Dream: 2011

  
The doll was aging. 

My family and I were all going to Peru, for a visit or to stay, I don't know. 
But, we were packing suitcases and bringing them downstairs. The house door was 
fully open, easy to roll suitcases out to the car parked outside. My mom was busy 
getting last minute things in order. My dad was going in and out the door, lugging
things in and out. While I stood watching the scene from the staircase. Motionless, 
until I remembered that I had one sandal but not its pair. Why had I done that? But 
I knew I needed the other pair because not everyone would have a paved shower floor. 

I ran upstairs, stressed out that I wasn't done packing yet. I went straight to my 
closet and found the sandal in the mess of clothes I wasn't bringing to Peru. 
Everything seemed normal until I walked out of the closet and faced my room. 
There she was, her back to me. The doll was upright and alive. I ran downstairs 
calling out my mom's name. I was decided that they would see now, that they would 
see that what I was seeing was real. I needed someone else to see. Even though I
was screaming MOM MOM MOM, when I got downstairs, she wouldn't turn around. She 
kept picking things up in the living room and putting them next to the door. The 
lamp, the chair, the scrap of paper on the floor. What are we doing, I though. 
MOM MOM MOM. I slammed the sandal, still in my hand, on the wall and MOM MOM MOM. 
She turned and I said LOOK, pointing toward to the top of the staircase. 

The doll walked to the corner of the staircase and like a soldier, turned around 
to face us. Her face was old now. Her skin had wrinkles and deep creased. Her eyes 
were sunken and her hair, still in ponytails, was gray and disheveled. I looked to
my side to make sure my mom saw that the doll was alive. "She saw" was the last 
thing I thought.

When I woke up, I knew the doll was dying. Whatever was inside her was decaying. 
I knew that the doll would not haunt me again. She was gone. Broken.