The Sunshine Project Pt. 05

I flip on the radio and roll my window down. Maybe some music and fresh air will help me get my mind off of things. One of my favorite AJR songs comes on, so I sing along. It's "Karma," and I know every single word. I blast the radio as loud as it will go and sing at the top of my lungs, and as the song draws close to its end, my gut sinks, but I keep singing.

"I... I don't wanna say bye.... If only I could keep you in my pocket..." My chest tightens.

"Ahhhhh! No, no, no, no, no! Fuck, fuck, fuck!" I roll to a stop at the stoplight and bang my head on the steering wheel. "Oh God, fuck!" Why does this have to be happening to me? Why does everything remind me that I am the black hole in this universe that sucks in pain and misery? "Fuck." I jam my finger into the power button to shut the radio off and lean back in the seat.

"Hi, Ms. Maier!" I hear from the car next to me. I look out the window to see the face of one of my daycare parents. Their toddler is in the back seat with the window down, and they are looking at me with a severe expression, as if they heard my cussing and learned for the first time, I'm not a saint.

"Shit," I whisper. "Hi!" I call, waving, but the light turns green, and they don't hear me when I grimace and shout, "I'm sorry!"

Someone behind me honks, and I glare at my rearview mirror before pulling away. This is so messed up. I am going to take a sick day tomorrow, and maybe the next day. And the day after that. I think I have some bereavement pay coming, so I'll have to call HR to find out. I can't work in this condition. I can barely drive this car as it is. How would I care for little kids?

Allie is curled up next to her phone beneath the hand towel sleeping when I get home. She is literally so tiny I'd have thought she was a doll lying there. I think about letting her sleep a while, but we have to check out these guns soon. Neither of us knows if there are lasting side effects to the shrinking, so the sooner we resize her the better.

"Al?" I whisper using a single finger to push her hip. She stirs, yawning and stretching. Her eyes blink open and she looks around in a panic before sitting up and sighing.

"I thought it was a dream."

"Not a dream." I sit on the end of the coffee table and set the bag of clothing down. "I got some things."

She yawns again and sits cross-legged, pulling the towel over her lap. "Let me see." I can see she's been crying. This has to be terrifying for her. Her entire life could be over, and she's only twenty-two. Here I am pouting because my best friend is tiny and it stresses me out. I'm so selfish.

"Uh..." I pull out the items I purchased and lay them on my knees. "This one," I tell her, holding up a soft yellow sundress. It was made for an American Girl doll, but by the looks of it, it'll be too big around. "I think it's big. But this one..." I pull out a multipack of clothing made for Barbie dolls. "It might be small... I looked at Cabbage Patch Kids but they're really chunky. Doll clothes are tough."

"What's that?" she asks, pointing. The small cardboard and plastic package is a bit of everything. I hold it up for her to see.

"Hairbrush, cup, plate, fork, spoon, ribbons, barrettes, lots of stuff. Oh, and look there are these tiny umbrellas too." I point out each thing as I say the word, and her expression sours the more I talk.

"How long do you think I'm going to be shrunken?" Allie scowls at me. "And an umbrella? Do you think I'm going to reenact Singing in the Rain?"

"I was trying to be helpful." I lay the clothing down next to her, and she pushes the towel off her lap and scoots over to the packaging.

"The Barbie stuff is probably too small, but pull it out Open the packaging for me. I don't think I'm going to be strong enough."

Allie waits as I tear everything open and lay it all out for her. The Barbie shorts won't even slid up over her thighs, which makes her angry because they are the only black thing in the entire lot. She tries a shirt but her tits get squished, and she can barely breathe. I end up using scissors to cut her out of the thing carefully. When she tries on the American Girl dress it's so baggy, she's swimming in it.

"Fuck's sake," she whines, plopping onto the cushion. The dress bunches up around her body and nearly covers her face. She shoves it down and folds her arms over her chest. "I hate this."

"It's just temporary, okay?" I glance at the scissors on the table next to me where I laid them after freeing her from the tight shirt. "Take it off." I gesture with my hand, and she pulls it up over her head and tosses it at me.

"Why?"

"Just wait." Using the scissors, I carefully remove the sleeves off the dress and cut a full inch off the length of it. Then I toss it back at her, and stretch the discarded length of hem out. Should be about perfect.

"What now?"

"Put it back on." I dangle the material from my hand, and as she stands and puts the dress on, I use the strip of fabric as a belt, cinching it around her waist. Despite its pastel yellow shade, the dress actually looks like something Allie might wear. It's jagged and rough, a little baggy, but the material gathered nicely. She spins around and shrugs.

"Is it okay?"

"So you only have one outfit and it's a yellow dress. At least you're clothed." She looks down at the makeshift garment and holds the skirt out a little as I collect up the things that didn't fit and the cut-off sleeves and shove them back in the Walmart sack.

"I hate pastels."

"You look fine. No one is going to see you anyway. Just me."

Allie leans over the assortment of accessories lying on the couch in its packaging. Her hair is disheveled, given that her hair ties didn't shrink with her. She eyes the ribbons, but complains. "Everything in here is pink. I am not a girly girl."

"It's temporary, Allie. Now, are you hungry? Or should we just get down to business?" I stand, picking up the sack and the accessories. Allie raises her arms up to me like one of my daycare kids.

"Let's get to it. It's getting dark out, and I want to see what these guns do tonight." She probably feels helpless in her state. My heart physically hurts knowing she's afraid and can't do anything about it. I reach down and pick her up, carefully carrying her to the kitchen where I toss the bag in the trash, lay the accessories on the counter, and then open the back door.

"You wait here," I tell her, setting her on the patio table. Shep's been locked up a while, and he'll pee in his kennel if I don't pay attention to him. So I let him out and fill his water dish before picking up the guns one by one and tossing them in the tub. When I've picked everything up, I carry the tub out and set it on the ground by the table and let Shep run around with the back door open.

"Okay, so what's first?" she asks, scooting to the edge. She dangles her legs, and I gasp.

"God, you're going to fall." I carefully pick her up and scoot her back, and she smacks my hand.

"You're literally not my parent."

"I don't care. You're my best friend. If you fall off of here and die, I will never forgive myself." When I'm certain she won't return too close to the edge, I reach into the tub and pick up a gun. "I think we shoot something, see what the gun does, then place it to the side. Maybe I need a pen and paper to write down what they do."

"Just shoot something. If we need paper we'll go get it." Alle curls her legs up, sitting cross-legged and hugs her arms over her chest. It's a warm evening, but with the breeze I can see how she'd be chilly.

"Alright..." Nervously I point the gun out into the yard. It isn't the same one that shrank her, but that one is buried. Besides we know what it does, and at least we know which one it is now. "What do I shoot?"

Allie glances around and shrugs. Shep has his leg hiked on the post to the bird feeder, marking his territory. I don't even know what this gun is or what it may do, so I'm not shooting him. Having a tiny bird feeder wouldn't be awful, so if this thing shrinks shit too, what's the worst that can happen?

"I'll shoot the bird feeder." I wait until Shep runs off chasing a bee and aim at the feeder. When I pull the trigger of the gun, nothing happens. There is no fancy light, no flash, no vibration. I look at the gun and shake it, then point it at the feeder again and shoot. "Nothing."

"Maybe that one's a toy. It's not lighting up. Start a pile for the ones that don't light up." Allie looks on in eager anticipation as I lay the gun to the side and reach into the tub for another one. This one is heavier--made of metal not plastic. There are words written on it, but they're so faded I can't read them.

"Okay, trying this one." I point the gun at the feeder and pull the trigger. A red light flashes inside a small circular piece of glass on the side of the gun, then a beam of light streams from the end of the gun and hits its target. But nothing happens. "Wait, what?"

"Strange. Do it again...." Allie stands and folds her arms over her stomach.

I pull the trigger again, and the same swirling red light circles the glass and shines out the tip of the gun, hitting the feeder. But again, nothing happens to it. No shrinking or anything else. It doesn't even scare away the been buzzing around the feeder.

"Okay, so that one just doesn't work?" she asks, shaking her head. She looks up at me. "So we need a pile for real guns that don't work. How are we supposed to know what they do if they don't work?"

"I don't know. Maybe if it's the growth ray it isn't working because the bird feeder wasn't shrunken to begin with." I scowl. I don't want to shoot Allie with this thing. Not until we know for certain it is what we want.

"Well if it's the growth ray, we can try it on Shep." She shrugs and I look at my him, licking his nuts like an idiot.

"No way. GG gave him to me. I'm not testing guns on my dog." I shake my head firmly and look back at her, but she's scowling at me. "No, Allie. Not Shep."

Allie walks straight to the edge of the table and jumps off into my lap, then lays on her stomach with her feet dangling and slides off onto the ground.

"What are you doing?"

"Then do it on me." She walks toward the planter on the corner of the patio and turns to stand with her hands on her hips.

"No, are you insane?" I stand to my feet in protest. "I'm not shooting you with this. We don't know what it does."

"Do it. I am not staying small like this forever. It has to be the growth ray. That's what makes sense. It can't regrow something that hasn't been shrunken. Shoot me, Jess." She holds her hands out to her sides and clenches her eyes shut.

"I am not shooting you." I sit back down as Shep runs over to her wagging his tail. It's weird to see him jump up on her and lick her face the way he would when they were full size. Like a miniature version of the scene playing out in front of, well, not like a miniature version. It really is.

"God, just give me the fucking gun then."

"And what?" I cringe at the thought. "You'll shoot yourself? This thing is as big as you are."

"Jess!"

I huff and shake my head. The ray gun did nothing to the bird feeder so there is a very good chance it will do nothing to Shep either. "Fine. I'll shoot him." I am not happy about this, but we can't just sit here bickering. "Hold him still."

Allie grabs him by the scruff of his neck and holds him still, and I stand and move closer so I don't accidently miss him. When I fire the weapon the red light behind the glass glows and swirls for a second, but not as brightly as before, then it goes dark again. No flash, no beam out of the tip. I smack it and pull the trigger again, but this time the light doesn't even come on.

"Shit... I think I broke it."

"Ugh!" Allie lets Shep go and covers her face. Shep runs off, happy to chase bees and Allie leans against the planter and pouts. "What now?"

"Well, we try the rest of the guns." There is nothing else to do. We just keep trying them until we find the right one, even if they break in the process.

"I'm hungry." She walks over to me and pulls on the hem of my shorts, and I pick her up and set her on the table again.

"We'll get pizza later. First the guns, okay?"

It takes us the better part of forty-five minutes to test them all and every single one has the same effect. Lights and a flash, but no results. We have another heated argument about using them on Shep, but I refuse, and she's not big enough to do much about it. By the time we get to the bottom of the tub it's too dark to see what we're doing, so we call it a night, with plans to call in to work tomorrow and keep working.

I order pizza, and Allie complains about the sausage being more like a meatloaf before having two bites of food and asking to go to bed. Allie is worse than a toddler, but I can't blame her. I just hope we can get her back to normal soon. I need my privacy or she's going to end up watching me masturbate because I'm stressed the fuck out.

Chapter 15

Cora

I heard Glenda come in earlier. Heard the doorbell ring too, right before she called me down for dinner which I ignored. There is no way in hell I'm sitting across the table from Dean today, not after what happened yesterday. I've been barricaded in my room ever since, and when she came to check if I had a fever this morning, I pretended I was sleeping. I've been stewing, wondering if I should tell her or not. Dean has already cut me off anyway. All he cares about are the guns for whatever reason.

I push myself up in bed and stare at the door. Any minute Glenda will come up for bed, and she'll be alone for a while. That is my chance to have this discussion. Last night Dean was with her, and I was tortured by the bed thumping on the wall. He gets enough sex you'd think his dick would run out of cum, but it never does. And if it's true that she knows, she sure didn't seem to mind that he fucked whoever that was earlier in the day when he put his dipstick in her last night.

I hear her on the steps; the loose board near the top gives it away. I'm about to climb off my bed and go to the door when I hear soft knocking. "Cora? It's Mom. Can I come in?" She doesn't wait for my response. She walks in and sees me sitting up and raises her eyebrows at me. "You didn't come for dinner. I got Chinese."

"Not hungry." I nod at the empty bag of Snyder's pretzel bites--the cheesy kind. I had the bag stashed in my room since last week when Danny slept over. "I had a snack."

"That's really not healthy you know." She walks over to me and puts the back of her hand on my forehead. I remember when she used to do this when I was a kid. She'd act like she knew what she was doing, like she cared. Maybe she does care, but I don't see it. "Must be why you're not feeling well." She scowls at me. "You're not pregnant, are you?"

"Fuck no!" I am defensive, but only because it's none of her business.

"I'm just saying you and that boyfriend of yours have sex a lot. You think I don't hear it, but I do. You better use protection." Glenda turns toward the door, and I call after her to stop her.

"Mom?"

She whips around to face me, a look of surprise on her face. "Yeah?" Her forehead crinkles in curiosity, and she folds her arms over her chest. She's wearing that damn pink Chanel again, this time without the jacket. You'd think it was the only thing she owned.

"Uh, so yesterday..." I squirm, wriggling to the side of the bed where my bare leg drapes over the edge. I'm wearing Danny's boxers and one of his t-shirts. They're comfy, and I felt lazy all day. "I came home after going to Jess's house and..."

"And what? Dean said you didn't get the guns."

I wonder if that's all Dean said. I feel my face screwing up in anger and rub it with both hands. "I walked in on him having sex with someone in the kitchen." I drop my hands and watch her expression change. Tiny minute changes. Her forehead crinkles slightly; a lip twitches. Then her nostrils flare. Her tongue flicks across her bottom lip, and I swear I see tears filling her eyes that she blinks away.

"You what?"

I take a deep breath and repeat it. "I saw him having sex with a woman in the kitchen. I don't know who she is, but she left in a hurry. It wasn't his secretary."

"You must have been mistaken." Glenda reels around on her heel and walks out the door hastily. I lurch off my bed and follow her as she scampers down the hallway taking her shoes off and carrying them.

"I'm not wrong, Mom. He's cheating on you. He wasn't even using a condom. He could give you some disease." I yap at her heels as she walks into her bedroom, but she refuses to turn and address me. She puts her shoes in the closet and starts unbuttoning her top, keeping her back to me. I hear her sniffle, and know I'm right. She knew something but not everything.

"Mom, please. He's such a loser. You can do so much better."

"Cora, I need you to go back to your room. Okay?" I hear the emotion in her voice. She's in pain, and I actually care. I take a few steps closer, but she snaps at me. "Your room!"

"What are you going to do?" I ask, retreating a step. She looks over her shoulder and down at the floor, then hides her mascara-streaked face again as she lets her shirt slide off her shoulders.

"Nothing."

"What! Why?" I'm confused. What woman in the world would keep her mouth shut about something like this?

"Cora, I'm asking you not to rock the boat. Things here are ... fragile." She turns to face me as she unbuttons her skirt. I see the wrinkles in the V of her cleavage and then I see the black streaks on her face. "Please."

I back out, unable to answer her. Shutting the door behind me, I retreat to my room. I'm too hurt and confused to understand what's going on. I can't stay here tonight, not when I know she has zero self-respect anymore. She's letting him walk all over her, which is why she's letting him walk all over me too. And maybe where she learned to do it. That woman is not my mother.

I shut the door and grab a bag, shoving a few changes of clothes into it. Then I put on some jean shorts and a bra. If I park a block away, I can sneak into Danny's room and sleep with him. I just have to hide somewhere when his parents say goodnight to him. He'll let me stay a few days at least, until I figure this out. It's so close to college departure day; maybe I can convince him to let me stay until then.

With my bag packed, I'm not even shy about trudging down the steps in flipflops with my car keys. Dean sits on the end of the couch and doesn't even look up when I walk past him and out the door. Though I do notice him watching me back out of the driveway from the door. I left my phone on my bed. No need for them to be able to contact me; besides it's pretty worthless with a broken screen, and Dean's credit card is locked, so I can't use it to get a new one.

Danny is home when I pull up. I can see him dancing around in his room in just his boxers like an idiot. He's not expecting me, but he'll let me in. I park around the block and lock the old T-bird before hefting my bag across his lawn. His room is along the side of the house, though the house sits on the corner, so the neighbors can see me when I climb in. I don't care. They won't say anything; at least they haven't any other time.

I use a single fingernail to tap on the glass, and his attention snaps my direction. It's dark, almost time for the sprinklers to come on. He walks over to the window and opens it. "Cora?"

"Let me in." I start to pull at the screen but he shakes his head.

"No, you can't tonight. I have that college thing in the morning."

"Danny, I'm not joking. I can't go home. Let me in."

He glances over his shoulder and sighs, rolling his eyes. Then he unlocks the screen and pushes on it. It slides out of the track, and I pull it free and hand him my bag, which he hauls in. Then he takes the screen in through the window at an odd angle, and finally reaches his hands out for me. By the time he gets to me, the sprinklers have engaged, and I shriek as water splashes on me. I slither through the window like a pro and wipe at my legs.