It's funny.
Not funny as in comical, or light-hearted, but dark and odd and bitter like the burnt skin of a roasted nut. The memory of that flavor makes me gag. Or is it other memories that close my throat and cause the reflex?
It's dark.
It's always been dark. The memories play like a movie and then somewhere, someone unseen presses the remote, and the screen goes dark. And it's a relief. Because some movies shouldn't have an ending that is revisited, over and over and over. Some movies should just be silent, and in black and white, and then just black. Blissfully black.
Though, the actors were in technicolor. The movie might be muted for the benefit of the present audience, but there was sound at the time of its recording. Hushed, under the cover of night, but it was there, and it was real, and it was horror.
I thought that only little girls played with dollies. But in secret, old men like them too. They take them, and break them.
For reasons that only the mind understands, and maybe not even fully, it is decided that the time is right, and the time is now, and the house lights illuminate the scene - just barely. Just enough to show an empty, dusty, attic. But it's not really empty - there is one little toy.
That's all she was, and that's all she is. A toy. Used and abused and passed around and forgotten. Hidden up in the attic because that's where all skeletons go to turn to dust.
I look at her little dress, and its patchwork design. I want to cry for her because he dress was so pretty. It was frilly, with a fluffy matching underslip. The slip is long-gone now. That was one of the first things to go, obviously. And the dress has filthy little fingerprints, and they are not tiny, child-sized fingerprints that speak of a doll loved well.
I imagine the rounds of her anticipated suffering and I feel shame for her, because dollies don't speak. Dollies aren't allowed to vote during playtime. They can be moved into all sorts of embarrassing positions, and they must simply wear their carefully painted smile. There are no tears for dollies, they have no ducts.
It's been a very long time that she's been hidden in the attic, and I decide I'm ready to restore her. It is my own anticipated suffering now that makes me falter in my steps as I cross the rafters, one by one by one. I reach her. I carefully lift her. She's so old now, I'm afraid that my touch will finally be the one to break her fully, and she will disintegrate into dust in my hands and then what?
But she doesn't break. She almost wishes that she could, but she doesn't. And so I hold her gently, and rock her against me. I whisper softly to her and tell her some dollies are born with ducts and will cry for her. I hold her, and refuse to let go. She melts into me until my arms are simply around myself, and I know the suffering will continue, but the healing will come too.
cover image by Jeremy Yap