Oh Dolly

“Mommy! Mommy!” five year old Jenny called, from the attic, to her mother, Claire, who was currently unpacking boxes in a room on a lower floor. The middle-aged woman appeared soon after, breathing heavily due to running. “Wh-what is it, Sweetie; are you hurt?

Jenny smiled at her mother and giggled, pointing to a life-sized doll in the corner. Its glass blue eyes stared at the woman and her daughter, its blonde hair was pulled back in pigtails. Faded red paint on its lips. It wore a violet dress, the top, just above the doll’s cleavage, having white frills. The dress also had black shoulder straps, though it had long purple sleeves also; probably a design flaw.

“Can I keep her, Mommy? Can I? Can I?” Jenny begged.

Sighing, “Well it was left here so I don’t think, um, her previous owners want her so if you’d like to keep her I don’t see why not,” Claire responded. Squealing in delight, Jenny started to skip over to the doll.

“Hold on there, missy, I’ll have Daddy bring her to your room when everything’s done being unpacked,” Claire said, interrupting the child’s eager pursuit of the new toy. Jenny, whined, but obeyed her mother, who took her hand and lead the child back downstairs. Just before they went down the first step, Jenny looked back at the doll. She gasped, “Mommy! The doll! She’s smiling!” Claire chuckled, thinking the child’s imagination was the getting the best of her, but she decided to play along, “She’s probably happy to have someone to play with, who knows how long she’s been up here.”

Later that night, Jenny was tucked into bed by her father, James. “Daddy, where’s my new dolly?”

“I put her in your closet. You can play with her tomorrow,” James responded, kissing his daughter’s forehead. He flicked on the child’s nightlight, before shutting of the room’s main light and closing her door. Jenny waited a few minutes before tiptoeing out of bed and to her closet. Just as her hand touched the doorknob, she heard a soft shuffle from inside. Jenny blinked in confused.

“Please, let me out,” a soft female voice came.

Jenny’s eyes widen before she said, “D-dolly?”

Another shuffle, “I’m so lonely. She left me here. She didn’t want me. Please stay. Don’t leave me, like she did.”

Jenny turned the doorknob and smiled, “I won’t leave you, Dolly.”

As the door opened Jenny could see the blue glass eyes shine out. The blue disappeared for a second before reappearing. Jenny watched the blue move upward; the child, backing up, watched the doll walk out of the closet. The doll was quite taller than the child. Jenny giggled, “You’re as big as Mommy, Dolly!”

The doll smiled, leaning down. “What’s your name, Sweetie?” “Jenny! What’s yours, Dolly?”

“Tina. Tina Polly, but you can still call me ‘Dolly’ if you like.” Jenny giggled, “Polly sounds like Dolly.”

Tina blinked, unsure of what to make of the child. “Yes, it does.”

Weeks later, Jenny and Tina had become great friends. Jenny actually looked at Tina as if she was an older sister.

Currently, Jenny was adding new accessories to the doll. “Dolly, you look so pretty!” Tina smiled, watching the child clip her hair with two bobby pins on the right side. Her eyes wondered to the white rose headband and then to the silver tiny hoop earrings the child had already added, “I think the bobby pins will be enough, Jenny.” Jenny smiled, finishing adjusting the bobby pins.

Just then the child’s mother came in, “Jenny, the neighbor kids want you to come and play with them.”

Jenny looked at her mother and smiled, “Mommy! Lookie! I made Dolly pretty!”

Claire smiled, looking at the doll, noticing the child had gotten into her accessories, “Yes, you did. Now go on, I’ll clean up, go play with the other kids.”

“Can I take Dolly?”

“No, Dolly. Go play.”

Jenny did as her mother said and skipped out to see the other kids, leaving her mother with Tina.

Claire started to clean up the small mess her child had made, frowning a bit at the sight of the doll, “Ever since she’s found this thing she stays with it constantly, even talking to it. She’s bound to have imaginary friends at her age but this is a little too much. I’m glad to get her away from it for a while. Maybe she’ll forget about it in a few weeks and we can sell it or something.”

Claire left the room, not noticing the doll turn its head and glare at her on her way out. Once she had left the room the doll looked at the mirror.

“I’m not going to be alone, again,” Tina growled, her left eye twitching slightly, “I’ll do what I did before that’s all. Then Jenny can stay with me forever.”

That night, after Jenny fell asleep, Tina crept out of the child’s room. Claire and James were downstairs in the family room watching TV. Being as quiet as possible, the doll made her way downstairs. Slipping into the kitchen and out the backdoor, Tina made her way to the tool-shed. Inside she found, what she deemed, the perfect weapon: a nail gun.

As Tina made her way back into the house, she made her way to the family room. James still sat watching TV while Claire must have gone up to bed; Tina crept up behind him, clamping plastic hand over the man’s mouth. Jumping in shock, James looked up, his eyes widening to see his daughter’s beloved doll smiling crookedly at him.

“This is for trying to take her from me,” she hissed, narrowing her eyes before placing the nail gun behind the frightened man’s head and pulling the trigger. The man jolted, screaming into the plastic; frowning, Tina fired a few more times. Once the man had seized moving, she stopped, admiring her work and the little mess. Cleanup could wait though; there was someone else who needed to go too.

Turning to leave the family room, Tina found Claire standing in the door the doorway. The woman’s mouth was a gap as if she was about to scream but no sound came out. Tina flashed a smile to the woman, taking a step closer to her. Claire backed away before turning and fleeing.

The horrified woman ran to her daughter’s room, slamming the door behind her and grabbing her daughter.

Jenny, still have asleep, looked around, “Mommy, where’s Dolly?”

“I don’t want to hear about, Dolly,” Claire whispered frantically, shoving her daughter in the closet and following after, closing the door as quietly as possible.

“Mommy-“

“Shh!”

The click of Jenny’s door being opened was heard, then Tina’s voice was heard, though demented sounding, “Jenny, where did you go~?”

Hearing the doll, Jenny shot out of her mother’s arms and opened the door quickly before Claire could grab her. The child ran to her doll and hugged her legs; Claire was left on the floor in shock. Tina smirked, “She’s mine, now.”

Before Claire could move, nails pierced her. Eyes, mouth, skull, arms, legs, anywhere really. Jenny screamed, crying and yelled at Tina to stop. Once Claire’s body went limp, the only sounds where Tina’s laughter and Jenny’s sobbing. Once Tina had calmed herself, she knelt down to Jenny’s level, “Now we can be together, forever.”

“N-no,” Jenny sobbed, backing away, “You hurt Mommy! I hate you!”

Tina froze, her eyes narrowing; she stood up, “Is that the way you want it, then? Are you going to leave me now? Like the others?”

She gave no time for the child to respond and shot her three times; once in the chest, and twice in her face, in both of her eyes.

“How was work, Honey?” Jamie asked her husband, Rick. He had just gotten home and looked more excited than a homicide detective should, especially after what he’d had to deal with today. A family of three murdered. A mother, father and daughter, they were just shot with a nail gun. “Oh, you know the usual. But can you keep a secret?”

“What do you mean, Dear?” Jamie asked him, her eyebrows rising.

“Well, let’s just say I may have taken something from the crime, but I doubt it would be missed.”

Jamie blinked, her eyes widening, “What?!”

“Calm down, it’s just a doll; I was going to give it to Tara for her birthday,” Rick smiled.

“Oh, well, I guess that’s fine, besides, she’s wanted a new doll for quite some time now.”

Rick chuckled, “She’ll love it.”