Rebecca

Sitting on a shelf#
beneath an old bell jar#
dust as its protector#
this doll has traveled far#
Bits of cloth and ribbon#
held together by glue and sting#
to the average passer-by#
it wouldn't mean a thing#
Eyes that seem to wander#
arms, limp from play#
a desire to appear regal#
unable to display#
Necessity was it's maker#
inspired by love and need#
a life void of pleasure#
was the inpiration's seed#
Though nothing much to look at#
clutched in a young girl's arm#
a gift of love and comfort#
to her it had such charm#
It comforted her while hidden#
beneath the bedroom floor#
while the enemy approached#
bursting through the door#
Their saviors strongly denied#
her family was there#
as their foe would search#
their home with little care#
They left by night and traveled#
under a darkened sky#
escaping from their homeland#
leaving fear and death behind#
Days turned into months#
the war came to an end#
by then they lived acrossed the sea#
a new life to begin#
It was her true companion#
through bad times and the good#
a friend, a child,a plaything#
it did everything it could#
A little homemade doll#
held together by glue and string#
to the average passer-by#
it wouldn't mean a thing#

Rebecca

Sitting on a shelf#
beneath an old bell jar#
dust as its protector#
this doll has traveled far#
Bits of cloth and ribbon#
held together by glue and sting#
to the average passer-by#
it wouldn't mean a thing#
Eyes that seem to wander#
arms, limp from play#
a desire to appear regal#
unable to display#
Necessity was it's maker#
inspired by love and need#
a life void of pleasure#
was the inpiration's seed#
Though nothing much to look at#
clutched in a young girl's arm#
a gift of love and comfort#
to her it had such charm#
It comforted her while hidden#
beneath the bedroom floor#
while the enemy approached#
bursting through the door#
Their saviors strongly denied#
her family was there#
as their foe would search#
their home with little care#
They left by night and traveled#
under a darkened sky#
escaping from their homeland#
leaving fear and death behind#
Days turned into months#
the war came to an end#
by then they lived acrossed the sea#
a new life to begin#
It was her true companion#
through bad times and the good#
a friend, a child,a plaything#
it did everything it could#
A little homemade doll#
held together by glue and string#
to athe average passer-by#
it wouldn't mean a thing#

Cathy

It was the first death I experienced in my life and I was shocked. Here we were in Granny Barbara’s apartment, and Granny was not there: she was dead. We had to clean which entailed putting her good stuff to the side, and the rest of the crap in garbage bags. It was weird but calming, because Granny’s death was hanging all over the place like smog. Then Mom and Aunt Susan said it was time to “go over” the jewelry. I got this queasy feeling, like we were all robbers. Just days ago, Granny was lying there gasping, dying of pneumonia. Now we were taking her possessions. Ugh!###

I was creeped-out, let me tell you. But Mom didn’t seem to be, nor Linda, nor Aunt Susan, nor my cousins Brooke and Tara. They opened the jewelry box, announcing each piece, and discussing who should take it. They were lady-like and patient, saying, “Oh, I remember Granny wearing that, it has such special meaning to me,” but I thought what they were doing was wicked and greedy. I got especially mad about Granny’s cameo. When it they took it out, Brooke said something like, “Well I don’t know if you all see it, but I see Granny’s image in that cameo.” Then Mom and Susan, who had taken Granny’s wedding ring and anniversary brooch, looked at each other and nodded. They handed Brooke the cameo. ###

I wandered away, leaving them to the jewelry box. I went over to Granny Barbara’s sewing basket. She used to make doll clothes. I loved this about Granny Barbara, that she made stuff. Sometimes she had given it away, and sometimes she sold it and made money, on her own, besides what her husbands had given her.###

They said I had to pick something. “Pick for me,” I said. “Oh, you’re finding this hard, aren’t you dear,” my Mom said. Damn straight, I thought, but I said only, “uh huh.” ###

Poking around in the sewing basket, I found a stick figure under some swatches. It had a silly little ball head, which made me smile. It was her sewing form, for the doll clothes. She had made that too. Basically just a wooden skewer stuck in a toy block, the doll had a cork for shoulders, half a cork for hips, some toothpicks for legs, felt for feet. It had a robe on it, unfinished. I want to finish Granny’s last project, that robe. Suddenly I felt happy, like Granny Barbara would still be around for a while. My sister came over to me, a gold charm bracelet held out, clunky charms dangling from it. “I know it’s dumb and you’ll never wear it,” she whispered, “but pretend you like it, for Mom.” So I nodded. “Ask them if I can have the sewing basket.” I whisper. She doesn’t bother to ask, she just nods and say, “Sure. It’s yours.”

Karmann

Doll
###The soldier jeered at the old woman, “he's dead Baba. There's nothing left, get in line.” She'd stood watching as they'd stripped her husband of everything, his life, his clothes, his teeth, and his medals, his precious precious medals he'd won for playing the piano so beautifully. She had nothing left of him, not even a photograph. Too tired to be scared any more, too close to dead already to fear it, she spoke back in a wasted cracking voice, “Please, can I keep something? A medal?”### “A medal! Baba you're crazy,” he laughed, “move on.” She started toward the line, her swollen feet moving in a painful shuffle, head down when he suddenly changed his mind. “Baba,” he called, “take your medal,” and he threw the bright striped ribbon from which a shiny gold medal embossed with a piano used to swing. It floated through the air and landed a few feet in front of her. Painfully she bent down and picked it up before making her way to the line, clutching the ribbon to her chest.
###It was early afternoon but the gloom lay thick in the bunkhouse when she'd finally made her way to her new home. She stood inside the door letting her eyes adjust before trying to make her way in the dark. If I die here she thought as she looked around I will already know what hell looks like.
### “There's an empty bed over here,” the soft voice of a child called to her. It seemed to be coming from the back of the bunkhouse and she made her way toward it. Her feet kicked up the dirt floor as she scuffed along and the dust in her nose smelled of death. Finally she reached the place where the voice had come from and amazingly there was life in the form of a young boy. He was huddled on a mattress in the corner beneath a window, his long arms and legs so thin he looked more like spider than a child. The skin on his face was stretched tight and when he smiled, trying to be welcoming she could see the teeth all the way to the back of his mouth and the effect was that of a grinning skull. She took this all in without shock. Too many times she'd seen children like this. Tightly clutched to his ribcage was a small white doll and the sight of this ugly doll fashioned from scraps finally brought the tears to her eyes that had not come to her once yet in this ordeal. It was too much that their beautiful joyful children were reduced to this - skeletons playing with scraps.
###“May I see your doll?” she asked, tears sliding into the crevices around her eyes.
###“Sure. He's a soldier and he's planning to save us all and take us home,” he pronounced proudly as he handed her the doll. She took the doll and examined it admiringly. Its eyes were stitched on to a misshapen head with brown thread probably plucked from another prisoner's sleeve, it's mouth a bright red slash and from its head sprouted four or five threads pretending to be hair.
### “He's very handsome. Has he already won many battles?”
### “Oh, yes, he's a decorated general.”
### “Well then he needs to wear his ribbons,” she said and she reached into her pocket where she'd stowed the ribbon from her husband's medal and carefully crisscrossed the doll's chest with the bright fabric. “There,” she said as she handed back the newly decorated general, “now everyone can see just how brave he is.”

Sigourney

Do you know who I am? You think you’ve seen me before, don’t you? That’s right. I may look different now, with my ill-fitting martial arts robe, my twisted neck holding my beetlejuice ping pong ball head and this baby hair tuft in place of that silky dark head of hair… One of my eyes is smaller than the other after the heart attack… and now I am for sale at a vintage garbage bin. I, the one who used to sail the Atlantic in search of adventures. I, the one who used to tie up and torture prisoners in the bowels of my vessel. I, the one who brought the dark stallion to the new world. I, the one who bought you and traded you for a piece of cowhide. You can take me or leave me. Buy me if you wish. You know what will become of you. The days of eating dirt are never that far behind.

Rajiv

I see you. I see you looking at me. "Just a piece of worthless junk." What would you need me for? I might make your shelf lose its panache. Its identity. You don't need me. But I still see you staring. I see that we may have connected. You can feel it, can't you? You know what I am. You know what I can do. All you need is the courage to pick me up and take me home. Ignore the looks from the other customers. Ignore the smirk from the cashier as he takes your money and fumbles with the change. Look him in the eye and don't waver. Don't make any excuses. Because you know what you need me for. You know what I can do.
#### Take me home and show me the care I deserve. I have been left on shelves for eons, all because man and women find me odd and worthless. The children however understand that I am to be feared and do not touch me. Who would believe a child if he complained that I was scaring him. All I may have done is smile at him. Children are so lovely, but they can sense my power. They just do not know what to do with me. But you on the other hand; you know what I can do.
#### We will start with him He did hurt you, didn't he? He didn't have to do what he did. You do not deserve to treated like that. People show more care for yesterday's laundry than he did to you.He will pay. We will make him pay. I know you still have his favorite sweater that you stole from his apartment. Look inside. On the left side, towards the back of the neck, you will find a strand of hair. That's all you need. Tie it around my neck and you will have power over him that you should have had all this time.He will be yours to do what you will. We can do this together.
#### Raise your hand. That's it. Come closer. I will be all yours. All you need is courage and five dollars.

Joseph

”This is my papa. His name is Abdyl Kreyziu. He was born in Yugoslavia many years ago. This place does not exist anymore. He grew up in a place called Kosovo. This place was not a safe place for my papa. There was much hate for him. Now he lives in my room, watching over me to make sure I am safe. I see you smile, laugh, think, ‘That is a doll, an ugly homemade doll. Why does she show us this? Where is Peter’s snapping turtle again, or Emma’s colorful hermit crabs?’ This is no doll. This is my papa. See how he wears my papa’s shirt, the cuffs trimmed just the way Papa would wear them. See the bright sash of his favorite football club? The woolen socks Grandmamma knit for him. See the wink he wore so often, a trickster who loved to laugh? See his hair, his poor hair that would not stay upon his head? ‘If I cannot have a head of hair,’ he’d say, ‘I’ll make the hair that stays memorable.’ Like a cartoon, he wore his hair, sticking up. My papa.
###
“Mama says that our soul lives on. In the places we live, in the people we meet, in the clothes we wear, in the objects we touch our soul lives. We live. You see a girl with garbage, a frightening doll made from a dead man’s clothes. But to me, this is Papa. Not a memory or a doll. My papa. Alive. He was trying to make for us a better place, a safer life. We are here, I am here because of my papa. This is my show and tell.”
###
Blerta walked back to her seat and stowed her papa in her bag. As she watched Carlie discuss the Coach purse her mother purchased for her in New York, she did not notice the thieving hands of Adam Feld who pocketed her papa, only to toss it out the bus window two hours later.
###
Shawna Adams, jogging home, saw Blerta’s papa lying prone on the sidewalk. “Weird,” she remarked as she picked it up.
###
The idol of the Albanian patriarch was with her as she and her boyfriend joined the throng at the 4th Street Swap Meet. “What are you going to do with that thing,” he asked.
###
“Watch,” she said as she removed a He-Man action figure from a table of retro toys, pulled off the $5 price tag, and replaced it with the priceless protector of a 10-year-old girl whose father had been killed fleeing his home. “Think they’ll notice?”

Jacqui

His grin dripped with such wicked glee, he was sure even his sweat smelled sweet - like roses, or a sip of granddaddy’s bourbon. He’d really done it – got even with that old hag. The way her witchy yellow eyes would slide sideways when he’d give his mom the slip every night. Or pursing her persimmon lips when he’d sneak money or pills out of mom’s pocketbook. No more. ### And he had that devil doll to prove it. When the witch was alive she would never let him even touch it, and now it was his, sitting on his table with its girly ruffles, skinny chicken neck and idiot cotton head. ### He practically drooled satisfaction all afternoon, seeing it there on his table. That old hag had carried it with her everywhere – she even talked to it – getting answers to questions that shouldn’t be asked like what Jed had done with that skinny girl of his. He’d hear her whisper down her chin, then see its stupid black sock feet poking out of her sweater pocket, or its one blue hair tickling her chin when she rocked. Now it was his. ### So he sat, greedily grinning into its flat dot eyes. Till the moon rose, suddenly slicking the room with chilly gray shadows that slithered over the doll’s blank, staring face. ### His grin started to slide down his chin into a shaky grimace. His neck began to itch with prickles of ice, his hands grew twitchy and hot. The eyes - those depthless black dots - seemed to glow cat-yellow just like the old hag’s, sliding slyly sideways when he stood to close the blind. The stitch of a mouth seemed to purse its lips. He saw it stretch into a wicked grin, as he ran from the room screaming for his mom.

Roan

I couldn't help myself.

I went in and bought it.

I took it home, and instead of getting on my computer, I sat down with a cup of coffee and just stared at it.###

There was something about it. It did not seem to be something designed and built, it seemed like it should be alive.###

I studied the clothing on it, and the first thing that struck me was that it looked like a kimono, the ancient Japanese clothing, but I could not figure out how it was put together.###

I got out an old but huge magnifying glass and peered at it under a bright desk lamp. The little black shoes were like the Japanese shoes I had seen and even worn before, with a separation between the big toe and the next, so little sandals could be worn, but this doll was so precision made it actually had that little separation in the shoes.###

$5.00? This was a work of art, even if made by the thousands in a factory! The body under the cloth felt thin, as if it was just a skeleton, but it seems far more than just a few pieces of wood glued together.###

The head looked like a wooden bead, but under the magnifying glass it was... well... rather unique. It looked more like a dull pearl, and shaped in a rather organic way, like it was grown rather than shaped, and it was not wood. At that magnification, the grain would show up if it was wood, even if once varnished. But I could see no paint or varnish, although it was very white in color.###

The eyes were small black dots, one seemingly almost worn away, but through that level of magnification, it actually looked like the eye was simply half closed. It looked like a real tiny eyeball, not just a black dot. The little tuff of hair on the top of the head actually looked like real hair, varnished together to stick up.###

There was no nose, and the mouth was a red slash, again looking like a painted curving line, but upon closer look, it actually had thin lips, and that was unexpected. Worse of all, those little black dots seemed to be looking at me, like the optical illusion some painting have. I shrugged it off and went on examining it. There was just something about that little doll that didn't seem... well... like a doll!###

I turned the doll up and looked at it's bottom. Printed there on a little white sticker were four words, in English!###

“Caboo, Born in Xancali”###

Confused, I went to my computer and looked up Xancali. I found all kinds of entries, many in languages I had never seen before, but no 'place' named Xancali. And why 'born' instead of 'made'?###

I put the doll on a shelf and went to bed, tired of messing with it. I had not found out anything about it, and probably wouldn't unless I went to the expense of having the doll chemically tested to see what it was made of. That is was very unique was not in question.###

I think I dreamed of it during the night. Lots of confused dreams of strange places and people, and a few with 'people' who were not 'people' exactly but who talked and such. Dreams are very strange sometimes.###

The next morning I went to the shelf and the doll was gone. I searched everywhere, thinking I had simply forgotten that I had put it somewhere else, but it was nowhere to be found.###

So I forgot it and went to work, my mind already moving on to other tasks and interests.

James

Toy war veteran###
Zapata X strapping a###
shallow chest###
billowy blouse of###
white he returns unsoiled.###

Hands missed and mimed###
phantom wave in a###
puppets' parade carved###
heart of wood unbeating but###
tulip red.###

Earless head cocked###
gamely attentive###
half eye bent leg###
neck of spindle turned###
in service still.###

Curly top lock###
for swooning doll waiting on###
a red smile to match a###
patriot's ribbon cinching###
a waist worn out.###

James

Yeah, old Bob Miller. Well, we weren’t best friends or nothing. I suppose I knew him better than most folks around here, although that’s not saying much. ### He moved next door around, oh, 1996 or ’97. He was from Pennsylvania somewhere. He said he worked in a steel mill up there for 40 years. Looked the part, too. When I first met him, he was pushing 70 but, man, the guy was built like a wall safe. ### I never could figure why he came down here. Didn’t have no family here -- no friends either, so far as I could tell. Guess that’s how he liked it. Look, there’s a lot I wish I’d have asked him, but you gotta understand, Bob didn’t go around sharing his life with everybody. Heck, for the longest time, it was all I could do to get a hello out of him. ### He started slowing down the last few years, so a couple times I went over and helped him fix some things around the house. I wouldn’t take his money, but when I got done, he’d offer me a can of Bud and we’d sit at his kitchen table and b.s. for 15 or 20 minutes. Nah, mostly we just talked about football and cars --typical guy stuff, nothing real personal. ### I hadn’t seen him around for a while, and then I saw in the paper last spring that he passed away. Next thing I know, the wife gets a call from this attorney across town, talking about how I gotta go pick up something Bob left me in his will. Now that was a shock. Since when does helping a guy re-grout his bathroom floor get you mentioned in his will? ### Anyway, I go over the next morning and the lady hands me this little oak box. I sat down in the lobby and popped it open right there. On top is this ratty, old, half-falling-apart doll. Looked like something a third-grader would have made. ### Second thing blew my mind. It was a black-and-white photo of Bob, looking younger and happier than I ever seen him, holding a little boy on his lap. Sure enough, the kid’s got that dang doll under his arm. There was a woman’s handwriting on the back; it said “Bob and Bobby. December 1956.” ### Third thing was a letter, dated 1971. It was addressed to Mom and Dad from Bobby -- must have been the same Bobby from the picture. He sent it from Vietnam. I’m not going to say much about what he wrote, but I’ll tell you, he sounded like a bright young man who really had his head on straight. ### That was it. Nothing else. No explanations. ### I’m curious to know more about the kid, but there must have been a thousand Robert Millers who fought in ‘Nam. I wouldn’t know where to begin. ### I’m keeping the letter and the picture. They feel kind of sacred, you know? But I gave the doll to my brother-in-law up in New York. That thing spooked me out, brother. It kept staring at me with that mangled eye and that weird little smile, like some half-crazed ghost who wanted to tell me a secret.

Liz

Damon hated shopping for Christmas, and he especially hated shopping during Christmas vacation. Somehow, regardless, we ended up in a store for one reason or another and he would go into a rant about endless consumerism and lack of humanity while the family browsed. Somehow shopping at thrift stores evaded the moral degradation of other venues. ### “We have to make things, “he insisted. “What does it mean if you just bought a thing? That you thought of a person for the few seconds that you had the correct amount of money in your pocket or your credit card to appease the urge?”### The reason we ended up at the thrift store, on Christmas Eve, was due to his suggestion of a scavenger hunt. Each person had to collect: a Head, two feet, two hands, a torso, legs and hair. Andy ran outside immediately and returned with an oak ball and some pinecones. Mom offered up some basic sewing notions: thread, pins, hem tape, a thimble. Lilly ransacked the kitchen to proffer bamboo skewers. Aside from some glue and paper, the lack of materials on the premises forced the hunt further.### In Sallie’s Attic we found a Pocahontas doll, a wooden Pinocchio, a pregnant visible woman, and a Barbie. Once home, we spread our treasures on the table for dissection. The visible woman, we decided, was too difficult to split up as she only had the one vertical seam and, unless you wanted to use the fetus as a head, she had no usable parts. She stood as an educational device and inspiration at the center of the table. Erin draped a blue napkin over her head and dubbed her Mary.### We had to use the serrated knife and cutting board to free Barbie’s hands. Pocahontas was held together by easily popped ball and socket joints. Pinocchio’s glue was ancient. We spent the evening recomposing the elements into figures and decorating them. Dad read the same stories aloud he reads every year. But instead of rolling our eyes when he teared up at the same spot, we were busy attaching heads and feet, hands and hair. We wrapped them up and wrote our exchanged names on them.### I got Lilly’s doll, with the Pocahontas shirt, Pinocchio’s shoes, and the oak ball head. But when she moved to Peru with the man she married, without inviting us to the wedding, I found I just couldn’t hold onto junk any more.

William

The only part of the battle attainable by the average fan, the fighting doll remained still; as if its lack of motion might cause the opponent to forget the verocity of prior moments or what was soon to come.

Camille

Everyone knew Melissa Varner had the corrode. If she came into the cafeteria, we all had to put our feet up, or we would all have the corrode. The corrode was transmitted mysteriously through the floor, so it could happen anywhere. If you were unlucky enough to be in the hallway at the same time as Melissa, you better run into the first door you see. She was taller than the tallest fifth grader, and older too. Everywhere she went she had Budman with her. Budman sat with her at lunch, and accompanied her to the swings, and most certainly, was covered in corrode.
###
My mom suggested that we have Melissa over to our house. She lived close by, and when she arrived at our back porch, I ran under the stairs. I could feel myself catching the corrode through the grass. "Hi- I'm here to play." I heard her tell my mother. I crawled up from my hiding place. "Hi."
###
Melissa played at our house many afternoons. I caught the corrode and survived, and we made Budman a house out of sticks. When she moved, I remember Budman waving at us from the backseat. Budman was a good friend. I could only aspire to be as constant.

Carmie

Thrift Shop Doll
By Carmie McCook
3/30/12 (861 words)

The sound of whispering awoke Shelly from a light doze. She was the only volunteer running the shelter that Christmas Eve. The umpteenth rerun of “It’s a Wonderful Life” was flickering on the old television in the corner of the room, the volume barely audible. Sharpening her senses, Shelly leaned forward and heard it again.
###
Pushing up from the broken recliner, she caught a glimpse of a little hand quickly disappearing from the doorway. She glanced at the wall clock. 2:10 AM. More whispering.
###
She smiled tiredly. “Okay, little ones. Come on in here. It’s okay.” A small face poked around the doorway. Slowly seven year old Mattie tiptoed into the shelter’s sitting room with her little sister, Lizzie, in tow. Lizzie held tight to something that looked like a handmade doll in her other hand. “What’s the matter, Mattie? You want something to eat or drink?”
###
“No m’am. We couldn’t sleep. Daddy’s snorin’ and Lizzie got scared.” The girls shivered in the chilly room. Shelly grabbed a knitted throw and wrapped it around the girls. Their skinny legs and arms melted into the blanket leaving just two sleepy little faces and tangled hair visible.
###
You know,” said Shelly, “I was a little lonely in here by myself. Would you mind sitting with me in the big chair for a while?” She lowered herself back into the Naugahyde Lazy-Boy with duct- taped patches on the arms and seat cushion.
###
Mattie and Lizzie coyly smiled and climbed into her lap. Shelly readjusted the knit throw so both girls were covered. The girls curled up and snuggled close to her, laying their heads on her chest, watching the muted George Bailey trying to reason with the evil Mr. Potter.
###
“You smell good, Miss Shelly,” said Mattie.
###
“Yeah, like the soap Mama used to bath us with,” added Lizzie. “We don’t smell like that anymore but Mama said one day she would buy us some soap that smells like flowers!”
###
“And, that’s why we got to leave tomorrow so Daddy can get to a job he’s got waitin’ for ‘em in Indiana,” Mattie chimed in. “Mama said when Daddy gets that job we can have a real house to live in and everything.” The optimism in Mattie’s little voice brought a lump to Shelly’s throat.
###
Shelly pulled the girls close and kissed the tops of their heads. “Try to get some sleep, sweethearts.” Mattie and Lizzie buried in even closer to her chest.
###

“Will you kiss Lucy good night too?” said Lizzie holding up the straggly, bald doll. “She don’t have no hair, but I don’t care. I found her at the place we stayed last night. I don’t think she has no Mama neither, so I took her.”
###
“Of course.” Shelly kissed the bald doll head. “Good night, Miss Lucy. And, good night Miss Mattie and Miss Lizzie.”
###
The next day no amount of reasoning on Shelly’s part could convince the girls’ father to wait for Christmas dinner at the shelter before getting back on I-75 and heading north. She packed a bag with sandwiches, water, and other non-perishable food and gave it to the mother. She also gave each parent and the girls wrapped Christmas gifts of socks and gloves that local high school students donated as part of a “Holiday for the Homeless” program.
###
A blast of cold wind went right through the sweater Shelly had thrown on to walk the family out to their car. “Drive safely, Mr. Barfield. And I truly wish you all the best with the job in Indiana.”
###
“Yes’m. Thank you for puttin’ us up for the night.” He turned the ignition key and the old car hacked and groaned.
###
The girls smiled and waved. Shelly stooped over to the back car window. “Mattie, you and Lizzie be sweet. I am so happy I got to meet you. Oh, and Lucy too!”
###
Suddenly, Lizzie crawled over her sister and held the scrap of a doll out the car window.
“You keep, Lucy, Miss Shelly. She’ll keep you company tonight in the big chair.”
###
“Oh, I couldn’t Lizzie. You’ve taken such good care of her. Wouldn’t you miss her?”
###
“Well, I got Mattie to keep me company but you don’t have nobody. Lucy can be your friend.” Lizzie pushed the doll toward Shelly with a sweet, earnest smile. Shelly grinned and took the doll as gently as if it were a piece of fine crystal.
###
“Thank you, Lizzie. I will take good care of Lucy. We will always remember you and Mattie.” The father threw the car into gear and the family drove off. Shelly waved and blew kisses to the girls as held-back tears finally ran down her cheeks.
###
Shelly’s sudden death, eight years later, was a sad day for her friends. Most of her belongings were sold at auction. Lucy, along with other left over odds and ends, was piled into a box and given to a local thrift shop. The doll, of immeasurable value to Shelly, was now jammed on a dusty shelf in the shop. A five-dollar price tag was affixed to her leg.

George

From Romania to you###

Bought brand new
for just 20 Bani.
Brought to you new###

Sold old
and considered
almost garbage###

Five dollars US
16.4 Leu, 1640 Bani
You value me anew###

Dow

Title: Deployment
###
Just at the first fail of light we came upon a farmhouse. We watched it for movement. Finally, Sergeant Pembrooke said he thought he saw a whiff of smoke slip from the chimney. We reconnoitered.
###
Bill Parsons was the first to reach the extended porch. After he crept around and peered into a broken window, he motioned the all clear. I called for a defensive perimeter and we investigated the cabin.
###
Inside, three were hanging from the exposed rafters: a handsome woman and two old men. One of the old men was missing digits and there was a dark cavern where one of his eyes had been. “That’un didn’t go quiet,” Sergeant Pembrooke said as he studied the corpse’s sallow face.
###
Parsons stood transfixed before the female, clicking his tongue. “Woman like that,” he mused, “would like have been soiled by ourn enemy.” He’d taken his hat off and was holding it over his heart in some elemental show of respect to her beauty.
###
“These fiends aren’t interested in the sensual,” I said. He extracted something from the woman’s waistband and studied it.
###
“Sir,” he said, offering the object to me. It was a crude doll dressed in a homespun frock coat. The angle of the bulbous head on the doll matched the odd expressionless death masque of the hanging woman. A banner of colors crisscrossed the doll’s chest, and the ric rac at the cuffs of the frock coat bore the red and blue colors of the partisans. “Does this mean there was a child?” he said.
###
“Yes, they have other uses for the children,” I said, not wanting to continue the exchange in the same vein. “These colors are what the mother died for,” I said, running my fingers over the coarse cloth on the doll. “It’s what they all die for.” I tucked the doll into my haversack.
###
We buried the lot of them in the vegetable garden where the soil was malleable and fecund. Then we burned the cabin, the flames lashing out into the darkening night. A rat ran out of the burning edifice, its tail aflame as it sped through the grass. Sergeant Pembrooke found some humor in that.
###
As the flames died away, some of the enlisted men dragged coals out of the rage with forkening hooks and began to prepare the evening meal: Johnny cake and grits ever the standard of the working soldier. We mostly ate in silence as a moon crept across the empty sky, each man lost in the thoughts of home, weary of burying the innocent dead in this land fraught with the danger. I took the doll out and placed it on my knee. Its black eyes told me nothing.
###
We all waited for the woodland sounds of the hideous things we sought, eager to silence as many as we could before our deployment reached it denouement. I was eager to flash the colors before the face of those we dispatched. Eager to reunite the doll with the child who had made it.
###

Fiction by Dow Ford

Gina

The Southern Americana Doll
During the days of grandeur with great mansions, and lavish parties in the deep south, there were many stories to be told. About 10 years ago this doll was found in an attic in a Beaufort SC, home. It dates back to pre-civil war. A daughter of one of the servants who was also the family seamstress used to collect remnants and buttons of fabric from her mother's work. She began to make these dolls and at the time she would design them after the family who lived in the house. These dolls were displayed in her room with pride. After the war when many buildings were burned down including the textile company where the beautiful fabrics were made from, so was most of this home. But a surprise was found one day when a new family bought this house. So we have a piece of American history in this little doll wrapped in red white and blue ribbon. Let us keep safe what time has allowed us to enjoy and look back on.Our bidding today will start at $150, who knows this could be Rhett Butler in his glory day. Thank You.

Jon

This is the voodoo doll we made of our boss, Ray. Ray had a way about him. He was always complaining that as a staff, we didn’t work hard enough. “Stop screwing around. Get back to work.” Ray was always ruining our good fun.
###
He used to wear rainbow suspenders, was slightly overweight and balding. We factored these physical shortcomings into the doll. We spent hours crafting Voodoo Ray. We would pass the doll from cubicle to cubicle. Sometimes we microwaved it, or threw it at walls, or stuck it in the urinals and sent pictures to each other with witty captions: “Pee Pee Shower.” When the real Ray left the office, one of us would pretend-walk Voodoo Ray across the desks and shout at the others in doll speak – “Stop screwing around. Get back to work.” We loved having fun.
###
Then the real Ray’s hands fell off in a commuting accident. After that, we no longer found the eerie handless resemblance ironic. Wendy suggested that perhaps we had caused Ray’s accident with actual voodoo, but she lived alone with an indeterminate number of cats and never pulled any office gags that were memorable. Soon it was considered bad form to mention the doll. Once again, Ray ruined our good fun.
###
Ray now travels the country giving seminars to two-handed people about overcoming workplace adversity, or never giving up, or some bullshit. We sometimes talk about how awesome it would be to show up to one of those seminars with the doll. We’ll never actually do it, but we can waste an entire afternoon just reminiscing about Voodoo Ray.

Marley

There once was a small girl, a long, long, time ago. The small girls name was Daphelia, she was 8 at the time and living in the heart of England. Daphelia’s father was a traveling trades-man. He traveled to India and to many other foreign lands to trade his items mostly textiles and the occasional Antique.
###On a steel gray morning, Daphelia sat were she usually sat in the morning, the dock. Today Daphelia sat half submerged its chilly English fog, with her blue eyes looking longingly out at the sea for her father and his ship the black moon. To Daphelia’s great astonishment, piercing the murk a needy-of-repair looking ship crawled up to the dock. ###
The words black moon were scratched into the side of the dilapidated ship.
###“ Father!” cried Daphelia. As she peered into the ship, she realized her father was no were to be seen. “Father were are you?” once again called Daphelia. Slowly she crept into the steering room of the ship. Calling out again, knowing that sometimes he was engrossed in last minute docking and receiving forms. Daphelia turned the old leather chair around. In horror she starred at empty chair. All that lay there was a small doll slightly disfigured. The doll looked up at her with one rather large eye loosely stitched and one quite small in comparison more of a dot really. A jagged mouth ran across the face, giving Daphelia a mangled smile. The dolls head could have very nearly been a turnip. Daphelia slowly picked up the doll it sat in her palm. Its faded Indian clothing reminded her of her father’s attire before he left on his latest trip. Looking around Daphelia slipped the doll into the pocket of her dress and left the ship without a sound.
###Daphelia’s mother had been a drunk, and shortly after Daphelia’s birth she had passed away falling down the steep stairs from there flat on the way to fetch some more of her “medicine”. Now Daphelia and her father lived above a carpentry shop where the smell of wood chips and the Zzzzzz Zzzzzzz Zzzzzzz of the hand hewn timber rested. Daphelia ran up the creaky aging steps to the freezing apartment. She fell onto her cot, weeping. Slowly she pulled the doll out of her pocket starring at the uneven eyes and jagged mouth.
###“ Father is that you?” whispered Daphelia. The tiny turnip head doll nodded. Shocked Daphelia hugged the doll; a slip of yellowed paper fell out the back of the doll. Cautiously she picked up the paper and read aloud.
###“ Dearest Daphelia, I am writing this letter with hope that you will read it, if not I’m am ever so sorry that you don’t know what happened to your old father. Well if you do get this letter I will tell you, I was kidnapped by bandits in India, they do not know I am writing, so my dearest I will not be arriving home, doing my best to escape, Fath…” the last two letters absent. Daphelia too shocked to understand exactly, but well enough to know her father would not be coming home. Ran to the window facing out toward the London street and open waters flung herself out.
The doll fluttered out of her hand as she fell, landing on a crate going to New York.
###Long after Daphelia’s death the little doll had journeyed to the Bronx, passed around from little hands to a shelf stuffed in a corner and lived there for a long, long time, until the doll was covered in enough cobwebs to knit a sweater. Eventually he was taken with a bunch of other teenager’s abandoned toys, to Salvation Army. The doll bought and sold a few more times then lastly discarded to a tiny thrift shop that now resided in what was once a old furniture makers work shop off of 3rd avenue and 22st. in New York City. There the turnip head doll was carelessly jammed in the back of a shelf with other rejects such as, a green ceramic frog, a robot picture frame and a purple and orange scarf. But there he sat, A jagged mouth One large eye staring the other like a period forever thinking of a little girl’s death and sea captains note.