The Doll

This is Clara. She mysteriously appears in your home. On her arrival strange things start to happen. Household items are moved into different places. Things go bump in the night. Strange whisperings follow you round the house. Cold energy seems to shudder through you. Doors slam and lights flicker.

You begin to wonder where she came from. Why did she choose your home? She is just a doll. She can’t be making these things happen. The eeriness continues. Suddenly you start to lose things that are important to you, jewellery, photos, clothing. Where did they go?

You ring your sister. No answer. She must be out, so you decide to try her again tomorrow. You cautiously settle down for the night, expecting, anticipating. Suddenly the phone rings, its your mother, ‘I can’t get through to your sister, is she with you?’. You reply that she is not, and both of you start to worry. Where could she be?

That night you go to her house. You try the doors, all locked. You shine a torch through the windows, all seems normal. You remember she leaves a key under the door mat, so you go in. The house seems cold and there is an unusual grey mist in the air. You shiver, draw your jacket around you and walk through to the kitchen. What is that smell? It is sweet, but also musty and putrid. You look at the floor and see tiny, blood-stained footsteps leading away from the corner of the room. Your heart beats harder in your chest.

As you turn, your sister is there, slumped on the kitchen floor against a cupboard. Her throat has been slashed and her eyes have been gouged out. Blood is seeping down her clothing. You drop to the floor in despair. Then, you see a tiny bread knife next to her, the size of a toy. That can’t have been the murder weapon surely?

The police are called, her body taken away. You call your mother, she is inconsolable, and keeps saying ‘why would anyone want to do this to our lovely girl?’. After the call, you drop down into the sofa, exhausted. You feel something sticking out from between the cushions. As you reach down you find Clara. She is holding a tiny knife and her pupils are missing.

In fear and disgust, you throw her against the wall. You begin to associate all the terrible happenings with her arrival. You think about the knife she is holding, her strange pupil-less eyes. Suddenly you realise, this is history repeating itself. Clara’s owner must have died in the same terrible way as your sister. And now they are sending out the doll in revenge! If she had to die such a grizzly death, then so will others. You decide you must get the doll out of the house, so you drive to the nearby lake and throw her in it. She will never be able to hurt anyone again!

A few days later, in another town, another house, a little girl bends down to pick up a doll she has found in the garden. She takes her into the kitchen to show her mother, ‘I’ve found a pretty doll Mum, and I am going to keep her. Her name is Clara’.

Rachel Toy

October 2023

Update 16/10/23: I am currently running an auction for the chance to own this very doll! Bid if you dare here: https://rachelsvintageretro.co.uk/product/vintage-haunted-doll-clara-special-halloween-auction/