The Doll Who Listened, a Toy Story + A Little Princess Crossover fanfic

The Doll Who Listened

By Laura Schiller

Crossover: A Little Princess/Toy Story

Emily knew from the moment her eyes met Sara Crewe's through the shop window that she had found a good mistress. Toys have a sixth sense about these things, and besides, the brilliant smile of the little girl as she tugged on her father's sleeve was evidence enough.

"Look, Papa, here is Emily! She has actually been waiting for us!"

They walked into the shop, took Emily down from the shelf, and placed her gently into Sara's arms. Captain Crewe bought a miniature wardrobe for her that made the shopkeepers' eyes light up with greed: silk gowns, fur coats, tiny pieces of jewelry, slippers and purses, just as if Emily were a real lady who needed her clothes to change with the seasons. It is not just any human, let alone any adult, who remembers that a doll may be cold in the winter, or bored with wearing the same frock.

"I knew her the moment I saw her," said Sara, looking down into Emily's face. "So perhaps she knew me too."

Emily could not believe her good fortune. Here was a child who understood.

I do know you, she wanted to say. I am so glad you found me. We will be so happy together.

But over the child's shoulder, she caught the eye of one of her sisters remaining on the shelf. The other doll shot her a stern look of warning – the slightest lowering of painted eyebrows, too subtle for any adult to see, but it was enough.

You must never tell, said her sister's glass eyes. Remember the Code.

Sara turned out to be everything a doll could wish for in a mistress.

Not only did she never try to cut Emily's hair or pull her arms off or spoil her clothes as some children would, but the games they played together were fantastic. Emily lived a thousand lives in the child's imagination: as a princess (of course), a schoolteacher, a mermaid, a Hindu goddess, a doomed aristocrat during the French Revolution who was rescued just in time … And when Sara invited the younger girls to drink tea out of Emily's miniature tea set, there was an entire audience to listen in rapture to the stories.

Sara left books in Emily's hands while she was downstairs learning her lessons: fairy tales, poetry, even textbooks on history and geography. By and by, Emily became nearly as educated as her mistress. And, perhaps most importantly, once Mariette the maid was finished cleaning the parlor, Emily was left with long hours of peaceful solitude in which to do whatever she liked.

Sometimes she dreamed of having a real conversation with Sara. She would have loved to thank her, tell her how much she loved the books and games and privacy, perhaps even make suggestions for what they could play next. (Frankly she preferred the adventure stories; playing hostess at a tea party was becoming rather dull.)

But Emily was loyal to her own kind. Sawdust, her sisters had taught her after closing time at the shop, was thicker than water. And besides, why risk ruining a life that was already close to perfect?

"Emily, do you hear? My papa is dead! He is dead in India – thousands of miles away."

Sara had never once raised her voice to her companion before, but she was shouting now, her fists clenched beside her absurdly short black mourning dress. Her eyes were red, even though Emily knew for a fact she had not cried. Those gray-green eyes stared at Emily in wild accusation, as Sara knew the doll was refusing to speak.

Then Sara collapsed into a chair and buried her head in her hands, not moving for what felt like hours. Emily's sawdust heart broke within her at the sight.

Not running into Sara's arms right then was the hardest thing she ever had to do. But she waited, as usual, until her mistress had fallen asleep – a restless sleep on a hard mattress, but deep enough that she would not notice any small noises in the room.

The journey down the stairs from the new attic bedroom was not an easy one. Each step was half Emily's height. Every time she jumped, she feared to lose her balance and ruin the shape of her waxen face. But she was at her wit's end and needed to talk to someone, and the only people who could possibly understand were her fellow toys.

"I must tell her," she pleaded, as soon as they were all assembled in Lottie's room. "I must. Please, I am all she has left."

But the other toys refused. They reminded her of how thin the attic walls were, how careless and impulsive Sara's friends could be, and what Miss Minchin would think of a twelve-year-old girl who still believed dolls could talk. The headmistress grudged Sara her place already as it was; if she decided Sara was not mentally sound enough to work as a teaching assistant, the girl would be out on the street.

Emily had no choice but to sit and listen. It was, after all, what she was made to do.

It took all the moral support their friends could give them for Sara and Emily to survive the next few months. But on the day Sara raised not just her voice, but her hand, Emily knew that things could not go on like this.

"I shall die presently," said Sara, coming in one cold and muddy winter day from an errand.

She looked like it. Her face was white and pinched, her sharp elbows poked through her sleeves, and her legs trembled as if the effort of climbing the attic stairs had almost been too much for her.

"I'm cold, I'm wet, I'm starving to death. I slipped in the mud and some men laughed at me. They laughed – do you hear?"

I know, dearest. The fools should be ashamed. Sit down, get your blanket, and for Heaven's sake, stop looking at me like that, because I do not know how I can bear it.

But for once, Sara could not understand the unspoken thoughts behind Emily's eyes, or perhaps she was simply too wretched to care. She flew at Emily, shook her, and threw her across the room.

"You are nothing but a doll!" she screamed. "You are stuffed with sawdust. You never had a heart. Nothing could ever make you feel. You are a doll!"

Emily, lying on the floor with her legs over her face, did not need the Code to keep her motionless. She was frozen with humiliation. Most toys had to endure worse than a shaking in the course of their duty; Lottie had torn the head off a teddy bear once, and sat there wailing until Sara sewed it back on. But for Sara to stop believing in her like this … it made being discarded, the fate a toy feared most, seem almost welcome in comparison.

Sara without belief was hardly Sara at all. What would be left of her if she continued on like this?

If Ram Dass had not looked through the skylight window at that particular moment, their story might have ended very differently. But he did, and Sara, who was hiding her face as she always did when in despair, never saw him. It was Emily's blue glass eyes that met the brown ones of the lonely foreigner, and though she was only a doll, she recognized the kindness in them. It was the first time a grown-up had shown any kindness since the death of Captain Crewe.

Ram Dass looked around at the bare, ugly room, the ragged blanket, the unlit stove, the too-thin girl hiding her face in her hands, and the relic of lost innocence that was her doll. Then he was gone.

Sara picked Emily up again, straightened her skirts, and kissed her on the nose with a remorseful smile. "You can't help being a doll," she said. "Perhaps you do your sawdust best."

But there was a distance in her eyes Emily had never seen before, as if she was only pretending and knew it.

Emily, however, had an idea. If her colleagues would not allow her to break the Code, she would simply have to find a way around it.

Emily's plan was not easy. It involved a lot of sneaking around while Sara was out on errands, dodging the servants, and making dangerous forays into the house next door to spy on its inhabitants. If every toy in the house had not worked together, they never could have done it. But there was not one of them who did not remember Sara from her princess days: the frocks she had mended, the torn limbs she had glued together, the wonderful stories she had spun for them to act in, the joy she had brought to their human companions. Even Donald Carmichael's tin soldiers, who had gotten lost in Mr. Carrisford's house, volunteered to help the legendary "little-girl-who-was-not-a-beggar".

They stole fresh fruit from the school kitchen, slung a rope between the two attic windows, herded Ram Dass' pet monkey up the stairs (a risky enveavour, since he seemed more interested in eating the toys than following their directions) and used the fruit to lure the animal into Sara's room.

Ram Dass followed to reclaim his pet. Sara came into the room to find a charming, mischievous monkey scampering around the floor, and a polite young man who reminded her so much of her childhood in India that she could not help making friends with him.

The rest of the story you already know.

Sara never found out to whom she owed her sudden reversal of fortune. But the day she handed Emily over to Janet and Nora Carmichael, who embraced her like a long-lost daughter and invited her to stay in their fully furnished dollhouse, Emily had all the reward she needed.