The Doll

The Doll

It was dark. So very dark. Too dark to see, and the silence. Oh, that terrible silence, nothing to hear. Nothing at all. There we lay, piled on top of each other, in what I could only assume was a box. The others, nothing but broken plastic and torn cloth bodies, peeling paint and matted hair. Clearly nothing special about them. No, I could see how someone could just toss them away, but me? How could they just leave me out here in this box, with these broken, useless toys? Hadn't they known there was something special about me? Something to hold on to? Something important! No. I'd been left behind too, like the others. I can't say how long we sat in that box. Days, weeks, months? It felt like an eternity, and I know all about eternities. An eternity of dark silence. That was, until the day I was found.

It was a cold, crisp autumn day, that I could tell. I was lying inside the box, in the same pile of broken toys, when I heard a noise. It had been so long since I had heard anything, that at first, I couldn't figure out what the noise was. It was the sound of old, rusty hinges. A door had been pushed inward, its hinges squealing in protest. They must not have been moved for a long time. Then came the sound of footsteps on old, wooden floorboards. These creaked, sounding as if they might give way at any moment. A shuffling sound, the box rocked, and then, for the first time in what felt like forever, there was light! Oh, and a face. The face of a little girl peered down into the box where I lay and she smiled. The girl took up the box. I felt it shake us all up in our pile and left the...shack. Yes, it was a shack. An old, broken-down shack in the middle of a dense wood. That is where we had all been left. “Look, Mama. Look what I found,” the little girl said, shaking up the box again as she lifted it to show a woman. The woman, tall, thin with thick curls, bent her head to peer in at us much like her daughter had, though she frowned. “Can I keep them, Mama?”

“Where did you find these things? They're all broken, not to mention filthy.” The woman poked a hand into the box, sort of pushing us around to look at each of us. “All right, but they'll have to be cleaned when we get home.” The box was put into the back seat of a car, the woman strapped the little girl in beside us, and away we drove.

I had no idea where we might be going, but I was overjoyed to be going somewhere! Somewhere far away from that cold, empty shack. Someplace with the little girl. When the car stopped moving and the door opened, the mother took the box inside. She sat us on a table. From my place in the box, all I could see was a white ceiling, but I could hear the mother and daughter moving about within the house. The mother came back not long after, took up our box and moved us to another room. Just as she had said to her daughter, she cleaned us. Each of us. As best as she could. She was careful of peeling paint and broken limbs. She even took the time to restitch those with tears in their cloth bodies. The little girl, who I learned was called Emily, was excited to take us to her room. All four of us. She set us up in little chairs and played a game of tea with us. Emily, unlike her mother and unlike the woman who left us in that box in the woods, knew there was something special about me!

“More tea, Lizzie?” she asked. Emily poured more tea from her plastic kettle into the little plastic cup with its pink paint and yellow flowers set upon the table in front of me.

“Emily, it's time for bed!” the little girl's mother called before she appeared in the bedroom door. Emily's mother helped her to bed, but when Emily tried to take me, her mother stopped her.

“You don't want to take that old thing to bed with you.” She handed Emily a stuffed cat, placing me up on a shelf in a bookcase across the room. She tucked Emily in, kissed her forehead and, left the

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room. I was grateful for what Emily's mother had done for me, but I wasn't going to stand for being left up on a shelf when Emily clearly wanted me to be with her! I began to shake the bookcase. Everything rattled. Books and trinkets hit the floor. Emily rolled over in bed, her glance aimed at the rattling bookcase. I watched as she got out of bed and came over to where I sat upon the shelf. She took me down, retreating back to the bed to sleep for the night. With me, of course. Where I should have been all along.

I woke the next morning to find Emily getting ready for school. Her mother rushed around the house. She made Emily dress, made her breakfast and out the door they went. When Emily's mother returned, Emily wasn't with her. I lay upon the bed, where I had been left until I heard her come home. Unsure of what to do with myself, and not wanting to be left alone again, I got down from the bed. I slid from beneath the covers and landed upon the floor with a small thud. I toddled my way across the room and out into the hall. The hall was long, or it seemed long to me, and my feet mad little tap-tap sounds as I hurried along over the hard, polished wood. This place was nothing like that old shed, thank goodness. It was bright, clean and warm. Up ahead I heard a sound, like chair legs sliding across the floor. Quickly I stopped and slumped against the wall. Emily's mother's head peered out from around the corner. She frowned when she saw me.

“How did you get out here?” Emily's mother picked me up. She turned me over a couple of times as if she were looking for something. She seemed satisfied when she found nothing, setting me on a small table that sat in the hall, the same one she had left our box on the day before. She returned to the room she came out of, leaving me alone once more. She didn't seem to get it. I didn't want to be left alone. I began to rattle the table. It was small, light, made of polished wood. It rattled easily, it's legs rocking against the hardwood floor. I rattled the table until I fell off, landing on the floor once more. Emily's mother must have heard the rocking, as she came rushing out of the side room. She looked alarmed, taking me up from the floor yet again. Her frown returned as she looked at me. I knew I was beginning to scare her at that point, but I was tired of being left alone! Couldn't she see that?

Emily's mother took me down the hall to the kitchen. She set me in the cardboard box that we had been left in, abandoned in the shack, and closed the lid. I watched as she folded them, the way the woman had before her. She must have left the room after that, as I heard her fading footsteps disappear down the hall. Much like the bookcase and the small, wooden table in the hall, I rattled the box. Unlike before, though, the tightly closed lid kept me inside. Why did she keep doing this to me? I wasn't hurting anyone.

I am not sure how long at that time I had to sit in that box. Everything had gone so quiet, I assumed I had been left in the house alone. I occasionally rattled the box I was being contained in, but, as before, I was stuck inside. After a time, I heard Emily and her mother return. They entered the kitchen, someone, who I could only assume was Emily, sat at the table. There was a clatter of varies sounds and small conversation between the pair, but no one removed me from the box. The pair must have been going about their evening. I waited to be let out of the box. I could be patient for a little while.

“Where is Lizzie, Mama?” Finally, Emily had asked for me!

“Who is Lizzie, love?” her mother asked in return.

“The little doll.” Emily's mother didn't reply, but removed me from the box, with the same frown she had looked me over with earlier that day, and handed me down to Emily. Emily hugged me, her expression the complete opposite of her mother's. Emily looked ready for bed, and she and her mother settled down on the sofa in front of the television to watch TV. It wasn't long before Emily had fallen asleep, me in her arms. A ring came from the phone nearby, Emily's mother answered it.

“You don't understand. This thing is weird. It came out of Emily's room all on its own. I found it in the hallway! When I put it on the table, I found it on the floor. I swear I can hear little feet scurrying about the house too. No, no. Emily is fine. She loves that creepy thing... All right, hun. Drive safe. Love you too...” There was a click as the conversation ended, the phone replaced on its receiver. Emily's mother returned to her seat on the sofa beside Emily and I, but she was no longer really paying attention to the television. I saw her. She'd glance over at me out of the corner of her eye. Her anxiety was growing, though I couldn't have said why. As she turned to look at me straight on, I thought it would be a good idea to reassure her that there was nothing wrong. So, I turned my head to face her as well, blinking once. I admit my joints had been a little worse for wear at the time, a little creaky, but there was no reason for the shrill scream that rose out of Emily's mother! She leapt off the sofa as Emily woke from her sleep.

“Emily, give me that doll,” her mother said, fear written all over her face. Emily looked at her in sleepy confusion. When Emily didn't act, her mother came for me. I, at this time, had had about enough of this. I leaped from Emily's arms onto the floor, taking off across the living room. With another shriek of fear, she came after me. Furniture hit the floor as she toppled small end tables. Grabbing a wicker chair I had tried to hide behind, she thrust it at a nearby window. The chair flew from the room with a rain of glass. She tried for me again, but I was small and far more nimble, avoiding her outstretched hands. Pillows, trinkets, furniture. Whatever she could grab went sailing out that broken window as Emily watched in horror. I tried to get away, but I was suddenly cornered. I was the last item to go out that window that night.

When I hit the cold ground in the yard below, I saw flashing lights. Someone, a neighbor probably, must have heard all the commotion and had called the police. There was a car in the driveway and a man at the door. No one was watching. I stood. Looking up at the window, I was saddened to leave Emily but knew I would not be welcomed back into that house. Before anyone could come looking for me, I snuck off. I could find another little girl like Emily to play with. It couldn't be that hard.