Playing Dolls

I laughed nervously and grabbed for the doll. The other dolls almost fell out of my pocket. Fortunately for me, Miss Gilda only saw my own doll. I picked it out of my pocket and placed in the living room, where we were. Her own doll had moved down there as well. I also added my wife back into the dollhouse, and at that very moment she reappeared at the doorway.

“Up to no good, are we?” she asked in a teasing kind of way. Yet there was something dark in her voice, as if she knew what we had just been about to do.

“N-No,” I said, and got up. I dusted myself off. “We were just playing dollhouse.”

“We were playing house,” Miss Gilda giggled. My wife shot her a glance and then they both turned their eyes towards my direction. If feelings were visible rays of color there was something angry, red, and maybe even a dark black streak shot my way and between the two women.

“I think I’ll take this to my workroom,” I said, and scooped up the dollhouse. “It seems to be causing some problems here.” Once again the voices that ran through my head began talking. They suggested that I keep the dollhouse shut up and away from the others, at least for now.

“That’s a good idea,” my wife said. “You need privacy to play right anyways, you can’t just be out here not thinking about what you are doing.”

Yes, the voices told me, take us to the study. No one will know what you do with us there. Put us in the dollhouse. Then you can really play. Then you can really create. The more female of the voices that ran in my head told me that Miss Gilda was right, that I did have some sort of magic. So play with us, she said, play with us and their dolls too. Make this whole house your own personal drama.

I almost started talking back to the voices before I had removed the house all the way to my study. I caught myself and looked back at the two women. They waved me away and then returned to shooting those strange stares back and forth. When I got to the study and set the house down, they were knocked over onto each other. I picked them up and inspected them.

“I guess this is as good as any place to start,” I said. I then began to mimic their voices as I did place them back on top of each other.

“You know there's tension between us because of more than him,” I said as Miss Gilda.

“What do you mean?” I sniffed in my wife’s voice.

“Put your hands on my chin and feel it---”

“I can--I can’t--”

“Just try it this once,” I said, still in character as Miss Gilda.

“But I--”

“Shut up, and put your hands here.”

“You are soft,” said me-as-my-Wife. “I want to kiss you.”

“**** me softly and you can,” I said. I was too excited to finish the scene that played out in my mind. I could imagine various ways to get to the end point, but the excitement proved too much and I quickly excused myself back to my bedroom to change my clothes. From the vent I heard the sounds of two women talking, in hushed voices.

“Shh, my husband will hear.”

“I’ll be your husband.”

What I had played out with the dolls had happened. Part of me wanted to do the same with Robert and Roman, after all they each seemed to have their own designs on the women. And part of me wanted to place my doll squarely down between the two girls.