exsanguinate | issue 1.2 excerpt

ragdoll

"I'm gonna be a ragdoll," she says, "and I'm gonna lie here on the floor like I'm dead--no, I am dead and I'll be a crumpled mound just lying here, limp and motionless. You're gonna walk over and look down. And then you're gonna pick me up, up by the shoulders, and my head, arms, and legs are gonna hang by my shoulders. You're gonna hold me up to your chest. I'm very small, see. I'm even the size of a ragdoll. And even though I'm dead, I'm gonna cry. I don't make any noise or movement, but the drops slide out by themselves from under my closed lids. My morbid white skin is wet and cold--almost slimy, very clammy. You're gonna wrap your arms around me and I bet you can feel the tiny bones in my body right through my skin--I'm skin and bone, you know--no muscles or organs. You're gonna take your hand and place it behind my head. My head is as big as the palm of your hand--small, isn't it? You're gonna hold your thumb to my head so it rests straight up in your hand. Then you're gonna let go and it's gonna drop with a snap. Blood is gonna drip out of my nose--drop by little drop--not just red blood, but dark, burgundy-crimson blood--black blood compared to my skin. You're gonna hug me tight and be sad, and you should wish me to be alive . . . but you won't be. 'Why don't you want me alive? Do you know? Think hard. There must be a reason if you have picked me up. Do you care about dead ragdolls? Do you like dead ragdolls? Do you love dead ragdolls?' I think that's sick, so sick it makes my stomach turn-But oh! I don't have a stomach--so sick it makes my skin crawl. 'Why do you love dead ragdolls? Don't you have any living ragdolls to play with?' You're gonna say that you don't love dead ragdolls but that you are obsessed with dead ragdolls. 'What do you do with dead ragdolls you're obsessed with?' You're gonna say that you bury them in the ground in a plastic bag. I'm gonna cringe. 'What do you do if the dead ragdoll comes back to life?' You're gonna say: 'bury it anyway.' But then . . . I can't . . . breathe. I don't have any lungs, but I'm gonna gasp and pant and then suffocate anyway. I'm gonna think that I hate you. Why would--how could--anyone be so cruel to a poor little dead ragdoll. And even though I'm dead, my hand is gonna move and I'm gonna stab your stomach with my bleeding fingernails. It's gonna sting like five tiny, sharp needles, and you're gonna drop me. And I'm gonna fall to the ground with the sound of a broken vase. And all my brittle bones are gonna shatter, shooting slivers and splinters into the inside of my skin like a cactus. Then you're gonna pick me up by the skin on my neck, and all the tiny pieces are gonna roll into my feet like a bag full of ceramic tile fragments. And my feet are gonna swell with the weight of all my bone pieces, and the skin of my entire body is gonna be drawn like a plastic bag holding rocks. Then you're gonna wrap a twist tie around my neck and bury me with a smile because you didn't even need to waste a baggie on me . . ."

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