Our Ragdoll Hearts

Heated Controversies

        She searched harder now, knowing that her discovery was near. About ten minutes later, she came across a small piece of stuffing. It was ever so small, but it hinted at what the ragdoll had possibly done. Could it really have tried to go down that road, just after it had been saved the night before? The doll quickened her pace, her mind edging closer and closer to panic. She found yet another piece of stuffing, and then again another. Each time, the pieces of stuffing got bigger and bigger than the one she saw before it. The doll picked up the pieces as she walked, knowing that she would need it if she were to fix the ragdoll yet again.

         She found the ragdoll in hysterics. It slowly walked, but as it did this it ripped at the stitches the doll had put in its side. It cursed under its breath, trying to make the hole in its side greater and greater as it stumbled along. The ragdoll, she slowly came to realize, was trying to kill itself. It was ripping stuffing out of its body like a madman, tearing at its burlap material skin.

         “What the hell are you doing?!” the doll screamed. She stormed over to the ragdoll in fury, clutching the stuffing tightly in her wooden palm. The ragdoll whipped its body around quickly looking at the doll in surprise. Then, all at once, that surprise turned to pure anger.

           “LEAVE ME ALONE!” it bellowed. It glared at her with such hatred that the doll completely froze, rooted to the spot. The ragdoll stomped over to the little doll and stared deep into her painted black eyes. It grabbed the front of her green dress, and then, proceeded to scare the living hell out of her with its words.

         “Why can’t you just let me die?! What do you care! You just met me! You don’t know what I’ve been through, and if you did, you would agree that I just can’t live with these memories anymore! There isn’t a purpose for me to live, so why keep trying?! What is the reason! Oh right, there isn’t one. So just let me die! I’m tired of being in so much misery and pain all the time! I. Don’t. Want. To. Live,” the ragdoll shouted at her, gripping the doll’s green dress tighter and tighter in its anger.

         “I won’t let you die,” the doll said stubbornly in fear. Her voice was a mere whisper, an echo of the pain inside of her.

         “What?” the ragdoll said lowering it voice to a harsh quiet tone. It scared her, but the doll refused to be treated like this.

          “I said I won’t let you die,” the doll said, her tone of voice forcefully raising. She glared, her little brows furrowed, into the ragdoll’s black hateful eyes.

         “Excuse me?!” it said, spitting the words at her. Its eyes had widened in wrath, and it looked at her with such hate that she couldn’t bare it anymore. But its anger did not scare her anymore. It only enraged her to keep going

         “I SAID I WON’T LET YOU DIE!” she screamed, her eyes shut together in blind fury. She pushed the ragdoll off from her and it fell to the ground in shock at her act of authority. The doll opened her eyes, expecting to see the ragdoll consumed with anger, but instead saw its scared surprise. It stitched up mouth hung open at her sudden burst of rage, and it sat dumbstruck on the ground, staring up at her stormy eyes.

        “I refuse to be alone,” the doll said, taking opportunity of the ragdoll’s silence. “There is always something worth living for. Even if it doesn’t seem like it at the time, there is something worth looking forward to. You just have to find it. You’re a coward to just give up like that. Death is the easy way out for you! Giving up is letting your misery and sadness get the best of you. You can’t just let pain win like that! It’s wimpy and pathetic. Life is precious, and I refuse to believe that there isn’t something worth searching for.”

         “But why do you care so much that I live?” the ragdoll murmured looking at the ground in obvious embarrassment. “Why go to all these lengths to save me? I don’t matter. Go live your life.” It looked up at her, with those black painted eyes, and for once the doll could see the pain and the heartbreak swirling in them. And she almost felt sorry for what she said. But not quite.

          “Because I’m tired of being alone. And I’d hate it if my new explorer friend cut his?” the doll then realized at this point she didn’t quite know the gender of the ragdoll and looked down to make sure “his” was correct. The ragdoll looked up from its spot on the ground and nodded. “Alright cut his life short for a stupid reason. So there you have it. That’s why I refuse to let you die. And that’s why I’m going fix you back up again.”

         The doll kneeled down next to the ragdoll and put the stuffing back in the hole that had been torn open. She took a few grass blades and shoved them in there as well, just as she had the previous night, because she didn’t find all the stuffing that the ragdoll tore out. The two of them walked back in silence. Upon their arrival at the cave, the doll took out her needle and string and threaded the hole in the ragdoll’s side back together. As she did this, the ragdoll spoke.

            “What should I call you?” he asked looking down at her.

         “Well,” the doll said, pausing to think about it for a second. “I’m not really sure. Maggie, m-my kid, used to just call me Dolly. I was never really named. What about you?”

          “The first boy, he called me Ragdoll. And as I was passed down and given away from child to child, the name stayed the same. But one boy, my favorite child, he gave me a name. He called me Rider. He was trying to come for a name for me one day, and thought that Rider sounded heroic and epic and it sort of matched my previous name of Ragdoll,” the ragdoll said, all the looking into the distance, his eyes clouded with remembrance.

         “Alright then, Rider it is. We’ll have to come up for a name for me later. So, what happened to your favorite? He get too old for you?”

        Rider’s face suddenly dropped at that last question. He looked down darkly and then looked over at the doll’s face.

         “That is personal. I’d rather not say. Thanks for stitching me up,” he brushing off the comment. The doll watched him walk away, back to the bush cave. Whatever happened to him, it must’ve been bad.

         The two began their slow trek back to their crude homestead. The doll trailed behind Rider, contemplating the day’s previous events. They treaded along through the tall blades of green billowy grass swirling around them. The brown, rich earth cooled their feet as they walked along. The ragdoll trudged along, shoulders hunched, it’s head hung down. They finally reached the cave, and Rider ducked under the intertwined branches above. The doll hesitated before entering the cavern. She knew that the conversations to come would only be tragic and uncomfortable. She sighed, summoning the courage to enter the room. The doll had the a strange sense that whatever was to come next in their relationship would not be good. She closed her eyes, and strode through the barrier of leaves and twigs.