Play With Me, Juliet

The gale angrily pounded against the window, shaking the glass in its frame. The storm raged on outside the silent, dark house. The sky lit up with violent flashes of yellow, purple, and blue. Forks swiped at the turbulent clouds and reached down to touch the tips of the houses below. The air boomed and crashed loud enough for the entire world to hear the battle happening in the sky. And while the world slept through the storm, carried away by dreams and their weary bones, Juliet Fairchild remained awake. 

She paced relentlessly to and fro in her bedroom, glancing at the window every few seconds, silently begging the storm to cease so sleep could finally take her too. She was rather short for a girl of ten, far below the average height. The hems of her silk gown dragged along the floor like a silver river as she walked, giving a little jump every time the thunder clattered through the air. Her small arms were wrapped tightly around a stuffed bunny, honey-and-gold in color. A possession she’d had since she was a baby. She snuggled her face into the soft fur as she turned on her heel and began pacing in the opposite direction. 

Tonight was not the night for this storm. It was a storm like this, violent and sudden, that had taken her father years ago, skidding his carriage off the muddy road into a towering oak tree before he could ever bring her that promised sweet treat. 

The sky let out a deafening crash. Juliet squealed, jumping a foot up in the air as she spun toward the window, her honey blonde hair whipping her across the face. Oh why, oh why, did the heavens have to fight tonight on the single night when she was completely and utterly alone in her massive house? The lace hanging down in front of the glass cast shadows across the oak walls surrounding her, taking the form of villainous monsters that sat still, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. 

Bang!

The sound of a door slamming open echoed throughout the entire house. Juliet gasped and spun toward her door, her vibrant blue eyes sparkling with tears as she inched toward the wooden frame. She heard voices coming from below. But that couldn’t be; she was alone. Charles was chaperoning Elizabeth’s church retreat. He wouldn’t return until after noon the following day. She was supposed to be alone; there wasn’t a reason they would have come back, and yet they had.

“Juliet!” Charles’ voice echoed through the house. Juliet gasped in relief, her eyes lighting up as she dropped Mr. Cuddles and ran to her door, leaving her bedroom behind as she bolted down the hall, her silk gown flying behind her like a cape. 

Ever since he had been forced to abandon his natural philosophy studies at Oxford to return to Colorado Springs as their bitter, reluctant guardian, he despised broken schedules almost as much as he despised playing parent to two young girls. 

“Charles!” she called back as she reached the stairs. 

She didn’t bother with the steps and instead climbed atop the banister and slid down, just as her brother had taught her years before. But fate was not in her favor tonight; her gown got hooked on one of the supports and jerked her backward, causing her to fall and tumble down the stairs, sprawling on the ground beneath the bottom step. She let out a small groan and stared down at the dust gathering on the wooden floorboards for a few agonizing seconds before she slowly pushed herself up onto her feet, rubbing her bruised elbows and dusting herself off. She expected to hear laughter. That was certainly something Charles would do if he witnessed such a sight. But there was only silence.

Juliet looked around the living room in which she now stood. It was silent; there wasn't a whisper of movement anywhere, not even the scuttle of a mouse. The room was pitch-black, with only the storm raging outside to light the furniture in small flashes. Juliet gulped anxiously as she slowly started to make her way across the room to the foyer through the archway.

“Charles?” 

She hesitated at the arch; Charles was probably lurking behind the wall waiting to jump out and scare her. That must have been it; he must have urged Elizabeth to be silent. Juliet closed her eyes, bracing herself before she spun around the wall to face her brother. But there was no one there. The foyer was empty. Their coats were still missing from the rack, and the shoe rack was still perfectly aligned. Something Elizabeth would never let happen if she’d come home: the shoes would have been scattered everywhere, even the shoes that were not her own. The great oak doors were sealed shut with the deadbolt still turned, trapping her inside the large house. 

“Juliet!” Charles's call was softer this time. 

“Charles?! Charles, where are you? Elizabeth?” She waited for a response but received none,e so instead drew in a breath before calling out. “Hot boiled beans!”

A game was the only way to get Elizabeth to snap out of whatever spell Charles had placed on her. She waited for her little sister to cry out ‘and bacon for supper!’ in return, but her voice never came. Only silence. Elizabeth must not be with him, she thought to herself; that was the only reasonable explanation.

“Charles, this isn’t funny!”

She suddenly heard shuffling coming from the drawing room and spun toward the dark hall behind her. She swallowed back her nerves as she started inching down the corridor to the dark oak door at the far end. She quickened her pace when she heard soft giggling coming from inside. Elizabeth’s laughter. She had come home. Juliet burst through the door and looked around the room, covered head to toe in bookshelves. It was more of a library than a drawing room, and yet that was what her mother declared it to be, so a drawing room it was. She could still picture her mother sitting trapped in the velvet armchair by the window, staring out at the empty street day after day, waiting for a husband who would never return until illness finally took her, too. 

Juliet’s eyes darted around, searching for the small child with a head full of rainbow ribbons, but the room was again empty. What was worse was that the room still smelled faintly of her dried lavender perfume, making the young girl’s heart ache with grief and a longing to be wrapped in her mother’s warm embrace once again. Juliet swallowed, beginning to wonder if this was all just a dream, but the thunder crashing outside the window assured her it was not. Charles and Elizabeth were home; they had to be. She’d heard their voices. They were just playing a trick on her, a cruel and awful trick. 

Just as Juliet was about to leave to continue her search, a mechanical voice rang out. “Play with me!” 

Juliet let out a quiet yelp and grabbed the lantern from the hook on the wall, igniting the flame with gas and casting light upon the drawing room. Her eyes darted around erratically before they finally fell on what had made the noise. It was one of Elizabeth’s life-sized dolls, almost as big as Juliet herself. It was a cursed invention to make a doll the same size as a small child. It only made them more life-like and, as such, all the more terrifying. Anne, Juliet believed, was the name Elizabeth had gifted the doll. There was nothing out of the ordinary about Anne; she was your typical doll, only life-sized. 

She wore a simple blue dress with a light pink cardigan and white frilly stockings. Her hair was the color of molten gold and was pulled back into two pigtails, bound with rainbow ribbon just as Elizabeth’s hair so often was. It wasn’t the doll that unsettled Juliet; it was Anne’s face, how horrific it really was indeed. She had huge, wide black eyes with long, lush lashes and a smile that spread from ear to ear. Her cheeks were a rosy red, and two dimples lay upon either side of her smile. But it wasn’t really her face that was so horrible, either. It was the fact that Elizabeth had accidentally broken her head off the body a year prior and Charles, in an effort to appease her cries, had glued the head back on. Only now the head sat at an awkward angle, and as Anne stared at you with her unblinking eyes, she had the look of a madman grinning wickedly, enjoying your terror, before she took your life. 

Juliet shuddered at the thought and quickly left the room, closing the door behind her as she left and walked back down the hall toward the living room, carrying the lantern along with her. The hairs on the back of her neck prickled as she entered the room and glanced around.

“Juliet!” Charles’ voice rang from upstairs. 

“Charles!? Charles, I’m not playing this game with you anymore. Where are you?” Juliet called, feeling deep frustration with her brother. “CHARLES!”

“Juliet! Juliet!” Elizabeth’s playful voice finally rang out from the upper floor. 

“Elizabeth? Elizabeth, where are you?” Juliet asked, slowly ascending the stairs again. She rang her fingers along the banister as she quickly skipped up the stairs, the hem of her gown tapping lightly against the steps as she rose higher and higher. 

“Juliet! Juliet!” Elizabeth laughed happily. 

Juliet looked over her shoulder at Elizabeth’s door down the hall and quickly walked toward it, Elizabeth’s laughter getting louder and louder the closer she got. She opened the door and walked inside to find the lanterns all alight. The room was littered with toys; you could barely go anywhere without having to step on one thing or another. 

“Elizabeth?” Juliet called out, walking farther into the room. 

“Juliet! Juliet!” Elizabeth giggled. Juliet smiled at her cute little giggle. 

“Elizabeth, come out, come out wherever you are,” she sang, stepping over one of the dolls as she turned around in a circle. 

“Juliet!” Charles called out from the same place as Elizabeth’s laugh. Juliet froze; something felt wrong to her; Charles’ voice didn’t sound quite right. It was too…mechanical. Elizabeth’s laugh was too echoey. 

“Elizabeth?” Juliet whispered, turning around again. “Charles…?”

Her eyes widened as she stared at the phonograph on the table, playing the sounds of Charles, Juliet, and Elizabeth playing outside, on a loop. Juliet only felt terror when she suddenly felt someone’s warm breath on the back of her neck, making the hairs on the back of her neck stand up like needle points. 

She slowly turned around to see Anne standing right behind her. Only she wasn’t an inanimate object; she was standing up to her full height, her head still at a horrifying tilt, but she was very, very much alive.

“Play with me, Juliet!” she said in a haunting voice. Juliet yelped and scrambled back, backing up against the wall as she stared. “Play with me, Juliet!”

All of a sudden, the other dolls littering the ground and walls- broken and bent, perfect and new- turned their heads on their swivels to look at Juliet. Blinking their eyes in horrifying unison, getting to their feet and approaching her, all chanting in unison. 

“Play with me, Juliet! Play with me, Juliet!” 

Juliet’s lip quivered before she let out a blood-curdling scream that rivaled the sound of the thunder that boomed outside, shaking the whole house. 

“Play with me, Juliet! Play with me, Juliet!”

Juliet shoved Anne away from her and bolted toward Elizabeth’s door, her heart pounding erratically against her chest as she tried to flee. But Charlotte, a doll in farm clothes with a pitchfork, was faster and slammed the door closed, trapping her inside. Juliet stumbled back as the dolls began to encircle her, forcing her to the center of the room, their chanting never ceasing. Juliet whirled around, trying to keep her eyes on all of them, but there were so many of them. There were too many of them, and their chant changed, taking the form of Charles’ voice. 

“Juliet! Juliet! Juliet! Juliet!” they all chanted, closing in on her. Juliet screamed again and fell to the ground, her eyes rolling into the back of her head as she fainted. 

“Juliet!” Charles shouted.

Juliet’s eyes snapped open, and she shot bolt upright, breathing hysterically as tears streamed down her cheeks. She looked up to see Charles standing right in front of her, his eyes wide with concern, his hands gripping her shoulders. She was in her bedroom. Early morning filtered through the lace curtains, casting shadows across her floor. 

“Charles!” Juliet panted, relief flooding her chest as she looked at him. 

“Hey. Hey, it was just a bad dream.”

“What?”

“Juliet, you were screaming,” Charles told her. 

“Screaming?” she repeated and looked around, trying to get her bearings. She suddenly looked back at her brother, confused. “Wait, what’re you doing here? Shouldn’t you be at the church retreat?”

“What church retreat?”

“With Elizabeth.” Juliet reminded him.

Charles furrowed his brows, looking incredibly confused. “Who’s Elizabeth?”

“What do you mean who’s Elizabeth!? I mean our sister, Elizabeth!” she exclaimed. 

Charles looked at her like she was crazy and pulled away slightly. “Juliet…” he began sternly. “We don’t have a sister.”

“Yes, we do! Elizabeth, she’s our little sister…”

“Juliet…Sister, stop! What’re you talking about?” Charles questioned. He suddenly noticed what she held in her hands, and a realization dawned. “Do you mean your doll, Elizabeth?”

“What?” Juliet looked down to find herself holding a doll in her arms. A doll that looked identical to Elizabeth. The same color hair, the same ribbons, the same blue eyes, the same cute dimples on her smile. Juliet let out a small scream and chucked the doll across the room. It hit the wall and fell to the ground with a soft thump. 

“Juliet!” 

“Get that thing away from me! Get it away! Get it away from me! I never want to see it again. Get it away! Get it away!” She cried out, scrambling back against her headboard.

“Okay, okay! I'll give it to the parish!” Charles exclaimed, raising his arms in surrender, looking thoroughly concerned as he looked at his younger sister. 

“No! Burn it.”

“What-Juliet…”

“Burn it, Charles. BURN IT!”

“Okay! Alright! I’ll burn it. Calm yourself, Juliet.” Charles said and walked across the room, picking up the small doll and heading for the door, muttering under his breath. Juliet closed her eyes, exhaling in relief as she slumped against her bedframe, her heart still pounding against her chest; it had all been a dream. Nothing more.