HTTYD - Day 9, Part 2 (Patreon)

Once Marcus signed Jessie out at the front office, they waited in the parking lot for an Uber to come pick them up. Between Marcus falling into her backpack, her trip to school, and the hour or so she’d spent between her first two periods before finding him, they were running so far behind that there wasn’t even time for her to bike home first and pack a suitcase. Luckily she always kept a change of clothes in her gym bag though, so before leaving school, she'd stuffed her books into her locker with her volleyball gear, and packed her spare t-shirt, socks, and underwear into her backpack to take to the airport.

As they waited, Marcus revealed that as soon as he realized Jessie was on the verge of getting in trouble and might not be able to leave class, he pulled out his phone from within her shirt and called the office to let her know they had a “family reunion” to attend (he had to speak quietly enough that Jessie’s classmates didn’t hear him, but fortunately at his size that wasn’t too difficult). Luckily the receptionist he spoke with overheard the other receptionist voice Jessie’s name during her talk with Jessie’s teacher, and Marcus ended up saving his daughter in the nick of time. But with their flight’s departure in little more than an hour, they weren’t in the clear yet.

“Oh my God,” Jessie giggled after hopping in the backseat of their ride. “I just realized I didn’t even ask where we’re going!”

“To see Aunt Emma!” Marcus proudly announced. “And Grandma too. And your cousin.”

Jessie's eyes widened, and she flashed a bright, gleaming smile. “Awww, that’s such a good idea!” She held her dad close to her shoulder for a hug, and then set him in her lap while keeping a hand on him for safety, since he couldn’t use a regular seatbelt. “Are we flying out of LAX?” she asked.

Marcus shook his head. “Burbank. So hopefully we should be able to get through TSA pretty quickly.”

“Who paid for the tickets?”

“You remember Ben Costa—me and him went to college together?”

“Sorta, yeah.”

“Well he works for Sunrise Airlines, so he was able to get me a ticket on short notice. For a decently cheap price, too.”

“You said ‘a’ ticket?” Jessie asked confusedly. “Like, you only got one?”

“People under 12 inches fly free. Some law they passed a few years ago. I’d need to sit in your lap, basically, but then we don’t need to waste extra money for a seat I wouldn’t even be able to sit in.” A quick puff of air escaped from Jessie’s nose as she imagined her dad trying to buckle himself in with clasps that were almost half the size of his body. Marcus remembered he had to forward Jessie’s ticket to her now that he’d broke the news, so he emailed her the itinerary, and then the rest of the ride was mostly spent in silence. But a good silence. An excited and imaginative silence.

Once the car pulled up to the arrivals, the two of them thanked the driver, and then Jessie grabbed her backpack and her dad before heading inside and making her way to the check-in area.

The airline employee, a handsome man in his late 30s, smiled with artificial politeness at the chipper young girl who walked up to the counter. “Good morning. Where are you two headed today?”

“Aspen!” Jessie replied, and pulled up the ticket on her phone to show him.

“Oh, lucky you,” he replied in a monotone voice. “We don’t usually fly that route non-stop.” He turned his attention to Marcus, “Are you flying somewhere too, or just dropping her off?”

“We’re both going,” he told the man. “Was I supposed to get my own ticket?”

“If you want to fly? Yes, you’ll need your own ticket.”

Marcus ignored the worker’s sass, but was confused. “No I mean, there’s that law about people under 12 inches flying free; so since I obviously fit that description—” he said, gesturing to his small size, “—was I supposed to order my own ticket somehow? The article I read said I didn’t need to.”

“That law only applies to national airlines,” the employee responded. “Regional airlines tend to set their own policies. Ours applies to anyone under 6 inches.”

Marcus furrowed his eyebrows. “Only six inches, really?! Do I look like I’m big enough to—”

“Daddy,” Jessie said quietly, putting her finger on his shoulder.

“Sir, I don’t make the policies. I can help you purchase a second ticket though.”

Marcus felt an anger brewing inside of him; too big to ride free, but obviously too small to ride without a companion like Jessie. And the employee’s uncaring attitude certainly wasn’t helping either. “No, that’s okay, I can’t afford a second ticket. She can go by herself.”

Jessie’s eyes widened. “Wait, what?”

“Just give us a moment first though, if that’s alright,” Marcus told the guy. “I’ll need to get a ride back home.”

“The flight’s already started boarding, and the gate closes in 28 minutes,” he replied.

“That’s fine, she can make it,” Marcus sighed. He nodded towards the direction they came from. “C’mon Jess, let’s head outside.”

“Wait, Daddy, I can help pay for it, you can take it out of my allowance. I don’t wanna go without you.”

“Jessie.” She understood her dad’s tone of voice and sighed, turning to head back outside. “Let’s sit down over there,” he said, motioning to a nearby empty bench. She sulked her way over to the seat and sat criss cross on one end of it while setting her dad down opposite her. Before she could start trying to bargain with him, a nervous-but-not-unhappy expression crossed Marcus’ face, and he looked around like he wanted to make sure nobody was around to overhear what he had to say. “I’m not actually gonna let you go by yourself,” he said, trying to be quiet despite the airport entrance’s somewhat buzzy surroundings.

“You’re not?” she asked, clearly confused, and leaned in closer as a look of curiosity replaced her previous disappointment.

“Not if I can help it—not if we can help it.” He chuckled anxiously, “There's gotta be some way we can sneak me on though, given my size. I’ve been looking forward to seeing Emma for longer than we’ve even been talking about me flying out there, so I probably wanna go on the trip even more than you do. If it really came to it then I’d shell out the money, but I don’t wanna give in to their bullshit policy. I mean they didn’t even offer me a discount or anything!”

Jessie glanced around, now starting to share her dad’s sense of caution, but she obviously still had no idea what he was getting at. “Okay… so what’s your plan then?”

Marcus bit his lip and placed his hands on his hips. “I don’t know,” he admitted, his mind racing as it tried to come up with a solution. “The first thing I thought of was hiding in your backpack again, but I’d never make it past the x-ray machines.”

“What if I like, put you in my pocket or something?” she offered. The front pockets of her pants were basically fake and unusable, but her back pockets had a few inches of depth to them. “You’d probably have to curl up, but you might be able to fit without anyone seeing you.” It didn’t seem ideal, but her dad still considered it. “The full-body scanners are just for like, metal and stuff, right? So they wouldn’t be able to detect you.”

Marcus looked at how tight his daughter’s pants seemed to be on her and shook his head. “I don’t think that’d work either. Those look like skinny jeans to me, which means there’d be an obvious human-shaped bulge in the back of your pants. The metal detector might not pick me up, but you’re supposed to empty your pockets, and one of the agents would notice once you walk on through.” The two of them both sighed in unison, and Marcus glanced at his watch to see how much longer they had. 25 minutes now, and that wasn’t counting however long it’d take to get through the screening.

He crossed his arms and pursed his lips, scouring Jessie’s things to look for ideas other than her backpack or her pants. When his eyes landed on her sandals, he remembered how her feet had covered him when she rode her bike up the hill while he was strapped to the pedal. And the night prior, he’d stood directly in front of her sole and been inadvertently measured against it. At the time, it had been embarrassing to see first-hand that he wasn’t even as tall as his daughter’s foot, but now Marcus realized that the size difference between him and Jessie’s sole might actually come in handy.

She noticed him staring at her Birkenstocks and she looked down at it, catching on quick. “Hold on, are you… are you thinking what I think you’re thinking?”

“I think so,” he chuckled, watching the teenager unstrap her shoe and hold it upright next to him. Since her Birks were naturally bigger than her foot, his head barely came up to the sandal’s toe section when standing next to it. He’d easily be able to fit within the boundaries of Jessie’s shoe—but that didn’t mean the idea was without its drawbacks. “Do your, uh…”

His daughter rolled her eyes and laughed, “No, Daddy, my feet don't smell bad if that's what you were gonna ask. I showered last night.” Marcus blushed, but he didn’t want to tell her that he knew exactly how bad they could be sometimes and that it was worth it to check and make sure. Although even if her feet didn’t smell that great, it wasn’t like they had any other good plans anyways. The key to his idea working was that he knew from his past times at the airport that the agents never seemed to care whether people took their shoes off or not (probably because it was a small airport, although that was exactly why they probably should've been more vigilant than normal about hijackers). 

“Alright,” Marcus said, rubbing his hands together, “well then is that what we’re going with? Are you comfortable going through with this?”

“Are you comfortable going through with this?” she asked, giggling and flexing her toes as she imagined what it’d be like for her dad. “It’ll probably be pretty cramped, right? And I’m gonna be standing on top of your whole body.”

Marcus grimaced, “Yeah, I can’t imagine it’ll feel that great for me. But we just have to get through TSA, and then I’ll have saved 150 dollars.” Jessie shrugged, surprised that her dad would be willing to risk it for what seemed like not that much money in the grand scheme of things. She looked around again to make sure nobody was watching, and then unshrugged her backpack to set it down behind her dad, creating a sort of barrier to block people from seeing what they were about to do.

Jessie set her sandal down and unfastened the straps, Marcus taking a deep breath as he stepped onto the heel and examined the surface. All things considered, the insole of her Birkenstocks weren’t as dirty as he was worried they’d be. Sure, there was subtle markings that amounted to the impression of a foot, but her shoes were relatively new enough that she could accurately claim that they were pretty clean.

Jessie watched intently as her shrunken father got down on the… floor?… ground?… whatever the surface of her sandal could be called. He felt a little eerie from how warm it was, and tried to tell himself that it was just from the sun. And the size was obviously unnerving too; laying down on top of her foot’s imprint represented a tactile confirmation into just how small he really was. What is it about feet that make them so embarrassing to compare myself to, he wondered, versus comparing myself to a hand, or an ear, or an arm? Probably because they’re the lowest part of the human body. And I’m gonna be even lower than that. He watched as Jessie brushed off her foot, making sure it’d be as clean and comfortable as possible before she set it down on him. I’ll literally be beneath a pair of feet. My daughter’s feet… Despite how much he loved and trusted Jessie, he couldn’t help but feel humiliated to willingly lay himself down in her shoe, and essentially ask that his daughter step on him. All just so he could save a few bucks.

She raised her foot over his body, wanting to be somewhat slow and gradual about stepping on him so that he could adjust easier. Although her skin was fairly pale, her sole was more of a pinkish hue, and Marcus marveled at her foot’s ability to grow continually larger the closer it got to him. But then it stopped, and she quickly pulled her foot back before leaning down to address him. “I just realized something that might be a problem,” she whispered. “Your shirt is like a really deep blue. And your shoes are black. I think they might stand out too much if anyone glances down at my feet.” The advantage of using Jessie’s Birks were that the edges of the sandals were curved, creating a small indent in the insole so that the wearer’s feet would be more comfortable. This meant Marcus was a bit more “nestled” and easily hidden compared to if Jessie had been wearing flip-flops or a cheaper pair of sandals with flat soles. “I mean they might not notice you anyways since you’ll be like, 99% covered,” she continued, “but, like, your khakis are pretty much skin color so they’d blend in pretty easily, but your shirt wouldn’t. Does that make sense?”

Her dad nodded and sat up, hesitating before taking his shirt off and pulling off his shoes and socks. Jessie carefully took the tiny garments from him, stowing them in the smallest pouch of her backpack. “Is your suitcase in here?” she asked. “Do you have another shirt you can put on instead of this one?”

“Yeah, my suitcase should be somewhere in there. I was wearing it when I fell in. But I didn’t pack any other shirts that are brown or beige colored.”

“So does that mean…”

Marcus glanced at his watch again. “There’s practically 20 minutes til the gate closes now,” he informed her, reluctantly laying back down. “We have to hurry.” He didn’t want to tell his daughter that yes, he’d be shirtless for however long she’d be standing on him, and hoped that she’d take his non-verbal cue to just move on and hurry up. Technically he’s wearing more clothing than when we go to the beach, Jessie reminded herself, trying to rationalize his level of modesty as being independent of her wearing him in her shoe. Neither of them had nefarious motives, so objectively speaking, there shouldn’t have been anything weird about what they were about to do. And yet, Jessie couldn’t help but feel weird about it anyways—although she was sure her dad would be feeling even weirder.

With his body laid out against the sandal’s warm leather, he wondered if it would’ve been a better idea for him to lay face down instead (with his head turned to the side, of course). Which would be less embarrassing? He wasn’t sure, but laying on his back would definitely be the more comfortable option, so he went with that.

Jessie’s pink-and-pale sole once again overtook his view, and he fidgeted nervously as her foot carefully set itself down on top of him. First her heel came to rest on top of his ankles (flattening his own feet to the side; he couldn’t have them poking out), then the ball of her foot smushed itself against his bare chest, until finally her toes settled over his head. He cautiously took a few sniffs to gauge how bad her foot’s smell would be, and was pleasantly surprised to find that she was right about them not smelling very bad. They didn’t smell good per se, but they didn’t stink, and there was even a faint hint of body lotion he could make out from when she showered last night. “OK Daddy, let me know if it starts to hurt or anything,” she said, pulling the sandal’s straps over the top of her foot and making a few last-minute adjustments to get her foot more comfortable with his body.

Her second toe was the one that got the honor of resting on his face, but even though it was fairly soft, he didn’t think he wanted to have to deal it pressing against him for however long he’d be beneath her. “Actually, mm, can you…” he began, already annoyed at his mouth being partially muffled by her. He tried scooting to the side a little bit, but even though she wasn’t standing up yet, the weight of her foot and leg was enough to keep him from budging. Instead, his best hope was to awkwardly tilt his head to the side, positioning it in the nook between her big and second toes, where there was the most (relative) room.

“Did you say something?” she asked, feeling his tiny squirms as he tried to accustom himself.

“Nevermind,” he sighed, deciding the most comfortable position would be to put his head back under her toe, but turn his face to the side. He groaned involuntarily a few times as she tightened the straps, wanting to cover her dad as much as possible and minimize any slivers of his body from peeking through. When she was done, she held her shoe up proudly and twirled her ankle in circles, ensuring that no matter what angle she held her foot at, her dad would stay perfectly in place hidden beneath her.

After taking a quick picture to send to Paris, Jessie swung her legs over the side of the bench and set her feet on the ground, slowly standing up and increasing the amount of weight she put on her feet. Marcus recalled how it had felt when he was tied to the pedal, and although the combination of her Birks and bare feet weren’t as uncomfortable as the bike trip, he still felt like he was moments away from his body pancaking beneath the teen's foot. Despite Jessie being a little under 130 pounds, it felt like over 45,000 to someone as small as her dad, and it was only thanks to the durability caused by his condition that his meager frame didn’t explode under so much pressure. She wanted to ask him how he was doing, but then she realized that he wouldn’t be able to answer anyways (or even give her some kind of physical cue), so she figured it’d be best to just slip her backpack on and try to get to the gate as fast as possible now.

Returning to the grumpy airline employee from before, she presented her ticket to him and quickly grabbed her boarding pass before briskly making her way to the TSA line. Since it was a small airport, there were luckily only a handful of people in front of her, and she used the opportunity to kneel down to the ground so she could adjust her sandals one final time before the TSA’s security gauntlet. The sandal containing her dad was on her pretty securely, but she wanted to be absolutely sure that her dad was as hidden as possible. Tugging on the straps as hard as she physically could, she managed to pull them across one additional notch, grunting from exertion as she fastened the leather ties back down. Her dad hadn’t been sure what she was doing, but he suddenly felt his body get squeezed even tighter against the teenager's slender sole, as if she was trying to fuse him to it. And considering how much the ball of her foot was molding itself around his bare chest, it certainly felt like he really was becoming glued to her. He could barely even breathe too.

The security agent nodded at her, and she quickly stood back up, fumbling to hand him her ID. He gave her a brief look, comparing her nervously smiling face with her photo while scanning her boarding pass, but then handed them back to her and nodded to the next person in line. “Thanks,” she sheepishly told him, and hurried along to the X-ray machine.

After putting her backpack on the conveyor belt, Jessie stood in front of the body scanner and waited until it was her turn to step through. But before the agent motioned for her to step forward, he glanced down at her shoes, causing her heart to skip a beat. She scrunched her toes, hoping that if some part of her dad’s head were visible, she’d be able to curl it deeper beneath her foot, and the agent looked back up at her with a sigh. “Shoes have to come off,” he told her.

Jessie froze, unsure of what to do. Could she try to make up some lie to turn back, or would they know that something was up and stop her from leaving? And if they found her dad, would he be the one to get in trouble, or her, or both of them? Or what if her dad’s body was stuck to her foot by now? No, that wouldn’t work; he was small, but he wasn’t flat. “Um… I don’t wanna get my feet dirty,” she lied, biting her lip. “I’m kind of a clean freak.”

“Should’ve worn shoes and socks then, miss,” he said, looking down at her sandals again. “I don’t make the rules, sorry.”

Before Jessie could think of what to do next, another one of the TSA agents walked over and looked Jessie up and down. The woman had been working there for several more years, and rolled her eyes at how strict her junior coworker was being. “John, kids don’t have to take their shoes off. She look older than 12 to you?”

“Are you kidding me?” he replied incredulously, wanting to say 'yes, way fucking older than 12,' but keeping himself from swearing. “She's obviously in college. Maaaaaybe high school.”

The older woman chuckled and shook her head. “You’re trippin, kids are insane these days with makeup. My niece is barely in middle school but already looks all grown up.” She turned to look at Jessie, tilting her head as she addressed the teenager. “How old are you, hun?”

Jessie thanked God that the older agent had mentioned the age limit, so she knew exactly how to lie. But there was no way she actually looked that young, right? “Um… twelve,” she lied, her eyes darting back and forth between the other two and hoping they'd believe it.

“See, she’s fine,” the woman declared, an expression on her face that said she was tired of constantly winning arguments against her male coworker.

“She’s just saying that to get through,” he replied, not willing to give up. "There's literally no way that she's that young." He turned to Jessie, "Lemme see your ID."

"Um... it's in my backpack," she thought to say, looking over at the X-ray detector and shrugging apologetically.

The woman ignored her coworker and motioned for Jessie to step through the metal detector. “You can come on, it’s fine. My brother-in-law’s got a thing for germs too, he’s just like Howie Mandel and everything. I know how you feel.”

The man glared at his coworker as she checked the machine’s monitor. Even without looking at him, she could sense his frustration with her, but she just sighed and shook her head. “You need to relax, John. She said she’s 12, so everything’s good. I’m not tryna start a fuss with a passenger for no reason. When I worked at LAX, there were always so many people that we didn't even have time to make people take their shoes off during rush hour.” Once the machine cleared Jessie, she smiled at the younger girl. “You’re good to go, sweetie. Sorry about him.”

Jessie swallowed anxiously, unable to believe her stroke of luck, and went to collect her backpack. The woman turned to the other agent and raised an eyebrow. “If Burbank Airport is on the national news tonight cuz some teenage girl decided to hide a bomb in her sandal, then I’ll personally hand myself over to the FBI. Otherwise, this job doesn’t pay well enough for you to stress over minor details that literally do not matter.”

Jessie couldn’t keep herself from giggling at the woman’s remark, and the man blushed, but realized that he was holding up the line at this point, and several other passengers were watching them. “Whatever,” he grumbled, and gestured for the next person to come on through as Jessie breathed a sigh of relief. 

Once she was out of earshot from the male agent, the woman came over to Jessie and nudged her on the shoulder. "By the way, you definitely don't look like a 12 year old," she chuckled. "I just don't like him very much so it's fun to piss him off."

"Oh, yeah, I'm not actually that young, obviously," Jessie chuckled nervously. "Thanks though, the um, the germ thing was real."

"So was the thing about my brother-in-law. Anyway, you have a good day," the lady replied, and turned back to her work before Jessie started making her way to her terminal.

Once her gate was within sight, she pulled out her phone and saw that she still had 8 minutes until boarding ended, so she took the opportunity to duck into a nearby bathroom. She made sure the stalls were all empty before heading into the one at the end, and unstrapped her sandal with a deep breath, calming herself after the close encounter. Even though it had only been a few minutes, she’d pulled the straps so tight that there were slight markings on her foot, and when she lifted her leg, her dad’s body even stuck to her sole for several seconds before gravity took over and he toppled to the bathroom floor, causing Jessie to giggle.

“Well, glad to see that’s over with,” Marcus stated, avoiding eye contact with his giant daughter as she sat down on the edge of the toilet and flexed her foot, rubbing the areas that her shoe’s straps had hurted her most.

“I mean, the TSA part’s over,” Jessie said, “but I still have to get on the plane. And if I’m carrying you when I get there, they’re gonna ask for both of our tickets, not just mine.” Frowning out of sympathy, she gave him a look that basically said, “I need you to get back in my shoe.”

“I know that, but I was gonna suggest that I ride in your backpack for the rest of the trip.”

“Yeah, but what if we get to the gate and she says that they don’t have any extra space in the luggage compartments. Then that means they’d need to check my bag, right? But I’m pretty sure the part of the plane where they keep the checked luggage doesn’t get any oxygen, and it’s either that or have to take you out of my backpack in front of everybody. Then they’d know you’re basically a stowaway.”

“Jessie, your bag isn’t that big. I’m pretty sure if they ran out of room on the plane, the flight attendant would let you just keep your backpack on your lap. Or better yet, stash it under the seat in front of you.”

“Final boarding call for Gate A6,” a lady announced over the intercom. “Jessie Tilden, please make your way to the gate immediately.”

Jessie sighed, “We don’t have time to argue. What if there’s another risk we’re not thinking of?” She crossed her arms and huddled over, waiting expectantly for her dad to lie down again so she could put her sandal back on. “We know this works, so we should just stick with this.”

Is she seriously gonna make me lay under her foot for the entire flight then? That’s like two hours! Marcus was inclined to keep arguing, but with their gate minutes away from closing for good, Jessie looked antsy and impatient, so he did as his daughter told and laid back down on his back.

“By the way,” she started to say, scrunching her foot a few more times in preparation for having her dad’s body smushed against it. “I know we were kinda in a rush earlier, but I didn’t have to go through with this and you felt sort of assertive about me needing to help you so you could see Aunt Emma. I was pretty nervous, like I’m pretty sure this is illegal, technically.”

“Sorry, you’re right,” he apologized, trying to get comfy as he readied himself.

“And…?” She looked at him like she’d expected him to say something else, something more. But it wasn’t like it really mattered that much anyways, so she shook it off and raised her foot over him again to put the shoe back on.

Just before her fleshy sole made contact, he realized what his daughter had wanted him to say. “Oh, um… and thanks,” he mumbled, moments before she set her foot down and covered him back up.

“Huh?”

“Thank you,” he repeated, a little louder this time, but now her toe was muffling his mouth again and making it harder to hear him.

“I can’t hear you, Daddy.”

Marcus grumbled, pushing her toe to the side so he could look up at the girl without her toes impeding him. “Thank you for letting me hide under your foot!”

Jessie hadn’t even been intentionally trying to tease him, but the young girl couldn’t help but snicker at how embarrassing what he’d just said was. “You are most certainly welcome,” she smiled, her toe effortlessly pushing his hands aside to reassert itself on top of his little face as she fastened her Birkenstock around him. It was a more relaxed fit this time, but still tight enough to keep her foot snugly pressed against her dad, ensuring both his safety and concealment. Then once that was done, she headed out of the bathroom and skipped along towards her gate, while her dad tried not to think about his position as a literal insole. He felt like nothing more than a part of his teenage daughter’s shoe. And for the next several hours, that was all that he would be.