by Pete Kahle
Their food was given to them, but Lewis had found that he had lost his appetite. He felt sick to his stomach, and he just wanted to go home. Pushing his plate aside, Lewis glanced back toward the doll. Lorelei is its name. Lorelei. Doris had seated it beside her like you would a child, its pale, porcelain skin exposed to the harsh fluorescent lights of the diner. The little doll was smiling, revealing a set of its teeth. He hated that little thing.
Lewis tore his gaze away from the doll and took the time to look around the diner. Other than him and Doris, the place was close to empty, save for a restless looking waitress, and a ragged old man sipping a milkshake at the counter.
After Doris finished her food, they crossed the diner to pay the check. The waitress met them at the register.
“How was your meal, folks?”
Doris smiled. “It was wonderful. Wasn’t it, Lewis?” She looked over and Lewis met her eyes, forcing a smile. He felt nauseous, and he wanted to get out of here. The waitress nodded and then her gaze fell on the doll. She grimaced and took a step backward.
“Did you get that thing from the store?”
Doris brightened and the shoved the doll toward the waitress. She cringed noticeably this time, nothing subtle about it. “Isn’t it just beautiful? Lorelei is a very pretty name. How much does she cost?” The waitress swallowed heavily, looking away. As she did, Lewis caught a glimpse a fleeting glimpse of terror in her eyes.
“Five dollars. Then it’s yours.”
Doris laughed and opened her little purse. “This is going to go in our bedroom!” She paid the five dollars. Doris turned and left while Lewis dug in his wallet to pay for the meal. The bell rang as she slipped out the door, her voice fading as she spoke to the doll. After she was gone, a powerful hand closed over his shoulder.
“Did your wife just buy that doll?” Lewis turned and looked right into the haggard eyes of the old man from the counter. “That is your wife, right?” Lewis nodded, not sure what else to do. The man looked around nervously, and Lewis realized how ancient the man really looked. His eyes were bloodshot from a lack of sleep. The man’s lips quivered as he focused his attention back toward Lewis. “Listen carefully. That doll… that doll is evil. Every time someone buys it, it wrecks their life and finds its way back here.”
Lewis frowned. “What? I--”
The old man shushed him. “I know you got the feeling. I saw your face when you looked at it. It will get in your head, and believe me, mister, you don’t want it there.” From behind Lewis, the waitress spoke.
“For God’s sake, Howard--“
The old man glared at her, and she tapered off mid-sentence. Howard looked back at Lewis, and his eyes seemed to plead, to beg. “Burn it.” The old man was leaning close now, and Lewis could smell liquor on his breath, thick and vile. Perhaps that wasn’t a milkshake he was sipping at. But, regardless of the alcohol, Lewis found that he believed him. He had felt a feeling, a powerful sense that had struck a chord deep inside. He did not want that doll in his house.
The old man stopped talking and glanced over Lewis’s shoulder. Then, he pivoted on his heels and walked away, his worn tennis shoes squeaking on the dirty tile. Lewis heard the bell over the door ring, and he smelled his wife’s perfume, a mixture that reminded him of the hospitals he had been stuck in during his time in the Army.
“Are you coming, sugar?” Lewis swallowed heavily before looking at Doris. “Yeah. Here I come.” Lewis glanced briefly at the doll in his wife’s arm, that doll that just stared dumbly into space. Burn it. Lewis glanced briefly at the old man, who waved a hand, and tipped a gruesome wink. With a sense of mounting dismay, Lewis realized that the old man was missing a finger. What in god’s name happened to his finger? With that final thought, he left the diner.
# # #
“No. No way is that thing staying in this room, Doris!’ Her face quivered as her eyes started to brim with fat, brackish tears.
“I don’t like it when you yell at me, Lewis,” Doris said, her voice quiet and low, nearly empty of assertion. “And neither does Lorelei.” This came with a little more force. He felt a tug of anger. Doris hugged the tiny doll to her chest, suffocating it against her breast.
“Yelling, Doris? You haven’t seen yelling. That…that…” Lewis struggled for the right words, rubbing his aching temples, “That toy does not belong in this room, and if you think I’m mad now, see what happens when you keep this up.”
Doris seemed to weigh these words, a loose tear rolling down her face. Lewis closed his eyes and imagined a shot of whiskey, crisp ice tinkling in a frosted glass. He found that he badly wanted a drink, bad enough to swear away ten years of sobriety. Bad enough to forget years of AA, bad enough to push aside the nasty, vomit soaked nights.
Lewis opened his eyes and looked at his wife, who had taken to brushing the doll’s hair in long, deliberate brushes. She’s bound to rip the hair right out of its fake little head. He swallowed and found that yes; a drink would go down very, very nicely right now.
“I don’t want to hear this anymore Doris. I don’t want this doll in this room, and that is final.” Lewis felt like he was talking to a child.
“Say it.”
Doris looked at Lewis quickly before averting her mascara stained face.
“But--”
Lewis interrupted her with a finger, “Say it. This doll will not stay in our bedroom.” Doris let out a massive, rattling sigh. She looked at him, her lips quivering. Lewis did his best to ignore it. He felt bad to be forcing her, but he couldn’t have that doll in the room while he slept. Why, he still wasn’t sure.
“I promise to keep Lorelei out of our room,” she said, her voice wavering on a full-out cry. Lewis smiled gently.
“Was that so hard?”
He leaned forward and kissed her, his slender lips meeting with her pallid forehead with a wet splat.
# # #
Lewis dreamt he was back in the hole. He could see the sky, the healthy, blue expanse of sky. He could also smell feces, the feces that he and his fellow soldiers had been lying in for far too long. Lewis looked down and he was lying in it. Stephens, an electrician from Brooklyn, was lying with his face buried, only his ears exposed. He was spread eagled, his limbs and head stretched. The rats had begun to eat away at him like rats do, first starting at his toes and fingers, turning them into tattered red strips of flesh, and white exposed bones that had been cleaned with little, lapping tongues. He had tried to stop the rats at first, but they kept coming. Deep inside, Lewis was glad Stephens was dead. His corpse brought rats. And they were delicious.
In his mind, Lewis knew he wasn’t back in the hole. But the fear lingered. He’d spent a week in the muddy, disgusting pit, wallowing in his own filth and the filth of Stephens, the only other man that been captured. They’d been on patrol; that much Lewis remembered. There had been an ambush, and half of his platoon had been killed by the bullets of the advancing Viet Cong. The other half had fled into the deep darkness of the jungle. He and Stephens hadn’t been so lucky. In his dream, Lewis looked around, thinking about how real this felt, how unlike a dream it seemed. He felt the gnawing hunger, he smelled the smells, and he heard the voices of his captors.
Above him, he heard the voices of the Viet Cong. They were moving closer, their high-pitched and hurried language leaking into the pit that was his home. Lewis heard harsh laughter, and he knew that feeding time was here. He looked up, waiting for one of them to poke his head over and dump whatever scraps they had decided to give him. Lewis had trouble looking through the harsh sunlight, the sunlight that had somehow found its way down to him in his muck.
A face poked into view, and Lewis gasped. It was Lorelei, her full, pallid face looking down at him. She smiled and her mouth was full of fangs, long needle-like fangs that were coated in a black mildew. She spoke, her porcelain jaw clicking together audibly. She sounded like the Viet Cong, the jagged form of English that they spoke. “You hungry now!? You eat!”
Lewis kne
w what was coming, and he knew that “food” was going to be upon him. The doll dumped a giant bucket of boiling human waste into the hole, where it struck him dead on, the foul heat rolling over his entire body. It was in his mouth, his eyes, his ears and his nose all at once, gagging and choking him. Lewis wanted to vomit, but his stomach was empty, and throwing up his remaining fluids was a very bad idea. The doll was laughing, loud and raucous laughter that seemed to fill the hole and reverberate through him. Lewis tried to scream, but nothing came out but a spray of the waste. Lewis looked up, where the doll seemed to have taken the face of a Vietnamese man, his lips thin and his eyes ablaze. The eyes were wide and filled with dancing lights, lights that spoke of insanity and darkness.
“Hi! I’m Lorelei, and I’m going to drive you insane. Then, I’m gonna slit your wife’s throat, and drink up the blood!” The doll leaned forward and seemed to transform into something dark, something that seethed and bulged against its earthly shape. Its voice was impossibly deep, and Lewis realized that this was something far worse than a child’s toy. “Then,” it bellowed, “You’re NEXT.”
# # #
Lewis awoke, a scream on his lips. He stifled it. In the darkness of the room, his gulp was loud. Lewis got out of bed, glancing quickly at Doris, who was snoring loudly beside him. He walked to the door. The hallway was dark. Lewis made his way down the stairs and into the kitchen. His plan was to make a sandwich, but halfway through he got to thinking about his nightmare. The smells. The darkness. Maybe he didn’t really have an appetite.
The sun came, and, along with it, an early morning call. The ringing woke Lewis up. For a second, looking around his living room, he was confused. Then he remembered that he had come down here. Must have fallen asleep on the couch. He tried to remember if he’d had anymore dreams. I don’t think so. Lewis slowly got up, stretching as he moved. His body groaned and cracked, and Lewis once again marveled at how old he felt. The phone brayed a few more times before Lewis made it over. He picked it up and answered.
“Hello?” At first, all Lewis heard was static. He half expected the voice of the doll, deep and hoarse, obscene and terrifying. Finally a voice spoke.
“Hello? Is this Lewis?” Inside, Lewis sighed. It was Rebecca, Doris’s older sister. Lewis cleared his throat.
“How are you doing Rebecca?”
On the other end, Rebecca sighed. “Things haven’t been great Louie.” Lewis cringed. Rebecca was the only person that called him Louie, and it irritated the hell out of him. “Cathy passed on last night.” Lewis’s heart dropped in his chest. On the way to visit Cathy they had stopped at the Waffle House that had the doll. After that, they’d continued on their way to the hospice that Cathy stayed at. They’d entered into the building, a quaint and stark place that made Lewis feel depressed. It was named Sunny Palms Hospice Center, a name that sounded overly cheery. They’d entered into Cathy’s room, where she laid in bed, watching television. The cancer had wasted her away to nothing. She was all crude angles and stretched colorless skin. Her eyes looked huge in her head, and her remaining hair consisted of patches of grey tuffs. Her bare head was a map of wrinkles and liver spots. Cathy looked drained, like some force was sucking her dry.
When they entered, they were assaulted by the scent of bleach and stale air. The room felt stuffy, though it was spacious. The television blared, a commercial for a used car lot, and Cathy stared at it, her mouth wide open, eyes glazed and blank. She glanced robotically at Lewis and Doris quickly before turning her gaze back to the television set.
They never stayed long with her sister. Doris always tried to talk to her, but she always got one word answers, and, some days, no answer at all. They left Sunny Palms Hospice Center, and Lewis was glad to leave its white corridors and its recycled air. It pained Lewis to see her Cathy like that. No person should be eaten away like that.
“Is Doris nearby Louie?” Rebecca asked, bringing him back to the present.
“Yeah. I’ll go get her,” Lewis said. He set down the phone and made his way upstairs. She’s dead. Imagine those cold, dead eyes staring blankly at you like that… like that… that doll. Lewis paused at the top of the stairs, his eyes on Lorelei. Doris had seated it on the windowsill, its little legs outstretched, and eyes staring directly at Lewis.
Lewis frowned and turned his back to it. He couldn’t stand the sight of the thing. He entered into the bedroom, only to find Doris before the mirror, caking make-up onto her face. As he entered, she turned and smiled. Half of her face was coated with what looked like cake batter. “Where did you go last night, Lewis?”
Getting away from the doll. Lewis gave Doris his most sincere smile and held out the phone. She gave him a puzzled look and took it from his outstretched hand.
The rest of the day seemed to fly by. Doris cried for a while, Lewis held her for a while, and then she packed for a while, her mouth running the entire time. “I’ve been gone from my family for far too long Lewis,” Doris said, tossing clothes into an old suitcase. “They’re going to need me now, and I have to be there.” Lewis just nodded, knowing that trying to talk would just be a waste of time. Once she got going like that, she couldn’t stop.
Doris finished packing, quickly throwing on a shawl and a beret. Lewis walked her to the door, his hands deep in his pockets. He wanted a drink, and that’s he could seem to think about. It seemed like a parasite had latched itself into his brain.
Doris kissed him once and then sighed heavily, “I’m going to stay at Rebecca’s for the next few days, and help everyone with the funeral things.” Doris looked at Lewis and smiled, her eyes twinkling. Lewis saw then that she looked tired, and, also in those eyes, the wonderful woman he had married. He felt love for her again. “Will you come to the funeral?” She asked, her voice low and quiet.
“Of course I will Doris. I wouldn’t miss it.”
Doris nodded as if she knew that was going to be his answer. “Great. I love you Lewis. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” With that, Doris turned and stepped out the door, leaving Lewis all alone in his own home.
For a while, Lewis didn’t know what to do with himself. He contemplated going and seeing a movie in town, but he eventually just sat down and watched television. Lewis found a John Wayne marathon on a cable channel, and just vegetated in front of it. He felt tired, worn out. What the hell is wrong with me? Am I depressed? While Dean Martin and Ricky Nelson sang about the whippoorwill, Lewis toyed with the idea. His need to drink, his distaste toward Doris, and even his reoccurrence of his memories of Vietnam all seemed to point to it. But if he was depressed, what had triggered it?
The doll. The doll had triggered it. Something about it. It emits bad energy, Lewis thought. As the movie ended, Lewis knew what he had to do.
The doll hadn’t moved. Of course it didn’t move. It’s just a toy. But, somehow, Lewis knew better. He stared at it, its blank eyes and pallid face staring blandly at him. It sat in the shadows, only a little bit of moonlight coming into the window behind it. He wasn’t going to sleep in his bed tonight. That nightmare had messed with him in ways he couldn’t understand. Lewis somehow knew that if he stayed in his bed tonight, he would have the dream again. He would sleep on the couch downstairs, and he would lock this damned thing in the closet.
Lewis grabbed the doll off the windowsill, surprised at its weight. It seemed far too heavy for a children’s doll, almost a strain for Lewis to hold. Also, the porcelain was cold to the touch. It’s frigid! Lewis thought, It feels like it’s been sitting in a freezer for a few hours. The cold made Lewis shiver. He hurried down the hall to the linen closet, which he opened quickly.
Lewis glanced at the doll one last time. The doll’s mouth suddenly dropped open with an audible click. Lewis cringed, and nearly dropped it. “Hi! My name’s Lorelei. Do you wanna play hopscotch?” Then, its eyes suddenly rolled into the back of its head, revealing only whites. They quivered and shook, and soon the entire body of the doll followed suit. It violently vibrated in Lewis’s hands,
and from its open mouth came a high pitched squeal. It screeched, its eyeballs quivering and its mouth chattering, teeth snapping within its porcelain jaw. Lewis yelled and pitched the doll as hard as he could into the closet. Its tiny body crashed into the shelf, snapping the wooden support right off. It crashed down but Lewis didn’t even bother to survey the damage. He slammed the door so hard that it shuttered in its frame. Lewis locked it and stepped backward, trying to catch his breath. From inside, the doll was laughing. Lewis ran his fingers through what was left of his thinning hair.
“Jesus,” he murmured. “What the hell is that thing?”
Shortly after the incident with the doll, Lewis went to the couch downstairs. He felt tired, and all he wanted to do is sleep. I’ll take care of that doll tomorrow, when the sun’s up. I can’t even think straight I’m so tired and stressed out. Lewis laid his head down, and, within a few seconds, she was greeted with the darkness of sleep.
Lewis awoke to the pitter-patter of little feet. The house was pitch black, so Lewis slowly sat up, trying to see his surroundings. From above his head, little feet pounded at the floor, crossing from one end of the ceiling to the other. It’s running around up there. How in the Hell did it get out? He got to his feet and crossed the living room toward the light. Lewis flicked it on and the room was flooded with light. From upstairs came the sound of a loud thud. Then, the laughter of a child.
Lewis took a second to think. This thing is alive. It moves how it wants, talks like it wants, lives like it wants. I’m gonna kill it, he thought. But, what could I use? They didn’t keep any guns in the house, never had any need. Lewis dug into his pockets, trying to find something that could be used. His hand closed around a square, metal object. Lewis withdrew it. It was his Red Sox Zippo, a cigarette lighter he bought at the last game he went to with Doris. He must have put it in these jeans a while back and never taken it out. Lewis dug further, and came up with nothing but change and pocket lint. He moved into the dining room, where he found his old baseball bat hidden behind one of Doris’s potted plants.