Where Are You.pdf

Marie had just discovered the most incredible app on her phone - it could shrink objects or people down to the size of tiny insects! Intrigued, she wanted to test it out.

"Logan, honey, come here for a second," Marie called out to her teenage son who was sprawled on the couch playing video games. "I want you to see something really cool."

Rolling his eyes, 17-year-old Loggan sauntered over, his stained t-shirt hanging down to his knees. "Whassup mom?"

"Watch this," Marie said eagerly, opening the app. She pointed her phone at Loggan and tapped the screen. Suddenly, he started shrinking rapidly, yelling in shock and alarm as he shrank smaller and smaller, until he was only a few inches tall.

"Whoa, mom! Reverse it!" tiny Loggan squeaked from the floor, now as small as a bug. His oversized t-shirt was like a tent.

"Hold on," Marie said, distracted by how tiny her son looked. She couldn't resist giving a little giggle at his high-pitched voice. This was too funny.

"Seriously, mom, change me back!" Loggan shouted, trying to pull himself out of his giant t-shirt. "It's hard to breathe in here!"

"Oh right, sorry honey." Marie took a step forward, in her tall high heels, to tap the reverse button on the screen. But she didn't notice the tiny figure on the floor.

In one swift motion, Marie raised her spiked heel and came down hard, right on top of her miniature son. There was a sickening crunch sound as her shoe crushed his tiny body into the hardwood floor.

"Loggan? Loggan!" Marie shrieked in horror, realizing what she had just done. She yanked her foot back. Her son's body was flattened, reduced to a streak of blood and mangled limbs. He was utterly destroyed, killed instantly by the impact of her stiletto.

"No no no, oh my god, what have I done?" Marie wailed, falling to her knees. She scooped up the remains of her son with shaking hands, sobbing hysterically.

In her haste and panic, Marie's finger brushed the phone screen. She felt the app activate as the reverse shrinking beam enveloped the bloody smear in her hands. With a flash of light, the mangled body began to rapidly expand.

Marie screamed and flung the growing form away. It crashed to the floor and kept expanding, flesh and bones reassembling at an astonishing speed. Within seconds, it was the size of a baby, then a toddler, a child, a teenager... until finally, an adult male was lying there, naked and unconscious, with an eerily perfect, unblemished body.

"Loggan? Can you hear me?" Marie cried, kneeling beside him. His eyelids fluttered and he took a shaky breath.

"Haaa... mom?" he croaked, opening his eyes. "What happened? Why am I naked on the floor?"

Marie helped him sit up, tears streaming down her face. "Oh honey, I'm so sorry... I was playing with this app and I shrunk you by accident. And then I stepped on you and... and I think I killed you!"

Loggan looked at her in shock. "Killed me? I don't remember anything like that happening."

"I don't understand it," Marie said, cradling his head to her chest. "The app must have brought you back to life somehow when I unshrunk you. I can't believe this... I almost lost you."

They hugged each other tightly, both shaking with emotion, as Marie sobbed into her son's hair. She vowed never to use that app again. The experience had been too traumatic, and she had come perilously close to causing Loggan's death.

As Loggan stroked his mother's back, he couldn't help but feel a shiver of fear. His own mother had unknowingly crushed him to death beneath her feet. How could he ever feel safe again? He pushed down the feeling of rising panic and focused on comforting her.

Later, after cleaning up the blood and making Loggan a stiff drink, mother and son agreed to never speak of the incident again. It was too unsettling. But that night, as Loggan lay in bed, he couldn't shake the memory of what it had felt like to be so small and fragile, shrunk down to a helpless bug.

He knew he would never look at his mother the same way again. Because he had seen how easily she could end his life with one careless step, without even realizing it. From now on, he would always be wary of his mother's feet, never wanting to be in the path of those feet in high heels again. The thought gave him the shudders.