Child’s Play
“Play with your dolls nicely,” mommy says.
“Don’t tear them up
or you won’t get any new ones for Christmas,” she advises.
“Santa doesn’t like
it when you break things he worked hard on. How would you like it if I went
around breaking the things that you made at school?”
My mommy always says that dolls are made to be pretty, but
whatever happened to the toys belonging to me?
After Santa gives
them away, they aren’t his anymore.
I can do whatever I want with them.
Santa’s probably too
fat to catch me if I ran.
Even if Santa didn’t ever give me anything else ever again,
I’d just get it from daddy. I break them, he buys them.
I love to play with my dolls, I rip their clothes and draw
on them with markers I like using blue and pink and purple and green and red. I
draw lots of different kinds of polka dots on them.
Sometimes they’re big;
sometimes they’re really small.
I run, hit, throw, and drag them. I scream and laugh and
howl and spin around and mommy says I shouldn’t but I don’t listen to her cause
daddy never does.
Sometimes when mommy’s not looking, I make marks on my dolls
with the candles that make the house smell good.
After you pour wax in their hair though sometimes they don’t
smell nice. I don’t know why when I pour stuff that smells good on something be
pretty it makes such a bad smell.
Mommy yells at me when she finds my dolls. I don’t care
though because daddy doesn’t care when mommy yells at him so I don’t care
either.
I have so much fun! She always tries to ruin my fun. Her and
daddy play all the time.
Daddy calls mommy
“baby doll” and “doll face.” Mommy always sends me to my room when they play
though. I hear mommy and daddy laughing and screaming and having fun just like
I do!
She says the reason I can’t play with them is because I have
to go to sleep. I hate going to sleep. It’s no fun.
Last night I was tired because, at school, we went to the
zoo for a field trip! We saw all kinds of animals and they said that the
animals were from all over the world.
Mommy says I’m weird cause I like bugs and my favorite is
the praying mantis.
We saw monkeys! They jumped around and made funny faces and
loud noises and we all copied them and chanted, “Monkey see monkey do!” It was
almost as much fun as playing with my dolls.
When I got home, I was so tired I couldn’t play. I took my
bath and combed my hair and mommy tucked me in like she always does.
Mommy and daddy started playing again and they were really
loud. I was so angry because they wouldn’t stop playing; so I went outside to
tell them to stop yelling so loud so I could go back to sleep! I know that
playing is fun, but even I know that you don’t play at night loud when people
sleep!
I swung open my door and stomped all the way down the
hallway. They must be having a lot of fun. There were handprints on the walls.
It made me mad cause Mommy won’t let me paint my walls. I
stopped when I saw her.
She was crying. She held out her hand and screamed, “Stop!
Go back upstairs Alexia!”
Daddy looked at me slowly and snarled like one of the
jackals we saw at the zoo, but Daddy was much scarier than the jackals. “Look
here doll face, what a nice surprise.”
I stared at Mommy not knowing what to do. She didn’t look
like she used to; she looked like one of my raggedy dolls.
It scared me. I couldn’t see one of her eyes. I didn’t want
to see Daddy’s eyes.
Daddy had Mommy by her hair. She kept reaching for me.
She was crying so hard that it made me cry too. I didn’t
want her to cry. I thought her and Daddy were playing. I started to go to her, but
Daddy was there and he knocked me down.
She jumped and cried out with pain when I hit the ground.
I cried harder. I
cried for Mommy, I cried for me too. Daddy let go of her hair and Mommy
collapsed for a little while.
Daddy took a step toward me.
He called me baby doll. Mommy didn’t like that and screamed
something I didn’t understand. I covered my eyes with my fingers and shrank.
The screaming stopped. The quiet felt bad.
Daddy picked me up. He threw me over his shoulder. He called
my baby doll again.
He asked me if I wanted to go play.
I didn’t.
I kicked and screamed. He wouldn’t drop me, I only made him
mad.
He dropped me at the top of the stairs. Daddy grabbed my
hair and pulled really hard.
Mommy got up and Daddy let me go. I didn’t want him to hurt
Mommy so I ran to the table and grabbed one of the candle glasses. Mommy had
lit them before dinner. I called, “Daddy” as loud as I could and threw the
candle.
It hit him in the chest. The wax splashed all over his face
and he fell down the stairs. The bad silence came back again. I ran to Mommy.
Mommy gave me the biggest hug I ever got. She squeezed me
til I couldn’t breathe.
Daddy didn’t get up. Lots of people came to the house. They
took Daddy away. Mommy held my hand. It hurt cause the candle I picked up was
really hot.
Mommy had to get bandages put on my hands. I couldn’t play
with my dolls for a while.
After Mommy took my bandages off she asked me what I wanted
to do with my hands.
I went in my room, I gathered my dolls, and I threw them
away.
