Seven entries, one a day · October 1–7, 2022
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The birth of a doll, traditionally, is reckoned from the last moment it has blood within its veins. There are many further steps and rituals before the process is successful but that is when the change is irreversible.
That exact moment, when the femoral shunt goes from the deep red of arterial blood to the milky white of the perflourocarbon mixture, is legally when the person dies and the doll is created.
— marching chant among the Rotten Dolls of the Bilious Witch
People and dolls break differently. The latter a quiet, priceless sound followed by “sorry, miss,” the former, a nauseating, wet-sounding crack with an instant screaming response.
I don’t regret what I did. He’ll heal, and even get back full range of motion if he does all the physical therapy exercises. My treasure will always bear the jagged marks of his careless shove, however carefully I align and glue her.
The witch’s needle slides in, deeper than anything has ever gone. Deeper than anything was ever meant to go. It feels good, then bad, then good again, like losing a baby tooth but in reverse, somehow.
Part of me knows that this isn’t right, that she’s poking holes through smooth muscle that could never heal, wounds that should be slowly painfully, mortal. It’s exactly that part of me that I came here to excise.
When a newborn doll asks, inevitably, “what kind of person was I?” It’s important to tell the right kind of lie. If it is to be shaped for domestic service, tell it it was a good person who fell on hard times or a child who was sold by destitute parents.
If it is to be a war-doll, tell it it was an atoning sinner, a condemned criminal or a useless drunkard scooped up off the streets. Any lie will do as long as it creates the right sense of self and of the world for its purpose.
This was supposed to be 6, and I’m supposed to be able to edit tweets but I guess not yet!
The fire is banked and crackling. Its light outlines two figures, glasses in hand, in the final throes of companionable conversation, when both parties drift into longer and longer silences.
From the darkened kitchen, an aproned figure peers hopefully out at them. Everything was just right: the dinner, the vintage, the ambiance were exactly as directed. Does that mean she’s going to do it? Is tonight going to be the night I get a sister?