The Doll

She tried to open her eyes, but she had cried herself to sleep the night before and it left that crusty stuff at the corners of her eyes. She rubbed her eyes and opened them just as the baby started crying. "Dumb baby," she thought.

Jessie was eight years old, and was an only child until her Mom and Dad had announced to her six months ago, that she was going to have a baby sister or brother. The baby turned out to be a sister, who they named Regina (Tina for short). Tina was named after her Dad’s mother, and Jessie hated the new baby and the baby’s dumb name.

"Jessie?" she heard her mother call from downstairs.

"Jessie, come down to breakfast."

She crawled out of bed and went into the bathroom. As she washed her face and brushed her teeth with her Harry Potter toothbrush, she remembered the night before. She was looking forward to her Dad reading to her before bed. They were in the middle of a Nancy Drew mystery, and she wanted to find out what happened next, but her Dad was busy helping Mom take care of the new baby. "You are a big girl now," her Dad had said. "You can read to yourself. Tina is just a little baby and needs a lot of help."

Downstairs at the breakfast table, Denise and John were discussing the problem of Jessie’s reluctance to accept the new baby.

"I can understand she is jealous," John was saying keeping an ear on the stairway, "but last night, the fit she pulled…" Denise nodded. "Maybe we should get professional help?" she was saying as John raised his hand to indicate he heard Jessie coming down the stairs.

Jessie came into the kitchen. She said nothing, but pulled up a chair and sat down. "Well, Pumpkin," John said cheerfully "we get to go over to the new house today and look around. We move in tomorrow, you know." Jessie frowned. "If it wasn’t for Tina, we would not have to move to a bigger house" she stated. "Well a bigger house is something we would have wanted anyway, so it isn’t just because of Tina." "You always take up for her!" Jessie spat. Denise gave John a knowing glance.

The trip to the new house was made in silence, at least on the part of the eight year old. John and Denise made idle chit chat, as the baby slept in her car seat.

Jessie managed to make one comment about how she would miss her friends now that she would be enrolled in a new school.

Once they arrived at the house, John and Denise tried to get their daughter interested in the house, the yard, and particularly her new bedroom. She reluctantly accompanied them to the bedroom, and idly watched as her father took some measurements. She walked over to what would be her new closet, and opened it. In the left hand side of the closet, leaning against the wall was a doll.

"Oh look!" she suddenly exclaimed. They were somewhat surprised at their daughter’s delighted outburst, and both came over to see what she had found. They watched as she stooped down and picked up what appeared to be an old hand made rag doll.

The doll was very old. It had large eyes made from yellow buttons and it’s mouth was not shaped as a smiling mouth, but instead was a straight line of red thread. The hair was made of yellow yarn grabbed by a pink faded bow.

Denise shuddered.