The Giraffes

 Silence.... Then, sounds of clip-clops echo through the hallways. A tower of giraffes, in a single-file, walk forward in a hypnotized sort of trance. The atmosphere is heavy with uneasiness, though no-one seems to notice.

The Advent symbols in the summer

Alma, meaning soul in Spanish...

 She breathes through her nose, and exhales the oxygen out roughly. She does this in a panic, and does this rather quickly… Breathes in, and out. In and out. In, and out… Alma isn’t able to rotate her new, plastic head, so she moves her eyes instead, examining the poorly decorated doll shop. She moves her eyes silently, and the clock that’s ticking get’s her agitated. Tick, tick, tick, tick.. Confusion and fear starts to rise within her as the attempt to move her body fails. “What’s going on here?” she asked herself. 

Alma figured out pretty quickly that she couldn’t move her lips to sound out the words she wanted to say. Her movements were very limited, and she didn’t like that. She continued to scan the room to kill time, hoping she could find a door, or someone that could somehow help her esca- wait…. Alma realizes she’s sitting on a shelf, no standing on one, that’s pretty high off the ground. She stops thinking all of a sudden, noticing a couch below… And, is that her glove?? How did it get there? 

Alma begins to retrace her steps and initiate everything that has happened that got her into this mess. “Now let’s see….,” Alma thought. “I saw a mini doll who looked like me that was displayed in the middle of the window, the door opened by itself once I angrily threw a snowball at it, I stood on that very couch down below to grab my mini self, and somehow…” Alma’s mind froze. The pieces were all coming together, and it didn’t create a nice puzzle. It was a very sinister one. To put it simply, Alma is now stuck inside of a doll that resembled herself almost too accurately. 

The sun has now fallen into a deep sleep, and the full moon has taken its place. The moonlight shone so brightly it created shadows for the light posts outside of the shop, which lit the walkway with its golden light bulbs. No one came into the shop. Not even the person who owned this empty-hearted doll store. Alma grew tired of waiting, and began to observe every detail of each doll. Some dolls have old school clothes from the 1800’s. Some have some very foreign looking accessories and bright clashy colours. 

When she was just about to close her eyes, voices started echoing in her consciousness. “Oh no, he’s almost here.. Hey, there’s another new victim today… How much you wanna bet that another kid’ll come here tomorrow… Oi, shush, we’re not supposed to hope for that kind of stuff…” Alma decided to join in while she still had the chance. “Wait, what? Who’s coming? What are we not supposed to talk about?” There was silence...

When she was just about to say something, the voice who asked about the bet spoke softly, but something about his tone made it sound like he was spilling a very important secret. “Just try to survive. Don’t anger the shopkeeper. And most importantly, don’t talk to us in front of him.” Alma was surprised, but the last part sent chills up her spine. “In front of wh-,” Ding-a-ling. The doorbell rang. “Who would come into the shop at this ungodly hour?” Alma asked herself. “Hopefully it’s not a child.” It wasn’t a child. It was someone worse. 

The person who walked in wore a pitch black cloak that covered most of his body, though you could just see his shoes sticking out, they were pitch black too. His baggy hoodie covered most of his face. “This guy has no sense of style,” Alma forced herself to snigger, or smile at least, but it was no use. The dark figure rotated his head while standing in front of the door and took his time examining the dolls, like a kid admiring all the candy in a confectionery shop. The hooded figure stops at Alma’s area, but it’s almost as if he's looking at her. He starts walking in her direction, making her panic. If she could scream, she would. If she could cry, she would. If she could wake up from this nightmare and forget all of this happening she would do exactly that. But this wasn’t a dream, and she couldn’t scream for help or cry her eyes out. This was reality, and things were about to get messy.

The sun was dawning and the hooded figure prepared to head out for the day. He looked at his new masterpiece with satisfaction, and put it on a stand in the center of the shop window. The brand new doll had snow-white skin with green eyes and crimson red hair. She wore a  maroon jacket with sea-blue jeans that stopped stretching around her ankles. She had pink mittens and her shoes were black with white laces. Looking back at his dolls once more like it was his last, he left the shop as swiftly as he did the night before. Without anyone noticing, the story took an unexpected turn.