There Goes the Neighborhood (Chapter 4) (Patreon)

Albert looked to the TV screen and watched his titanic blonde parent standing still as a statue upon the rubble where she’d fallen. It was strange to know he was casually speaking on the telephone to the very same mythically humongous creature shown on the TV, who had just spent part of her morning unknowingly wreaking havoc and squashing swaths of land flat beneath her doom-bringing hot-pink clogs. Albert stooped by the screen and tried to imagine just how utterly large his mother and sister had become; there was a bit of perspective offered, when the news footage shifted to reveal that an entire river which ran near Rachel’s foot comparatively looked thin enough to be a blade of grass, but even this was hard to wrap his brain around. However, it was clear that, though Albert and Rachel could somehow still communicate through the phone, if the boy was physically present, even if he was standing in his mother’s own hand, she probably wouldn’t be able to see him, let alone distinguish him from a speck of grit lost in the fleshy valleys of her palm lines.

“Where is Sassy? Can you see her?” Rachel asked. She turned around in all directions, with one hand cupped over her eyes to blot what little sunlight penetrated the cloud layer. Still, she saw no sign.

“Wait a second,” Albert said. “I’ll find her.” He hopped on his computer and started investigating international news sources.

It didn’t take long to locate his sister, as she was large enough that multiple countries were filming her as they were being squelched beneath her flip-flops.

For, as it turned out, Sassy was visiting Europe, kneeling rather callously down on several interlocked nations, and gliding her fingers through untouched terrain with the care and focused zeal of an expert gardener. The petite blonde was knowingly picking apart European cities, using her manicured fingernails to slice up the crust and collecting the remnants in her delicate fingertips. Those soft, curious hands were consciously committing uncountable atrocities, from the demolished townships she sprinkled into her expansive palm like plant seed, to the mushy ground zeroes where she pressed her hand down hard enough to make a clay-like imprint with her widespread fingers. This level of destruction didn’t even yet account for Sassy’s lower body, with her legs folded regally upon the buckling ground; her lithe bare peds were splayed in her worn-down flip-flops, her creamy soles peeled back from the squishy platform, and her happy toes burrowing into the earth where they resided.

“Well?” Rachel anxiously demanded.

“She’s in Europe.”

“Europe. You mean she…”

“…walked away, yes,” Albert uttered. “Across the Atlantic.”

“Doesn’t she realize what’s happened, though? If she left, that means she had to walk all the way there, and…”

“…she crushed everything on the way,” Albert finished. He shook his head, and felt urgent dread plaguing his innards.

“SASSY!” Rachel shouted at the top of her lungs. “STOP!” The hallowed boom of her voice was heard in every corner of the globe.

On the European news networks, Albert saw his gargantuan little sister pause what she was doing, clearly having heard her mother’s call. However, when no further remark followed, the blonde shrugged, and resumed digging and picking at the miniature urban landscape. To get comfier, Sassy adjusted her seated position, pulled her flip-flops off, and let her feet slide to the side off the coast and onto a chain of islands. The shoes were carelessly discarded with a flighty toss: the foamy slabs tumbled end-over-end, and effectively formed a new set of rubber continents. Sassy’s hefty heels instantly sunk many of the major land bodies, while other slightly luckier isles were blockaded between her splayed toes in the shallow ocean waters.

Those lovely fingers raked through the pristine continental sprawl with remorseless abandon, grappling giant handfuls of jumbled forestry, silver city, and agrarian countryside all in one elegant fist. As she scooped up every new clump of Europe in her hands, Sassy brought the findings before her face, grinning ear-to-ear, and combed through the assorted dirt and fires with her pinky. There was nothing half-hearted or unwilling in her actions at all; her brother, and the whole planet, could see that Sassy was fully engaged in playing with the world.

“M-Mom, I know you don’t want to hear this, but… I don’t think what Sassy did was a mistake. She’s… touching the ground, picking things up. She bent down on her knees, and everything under her is just gone now. And it wasn’t on accident.”

“Oh, God… we’ve got to make her stop. I don’t want to move again, darling, or I’ll squish something else. Please, how can we contact your sister?”

“You already have her phone, Mom. There’s no other way. You have to go stop her.”

“What? But that means I’d have to walk over there again, and… God… step on more little people down there! So many buildings and houses and families, and they’ll all be gone… crushed under my own shoes just like insects. It makes me SICK! Please, please, tell me there’s another way, Albert.”

Albert trembled. He’d never heard his mother so vulnerable. Yet he had no good news.

“Please hurry, Mom. Before it gets worse.”