Keeley spent the night in the box in the loading area, waiting for the morning to load her onto a truck and ship her -- a human woman -- across the country. Or even, she thought, to Canada. And while she did desire to see the world, she was less than pleased about the circumstances of her trip. Keeley figured out quickly that something strange had happened to her. That more than not moving, Keeley wasn't even breathing. Her heart wasn't beating. Or if they were, they were working at such a slow speed it didn't matter. And yet here she was, alive and thinking.

The morning came soon enough and men loaded her onto an eighteen wheeler. She heard them outside, separated from her by less than an inch of cardboard box. If she could talk, she could yell for help. But her mouth stayed frozen in its perfect smile. She had seen the way the loaders packed the trucks to the brim, and knew she would be surrounded by boxes of toys.

I'm just like them. I'm just a toy. Keeley thought.

She banished that idea from her mind as the truck rumbled to life, its thrumming engine vibrating all the little packing peanuts that surrounded her. It was a strangely calming sound and feeling. It was the only thing she felt in her completely darkened box. She was awake and aware for the entire journey, which she could only guess took three days. She could only try and count the times the engine went on and off, and guess for how long. Short stops for rest and food. Longer stops for night. But eventually everything happening beyond her box was part of a different world from hers. It was a world beyond hers shipping box. It was a world that controlled her, and one that had decided she was nothing more than an object. These were the kinds of thoughts that floated through her mind while Keeley lay helpless in the truck.

Eventually she heard voices again, and also the sound of a smaller engine that was also closer to her. She was now being moved across a city instead of across a country. Then came the driver, jostling with Keeley's box until it was on a handcart. Her now frozen heart tried to race. It failed, but Keeley still grew worried. Surely whoever saw her would recognize her as human and help her out of her problem. Surely. She held onto that thought as she was quickly taken to wherever the AutoCart had first decided she should go.

She heard voices, but they still seemed distant. One deep. One lighter. They spoke quickly. Then Keeley was off the handcart and on her back again. And then . . . nothing. She heard steps and voices. But nothing directed at her. It was maddening. She was here, wasn't she? At her destination? Shouldn't someone be opening up her box and looking at the doll they had ordered? After four days now in darkness, Keeley didn't care that she if she was frozen, or if she was a doll. She needed desperately to see light again, to see where she was. But no one cared about the doll in her box, it seemed, and the noises quieted down. The voices and steps went away. And Keeley spent one more night trapped.

It wasn't until the next morning when she heard purposeful steps come toward her. Heavy steps. Then she heard something jab into her box. Then a cutting sound. A sliver of light came through the blue-white Styrofoam. Her eyes had just adjusted when the box lid was pulled back. Sound that had been strange and muffled became clear.

"Let's see what we have here." A man's voice said. Old, Keeley thought, with a bit of a rasp. A hand came through the peanuts and pushed them aside to reveal Keeley's leg. "Wrong side."

The peanuts above Keeley's face began to stir and move, pushed away by a human hand. This was it, she thought. She would be seen, and then she would be helped. She would be free of this box, free of this costume, and free of this spell that held her in place. Then she saw the face of an older man with a pair of glasses perched on his nose, white hair that had long abandoned his head, and a wrinkled face. He blinked as he looked at Keeley.

"Huh. They make 'em more real every year."

She didn't understand at first. It simply didn't make sense that this man looked at her and saw a soldierette doll. Keeley thought it a cruel trick or maybe that he was just blind before, as the man pulled Keeley from her box on her backing board, she admitted the truth.

I'm just a toy. Keeley thought.

Stop it, stop it, stop it! She remanded herself. She watched from the corner of her eye as the man kneeled down next to her and began to undo the twist ties that held her to the backing board. The ties came off and Keeley tested her hands. Her body. Nothing moved. Hope deflated as she stared absently at the fluorescent lights above her, and as the man continued to handle her, pulling Keeley to a sitting position. She now saw she was in a backroom of a store. Gray concrete floors and shelves filled with overstock toys. A plastic table with a microwave and coffee maker.  An office door half open. And the remains of the box that had been her home for four days.

A toy store. She had been shipped to a toy store. This was going to be her life, she thought, remembering the large toy soldiers on the warehouses high shelves. The ones meant for displays. She wasn't going to be a doll for sale, but a doll on display. Hundreds and thousands of people would see her inviting them into the store. They would see her as a toy. Treat her like a toy. Talk about her like a toy.

And then something changed. Everything changed. Keeley felt the metal key that had once been made from cardboard slide into her back. She began to breathe. Her heart began to beat. Keeley sucked in air to fill her lungs. Her eyes went wide and wild. Her body still felt stiff but seemed to move to her commands. She looked up and around, trying to find the man.

"Please help!" Keeley said, twisting around, "I'm a human, not a dooooooollll."

Everything froze again. Keeley's voice went away. She felt stiff and off balance, having frozen in an awkward position. She didn't feel the key in her back, and barely saw it in the man's hands, his face pulled in shock.

Keeley fell to the ground, unable to stop herself. The pain and shock felt dull. But she wasn't even thinking about that. She could move! She could talk! She could get out of this.

If, that is, the man put her key in her back again.