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progrocksandcoke · 5 months ago

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Dollhood

Dollhood is a follow-up to Humanity.

I'm sitting on her lap. The witch's hands were on my back, massaging me with a gentle firmness. I stare down at the glass of iced tea she poured me moments ago. I can't take my eyes off it.

"Take all the time you need, darling." She whispers in my ear. I shudder and let out a ragged exhale. "Becoming is a very big moment."

I very slowly, very deliberately, reach out and grab the drink with both hands. I pull it closer to me. I can hear myself breathing. I hold it up to my mouth. I feel her hands get softer and gentler. I... take a sip...

...oh. Oh.

I take another sip. And another. Each time I take just a bit more, and keep it in my mouth just a bit longer. Everything about it is so... perfect. The flavour, the temperature, the texture, the mix... I never knew iced tea could taste so lovely.

It's done. I set the empty glass down and let the feeling sink in. I'm going to become a doll.

The witch wraps her arms around me, pulling me against her torso. I just noticed how heavily I'm breathing.

"Did it taste good, darling?" Oh god, her voice is wonderful.

"Yes Miss."

Chills. A static runs up my spine and tickles my skin. "Miss..." I can't help but repeat it under my breath. It was automatic, a reflex, a natural reaction to her.

She laughs. She coos at me like I'm an adorable, beloved pet. "Oh, you're already such a good doll~"

I can't keep it up anymore. I just melt into her. I'm her doll. I'm her good doll.

"What else do you feel? I want to know everything. I've been waiting for this almost as long as you have."

Miss wants to know everything.

"I feel amazing." The words fall out of me. I'm barely trying to speak, but... it takes so little effort to follow her orders. "I feel a little stiff, but my muscles feel limp, and I..." I hesitate for a second. I can't stop for long, it feels too nice and right to do what she tells me. But I don't know how to say this. But before I can, I feel her nails ever so carefully trail up my arm.

I moan. I can't help myself. I lean my head back, resting on her shoulder. I can tell I have a big, blushy smile on my face, but I can't bring myself to care about anything except her.

"Oh, you are starting to harden, aren't you?" Her touch feels like God. I've been scratched in bed, but there's something different. It's... Miss. Her touch, her nails, it's so much more than I've ever felt.

And... she's right. My skin does feel different. I can feel it from her touch. Her nails aren't digging as deep as they should before they start to scrape. "Hold your arms up, darling."

"Yes Miss." I blurt it out, like every moment the words are unsaid is torture. She caresses along my arms until she reaches my elb... ow?

I look at my arms. My joints are exposed. There's no blood or bone, it's like the joints are part of my skin, not covered by it. I can see the seam in my arm where it connects to the joint, I can see what should move and what shouldn't. She's touching them directly. Oh god, they feel so tender and weak.

"You're whimpering, you poor thing. Do you need me to stop?"

"No Miss! No Miss, please, Miss, ple-hease, don't stop, please don't stop Miss." I close my eyes, I can't take all this stimulation, but it can't stop, please, it just can't. She's nuzzling into my neck now. "Then ask nicely. Dolls should be polite."

"Please Miss, please keep touching muh, mmmmmf, mmn, haa..." I can't, I just can't. It won't come out. It shouldn't come out.

"This one."

"Keep touching this one," I feel like the world is finally right. I... this one feels like this, talking about itself like it's just some thing, makes everything feel right. "keep touching this one," It just feels like what's supposed to happen, how this one was meant to talk about itself all its life. "keeping touching this one, keep-"

"Shhhh."

This one can't talk. She doesn't want it to.

"Lean forward, darling."

This one leans forward.

She holds this one's torso in place with both hands. She lifts it up just enough so she can place her ear against its upper back. Like this one is just a toy for her. Just Miss's toy. A toy for Miss.

She giggles. She's so beautiful, she's perfect, she makes this one want to weep with everything she does. "Can you hear the ticking, dear? Your clockwork is growing in. You must be so excited~"

It tries to keep still. It's holding its breath. It's so worked up, everything is so intense, it should be hearing its heartbeat in its ears. But it's just ticking. A soft, rhythmic tick, still going as fast as Miss deserves. Tick-tick, tick-tick, tick-tick, tick-tick.

She sets this one back down on her lap. This one feels so weightless, like it couldn't put up a fight even if it wanted to. Everything about her feels so much better, so much warmer, so much softer. This one never wants this to end.

"You're almost a doll, dear. Anyone who looks at you can tell you're not a person." She's enjoying herself so much, and the intense euphoria of knowing that this one is the reason she's so happy is the best it's felt all night. "Any last words before your humanity goes away? This is your last chance before you're nothing but my cute, obedient doll forever~"

"No Miss." This one can keep its voice down. "This one needs to be a good doll for you Miss. Please get rid of everything that ever made it human."

Miss hugs it tight again, as tight as she can, and it goes limp. We both fall sideways, and she's careful to keep herself cuddled close behind this one. She brushes this one's hair aside, and leans in as close as she can, until this one can feel the heat of her breath.

"Be still for your Miss, Sugar."

So this one was still.

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progrocksandcoke · 5 months ago

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Humanity

[CW: Passive suicidal ideation.]

Being a person feels... heavy. Like I'm always full of something. It didn't have to be gross, but it usually was. Sometimes it was something with an easy word to it, like disdain or cowardice, but usually it was more vague. Some sort of congealed, disgusting mass that's been slowly accumulating for as long as I've been alive, weighing my guts down until I'm too stressed to eat and too tired to sleep.

I don't want to die. Death sounds too painful, and I'm scared of commitment. But, as I looked out into the bay, waiting for the traffic on the toll bridge to advance, I can't help but daydream. If I drove into the river, just by some freak accident out of my control, I... wouldn't do much to fight it. I would just let whatever happens happen as I sit still. Let this heaviness in my chest weigh me down and drown me.

My whole life was like that, really. Just moment after moment of letting things out of my control happen to me. My parents never really let me do much, either because we didn't have money, or they decided it wasn't right. I had to move out young after they died, and that didn't give me much of a choice in where to work and where to rent. I didn't even have a chance to think about what my major would've been.

Being a waitress meant doing what you're told when you're told, which table to go to and what to bring them, and what to clean. The work itself was fine, it's just... everything around it. The same awful people just as trapped here as I am, the same inconsiderate boss that barely pays me enough to buy vegetables, the same disgusting smell of fish and chips, all building up and coagulating little by little.

The only way I could get through an average work day was by shutting my brain off and just letting my body move on its own. The years I've worked there have just been the same fog of meaningless obedience. It's a sort of torture, suppressing your ego all just to become your work, for the sake of people you hate. Just feeling full and heavy and gross.

That's how I survived most of my life. Ever since I started school, I learned quick that you keep your head down and go with the flow. Don't be too loud, too big, too anything. Just look pretty and do what you're told without thinking too hard about what you're doing. Try not to feel too much.

Of course dying isn't that big of a deal. I don't feel like I was ever truly alive, ever something that could really be called a person.

Oh, I'm home.

God it's so cold out. It's like the wind is trying to bite me through my coat. I really wish our heating worked, but I've given up trying to fight for it a long time ago.

I can hear the music from here. I swear to fucking god if she's throwing another party I'm going to scream. She can't keep doing this, she really can't.

I fumble with my keys because it's too cold in the hallway, and I struggle with the lock because it hasn't been replaced in over a decade. This is the right key, and I keep trying to turn it, but it won't unlock and my fingers are starting to hurt.

Today needs to end. Please. I just need to stop, after everything, I just need things to stop and let me be still for a single fucking-

Finally.

I leave the door open for as little time as I can. I don't even take my coat off before I march into the living room. She's there, on the couch with more friends than I've ever met. They're all smiling, talking with each other, and having fun. They're smoking weed inside.

I need to stop looking at the one sitting on the arm of the couch, she's not important right now.

"Hey, what the fuck?!" I raise my voice to be heard over the music and drunken ramblings. "I told you that you can't keep doing this, I'M the one who gets in shit for this with the landlord!"

She looked around her, gauging her guests' reactions. She forces a timid smile. "Hey, you don't have to make a big deal out of this, alright? Nothing's gonna happen if nobody tells on us, so just relax." She turns away from me, back to the others. To the woman on the arm of the couch. My roommate falls into this sort of drunken fawning, trying to excuse my behaviour, but that woman on the arm of the couch doesn't join in with them exaggeratedly rolling their eyes or shooing me away.

"I'm not the bad guy here! You're the one who keeps...!" I wince, bringing a hand over my eyes as I recoil into the door frame. It's so loud. "Fuck it, I can't do this with you, I'm going to bed." I turn and leave and slam my door and lock it. She turns the music back up. I'm ordering food and going to sleep.

After I stop crying.

. . . . .

"Do you like your life, darling?"

I'm floating. I'm naked. I can't tell where I am. I don't think I'm anywhere.

"...No."

The woman from earlier. I couldn't stop thinking about her all night. The way she looked, how she carried herself, it was just stuck in my brain.

She's so... big. She's towering over me. I'm like a toy, barely up to her shins.

This isn't a dream. She's there. I can feel her in front of me, almost more real than being awake. I've never been more lucid before.

"Such a poor thing..." She looks so sad. For me?

She's kneeling. "Let me take all that hurt away. I've always wanted nothing more than to help someone like you live the life they deserve." I should be scared. I shouldn't trust her. "I already know you'd make such a good doll~"

I look down at my body. It's fluctuating, moving in and out as I look at myself. My torso is flat and wooden like a marionette, but with each breath in it expands with cloth instead of skin. I can feel the seems of my stitches, the plastic of my joints, the clattering of my porcelain, all at once. It feels... welcome.

She's reaching for me. I know I should flinch, I should be scared of her crushing me as she wraps her hands around me like a doll, but I can't even remember what such a distrust would feel like. She's pulling me to eye level.

Why does her touch feel so... nice?

I feel a breach, like I've just come up for air. I can feel my soul hack and sputter, and finally begin to breathe. I've never felt so light, so emptied. Everything disgusting inside of myself was drained away. Have I been drowning all this time?

"Meet me whenever you're ready, darling." I know where she means. I see her manor, grand and sprawling, but tucked away just out of sight. I can see it so perfectly. "I'll be waiting for you there."

Her hands start to loosen, and I start to fall, further and further away from Miss.

I inhale sharply, way too deeply, as I wake up. It feels like I'm gasping for air. My whole body... hurts is the wrong word, there's a heavy rawness pulsating through me. It's not the heaviness normally in my chest. I'm in a puddle of sweat. I can feel my heartbeat behind my eyes.

My phone says it's 4:37 am. I don't care. I need to see her.

. . . . .

It's a blur. I'm on autopilot, too wired to think. This doesn't feel like before, this isn't the fog. This is pure intention.

I find myself in my car, driving to her. I know where to go, I know. I need to get there. I can't afford to waste any time.

I leave my car parked on a dirt road and wander into the forest just as the sun starts to rise. I didn't bother grabbing anything I didn't need to get here, and I left what i did grab in the car anyway. I didn't even take the keys out of the ignition. Whatever happens, I'm not coming back.

It's a few minutes of walking from the road to her manor. I have plenty of time to reconsider. It's not too late to go back. I'm afraid, of course. My self-preservation is trying to restrain me by my neck. But every time I think about giving into that fear, that complacency stopping me from stepping into the unknown, the idea of returning to what was... I keep walking. I couldn't explain why. Too much momentum, too heavy to bother stopping.

I'm here. Oh god, this is really happening. I lean against the house on an outstretched arm as I stare at the front door. It's thick and wooden, like something from a fairy tale. I close my eyes, take a deep breath, and raise a fist. She opens the door before I can knock.

This is really happening.

"Oh, I'm so happy you came, darling!" She quickly reaches an arm around me and ushers me through the door. "And so quick, too! I knew I made the right choice."

She sits me down on the couch and disappears just a room away. Before I can even admire the decor, she returns with two glasses, and a jug of iced tea. She sits down beside me, pours herself a glass, and sets the jug out of my reach.

She takes a swig of her drink, leaning back and swirling it in her cup. She stretches her arm across the back of the couch. I could cuddle up to her so easily, and I've never before felt this tempted to do that with someone. "Tell me what you know about dolls."

I feel something I've never felt before. Just a little, just enough.

"U-uh..." I try to gather everything I can. I don't know why I'm so caught off guard by the question, I came here for a reason. But saying it out loud, actually articulating these feelings, is something totally foreign.

"A doll is like a person, but... not." I take a deep breath. I feel like I'm standing in front of a stadium of thousands. "Witches use their magic to turn people into dolls so they can have servants. And... there are rules to being a doll, like how you have to call yourself an object, and do everything you're told."

I look at her for approval. She's waiting for me to continue. "Am I gonna be a doll?"

The witch almost... melts. She has such a kind, compassionate smile. She sets her drink down and turns her body to face me as much as she can. "Do you want to be a doll, darling?"

"I... I mean, I, uh..." I have never felt more like prey. Why is my face so warm? I'd do anything for her.

She reaches out and takes my hands, that I was holding up to my chest defensively. I leave them limp, just letting her grab them. I feel my shoulders start to lower just a little bit. She's so warm.

"Dolls are empty spaces shaped like people." She teaches me. "Dolls are objects that are obedient and docile. There's a special feeling they have called stillness, where your thoughts go away and you just feel happy." She starts to smile, a tender eagerness. "Can you feel it now?"

I feel it. I feel it. I feel it, I feel it. The stillness. She's making me still. It's gone. I don't feel heavy. I'm empty in such a wonderful way. I feel like I could float through the breeze for the rest of my life and be perfectly happy. Like I could do anything, and I would be happy. Is this what life was supposed to feel like? All this time?

"It's a big decision, darling." Her voice is so... magical. It's calming, it's exciting, it's everything to me. "This can only happen if you want it to. Think about your old life, everything you'll leave behind. This is your last chance."

I think about being a human. I think about everything that comes with being a human, the things I'll lose. My autonomy, my identity, things I was never granted in the first place. The privilege of destroying my self just a little every day, all to save myself the trouble of feeling. More than anything, that disgusting heavy feeling, the filth so deeply compacted inside me I thought it was inherent to being.

"Y... y-yes... yes, I want to be a doll!" I'm smiling so wide. Crying hasn't felt this good in a long, long time.

The witch smiles back at me. She pulls me into her, hugging me so tenderly. She's soft, and warm, and so many things.

"You're going to become such a good doll."

Good doll. I can finally feel good.

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