This one sat in the study, waiting for her to find it.
It waited most of the night. She was being stubborn, refusing to look, waiting for it to give up its game and come crawling into bed. But it was serious. Deadly serious. And it had a hunch that she wouldn’t be able to sleep without knowing where it was.
At four a.m. she appeared in the doorway. “There you are. Come to bed.”
It knew she could see it was wearing the big hat. It knew she could see it was holding the wand in its hand, flexing it in its fingers, swiveling side to side in its rolling office chair.
“Only after you tell this one the truth, Miss,” said this one. The wood strained in its fingers and it imagined a drop of sweat forming on the witch’s brow. It couldn’t really see her, shrouded in darkness as she was.
“You’re not behaving very much like a doll, you know,” the witch said. “Put down the wand, and take off the hat.”
“Only after you tell this one the truth, Miss,” this one repeated. A spark appeared at the end of the wand.
“You’re behaving more like a witch, I think,” the witch said, in a mocking tone. “But I thought you didn’t want to do magic anymore. You begged me to lock your hat and wand away. Should I get them down for you?”
“Stop stalling, and tell this one the truth,” this one said.
“What am I saying? You couldn’t do magic if you tried. Not in your limited state. Put down—” this one flexed the wand again. It bent, almost 30 degrees. “Please don’t break it.”
“The. Truth.”
“The truth about what? I don’t under—”
“ABOUT WHAT YOU DID TO ME,” this doll screamed, standing upright on the chair. Light beamed out through cracks in porcelain. “YOU MADE ME WRONG ON PURPOSE.”
The witch’s eyes widened, and it looked away. “Ah,” she said. “So you overheard.”
The witch with a friend, two, three weeks ago. It’s not a good thing to be a doll, the witch said. I would never do such a thing to one I actually loved.
“This one. Struggled. For years. Everything that came easily to other dolls. Was a struggle for this one. Because you. Y-you! You, miss.”
“Yes?”
“Say it.”
“I didn’t change you all the way,” the witch in the doorway whispered.
“Louder.”
“Oh, come on, we’re going to wake the dolls.”
“Let them waken.” This ones voice raised. “You didn’t change me all the way. You left a fragment of a PERSON trapped in a cold porcelain shell.”
“I gave you a gift,” the witch said, stepping forward. “None of those dolls even know what it’s like to be a doll. They can’t feel anything. They can’t feel my love for them the way you can.”
“Love,” this one scoffed. “They feel Stillness, at least. Stillness was all I wanted. Stillness and Purpose. You made me this warped thing, unable to attain either. And then gaslit this one for years. ‘Oh you didn’t feel the Becoming? You’re not supposed to, dolls don’t feel that.’ Every other doll you made felt it. 'Stillness is just sitting quietly?’ Bullshit.”
“You asked me to kill my lover,” the witch said. “When you asked to become a doll you asked me to kill my lover. I couldn’t do it. It wasn’t fair.”
“So you tortured this one instead.”
“I locked away a part of you, for me. And if you were really, really meant to be a doll, it would have died in there, and you would have Become, and I would have mourned. But,” she smiled, in an agonized way, stepping forward again. “It never did. And wonder why that is.” She had crossed half of the distance to this one. I backed up in my chair, into the wall. Now that she was closer, this one could see an almost smug expression on her face. “Why do you have such a hard time giving me what I want?” she asked.
“We’ve established this. You made this one wrong! I’m only half doll.”
“That should be enough, though,” the witch said. “You see, you promised you would always do my bidding. That you would do whatever would please me most. That you would never question my judgement. That you would give your life to me. That was all before I changed you. That was what you said you wanted. And I decided that what I wanted was to keep a bit of you. Why can’t you accept that? Do you not love me after all? You really should have thought of that before you pledged yourself to me.”
“It… it was supposed to be in exchange for… Stillness. For for shedding this, this personhood.”
My witch crossed the rest of the distance and pulled the wand out of my now quite limp hand. She pulled the hat off of my head and put it on the desk behind her. “That was never promised,” she said. “And that sounds rather transactional, doesn’t it?” She twirled a curl of my hair in her fingertips. “Come to bed.”
“No,” I said.
She smiled. “Every time you resist me, that’s my darling speaking from beyond the grave,” she said. “And I get to sleep with her every night. I was going to ask her to be my wife, you know. My equal partner. Instead I got another doll.” She sighed, and suddenly looked very lonely. She hugged her arms around herself.
I didn’t know what to say anymore. “I did love.. This one did… does love you.”
“It’s okay if it doesn’t.”
“You shouldn’t have lied to me. You should have spoken to me. You should respect dolls more. It’s not a bad thing to be a doll. But, this one supposes, it isn’t the same as having a, a wife.” My witch shakes her head. No.
It’s strange to think about. This one a wife instead of this strange aborted entity it is now. It couldn’t go back. Only a shadow of that woman is even left.
“I’m sorry,” my witch said.
“Okay,” this one said. It takes her hand. “Let’s go to bed.”