Jim’s mind raced. What would he say to his sister? He wanted anything but to have her know the truth, but he realized that any lie would just cause him more trouble in the long run.
“Judy,” he said.
His 9-year-old sister looked surprised. “How did you know my name?” she asked.
He gulped and replied, “Because I’m actually your brother, Jim.”
Judy looked confused at first, and then she smiled and laughed.
“What is this?” she asked. “Some kind of joke? Did Jim tell you to say that to me when I came in?”
“No! No, Judy, it’s true,” he squeaked.
She stood up and called out to the room, “Okay, Jim, where are you hiding? You got me on camera right now, right? Well, it’s not funny.” Then, she looked back down at the toddler below her. “And, who’s the kid, anyway?”
“Judy, please believe me!” he said. “It’s really me, Jim. I know it sounds impossible, but I got transformed into a little boy.”
She smirked at him. “You sure are good, kid. I mean, you could be an actor, and you even look a bit like Jim.” She crouched down in front of him again. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll play along. If you’re Jim, then tell me something only he would know.”
Jim wracked his brains for a memory that would convince her. “Oh!” he said. “I know! When you were seven and we were on vacation, we all went diving, but you refused to go into the water. I picked up some seashells while I was diving, but after we got back to the hotel, you stole a few of them from my bag. I told Mom and Dad that you should give them back, but they just said that I should share with you. Later that night, I called you a brat and said that I wouldn’t let you play with any of my things anymore.”
As she listened, Judy’s eyes went wide, first at hearing such a young boy speak so fluently and second at hearing him say something only her brother would know.
“Jim?” she asked. “Is that really you?”
“YES!” he shrieked.
“This is… amazing,” she said. “I mean… How did this happen?”
Jim told her everything about how he found the shop in the mall and the old man who sold him the balloon. He told her about how it worked and what he had done with it already. Then, he blushed and told her about how he had ended up as a toddler.
After hearing the last part, Judy looked down at him and chuckled. Jim could only frown back up at her. It was an embarrassing enough situation without his little sister laughing at him.
“Oh,” she said. “Don’t start pouting. It’s funny. And, you are such a cute ‘widdle baby.”
She pinched his cheek.
Jim pushed her hand away weakly with his own little hand and said, “Cut it out! It’s not funny, and I’m not a baby! Just get the balloon and turn me back!”
Judy just gasped in mock outrage. “How rude!” she said. “Is that any way to treat your big sis?”
Jim sighed, this was too much. “You’re not my big sis,” he said. “And…” But he was cut off before he could finish when his sister grabbed him under the arm pits with her huge hands and lifted him off the ground.
“Whoa, you’re so light now!”
“Judy! P-Put me down!” he said, panicked. This is just like her, he thought. A brat as usual! I’m in trouble and she’s making it worse!
She held him high above her head and smiled at his worried face. “Well,” she said. “Could your little sis do this?”
“N-No,” he stammered as he worried about falling the seemingly great distance to the floor.
“So, I’m your big sis then? Right?”
“R-Right. S-Sure.”
“Good,” she said apparently satisfied with his obedient reply. “I’m glad we agree on that now.” She roughly plopped him down butt-first onto his bed. She sat down heavily next to him and picked up the instructions for the balloon. Jim stared up at her as she read them quietly to herself. He was too afraid to speak now. She was so huge, and he worried what she might do next.
“So,” she said to herself. “It just takes a name and a type of change? Easy enough.”
“W-Wait a minute,” he said, but Judy ignored him. She stood up, grabbed the chair from his desk, and positioned in front of the bookcase under the balloon. She climbed up on it and stretched her arm high up until she had the balloon in her fingers.
After hopping down to the floor and walking back to the bed, she stared at the balloon and mused to herself, “So this is the balloon? Huh? Seems pretty ordinary.”
“JUDY!” he shouted, frantically. “PLEASE! Just blow some air into it! Turn me back to normal!”
Judy looked back at him as if she had forgotten he was there, and then an idea came to her and she smiled an evil grin. She held the balloon out to him and said, “Here, how about you do it for yourself?”
Jim looked at her suspiciously. What was she up to? he wondered. Still, he quickly grabbed the balloon, put it to his lips, and blew…
…and nothing happened. Only a little air made it into the balloon, but he could not blow hard enough to inflate it. Desperately, he tried again and again, huffing and puffing, over and over. But, either his small hands were too weak to hold the balloon firmly enough to his mouth, or his lips were too tiny to cover the opening. Whatever the reason, no matter how hard he tried, he could not get it to inflate!
Finally, after blowing the balloon clear out of his fingers, his sister picked it up again and wiped his spit off of it on his bedspread.
“Well,” she said, smirking. “Looks like it’s my balloon now, seeing as you can’t use it anymore. You were too careless, Jimmy… too much of a… a baby. And, now, that’s all you are, an itty bitty baby.”
Feeling mortified and out of breath from all the blowing, he stammered, “Puh-Please… Judy… Just… t-turn me… back… I’ll do… anything… for you.” His eyes teared up. “Please… don’t leave me like this.”
She didn’t even look at him. She just stared at the balloon. “I could have a lot of fun with this,” she said. “And, I’d be a lot more careful with it than you were.”
She rotated the deflated balloon in her fingers as she thought about the situation. Would she show him some mercy or leave him as the toddler he had made himself?
What would she do now?