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  Patti Larsen

  © 2013 Patti Larsen

  Purely Paranormal Press

  Find all of my books (there’s over 85 of them!) on Amazon!

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  Kindle Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Amazon.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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  Jane hovered near the rickety wooden yard sale table, discomfort clear in every line of her body. The thumb and index finger of her right hand absently reached for the gold band no longer gracing her left ring finger, though the indent of twenty years of marriage remained.

  Annie bumped her shoulder from behind, a little smile on her face. “You look like someone's torturing you,” Jane's younger sister said, tossing her blonde bob, mascara laden lashes winking. Jane hated how great Annie looked, fit and happy. Diamonds of happy matrimony glinted from her hand, a slap in Jane's face.

  It just wasn't fair. Why did her life have to fall apart? But she forced a little smile and shoved her shoulders down from the tense mountains they made on either side of her ears.

  “Sorry,” she said, even as she hated the automatic reaction of apology, left over from years of trying to make Bob happy and never succeeding. “I haven't been to one of these before.”

  Annie swung her designer bag over her shoulder and grabbed Jane's arm, pulling her closer, fake nails digging into the soft flesh of her arm even through her jacket.

  “A little retail therapy,” Annie said, lip-gloss shining in the sunlight of the bright June morning. Jane shifted sideways, out of the path of a pushy older woman who pawed through the offerings on the table. “Never hurt anyone.”

  Retail therapy used to be Jane's favorite when two incomes kept her comfortable, if not happy. But now Bob was gone, the cheating Angela with him—what were best friends for?—Jane hadn't been able to afford much in the way of new clothes or nick-knacks for the house until she'd gotten her very unstable feet under her at last.

  The woman behind the table smiled at her, rumpled and weary, the strained, almost bitter undertone making Jane retreat a little even as her eyes settled on the sweet porcelain doll perched near the cash box. A lovely auburn haired heirloom smiled at her, crisp white dress almost glowing in the sun. The doll’s hair glowed richly red, tight corkscrews held in two matching satin ribbons, eyes clear blue, darling smile showing perfect white teeth as her flawless cheeks and faintest blush painted over the palest ivory. Jane's hand went unconsciously to her own hair, once that gorgeous shade, now faded to brown and threaded with gray. Her limber, attractive young body was long gone, too. One of the reasons Bob left her, he said.

  Jane's eyes burned with tears as Annie, unknowing, uncaring, left her there staring at the doll. The sudden need to flee, to hide in the small house she'd barely been able to afford on her own and never come out driving her back from the table.

  Until the old woman pushed her again. Something inside Jane snapped in that moment as the woman's grubby paw reached out to take the doll. To touch Jane's precious memory. In a move nothing like her normal passive and quiet nature, Jane shouldered the old woman aside and grasped the doll in her hand, holding it out, shaking slightly, to the woman behind the table.

  “How much?”

  Annie's lack of enthusiasm over the doll, which she deemed ‘creepy’, did nothing to deter Jane. She'd found a side of herself previously unknown, an aggressive side okay with getting what she wanted. The surge of joy and excitement the feeling of buying the doll brought her was as powerful as the rush of a heroin injection.

  Jane ensconced the doll next to her bed, where she could look at it before she slept and where it would be the first thing she woke to each morning. A reminder of the new Jane. As she fell into sleep that first night, she was positive the doll smiled just for her.

  Life became the passion of the purchase. Jane's new job working as an insurance technician allowed her to do so from home, and afforded her enough money to indulge in her new favorite past time—yardsaling. Anticipation of each weekend's goodies was only partly satiated by the exploration of thrift and dollar stores she discovered after timidly Googling her new favorite topic.

  Annie wrinkled her nose immediately the next time she came to visit at the pile of goodies Jane eagerly showed her, perched on the spare bed.

  “What do you want all this junk for?” Just seeing Annie handle her precious discoveries with her filthy, clammy hands made Jane's new-found temper boil.

  Their visit didn't last long.

  An introvert by nature, it was easy for Jane to fall into a happy routine over the next six months: working all morning with a quick trip to the thrift shop over lunch before finishing her day. It became harder and harder to keep her time in the stores down to the half hour she'd booked herself, turning quickly into two and sometimes three hour marathons she paid for by working well into the night. But to Jane, it was worth it.

  When she realized she could no longer sleep in her own bed because it was full of things she just had to have, Jane paused. A flicker of concern passed through her mind, but only a flicker. The moment her eyes settled on the doll, doubt faded and her happiness came back. Jane scooped up her porcelain treasure and carried it to the living room, setting it on the end table beside her recliner. She often dozed in the chair for a few moments after supper looking over classified and yard sale adverts, so it seemed logical to make it her full-time sleeping place.

  Especially if it meant she had more room for her stuff.

  The first time she heard the doll whispering, Jane thought it was the television. But no, that soft, sweet voice, the words she couldn't quite make out, they came from the doll. Crazy? Maybe. But Jane wasn't willing to admit it. Not when hearing the doll’s lovely murmuring gave her such peace. It was so much easier to fall asleep to the sound and she found she welcomed it.

  Even better the first time she answered it. Opened her eyes in the deep of the night to that glittering blue gaze. “You're so beautiful,” Jane said, stroking the doll’s perfect hair, the porcelain cheeks warm to the touch. “I wish I looked like you.”

  It was easy then to tell the doll everything, to let go of all of her hopes and fears and dreams and old pains, to weep at last for the loss of her marriage and the pathetic hopelessness of Jane's existence.

  “Until I found you.” She kissed the doll little head of corkscrew auburn curls and hugged her close.

  And the doll whispered happily back.

  Annie wasn't welcome any longer. Not after the disgusted look on her face, the snide comments about how hard it was to walk down the hall. Her realization Jane slept in her chair. Jane put a stop to her visits right then and there, using some of her new-found passion to muscle her normally dominating sister out the front door.

  It was with great satisfaction Jane slammed it in Annie's shocked face.

  The doll approved, the whispering congratulatory. Jane beamed in joy as she pulled herself over the pile of wrapping paper, blankets, a toy house, scrapbooking supplies and tupperware dishes, into the kitchen for a celebratory snack.

  Jane rifled through the plastic bags full of new groceries she'd set on top of the old, deciding on a chocolate bar, nose wrinkling slightly at the scent of rotting food, quickly gone from her mind as she returned to her chair and held the doll while her mouth tingled, full of yummy sweetness.

  Work fell to the wayside. How could she focus on
other people's problems when she had the doll to talk to? Bills piled up, her phone cut off, internet. There, she couldn't work anymore anyway. She just managed to keep the lights on by applying for social assistance, meals in her stomach from the food bank. The part of her cringing in shame over using such services wasn't nearly as loud as the thrill she felt buying more things.

  Jane ignored the ringing of the doorbell, never answering, knowing it was Annie or one of the nosy neighbors who complained all the time about the stuff piling up in the front yard. They needed to mind their own business. Until she heard a man's voice telling her it was the police knocking. Jane blinked into the sunlight, scowling at the two young officers.

  “We've had calls,” the first said, while the other looked over her shoulder into the house. His face judged her, raised her anger while his partner went on. “From the neighbors.”

  About the smell, he said. And the condition of her property. Jane turned and, for a brief heartbeat, everything stopped for her. She saw the mess. But not for long enough. Not with the doll tucked carefully against her chest in one protective hand.

  Jane made empty promises to the officers, about cleanups and garbage bins, before closing and locking the door on them. Returning to her chair and the auburn-haired doll.

  Always the doll.

  Jane was sleeping when someone broke the door down. She pushed her way through the piles near the entry and found Annie, backed by a crew in masks and gloves.

  “We're here to clean this up,” Annie said, hand over her nose, horror on her face. “Jane, you have to or the city will make you move.”

  No, no. Never. The phone was in her hands, 9-1-1 called, the police summoned.

  Trespassers. Defilers. The cops came, Annie fought, Annie pleaded.

  Annie left.

  Just how Jane wanted it.

  As Jane turned in triumph, shimmied her way back to her chair, her arm bumped the wobbling stack of magazines she'd placed on top of the old books she piled on the six bags of curtains she rescued from destruction. The doll fell from her grip while Jane reached for her, terror seizing her heart, porcelain perfection bouncing over the heaped-up garbage, coming to land against the bones of a small animal.

  She had a... dog? Jane's mind snapped open. No, no dog. A raccoon, it looked like. Jane tipped her head back, looked up. A gaping hole in her ceiling disgorged insulation from the blackness. When had that happened? She staggered back, eyes going wider and wider as she stumbled away from the horror before her.

  And saw. For the first time. All of it. Smelled, tasted the rot in the air, the heavy pall of waste and decay. Looked down at herself, her unwashed body, the stringy length of her hair falling over a filthy sweatshirt she'd never seen before. Fell to her knees and sobbed into her hands, barely able to stand the stench of herself as the piles and heaps and stacks closed in around her.

  Jane stumbled to her feet, heading for the door, reaching for the distant knob, Annie's name on her lips.

  Stop.

  The whisper. A voice now. Jane paused, heart pounding in her chest.

  Don't.

  “I can't live like this.” Her hands shook, mind reeling as she understood she'd been talking to a doll, she'd most likely gone insane and, instantly, blamed Bob automatically before the voice spoke again.

  More.

  Jane's mouth gaped open, the reek of her own breath making her dizzy as she ran her tongue over teeth fuzzy with plaque and worse things.

  “No more.” She hugged herself. “I'm done.”

  More.

  Jane took a step toward the doll, the smiling face of the little girl in porcelain now somehow changed, bitter, angry. Morphing into evil. Jane crouched to touch it.

  Yes.

  She fell back, panting, grasping desperately about her as the voice, clear now, demanding, pulled her in to madness. Jane felt some fabric, jerked free a rotting t-shirt, wrapped it around her hand and lifted the doll. The draw of the siren's call through the flimsy material wasn't reaching her anymore.

  Her awakened horror was stronger.

  “Enough.” Jane turned toward the door again, heading down the hall. “Enough.” As she climbed over piles, panting, tears now trickling down her face, her true strength finally won, and she screamed at the doll, “ENOUGH!”

  The door was so close. Outside beckoned. Fresh air, a new life. Leaving this behind... Jane found herself smiling through her tears. Yes, she'd lost it for a while. But she could start again.

  And this time would be different.

  No. No. No. The doll almost burned in her hand, the heat reaching her through the worn fabric. Jane clutched it close, stumbled over a collection of Barbie dolls missing parts and hair and fell hard in a crumpled heap of garbage. Something broke under her knee, wetness staining her pants, the reek of rotting citrus filling her nostrils. Jane reached out with her free hand for support as she struggled to rise.

  Felt the pile beside her shift.

  Slide.

  Fall.

  She purchased the six bowling balls only two days before, stacking them on top of the old bookshelf she filled with baby clothes and the comic-book collection she meant to catalog. The shelf was weaker than she thought, gave way as her grasping fingers used it to steady her.

  And it all came tumbling down.

  Jane landed on her belly, the first ball crushing the small of her back and severing her spinal cord just before the pain came. The second, an instant after the first, took out her right arm, at the elbow, bone powdering under the twenty pounds of falling resin. But Jane barely registered it.

  Not when the third struck her in the back of the head.

  Darkness closing in, Jane's eyes locked on the doll, sitting pretty and perfect, upright, looking down at her.

  Smiling again.

  ***

  Annie broke through the front door a week later. A kind young officer comforted her as the firemen pulled the body out of the front hall, after first unloading a dumpster full of garbage in order to reach Jane's decaying body.

  “It's my fault,” she sobbed on his blue shoulder. “I should have tried harder.”

  Annie had to force herself to enter the house after the funeral, but it needed to be done and there was no one else. She rescued the sweet doll from the floor before one of the crew could trample it, stuffing it in a bag, surprised to find its pretty while dress stayed clean amid all the filth. Jane loved that doll. It was the least Annie could do to save it.

  The cleansing of the house took four full days, leaving behind a home that would never smell fresh again. Still, the For Sale sign swung at the end of the driveway the day Annie had the yard sale. Most of what Jane brought into the house was garbage, but some of it could be salvaged and Annie wasn't beyond making a little money on the whole thing, considering how much Jane's death and debt already cost her.

  A young woman with a sad expression stood back, hands clutching her purse. Annie watched her with the shrewd attention of a true saleswoman, noticing where the woman focused. The doll sat, shining and lovely in her pristine white dress, front and center and the buyer couldn't seem to keep her eyes off it.

  “Only ten dollars,” Annie said.

  The woman smiled, hesitated. “Will you take five?”

  “Seven.” Annie slid the doll into a plastic bag, but the woman shook her head and stepped forward, hands sliding around it as she lifted it and met Annie's eyes.

  “Sold.”

  The doll smiled.

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  About the Author

  Everything you need to know about me is in this one statement: I’ve wanted to be a writer since I was a little girl, and now I’m doing it. How cool is that, being able to follow your dream and make it reality? I’ve tried everything from university to c
ollege, graduating the second with a journalism diploma (I sucked at telling real stories), was in an all-girl improv troupe for five glorious years (if you’ve never tried it, I highly recommend making things up as you go along as often as possible). I’ve even been in a Celtic girl band (some of our stuff is on YouTube!) and was an independent film maker. My life has been one creative thing after another—all leading me here, to writing books for a living.

  Now with multiple series in happy publication, I live on beautiful and magical Prince Edward Island (I know you’ve heard of Anne of Green Gables) with my very patient husband and six massive cats.

  I love-love-love hearing from you! You can reach me (and I promise I’ll message back) at [email protected]. And if you’re eager for your next dose of Patti Larsen books (usually about one release a month) come join my mailing list! All the best up and coming, giveaways, contests and, of course, my observations on the world (aren’t you just dying to know what I think about everything?) all in one place: http://smarturl.it/PattiLarsenEmail.

  Last—but not least!—I hope you enjoyed what you read! Your happiness is my happiness. And I’d love to hear just what you thought. A review where you found this book would mean the world to me—reviews feed writers more than you will ever know. So, loved it (or not so much), your honest review would make my day. Thank you!

 

 

  Patti Larsen, Hoarder

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