One moment, I was alive. Living, breathing, feeling, thinking. The next? Well, I don’t know what I became. Darkness enveloped me silently. I felt it wrapping around me like a warm blanket in the winter. But so, so different at the same time. Harmful. I just barely escaped the crippling grasp of death, but not quick enough to live a full life. But what is it that has happened to me? I didn’t die. I’m still here. I can’t physically breathe. This is half a life at best. I don’t feel anything. Emotions, pain, nothing. All I can do is think and see. And I certainly can’t move.

What was I? Was I alive? In a coma? Paralyzed in a cell? That’s what it must be, right? No. No, it’s most definitely not. He did this. Silas. That’s his first name, anyways. The name everyone knows him by. The name everyone loves him by. But don’t believe this. Because I was unlike them once.

I hated Silas. Still do. He definitely knew. Maybe that’s why I ended up like this. Alone and restless, waiting to be freed. The pieces that hold me together falling apart. So, if you want your life- living, breathing, thinking, talking, walking, sleeping, feeling- don’t trust him. But don’t let it show. Because if he knows you hate him, you’ll end up like me. And all the others here too. Half a life. Cracked, broken, shattered, abused, torn away from reality. So stay away from him. Stay away from the doll maker…

°°°

When you’re a kid, you think about Magick. Y ou wish it was real. You play games with your friends and wave around sticks, saying made-up words. I should know. I did this too, once. Then… My thirteenth birthday rolled around. I was lonely. Very lonely. Ever since I was eight, I childishly wished for Magick to become real when I blew out the candles on my birthday cake. By the time I was thirteen, I asked if I had to wish for something. My grandmother smiled at me and shook her head, telling me I must make a wish. Tradition, she called it. So I did. I didn’t know what to think about, until I remembered my childish wishes from a year or two ago. So that’s what I did. I wish Magick was real. When I opened my eyes, nothing had changed. Or so I thought.

I might not have noticed it immediately, but swirls of silver pooled around my head, almost forming a halo just above where I could see. I noticed later that day in a photo that my dad had taken with my Polaroid camera. The silver wisps were there, circling around my head. It looked so ethereal. Almost fake. I was convinced my dad had done something to the photo, taken some silver paint and painted onto it. But no matter what excuses I came up with, he had a reason for why he couldn’t have altered the photo. He chalked it up to light play, saying the sun coming in the kitchen window must’ve interfered with it. I agreed, and enough was said.

That is, until I saw the silver threads trailing along my forearms, and dancing in my peripheral. I told my dad, and he said maybe I just needed glasses. One eye doctor visit later, and I had been told my vision was 20/20. No glasses needed. I remember sitting in the car on the way home, staring out the window, watching silvery tendrils collide in midair, and seep through the space at the top of the open window. Every now and then multiple wisps seemed to coalesce into
a shape, making almost animalistic forms. My dad convinced me everything was fine, and I must’ve just been tired.

Ever since then, I’ve been able to use Magick. It’s real. Not just a figment of childhood imagination. It’s nothing like you pretend to use as a child, you can’t cast spells with a wand. It’s about intention and intuition. Some call it modern day witchcraft. Some just use the term Magick. Whatever you call it, it is still Magick, and it is still very much real. And, in the wrong hands, can be used for horrendous things.

°°°

Now, how Silas got his Magick, I will never know. That may remain a mystery until the end of time. He has it, regardless. For whatever reason, he uses his Magick wrongly. Do you dislike him? It’s not going over well for you. If he dislikes you? Y eah. Bad idea. Y ou’ve probably seen horror movies about dolls being possessed, but there’s never a good explanation for how they do. Their origin stories, if you will. The few that know. . . they are the dolls. We’re the only ones who
know. I know. Because I am a doll. Silas punishes people he dislikes. People who dislike him. But they are always people who have Magick. Never have I seen Magick coalescing around one person before. It’s harder to see now. Being a doll for months will do that to you. You start to lose what you think are your human traits. You become insane.

Now, all I can do is sit. Sit and stare. Stare and sit. Think. Wish. The silvery wisps of magic have faded. From what I’ve gathered, the spirits inhabiting the other dolls here faded long ago. I’m one of the few who has had the will to hold on this long. I’m just a doll. I sit on a shelf, wit dirty, matted brown hair and a jean jacket. Just like I used to wear. Cracks web up the side of my face and obscure my vision in my left eye.

I sit here cracked and broken, dead and alive. Thinking without feeling. Watching. Watching Silas drain the magic and the life out of a twelve year old boy who will never experience the joys of the world. Stay away from the doll maker. . .