"Those who know do not speak. Those who speak do not know."
― Lao Tsu, Tao Teh Ching
Tri-County Area, 2003
Yellow plaid shirt... a vest with a cow pattern... brown, wide-brimmed hat. Sharp disturbing eyes, looking at me without blinking even for a moment. Blood... Blood... Was there really blood? I only saw black at some point.
The smell of fire?
A Cowboy doll. Length of… 14 inches? No, 16 inches? Everything looks bigger and scarier in memory.
I won't forget the warm touch I felt in my hands when holding this doll. I know it wasn't really hot, it couldn't be. After all, it's not alive, not really... but it felt like it was burning my hand the moment it's head... his head turned and...
I suddenly get sick. I apologize to Mrs. Krang, and run to the bathroom, for the third time in this session. I can't think of it again.
I don't know why, but when I talk about it with Mrs. Krang, I react differently when those thoughts fuck with my head when I'm alone. As if telling Mrs. Krang feels dangerous, feels like they know and I really shouldn't tell anyone.
But Mrs. Krang is good, and after not a very long time trying to hide the truth from her, she managed to get the story out of me.
Mrs. Krang says I developed paranoia and delirious thoughts following my parents' neglect, and one day I made up - no, my mind made up, since apparently it decided to betray me - the story with the toys because my mind compared the toys to my parents and they judged me like I believe my parents are...
Or some bullshit like that. She says it's a defensive system I developed for myself.
So if it's defensive, why do I feel like shit? Why am I so scared of something that didn't really happen? How exactly is it protective this way?
And if it's just a defense, why does it feel so real?
It isn't possible, that just before that event, my mind was on predator mode, violent and vicious, and suddenly it switched to prey mode, a pussy. Something about the story just doesn't seem right. It can't be that it really happened. It couldn't be that at that moment I became a different person.
I read somewhere, that people with trauma and depression tend to have their personality changed. But could that really be what's happening to me? And why?
All these thoughts have not stopped running in my head every moment for 8 years.
No matter how many medications I'm given, nothing wipes that day off my memory. Although I try to hide it from Mrs. Krang, she knows they aren't working, but acting as if they are to make me feel better. I have a lot of respect for her for this.
"Sid, I thought you made progress." I hear Mrs. Krang say in disappointment behind me as all the contents of my stomach spill into what I later realize is her dog's bed and not the toilet.
For a long time, I didn't feel this familiar sense of defeat when someone is disappointed in me. But she is different from my parents and teachers, her disappointment is what I think (or at least hope) is because she cares about me.
The truth is, I thought so too, Mrs. Krang. I think I was moving forward. Well, I did manage to keep myself so busy that I hardly had thoughts, except for a few difficult nights.
Working in a garbage truck is a job that only occurs in the morning, so I volunteer myself for every other possible job, doing everything I can to keep myself busy enough and have minor time to think. Though there's nothing I can do to beat those lonely dark nights, staring at ceiling and thinking helplessly about that goddamn day.
But for a change, for the first time in a long time, I really believed I could feel better. But… something happened, once again.
"Mrs. Krang..." I say, my mouth full of vomit, as much as I'm full with despair. I'm always surprised that Mrs. Krang accepts me even in my most awful times. She is the only person who I ever felt that cares about me, even if just a little.
"What is wrong, Sid?" She approaches me and sits next to me, looking at me at an eye level. I look at her with glazed eyes.
I approach her with secrecy, so they won't hear, and whisper: "Something happened a few days ago."
Mrs. Krang closes her eyes and sighs. "Sid, why didn't you called me at that moment?"
"Because ... I'm not sure it really happened, but-" Then I freeze.
Ralph, Mrs. Krang's dog enters the house through his door hole. But that's not the problem. The problem is what he holds in his dripping mouth. A cloth doll with her head torn and inclined down, her eyes looking straight into my eyes.
I point at her with a trembling finger and start screaming. My heart is heavy in my chest and black spots slowly spread over my sight. I can feel my eyes rolling, as if I'm about to faint.
Mrs. Krang snatches the doll from Ralph's mouth, which makes it tear, now her head is completely cut off from her body, still looking into my eyes.
And then all I see is black.
"Sid, you know I'm doing everything so you have a puppet-free environment here. I'm really sorry." Mrs. Krang tells me as she replaces the wet cloth resting on my forehead.
"Relax, everything is fine now." She says calmly.
I stare into the air. I haven't uttered a word since I pulled myself together after a couple of minutes since Mrs. Krang took the doll away from my sight. I just can't.
Usually I don't respond like that when I see ripped dolls. But this time it's different. I think I know her. No, I'm sure. Button eyes, one of which is now missing; Semi-torn red curls; The disturbing red stain on her pink velvet dress.
"Mrs. Krang."
"Yes, Sid?"
"Can I ... see the doll?"
Mrs. Krang looks at me with narrowed eyes. "Are you… sure, Sid?"
"I'm sure." I say, and my voice breaks in apprehension.
Mrs. Krang hands me the doll carefully, a strange situation in which she is afraid I will break because of a doll touching me.
I hold the doll with shaking hands. This is my first time holding an object aimed at entertaining children. Yes, that's its goal.
Like I thought, the doll is familiar to me. I examine her, turning her around. Mrs. Krang has already fixed it, which bothers me more than the thought that I would hold it headless. Why did she rush to fix it? Maybe she's afraid of them too? Maybe I'm just paranoid, and she did it because she thought her headless appearance was what bothered me, because it makes perfect sense...
Usually the opposite is true. If she was headless, it would encourage me because I knew she was harmless, pitiful in a way she could do nothing to me. This is also why I work with a garbage truck, to feel that I am responsible for their destruction, revenge them. There is nothing more reassuring to me than seeing them ruined in these piles of garbage, crushed under the weight of the machine, can do nothing to me.
But this doll, specifically. I'm almost entirely sure that it's that one.
I stare at her for a few seconds, barely blinking, my breathing is heavy. She fills my two palms, like a newborn baby. She is silent, looking at me and doing nothing.
But I'm sure that as soon as Mrs. Krang leaves the room, she will leap onto me, her mouth open, full of sharp teeth-
Mrs. Krang suddenly rises from the couch carefully, heading for her kitchen.
"I'll give you a moment with her alone, I'm going to bring something to soothe you-" Mrs. Krang says as she slowly moves away, my heart begins to throb hard in my chest.
"-Just a moment, Mrs. Krang. Don't go!" I insist, my voice whimpering.
"Sid, you'll manage alone. You are making a big step now. I'll only go for a few moments." She says, her voice of begging for my cooperation. She stays still, waiting for my final approval.
I wonder if I really should tell Mrs. Krang about what happened with this doll. Maybe everything was really all in my mind?
But now that I see her, hold her… This doll was watching me around my house, stalked me. I'm sure I saw her looking at me.
What if the doll will be mad at me for telling?
Mrs. Krang will probably say she belongs to my neighbors, but she knows I live in a childless building, on purpose. I prevent any encounter with toys I can.
The doll was there for sure, I saw her.
I knew I shouldn't have taken the basement apartment, but my requirements and my poverty left me with no choice.
But how could it be that the same doll is here. The distance from Mrs. Krang's house to my house... Her dog couldn't have brought her from there.
Oh my god. She followed me, I have no doubt. She sneaked into my truck, hid there without me noticing her. Ha. Ha ha ha.
Does she think she's so sophisticated? She thinks...
My hands seem to shake more than before. I imagine thousands of bad things I can do to this doll, with every object around me. The violent side of my brain is trying to take command. But the other part, the traumatized part, is stopping me. I want to, but I can't.
Truth be told, I'm not even sure I do want to. Whenever I'm glad to see them hurt, getting revenge for what they did to me, I feel as equally bad. Feel bad for them.
After all, if what happened to me really happened, then they are living beings. And I hurt them a lot in the past. I did terrible things to them. Doesn't it justify their revenge at me? Maybe I should just... let them? Maybe then… maybe then I'll be free.
Suddenly I feel a wetness on my cheek, which snaps me out of the frozen state I'm in. I notice tears streaming down my cheeks. Mrs. Krang hands me a tissue with an encouraging smile.
"Is there anything you want to say to this doll, Sid?" Mrs. Krang tries to connect us. I can't get my eyes off the eye-button, even though it feels like her glare is burning me.
After what feels like a few minutes of silence, in which Mrs. Krang does not urge me to respond, I finally decide to respond.
"I'm sorry." I say to the doll, quietly. I feel weird, though not due to the situation being weird because of what most sane people would probably think. But because I never thought I would be the first between the toys and I to say that. Maybe I need to be the adult between us.
I look at Mrs. Krang who seems very pleased with this bizarre situation, and I emit a laugh of embarrassment mixed with a slight cry.
"Let's give her a new eye, right Sid? I'm sure she would appreciate it very much." Mrs. Krang says gently, smiling. She crouches and starts to search in boxes under her desk. She pulls out a button that looks completely different from the doll's other eye button. I wonder if the doll would mind.
She signals me to bring her the doll and I hand it to her with trembling hands.
I don't know why but I feel disappointed, as if I felt something good was going to happen if I just wait a few minutes with the doll in my hands. Suddenly, I want Mrs. Krang to leave us alone.
She fixes it, sews the odd button to where her previous eye was - until the last time I saw her at least.
"That's it. Perfect, right?" Mrs. Krang says and holds her kindly as if she were a perfect creation, or her little girl. She even taps her nose and makes a boop sound.
Mrs. Krang places the doll in her pantry and turns back to me. I look at the doll that looks blurry now behind the glass. My heart jumps at the sight of seeing her move, though I reassure myself she must have just fallen.
"You have progressed today, I'm proud of you." Mrs. Krang says encouragingly.
"Are you going to leave her there?" I point to the doll in the pantry with concern. I may not have progressed as we think. Mrs. Krang looks at the doll for a few seconds and then at me.
"I think we can use her at the next meeting." She says cautiously, putting a finger on her mouth thoughtfully.
"Ah-" I start to protest, but Mrs. Krang immediately silences me.
"-But we'll see how you're doing before that. Don't worry." She calms me down. I sigh and nod.
I wave to Mrs. Krang on my way outside, and when she closes her door behind I immediately feel nauseous.
Now it's the real test. Mrs. Krang saw the doll, and she's inside her pantry. If I see the doll again in my home area, I'll know for sure that everything is true.