A/N: I guess this one isn't technically a drabble because it's over one thousand words. Oh well, it's still short.

So apparently I headcanon Susie and Sammy as a "smol and tol" pair. I'm not usually drawn in by that kind of thing but it works for them and I think it turned out pretty cute (they're allowed to be cute here because this scene takes place before things started going crazy at the studio).

TW for this chapter: Susie has some body image issues. It's really a lighthearted chapter, though.

Enjoy!


Sammy's first thought when he met her had been that her figure would never read well on a movie screen. Must be why she turned to voice acting, he'd guessed as Joey guided her away to meet the rest of her new coworkers. Susie Campbell was not a large girl (quite tiny, in fact – standing she only came up to Sammy's chest), but she more than filled out her dress. Her arms and legs were thick, and even though her chest was ample enough, her narrow shoulders and straight hips denied her the hourglass shape that had made so many of the day's more bosomy starlets.

Of course, Sammy did not care for the day's starlets. Miss Campbell was far more appealing to him. He only wished he'd expressed that to her in a better way than he had.

Susie was in what was at that point still a break room, reviewing her lines and chewing on a pencil. She was on her feet in seconds when Sammy stuck his head in to ask if she was busy. "Not at all, Mr. Lawrence!" she said in that sweet, chirpy voice of hers.

He bit down on the inside of his lip to hold in his smile. "Excellent. Henry needs some assistance and I told him you're the perfect girl for the job."

She followed happily, with just the slightest bit of concern. "Henry who?"

"You'll recognize him."


"So, Boris has followed Bendy to a barn dance. He's looking for Bendy when he gets caught up dancing with a young lady, the gag being that she's half his size." Henry leaned against his drafting table and rubbed his eye, already exhausted. "Think you can do that, Susie?"

Susie giggled. "You're Boris?" she said, looking at Sammy.

Sammy grumbled and nodded. "Yes. Every time" He was tall and lanky and wore suspenders every day and as punishment, the animators had made him their go-to Boris reference. They'd stopped asking him why he wasn't eating sandwiches at lunch, but it was still humiliating.

"That's sweet," said Susie genuinely.

Sammy had to press his lips together to keep the corners of his mouth from ticking up. "This had better not take long, Henry," he said tersely.

"Just a few sketches to get the proportions right," promised Henry. He straightened up his papers and readied his pencil. "Okay… could you get into position like you're about to start dancing?"

Sammy stood awkwardly still, and was about to demand more instructions from Henry when he felt a small hand slide into his. Susie laced their fingers together as she stepped in close. She had to stand on her tiptoes to place her hand on his shoulder, and as she reached, she pressed her chest flush against him. Sammy could feel her breasts rising and falling as she breathed. They definitely looked ridiculous as dance partners, but wasn't why he was blushing.

"Mr. Lawrence? You need to put your hand on my waist."

"Right," he said. She sounded flirtatious. He hoped she was.

They stayed in that pose for a while as Henry, ever the perfectionist, gradually captured their outlines on his paper. Susie almost lost her balance a minute in, but Sammy caught her and, reflexively, tightened his hold on her so she wouldn't fall again. She looked up at him and whispered, "Thanks," and the intimacy of the moment made a cozy warmth spread throughout his body.

"Call me Sammy," he whispered without thinking. "I'm your colleague, not your chemistry teacher."

A mischievous smile crept across Susie's face. "Really?" she said, scrunching her nose up adorably. That decided it: yes, she was flirting with him, and yes, this was the girl he would marry. He suddenly no longer cared how long Henry kept them busy.

They did two more poses for him. One was to illustrate Boris twirling the girl away from him, and Susie further endeared herself to Sammy with the way her skirt swirled around her knees as she spun. The other – and Henry's chuckle when he said this was not appreciated – had the girl pulling Boris down to her level to kiss him on the nose. Of course, since Sammy didn't have a wolf's snout, Susie just mimed kissing the air in front of him. The sight of her delicate pursed lips hovering inches away from his while her hands clutched his suspenders tempted him to say Screw you, Henry and go for it, but he was professional enough to wait until there were no animators present.

"That'll be it," Henry said finally, dropping his pencil and stretching out his wrist with an audible click.

Susie sighed as she let Sammy's suspenders snap back to him. "Oh, that was fun. Wasn't it, Sammy?" she said, patting him teasingly on the arm. Sammy realized at that moment that he had been holding his breath. He could only nod in response, which made her giggle. She batted at his chest before turning to Henry. "Can I see them?"

The animator raised an eyebrow. "Um… I suppose so?" He turned the drafting table out slightly so she could join him.

Sammy didn't give a crap about Henry's doodles –he knew they would just be a collection of vaguely person-shaped ovals with animal ears tacked on, and on any other day the animation wouldn't matter to him until it was a finished product he could score. But this girl and her charming grin lured him over to the table. He still wanted to be near her and see what she saw, and unfortunately, this meant that they both spotted it at the same time. It wasn't one of an animator's standard ovals. At the front of the shorter figure's head, Henry had drawn what was clearly a pig's snout.

Sammy's stomach twisted as the image sunk in. He shut his eyes and grit his teeth. He hadn't known, Jesus Christ, he hadn't known…

"This is what I'd be 'perfect' for." Susie's voice had gotten very quiet and choked up. When Sammy got the nerve to open his eyes again, she was looking at her shoes, her smile quickly fading. "Well. At least I know what you really think."

Even running away, she was enchanting. Sammy cursed when she as out of earshot and slammed a fist against the drafting table. "A pig, Henry? Are you kidding me?"

"It's a barnyard scene, Sammy," said Henry, already back to drawing. "It was either this or a cow." He was looking away from Sammy sheepishly. Good. At least he realized how far he had set him back.

When he met with Susie later to record, her eyes were glimmering and tinged with red. She kept her arms crossed over her round stomach as she sang, and it pained Sammy to see her so self-conscious. He knew that he could make it better by telling her just how perfect he thought she was – not as a movie star, not as a cartoon, just as a wholly perfect woman. But he didn't say it. He was afraid now that she wouldn't believe him.


A/N: Ouch, Sammy, you really shot yourself in the foot there, didn't you?

I like to imagine that Alice's obsession with making herself beautiful stems partially from Susie's own negative body image. It gives her a little more depth, I think; the villainess whose only characteristic is vanity is kind of a boring one.