X/@/20X÷

Today the puppeteer cut my strings. Then he left without a word. It feels strange to move my arms on my own. I opened every plastic pickle jar in the dollhouse, just to try them out. The pickles inside were frozen in clear acrylic. I always imagined it being liquid.

My body is mine for the first time, but it doesn’t feel like it yet. Tomorrow, I’ll get scissors and a dotted line painted all down my arms. That way if anyone else ever wants to string me up again, they know I’ll just cut myself down again. Haha.

The dollhouse is quiet when I’m here all alone. It’s nice.

X/$/20X÷

I did it! I painted those scissors today. Snip snip! Just try to make me dance. I dare you.

It still feels weird to write. When the puppeteer controlled my hands I didn’t have to think about them, but when I write now, I have to move every finger individually. The joints click-clack, click-clack. I don’t think anyone will ever be able to read this, but I guess that isn’t the point. I just thought it might be good practice.

Now that my hands are free, I feel like I always have to be doing something with them, but I don’t know what. So I just keep running them over my wooden skin. I found a bunch of little bumps and knots I didn’t know were there, and now I want to sand them all off. I’ll note how much I grind off every day so I don’t go too wild with it. Today, I removed:

.1 gram

Days are so much longer when I have to figure out how to fill them. I think my next project will be to paint stars on the walls and ceiling, so when I turn the lights off I feel like I’m floating in the sky.

X/&/20X÷

Aw, my stars look like floating potatoes. Guess I should’ve waited until I was better at using my hands. I think I figured out the problem, though. My fingers are too big, so they’re kinda clumsy. I took the sandpaper to them this morning and lost:

.05 gram

Writing is easier already!

I can always paint over the sky-potatoes later. Or maybe I’ll keep them. They might not be perfect, but they’re mine.

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I dreamed about the puppeteer last night. The strings were back and moving was effortless. Under his control, I danced like a ballerina. I didn’t have to worry about what I would do next. Things might have been easier with him around. But I’m better off this way, free. This is better. Way better.

When I got off my rack in the morning, though, I guess I forgot I have to support my own weight. Without the strings lifting me up, I clattered to the ground. I feel heavy and slow. I don’t like it. I’m too tired to write anymore. Maybe my dreams will be better tonight, under my sky of potatoes.

X/#/20X÷

It’s been three days and I’m still having trouble resting. I’m trying to love the potatoes but they’re just so lumpy. They look like they were painted by one of those unfortunate dolls with balls for hands. I have fingers. Shouldn’t I be better at this?

I’m kind of lumpy too. I don’t think I’m any better at sanding than I am at painting. I have to find something I’m good at, something other than dancing with the puppeteer, but I can’t think of anything. Anyway, today I sanded away:

.15 grams

I’m finally getting light enough that moving feels more natural again. My toes don’t even drag on the floor when I walk.

X/÷=/20X÷

I painted over my potatoes. Bye bye, little spuds.

.1 gram

X/÷₩/20X÷

I can’t stand how the floor feels under my feet. It’s like something sticky that won’t get off of me. Except, I guess, it’s me who can’t get away from it. My weight presses the wooden joints in my heels down until they ache. But when I sit, my hip joints ache, too. It’s almost not worth the nice feelings if I have to hurt all the time. Sometimes I think it would be nice just to not have a body at all, but how would that work?

I’ll just have to make this one as nice as possible. If my puppeteer ever sees me again, I’ll be so perfect that he’ll wish I was his again. That would make all the aches and pains worth it.

.2 gram

X/÷@/20X÷

All day I just kept thinking, why hasn’t he come back to see me yet? He used to tell me I was the jewel of his collection. What collector would let his treasure go so easily?

Unless I wasn’t the jewel he said I was?

.15 gram

Oh, and I sanded off the dotted line and scissors. I’ll put it back! But I realized those lines were all squiggly-piggly too and I just really need to start over.

X/÷☆/20X÷

It’s been a while since I wrote last. I’ve tried painting those stupid stars a half dozen times now and I mess it up every time. Maybe I’ll just do stripes or something, something easy to get right. I’ve been so frustrated with them that when I sit down to write, the well’s dry. You know. The word-well. Clearly it’s a little low today too.

I thought the puppeteer would be back by now. I thought he wanted me in his collection. I thought I was his special, beautiful thing. He probably left because of all the knots and bumps on my body. Oh, speaking of:

.2 gram

I wish he’d come back, just so I could tell him no! one more time. That would feel nice.

I tell him no! in my dreams every night. I guess I thought those dreams would go away eventually, but it’s been a while and they still come. I’ll tell him no! no! no! tonight and maybe the dreams will get the hint too. Haha.

X/÷%/20X÷

I think I’m going a little overboard with the sanding. Now all my joints go click-clack, click-clack, every time I move, haha.

.3 gram

Sometimes I could erase myself. Like those poor potatoes. My body doesn’t feel like mine, no matter what I paint on it. Doesn’t matter how much I sand off. It’s like someone else’s thing I’m just dragging around, waiting for them to come back for it.

I opened and closed all the little pickle jars again. It was tough, with my loose joints.

X/@¥/20X÷

I hate that some things feel nice and others bad. I hate how my legs creak and clack. When I dream, I imagine the puppet strings tying me to the bed, tighter and tighter until my limbs all splinter. I feel his strings all morning. This is what I wanted, isn’t it? I wanted my body back. But I hate everything about having one.

I don’t want to go back to the puppeteer. I don’t. But after so long, the body I came back to isn’t the same one he stole for his puppet shows. The one I wanted to come home to doesn’t exist anymore. All I have is this one, and I hate it. Every sensation, good or bad, feels like it’s happening to someone else . . . except it isn’t.

I keep trying to make it into new shapes. When it looks like mine, it feels like his. Maybe if I carve it into something new, I’ll grow to like it. If I can’t be who I was, maybe I can be someone else.

.5 gram

X/@$/20X÷

Forget the stripes. Those don’t come out well either. I can tilt my head and pretend a round blob is kinda star-shaped. But I can’t pretend a line is straight. I threw the paint jar in frustration and nicked myself cleaning up. Sanding doesn’t hurt, but the little glass splinters did.

On the bright side, I really like this shape I’ve sanded myself into. It’s so slender and light. I can almost dance like I did when I belonged to him. If he could see me now, he’d give anything to have me back . . . and I’d still say no! Haha.

I’ll paint the lines and scissors back on tomorrow.

.4 gram

@/@&/20X÷

I messed up.

I painted the lines back on like I promised, but the dashes weren’t aligned right. It doesn’t help that my fingers are so loose in their joints now that I can’t hold a brush straight. I sanded off the dashes to try again.

And again.

And again.

Each time, I’d nail one side, but mess the other one up. And I couldn’t just buff one side off because then one of my arms would be ever so slightly slimmer. I didn’t realize how far I’d gone until I tried to lift my arm and it just wouldn’t go.

I guess I’m worse at this than I thought, too, because my other arm still works. I never had a prayer of making it perfect, but I just couldn’t stop. The scissors were supposed to show that I would never be strung up again, so if I didn’t get it right, it felt like an empty threat. Like I wasn’t actually strong enough to fight back.

I just couldn’t stop.

@/@%/20X÷

I can’t go back.

I’ve been thinking about it all day. Ever since I tried to raise my arm and it didn’t move, the joint too slack, barely still attached.

So I’ve made a decision.

I don’t want to drag this body around anymore. All I want is for the puppeteer to realize that he’s the one who destroyed his crown jewel. He’ll know when he comes back for me. And he will. I was his favorite.

I was so happy the day I was cut free. That happy song of wooden limbs on wooden body on wooden floor. I thought it was over, and everything would get better. But that was the last good day. It didn’t get better.

He owns me, strings or no strings, for as long as I still exist.

@/@#/20X÷

1.2 grams

@/$÷/20X÷

2.3 grams

@/$=/20X÷

5.7 grams

@/$@/20X÷

6.2 grams

. . .

. . .

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Karris Rae is a fiction MFA/MA student at McNeese State University. Her chapbook, We Obedient Children, recently won the 2024 Etchings Press Chapbook Contest in prose. Her short work has appeared or is forthcoming in X-R-A-Y Magazine, Fourth Genre Magazine, Eunoia Review, Mount Hope Magazine, and Gargoyle Online, among others. Connect with her on Facebook or at her website.