All day

4'6

At first it was pretty cramped in the trunk of the car. I couldn't sit up, so I just laid on my side with a bunch of magazines as an uncomfortable pillow.

I wanted to yell, but what Himiko had said scared me. Would doctors really start cutting me up to figure out what was going on?

I put the stone in my pocket, but I could still feel it somehow. Not it's weight, but like a weird cross between heat and static electricity. I thought I'd better take out my phone before the stone somehow messed it up.

My phone! I started to call my mom, then realized how ridiculous that would have sounded. "Hi Mom! A 4'11" girl shoved me into the trunk of her car. How? Well, I'm smaller than her now, so it was easy!" I couldn't think of what to do, so I didn't do anything, I just played games on my phone.

3'

A couple of hours later, I felt like I'd made a mistake, but I was stuck with it. I'd shrunk so much that I could sit in the trunk with my head bent down a little. My clothes were hanging off me like I was a small child in adult clothes. Things were getting worse, but at this point anyone who found me wouldn't even take me to doctors, I'd get locked up in some government lab and experimented on.

I turned on the flashlight on my phone and looked at the magazines that were in Himiko's trunk. I couldn't read Japanese, but I could tell that they were pretty weird. One had tentacle monsters. Another had girls who turned into beasts and ate men. All of them had nudity or sex.

Then I found the one about a girl who shrank to the size of a doll. A guy found her, maybe it was a guy from her school, and she lived in a shoe box in his room.

This is what Himiko had meant when she said she'd seen this before.

1'8"

Lunch time came, and I found half a bag of chips. They seemed huge, and almost filled me up. By this point I had taken off my clothes because they were getting too heavy. I just sat there, naked.

Eventually. I pulled my jeans to one side of the trunk and stayed on the other side. Maybe begin farther from the stone would stop this.

6"

I don't know if that's what stopped my shrinking or if I just couldn't get any smaller, but it did stop. By the time school ended, I hadn't changed in awhile.

I heard Himiko's voice! She was talking to a friend. Was she going to let me out? The car shook as one of the doors opened and closed. Then it started moving. I sat down and tried to hold on to the carpet, but the pile of magazines slid around and knocked me over. The whole trip was terrifying.

Finally, the car stopped. The trunk opened, and daylight flooded in, blinding me. I could only see the outline of Himiko looking down on me like a giant.

"Gyaaa! You are so cute!" Himiko reached down and picked me up with one hand. I was completely naked, but that didn't seem to surprise her. She hugged me to her chest. Normally I would love that, since she was really curvy, but it was a bit alarming right at that moment. She pulled me up to her face and looked around to check if anyone was watching before saying, "Stay quiet. We go inside now."

"But, my clothes! My phone is still in-"

"Shhhh!" Himiko held her finger up to her lips. She placed me in a little box. I recognized it as some kind of lunch box when I saw the bits of loose rice that were as big as my toes. Then she closed the lid and I was in darkness again.

I rolled around inside the box as Himiko carried me inside. She stopped, and I heard a woman asking her how her day was. That must have been someone from the family she was staying with while she was studying in America. Himiko made small talk, then carried me upstairs and into her room. Every step and closing door sent vibrations through me like a thunderclap.

Finally she opened the box, picked me up, and put me on her desk. Even standing on the desk, she still loomed over me.

"Don't worry," said Himiko, "I have seen this before. You will be fine."

"Okay." That sounded insane, but I didn't have anyone else to ask about this. "How long do you think I'll be like this?"

She nodded intensely. "Until we fall in love."