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John slumped. The lava lamp glow of the screen on his desk was barely enough to illuminate the keyboard, barely enough to illuminate the scribbled notes that had managed to hold him awake until now; until now when the relentless drip of cheap vodka down his throat had overpowered the passion in the pen. Perhaps John would have called it poison in the pen. Anyone walking into the room would have noted that whilst in general it was tidy, the desk was suffering an overflow of castellated paper, cut neatly from the pads, defending the table against the siege of serenity. Anyone walking into the room would have switched off the monitor, turned and closed the door behind them, gently. But there was no one in the flat to care. Oh, there had been people in the flat who had cared about John, and some of those people were still caring about John, but they were no longer part of his life in any intimate way. Perhaps it was these ghosts who roused him, suddenly self-aware enough to note his position, his lack of closure before accepting that rest was necessary, that he needed to switch off. He looked down at the half- drunk glass by his side and seemed to send it a disapproving look, which the mute silicate correctly reflected, as perhaps was intended. He stood from the swivel chair, slightly uncertainly, then brushed an irritation from his cheek. He checked his finger to see the wet glint of the tear that he'd wiped away. As incongruous as it appeared to him on his finger, it had been more so on his face, rising out above four days of stubble, and the demeanour of the haggard unwashed. John stumbled more purposefully towards bed, quickly undressing as he reached it. Slid under the duvet he suddenly discovered that he was awake again, that the moment of dozing in which he'd indulged had taken the sharper edges off his fatigue. As he lay back, eyes open unseeing in the dark, as shapes coalesced on the ceiling, he wondered about his decision, about what he could have done to make it any different. Was there a way, a single way, that on that day, four days ago, he wouldn't have to inform Josh's parents that he had to take him away. Yet he knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, logically, that he had tried everything with the family, and that even the law, that baseless arbiter of right and wrong, had forced him to try everything. He could do no less, and would have done no less, because whatever the father's faults, and the mother's issues, Josh saw them as the ideal of parenthood, and adored them. Taking a child from his parents might rip the heart from the family, but it went further than that in the child, heart, mind and soul, which was why it could only be the solution of last resort. What made this decision hit John so hard was that Josh's situation was, and by a long way, not the worst he had encountered. Josh's parents were uneducated, uncultured, unwise, but not unloving. Ignorant, yes, and so unable to give Josh what he needed, or giving it in odd ways. Josh was malnourished through ignorance, not through lack of food. He did sport minor bruises that his father had given him, yet none abusive. Some sober punishment, some play, toughening him up for the life that his father knew. John knew that Josh's parents cared for him and loved him in the ways that they knew, but those ways weren't good enough for society, not good enough for the child. John couldn't allow the ignorance, and the disbelief or outright spite of his suggestions, to continue, but he knew that if they could bring themselves to learn, he would return Josh to them. As soon as he could. There were worse. There were situations where the intervention came too late, where the obligation to try as hard as you could for the sake of the family was detrimental to the health of the child. John had seen children dissociate even during the periods of his work, of his care. His head told him that their methods were true, and right, that the family was the first priority, for he had lived through histories where the system itself had been the abuser, and yet his heart could only go out to the children that needed help to keep themselves together. Someone to talk to, alone; someone to play with that understood; someone to be there who cared. He wished, as he always wished, that he could be that soul to find them. John could hear the smothered sound of sobbing. His hearing wasn't quite together, and the sobbing sounded deep, low and resonant, even slow. His eyes weren't trapped by sleep, but still stiff to open, as though cracking open dried paint. Immediately his eyes were beset by a blast of light, and he took a moment to slow his waking, to come to terms with his environment before launching into it. He was sitting, and that was wrong. He didn't need the toilet, so that hadn't woken him. The sobbing continued, punctuated by a long sniff, drawn slowly in through tears. He looked again at the wall in front of him. This wasn't his room. This wasn't his flat. The wall seemed a single piece of wood, rough, undecorated, and in front of him was a dressing table with a picture where the mirror should be. A beautiful, simple picture. A portrait. A woman. Young, porcelain pure, and hugely bright of eyes and lips. She seemed lost, confused, and the expression was painted onto her perfectly. Her neck was swanlike, exaggerated perhaps by the tying back of her hair, which appeared barely there. She was, John wondered, unnaturally lifelike. He turned his head slightly to sense if there was a hologram effect, and saw it as she too turned. Maybe it dawned on him exactly at that moment, maybe a moment later as his skin reported the swish of hair across his shoulder blades, and he felt the slight tug at the back of his head that he'd never experienced before. Whenever it did dawn upon him, just one moment later the perceptual ignorance was gone, never to be retrieved and lived in again. He knew that he was looking in a mirror. He was this woman. He brought his hands up and looked at them. They were so slim, his wrists tiny, his nails painted pink. His arms appeared unnaturally slim, thin, and led his eyes down to a chest that was grossly wide and protruding by comparison. He moved his hands to the breasts and felt their huge weight, his skinny hands able to heft them and yet feeling the pressure in his matchstick upper arms. The earlier tug niggled him, and he swept his head from side to side to feel what was at the back of his head. Hair brushed over his shoulder and arms as he did so. One hand went up, cautiously, inspecting. He felt his hand at the back of his head and a ponytail protruding. He'd felt one before, knew what it felt like, but never experienced one himself. He debated pulling out the band that was holding it, then left it. There were other concerns. He stood, and his lack of familiarity on tiny feet betrayed him as the weight on his chest lurched forward and down. He threw his hands forward to the dressing table and caught himself. Standing more gently and carefully upright he caught the reflection in the mirror again, a reflection that now displayed an impossibly narrow yet muscular waist suddenly spread out to superheroine hips above slim thighs. Between them, nestling in the crevice, nothing. No hanging member. No hanging sack of skin. No balls. There was, something. Worse than nothing. A crevice within the crevice, smoothly closed. John noted that there were not even any proud labia, any swollen lips that would have marked a woman, just barely visible blonde hairs highlighting a tight, dark, vertical line. He moved one hand to it and looked down. The touch, unfamiliar. There was give in between the thin lips, and the pressure of his finger felt uncomfortable in the depths of his belly. Gently he tried to part the lips with two fingers and discovered a reluctance, down there, to part. Flesh that he had little control over wanted to stay squeezed closed. He took his hand away and placed it back on the table. He took a deep breath, then reached up to pinch his arm. He failed, but succeeded in squishing his right breast as he reached across, enough to cause mild discomfort. He failed because he couldn't reach his left arm without moving it part way to meet his right hand, the fatty flesh in front preventing him from reaching across himself. Frustrated he pinched the offending mound, and 'Eep'ed in pain as his nails bit into the tender skin. He was awake! And as he recognised this fact he became aware of another. Something else was awake. Straightening, slowly and tremendously carefully he manoeuvred his body around to face the direction from which he had previously heard the sound of sobbing. Less than ten feet away the room he was in ended, ended in nothing, no windows or wall. It simply looked outside upon a vast, brightly lit room, and out there, looking in, were two big, damply sparkling eyes. John realised he was holding his breath. He knew why. A hot terror had gripped his heart and he could feel it trying to escape his chest. If he breathed he would scream. The door he could see about sixty feet away looked about forty feet high. The bed to the left of his view was about twenty feet high, and he was looking up towards the top of the mattress, a pink striped duvet dripping down. Behind the top of the duvet, near the door, the head holding those eyes faced him. Suddenly, involuntarily, the face sniffed, and a hand languidly arose to wipe the nose, a button nose that would have been cute on a child, was cute on a child perhaps, except that this child was an agent of Brobdingnag. "Hello?" said the child. It took John more than a moment to realise that he was being addressed, the same long moment in which he realised that he was breathing again. His lassitude and confusion in comprehension derived from the simple confliction of a bass-baritone voice exuding from a child, a female child, of surely no more than eight years old, even if her mouth appeared capable of swallowing his head. Not only that but it was her languid manner, the way that stating that one word seemed to take twice as long as it should. He couldn't bring himself to reply, still couldn't bring himself to move, and then he realised that she was. He could feel the vibrations as her bed creaked, his floor seeming to shiver in tune with her rising. The girl was maybe twenty five feet tall. The arrival of her feet on the floor seemed to bend the room, and yet she was sliding carefully out of her bed, almost trying to be gentle, quiet. She came down to her knees and then placed her elbows down on the floor, bringing her face within a few yards of John's, on the same level. He could sense, just out of hearing but just within feeling, the slow beat of her heart, imagined that he could feel the breeze from her breath. He tentatively took a step back, flashed a glance sideways to see if there was somewhere he could hide, just at the instant that his heel caught his chair and could move no further back to counter his motion. He fell sharply to the hard seat, breasts slamming down the second later and pulling harshly at him, disorienting him. For a second time the 'Eep' escaped him. "Millie?" he heard and felt, sounding like a 45 played on 33. "Are you awake?" He looked up to see the child no closer, but her hand was approaching the room he was in, undefended. A hand with fingers the size of his legs. "No!" he cried out, skating his heels to push his seat as far from that appendage as he could, find the door, get out, his soprano voice going unnoticed if not unnoted. The hand stopped, and immediately retreated to the floor. "Millie, you spoke!" John stopped, and looked up at the eyes again. There was no destructive intent within them, no anger, temper or violence, and he could see deeply into them, truly deeply. All he saw was innocence, excitement, childhood. He softened, as he so often did. This child could not mean harm. Some did, but you knew them already, knew the signs, knew what to look for. At the eight years which she appeared there was only immediacy, and her withdrawn hand instantiated his theory. He decided to speak. "Who-" and then he stopped abruptly, coughed. This voice was high, soft, like the body he was wearing suggested. He tried again. "Who is Millie?" No difference. A mental shrug, and he watched the reaction of the girl for any extraneous motion. She looked confused, stumped, with a cute-girl pout and her eyes screwed up. "Speak more slowly, Millie. You're talking too fast!" John was momentarily taken aback. He was used to, trained to, speak with children. His male ego protested his expertise before he slammed it back down with a practised familiarity that exposed its well-bred contempt. He spoke more slowly. "Who is Millie?" "Wow! Your voice is so tiny! You're Millie, Silly!" That the smile happened yards away could not reduce its terrific intensity. Teeth the size of his feet were bared, rotten with black cavities, if not with intent. John recoiled from the smells that her breath brought him. A nurturing emotion that he knew well rose up from his genuine depths. This child, Gog and Magog be damned, needed help. "And what is your name?" He enunciated. "Tori." She paused. "If you were really Millie you'd know that." John wondered briefly how he should play this. If he was awake, as he'd already proven, then he was in the body of someone called Millie and in the care of a giant child, probably with giant parents close by. Millie, as he'd already determined, was not designed for running, climbing, jumping, or any method of escape. This world and how he'd come to be in it was so far beyond his comprehension that he needed to work with what he could control, and see what developed from there. "Okay. My real name isn't Millie, but you can call me Millie if you like. I don't mind." "Great!" The word was said with an enthusiasm that made it almost childlike, almost an instantly recognisable part of John's world. Could everything else be made to seem the same? "Pleased to meet you, Tori," John said, getting up and tentatively moving his unbalanced, unrestrained body forward in the room and holding out his hand whilst attempting to hold a confident demeanour. He watched as the child raised her hand towards his, and placed a finger into his room, about his chest height. He gripped it with his petite digits like it was a drainpipe and shook it gently before letting go. Tori took her hand back. "You're naked," she observed. John smiled. "I haven't had a chance to get dressed yet." "Can I dress you?" Tori pleaded. "You could choose my clothes for me," suggested John, seeing none immediately available. Tori smiled and looked down into what John presumed was the floor below, and he took the opportunity to look around for stairs. There was a door in his room, open, though he'd have to duck down to move through it, showing a view of a landing, balustrade and stairwell beyond. "Tori," he ventured, "why were you crying?" "Millie, don't be silly." The girl appeared to chant as she started to drop items into John's room. "We have to talk about you like we always do. I want to know what you've been doing all this time that I've been out. I think I like the rainbow skirt and the pink top and the pink jacket and the pink shoes." John perused the pile before him, and carefully crouched down to select the suggested pieces. He turned and placed them onto the bed, then sat on it as it was easier to deal with his body from a sitting position. There was no underwear, a fact which surprised him slightly but then became clearer as he pulled the skirt up over his feet and stood to bring it up around his waist; the clothes were dolls' clothes. The pretty, rainbow skirt was stiff, and fastened at two saucer-sized halves of a standard popper. Not much smaller than his delicate hands he had no strength to push the two sides together and clip the skirt on, and it hung loosely, precariously, on his hips. He sat back down and picked up the crop top. No labels, a rough, stiff material, with a thick weave, a very thick weave, each thread much larger than he was used to. And the jacket, two more poppers, and a thick, heavy 'B' embroidered onto the left breast pocket. John came to the conclusion that he was a doll. How he was a doll was a question still too far. He was a doll, and he was this girl's doll. Recalling his reflection, looking at his own body, and judging by the jacket lettering he was a Barbie doll. The questions that arose began to overwhelm his already confused mind. How long for? How would he eat? Would they miss him at work? What if he was 'Millie' forever? Would they put him on show? Without a string to hang on to he was lost in the turmoil, and the sliding of the door across the deep, gorse carpet sent the blood rushing through his veins as he panicked to stand, deep red departing his head leaving him acutely pale, and he fainted. John thrashed awake suddenly. His throat was dry and his heart pounding in it. A huge hand faded from his imagination as it reached for him, and he sat up to where it had been, gulping in oxygen to calm his frantic mind. Momentarily his perception was askew, his room appearing claustrophobically petite before it balanced out to big enough. John kicked off his blankets and rushed across his apartment to the study, determined to capture every detail of his experience. And yet, as he ran, as dawn lit his objective, he realised that the greatest indicator of the reality of his recollection was that it didn't fade. Dreams dissolved with daylight. He had clarity. He grabbed for a new stenopad and a biro, and girt for battle he began to stencil his case notes. Twenty minutes later he was certain that he had everything that he could garner, and switched to the desktop to open a new folder, 'Tori'. His discipline meant that he answered the core questions as capably as he could, with no extraneous improvisation. The moment he was certain that he'd gathered all those identified notes into the digital safe, he began work on an associated folder, full of his own questions, and, at the moment, very few answers. The top questions were two that preceded large blanks. What was wrong? and, Could he help? Breakfast was toasted, stale bread. Looking through his kitchen John recognised the need for fresh milk and vegetables. After breakfast he showered and shaved. Briefly nervous of looking into the mirror he fortified himself by wrapping his hand about his masculinity before taking the plunge. No shocked blonde returned his gaze. Dressed up for the office he locked up behind him and took the underground. Not so lost in thought that he was ignorant he noted a young, maybe four year old girl opposite him for two stops, making conversation with her doll while her mother wore her commuter face. The scene made him smile as he connected some dots. A young child's imagination was so powerful that there was no borderline between play and reality. To the girl, the doll was alive and taking part in the gossipy chat, probably making snide comments about the man in the chinos and blazer presently watching them. If his consideration was correct, Tori would adapt her worldview to include a living Barbie doll without faltering, and see it as a natural part of the magic in her life. Her parents would dismiss any reporting as fanciful, as they might dismiss any imaginary friend. The scenario he was certain that he had lived was only truly magical to one person, him, and only he maintained the adult perspective that it was impossible. He spent the day in work arming himself in case the event should happen again. He was no therapist, but knew many, some of whom used play therapy, dolls and toys, as a way of trying to get into the mind of the child, and gently bringing out the suppressed issues in an unthreatening environment. Some sat back and watched. Some directed the play. John knew that if he was ever to be so directly involved again that he would have to direct the play in some way, as a living part of it. He found himself wanting to experience the situation again, to be involved, to understand it, and become a part of the child's world. The impact of being a lilliputian had little impact upon him, the dangers a necessary part of helping another. Those dangers had included for him interrupting an exchange to ask for directions, arriving at homes when family members were under the influence, being chased down a stairwell by two dogs, and having a knife held to his throat by a boyfriend suspected of steroid abuse. Entering the dens held fear, but John was about reducing that fear, redirecting it into respect, removing it from vulnerable minds. The fact of being a female did have some impact, however, and though perhaps a necessary part of the mystical scenario, John wondered how the likely disjunct between male mind and female expectations could be resolved, at least to Tori's satisfaction. What would she expect her doll to know, and how could he know that? The final piece of his puzzle that he tried to address in work was the question of Tori. Who was she? He had a description and a single name but that wasn't enough to start a search on any of his systems, if she even existed in the system. Her accent was disguised by the deep, slow manner in which she spoke, an aspect that John considered might be due to his physical size at the time. His ears were likely set at a much higher range of pitch, and his timescale might be skewed by shortened processing times. Was it possible that his much smaller size meant much shorter times to process and act, and therefore everything at Tori's scale seemed slower? Somehow, regardless of his size, he would have to get an idea of Tori's location, and he couldn't be sure whether she would expect her doll to know that kind of detail, much like her comment on him not knowing the doll's name. On his way back out of work to the underground he whistled to himself. Realising, he laughed. He was happy again. A new child, a puzzle to solve, and a new entry route into another's life. The last he might never be able to disclose, should he be thought insane, but if it were real, if Tori truly existed and he wasn't insane, then magic existed in the world, and he could use it to help! He so wanted it to be real, to happen again, and to allow him to prove it real, even if only to himself. The difficulty now was learning how to act like a barbie doll. A true challenge, he considered to himself. He chuckled as he wondered how the women in the office might react if he asked them for pointers! His head swam with new information, names for clothes, names for underwear garments, names for makeup products. An online pop magazine had provided him with some more information on the teen stars that some of the mothers in the office laughed about. He'd almost dropped off listening to local radio but was pleasantly surprised that he had heard many of the songs. He wasn't even confident of what he might be expected to know, but was confident that he would find out. He felt certain that his purpose was to be a friend to Tori, and he would fit that mould, whatever it might be. And so the shift to the doll's house wasn't as disorienting as it had been the night before. John awoke on a bed, quite a hard bed, with rough sheets, but dressed this time. Although dressed was probably a relative term, as he didn't feel dressed, simply loosely covered. The skirt was the rainbow skirt, popper clasped, and a quick check told him that there was no way he was going to be able to undo it. There was a coarse crop-top-like bra covering his chest, elastic holding it tighter under his massive bust yet not constrictingly tight against his chest. The looseness of the bra meant that his breasts swung around within it, the nipples rubbing roughly, causing him some irritation as he moved and forcing them tight and hard like rubber doorstops. A denim jacket hung over the top and it was thick and heavy, and he could barely move his arms and shoulders in it. Sitting, he shrugged it off onto the mattress. "Hi, Millie!" John started on the aitch of 'Hi', but was already focussing on Tori by the em of 'Millie'. He spoke very slowly and clearly, and tried to lower his voice. "Hi, Tori. How are you?" "Where did you go?" John considered his response. "Someone else came into your room. I had to leave. I'm only your secret, you know? Your friend." He stressed the 'your' as much as he could, but didn't know how it would carry. Tori looked disappointed, her slim lips turning down slightly, not the response John was hoping for. "You left," Tori stated flatly. Then in an instant her demeanour changed. "I dressed you!" "Yes!" John smiled back. "Don't you like the jacket? I think it looks cool!" "It does! But it's a bit too heavy for indoors." "Would you like to play house? I'll be mummy and you can be my daughter, Millie." "That sounds good." John smiled brightly, outwardly and inwardly. "What are we doing today?" "Well, Millie, I've decided I'm not going to the gym tonight, so why don't you come downstairs and we'll watch a film?" John scribbled down every note he could as he played and replayed the entire episode through his mind. First they'd talked about a Disney series which he'd never seen but of which he had some referred knowledge. The series was contempary, so John assumed he was living in real time. Then an imaginary visitor had called. Tori had told him to go to the door to see who it was and he had pretended it was the postman asking who lived at the house. John had looked up at Tori and asked, "Who are we?" and Tori had answered, "Say Mrs Collier lives here." "Am I Millie Collier?" John had asked, with an air of affected innocence. "You're just Millie," Tori had replied. "Can I be Millie Collier?" Tori looked a little puzzled. "I might have to ask Mummy." John knew he was onto a winner with that one. Tori Collier would be the first thing he would be looking up in the databases at work. After that the game had continued until Tori decided that Millie had to go to bed. "Mummy," he had asked, "can I get some new clothes?" Tori had been quite happy with the question as she pulled into bed. She slept in the light, which John guessed she did for comfort, the dark being full of fears, and finally he returned to his own dawn. There were issues, and after taking his objective notes, John began his subjective ones. Being a pure beginner at therapy John knew that he could throw many ideas at the target but few of them would stick. It was likely that elements of Tori's play were reflections on reality, and elements were reflections on fantasy. He considered that spending time together was an element of fantasy, or a rarely realised event. Whenever Tori needed something she had sent Millie to do it, suggesting that Tori herself was both forced to, and capable of, providing for herself. As an extension of this it was possible that Tori occasionally cared for her mother, a situation often seen in negligence cases. The reason that this might be was hard to surmise. The potential reasons for such a situation extended from disability, through impairment, injury, illness, into base neglect through laziness, ignorance, spite, and out into the realms of addiction and abuse. Even the later reasons could come from a temporary mental instability such as stress or depression, and be treatable, resulting in an improvement in the child's situation, and the parent's. So John investigated the potential cases in the office. There were a number of Colliers being supported nationwide. In many cases a child was involved, but none were directly identified as a Tori or a Victoria. Few indeed could be indirectly identified as being Tori, eliminated through age range or other identifying features. Neither did he have enough information to identify any of the supporting characters, or the details of the case. As impressed as he had been by his detective work, John had to admit to himself that he had done nowhere near enough. He smiled with slight embarassment as he thought about another incident of not doing nearly enough. Tori had passed him a pair of shoes, to walk around the house in. They were plastic, completely flat soled inside, and high heeled. A plastic buckle was supposed to hold them on his ankles, but he had realised from the moment that his weight fell down onto his toes, slipping down inside the shoes, that there was no way he would be able to stand up straight in them, let alone walk. He managed to slip them off quickly, suffering only minor protest from Tori, who was obviously used to her doll wearing such shoes. He knew that Tori would eventually get her way - he'd have to allow her to get her way - so some practice in heels was required. He wondered if there was a local drag queen who could give him some lessons. John watched the adverts come on and sighed. He looked down at the insane shoes that he was wearing, and eased himself up onto them. The rise onto them was always the problem. There was no grace. He could see why women offered their hand to their partners in pubs and clubs. The first stumble there would always be into a willing person's arms, and be passed off as intentional. John had realised early on that regular arising was impossible, and that the feet had to be turned sideways and the backside slid forward to allow the leverage to rise. He wondered on the impact of the types of tight skirts that women tended to wear around the office, which kept their knees close together. Would they perhaps be a hindrance or a help? The insane shoes were clogs with chunky heels over three inches high. Clogs seemed to best replicate the hard, plastic heels that were all that was available in the dollhouse. Those heels weren't stilettoes either, a fact for which John was exceptionally grateful. At least the wider heels allowed a stable surface to balance on. He headed into the hall and began his procession of walks to the door and back, for the duration of the commercial break. His back was aching slightly, his calves were aching a lot. There was a tension across his backside that felt like he was trying to avoid a gentle case of diarrhoea. He tried to step slowly, shortly and surely, avoiding the strides of his usual manner. This was certainly not a comfortable exercise. It was intriguing, in many ways that John reflected upon. The shorter steps made him feel somewhat like catwalk models that he could imagine in his mind. Even in the privacy of his own apartment he felt embarassed to throw his shoulders back in the way that they did, but he could smile at himself imitating them, lightening the load of embarassment. Likewise his steps appeared to swing in as he tried to maintain his balance, and this made him think of the sway of a woman as she crossed the floor. He tried rocking his hips, again getting the feeling of showing himself up, but again could smile as he struck fabulously camp poses before each turn. Why he might be embarassed to act up in the surety of his own hallway and yet comfortable in the grossly feminine body of a doll in the presence of a young girl he had no idea. It was the wonder on which he fell asleep that evening. And when he woke up the next morning it was not having had the chance to investigate the situation. Instead of fair memories of play and investigation he creaked his aching legs out of his own bed and into his own world. This went on for a few more nights. John was not entranced to become Millie. He wasn't sure how he felt about that. There were new cases appearing on his desk that needed his time and attention. But he was distracted by the fact that there was a girl out there who needed him, and somehow brought him to her side, even as he didn't yet perceive what that need was. In his mind he decided that she would reveal this in time, and that it was likely that he only appeared with her when she really needed him, so she was safe right now. This relaxed him, but not enough to allow him to devote himself to his day job. It was the puzzle of getting her to reveal her need which occupied him, and he convinced himself that the way to do this was to become Millie completely enough that she would befriend him and trust him. He didn't consider that becoming Millie involved a change to his way of thinking. As far as he was concerned the majority of work in becoming Millie was in doing; walking, talking, dressing, playing. So he concentrated on knowledge about what women did. Over the few days, and mostly from charity shops, he collected a small female wardrobe, to get him comfortable in his doing. He allowed himself to get dragged into the banter in the coffee room in the office, especially when there were mothers involved. He tried to glean what they were interested in, and information about raising children, especially daughters, yet often felt somewhat more the subject of the conversation than a party to it. He felt that it was his own involvement that was at fault. Women didn't talk about different things when men were around, they just talked differently about them. He knew that men did the same, trying to involve a woman who showed interest into their own conversations. He dismissed it as unimportant, yet determined to understand what it was that the women were talking about, so that he could more naturally engage in their conversations. For this purpose magazines and papers were useful and interesting. John found it easy to research and read, and had an appetite for knowledge. Even so, it was easier to read a computer manual than it was to suffer articles on 'How To' for women. Did they really always rely so heavily on directions? Were they so reluctant to simply get their hands dirty? He wasn't ready to awaken on the floor of the dollhouse. He picked himself up with some awkwardness and effort, cursing the weight on his chest and his flimsy arms. He was facing the back of whichever room he was in, and turned around. As he did so he winced, suddenly recalling the stretch and rebound as his huge breasts wobbled to catch up with him and the overbalancing impact that would have as he stopped, yet no such activity occurred, just a pull on his left shoulder as the weight shifted. He looked down and raised his hands up to feel at the same time. He was wearing a bra! It felt rough in spots, was a little loose closer to his chin, but seemed to hold him firmly below and up to the nipples. Those seemed much more in his face. His hands at that moment hit the smooth, firm lump below his breasts against his chest and he realised that the bra was underwired somehow. He looked across for the dressing table mirror, but didn't see it. He appeared to be in the living room. So he couldn't see himself in the bra. He reached around to the centre of his back, where the thick strap ran, and looked for a clasp, but couldn't feel one. The thick piece of elastic seemed to stretch smoothly around most of his back. He reached up to the shoulder straps, also thick, and also elastic, but couldn't find a way of loosening them or undoing them. As they were elastic he guessed he might be able to slip the bra off over his head, but only if he needed to. At the moment it was a boon, and quite comfortable in holding him together. He wasn't wearing knickers. That made him a bit too underdressed for his comfort and he didn't want to appear in front of Tori like this. He could hear her in bed, but couldn't see her, so decided to try to quietly find some clothing before she got up to investigate. A quick perusal of the room he was in showed nothing, so he went through the hallway and headed up the stairs to the bedroom. There he found no underwear, but a beautifully lightweight skirt that seemed to be created like a saree. It was a near rectangle of some kind of thick silk, though he realised that it might be very delicate silk to anyone not doll-sized. The 'top' of the rectangle had some panels cut, angled in and then sewn together with some rough stitching. At the very top of this work the material had been folded back over a rope that appeared to be three threads of cotton plaited together. The 'rope' was light but very strong to John's pull, and long, ending in two rough plastic pearls about the size of ping-pong balls. He wrapped the material around him like a towel around his waist, then passed the rope belt around again before loosely knotting it off at his side. The angled top meant that the shape fit around his waist and over his hips, falling down almost straight over his legs. It was an excellent, if rough, design, and he admired it in the long bedroom mirror. It made his waist appear to taper more gradually into his hips, and his legs appear slim and long, which they were. The pearls on the belt, it seemed to him obvious now, must be balls of glue, an imaginative and decorative way of making the belt! Whoever had made this skirt, tailored as it was for a doll yet intended for doll rather than human hands, was quite ingenious. All doll clothes were designed for humans to put on and take off. In general they were loose fitting and had no purpose other than coverage and looking right. As John had discovered with the denim jacket, they were often too heavy for the proportional human to wear. And yet, who would think of this? Only one person knew that their doll had experienced discomfort from their clothing, and an inability to operate the clasps that required human strength. Only one person presumably had a doll that came alive. Assuming that Tori had not told anyone else of her experience, though any child might, only she would know that her doll needed new and different clothes. There might be specialist outlets selling properly proportional clothing for Barbie Dolls, but what was the likelihood of Tori visiting them, let alone being able to purchase? These again were elements of her life that John did not yet know. As it was, his deductions could only allow him to assume that Tori had made his new clothes herself. He was impressed. "Do you like the skirt?" He swung around suddenly to find Tori in bed, observing him. He hadn't been as stealthy as he thought. "I love the skirt," he squeaked, forgetting that he had to speak more slowly and deeply. He started again. "It's a lovely skirt. Did you make it?" She beamed brightly. "Yes. I took one of the shirts that Mummy was going to wash out of the basket because I heard her say that the man was never coming back again, and she sometimes sells their stuff if they leave any. It was a really nice material, silk, and it was really light so I thought you'd like it. I haven't finished your top yet because it's a lot more fiddly, so you'll have to use the clothes you have if you want to wear something." "I'm not sure you should have taken the shirt, Tori," John said carefully. "Won't your mother miss it?" "She won't miss it." She seemed so sure, John remarked, almost throwing away the comment. He marked it as something to explore, but put it aside not wanting to seem too involved or interested. "How did you make this bra?" he asked, pointing obviously to the underwire, a true feat of engineering for a young girl. "I copied one of Mummy's old ones. It got broken and I wondered what it was made of and Mummy told me that when girls grow they need bras to support them and that it's made to support your boobs. She has big bras because she told me that the hospital made hers bigger when I was still a little girl. There was a spring inside a pen and I used it for the cups on yours and then shaped it around you. It's so good that you're a doll most of the time and then you're real because I can use you like a model and then everything fits you when you're alive. Isn't it so cool?" "It's more than cool, Tori. The work you've done is amazing. Well done!" "Ooh," she flustered, "don't start talking like my teacher!" John leapt in. "Where do you go to school? Who is your teacher?" "Miss Doberforce. I go to St Dunstan's. Do dolls have schools? Did you go to school before Mummy brought you?" John smiled brightly at the thoroughly naive line of questioning. "Of course dolls have schools, and I did go to one, though we don't go to school for very long. Dolls are made in toy factories along with many other toys, and we don't have long before we're all sent to the shops to be bought by loving children. We learn how to be the toys we are, and how to love our children." "You don't learn maths? I want to be a toy." "Some toys know maths. Some toys, but only very few, know lots of stuff. They're very special toys, who can talk and play with their children, like you and me." Tori frowned in thought. "I saw Toy Story and toys only come alive when children can't see them. Woody was very special and he knew a lot. Why couldn't he play with children?" "I don't know Woody. I only know you. Maybe it's because you're special that I come alive to play with you?" Tori considered that. Then, "I want to finish your top. Will you be my model? Have you got any makeup? Models need makeup and I can do your hair for you." "Okay. I'd like that." Little girls like to dress up as big girls. The phrase ran through John's mind, a thought trying to become a perception, trying to become... what? John jabbed his pencil onto his defenseless notepad only for the point to snap, proving that the sword also had its place. He had enjoyed his time with Tori, helping her fashion a halter top that matched the skirt. She knew exactly what she wanted to achieve, and had shaped her initial thoughts into the final material until it clung tightly to his chest, tightly but not restrictively. The bottom of the garment was cleverly and minutely manipulated, and he had no idea of where she discovered the concept. She'd first hung the garment loosely over him, allowing it to drop as a loose vest, camisole like, he thought. Then having cut a carefully considered set of tiny triangles out of the bottom, leaving a zigzagged, toothed edge, she'd extracted the elastic from the orignal top which he had worn and looped it into the pointed bottoms of the teeth. John's petite fingers were much better suited to fastening the loops, using a single strand pulled from a cotton thread, which he was able to work through the seams of the silk and tie off each side of each tooth. The result was the top opened when the elastic was pulled, and closed underneath his bust as the elastic sprang back to size. It was ingenious. And the modelling as it came together was enjoyable, Tori wanting to see every movement in the material. Yet she seemed...strict?...as he modelled. He had to wear the heeled shoes, had to toe a line that she drew on his floor, had to sway, wiggle, and pirouette. She pulled his hair into strange creations, and brought tiny amounts of scraped lipstick and foundation, and rocks of blush powder into his bedroom for him to sand and paint himself with. Was this her experience? Was she just a doll for beauty pageants, for some deprived mother living life vicariously through the exploits of her child? But no, the teeth, the clothing, the care. It didn't add up. In work John threw himself at the database, daring it this time to deny his detection skills. But it did. No child of St Dunstan's was registered, not St, Saint, Santa, zero. Online there were many St Dunstan's, probably one per county, a high count for the country, enforcing a slow, seditious telephone search as he allowed his newer cases to lay fallow. His supervisor knew his ways, but John knew he wasn't only undermining his obligatory caseload, he was undermining the families in there, so he restricted his conversations with school secretaries as much as he could. And then there were his extra- curricular conversations with colleagues covering childhood behaviours. Coffee breaks became investigations into the exploits of young daughters and their mimicry of their mothers. It wasn't a subject that his colleagues were likely to think odd, as all caseworkers covered all forms of family, even though efforts were made to assign on a gender basis. More often what happened was female caseworkers getting single parents, mothers and fathers, as couples tended to provide a masculine element of uncertainty which it was assumed male caseworkers were better equipped to deal with. John asking to understand the world of a young girl was not out of place, but he was careful not to overstep his mark. It took three days before he encountered a school secretary who could refer him to a Miss Doberforce, and who by prevarication inferred the existence of a Tori Collier. John didn't press his credentials, which he was sure would evince the confirmation of her attendance. Instead he sat back on his success, waiting, contemplating his next move. He armed himself with information. The town, the local council office, any contacts he could find there in childcare and social work. Tori was across the country from him, hundreds of miles away, hours of driving, and yet he met with her in the blink of a dream. Sobbing. John sat up, got up, and walked straight to the front of the bedroom only to find the housefront closed to him. He looked through a plastic window but couldn't see Tori in her bed. He called but she couldn't hear him or paid no attention, though he imagined his mouse-pitched peeps would be inaudible through the wood, blanket and tears. He ran down to the front door and managed to push it open, then swore in pain as he placed his barefoot onto the gorse bristles of the carpet. Carefully stepping back he went to retrieve shoes, heels, and tried again. He was uncertain underfoot, the combination of heels and having to tread on three inch high spiked rope making him uneasy. A slip, a fall, could cause him serious damage. He called for Tori, and finally she heard him, shifting to look over the edge of her bed at her Barbie tentatively approaching. She reached down a hand. John was worried. She could crush him with a mistaken grip, drop him from twenty feet onto the brambles, or just hit him over with two hundredweight of lower arm. He sat on her palm, and tried to relax as she lifted him onto her bed. She let him down, onto her duvet, soft, yes, but rough like a towel. John looked at the sniffling giant. "What's wrong, Tori?" "I wanted to play with Katy. Mummy told me to stay in here so her boyfriend tonight wouldn't see me. I'm hungry." "Why don't you go to get something to eat?" "Mummy's asleep and I mustn't wake her." John recognised the issue. Mummy had probably lost her temper at least once in the past due to being disturbed. A drunken mother, a mother coming down, an ill mother, a depressed mother, even a mother at that strange time of the month could lose her rag. Usually it was more than once before a child became frightened to disturb her parent. And internalised, as 'I mustn't wake her', as though Tori took it to be her fault if she was woken. That was the sign that parenting was becoming punishment. John couldn't wonder at the source of such tempers, but he could see the symptoms. "Would you like to play with me?" Tori's face brightened to a near smile. John looked through the notes on his computer. He smiled to himself as he saw the casenotes unfold on the Colliers. He'd called through to the contacts in the council offices there and had a local woman make preliminary investigations into the family which had opened into a minor case. Tori's mother, Julie, had dependence issues and a string of boyfriends who took advantage of it. Surprising to John was that Tori herself appeared to have no issues other than mild negligence of her health and hygiene, though the officer did note a slight social awkwardness manifesting in school. The facts that seemed to present themselves were of a simple yet necessary case, where intervention perhaps interrupted progress towards something worse. Nothing special, John considered. And yet it was. Of course it was. It was the most special case he'd ever been involved in. He closed his link to the folder. It wasn't his, and though cross- referencing was a common method of research, his access to the case would be noted somewhere, he was sure. He could not be found to be too involved. He sat back and wondered about Tori. Since he'd called in the case, since his last visit to her, he hadn't seen her again. There was that little niggle in the back of his mind, the itch he couldn't scratch, that she was still somehow unreal, fictional. Could he maybe drive over to her address one day and just look from across the road, check that his little girl was safe and sound, and that her mother was coping? No, he knew that he couldn't. This was another child that he had to let go. Everytime there was a happiness with a success, and a sadness of withdrawal. When you did right by the child, by the family, you had to turn away, say goodbye. That was why you couldn't get too involved, shouldn't get too involved, in case at each closure you left a piece of yourself behind. John knew he would have a piece of Tori with him in return though. He would never, ever be able to forget the magic of visiting her as her doll. Everything was wrong, everything felt wrong, everything was dangerous, but it was his gateway to being with her. He occasionally stared at the heels in his closet with fondness. Not lust, envy, or desire, just fondness. He set to his caseload with a resigned, but smiling, sigh. John slumped. Once more the tipple of cheap alcohol had befuddled his late work and Dionysius had handed him over to Hypnos for care. He roused before his head hit the doodles, drawn of dancing maidens, nymphs, his thoughts bending to golden memories of Serena, her sufference of his strange ways and cares now ended. Two years. Two years she had been the light of his life, prospects of settling together, marriage and family now tilted into the wastebasket of his life. Evenings in Eden now ended. Nights of careless abandon, abandoned. But that was his curse, that there was never abandon, and never was he free of care. Maybe she had wanted his children, but never all of his children, nor his image of the perfect family. Had he really tried to mould her, to make her the mother that he thought she should be, rather than the woman she wanted? It was so easy at first, so simple to entrance her, not that he ever considered that he was doing so. For he knew so much, was so understanding of her and her ways. He shared her likes and dislikes well, was a man that she could connect with. A marvel that he could be so unlike the men she had known, so in touch, so committed. Eventually she shared with him that he simply wasn't enough of a man for her. Serena. How could that be true, that he wasn't enough of a man? He earned, drove, shared and played. He took her, and she was taken by him. But she grew weary of his care. Was it a softness to love someone and want to be with them for always. Or were real men those who didn't wish to love so much? Surely she didn't want abuse? She wanted her own life and he gave it to her. Was it a sin then that he started to want her only for himself and to be the loving part of a family who would keep her for themselves? He didn't understand. Perhaps he couldn't understand. How could she not want to be a wife, mother, and lover? She could be, he knew that, and she would be, for him, but then she decided that lover came first, and he, soft, gentle, understanding he, was no longer that lover for her. Sleep, again, came with difficulty. Waking was a shock. Memories flooded back. John knew exactly where he was and he wasn't in John. He was sat, legs straight out in front, on a hard, wooden floor, back to a cold wall. He was dressed, a long pair of loose trousers running down his legs to the customary heeled shoes. His breasts were supported and covered by a light material, then overlaid with a thick, woolen sweater that felt like it stopped above his midriff. His hair was hanging down loosely, front and back. He looked to his left, and brushed his hair aside to reveal a large, possibly tin, box about three feet away. To his right was a wardrobe, plastic and decently sized, and therefore no doubt for a doll, him. Carefully, noting a ledge near his feet, he stood up. Over the edge the floor was about twenty feet down, though it wasn't a floor but a bed. Regardless of the softness of the landing, a three storey drop was not a distance he wanted to test his level of destructability on. But there, at the other end of the cavernous room, looking out of the window, with her back to him, was a girl. Was it Tori? He had no idea. If anything this girl was taller and slimmer than the young giant he used to know. But she would be thirteen by now, Tori, so the height and shape would be different. The hair was similar, but much longer. Could it be? If it wasn't, then he wasn't Millie. But he must be here for a reason. The magic hadn't worked for years, but he knew it eventually would again, and he was happy that it had. He would take a risk. "Tori!" he shouted. The girl turned in surprise. He noted her face, her shocked features. Still young, still childish, yet in the throes of maturity. She had a spot on her chin, breasts, quite reasonable ones, long, coltish legs. But it was Tori, still his favourite case, and quite a success if the family case notes were to be believed. "Millie?" she growled with a tone of disbelief. "Millie, is that you?" John waved, and Tori came towards him. Her eyes were red, but she was smiling brightly. "I started thinking you were a dream." She greeted John. "You were there for me when things were sometimes bad, the way I remember them. Things got better. I wanted you there though. It's so weird. You're here now, alive! Are you really a doll? Am I dreaming?" "You're not dreaming. At least I don't think so, unless I'm dreaming too." Tori laughed, uneasily. John continued. "It's a nice dream." "Are you really a doll? I mean, like, are you Millie, come to life, or are you something else?" She approached much closer to him, and then asked "would you like to come down?" John demurred. He didn't wish to be held in Tori's giant hands, and on the positive side he was able to look down on her from the shelf. Tori sat on her bed, looking up. "I don't know if I can tell you." He began. "I've never been told the rules for this. All I guess is that I come here to help you." "Help me? I..." Tori shook her head. "I don't need help. Oh, but, yeah, you can help!" She smiled brightly and clapped her hands. "Gimme a sec!" She leapt to the floor and pulled a long strip of wood out from under the bed. She threw her duvet back and placed the strip onto the mattress. Then she rummaged around in the doll house under the window and brought out a dressing table which she placed at one end of the strip. She reached up next to John and took down the wardrobe, placing it open next to the dressing table. John could see it was actually full of clothes. Finally she put her hands up towards John, either side, like she was about to pick up a baby. "I need you down here." She explained. John held his arms out and allowed Millie to lower him the breathtaking distance to the mattress. "Right," she explained. "This is like a proper Milan show. I'll pick out the outfits and you can model them on the catwalk. Oh, I've been so looking forward to this! I've done it with you so many times you should be, like, natural!" John and Tori had a good time together. John remembered how to do the makeup, Tori did his hair, and he strutted up and down the strip in the outfits Tori picked out for him. The clothes were amazing in their fit and detail, and John was truly impressed. Tori had obviously spent a lot of time with Millie, and loved the fact that she had really come alive to display them. They chatted, especially when John was 'backstage' and Tori told him about her school, her friends, issues with boyfriends and her girlfriends, and how her mum was getting along now. She would be getting married soon, and Tori had a stepbrother and a stepsister with whom she got along okay. She missed her mum because she spent so much more time with her fiance, yet life was really coming together. But she didn't like how boys were getting, and appeared to be losing a few of her older, boy friends because of 'changes'. "They're so different!" She complained numerous times. So many appeared to ignore her, and she was definitely a pretty child now, with decent teeth, John noted. She seemed confused about something, but John couldn't put his finger on it at all. "Don't worry," was his simple message to her. Girls go through big changes and boys go through changes too. He spoke from experience, though it was long ago. "Eventually they get along just fine together. There's a learning period boys, girls, and parents need to go through. For now, be yourself." Tori smiled brightly at that. Back on the farm John smiled to himself. He checked Tori's family case notes again and surreptitiously scheduled a checkup from his local contact for the new family. "Be yourself." He remembered, and shrugged at the advice. If Serena couldn't accept him as he was then she wasn't the woman for him. He had families out there to care for and they were his priorities. He did admit to himself that it still hurt, to be left behind, single again. But not lonely. No, he had Tori in his thoughts and plenty of people in his life. If only there were a way to go back, a way to enjoy the fun that Tori engendered, to live life playfully again, yet still he was aware of his responsibilities. He wanted to do what he was doing, to guide people through life. He simply wished he had a child like Tori, accepting, open, clever, skilled. Her fashion creations were no longer limited to dolls, he hoped, as he wondered with her whether she couldn't design her own bridesmaid's dress, and whether she could ask her mother for help with buying materials and tools of the trade. This time John wondered why he didn't visit again. He had no doubt that something was troubling his magically-found charge. The sorcery he expected in sleep slipped away with the evenings passing, and he guessed that his advice had settled any issues. Free of any obligations however he was able to take time to himself and travel cross country. He tested the bounds of his ethics by driving to Tori's town and spending a day. He looked up the address, the house, and saw it populated and quiet, settled in the summer sun. Satisfied that he'd done enough he skirted the city centre and then entered in on foot. He found a small town to his liking, equipped and unhurried, beautifully architected and pleasantly historic. Sampling a coffee and cake in a street cafe he suddenly noted the back of a girl, walking away from him, tentatively accepting the hand of a taller boy who was smiling at her. She turned her head slightly and he caught the smile back. It was her, he was sure. He sighed, and sipped the bitter liquid. Sometimes life just deals you a hand that you can do nothing with. The economic climate hit the public sector hard, and sacrifices had to be made. John was told that he was one of the lucky ones, given a choice of voluntary redundancy or a risky period moving into a role that no longer dealt directly with the outside world. Push a pen across a desk or take the money. Retirement was still a few years away, a few good years and a good few years. His would be a very decent redundancy package if he chose to take it, so he did. There were other jobs out there, other roles, and he could still make a difference. The money would mean his debts to financial society were paid, and perhaps he could take up a hobby. The platitudes weren't patronising, but endearing. On his last day in the office John's manager made a speech that she'd obviously worked on for quite some time. He was overwhelmed by the generosity of his co-workers, many of whom he'd known for many years, grown up with in the department. The entire office took early leave and took him out, making sure he enjoyed their final night together. He perhaps hadn't realised how many friends he had, how many of the younger men and women looked up to his experience, how many of the older women looked at him as a friend. There were few older men at his level in social care. Perhaps that was a reason they thought he might want to go. But after his first day at home, nursing a hangover, it all came crashing in on him. His life in care might be over. He wished he could see Tori to say goodbye. "I was expecting you," she said as she watched her doll open her eyes. "What?!" squeaked John, the tiny tinniness of his voice surprising him once more. He looked at her. Seventeen? He guessed, but it should be a good guess. She should be three months past her seventeenth birthday if this whole magnificent bewitchment worked in real time. She was, by any mean standard, beautiful. Her hair, dark, chocolate brown, melted across her shoulders. Her skin was clear and fresh, any trace of teenaged spots washed away, save perhaps a tiny scar above her right eyebrow and a stubbornness of black sprinkled at the tip of her nose. Above that a motley collection of pale freckles suggested recent time in the sun, and underswept her brown eyes. She was still a skinny teenager, with the width of waist that could only exist in the memories of mature women. There was a nose stud, and earrings, no doubt a belly piercing too somewhere under her painted, fashion tee. Hiphugger jeans were artfully printed onto her legs. Her feet, vertiginously far below, were bare but for a toe ring. "I knew you were coming. I...I was upset," she stammered. "And I wished you'd come!" "Upset? About what?" John was looking almost eye to eye with Tori. Standing up on the shelf he could avoid looking up her nose if she came closer. Reflexively he cocked a hip and ran a hand through his long hair as he settled. Tori turned, and looked towards the window. "Simon left Mum. He took Callum and Jayne. I was talking to a friend about it. She, well, she was understanding, but then..." "But then what?" John called to the distant back. She turned around to face him. Her smile was resigned. "I kissed her." She shrugged. John's hackles rose until they were stood on end. His entire body froze over with goosebumps. The blood from his pale face dropped into his stomach. Years of training, of empathy, of sympathy, came to the fore. Was this why he had to help Tori? If everything led to this point, how was he qualified to help? All the experience of a man, in a doll's body? "Why, uh, no, well, um, what did she do?" "She pushed me away. She spat and wiped her mouth. She looked like she was going to hit me." "Did she?" Tori sighed. "No. I guess, well, no, it was worse than that. She, like, calmed down. I thought she was going to scream something, but she calmed down and then, like, it was soft, and easy. She says to me 'Are you a lesbian?' and I was just scared of answering her. I didn't even move. Then she says 'I'm not and I don't think you are, but if you are we can't be friends that way'. Then she waited." "What did you tell her?" "I told her I wasn't." "Are you?" John waited. "Do you think you might be?" Tori looked at him, and slowly nodded. "Wow," mouthed John. Then he had a sudden fit of giggles at a stray thought. Tori looked askance. He noted the look. He sat down, and invited Tori by gesture to sit also. He moved his