“Hey, new fish. What’re you in for?”

“Leave me alone…”

“Don’t be like that.”

“Don’t be like what?”

“Feeling all sorry for yourself. Curled up in terror, waiting for the inevitable.”

“What’m I supposed to do instead? Pretend everything’s fine and dandy? Pretend any of this makes sense?”

“Calm down, new fish, nobody likes an asshole. We’re all in this together.”

“What the hell is this, anyway?”

“I could tell you, but you wouldn’t believe me. What’s it look like to you?”

“Prison! It looks like some bizarre fucking prison! I don’t know what I’m doing here.”

“Tell me what you see.”

“I don’t see anything, everything’s blank. Just these four empty walls. You, standing over me, and that guy in the corner. Why are we all nude?”

“I’ll get to that. Look closely at the walls.”

“There’s nothing to see.”

“Do they look familiar to you?”

“There’s nothing to see!”

“Look closer, new fish.”

“Quit calling me that!”

“You take another swipe at me like that and I’ll kick your ass. You’ve been curled up and sobbing like a little girl since you showed up. I think I can take you.”

“Sorry, just… don’t touch me.”

“Look at me, I’m standing back here. Take a deep breath and look at the wall you’re leaning against. Really look at it. Touch it, smell it. Tell me what you think.”

“There’s nothing do it. It’s just a blank, empty wall, like something they’d put up before construction.”

“All right, tell me what it’s not made of. Don’t give me that look.”

“It’s not metal.”

“Right.”

“It’s not wood or glass. It’s not plaster. It’s not exactly drywall or pressboard, but it reminds me of these. No, it reminds me of something else, but that’s ridiculous.”

“No, three men imprisoned in a large, doorless room without their clothes is something worse than ridiculous. What does the wall remind you of?”

“Well, honestly it looks like cardboard.”

“Like a moving box?”

“No, not that kind. When I punch it, the whole thing rattles in one piece. It sounds like cardboard. No… it sounds like a shoebox.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, listen when I scratch on it. That sounds just like a rat clawing inside a shoebox.”

“You’ve answered the first of your three questions.”

“We are not in a shoebox.”

“We are, and here comes the second.”

“How’d I get here?”

“You were dumped in here, just like me and that guy over there.”

“What’s his deal?”

“I don’t know. He just started bawling like you did but I haven’t been able to shake him out of it.”

“But how did we get here?”

“We were placed here by a woman. I’m going to need you to slow down because you’re not going to believe the answers I give you, so I have to get you to answer these questions for yourself.”

“That’s fucking cryptic.”

“The Socratic method has never failed me.”

“I hate philosophy.”

“No, I’m getting you to answer your own questions. What’s the last thing you remember?”

“Remember?”

“You weren’t always here, in the shoebox, so what’s the last thing you remember?”

“I was shopping. I was out at the factory outlet.”

“Alone?”

“No, with my wife. Buying clothes for our vacation this summer.”

“Shit. Don’t tell her you’re married.”

“What?”

“She probably already knows, has your wallet. Shit, that’s bad.”

“Who knows? What are you talking about?”

“Where were you in the store? What were you doing?”

“Don’t tell who I’m married?”

“Think! Focus! Go through your steps. What were you doing?”

“Well, I was carrying all our bags, because apparently that’s all I’m good for, carrying things and being tall.”

“I hear ya. Go on.”

“Cecilia was going to the changing room to try on some jeans. I didn’t have anything to do so I hung out while she changed.”

“What did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything.”

“No, in the store. Where did you go?”

“We were in the women’s section anyway, so I checked out the bras. I was suddenly curious about how big they got, in a factory outlet. I always figured women with huge boobs had to order them online from a specialty store or something.”

“So how big do they get?”

“I… don’t know. I was holding all the bags, trying to peek around at the tags of these big, huge yellow and pink bras, and…”

“Yeah?”

“Then I woke up here. Like an hour ago. Shit, Cecilia, she’s got be freaking out. I have to call her.”

“Look around, dude. There are no phones.”

“Where’s my clothes? My phone and wallet are with them.”

“They’re gone, man. Forget about them.”

“Forget about them! Anyone could steal my identity with them! Three credit cards, all my contacts!”

“Forget about your identity: you’ve been stolen.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Imagine if someone walked up behind you and slipped your wallet out of your pocket, and they kept it and just walked away. That’s exactly what happened to you.”

“They stole my wallet in the store? Did you steal it? Give me my wallet and phone back, now!”

“Okay, you look bigger than you did curled up on the floor, but I still think I can take you. You better settle your ass down and listen to me.”

“You have two seconds to give me my shit back.”

“Look at me, dude, I don’t have anything. If you come near me…”

“Fuck! Fuck!”

“You shouldn’t have come at me. I’m sorry I had to do that.”

“I think you broke my nose!”

“I’ll do worse than that if you try that again.”

“I don’t know what’s going on!”

“I’m trying to tell you. Someone has stolen you and now they’re keeping you in a shoebox.”

“That’s insane! Is this a reality show? Where are the cameras?”

“We have to get to your third question before she shows up.”

“What third question? Who’s she?”

“The woman who stole you. The woman who knows you’re married. The woman who picked you up in the factory outlet store and took you out of your former life.”

“You’re creeping me out. I think you broke my nose.”

“You’ve got bigger things to worry about, asshole. I’m trying to help you.”

“Who’s this woman you’re talking about?”

“You’ll meet her in a few minutes, but believe me, you don’t want to.”

“Why, is she going to kill me?”

“…”

“Holy shit, you need to start talking right now. You need to tell me what the hell’s going on here.”

“I’m trying to but you’re not cooperating. You want me to just come out and tell you? You won’t believe it.”

“You keep saying that. Try me. Have I been kidnapped?”

“Yes, but more like shoplifted.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Hold on. Touch the back of your neck. What do you find?”

“What?”

“Just do it!”

“Fine… ow, it’s sore right here. Holy shit, how long have I been bleeding? Where’d that come from?”

“All right, that’s what happened. She got you in the neck and now you’re here.”

“What’s that mean? I don’t understand.”

“I don’t know how exactly she does it, but she did it to us too. All three of us.”

“Did what?”

“Stabbed us in the neck with something. A syringe. Snuck up behind us when we weren’t looking, jabbed us in the neck, and took us away.”

“What? What kind of woman can just pick up a man and walk out of a store without anyone noticing?”

“She made us hard to notice. It’s what she stabbed us with, injected us with something that made us smaller.”

“Bullshit.”

“Look around.”

“At this reality TV studio? Ha ha, very funny. Everyone can come out now.”

“Look at the seams against that wall, the short one on the end. That’s how a shoebox is assembled.”

“Yes, it’s very realistic.”

“Go ahead and try to tear it apart.”

“I can’t. It’s too thick, it’s really sealed shut.”

“Then jump up and try to knock the lid off the shoebox.”

“I can’t, it’s too high.”

“She shrank you and stole your clothes and hustled you out of the store.”

“Someone would’ve noticed!”

“In a factory outlet? With those bargains? You were the last thing on anyone’s mind.”

“My wife would’ve noticed!”

“She only noticed you weren’t waiting for her where you said you were. Not unusual behavior for a bored husband. Probably left all your bags unattended by the changing room so she was mad instead of scared.”

“But I had the car keys. How’s she supposed to get home?”

“Shit. That shortens your time.”

“What?”

“You’d have more time if she could’ve driven home on her own. You’d have even more time if you were single.”

“What are you talking about?”

“This woman who collected us, she just wants to use us for her pleasure.”

“This magical woman who somehow has a shrinking potion?”

“We’re not the first people in this shoebox. This is just where she stores us until she wants us. There’s some poor asshole out there getting mangled to death while we speak.”

“What? How?”

“And I was trying to figure out how much time you had left, seeing as how you just got here.”

“You sound like a fucking psycho right now.”

“Sorry, just trying to help.”

“How does this help? Telling me I’m about to get killed sooner rather than later? And why should I believe you anyway?”

“You don’t have to, you’ll see soon enough.”

“What do you mean?”

“She uses us for her pleasure. She fucks herself with us, now that we’re tiny.”

“Who’s us?”

“Anyone she can find. Random men out there, anyone she finds attractive. She just shrinks them down and stuffs them in her shoulder bag and dumps them here. Did you hear that?”

“I didn’t hear anything.”

“I guess she’s too far for us to hear him scream.”

“Now you’re trying to psych me out. It’s not working.”

“No? Fine. We’ll just hang out and see who’s still here in half an hour.”

“Yeah? And how do you know all of this?”

“Because I’ve talked to several other guys in our situation, and I’ve survived the longest. Never married, no one to miss me at home.”

“Why wouldn’t she kill you first, if no one’s going to miss you?”

“Because it’s not the killing she gets off on. She enjoys watching us suffer, reminding us of everything we’ve lost. She loves the feeling of our spirits dropping when she’s finally convinced us that we’ve lost our identities and we belong to her. But more than that, she loves it when we fight. I’ve never fought, I have nothing to fight for. But you…”

“What about me?”

“She knows you’re married. She’s going to use your wife’s name against you. You have to pretend that you don’t care.”

“I love my wife. I’m sick in my heart, thinking that she’s missing me. How long have I been gone?”

“Probably a few hours, only. Unfortunately, Cecilia’s probably called the cops, because where else would you go without the car?”

“A bar? We passed six brewpubs and taverns on the way there. She might think I got bored and fucked off for a beer. I’ve done that before.”

“That’s good. Shit, that’s good. That might save you.”

“Or else what?”

“If she called the cops and they started sniffing around, she’d dispose of all the evidence. It’s really easy to hide a shrunken body where no one else would think to look for it.”

“This is getting creepy. You’re starting to freak me out.”

“You should be freaked out. You should be thinking of a good story right now. That’s good, going off to get a beer. Maybe your wife never tried to look for you, just called an Uber, and is waiting to give you hell when you come home. That’ll be good for another day.”

“She’ll call my phone.”

“I hope you locked your phone, or she’ll get your voicemail.”

“Shit. I know I’m supposed to do that, but it’s such a hassle.”

“You better hope she’s just angry and not curious.”

“Why? What’s this scary woman going to do?”

“She’s going to make love to you.”

“She can’t. I love my wife. I won’t go along with this.”

“Dude, she’s fifteen times your size. You won’t have a choice!”

“She’s going to rape me?”

“Don’t use that word around her. But yes. She’s going to take you against your will and use you however she wants to.”

“She can’t do that! Are you saying she’s a psycho?”

“There’s, uh, something going on upstairs. I don’t know, I’m only watching and trying to figure her out. But if she knows you miss your wife, she’s going to remind you how much your wife misses you, all the while she tells you you have no wife anymore. She’s going to remind you of all the things you’ve lost, while she tells you that they were never yours and everything’s been leading to this.”

“Jesus. Is this what she tells everyone?”

“Only the ones who have something to lose.”

“What’s she do with you?”

“Just uses me to get off. Fucks herself with me, sits on me, laughs at my weakness. That’s about it. I think she’s disappointed that nobody else wants me.”

“That’s sick.”

“Don’t tell her that, either.”

“Was… was that my third question?”

“Which one?”

“ ‘How do you know all this?’ ”

“I thought it would be ‘how can she do this to us,’ but that’s a better question.”

“So how do I die if we’re just going to have sex?”

“You’re tiny, guy. Think about it.”

“I’m struggling to imagine.”

“You’re about the size of an action figure, less than that. You’re half the size of a dildo.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah.”

“So she’s just going to stick me up inside her cooze until I drown? Suffocate?”

“You wish. She’s going to tell you how much she loves you as she grinds you into her clit. Or maybe she’ll crush you with her pussy.”

“That’s not possible… is it?”

“She’ll try. She’ll mash you into her clit.”

“I can breathe, at least.”

“Dude. That little nub is just the tiny little bit of it. The other four-fifths are right inside the entrance. She’s going to grind you into that.”

“That’s bullshit. Is that even true?”

“This would be the part where I insult you by questioning whether your wife’s ever had a genuine orgasm, but let’s skip that.”

“Of course she has.”

“Uh-huh. Or she might stick you up her ass and walk around her house, just to feel you squirming in there. It’s kind of a power play. She might even go out and do some errands or hunt another little man for her collection.”

“That’s disgusting.”

“You get used to it. It’s not bad.”

“She’s done that to you?”

“She’s done everything to me, she just doesn’t need to kill me.”

“Why doesn’t she just crush me in her fist or bite my head off?”

“It’s over too soon. She doesn’t want to crush you like that because that’s not making love. She’s going to use you to get off, first and foremost. She’s going to tell you how much she loves you, how special you are, how you were always meant to be hers, and you’re going to die at some point.”

“I don’t want to die. I have to get out of here.”

“Then start working on that corner flap.”

“It won’t budge!”

“Then think of something else.”

“I can’t!”

“Oh, shit.”

“What’s that noise?”

“That’s her.”

“That… it can’t be! That’s construction or something.”

“Dude, think of something.”

“That can’t be a person!”

“I told you, she’s huge. We’re tiny.”

OH LOOK AT YOU MY LOVELY LITTLE MEN

“Fuck! Fuck! What is that?”

YOU’RE AWAKE THAT’S WONDERFUL I’LL LET THAT LITTLE ONE SLEEP A LITTLE LONGER

“Oh God, my ears!”

HOW ARE YOU MY SWEET NEW PET ARE YOU COMFORTABLE

“I can barely make out what she’s saying! How can she be so huge?”

WHICH ONE SHALL IT BE TODAY YOU BOTH LOOK SO SCRUMPTIOUS

“Giantess! He’s married! His wife’s name is Cecilia! She’s worried sick about him!”

“What? You asshole!”

“He doesn’t lock his phone! You can send her pictures! Cecilia!”

“You fucking prick! I’m going to… no no no no no AAUGH”

YOU BEAUTIFUL LITTLE MAN I THINK WE’LL START WITH YOU TONIGHT

“…”

“Look at you, there. I used to think you were pathetic, crying all the time, but now I get it. I see what you’re doing. That’s smart. You might even live longer than me.”