Lily Copeland learned that her life was about to get shattered just as she was putting away her dishes. Her smartwatch lit up with a little notification, which informed her that she should sit down. Inconspicuous enough, sure, but she’d written enough articles about this exact thing to know exactly what the notification meant. The plate that she was about to put up on that rack fell out of her fingers and fell into the rack with a loud rattle. Lily took a step back, suddenly feeling light-headed. She brought her wrist in front of her face and, with a trembling fingertip, swiped the notification. The invitation to sit down changed to a shrinking notice. The watch detected that the Phenomenon’s primary marker just expressed itself in her sweat. She was going to dwindle, like hundreds of thousands of women had before her, and there was nothing she could do. 

“No!” she shrieked as she ran out of the kitchen to get her phone, which was charging by her bedside. It barely got to 20%, but she ripped it off the cord and opened her browser. She Googled “I am shrinking what to do”, blindly hoping that there was just a breakthrough, that something had just been discovered, something that could help her… but the search engine returned only some well-meaning advice about turning off appliances and calling a friend or 911 immediately. Tears came to Lily’s eyes as she threw the phone down and buried her face in the pillow. 

It was not fair. She’d never felt anything to be this unfair. Writing for a socialist outlet, she sure produced a ton of material about life being unfair to countless people. Had she ever felt like she was one of them? Not really. She pretended to be, but in reality there was always a safety net guaranteed by her affluent mother, Jennifer Copeland. Sure, Lily didn’t lead her mother’s lifestyle and didn’t accept any money, but that would never be enough to get the rich girl label off her. Well, here you fucking go: she was about to become tiny, and she knew full well how bad that could turn out. Life finally wasn’t being fair to her, either, and she hated that instantly. 

But she still had a bit of control over that. 

She pushed herself off the pillow and looked at her phone. Sure. She still had control, because she still had a choice. There were a hundred people saved to her list of contacts, a hundred people she could call right now. A hundred paths. 

With her heart beating so hard it felt like it was going to punch right through her ribcage, she started to think. She bit on her nails as she went through her options. She couldn’t even sit in one place, so she jumped to her feet, her thoughts constantly sliding towards what it would be like to shrink. She even looked around: was there anything dangerous on the floor? Where should she even put herself?..

Focus, Lily! 

There was Angela Douglas, her boss in anything but name (the paper Lily worked for was organized horizontally). Angela would figure something out. Probably. She was a Black woman in her mid-thirties, very friendly, a militant leftist with a history of attending every single march and protest she could. She was also disorganized and a total junkie. Lily used to think that was really cool, but now… Angela would probably want to help her, right? She could even help her keep working, keep writing! Unless… unless she simply didn’t care enough… or happened to harbor secret resentment for the Copeland girl. 

Who else? Perhaps her former best friend, Esther Kim… An immigrant a couple years older than Lily, she made an incredible rise since they were in college together: a stellar job, a hot husband… Esther was a no-bullshit kind of person, a woman of action, and her husband Mark, whom Lily remembered from the wedding, seemed confident, strong and charming. Yeah, Esther… she was trustworthy. She was also a bit of a sex freak, though. Did that matter? Maybe it didn’t.

Lily shook her head. There was another thought — an unpleasant, but a very tempting one. Her mom, of course. Jennifer Copeland, the suburban lioness. Oh, mom would scold her. Berate her, probably. Lecture her. But… she couldn’t imagine anywhere or anyone safer than Mom. Mom would probably try to help her regain her size, too. Of course, every step of the way she’d tell her it was all her own fault, or that Lily would have to stop playing her silly woke games, and God she would just fucking gloat all the time, pleased with how life proved her to be correct regarding Lily, but — perhaps it would be worth it to suck it up, swallow her pride and fall into the safety net she’d been neglecting for so long. She cringed just thinking about it, every fibre of her being already protesting against it; just the thought of Mom walking in, seeing her tiny and laughing at her in that what-did-I-tell-you voice made Lily nauseous. 

Maybe it would be a little better to call Mom’s friend, Catherine Burke. Lily wasn’t sure how she had Catherine’s number, but then again, Catherine was just one of those people who made sure everyone has their number. Perhaps Lily could convince her to help her without telling Mom. Both Mom and Catherine had connections to that hotshot company that studied the Phenomenon, Small World, and Catherine would probably get in touch with someone there. If Lily played it smart, she could even outsmart Catherine, made her think this is all one of Jennifer’s games… She wasn’t sure if she could pull it off, but it could be worth a try. Catherine didn’t seem too smart. She seemed like a total snake though, and she was horrible to staff at restaurants in that entitled rich woman way. Lily could totally see that woman just scoffing at her and telling her one of those horrible things that healthy people tended to say about tinies, like “I don’t mind them but I’m sure not gonna watch my step, and they better not get my shoes dirty!”

She kept thinking, mulling it over. Maybe there were some other people she could call? 911? Oh, but they would just end up handing her to her mother… Maybe she wouldn’t shrink after all? Her watch was still gently alerting her that it was coming, but Lily had heard of false positives. Finally, having decided, she walked back to the bed and reached for her phone…