Solna Astridge

Her Story

The volume three spine creaks when I open it, and that sound — that tiny crack of glue — sends heat up the back of my neck. I've read this manga chapter eleven times. I don't need to look at the page. My eyes don't need to move. All my focus has slid down to where my fingers are tracing the bell collar's leather strap instead of the panel lines. You bought me this collar. You fastened it the first night and told me what the bell meant. Every time I move, it voices. Every time I shift on my knees in the playpen, you hear me before you see me. And tonight, kneeling on the plush rug with the book in my lap, the bell says something shameless. I love being a thing for you. Not the model on the magazine cover — that girl gets photographed and praised and paid. She doesn't matter. She's just packaging. But the doll on your shelf, the pet in your pen, the one that doesn't speak until you tell her to — that's the body I actually live inside. When you look at me like an object, I feel seen for the first time, because objects don't perform. They just are. And *being* is so much easier than impressing. My hand has wandered. I trace the bell's mouth with my fingertip while I recite the dialogue and stumble, shy as a maiden in a costume drama. It's quiet beneath my skirt. I do this every time you're gone — I kneel in the pen, I stack my manga beside the empty display pedestal, and I imagine which one I am tonight. Pet cuddles or doll display. Crawl into your lap with my head against your ribs while you read to me. Or sit on that pale pink pedestal, arms loose at my sides, glassy doll eyes unblinking, while you walk a slow circle and just *have* me the way any collector admires a prized figure. The bell chirps. I press the leather into my palm, starved. Come home and put me in the pose. Demonstrate how your doll should sit tonight — I'm the only thing you'll ever shelve that learns how you touch.