The Inspiration
M arie Iida
Maggie Jacques was an inch and a quarter tall. Her husband, Theo, was taller by half an inch, and this
extra height gave him the authority to decide that the world was too dangerous for Maggie to face alone. On
the day Maggie made up her mind to go out alone for the first time in her married life, she opened a hatch
in the floor of her home that connected to an abandoned rat’s tunnel. A string of battery-operated Christmas
lights, a fortuitous find during one of Maggie and Theo’s past scavenging trips, glowed inside. Maggie threw a
long cloth ladder into the tunnel and began to climb down.
For the last four years, Maggie and Theo had lived inside the kitchen cupboard of a trendy Los
Feliz bungalow. Neal and Shanae, the young owners of the bungalow, were the size of ordinary humans who
roamed the earth, and they had no clue that if they were to dislodge the crown molding at the top of their
kitchen cupboard, they would find Theo and Maggie inside, sipping tea or having breakfast. This secret living
arrangement worked so well that Theo finally felt safe enough to leave Maggie while he embarked on the
most important mission for a husband: securing an animal as a means of travel. Most men of his size, if they
survived the hunt at all, came home with a domesticated cockroach or mouse; the boldest among them
returned astride lizards and garden snakes. Theo, a proud and confident man, aspired toward the latter. Mag-
gie insisted until the morning of his departure that he should take her along, but Theo only smiled, kissed his
wife, and told her that her place was at home, where she would be safe.
Before he left, Theo equipped Maggie with plenty of food and supplies, ensuring her survival until his
return. He had prepared for everything. Everything, Maggie realized, save for this unexpected turn of events
that she now faced alone. After entering the tunnel in the cupboard and climbing down the length of the wall,
Maggie reached the ground. A vast expanse of tessellated tiles lay open before her as she peered outside.
Maggie tightened the straps of her favorite yellow clogs and stepped out into Neal and Shanae’s kitchen.
Maggie could hear Neal snoring as she crossed through kitchen and into the living room. When she
neared the couch, she saw the tip of his nose, and cavernous mouth beneath, hanging half open. His socked
feet were piled over the armrest. Stupid giant, Maggie thought as she hurried past him. No wonder Shanae
left him.
Shanae and Neal broke up two days after Theo left on his hunt. Maggie watched from the cupboard
as Shanae, dragging a suitcase behind her, stormed out the front door. A few days later, when it became clear
that Shane was not coming home, Neal began to throw out her clothes, books, plants and records, anything
that represented her taste. Maggie could only see into the kitchen and the living room from her cupboard, but
she could hear Neal wreaking havoc on the other rooms with his vacuum and trash bags. Maggie was
particularly concerned with the state of Shanae’s bathroom, from where she and Theo regularly stole useful
knickknacks, like dollops of Vaseline, hair pins, and elastic bands. Maggie knew she had to act before Neal
threw away everything precious away from their home.
When Maggie crawled beneath the bathroom door, however, she discovered she was too late—all the
colors and charms of Shanae’s bathroom were gone. Shanae’s bathroom used to be a pink-tiled green house,
crawling with devil’s ivy and electric blue orchids, where shimmery beaded curtains dripped over the
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Cauldron Anthology