very least, the giant hadn’t turned tail and run yet. Joe kept drawing closer.

“You can have a look if you want.” He offered.

“I… okay.” Harry said, his voice wavering with surprise.

Still thoroughly malfunctioning, Harry extended his hand to Joe who noted that it was visibly shaking. Joe climbed in, careful of it at first. When he saw that Harry’s hand was clean, he didn’t stand in it, or sit in it for that matter, but lounged in it as though he owned it, then smiled up at the jittery giant who dutifully carried him upstairs.

“So how’d the visit go?” Asked Joe.

Harry shook his head gravely.

“It wasn’t a cold. Miss Wilkins’ father came down with tuberculosis. I spent the day arranging for him to be taken to the sanatorium and comforting the family.” Harry said.

Joe had no idea what to say to such a thing. In his ten years as a hermit, it was a rare occasion when he had to comfort anyone. He tried his best for Harry's sake.

“Are you all right after that?" He said.

“I'll live. It's part of the job." Harry assured him.

"Yeah, well, it's a shit job." Joe said. "You sure you'll be all right?"

"I'm sure. At least one of us had a good day by the looks of it.” Harry replied.

Joe suppressed his nervous laughter. Thought of the gruesome occurrence at Tiny Town had melted away when Harry showed up, but now it came back again in full force. He wanted to deny it away, to bury it, to pretend everything was all right. Instead, when he disembarked Harry’s hand, he stood before his new bed on the nightstand and debated with himself over whether or not to talk about it. Ultimately he decided that he wanted Harry to know. He wanted the giant to understand that tinies were also capable of evil. Maybe if he did, he would finally stop sheltering Joe.

He couldn’t turn around to face Harry when he said what came next.

“Saw a guy get marked outside of Tiny Town today.” Joe could feel the giant’s concerned eyes on his back. “A whole crowd chased him down. I don’t know what he did. I just ran. Maybe I should’ve done more to help. Tinies are just… we’re evil, Harry. We’re just as bad as you are sometimes.”

Joe was fighting back tears again as he turned to face Harry. The giant was sitting on the bed with his chin in his hand, looking deeply worried.

“I’m glad you came home in one piece.” Harry said.

“We gotta do something about that place, Harry! Find out what’s going on. The professor might know… I should call him.” Said Joe.

“Do it tomorrow when the poor man’s awake.” The giant advised him. Then his brow furrowed. “...why didn’t you tell me you were going there?”

“You left before I could! You ran off so fast today I didn’t even get a chance to bring it up!” Joe exclaimed.

Harry’s face fell.

“…I did, didn’t I? I’m sorry for running off on you like that.” He said.

Joe had said enough about Tiny Town, he decided - more than he could stand to say. He didn’t want to dwell on the horror any further, so he shoved it away and turned his ire against Harry instead.

“Yeah, well, you should be. What’s gotten into you lately, anyways? You don’t talk over breakfast, you won’t read with me, any other time you’re busy with your files, and when I try and say anything you run out the door!” Joe ranted at Harry, who had gotten up and started rifling through his dresser. “You’re gonna leave right now, aren’t you?”

Harry froze.

“I uh… I have to get changed.” Harry insisted.

Joe crossed his arms.

“Then do it when I’m done telling you off. This is important, Harry.” Joe said. “You still scared you’re brainwashing me or something?”

Harry shook his head no. As the giant clutched his pajamas and cast a defeated look off to the side, a strange feeling of satisfaction came over Joe. It was there on the nightstand, dressed in his finest, that Joe embraced his twisted nature. He wanted Harry, and by extension he wanted to know about Harry, to learn who the real Harry was. He couldn’t do that if the giant was constantly hiding from him.

“I’m just… not good at taking compliments, I guess.” Harry said.

Joe tilted his head at him in confusion.

“What do you mean?”

“The other day, you were drunk at the time and you ah… said something very nice to me.” Harry explained.

Joe couldn’t help but laugh. The horror and anger fled from him again at the sheer ridiculousness of Harry’s statement.

“That’s what you’re wound up about? Really!?” Joe cried.

The embarrassed giant nodded at him and Joe, little devil that he was, immediately took aim at Harry’s weak spot and fired away.

“Well what did I say? Did I say you were smart or handsome or kind or something?”

Joe watched in delight as Harry grew so worked up his only usable hand started to fidget. The giant sank back down onto the bed and sat there as Joe smiled with cruel joy.

“…I’m not going to repeat it.” Harry said.

“Did I say you have a nice ass? ‘cause we can add that one to the pile.” Joe continued.

“What!?”

“I said what I said.”

Poor Harry looked like he wanted to melt into the floor. Joe, meanwhile, was laughing in sadistic glee as Harry looked at him helplessly.

“What are you so afraid of?” Joe threw the question at Harry in the same deadpan fashion he had done with Gutters earlier.

“You.” Harry admitted.

“Me? Little old me? Really, Harry?” Joe said.

Harry? Afraid of him? This knowledge turned the entire world on its head. All this time he hadn’t thought it possible for Harry to get flustered at him. He had imagined the doctor a cool seducer, even, hellbent on getting Joe riled up. Learning it was the exact opposite changed everything! So Harry wasn't a seductor. He was a precious, darling innocent ignorant to the wonderful world of boys. Was that really why Harry was blushing at him so intensely?

Joe had no better option than to test his theory. He shrugged off his suit jacket and hung it over the metal lighter on the nightstand, then took off his waistcoat and tie for good measure. What he was about to do was thoroughly unprecedented. His inner, sexually confused twelve-year-old was screaming at the mere thought of it. Still, it had to be done, for Harry’s sake and for Joe’s as well.

First he took a few steps back and judged the distance from the nightstand to Harry’s left knee, then he sprinted at full speed and launched himself toward it. Harry jumped and yelped when he landed – predictably – and Joe scrambled to stay balanced as the giant panicked. Within seconds Joe was swept into Harry’s hand, and as he lay there he gave the doctor the best puppydog eyes he could muster.

“Harry, there’s a lot of awful shit in this world you need to be afraid of, but I’m not one of ‘em. You know that.” Joe assured him. “Tuberculosis, Tiny Town, that’s shit worth being afraid of. Not me.”

“…right.” Harry said.

He couldn’t stop smiling up at Harry. The giant was innocent, painfully so if the dumbstruck look on his face was anything to go by. Joe wouldn’t dare corrupt that innocence, but he would use his newfound knowledge to bridge the growing gap between them. He sat up.

“But hey, here’s an idea: if you wanna be scared you can go ahead and be scared, but that’s no reason to avoid me. Wanting to run away is normal but we’ve been through too much shit for that. Just do it scared.” Joe said.

“I’ll try to do that.” Harry sighed.

With that, a timid smile came over Harry and his thumb started stroking Joe’s face the way it used to. Joe, triumphant, leaned in to Harry’s touch. He was proud of himself, for in an odd way Joe had caught the giant, had lured him in and cornered him. Harry had no excuse now. He would have to stop running and start enduring.

“By the way, there’s something I’ve been meaning to show you…” Joe said.

Read the next chapter here!

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beansthough · 1 year ago

Text

A Small and Precious Thing

Part 24 of my story! See the index and content warnings here. In which Harry drools at Joe like a cartoon wolf while convincing himself he's not gay.

Harry Avery barely held himself together that day. He sat through appointment after appointment, assessed patient after patient, but each time part of him was somewhere else entirely, worrying about the tiny man who now lay passed out upstairs. Now that the day was done emotions boiled between his ears like the water in the pot in front of him. He couldn’t even tell what they were at this point. Anger? Outrage? Disappointment? Fear? What did Joe think he was doing ending up drunk in a lake like that?

He tossed a coin of ginger root into the pot as he dwelled on the events of the day, dissecting and quantifying and rationalizing. One question above all others still persisted in his mind: is this the right thing to do?

Harry still couldn’t answer. Joe was tough stuff; that much was apparent. The little man could hold his liquor down. Joe had been thoroughly green the entire journey home but hadn’t once thrown up, which was more than Harry could say for himself whenever he had been in Joe’s shoes. The so-called floating thing by the lake which Harry had gone in search of that morning had been considerably far away from the Stinson House, much further than expected. To think that Joe traveled all the way across the city with such regularity astounded Harry. Maybe Joe could make his own decisions, but would they be safe decisions? Could he really trust Joe’s judgment when he had found him at the mercy of a snapping turtle?

Then there was the fact that Joe had the audacity to horse around after nearly getting bitten in half. To look him in the eyes and call him a big, sexy giant on top of everything else. It was practically an insult. Surely Joe had been joking with those words, but joking in what way? How big was big he wondered? How sexy was sexy? How giant, exactly, was giant?

He could only hope that Joe had been joking. Anything else disturbed Harry far too much to think about. Whatever pathological attraction Joe had towards Harry was sure to get him killed, just as his own attraction to Georgie had gotten that boy killed. He knew what the medical journals had to say about homosexuals; hell, he had read them! He had to give himself some credit, however. The little bastard had been drunk as a skunk, lying helplessly in his hand, and the worst Harry had done was march him straight upstairs to tuck him into bed. Whatever pathology Harry himself had, it had not gotten the best of him yet.

Harry tried to put it all out of his mind as he eye-droppered the ginger tea into the misshapen glass he had plucked from the floorboards, then carried it upstairs to his live-in patient.

Sure enough, Joe was stirring as nighttime crept closer. As he approached the nightstand he could see that the poor man was thrashing in his sleep and rubbing his face. Joe had been fully clothed when Harry had tucked him in, but sometime during his nap he had shrugged his jacket off and tossed it aside. He watched as Joe jolted awake from whatever nightmare he was having and sat up in a slump.

“…shit.” Was his greeting to Harry.

Joe gave him a lazy wave for good measure, then when he’d gotten his bearings he started removing his shirt without a second thought. Disrobing without a care for Harry's presence was a strange tendency of Joe’s, and normally when he did it Harry fled the room accordingly. This proved to be a challenge now that he was holding a minuscule glass of boiling hot ginger in his only usable hand - one that he didn’t want to run all the way back downstairs to refill in the event it spilled.

Much as he wanted to look away, he decided to assess Joe’s condition instead. That’s all he was doing, he told himself. That or he was brushing up on his anatomy, perhaps: deltoid, biceps brachii, brachioradialis, all of these muscles were ones he could plainly see on Joe’s arms now, where before the poor man had been skeleton thin. He was thrown for a moment upon realizing just how toned Joe was, though it made sense with the sheer amount of climbing the man did in a day. It was the body of a dancer or a figure skater – something graceful and beautiful that was built to move with ease.

“What?”

Joe’s sharp glare drew Harry’s attention to the fact that he was staring. Immediately he went rigid and tried to wipe the dumbstruck look off his face as the tiny glass quivered in his fingers. He reached out and handed it to Joe. Previously, all Harry had needed to do was look at Joe and the miniature would start blushing. Now the roles were reversed, and Harry could feel himself turning scarlet red with embarrassment.

“Brought something to help sober you up.” He said.

Joe took the glass and sniffed at it, rubbing at his head with one hand.

“What’s this? Ginger? You got any willow bark to go with that?” He asked.

“I don’t, I’m afraid.” Harry said.

“Nothing for a headache at all?”

Harry shook his head no. There wasn't anything Harry had on hand that wouldn’t run the risk of poisoning Joe if improperly dosed, and Harry wasn't competent enough in miniature medicine to try. Joe cursed under his breath in response and chugged the ginger tea. To Harry’s horror he realized he could not take his eyes off of Joe. It was getting awkward. He had to say something.

“Do you… usually do that?” Harry stammered.

“Do what?” The hung over miniature asked him.

“Go to the lake and drink.” He said.

Joe polished off the last of the ginger tea and lounged in his new bed.

“Sometimes. When I’m really pissed I do.” Said Joe.

Harry braced himself. He knew they had a score to settle.

“I’m tired of being the tiny, Harry. And you being the—y’know. I can make my own damn decisions.”

“Me being the what? The big, sexy giant?” Was what Harry wanted to say.

What he said instead was,

“Well, whatever decisions you made last night ended with you drunk in a tin can with a turtle after you.”

Joe squinted at him.

“What? That’s bullshit. You’re lying.” Joe said.

“Tell me something, Joe. What animal were you dreaming about just now?” Harry replied.

Joe's scowl only deepened.

“That’s not important!” He said.

So Joe didn’t remember the turtle. That must mean he didn’t remember what he had said after the turtle either, Harry realized. Some part of him wanted to bring it up but he had no idea how he would even broach such a conversation. For all he knew, Joe would be downright offended if he did. Right then and there Harry decided that he would put whatever drunk Joe had said out of mind and take it to the grave for good measure. Harry, though he hated to admit it, was afraid – not of Joe himself, but what Joe represented.

“I’m tired of being the tiny.” Joe reiterated.

Harry watched in bewilderment as Joe curled up into the crisp, white towel. He was still at a loss for words when Joe’s head perked up from below the blankets.

“Hey. Could you do me a favour? Could you bring me my clothes?” Joe asked.

“Which ones?”

“All of them.”

All of them? The ring box, in other words, Harry reasoned. Harry, who would do almost anything for Joe at that point, had no other option but to comply. He marched all the way back downstairs to the kitchen, grabbed the ring box, and marched all the way back upstairs with it again. He presented it to Joe as though he were the tiny man’s personal waitstaff, and Joe gave a catlike grin in satisfaction.

“Put that over there.” He gestured to his right. “Then get me my shelf.”

“Your shelf…?” Harry said as he set the ring box down and looked at Joe in confusion.

Joe simply nodded as he gazed up at Harry with an expression the giant couldn’t pin down. He was smiling in a very self-satisfied way, but there was something else to it. Mischief, perhaps.

“And my plates, too. Don’t break ‘em.” Joe ordered.

Harry, who by this point was sick and tired of arguing with Joe, nodded awkwardly and ventured downstairs once again, mentally replaying every event in his life that led up to the current moment. He knelt down and contemplated the logistics of single-handedly transporting the “shelf” – the cracked ring dish that held Joe’s heirloom plates. He settled for carefully setting the three plates down flat and stacking them on top of each other on the ring dish, then picking up the dish in its entirety with all the care of a waiter at a busy restaurant. Keeping one thumb on the stack of plates, he took a moment to mentally fortify himself for the anxiety-ridden journey ahead, then transported the precious cargo upstairs. He held his breath all the while and didn’t start breathing again until he reached the upstairs bedroom.

Joe was, fortunately, fully clothed in his pajamas when Harry returned to the nightstand. Harry set the ring dish down by the wardrobe unprompted.

“I’m not touching that again. You'll have to move it yourself.” He said.

Joe immediately went to inspect the plates. Right when Harry was about to sit down on the bed and give himself a break, he heard the last thing he wanted to hear.

“Aw, Harry, you broke one!” Joe cried.

“What!? Let me see!”

Harry jumped back up again, now on the verge of a stroke. It was bad enough that the two had been fighting; a broken plate was the last thing he needed.

Joe only laughed in response.

“Take it easy. I was just messing with ya’. God, the look on your face!" Joe said.

Harry gave Joe a dirty look as he prepared to sit back down, only for Joe to interrupt him again.

“…but while you’re up, there’s a couple more things I need you to grab for me.” He said. “The rest of my novels and a matchbook with some other stuff in it. Don’t open it! The rest can stay downstairs.” Joe halfheartedly waved a hand as he went about setting up his plates. “Then I’ll be all set.”

Now knee-deep in the sunk-cost fallacy, Harry obediently went back downstairs once again to fetch the stack of novels and the matchbook. He had grabbed everything else at this point, so why not these, he reasoned? He had seen the novels before, but the matchbook intrigued him. It was a small one he remembered receiving at a restaurant a while ago, about an inch and a half in size, and he could now see that it was filled with paper. He could only guess that this matchbook was where Joe was hiding his art.

True to Joe’s wishes he didn’t open it; he simply marched everything upstairs and placed it in front of Joe like a hunting dog retrieving game. He watched as Joe stacked the novels up beside the soap dish and then heaved the matchbook, which was quite large in comparison to his size, onto his new bed. Harry leaned over curiously when it appeared that he was about to open it, but Joe hesitated in the last second and eyed him with suspicion.

“I don’t think I'll show you this yet.” Joe said.

“Why not?” Asked Harry.

“’cause I’m still kinda mad at you.” Joe sneered.

“Haven’t I redeemed myself? I saved you from the turtle, didn’t I?” Harry’s tone grew more and more emphatic as Joe crossed his arms and turned up his nose. “And I just moved your entire house for you, too, after you invited yourself into my bedroom no less!”

Joe let out one single, smug laugh.

“So you admit it. I’m up here because I manipulated you, and not because you manipulated me.” Joe said.

It was only now that it struck Harry how seamlessly Joe had used him as a de-facto moving service. It was hard to stay upset at him for it as he watched this endearing little man shuffle through his endearing little things. It had been fascinating enough to see Joe’s living space from beneath the floorboards, but to see it right there on his nightstand was mind-boggling. He tried to find some way to argue Joe’s point but soon realized he couldn’t.

“Fine. You can stay here if you want. I’ll listen.” Harry promised him.

Joe’s nose was still in the air, but he was smiling now.

“I’m sure you will. You have to. If I’m gonna be the tiny, then it means you have to be the giant and do everything I say all the time.” He said.

When Harry finally sat down on the bed, he found himself smiling at Joe. Now he could fully appreciate what sway Joe had over him. It was that desire of Harry’s to help and to heal that Joe had played like a fiddle. It was what had allowed Joe to live rent-free in the Stinson House. What had drawn Harry to the docks in search of him during the wee hours of the morning. What had now allowed Joe to set up camp on his nightstand. Tiny or not, Harry couldn’t help but begrudgingly respect the fact that Joe held his own subtle power over Harry, a force silent and invisible but no less potent than the power Harry held over Joe.

“So what do I have to do to see your art?” Harry asked.

“You have to not make me mad at you.” Joe answered.

Joe tossed the matchbook aside, but one page in particular had other plans. It went flying out and landed on the hand towel, and Joe grabbed it and clutched it to his chest – but not before Harry caught a glimpse of it. They were more studies of hands, only these ones were accompanied by miniature figures, some being held, some perching upon them, some hugging the fingers as Joe had after their trip to the circus. Harry leaned in, fascinated by them. There was something so raw, so tender, so affectionate about the artwork that it couldn’t help but strike a very deep chord with him.

Joe, meanwhile, was mortified.

“…and don’t stick your nose where it doesn’t belong!” Joe snapped.

“All right! That’s your business.” Harry showed his palms. “…those are very good, by the way.”

Joe, for reasons Harry couldn’t discern, appeared even more stricken.

“Yeah, well… we’re not supposed to draw this kind of stuff, so pretend you didn’t see it.” Joe said.

Something about Joe’s reaction provoked an uneasy thought in Harry. What if Joe hadn’t been joking when he made that big, sexy giant remark? What if Joe on some level was just like he was, a deviant maligned by society. Wasn't that the case for most artists? What would Harry do then? Certainly, Harry cared for Joe, but the prospect of loving him now stretched out before him like an endless, terrifying sea.

“Whatever you say.” The giant said.

He lowered himself into the bed and watched as Joe, who was now wide awake, sorted through drawings and studies that Harry was no longer privy to. He contemplated what he was getting himself into as he did so. The only person who had held this much sway over Harry had been Georgie, and that friendship had ended as well as anyone would have expected: when Harry had confessed his love to Georgie on the eve of the day the two were both fated to die, Georgie’s response had been,

“Go to hell.”

Georgie had then stomped off, and shortly after Harry had been assigned stretcher duty. Maybe if Harry had never said such a thing, if he had never made Georgie walk off the way he did, Georgie would have carried stretchers along with him and lived instead of coming back on one in pieces.

Harry’s love was a dangerous thing, and Joe was a delicate being, a small and precious thing, intricate as the artwork he created. Yet whether Harry liked it or not, he had been tamed by Joe. He was as much Joe’s pet now as Joe was Harry’s pet. Maybe this wasn’t the right thing to do. Then again, maybe it was. Maybe there was no easy answer.

Maybe the both of them were thoroughly beyond helping, Harry feared.

As Harry drifted off to sleep to the sound of the scratching of Joe’s charcoal on paper, one thing was certain: Joe wasn’t just a tiny to Harry. He was so much more than that.

Read the next chapter here!

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beansthough · 1 year ago

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The Night Market

Part 23 of my story! Read the index and content warnings here. Today we get to meet drunk!Joe.

It was not alcohol Joe was seeking when he hopped through the entrance to Captain Calloway's that evening, but the monthly night market. Due to the time and effort involved in their maintenance, it was rare for miniatures to have dedicated store fronts unless they were from exceptionally well-to-do communities. Rather, for the vast majority of them, places of social gathering also doubled as flea markets of sorts during their off-peak hours, especially on nights of the full moon as this night was. This was the time when the wheeler-dealers of the miniature world came out of hiding to haggle and barter, trade and negotiate, split hairs and pinch pennies and make offers their fellows couldn’t refuse, all in the name of scoring the best deal. This sprawling mass of makeshift stalls took up the entire lower portion of the abandoned steam dredge’s engine room on their best months, and boasted everything from jewelers to tailors to cooks to salons and anything and everything in between.

Joe, who could wheel and deal with the best of them, had thrown on his good borrowing gear, stuffed his pockets and rucksack full of soap and pure chocolate, and left in the hopes of making a quick scrap or two that night. To his amazement he had been cleaned out shortly after arriving, and after making more than enough from his dealings to buy a few nice things for himself, he sat at the counter after going on a date with a straight razor at the barber’s and putting in an order for new set of clothes. All he had to do was wait for the tailor to finish them and he would be a whole new person.

Even Captain Calloway barely recognized him it seemed, for instead of giving Joe his usual greeting he just smiled at him and poured him a drink. Joe, still fuming at what Harry had said earlier, downed the entire thing at the speed of light and asked for another.

“That’s never a good sign.” Said Captain Calloway. “What’s up? Trouble in paradise?”

As Joe sat before the bartender he debated how to play his cards. The argument with Harry had irritated him so much it was hard to keep it in, but he had no idea how he would articulate any of it to the captain without losing an ear. At the same time, this was a position Joe was sick of being in with Harry. He had been here before, when he had broken the teacup and the clock and hijacked the phone. Joe had thought Harry had genuinely learned to listen to him then, but now here they were back at square one.

After much consideration he decided to begin with,

“…so there’s this guy.”

Captain Calloway gave a knowing nod. This was an opener Calloway had heard many times before. Joe was no Casanova, but he was not inexperienced with other men either, and every so often when problems arose Joe would air out his grievances at the bar.

For much of his life, Joe had known deep down that he was usually the source of the problem whenever he ran into relationship issues. He had already done the math back when he was eleven or twelve and concluded that other miniatures would never do anything for him. One very large man was superior to even multiple small ones because there was more man per cubic inch - it was simple economics! This posed a logistical problem among his fellow miniatures, who on a cultural level wouldn’t bat an eye at Joe for being romantically involved with another man… as long as that man was the same size as him. He had tried for many years to date within his size and fulfill those expectations, and each time he had failed miserably. Now, as he geared up to unload about his issues with Harry, he had no idea what the source of the problem was, or even how to articulate his relationship with Harry for that matter. So when Captain Calloway asked his next question, Joe had to think on his feet.

“This about your new sweetheart?” The captain asked.

“I guess so.” Was Joe’s vague confirmation.

“The hell’s going on there?” Said Calloway, slinging Joe another glass of spills.

Joe decided to approach the conversation as a sort of mind game. Whatever issues he was having with Harry were ones he had to couch in metaphor to avoid detection, but if he wanted good advice on what to do, he would have to use the right kind of analogy for the captain to identify the root of the problem. After much uneasy internal debate, he finally landed on one.

“So picture this: this guy is freaking loaded. He’s got good borrowing. High social standing. He’s way more powerful than I am.” Joe said, as the captain nodded and uh-huh-ed along to him.

“I figured he was either loaded, a good cook or both by the looks of you.” The captain laughed.

“He’s more than that! He’s… tall. Really tall. ...and sexy.” Joe could feel the blood rushing to his cheeks again as he finally said what was secretly on his mind. “…and he doesn’t even want to sleep in the same room as me because he thinks he’s taking advantage of me somehow by giving me nice things.”

“Taking advantage of you?” Captain Calloway raised an eyebrow. “How?”

“I don’t know!” Joe admitted. “I guess he thinks that ‘cause…”

Joe searched high and low for a way to explain the situation. What was Harry thinking? Joe could never pin that down.

“…’cause he’s way better off than I am, it’ll make it harder for me to leave him or something. That he’s luring me in. I mean—” Joe laughed nervously as he steeled himself in preparation for how the captain would react to his next statement “—if it were a giant treating me the way he treats me, everyone would call me a pet.”

“Well of course they would, Joe. That’s because giants are evil.” The captain said matter-of-factly.

He may as well have poked Joe squarely in the eye. Nonetheless, the bartender continued.

“…but everyone needs someone in life to watch their back. It’s not pet shit to be looked after, that’s just being human. Sure, maybe he has more power than you do, but the thing about power is, it’s not having it that’s the problem. It’s how we choose to use it.”

“Yeah…” Joe finished his second glass and slid some more scraps across the counter.

He wondered what it was about Harry that had him pulling his hair out and stomping his feet and drinking like a fish.

“And you, you’re over the damn hill for a wild man. If you don’t settle down now, these next few winters are gonna do you in. I’ve seen it happen. You could use someone like that. Sounds like you’re not the one with the problem here.” The captain said.

Joe’s eyebrows rose in disbelief.

“I’m not?”

“Not if you’re being open about what you want and everything. That’s how love works, Joe. You gotta want it. If he don’t want you in the same way, that’s his loss.” Captain Calloway set glass number three onto the counter, and Joe stared into it.

He had to give the alcohol credit: with less inhibition came greater introspection. Gone was the usual denial that came over him when he thought about Harry. Joe wasn’t being open about what he wanted. How could he be? As far as Joe was concerned, enthusiastically wanting Harry to hold him, to tend to him, to love him, was all akin to romanticizing a very dangerous thing. He had to lie to himself instead, to pretend that he did not want what he wanted, to tell himself that anything Harry offered that he secretly did want was something being imposed upon him. There was plausible deniability that way. He could turn around when all was said and done and insist that he was being unwillingly and cruelly domesticated by Harry, not voluntarily opening his heart up to the giant. Any time Harry offered something Joe couldn’t say no to, it was because Joe knew his real answer was yes – he was just too afraid to say it overtly. He argued and fought and begrudgingly accepted it instead.

What was that saying to Harry?

“What if you shouldn’t want it?” Joe asked when he was done gazing into the abyss.

“Who decides that?” Said Calloway. “Tell me, Joe. Show me the panel of judges who decide what the right things to want are. I’ll wait.”

Joe sighed into his glass as he sat with his own guilt. The words of support were getting harder and harder to listen to with the knowledge that if the captain knew the whole truth, he wouldn’t be talking to Joe at all.

“It’s up to you to decide what you want in life.” Calloway continued. “Hell, you know what, Joe? If you really wanted, you could cut your damn ear off, live in a cage and be a pet. That’s a thing you can do. You have the freedom to decide that for yourself. We’d all kick the shit out of you for it, but none of us would be able to stop you.”

Was Joe being a pet, or was he being human? He certainly felt human with Harry, moreso than he had ever felt in years. Moreso than how he felt now sitting before the captain, with all his conditional acceptance.

“This guy… whoever the hell he is, he’s gotta learn to listen when you say yes, just as much as when you say no. Anything less and he’s not really treating you like a person.” Captain Calloway concluded.

There it was: the thing Joe had sat at the counter for. Captain Calloway didn’t know it, but he had just put the entire problem between Joe and Harry into words. Joe was afraid to say yes, and when he did, Harry wouldn’t take it seriously anyways.

Joe looked up at Captain Calloway and nodded.

“Yeah… yeah, I think you’re right about that.” He said.

“That’ll be 500 scraps, please. Advice surcharge.” The captain replied.

It was morning when Joe emerged from Captain Calloway’s – the wee hours to the average nocturnal miniature. By the time he left his hair was evenly cut and he was over 1000 scraps poorer after the captain’s advice surcharge and a round of poker dealt a one-two punch to his wallet. He had done quite well for himself in spite of all that, he decided, since he would have a nice outfit waiting for him once he returned in three days’ time. So Harry thought he relied on him for everything? This would show him, Joe figured! Now all he had to do was suss out how to get home when he was so drunk he could hardly see.

Joe was well aware that he was in no good condition to be going anywhere. The skyline and shore that stretched ahead of him blurred and spun in his inebriated vision until he could barely tell where he was. If one thing kept him going, it was hubris, and that was what propelled him to crawl, slowly, surely, carefully, on all fours down the bucket arm of the steam dredge as the lake once again threatened to swallow him whole. It was on this journey down when Joe’s luck finally ran out, and he lost his footing when he was halfway across. He grasped and clambered at the cold steel in a blind panic, trying desperately to climb back up. The harder he fought to get back up, the further he slipped from the arm, until he reached a point where he had no choice but to decide where in the water below he wanted to fall.

If he landed straight in the water he was good as dead. Even if he could make the swim from halfway across the bucket arm to the shore, it was very likely that a predator would eat him first. The only hope for Joe’s survival was in the form of a sardine can that was floating right underneath where he hung from the side of the arm of the steam dredge. If he aimed it just right, he could fall into the can and not drown instantly. He squeezed his eyes shut and listened to the panicked thumping of his heart in his ears, timed the perfect moment, and let go.

When he fell, he hit the can with a clang so hard it threatened to capsize. He lay inside and looked up at the morning sky as he contemplated the dire situation he was now in. If he was patient, he reasoned, maybe the can would float to shore and he would be able to escape unharmed. Joe sat back and once again found himself wishing for Harry, but he knew full well he would have to find some way save himself as he always did.

That was the moment when Joe learned he was not alone. Something stirred in the water, then launched out of it like a missile with such force it sent the sardine can coasting along a great wave. It was a creature with a bite force of 210 newtons, capable of swimming roughly 20 miles an hour at maximum speed, with a diet consisting of almost anything, up to and including small mammals such as tiny humans.

It was a common snapping turtle, and it was very interested in Joe’s sardine can.

Now he wished for Harry so hard he could almost hear the giant calling his name. Joe sat up and watched as the dark mass of the turtle circled the can beneath the water. Maybe if he were sober he would have thought up some clever way to escape the situation, but as he drifted further and further away from the dredge, seeing double and with all his hooks and lines spent, all he could do was take in the futility of it all.

“Joe!?” Cried a voice in the distance.

It sounded so much like Harry’s voice.

Joe did not want it to be Harry’s voice.

What Joe wanted was to stride home confidently and wait for Harry to spot him sitting smugly in the windowsill, well-dressed, well-groomed, and well sobered up. The last thing he wanted was for Harry to find him drunk in the lake at the mercy of a common predator.

“Joe!?” The voice cried again.

It was Harry’s voice.

The neck of the turtle shot out from the water once more, narrowly missing the can and causing it to spin. Now two different kinds of dizzy and on the verge of being bitten clean in half, he knew that there was one thing he could still do. It would hurt his pride immensely to do it, especially when he was still mad at Harry, but it was likely the only thing he could do if he wanted to save his own skin.

“HARRY!” He shouted as the beast dove again. “HARRY I’M OVER HERE!”

He whistled with his fingers for good measure and sat up as tall as he could without tipping the can over, waving to no one in particular. He couldn’t even see where the giant was, let alone tell if Harry had worked out where he had floated off to. Like a spiny, murderous blessing in disguise, the creature after him would at least draw attention with all its splashing. In an act of drunken hubris, Joe began to rock the can again to entice the turtle to bite one more time.

His attempt was a little too successful. The turtle’s maw emerged from the waters of the lake like the gaping mouth of some ancient monster that fed on the souls of sailors. The grimy lakewater rushed over its beady little eyes as its beak, sharp as a dagger, flew towards Joe faster than a gunshot. He covered his head at the sight, paralyzed by primal fear as the turtle’s jaws closed with a loud snap.

Joe looked up to see that the turtle had bitten onto a large tree branch. It wrestled with the stick before giving up and letting go. On the other end of that branch was Harry. He kept the turtle busy by taunting it for a few more strikes until it gave up good and tired. When the excitement was over, he pulled the can to shore using the stick. Joe, equal parts shaken and stirred, clutched his rucksack, crawled out of the can, and tried to think sober thoughts as he faced his saviour.

“When you said you were in a floating thing in the lake this wasn’t what I was imagining.” Said the voice of Harry as Joe blushed at his shoes.

Before Joe could answer he was swept straight off his feet by Harry’s one good hand as the giant turned to leave.

“What were you doing in there?” Harry asked him.

Cast-iron Joe, in the meantime, was doing everything in his power not to throw up in Harry’s palm.

“Questioning my life choices.” Joe said.

Joe, rattled, watched the world whirl about as Harry effortlessly crossed the beach and sat down on the front steps of a building. All he did, meanwhile, was lounge in the giant’s palm and swoon like a schoolgirl as he looked up at his knight in shining armour. Harry wasn’t supposed to save him, but that wasn’t stopping Joe from appreciating the fact that he did. It took everything in him not give up and let the alcohol do the talking. What the alcohol wanted to do was to flirt with Harry aggressively. Joe knew that this was not an option, so he said whatever else he could think of.

“I owe you one. You really came through for me back there.” Joe sighed.

“Are you okay? Can you get up?” Harry asked.

Joe could not get up. Joe was overtaken by the warm, fuzzy feeling that filled him from head to toe as he looked up into the giant’s worried eyes.

“No.” Joe said through a smile. “I’m not getting up. You can’t make me.”

“Are you…” Harry laughed nervously. “Joe, are you drunk?”

“No I’m not.” Joe insisted as he watched one Harry spin and melt into the other Harry. “I’m just tired.”

“Uh-huh…”

“Really!”

“Well, sober or not, you look very handsome.” Harry said of Joe's freshly-cut hair.

Harry’s words cleaved Joe into two halves.

To one half of Joe, heaven itself may as well have opened up. Choirs of angels may as well have sung in reverent absolution. God himself could have called in the rapture at that very moment and Joe Piccoli would not have cared, because his life was now fulfilled. Harry Avery had called him handsome! This half of Joe wanted to say, "thank you."

To the other half of Joe, these words were his cue to flee halfway across the world and never be seen again. He would now have to wear a bag over his head for the rest of his days. He was a monster, a temptor, a vile and ungodly thing that should not be. A giant had called him handsome! This half of Joe wanted to say, "fuck no I’m not."

When these two halves mixed together with the alcohol, what came out of Joe’s mouth instead was,

“Fuck you!”

Harry was none too impressed.

“I beg your pardon?” He asked.

Joe jolted up into a sitting position, which was no easy feat when his whole body felt like lead. Thinking further, Joe decided to stick to his guns.

“I meant that. You don’t get to call me handsome until you start listening to me.” He slurred. “You gotta—you gotta want it.”

Joe crossed his arms and scowled up at the beautiful man and his beautiful face as Harry tried to parse what Joe was saying.

“Want it…?” Harry echoed.

“Yeah. You gotta want to be my friend. And screw what anyone else thinks!”

Joe struggled to remain stable as he sat in Harry’s palm and fought against the temptation to lie back down again. He knew if he did he would likely pass out.

“I do want to be your friend.” Harry said. “I just worry. That’s all.”

“You worry about all the wrong things. You get so damn worried about what you think that you don’t care what I think, Harry.” Joe swayed as he pointed a finger at Harry.

“Half the time I don’t know what you think, Joe.” The giant argued. “You turn red and get all quiet… what am I supposed to do with that? Am I frightening you? Intimidating you? I don’t-”

Joe laughed so hard he cut Harry off completely.

“You think I’m scared of you!?” He crowed.

“Well, I don’t know for sure…” Harry said.

Joe was doing a fine job of holding down his liquor so far, but he still kept one hand over his mouth and another over his upset stomach for fear if he laughed too hard he might throw up. At those words Joe lost his hold over himself completely, and what the alcohol made him say next was something he would never be able to take back.

“That’s not ‘cause I’m scared of you, Harry! That’s ‘cause you’re a big, sexy giant!”

“I’m... what?”

A strange sense of triumph came over Joe as he watched Harry’s face turn about as red as his was.

“Harry. I like the shit you do. I just have to pretend not to like it because if I don’t I’m—I’m—romanticizing the altar of petdom or something! I dunno. Captain Calloway said I was just being human, wanting to be cared about, but most people don’t treat me like I’m human, so what do I know about that?”

Joe’s motor mouth kept on running as Harry sat there, stunned.

“You’ve treated me the most human out of any giant I’ve ever met.” Joe continued. “The trinket box, the assistant thing, sleeping upstairs the first time… I say no and you listen. And that’s good! Now you just gotta listen when I say yes and we’ll be all set.”

“Joe… can we go back to the big, sexy giant part for a second?” Poor Harry still could not compute.

Only when those words were parroted back to him did Joe understand the implications of what he had just said.

“…I said that out loud. Fuck!” He exclaimed.

With all the grace of a camel having a stroke, Joe tried to stand up in Harry’s palm and bid him farewell.

“Sorry Harry, I lied. We can’t be friends anymore. I’m leaving. Changing my name. This is it for me.”

He got halfway to his feet and then toppled over again. Once again he was on his back, looking up at Harry helplessly, red-faced, with no pride or dignity to show for himself.

The difference this time was that Harry was nervously blushing right back at him. To Joe’s surprise, the giant began to smile.

“I don’t think you’re going anywhere at this rate unless I take you. Come on. Let’s get you home.”

As he faded in and out of consciousness, all drunk Joe could do was lie there and hope that sober Joe would know how to handle the situation when he woke up.

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beansthough · 1 year ago

Text

The Right Thing

Part 22 of my story! Read the index and content warnings here. Elder financial abuse CW! They're idiots, your honour.

It was not endearment that Doctor Harry Avery felt when he woke that morning and saw Joe sleeping peacefully beside him on the nightstand. What he felt instead was nothing short of self-disgust. Inviting Joe into his room had been an act of selfishness, after all, for lately an irrational fear had gripped Harry and refused to let him go. It was the fear of suddenly losing Joe, and it was this fear that had driven Harry to suggest the sleeping arrangements that he did. He couldn’t be certain what had triggered it; maybe it was the photo of Georgie Joe had momentarily stepped into, or the way Davidson Sr. had eyeballed Joe at the circus, or how Joe had returned muddy and half-dressed from Tiny Town. Joe Piccoli was a very small man who lived in a very big world, a violent one at that, and the thought of losing him was keeping Harry up at night yet again.

Yet as he watched Joe snooze on the nightstand, buried in the plushness of the hand towel, Harry couldn’t help but feel as if he had taken advantage of Joe somehow. This was too real, too close for comfort for Harry to process. Joe could sleep in the upstairs bedroom so long as Harry slept downstairs on the couch. Joe could even fall asleep in Harry’s hands without issue so long as Harry spent the night in a different room. It was the prospect of Joe sleeping in the same room as him that felt odd to Harry - after all, Joe did not know what Harry was. He was not aware of the proclivities that Harry had. Surely Joe would be disgusted with Harry if he knew about the secret he harboured! Joe himself was especially vulnerable due to his status as a miniature. What right did Harry, sinner of the Oscar Wilde sort that he was, really have to lure this tiny, unsuspecting man into his bedroom the way that he was?

With all of these thoughts colliding in his mind, Harry did not awaken Joe when the mourning doves announced that it was time for breakfast. He did not pick him up and carry him downstairs. He did not so much as touch the little man at all for fear he was secretly indulging in some sick, twisted perversion on an unconscious level by doing so. Instead, he went down to have a smoke and thought about their day at the circus.

What did it say about him and Joe, Harry wondered as he mindlessly puffed away on his cigarette in the crisp morning air, that the circus mogul he had encountered the other day immediately assumed that Joe belonged to Harry? Was that what most people would think? As the doctor listened to the birdsong and reflected on his entire relationship with Joe to date, one question and one question only plagued him: is this the right thing to do?

When Harry was done brooding and returned inside with the morning paper, he was not met with an answer. He was met instead with a winded Joe who was now standing at the base of the stairs.

“I climbed all the way down.” Joe puffed. “Why didn’t you wake me up?”

“I thought I’d let you sleep in.” Harry lied.

Joe tilted his head at him, then scurried down the hall and over to the dining room table. Harry followed suit, set the paper down and reluctantly placed Joe onto the table, studying him for a moment.

“I got a couple things you can see, but one of them isn’t finished yet.” Joe said.

“A couple of what?” Asked Harry.

“Artworks, remember?” Joe’s brow furrowed.

“Right.” Harry said.

“So what’s for breakfast?”

Joe Piccoli was not Harry’s pet. But Harry still fed him like a pet and chauffeured him like a pet and gave him a bed to sleep in like a pet. Why wouldn’t the circus manager see a pet when he looked at Joe? All Harry saw was a friend and neighbour, but he couldn’t help but wonder if some dark part of his psyche was unconsciously idealizing his entire relationship with Joe. Joe, who was relying on him for food, comfort and safety. Joe, who Harry could squash like a bug if he were so inclined to. Joe, who after his horrible outing in Tiny Town, clearly had nowhere else to go.

Harry was a degenerate, a menace to society – or so society itself told him he was. Knowing that, how could he be truly certain his intentions towards Joe were pure?

“Joe… can I ask you something?” He said.

Harry watched as Joe turned to face him and blinked in confusion.

“What?” Joe replied.

“Did you really want to sleep upstairs last night?” Harry asked.

“I said I would, didn’t I?” Joe was scowling at him now.

“Did you want to?” Harry pressed.

He watched with dread as Joe’s cheeks began to turn red.

“Yeah… I did. I’ve been having bad dreams lately. What’s the problem?” Joe said.

Harry let out a long sigh.

“I don’t like the way you said yes after you said no.” Was his blunt response.

Joe narrowed his eyes and tossed his hands in confusion.

“What? Am I not allowed to change my mind? Downstairs, upstairs, what does it even matter where I sleep?” Joe ranted.

Harry should have stopped there, but the feeling of guilt he had woken up with compelled him to press further.

“I just… don’t you find that associating with me may not be healthy?” Harry asked him.

“What are you talking about!?” Joe growled. “I’m the healthiest I’ve ever been in my life thanks to you!”

Joe ventured right up to the edge of the table, his face contorted into an expression between anger and confusion. Harry just stood there, not knowing what to say. Joe was right. He had been at death’s door when Harry first laid eyes on him, and now he was the picture of health. In any other circumstance it would be something Harry took pride in, but now it was part of the problem: Joe’s life, quite literally it seemed, depended on Harry.

“I’m not certain this is a position either of us should be in,” Harry rubbed his forehead as Joe paced about in irritation, then added, “one where I could take advantage of you, I mean.”

Joe stopped short at those last few words. To Harry’s surprise, he began to laugh, then looked up at him with a disbelieving smile on his face.

“Let me get this straight. You think you’re taking advantage of me?” Joe said.

“I think I could, yes.” Harry agreed.

Harry spoke in the most dire tone he could muster, but Joe kept on laughing. Harry could only assume that Joe, borrower that he was, incorrectly figured he had the upper hand because he was materially benefitting from their relationship. He certainly didn’t expect Joe to understand the nuances of the power imbalance between them. Joe, meanwhile, doubled over with his hands on his knees.

“…what’s so funny?” Added Harry.

Joe just smiled that boyish smile back up at him.

“You are, Harry. Oh, you’re funny.”

“Joe, this is serious.” Harry scolded him.

Joe straightened up and shrugged at him.

“Well, what are we gonna do about it, Harry? Stop being friends? Should I go back to eating bugs? What are you even gonna get out of worrying about this stuff?” Joe asked.

Harry hadn’t thought that far. He was less interested in finding a real solution than he was in sitting around and feeling bad about the problem, so that was what he did.

“I don’t know.” He said. “We’ll talk about this later.”

“Why can’t we talk about it now!?” Joe exclaimed.

When the household received the first of many phone calls of the day, Harry pointed to the ringer box in the hallway and said,

“That’s why.”

He had just enough time to watch Joe’s face fall before he turned towards the kitchen to make breakfast.

“You giants never listen!” Joe shouted after the doctor as the ringing of the phone drowned out his voice.

“…I don’t like the sound of this one, Harry.”

Harry didn’t look away from the case record he was in the middle of opening. Joe kept airing his grievances as he sat on Harry’s shoulder nonetheless.

“He says his mom is going senile and should be put in the asylum, but I had to fight with him to get him to bring her in so you could talk to her. Told me he wants a letter from you telling them to send her there. I dunno, Harry, something ain’t right about this guy.” Joe said.

“No need to make assumptions, Joe. I’ll look into it myself.” Harry responded.

“Yeah… sure you will.” Joe paused for a moment, then said, “…I just don’t get this stuff, Harry. I mean-when someone ain’t right in the head, you don’t lock ‘em away. You love them, Harry. That’s what me and my brother did.”

A knock at the door robbed Harry of the chance to hear more of Joe’s story. He went out and set the little man down on the phone table.

“It’s going to be all right. Trust me.” He said to Joe.

When he turned around and entered the hallway, he was met with a familiar face. It was the woman who had been painting in Withrow Park the day Joe had stowed away in Harry’s medical bag, only now instead of smiling at Harry her eyes were downcast. The man who was presumably her son stepped in after her, and appeared for all intents and purposes to be an archetypal middle-aged Bay Street businessman. He quickly ushered his elderly mother to the couch in the parlour before she could so much as greet Harry, then gave the doctor a firm handshake.

“Wilfred Tucker, and this is my mother Evelyn.” Said the man with the radio announcer’s voice. “Please excuse her, she’s very frail.” Wilfred’s voice lowered into a whisper and he added, “I suspect what we’re here to discuss may upset her. If you and I could meet privately first, I think it would be of much help to her.”

Harry nodded and received the man into the examination room. As he glanced back at the nervous old woman sitting with her head bowed on the couch in the parlour, he was starting to understand what Joe meant.

“So what seems to be the problem with your dear mother?” He asked the son.

“I believe she’s losing her faculties. She’s leaving food out at night. Not outdoors, not for the animals, but inside along the baseboards. Knitting tiny clothes nobody could ever wear. Talking to herself… if you ask me, she’s gone mental.” Wilfred said.

“Mmm-hmm…” Harry scribbled single-handedly as he took note. “And you want me to refer her to the asylum?”

“For her safety, yes.”

Harry eyed Wilfred with no small amount of suspicion. All of the things Ms. Tucker did were things Harry himself would do if someone caught him living with Joe. He wondered if something practical like a group of miniatures taking up residence was a more likely culprit, but he was uncertain if he should say such a thing to the son. If there were indeed miniatures, it seemed like a good way to get them all exterminated.

“How is your mother’s speech and memory?” Harry asked.

“She’s becoming increasingly incoherent. Why, she can barely hold a conversation!” Wilfred asserted.

“And her coordination?” Was Harry’s follow-up question.

“She’s very feeble. She can barely hold a pencil.” Wilfred insisted.

“Does she go outside often?” Harry kept on scribbling.

Wilfred simply laughed.

“Oh, she hasn’t gone out in years! That’s why I think the asylum would be good for her. She would finally have some company.” Wilfred declared.

Doctor Harry Avery, who had seen Ms. Tucker painting in Withrow Park a little over a month and a half ago with his own eyes, had written only one word in his notebook: LIAR. He closed the book and smiled at Wilfred.

“Right, this should be an open-and-shut case, but for posterity’s sake I must also assess your mother directly before rendering a decision.” Harry said.

When he got up to go to the parlour, Wilfred reached out to shake his hand again.

“Of course, doctor. Thank you so much for your time.” Said Wilfred, in the glib manner of a man who thought he had put one over on someone.

When Harry entered the parlour, it seemed that Ms. Tucker was already being interviewed.

“The miniatures in my house aren’t as talkative I’m afraid, though they take the food and gifts I leave them. It took years of trying before they would do that.” Said the voice of Ms. Tucker.

Inching closer, Harry could just make out a second voice.

“I’m sure they appreciate it. Talking to you giants isn’t something we really do ‘cause you can get in a lot of trouble for it. The fact they’re even taking stuff says a lot. They must really trust you.” Said Joe.

“I would like to keep it that way.” The old lady said. “If Wilfred finds out they’re living there I know what he’ll do to them. I would rather he think I’m crazy than find out about the neighbours, but we may not have a home at all by the end of it. I love him, but I know he cares about money over anything else, including me. He’s itching to sell the house.”

As Harry leaned into the doorway he could just make out the outline of Joe, who was sitting on the coffee table and chatting with Ms. Tucker.

“I’ve never liked that about most giants.” Said Joe. “The way they treat people. How they don’t care about the important stuff. Harry, he doesn’t always listen but he’s a good person. I hope he’ll listen to you.”

Harry cut the conversation short when he rapped on the parlour doorway. Ms. Tucker soon joined him in the examination room once her son was unceremoniously shooed out of it, and Harry looked her up and down as she sat before him. She appeared to have regained some confidence after speaking to Joe.

“Is that your friend?” She asked after their introduction.

Harry smiled into his notes. Hearing Joe being referred to as a friend provoked no small amount of relief in him.

“He is, yes. I understand you have a few as well.” Harry said, and quickly added, “I won’t tell your son about them.”

A hopeful look came across Ms. Tucker’s face as she nodded. It seemed as though that reassurance opened something up inside of her, and the interview went much more fluidly than expected. Harry learned that Ms. Tucker was a former schoolteacher who painted as a hobby. Her husband had predeceased her and Wilfred was one of four children. She lived mostly independently aside from the occasional check-in visit, enjoyed hiking well into her seventies and presently took regular trips to the park. She had a stint as an actress in Shakespearian theatre years ago and could still quote a few lines. By the end of their chat Ms. Tucker was vivacious and lively, making herself laugh as much as she did Harry.

When the interview was concluded, Harry had learned all he needed to know. He advised Wilfred that he would be in touch in the coming days after thinking things over. Once the two were seen off, he sat back down at his desk to contemplate the verdict he would render later that night.

“You’re writing to the asylum!?” Joe cried.

He stood before Harry on the desk, white faced and quivering with indignation. Harry sat back and let Joe get everything out of his system.

“You can’t do that, Harry! Didn’t you see her? She’s fine! There’s nothing wrong with her! I—you—”

Finally Harry cut in when he could sense the tears coming on.

“Do you want to know what I’m writing?” Harry asked.

His eyes followed Joe, who was stomping across the desk and tugging at his hair in rage.

“Not really!” Joe snapped.

“I think you do.” The doctor assured him. “Here’s what I have so far: Dear Sirs, I am writing to warn you of the questionable conduct of one Wilfred Tucker in relation to his mother, Evelyn Tucker.”

Joe stopped in his tracks as Harry read the letter aloud.

“Upon assessing Ms. Tucker personally, I have reason to suspect that his claims regarding his mother’s capacity are false.” Harry continued. “I would ask that you please treat any subsequent referrals Mr. Tucker may obtain in relation to his mother with utmost skepticism. Yours very truly, Herman Richard Avery, M.D.”

Joe breathed a sigh of relief that was so deep even Harry could see it despite his small scale.

“So this’ll keep him from sending her there?” Joe said.

“Hopefully it will. There’s only so much I can do.” Harry set the letter aside to dry as he spoke. “Seems like you two had quite the conversation.”

Joe lit up.

“Yeah. I wanted to ask her about painting but I got sidetracked.”

That feeling of unease hit Harry again as he wondered whether or not Joe was becoming too bold around the giants. He spent more time talking to them now than he did his fellow miniature.

“…speaking of, I had some art to show you if you’re still interested.” Joe deferently reminded him.

Harry tapped his pen on the side of the desk.

“You don’t have to show it to me if you don’t want to.” He said. “I didn’t mean to intrude.”

He watched Joe’s frustration grow yet again. The art was another area of uncertainty for Harry. After the way Joe had reacted last night, Harry couldn’t be sure if Joe wanted him to see his art at all. Harry couldn’t be sure of anything Joe truly wanted, he realized. How much of his relationship with Joe was genuine, he wondered, and how much of it was Joe going along with Harry’s suggestions in the name of diplomacy?

“Harry, what the hell has gotten into you today? Why is everything such a big deal all of a sudden?” Joe was tensing up again. “I never said you were intruding. Can’t you just listen to me the way you listened to Ms. Tucker? I said I’d show you, didn’t I?”

“Well…” Harry opened his mouth and promptly inserted his foot into it. “…Ms. Tucker isn’t a miniature living in my house who relies on me for everything, is she?”

That really pushed Joe over the edge.

“No, this is my house, and I’ve lived here ten years without you just fine, thank you very much.” Joe admonished him.

The two looked at each other uneasily for a moment before Joe added,

“…what are you so afraid of all of a sudden?”

Joe. Joe was what Harry was afraid of, but he could never tell the little man that.

“Joe… doesn’t it bother you that when we sat down in front of that circus manager the other day, he treated you like you were my property?” Harry asked.

“Of course he did that, Harry!” Joe stepped towards Harry with open arms. “That guy was an asshole! Everyone’s property to him.” His arms fell limp at his sides as he said, “Ms. Tucker thought we were friends. Hell, I thought we were too, but now I’m starting to wonder, if all you’re gonna do is-is-doubt me like this.”

Joe’s words cut Harry to the bone. Scared as he was of not doing the right thing, he was even more afraid of losing Joe. As the tiny man walked off and sprung from the edge of the desk to the floor, it hit Harry that Joe was the first real friend he had made in the last ten years.

“Joe? Joe, wait-”

“Whatever, Harry. I’m going to Calloway’s. It’s in a floating thing by the lake. I’ll be back tomorrow.” Joe said.

All Harry could do was watch helplessly as Joe raced off. By the time Harry made it from the chair to the doorway, his best friend was already gone. He stared into the now-empty house in bewilderment, not knowing what to do.

Maybe he was sparing Joe in an odd way, he reasoned. Sparing the miniature from the pain that inevitably came with knowing him. Still, pushing Joe away like this was splitting Harry in two, and in spite of all his guilt and sadness and shame, he still did not know if it was the right thing to do.

If Harry Avery wanted anything in life, it was to live in a world where it was okay to want Joe.

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