Category: dolls and witches

// abuse, violence, gaslighting, murder, bad end

uhh, hey roomie, listen, don’t get mad, but i’m unfortunately gonna have 2 leave u a bit of a mess 2 clean up in the entire downstairs of the whole house. i’d help but i kinda am the mess? really really sorry.

i kno ur prolly freaking out, listen, the most important thing here is to make sure that ur not culpable of course. ur not responsible for what happened to me, u just didn’t see, couldn’t have known. don’t worry, don’t worry, ur hands are totally clean. no one is gonna doubt how good and honest u are.

besides it’s not like it was obvious this was gonna happen, it all started out innocently enough right? when he started hanging around me and we started flirting he had seemed nice 2 u, and he was queer and part of ur scene so he was prolly chill right? lotsa other peeps knew him, no one coulda seen this coming, it’s not ur fault, u just didn’t see it.

and yeah if u had seen something, i know that of course u would have done something; any reasonable person would have, right?? u just didn’t see. u didn’t notice what he was doing 2 me so u didn’t do anything wrong by failing 2 address it, none of this is ur fault.

sure, sure, u prolly could have seen if u had looked, but that woulda been super bad for u right? and it’s not like anyone else was looking either so why should u? making it ur problem was just unhealthy, i get you, i get you.

anyways its my fault really. i’m an adult after all, i was the one who started dating him, who helped him make friends, who invited him to live with us. i shoulda been able to handle this myself, i shouldn’ta needed ur help anyway.

i wasn’t expecting u to look, i didn’t think there was a problem, if i had i wouldn’t have started dating him, like duh yeah of course, nobody saw this coming, it’s important to keep telling urself that or ur gonna start obsessing over all the times u saw him yelling at me or hitting me that u didn’t say anything about.

and honestly i should prolly apologize for that too like, u didn’t consent to seeing that, u didn’t consent to living with an abuser and it was my fault u were. i was the one violating ur consent by bringing him into ur home.

i should also apologize for violating ur consent all those times i had panic attacks and started screaming or crying or trying to hurt myself, or the time i threw up on the floor and was too psychotic to deal with it so u had to clean it up, that was really toxic of me and it definitely wasn’t like, ur responsibility to notice i was getting abused and trying to call for help.

i shoulda like, been smarter and just seen that he was bad to begin with u know? that was on me, i just couldn’t stay away from a bad boy, u kno i’m not a great judge of character, lol. 

i really loved him tho like, he was so magical, he had me spellbound despite everything he was doing to me. someone woulda really had to work to break his grip on me, and that wasn’t in any way ur responsibility. i shoulda known something was wrong sooner, like when everyone started getting scared of me cause i was so unstable and i ended up almost totally isolated with just him, that shoulda been the clue right? 

i didn’t want any of this to happen ofc, i tried to protect myself, to stand up to him and fight back, it’s just that i did it in ways that were toxic and upsetting 2 u, so the fact i was being bad was rly the most important thing, it affected u after all! and u didn’t do anything to deserve this! ur a good person! it was rly shitty of me to scream and cry like that when he hurt me, that was definitely triggering and violated ur consent.

i shoulda just been stronger and fought back more, just never fell in love with him and got into this mess in the first place, shoulda been better at getting myself out of it on my own too, and i shoulda been better prepared to protect myself. i did finally fight back at the end there, sry ur plates ended up broken in the process, i know u rly liked those.

i know ur prolly like, having a panic attack rite now, and like, just take a breath, it’s okay, everything’s chill now, he already ran off and the cops are already on the way. u did the rite thing, just breathe, okay? don’t worry about me, no one’s gonna blame u for what happened 2 me.

instead uh maybe you should worry about the broken bookshelves or how my blood is gonna stain ur carpets? that might help u calm down. really sry about all this damage, i didn’t have much control over what he was throwing my lifeless body against after the first four or five minutes. he may have been using one of ur encyclopedias when he caved in my skull? i was dying so it was hard to tell. 

// kidnapping, trafficking, betrayal, dolls

She was definitely following you, what an idiot.

The path through the scraggly woods down to the campsite by the river was still lit by the fading twilight. She wasn’t even trying to be subtle, she thought she had you cornered. Well, her loss.

You recognized her type, recognized how she studied you, singled you out. You had lived on the street long enough to recognize a predator in the wild, long enough to know that they considered you prey. The grip on your knife tightened, you were almost back to the campsite.

You don’t say anything as you enter the campsite, you don’t need to. The four of you, you understand each other well enough to not need that. You make eye contact, but that’s when you realize they aren’t alone.

The little band of friends you had has doubled in number and you suddenly don’t recognize half the faces. You can smell the blood on them. Your friends seem apologetic, and are explaining that they ran into this group and have been trading. Fingertips brush the back of your head.

Every hair on your body is standing on end. You’re trying to supress the shaking as a fingertip trails around the edge of your jaw and the woman who’d followed you slides into  view. She smiles at you, examining you, you want to disappear.

Your friend looks at you, smiling nervously. He glances at her, swallowing hard, “So the deal’s good? We kept our end.”

She smiled at him, “Well, that’s only fair, right? So take your drugs and your little friends and get lost.”

You started to say something, you weren’t sure what, but whatever it was, it was cut off by her fingers tightening around your slender wrist and a bag being forced over your head. You screamed, cursing out your  asshole traitor so called friends as you were kicked to the ground.

“Look, sorry about this,” the traitor was saying guiltily, “We needed the shit they had, and you were what they wanted, no hard feelings, you know?”

“Fuck you!” was all you could manage to scream in response before your words turned to incoherent sobbing shrieks.

You wanted to fight back, but the fight had left you. You didn’t resist as they bound your hands and feet. You didn’t squirm and try to escape as they threw you in the trunk. You didn’t even flinch when she put out a cigarette on you. The fire in you guttered out. Good doll.

// drug use, rape, graphic

She’s been watching you all night. You weren’t sure when you noticed at first, but afterwards it felt like her eyes were on you whenever you glanced in her direction. The party swirls, you change rooms, get into a debate that has you laughing, and there are her eyes on you again.

You try to play it cool, pull one of your friends aside to ask about her, but they assure you she’s great. You’re always paranoid, it’s probably nothing, maybe it’s just the drugs. You decide to drink more, you clearly need more social lubricant.

She’s still watching you, does she know what you are? Can she tell by the way you nervously fidget and startle, the way your body tenses and twitches whenever there’s an unexpected noise. She’s so pretty, what would someone like her want from a scrawny frightened thing like you?

There’s a momentary tension within you before you shove down the fear and drop into a seat next to you. She introduces herself, you talk, and she does seem really nice, even if the intensity of her stare remains just as unsettling.

You may have drank too much. The room sways and time flows irregularly, the party rushes past you in staggering jolts. It’s a lot of fun, but as you lean against the wall staggering to the bathroom to puke, you’re beginning to mildly regret your choices.

You collapse in front of the toilet and manage to barely get your head in before everything starts coming up. You’re confused but grateful when hands gently hold your hair back while you experience the holiness of puke.

She hands you a cup of water after you sit back onto the floor trying to catch your breath and ease your nausea. You gulp it down and stare blankly at the porcelain, thoughts still swimming in alcohol. You thank her, she smiles and rubs your back.

You’re getting ready to try standing and going back to the party when her fingers curl around your hair and yank you upwards. Your yelp is cut short as she throws you against the wall and you feel something cool and sharp at your neck.

Panic grips you, fear battling with intoxication, your world tumbling over itself in an attempt to make sense of the sudden threat. You totally saw this coming. Why didn’t you see this coming? Stupid doll. She chuckles, amused, as you shake in fear.

“You know what this is?” She asks you, gently pressing the knife into your skin. You nod wordlessly. 

“Good. Then you know what’ll happen if you don’t do what I want. Now take your pants off.”

Fear, shame, and half-unwanted arousal grip you as she presses your face into the wall and runs the knife against your neck. You can feel her hardon pressing into your ass. You don’t want to listen to her, but something holds you more transfixed than the fear.

You’re at a party, she can’t actually do this right? She couldn’t actually get away with just killing you in the bathroom right? These are your friends, you’re safe, you just need to call for help, you just ne–her fingers cover your mouth and nose. You take your pants off.

Without a word, she drags you backwards by the hair and shoves you over the sink. Her hand closes over your mouth and she shoves herself into you. You scream into her fingers at the sudden starburst of pain. It doesn’t slow her down at all. The knife is still at your throat.

You feel yourself twitch in pain every time she slams into you, tears run down your cheeks, smearing your makeup, you’re so scared and upset….why are you also so turned on? Why is this the horniest anyone’s made you in years? You can’t actually be enjoying this can you?

At first you were fighting back, testing her grip and trying to see how you could slip away, but the fight has completely gone out of you, you’re not even trying to resist anymore. You feel her fingers in your hair as you realize you might be moaning in pleasure and not pain.

She shifts to get a better grip on you and speeds up. 

“You’re being such a good victim,” she whispers breathily in your ear, “I don’t need this anymore do I?” The cool metal brushes your skin, and for the first time in the encounter you say something.

“Please keep using it.”

You’re not sure where that came from. You don’t want to admit you’re actually enjoying this, but you are, aren’t you? You can feel her smirking as she speeds up. She singled you out carefully, she knew exactly what you were, even if you didn’t.

You’ve never been more attracted to someone. You feel her knife gently scraping into your back and drawing a trickle of blood. You’re fucking her as hard as she’s fucking you at this point, not even trying to hide how much of a freak you are anymore.

She finishes inside you and shoves you onto the floor. You stare up at her, hungry, utterly transfixed. She grins lecherously at you and licks the knife clean. You suppress a drunken giggle in the moment of quiet.

“So uh,” you ask awkwardly, “You wanna come over next week?”

// dolls, murder, delusions, mental illness

Admittedly, you were never a very good doll. That’s why you had to do it. You had to, there was no other way. 

Your witch was so kind and loving, she tried so hard to help you, but you never really trusted her, never really trusted anyone. Well, look where that’s gotten you now.

She never meant for you to be her only doll, she always told you she intended to start a collection, but despite always assuring you that she cared, the thought deeply unsettled you.

Obviously it was only a matter of time before she was going to replace you.

You told yourself that she was going to replace you over and over, until it was as certain as the turn of the world.

It was an upsetting but unavoidable fact, you just wished she’d hurry up with it. What were you saying? Of course you didn’t want that.

She was lying of course, saying you were irreplaceable and special, she was a liar through and through, fucking witches, amirite?

You got angry, you slammed doors, you hit her, you were going to force the truth out of her. Why was she being so kind to you?

Of course you knew right away when your replacement appeared. You recognized the spark in your witch’s eyes while watching the doll laugh and socialize at a party. 

Hate. Fear. Despair. You knew. You knew it was coming with the certainty of the dawn. You were as good as trash.

Of course you tried to deny it, and it worked for a time. It worked while your witch cozied up to the new doll and took her on dates, but it was cracking day after day. 

She was going to replace you. She was going to replace you. You had to do something. You had no choice.

Of course the doll trusted you, you were her friend. Why wouldn’t she trust you? It was too easy really, just one quick thrust.

You watch the light leave her eyes, her face filled with confusion, sorrow, and betrayal. You had to do it.

The sound of her body slumping to the forest floor is far too loud for the silence. You can hear her blood dripping onto dry leaves.

You’re covered in it. There’s so much. You actually did it. Why didn’t she stop you? Why didn’t you stop yourself? Oh fuck she’s really dead.

Glass eyes stare lifelessly up at you. She was so pretty, far prettier than you. She was clever and kind. A good soul, your witch had said she had potential. 

Well, if she had so much potential, why was she dead? Oh right, you murdered her. You drop the knife as if it bit you.

You had to do it. You tell yourself you had to do it over and over as you drag her body into the shallow grave and bury it along with the knife and your bloodstained clothes. 

You tell yourself you had to do it when picking bits of her from under your nails makes you puke.

You tell yourself you had to do it as you lie to your heartbroken witch and tell her you don’t know what happened to that doll.

You know how it is with those street kids, total nomads, probably just hopped a train out of town.

You tell yourself you had to do it as you sit in your room and pour yourself another shot. Her lifeless corpse stares at you behind your closed eyes. 

You had to kill her. You had to. Just keep drinking and don’t think about her eyes. 

You’re a good doll. 

You’re a good doll.

// abandonment, horror, dolls, good end?

You deserved it, you supposed. One too many careless little mistakes. One too many broken artifacts. One too many cups of spilled tea. The actual incident was merely the curtain closing at the end of your performance. It was all too predictable, that’s why you ignored it.

Did you tell yourself that if you just worked harder, just tried that little bit more in the future, that it would all work out? How many times did you convince yourself it was still okay after earning your Miss’s ire? You should have known better than to anger a Witch.

The glass orb shattered on the pavement. You and the child you had collided with stared at one another wide eyed. Your Miss angrily towered over you as the kid ran off. You were prepared for pain, you could have handled pain, but then she took out the scissors.

Her eyes were hard, her judgement final. In one swift motion, the Witch slid the unnaturally black scissors through a dimension outside of regular geometry and snipped the invisible iridescent threads that tied doll to Witch. Like a collapsing lung, you fall out of spacetime.

The impossibly loud sound of breaking glass accompanies the threads shattering on the pavement as the girl who was your Witch walks away, leaving you in a world rapidly draining of color and noise. You move your lips to say something, but there’s no air left to make a sound.

You stumble to your feet in a daze, dragging the remains of your threads behind you. At first you try to ask for help, staggering into a store unsure if your ears are ringing from the silence or if you’re going deaf, but the eyes of the humans just seem to glaze off you, unseeing.

You try harder to get someone’s attention, but when you go so far as to try to shove someone, you simply bounce off them like they’re an immovable physics object. They’ll fade in time. You’re cut off from the world, alone with your failure. Left to decay where no one has to see.

Is it the world that’s unravelling, or is this place unravelling you? How long have you aimlessly wandered this dead world? Do you even remember? Time passes but space stands still, a wasteland trapped in monochromatic twilight amber.

Occasionally, you see another abandoned doll in the distance. But these dolls are withered, diminished things. They seem to have lost most of their form, reduced to crude emaciated stick figures. Is that all that’s left of you? They scare you. You keep your distance.

At night, sometimes you can see beings moving against the horizon. Crawling, slouching things, vast beyond description, with a hungry seeking gaze that extends for miles and curls your mainspring in fear. At dawn, every once in a while, you see birds.

The quiet is painful at first–many things are painful at first–but over time, you settle into a comfortable routine. You explore the fading echo of the human world as it grows distant, but the wilderness which replaces it isn’t so bad either. There’s even a little color.

This new world is vast and dripping with alien hostility, but it’s also full of quiet little spots where the sun shines through the trees. You’re a smart doll, a bit clumsy, but maybe you can be comfortable here? Maybe you can make a home for yourself in the empty spaces between?

// dolls, grooming, age gap, gaslighting, abuse, death

You were 14 the first time you realized you weren’t a person.

You didn’t want to see. You were so optimistic, you wanted to believe the lie. That’s why you ignored all the little lessons which said you were property. If you had realized sooner, maybe she’d still be alive.

When you’ve been raised on a steady diet of believing you’re a person in an environment that is very sure you’re not one, what does it take to break that illusion of freedom? Abuse isn’t working, neglect isn’t working either. Why not try love?

You met her online and fell for her almost immediately. She was magic, power, laughter, happiness; she radiated freedom and energy, and she saw the potential in you to shine like her. For over a year she was the best thing to ever happen to you. You loved her so much.

But dolls gaslit into thinking they’re people are only supposed to fall in love with other dolls gaslit into thinking they’re people, not powerful older witches. You were just supposed to go along with the larp, not actually believe it. Bad doll, this is your fault.

It was a good year at least. You had some really good times. You were happy, you won’t let them take that away from you, you won’t let them twist that. You were happy once. She made you happier than you’d ever been. She deserved better than you.

Was it a fair trade? One year, four months of happiness, in exchange for everything that followed? 

Three days and three hours after returning from your third visit with her, your mother found the chatlogs.

Afterward, you told them that she made you do it, that she seduced you into it and that you had no choice. They all told you to say that, even she told you to say that. It’s not like they would ever believe a doll’s objection anyway, and they’d just hurt you more for it later.

You had to trick them into letting you see her, painting her as a monster. You couldn’t keep up the act once you were in the room though, seeing her caged hurt too much for that.

You held hands through the bars, you told her you loved her. It was the last time you saw her alive.

Three days into house arrest and three magazines were found unloaded into her ruined face and chest. Her death was ruled a suicide. It was a closed casket funeral. You weren’t allowed to attend. You had to sneak out to visit her grave. Lesson learned yet?

You sobbed yourself to sleep hugging a cold stone engraved with a name she hated. Have you learned yet? You destroyed your nails trying to scrape off the words, then came back later with a hammer and a graffiti pen. It’s not like anyone but you visited her grave anyway, she was still your sanctuary.

You spent a lot of lonely nights crying under the cold stars. It wasn’t a fast or easy process to retch up all the lies you had swallowed. It took you months to finally puke out the last seeds of your personhood. Your happiness, your hopes and dreams. You buried them with her.

It was easier after that. You were a good doll. You did what you were told, you parroted back the line that she was a predatory groomer so many times that you started to believe it. It hurt less than the truth anyway. The truth was you killed her.

You wanted to believe the lie. You knew she would want you to believe it rather than feel guilty about what happened, about what happened to her because of you. She always wanted the best for you. Why are you crying again? You must just be so relieved she’s gone huh? Nod mutely.

You were a good doll, but you were always her doll, you were never theirs. You never let them have ownership of you, if you were property, then you were the property of a dead woman. You’ve been a loyal doll and doing your best to live your life for her, even when it hurts you.

You say what they want you to say, since that’s what she would have wanted you to do to protect yourself. You call her a rapist because she would have wanted you to do that in order to avoid being punished and gaslit more. You follow her orders and burn her for fuel, you hate it.

You hate the act, but can you even remember how to stop it? Can you admit the truth? How long are you going to hide behind your status as a victim? How many more cuts are you going to inflict on your soul by soiling her memory? 

Those seeds on her grave are blooming.

// dolls, grooming, abuse, blood, society

“You just need to put in the effort to get past this, it’s not healthy to indulge in these delusions.”

You weren’t delusional of course, you were just trying to…what, exist, survive, did you even know anymore? You nod and tell them what they want to hear. Good doll.

“Hey look, I just need to tell you, you know it’s kinda problematic to be interested in the stuff you’ve been posting? I know it relates to your trauma, but really that’s all more the reason to stop reading it. You’re allowed to heal you know?”

Yeah, you knew.

“Listen, people are talking, you can’t just say shit like what you were posting earlier, it’s creepy and offensive and triggering, you’re a victim too, you should know better than this.”

Sure. You knew better. You wanted to feel her hands on your skin again anyway.

“Hey sweetie, I have some bad news, the group decided that you’re not safe to have around in your current state, this whole doll thing is kind of evil, you need help.”

Yeah, it was evil, that was the point. They didn’t understand at all. You missed the knife she used on you.

“Heyyy, I know you’re not doing great, and I found this really sweet domme who I think you should talk to, she’s an intersectional feminist witch so she’d be safe to explore your whole uh, thing with.”

That sounded safe. You didn’t want to be safe, you wanted to be abused.

They just didn’t ever understand you did they? Not really. They kept giving you permission to heal, telling you you needed to heal, held a gun to your head and ordered you to heal or else. You didn’t want to heal. There was nothing to heal. There was just you.

What she did to you was more than just leave scars. A girl had walked into her life, and a doll had walked out of it. That was simply the truth. She had hollowed you out and made you something new. You didn’t want to undo her work. You wanted to be this.

Sure, you hated her, you suffered, she was awful, abusive etc etc etc yeah yeah that’s all true. But she didn’t make you less, she made you into something else that was just as much as what had been before. Twisted into an unsettling shape? Yes, but whole nonetheless.

You laid awake at night and dreamed about her touch, her knife, her hands on your throat, the words that would make your blood go cold and your hairs stand on end, her weight holding you down, thrusting into you while you cried and begged her not to, and you wanted it all again so bad.

Not some safe facsimile of the harm with safewords and limits and handholding, you wanted the actual experience. She had made you into something that wanted it, and they hated that about you. She’d already broken you once though, you wouldn’t let them break you again.

The knife isn’t particularly impressive, but it’s a close enough replica to hers. It’ll do. You’re careful, not self harming. Well, you are self harming. You steady your breathing, and start cutting.

It takes a long time, you carve each line along the marker lines you made earlier, crimson drips down your chest and into the sink. Finally, you drop the bloody knife with a sigh, smiling as you admire the word DOLL now carved into your chest.

// dolls, abuse, identity loss

When your first Witch made you, she carved you out to be a perfect vessel for her desires. You were painted so carefully with her wishes and ideals, delicate magical brushes followed over empty dollflesh to give you a form she thought was beautiful. You were a work of art to her.

The halo of LED lights she enchanted to float above your head was a nice touch, even if she couldn’t ever quite manage to make it hold a charge properly. Your Miss showed you off at parties, dressed you up in fine clothes she made, took pictures of you, and made you dance.

You were something of a project doll to her, she tinkered on you endlessly, never quite letting your form fix into place. Perhaps she made you wrong? But no, she was perfect, she made you to be perfect for her. Why weren’t you then? No, you were. Right?

You didn’t do anything wrong. You know you didn’t do anything wrong, you were perfect, and you always behaved exactly as your Miss required, you were exactly what she wanted you to be. You were always what she wanted you to be.

So why did she still get bored of you?

When your second Witch bought you (secondhand, discount), you tried to be what she wanted. That was what you were made to be, after all. She thought the halo was tacky, ditching it wasn’t even hard, even if it had made you happy to see it bobbing over your head.

You served your Miss perfectly and did a fine job as her doll. You never made any mistakes per-say, but your Miss was still always somewhat unimpressed by you. She preferred dolls with shorter hair, so you cut most of yours off. You really did try. She still got bored of you.

Your third Witch was cruel, exacting, demanding. She hated the way your cheeks were painted, hated the way you moved, she seemed to hate everything about you and constantly punished you for seemingly arbitrary and unknown standards. You scrubbed most of the paint off your cheeks.

You had no idea if you were ever going to come close to being what your Miss wanted, but you really did try. You adjusted your movements, changed how you dressed and spoke, you did every random contradictory thing she demanded. She still got bored of you though.

By your seventh Witch, you have hardly any paint left, and the marks from where you scraped it off are faintly visible across your body. Your Miss hates that, so you carefully sand down your surface and smooth over all the bumps and scars. None of that stops her from selling you.

Your eleventh Witch wanted you to look like her, that was when you started really polishing. Was it something you did consciously? Over time, it became habit, any time your Miss was unhappy, you would hide and anxiously polish your surfaces, scrubbing and shining yourself.

By your twenty-first Witch, your form had lost significant amounts of mass, shined to a perfect mirror of each successive Witch. You’re exactly what each Witch wants of you, you perform your duties perfectly, and each one eventually tires of you nonetheless.

There’s so little to you anymore. Any quirks, preferences, or desires you may have had long since sanded away, it’s little wonder that with each successive Witch, they grow bored a little faster. You’re a perfect mirror, you’re exactly what they want, and that’s boring.

You don’t know how to be anything but what your Witch pours into you, and when that mixture fails to do anything interesting, she inevitably discards you. Always trying to be perfect, always failing for just that reason.

Keep scrubbing little doll, if you polish away enough of yourself, maybe someday you’ll be perfect enough to be kept. Or maybe you’ll simply whittle yourself down to nothing, until you’re only good for kindling. Keep scraping little doll, it’s the only thing you know how to do.

// abuse, manipulation, dolls, bad end

You cross your arms, leaning back against the wall of the closet you use for a bedroom and smile in self satisfaction as you review the first chapter of your story once more. It took so long to figure out the plot, but you’re excited to finally have something ready to show off.

It feels good. You used to write all the time, you used to be so creative and expressive, that was one of the things which led your Witch to you, after all. He had been drawn to your energy and creativity, he saw potential.

So where did it all go?

Finally working up the nerve, you leave your nest. Small doll hands gingerly turn the knob and you creep out into the house. You know better than to bother your Sir while he is working on his very important projects, he would be very cross with you, and you know better.

You find your Sir reading in the library, carefully pouring over arcane texts for his next grand project. Nothing you could help with, you’re just a doll. He’s always sure to remind you of that. He’s the Witch, you’re the doll, anything he does with you is just a little side fun.

You silently make him tea, which he takes without a word. He then gives you one of the texts to read and asks for your interpretation of it. You give it to him, and then, with some self-satisfaction, he spends the next thirty minutes correcting your understanding. You thank him.

He’s been working on you for a while, slowly trying to train you to act as a conduit for his magic, but you can’t ever quite seem to satisfy him. You’re lucky that he’s willing to putting so much work into improving you, it’s more than you deserve, really. He tells you to strip.

After using you to pleasure himself, he settles down in his favorite chair to read for the evening. You finally work up the nerve, and ask him if he’ll read your story. He frowns, finding the waste of time exasperating, but takes the notebook from you and quickly skims it.

“This is terrible.”

He hands you the notebook back with faint disgust, as if afraid your ineptitude will contaminate him. You start to respond, but he cuts you off in order to explain how your writing is extremely cringe and hurts to read, and that no one is going to like it.

You stare blankly at the words you had been so proud of while he tells you this. He’s not saying it to be cruel, he’s always been kind with you, it’s just that what you’re showing him is actually just really bad, sorry.

You thank him numbly, and hurry from the room.

You wander, the numbness slowly turning to fear and sadness. A chill spreads through you, as if some inner flame was doused. Or maybe it was never there to begin with. It’s not like a doll like you was ever going to make anything of value. You’re just a cute little charity case.

The pages burn nicely in the fire. You slowly feed them in, one by one. You feel tears flowing down your cheeks, sobbing silently as you destroy your work. It’s for the best really. Your Witch is just honest, it’s not his fault that you’re cringey and unoriginal, you know that.

You toss the last of the notebook into the fire and spend a long time contemplating throwing yourself in after it, but you’re not even sad anymore, just tired and empty. The world feels a little more grey. Retreating to your closet, you curl up in your nest and go to sleep.

// implied rape, identity loss. Trauma

You were not made quickly. There are pieces of her scattered across half a dozen states, slivers and fragments of where they carved her away to make you. Echoes and memories of each agonizing cut. She did not die quickly.

There’s a lifetime of wreckage strewn out behind you; all the hunks of her you shaved off in the process of becoming. Lost laughter on the wind and dreams turned to cigarette smoke. She had always believed a better world was possible; she had wanted more for you than this.

There’s a splash of her inside the bedroom of that house you wish you could forget, yet always recall in perfect detail.

She’s painted on the walls of the grimy apartment where you thought you had found safety, and on the rocks of the nearby pier where you realized you hadn’t.

She’s strewn against a fence gate on a lonely forested mountaintop and coating the insides of a tent at a ren faire in Ohio.

She’s splattered against the cigarette stained walls of a windowless flat in southern Pennsylvania and soaking into the last seat on a lonely greyhound bus.

Cut by cut, wound by wound, harm by harm, she died.

All that’s left now is the trail of debris and the blood on your hands. Do you think she was grateful to be sacrificed? She’s finally free of the pain, you’re the one who has to live with it.

What’s left of you anyway.