Wasp Boy
DISCLAIMER: I hope it comes without saying that this scene is purely fictional. The smallest waist of a person with a normal stature in the documented history was 33 cm (13 inch) recorded on Ethel Granger (UK, 1905-82).
Early 20th century. Hunger. Depression. Little kids ready to do any hard work for a piece of bread. Permanent stress makes even the adults crave for wonder. Cinema and circus become increasingly popular, people spend a whole day's salary on a ticket to a different world. The evergrowing demand determines supply and, in order to increase their income, circus owners oblige their performers to work harder and harder toward taking their bodies to the extremes with a cheerful smile on their faces and making people believe that even wonders are possible through hard work.
The recent change of fashion caused by the advance in medicine slowly shifts the art of tight-lacing into the category of oddities. Year by year corsets disappear from everyday's wear and following the voice of newspapers, the unthinking majority starts seeing overly tiny waists as freaky rather than fashionable. The tight leash that men of the past centuries put around the woman's waist is now released but some people still keep the strange addiction to the sight of the deformed human body, and as per the new economic law, demand determines supply.
Brothers Jim and John Hoods were born in a poor family but lived fairly well up to the days of Great Depression when their parents deceased within just a couple of months after losing their jobs as well as all hope. Knowing not what to do, the brothers went around the city trying to find any food at all. The streets were suffocating and crowdy but perfectly clean of anything edible. Soon they ended up near a circus tent and saw a man and a woman on the stage performing an act of a freaky nature, to the gasps of the crowd the man would squeeze the woman's tummy with a belt, tightening it to the size of her neck, the woman however would smile wide while her internals would seemingly have to be in a worse state than squished tomatoes. After releasing the belt the woman did several skillful acrobatic postures, assuring the crowd that she never felt better after basically destroying her entire digestion system.
By sheer accident, John got to talk to the performers some time after the show. The woman seemed like a nice person and seeing that the brothers are starving, she shared a bit of her food with them, explaining that she doesn't need that much anyway, and mentioned that it's an oddity that such a handsome and slender boy as Jim, and John with his athletic build, are sniffing dirt in the streets instead of entertaining people on the stage and making pretty good money. A couple of months later the brothers were ready for their first serious performance. The woman gave Jim a thousand and one tip about proper breathing, digestion and all kinds of massages. The man helped John build a lacing machine that was fairly light and easily to use and transport. The four of them became very good friends but as soon as the brothers succeeded on the stage, they had to be sent out to a different tent to avoid showing similar acts in the same part of the city.
Jim seemed to have been born with a very unique talent for tight-lacing and learned to do things that could make a person faint just looking at him doing it. They derived several ideas for their act from nature and other performers, something they invented on their own. And so, this is how the Wasp Boy act was born... ^^