Doll walked along and beside the woman, and she looked wide eyed from her mitten hand that she held onto to the beautiful face of this stranger. She was in awe. She had never ever been touched like this, never been pulled along, and never spoken to anyone but Owner. And here was someone else who wanted Doll and was taking Doll to her home. They stopped at a doorway and the woman fished her keys from her coat pocket. Doll continued to stare, and the woman noticed.

"What?" She asked.

"Are you going to be my new Owner?" Doll asked.

The woman shook her head, "What, no? How long have you been in the cold?" She unlocked her door and brought Doll inside. The toy was confused at the woman, but came along inside. She hadn't been cold, or at least, hadn't felt cold, until she felt the warm heated air inside.

"Ooooooohh." Doll breathed, standing by the vent that made the air warm. The woman went on to her kitchen not far and put down her bag. Then she traded her comfy boots for pink house slippers and pulled off her big, warm sweats. And when the woman came back around from the kitchen, she had transformed. And Doll realized she had gotten everything absolutely backwards.

"You're a toy like me!" She said upon seeing the woman, who was dressed in a pink dancer leotard and pretty white tights. She had a little wrap skirt around her middle. Ballerina blinked. Then she came over and felt Doll's head and face. The touches sent shivers through Doll.

"You don't feel cold."

"I told you, I'm fine!" Doll said merrily. Then she took Ballerina by the hands, "But I have a billion questions. Do you have an owner, too?"

--------------------

Valerie looked at the doll for a moment, unsure what to say. What to do. She was beginning to believe the woman in the doll costume really believed herself to be a toy. And now she thought Valerie was a toy, too?

"No. Look, I'm not sure what you're talking about."

"So, you pretend, too? Pretend to be a person, I mean. Sometimes, even when I'm not dressed like a dolly, I feel like a doll. I want to tell people I'm just a doll. Is that like what you do?"

It surprised Valerie that it took her more than a second to respond. "No, I'm just a dancer. Well, I have a real job, but I have dance most nights. But I'm not a toy."

The doll pondered this for a moment, putting her mitten hand to her chin. "Hmmmm." Then she said, "I don't understand. Are you a toy or an owner?" She asked, as if those were the only two possibilities that entered her mind.

"Like I said, I'm not a toy."

"So you're an owner?"

More out of curiosity than conviction, Valerie nodded, "Yes, I'm an owner." She wondered how far and how deep the woman's delusion went. So, she added, "I'm going to be your owner."

Valerie half expected the woman to take a step back. For the spell or trance or whatever it was to break. But she lit up in a huge smile, as if all the dreams and hopes she ever had come true and every Christmas and birthday present she ever wanted came to her.

"Go sit on the couch," Valerie said, and even though her voice came out harsher than she wanted, Doll never stopped smiling and just did as she was told. As she walked away, Valerie noticed her slipper shoes and tights were wet, probably from trundling through snow banks.

"You need to get out of those wet clothes," Valerie said.

"Are we going to play dress-up?" Doll asked.

Valerie nodded. "Stay right there, let me get some new tights for you." She went into her room and her dresser, searching through it to find an appropriate pair for the doll to wear, and found a single pair of apple red tights that would match her costume. Not quite as well as her stripey legs, but well enough.

She came back to her doll with the tights in hand. She was still terribly confused by the way Doll talked and acted. But she was beginning to get uncomfortably comfortable with thinking of her as a toy. She sat on the couch, her legs pink and bare, making her look more like a woman in costume and less like the doll she was.

Valerie knelt in front of her doll and slid the red tights up her legs, covering her back up. Completing her costume again. Doll let Valerie dress her up, as if she was just a toy. They sat across from each other for a moment, Valerie on her haunches looking up to the doll sitting on the edge of the couch. She looked from her new red legs to her new owner, excitement almost electric in her eyes.

"Does your owner -- your previous owner, I mean -- play with you like this?" Valerie asked.

The doll shook her head, sending her red yarn hair flopping back and forth. "No, never."

She looked so cute sitting there, costumed from head to toe. From her padded dress and stuffed mittens to her soft red cheeks and inviting red lips. It was beginning to sink into Valerie's mind that this toy was hers. That, crazy as it sounded, this woman acted so much like a toy that Valerie was thinking of keeping her.

And it happened then, as she looked at her soft, pretty toy, that Valerie sat up and kissed her Doll.

It was barely a conscious choice on her part. She simply saw the toy and decided to have her. Doll let out not even a squeak in protest and responded to her owner in kind. She was soft. Soft lips, soft breasts, and soft legs. The only thought going through Valerie's mind was that this doll was hers and would always be hers.