Page 40 of She’s a Doll

Where?

“He’s got a house,” she said. “But, Lu, I need you to know I believe you. I know he’s a monster. I want answers as well as you do. But⁠—”

I don’t give a shit about answers. I want him dead.

“Yeah. OK. Valid. I just . . . You still haven’t told me how you’re going to make that happen. How are you going to kill him?”

I’ll figure out a way.

“Sure. OK. You’re tiny and very breakable. You know that, right?”

I’m a vengeful spirit who can control time.

“I’ve been watching you control time. You suck at it, no offense.”

Don’t underestimate me. I’m more powerful than⁠—

“You sound like a baddie. I don’t mean that in the complimentary way. You sound like the villain in a ’90s kids’ TV show.”

I leaned into it. With our combined strength we will destr⁠—

“And that’s where the issue is,” she said. “You want my help.”

I couldn’t deny it.

“I understand your feelings about Kyle⁠—”

Piece-of-shit murdering fuck.

“⁠—are justifiably extreme. But I can’t help you kill someone, even someone like him. You know that, right? You’re a doll. The laws might not apply to you, but I’ll go to prison.”

People get away with murder all the time. He did. We’ll find a way. It’ll be easy.

“Look,” she said, and picked up the remote, stopping The Walking Dead mid-monologue. There had been a lot of monologues these last few episodes. I was starting to wonder where the zombies were. “I want to help you. I do. But I think you’re thinking about this wrong. Do you know where your body is?”

You want to go to the police, I said, jumping ahead in the conversation.

“I’m just saying. DNA lasts a long time, right? Was his DNA on you?”

I thought about my nails, scratching bloody red lines into his forearms. I don’t know what he did with my body.

“What about the murder weapon? There must be some evidence we can⁠—”

His hands. He used his hands.

That silenced her for a moment, her cheeks losing color and her shoulders twitching.

It won’t work, I said. The police will never believe you. What are you going to tell them? You can speak to ghosts through your hearing aid? They’ll lock you up in the mental health ward.

“Not if we find something the police missed. A witness. A piece of evidence. A clue.”

A clue! A clue! I sang out, high and mocking, my doll body twitching with rage. Oh boy! Why, oh why, didn’t I think of it before? We’ll put on our thinking caps, solve the case, and then everything will be OK again. I’ll come back to life and Kyle will melt away like the Wicked Witch of the West.

“I’m serious,” she said.

So am I. I don’t care about the police. I don’t care about clues. He needs to die. That’s the only way to make any of this better. The only way.

“Lu,” she said softly. “Please. I know this isn’t what you wanted, but think about it for a second, OK?”