Hi! I'm Charlotte Playroom. This is much easier than my profile because Zachary - ouch I mean Zach is writing as I tell him. I am a borrower, which is a tiny person who borrows things from humans. We are about 1 inch equals one foot to people, and I am four inches tall. I am 13. Borrowers only borrow small objects like postage stamps, pins, paper clips, blotting paper, darning needles, needles, unraveled socks….. It goes on and on. We don't take huge things, but we need to eat and survive too. Borrowers are terrified of human beans. Cover is anything we use to hide, and without cover, a borrower is as good as dead. But…. There is a problem with me…. I was caught without cover, and I'm not dead. I can never go back to my old life, and now it's still scary. Even now I'm at the mercy of the human beans. Better get started, Zachary OUCH sorry Zach, is angry with me for stalling…
I guess it started when I ran away from my aunt again. She's not really my aunt but I have to call her that. I left the Playroom and headed down the stairs by sliding (I can't really describe it but there is this thin slanted space in between the stairs and banister, and I can slide down it but my "aunt" is too fat.) And then headed outside by riding the overly fat cat. Yeah, it's risky, but the fat cat is so fat and couldn't hunt if it wanted to. Seriously, she's this big fluffy ginger Persian named Snookums. Yes, Snookums. Anyway Snookums has two inches of fluff, has amber eyes, is unrealistically fat, and has a gigantic green bow around her neck. I tamed her with anchovies, patience, and several near death experiences. Snookums is allowed on the porch so she let me off there. Then I headed for the tiny fish pond in the human beans' backyard. I liked to sit on the marble bricks around the perimeter of the pond and think about really escaping, maybe to another house or a different part of the big old one I lived in now. Then some boys from the nearby houses came to play in the big yard. Mrs. Pluff, the mistress of the big old house never lets them near the fish pond. Well, I didn't know that Mrs. Pluff wasn't there today. She was out shopping and had left the house for a few hours. So the boys there had heard that and were equipped and ready to catch the frogs and tadpoles that lived in the goldfish pond. They longed to do this every day and Mrs. Pluff never let them. Today she was gone. Well, did I mention the equipment? I mean tiny handheld nets, big nets, nets made out of pillowcases and hangers, small or big nets tied to broomsticks for long reaching, glass jars, a long necked bottle with a cork, and even a tin soap dish. I realized with relief the jars had air holes. The boys raced for the pond, and I tried to think what to do. I was exposed on the open marble blocks, no cover, where I could be ….. Seen. I couldn't go in the grass, surely I'd be trampled, I'd be seen if I stayed where I was , and there was no way I'd survive the fishpond if I tried to swim… but then I saw a twig nearby and dragged it into the water, pushed gently, and then dived in . I surfaced, gasping, and threw my arms around the stick, cursing the ridiculous pink dress that my aunt had made me. Then the boys came. They were loud, earth shaking, and terrifying. All of them started searching for tadpoles and frogs. I counted seven boys. It wouldn't be long before one of them saw me. At first they didn't. Then they caught a particularly large bullfrog, and delighted in making it croak. One of the boys got bored and started scanning the fish pond for tadpoles. He saw me. He looked like he was about to call to the other boys, but leaned in closer and stopped. He slowly reached down and picked up the small net tied to a broomstick. I guess he picked the small one because there was no way I could slip through the super fine mesh. He never took his eyes off me once. He leaned out with the broomstick, and I screwed my eyes shut in terror. He snagged me up in seconds. He drew the net closer the lifted me up in a very undignified way by the back of the skirt of my dress. He squinted, peered at me closely, then said, "Well, I'll be…." very softly. He turned me 'round, and then grabbed the long necked bottle and quickly walked a distance away from the other boys, now intent on divvying up frog's eggs. The boy plopped down on the grass. He let go of my skirt and I fell into his open palm. He examined me closely, and I realized what he was seeing. Four inch tall girl, obviously, but with minute bare feet, soggy, puffy pink dress complete with petticoats, red curls that clashed horribly with the dress, and green eyes. He murmured softly," Wow," then said, "Hello. My name is Mark. Do you speak English?" as if he was talking to a person who was quite touched in the head.
"Yes, I do, thank you very much," I said angrily, despite the fact that I was terrified.
"What is your name?" he asked.
"Charlotte. And I would thank you very kindly if you would let me go! " I yelled, taking a few strides towards the edge of his hand. The boy, evidently Mark, laughed. "I don't think so," he said, and grabbed me in his fist. He took up the bottle in his free hand. "You wouldn't dare," I said weakly. "Oh, I would. " he said. Then inserted my feet into the bottle and let go. I plopped down in the bottom of the bottle. I can talk to you from in there. But I don't want to. Hope you like fairs. " I didn't understand this last comment yet.
He walked for a bit, but he finally came to his house. He walked straight up to his sister's room, or what was evidently his sister's room. He grabbed a green dress even more ridiculous than the one I had then took a teeny hair brush and teeny hair ribbons. He sat on the floor and put me in the ridiculous dress, then forcefully brushed and beribboned my hair. After that he ran outside and took what looked like an old lemonade stand from the shed. He flipped over the sign that read "Lemonade- $0.05" and wrote instead " Real Live Thumbelina! Only five cents a view!" and put it back on the stand. He took a box, turned it on its side, and put a curtain over it. He put me in my bottle inside, then wheeled the cart up to the fair. Sorry, I have to go. Zach wants me to stop, and I am at the mercy of the human beans….. at their mercy…
