Chapter Text
📘 Chapter 1 – Bonjour, Littleton
It all started out fine—too fine, even.
The late August sun was just beginning to fade behind the narrow horizon of Littleton, Massachusetts as the train pulled into the modest station. The air buzzed with a sleepy, small-town calm. Birds chirped in the maple trees, wind tickled hanging flower baskets, and crickets started their evening rhythm. It smelled faintly of pine and cinnamon, like the town itself had been tucked inside a handmade sachet.
Louis Dupain-Cheng Agreste stepped off the train with a suitcase in one hand and a duffel bag slung over the other shoulder. His black boots crunched against the gravel path as he took in the sight before him—rows of brick buildings, an ice cream stand still open, a bike shop with its door propped ajar.
It was different from Paris. Very different.
Still, it felt... peaceful.
“Louis!” a voice called out.
He turned toward the sound and spotted a smiling middle-aged woman with a camera bag and warm brown curls pulled into a messy bun. Beside her stood a lanky man with wire-rim glasses and a tucked-in shirt that looked two sizes too big. And between them—
A girl.
Blonde. Around his age. Holding a bright purple welcome sign with bubble letters that read “Bienvenue, Louis!” decorated with stickers, glitter, and one precariously attached googly eye.
She grinned wide enough to rival the horizon. “Hi! I’m Polly!”
He raised an eyebrow, his lips quirking. “You made this?”
“I had help,” she admitted, laughing as the sign drooped. “But yes.”
“Impressive,” he said, with a polite nod. “I’m Louis. It’s nice to meet you.”
He extended a hand.
She took it—firm grip, surprisingly strong. “Let’s get you outta this train station. You’ve got a whole American high school to survive.”
Behind her, the woman smiled warmly. “I’m Pamela Pocket, Polly’s mom. And this is Peter, my husband. We’re so happy you’re here.”
“Merci,” Louis said automatically. “I’m happy to be here.”
He wasn’t lying. Exactly.
Just... not telling the full truth either.
The ride back to the Pocket house was filled with questions—nothing invasive, just the usual “what do you like to eat?”, “do you have siblings?”, and “what do you want to get out of your year abroad?”
Louis gave safe answers. He talked about his love for fencing and photography. He said he was excited to experience the U.S. school system (not a complete lie). He smiled when Polly asked if Paris really did have the best croissants and nodded solemnly when Pamela reminded him their family dinners could get “a little loud.”
But inside, a strange tension curled around his ribs.
He had a secret. Several, actually.
And something about Polly’s bright curiosity made him feel like he was standing under a spotlight.
The Pocket house wasn’t large, but it was lively. Cozy. The walls were full of family photos and framed crayon art. A chubby dog named Peaches barked excitedly before tumbling over herself to greet him. Upstairs, Polly showed him the guest room, which smelled faintly of lavender and was decorated with glow-in-the-dark stars.
That night, over spaghetti and salad, Pamela asked Louis about his parents.
“They’re designers,” he said. “They run a fashion house in Paris.”
“Like, real designers?” Polly’s eyes widened. “That’s so cool. Are they famous?”
“Some people know them,” Louis said, keeping his voice neutral.
He didn’t mention their names. He never did if he could help it.
After dinner, Polly offered to walk with him to the backyard, where the late summer fireflies flickered lazily under a pale moon.
“Your accent’s not super strong,” she said as they walked along the gravel path. “Most exchange students I’ve met sound way more... I don’t know. French.”
He gave a half-smile. “I was raised bilingual.”
“Well, you’re lucky. I’ve been trying to learn French for like... ever.”
“Say something.”
She blinked. “Like what?”
“Anything. I’ll tell you how bad it is.”
She laughed. “Okay. Uhh... Je suis une... banane?”
Louis snorted. “You just told me you’re a banana.”
“Well,” she shrugged, “I do like potassium.”
They both laughed. The air between them lightened.
They walked until they reached a small bench near the back fence. The trees swayed gently. Louis looked up at the stars.
Polly followed his gaze. “We don’t have an Eiffel Tower or anything fancy, but we’ve got space and sky.”
“I like it,” he said quietly. “It’s... quieter than Paris.”
“Quieter’s good,” Polly said. “Especially when you’ve got secrets.”
Louis glanced at her then. “You mean...?”
She grinned again—wide, knowing, a little mischievous. “Let’s just say... Littleton might surprise you.”
Before he could respond, she stood up and dusted off her jeans. “You’ll see soon.”
The next morning, Louis stepped into Littleton Junior High with a fresh backpack and a dozen eyes on him.
Being new was one thing. Being from Paris was another.
Polly, ever the social meteor, helped soften the blow. She introduced him to nearly everyone, including her two best friends: a fashionable redhead with bold eyeliner named Lila Draper, and a calm, soft-spoken girl with wireframe glasses named Shani Smith.
“Lila’s our trend expert,” Polly explained, “and Shani is basically a genius.”
Shani offered a small nod. “Don’t believe her. I just like science.”
“Did she tell you she built a secret hot tub?” Lila added, elbowing her.
“Lila!”
Louis raised a brow. “Wait, is that true?”
Shani sighed. “Technically yes, but it’s not a hot tub hot tub—it’s a thermal steam bath using geothermal principles I learned from an online course.”
“She’s humble,” Polly whispered.
Louis found himself smiling again.
They made an odd group, but they felt... real. Not fake, not performative. Just genuine.
That afternoon, the four of them hung out at Polly’s house, sharing snacks and trading stories. Polly told them how she once got stuck in a treehouse while tiny (whatever that meant), and Louis shared a sanitized version of how he once accidentally set off a museum alarm in Paris.
They laughed, teased, and took selfies with Peaches the dog until the sun began to set.
And just before he left, Polly nudged his shoulder and whispered:
“Tomorrow. I’ll show you something... magical.”
The next morning came early.
Louis had barely adjusted to the time zone. His body felt like it was still stuck in Paris traffic, and his brain hadn’t quite accepted that school started at 7:25 A.M. in Littleton. He stood in front of the mirror in his guest bathroom, trying to get his hair to fall into something resembling effortless cool—not that he cared. Not really. But the guy in the mirror looked like he was trying to be okay. That was enough.
Downstairs, Pamela had made waffles. Polly, already halfway through hers, gave him a sleepy wave with her fork.
“First full day. You ready?” she asked through a mouthful.
“Sure,” he said, grabbing a plate. “As ready as a sleep-deprived exchange student can be.”
“Eat up. You’ll need your strength.” She winked. “Today might get interesting.”
By second period, Louis was starting to realize just how different American middle school was.
The classrooms were brighter. The teachers more casual. There were more posters on the walls—some about kindness, others about the solar system, one awkwardly positioned above the pencil sharpener that read NO BULLYING ALLOWED. Most of the kids wore jeans and sneakers. One wore a Pikachu hoodie with pride. Another passed Louis in the hall and whispered “bonjour” with an exaggerated French accent.
He didn’t correct him.
He also didn’t miss the way Polly smiled at everyone as they walked, like she carried sunlight in her back pocket. She wasn’t just popular—she was known. Loved, even. Not in a shallow way, but the kind people noticed.
She walked him to lunch, where Shani and Lila were already seated near the courtyard windows, splitting a container of strawberries.
“Tell him the weird thing about Tuesdays,” Polly said, sliding into her seat.
“Don’t say it,” Lila warned.
Shani lifted an eyebrow. “You mean the cafeteria chili?”
Polly grinned. “Yes. Never eat the chili.”
Louis stared at his tray. “So... this?”
“Poison,” all three girls said in unison.
He slid it aside.
Lunch passed in a breeze. They talked about weekend plans, the upcoming school dance, a new sci-fi show Shani was binging. Louis found himself listening more than speaking—not out of shyness, but because it felt rare to watch people talk like this. Honest. Comfortable. Unfiltered.
In Paris, everything was... filtered. Measured. Especially for him.
Here, it was just kids being kids. For now.
That night, Louis sat by the window in his guest room, legs folded underneath him, a spiral-bound sketchbook in his lap. He hadn’t drawn in weeks. Maybe longer. He tried sketching Polly, but her smile was hard to pin down. It wasn’t just lips and teeth—it was movement. Energy. A spark that flickered before every idea, every joke, every surprise.
He gave up on the face and started sketching Peaches instead.
There was a knock at the door.
“Come in,” he called.
Polly peeked in, barefoot and wrapped in a big hoodie. “You busy?”
“No.”
She stepped inside and shut the door gently. “I figured we could talk.”
Louis tilted his head. “About?”
She leaned against the edge of the bed, arms crossed. “You asked me earlier what I meant about surprises.”
“I remember.”
“Well...” She paused, then smirked slightly. “What would you say if I told you magic was real?”
Louis blinked. “I’d say you either believe in fairy tales... or you’re testing me.”
Polly gave a tiny nod. “Fair enough.”
“I mean, I’ve seen... unusual things,” he said carefully. “Paris has its moments.”
“Oh? Like what?”
He hesitated. “Let’s just say... I’m good at keeping secrets.”
For the first time, Polly looked serious. Like something important was behind her usual sparkle.
“Okay,” she said. “Then maybe... tomorrow after school. I’ll show you something.”
He held her gaze. “Magic?”
“Sort of.” She smiled faintly. “You’ll have to see it to believe it.”
In the morning, Louis noticed something small but odd.
The locket.
It hung around Polly’s neck, silver with a tiny heart etched into its center. Nothing extravagant. But he could’ve sworn it wasn’t there yesterday.
She wore it tucked under her shirt like a habit. Like it had weight. Like it wasn’t jewelry, but armor.
He didn’t ask about it.
Not yet.
The school day blurred by, though Polly seemed distracted. Shani noticed first and gave her a quiet look. Polly shrugged it off, whispering something about “a surprise later” under her breath.
“Surprises?” Lila asked, sipping a smoothie. “Polly, last time you said that, we ended up in a canoe with three raccoons.”
“Hey, they needed help crossing the pond!”
“Sure, but one of them stole my lip gloss.”
Louis tried not to laugh but failed.
After the final bell, Polly waited by the lockers, bouncing slightly on her heels. “You ready?” she asked Louis.
“Always.”
They took the long way home—through the woods behind the school, past a rusted-out tire swing and an old stone well. Polly didn’t speak much. Neither did he. The air was cool and smelled faintly of cedar and damp leaves.
Finally, she stopped in front of a mossy tree stump.
“I need you to promise something,” she said.
Louis tilted his head. “Okay.”
“Whatever you see—you don’t tell anyone.”
He nodded slowly. “I already said I’m good at secrets.”
She gave him a sharp look. “Even from your parents?”
His throat tightened. “Especially from them.”
Polly took a breath. Reached into her hoodie pocket. Pulled out the locket.
Then, in one smooth motion, she opened it—click.
A warm, violet light spilled out. There was no flash, no dramatic explosion. Just a hum. A shimmering glow. A pulse of energy like a heartbeat from the center of the world.
And then—
The world stretched.
Everything around them ballooned in size. The leaves turned into walls. Twigs became tree trunks. Ants scurried by, suddenly massive. The tree stump they stood by now towered like a fortress.
Polly Pocket and Louis Agreste were now four inches tall.
Louis blinked. Once. Twice.
His eyes darted from Polly to his surroundings, trying to make sense of what had just happened. The stump beside them now towered overhead like a gothic castle, casting long shadows across the moss. The grass swayed above them like jungle vines, and even a ladybug buzzing nearby sounded like a motorcycle.
He turned to Polly, whose hoodie now hung awkwardly on her tiny shoulders.
“What just happened?” he asked, in a voice higher and smaller than he expected.
Polly grinned. “Welcome to my world.”
“I’m dreaming,” Louis said. “I fell asleep on the bus. Or I’m hallucinating. There’s no way we’re actually—”
“Four inches tall? We are.” Polly stepped across a pebble the size of a dinner plate. “It’s real. It’s weird. And it’s kinda awesome.”
She started walking, motioning for him to follow. “Come on. You haven’t really seen Littleton until you’ve seen it like this.”
Still dazed, Louis followed. Each step made his legs ache slightly differently—like gravity had shifted. Polly moved confidently, navigating the oversized terrain with ease. She pushed aside a blade of grass like it was a curtain and revealed a narrow tunnel made of leaves and twigs.
“What is this?” he asked, still spinning.
“One of my shortcut trails. Leads straight to my backyard. Took Shani and me a month to build it.”
Louis stared at the leaf-covered path. “You built a... micro-highway?”
“Yep. And that’s just the start.”
The journey through Polly’s “tiny town” was something out of a fantasy novel. Polly led Louis beneath a bent dandelion she called “the umbrella tree,” across a pencil-bridge made of popsicle sticks and glue, and through an old birdhouse she had converted into a kind of hideout—complete with scraps of paper and glitter tape for wallpaper.
At one point, she tugged his arm and pointed to a tiny plastic Jeep parked beside a stack of marbles.
“Shani made it. Remote-controlled. We use it to haul Peaches’ snacks when we’re small.”
“You do this often?” he asked, wide-eyed.
“Pretty much daily.”
“And no one knows?”
She shook her head. “Just Shani and Lila. And now... you.”
Louis exhaled slowly, processing everything.
The surrealness of it all. The absurdity.
But also—how calm she was.
Confident. Capable.
He’d met other girls before—some from school, some from high-profile galas his parents dragged him to. But none like Polly.
None who showed him a glowing locket and shrunk him down to the size of a toy without flinching.
None who laughed as they balanced on a pine needle bridge over a garden stream, teasing him when he stumbled.
None who kept secrets as heavy as magic without being crushed by them.
They stopped at a resting point under a cluster of mushrooms that looked like umbrellas, catching their breath.
“Okay,” Louis finally said, brushing moss from his pants. “So... that locket. What is it, exactly?”
“It belonged to my grandma. Penelope. She passed it on to me a couple years ago,” Polly said, voice softening. “It lets me shrink. And whoever I’m holding onto when I open it... shrinks too.”
“And the light?”
“Pockite energy,” she explained. “It’s ancient, but it lives in the crystal inside the locket. There’s more to it—Shani could go into the science—but basically, it works because I believe it should.”
Louis tilted his head. “That sounds... dangerous.”
“It can be.” Her eyes met his. “That’s why I don’t tell people.”
He paused. “So why tell me?”
Polly hesitated. Then: “I don’t know. You just... felt like someone who’d understand.”
He stared at her for a long second. Something shifted in his chest.
A small truth—not loud, not huge, but quietly meaningful—settled inside him.
“I do,” he said. “I do understand.”
She smiled then. Genuinely. No mischief. No mask.
“Good.”
As the sun began to dip, casting long shadows across Polly’s backyard, they stood beneath the birdbath, now enormous above them. She pulled the locket from under her hoodie and held it between them.
“You ready to go back?” she asked.
He nodded. “Yeah. But... I don’t think I’ll ever see the world the same way again.”
With a soft laugh, she opened the locket.
Click.
In a flash of violet, they grew back to normal size. The world shrank around them.
Louis stumbled slightly but caught himself.
“Still standing,” he muttered.
Polly gave him a quick thumbs-up.
They didn’t say much as they walked inside. Pamela was finishing dinner. Peaches barked twice and then flopped onto the rug, satisfied.
At the dinner table, Polly kept stealing glances at Louis.
He caught her once.
She didn’t look away.
That night, as Louis lay in bed, he stared at the glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling.
He’d come to Littleton thinking he’d just be an ordinary student for a year.
Low profile. New country. A break from the legacy that haunted his name in Paris.
Instead, by Day Two, he’d been shrunk, befriended by a girl with magic in her necklace, and trusted with a secret heavier than most people could carry.
And somehow... he didn’t feel afraid.
He felt alive.