Lannie’s Dolls and the Magic Key

Tillerina could imagine they were all just ordinary girls in extraordinary costumes, instead of what they really were. What they had been forced to become. It was hard to hold on to that thought and ignore the huge living room that stretched before them. But when it was empty, when it was night, Tillery could imagine, and it helped her deal with being a doll.

Something else about nighttime helped her, too. Tillery could move. Sort of. Maybe. And not just her, but the other toys. Kelly Fool the jester was the best at it. When twilight came, she bounced out of her box and helped Erin Bear wobble to her boots. But despite their help and encouragement, Tillery hadn’t managed to get off her stand. She could sit down, wrap her arms around her legs, and talk with the others.

“I kinda always wanted to be a ballerina,” she said, smoothing out her tutu, and thinking how much prettier it would be if she was still full sized.

“Well now you are!” Kelly said happily, trying to pirouette like a dancer, but wobbly jester ankles weren’t made for dancing and she fell to the mantle, laughing.

“What made you not learn to dance?” Erin said. She sat cross legged and shook her head at the clown, but smiled just the same.

The ballerina shrugged, “I don’t have a good answer for that. I just . . . never did.”

“You should. If we get back to being human, that is. I bet you’ll be pretty great at it.”

Tillery smiled, “Thanks. What about you? What would you do when we get changed back?”  Her psychology major mind told her not to hope, so she wouldn’t be disappointed. She pushed those thoughts aside.

The panda girl winced. “Oh, God, I don’t know. It’s too late to sign up for the spring semester. And I bet I’ve been fired. And my apartment is probably already gone.” Erin thought about it further, and her frown turned around. “Which, I guess means I’ll have a fresh start once this is over.”

“Well, I have a couch if you need it for a few nights,” Tillery said, “I think my place is still mine.” It had been almost a week since the mad lady with the magic key transformed her, and rent wasn’t due till the beginning of the month.

“You’d do that?” Erin Bear asked. “We’re kinda strangers.”

Tillery laughed, “I haven’t decided if I’m hallucinating this entire conversation or not.”

“Do you have a good shelf for me?” Kelly said, scooting closer to get back into the conversation.

“You really don’t want to be human again?” Tillery asked.

Kelly’s spring body shuddered and her bells rang out, “Blech. No. Humans are big and boring, and being one is not nearly as magical as being a Kelly-in-the-Box.”

Georgia, the marionette who refused under any circumstances to move, groaned. “Listening to you three yammer on is a level of hell itself. A stupid level.” The marionette glowered at all of them. “We got turned into toys. We don’t deserve to be human again.”

“Keep being no-fun Georgia, Georgia,” Kelly Fool said as the sun finally broke above the horizon and poured its brilliant light into the living room. All four toys found themselves back in their proper places and poses, as if they had never moved at all.

Erin Bear waited patiently for the door to Lannie’s bedroom to open. She had fallen to a slight flop over night, her front paws unable to support her. But she knew her Owner would put her up right again. And that wasn’t so bad.

Despite it being a Thursday, Lannie came out of her room very much not ready for work. In fact, she had on her fairy dress. The pink and green one with wreaths of flowers around her ankles. The one that she wore on days where she pretended to be a doll herself. Which very much meant she was not going to work that day. That has been happening more often lately.

“Good morning, my little collection,” she said with a brilliant smile. As she always did, she gave each of her toys a little hello. Bopping Kelly Fool. Saluting Comrade Georgia. Posing Erin Bear. Activating Tillerina.

“What’s up today, boss?” Kelly asked, as if Lannie could hear her. And their owner looked at the jack-in-the-Box. It was plain to everydoll to see consideration in her expression.

“It’s a play day, I think,” she said finally, answering the toy’s question.

“Hey, can you hear us?” Erin asked. But her owner didn’t respond or react. So much for that idea, and another day of being a simple toy began. For Erin, that meant trying her best to stay in the pose her owner put her in, all while feeling her plush give way hour by hour. Georgia and Kelly swung or wobbled ever so slightly. Only Tillerina, in her pointe shoes, kept statue still.

As for Lannie, she watched TV. Until she did something odd. Without pausing, she walked to her bedroom and came back holding her magic silver key. She pushed it into her back with practiced precision, and it automatically wound the requisite five times. This had happened before, when their owner felt the worst. Or when she felt the giddiest. Or when she felt nothing at all. Owner was enigmatic.

The key turned and Lannie’s body shifted, rippled, and changed into something Erin Bear appreciated. Something soft and huggable, a rag doll fairy with yarn hair.

“Cheater,” Comrade Georgia said.

“I really don’t get you,” Erin said, wanting, but unable, to turn away from her owner going slightly mad with her key.

“She can’t just turn herself into a doll, and pretend that she’s human. She’s one of us now.”

“Well, you tell her that,” Erin said.

The key had almost finished its revolutions and Lannie’s body became exactly what she wanted it to be. Then, she shuddered. Something clicked and clattered to the ground. Their owner’s eyes went wide, she gasped, and then shrunk until she laid immoble on her carpet, her amazing key lying next to her.

But more amazing than all of that, Kelly Fool hopped out of her box. “Boss, you ok?” She yelled down to their owner. And when no response came, the jester jumped off the mantle.

Kelly Fool jangled and bounced on her springy legs to get to her boss. The newest toy of the Collection hadn’t moved a single thread, but that was normal. Kelly was the weird one, but never gave the whole mobility thing much thought. Right now, she was worried about Lannie. The poor toy probably didn’t know what she messed up and was scared out of her plush mind.

“Hey, boss, how are you doin?”

“Kelly?” Her small, confused voice came. “Am I dreaming this, or are you moving?”

“Both. Neither. I don’t know, why are you asking me?” Kelly said. She sat the fairy doll up, pulling her by limp rag doll arms that did not want to help one bit. The jester knew that feeling, that total immobility of being a doll. It was terrifying at first, until it became the way of things.

She looked from Lannie to the key, which was giant and dormant. It appeared so simple, not even magical. But everytoy in the house knew exactly how it worked and what it could do.

“Be right back, boss.”

Kelly sprang to the key, over Lannie’s disbelieving protests. She studied it with all the intensity of a writer studying her story, wondering half at the possibilities, and half at her own wants.

“You can’t use that!” Lannie said, “It’s not for toys!”

“If it’s not for toys, it’s not for you, either,” the jester said. She knelt and touched the magical object and a vibrant wave spread through the key. It shimmered and melted, and Kelly jumped away from it, until it stopped. And instead of being several feet tall and long, the key shrunk, becoming perfect for a toy-sized girl. There was a gleam to it, a pull. It was the very same key that had turned Kelly from breathing woman to jumping jack doll. And not just her, but five others.

“That power could be mine,” she whispered, hefting the key in her awkward hands.

“Kelly! What are you doing with that key?” Lannie asked, fear palpable in her voice, but what kind of fear the jester couldn’t tell.

“I really don’t know!” The fool said happily, and it was true. Could she turn herself human with it? Kelly wrinkled her nose. Ew. She could make herself new friends. But she’d probably have to turn herself human, go meet new people, turn the fun ones into toys, and...it all just seemed like a lot of work. Then, she turned back to the mantle, where she knew already toy friends sat.

“Kelly Fool, as your owner, I command you to give me the key so I can fix myself.”

“In a minute, boss,” Kelly said, walking toward the fireplace, and her friends.

Comrade Georgia seethed on her strings. Dangling as she ever did, she could look down at that disrespectful jester and that cheating fairy. Didn’t they realize that they were both playthings? That they were all playthings? There was no fate for them but to remain that way. When Lannie set that key in their backs, they lost their humanity. Even if they did somehow transform back, it wouldn’t change things. Once you become owned, there’s no going back. She knew that, and she had to teach them that lesson, too.

Kelly left her view, hidden beneath the mantle shelf, but her ridiculous clowny voice called up, “Erin! I have the key, I need you to roll down here!”

Georgia saw red while the bear toy sitting next to her struggled to her booted feet.

“She has the key?” Tillerina asked. “What does that mean? Can we be changed back?”

“I think so,” Erin said. They both sounded happy about that, never once considering the truth: they ought to be toys.

“Don’t do it, Erin,” Georgia said, “You know you can’t really be human again.” The soldierette knew the others felt it. They had all said as much in their illegal nightly conversations. None of them really felt they were people instead of property. The panda girl stopped. She had always had her doubts about being human again, and worries what that might mean. Georgia didn’t let up. “Even if you did deserve it, I’ve heard you talk about your old life. Do you really want that back? All that worry? Bad school? Failing grades? Never getting anywhere in . . .”

“Georgia, what the hell?!” Tillerina shouted at her. The ballerina remained stuck on her stand, but she looked so cross with her hands on her tutu. “Erin, this could be our only shot to be human again. Please. If you really don’t want to change back, I guess I get it. But, at least help Kelly and me.”

“Oh, she doesn’t understand,” Comrade Georgia said, “she’s only been like us for a few days. She hasn’t realized what being owned means. You’re owned, Erin Bear, like any common toy, and you can’t change that. Ever. Those cute little circles on our faces will mark us until the end of time.”

She couldn’t see the teddy’s face, but she saw the way she was frozen. Not like a proper stuffed toy, but wrestling with herself. Good. Comrade Georgia just needed to keep her up here, and Kelly Fool couldn’t use the key. She would keep her companions. They would stay what they were supposed to be. 

“If we can’t change that, why are you so worried?” Erin said at last, before she fell from the mantle.

“No!” The marionette shouted. This was not happening. Her humiliation had to be shared. And though she hated to do it, Comrade Georgia saw no other choice. She slipped out of the strings holding her to her handle. It was the first time she had moved on her own since Lannie reduced her to being a puppet all those months ago. She looked over the edge at the Bear and the Fool and jumped down to meet them.

Georgia landed just in time, just as the springy jester began to put the key into Erin’s back. Not if the marionette had anything to say about it. She had landed behind Kelly Fool, and before either of them could turn, Georgia kicked the jack-in-the--box, right where she was supposed to be attached to her stand. The toy yelped as she went into a springy jumping jack pose, all automatically. She dropped the key and the cossack shoved her aside.

“Georgia, what are--” Erin said, but didn’t act. The marionette got the silver key in her wooden hands, and she backed away, carrying the magical artifact away from the dolls who would use it for no good.

“You will not leave me. You will not abandon me. You will stay simple toys and we’ll get a new owner.” She backed away, keeping the two other dolls in her sight as they recovered.

“Were you always crazy, or just since you got strung up?” Kelly asked.

“Oh, shut up. I thought you loved being a plaything for our ‘boss,” Kelly?”

“I do! But Erin and Tillery don’t! I’m not going to hold them hostage just so I get to live out my toy dreams.”

Comrade Georgia scoffed and continued to walk backward. It didn’t matter anymore. Someone would find them, eventually, when Lannie didn’t pay the rent, or the electricity. Or just didn’t show up for work. It was about time someone fired her. Someone would come looking, and they would find five dolls ready to be purchased by someone else. Georgia was stronger than Erin Bear, sturdier than Kelly Fool, Tillerina was trapped on the mantle, too delicate and heavy to risk jumping down, and Lannie hadn’t yet figured out she could move. The marionette had the key. No one could take it from her.

A shadow grew all around Comrade Georgia, and she looked up before her stand came crashing down.

Lannie Doll’s jaw went slack as the wood and string smashed into the marionette, sending her to the carpet. She managed, just barely, to crane her neck up and see her ballerina toy standing near the edge of the mantle. This wasn’t happening. She refused to believe her own eyes and lose her playthings that she had worked so hard to collect. All because of that stupid key. She just had to see what it was like.

There was shouting between her toys, first in worry, until Erin wrestled the silver key from the pile of wood. Georgia said something indistinct. But now the others didn’t waste time. That cheating fool pushed the key into the anxious shopper’s back. Five twists, and it was over. The bear grew and grew, losing the plush Lannie had forced onto her, but keeping the costume. With the former bear full sized agan, the overbearing boss wasn’t an issue.

The ungrateful driver was next, after she hurried back to stand on her stand. She, too, remained a ballerina when she regained her humanity. The two returned people hugged and laughed, and turned to turn Kelly Fool back. But the doll held out her hand and shook her head. Instead of transforming the toy, they returned her to her proper box, where she could jump and smile and tell jokes all day.

They decided amongst themselves that the marionette deserved her fate, and they only begrudgingly dug Georgia out of her handle and stand, restoring her and making her a puppet once again. Lannie’s former boss never stopped berating them, but she never disobeyed her strings again.

Then, all eyes turned to Lannie, still unmoving on the carpet. The newest toy, the least experienced, and the least deserving. The wizard gave her the key for a reason. He had told Lannie as much. But the fairy doll gulped down her pride and looked up to the two humans and one toy who would decide her fate.

“Please, just fix this. We can go our separate ways,” Lannie said, her voice small and full of contrition. She remembered the lying lover pleading with her last Halloween. And she remembered what she did to him.

The two humans and toy all looked at each other, but it was the cheating fool who  spoke. “Lannie, I don’t have any hard feelings for you. But my new bosses, they’re a bit madder than I am. Plus, you got a taste for turning people into toys. I think it’s best we let you stay as you are.”

Lannie Doll slumped. It was the most movement she had managed so far, and just enough that it threw her stuffing out of balance. Helplessly, she fell back onto the ground, left lying there as nothing more than a toy while her collection left her house and her life.

The End