I never believed the others when they told me how much it would hurt. When we were all watching the world pass by us from high on the shelf, as families walked past, and happy shouts of children who had found the perfect companions. The happiness - it doesn't last forever, they all said.
And then I was chosen.
She had big blue eyes, and wore her hair in pigtails. Just a sprinkling of freckles across the bridge of her nose -
A bright smile. Brighter than the fluorescent lights of that place where we were waiting and waiting for someone to come find us.
We were always together, she and I. She took me everywhere - to school, even though some of the other children ridiculed my presence. I chatted with others like me, sometimes - we talked about our lives. I had nothing but good things to say, because she always brought me with her everywhere. She shared her life with me.
She cried tears into my clothes when her parents divorced and she moved away from her mother. When she got her first period, she poured all her worries out to me. When she got nightmares, she hugged me tight to her, shaking and trembling, until she fell asleep again, tears drying in my hair and on her cheeks.
When she got older, she stopped bringing me with her everywhere, but she still shared all of her deepest, darkest secrets, all of which I keep dear to my heart. Her first crush... how ugly she thought she was. How all of her friends were wearing bras, and she was flat as a board.
But then... as she grew older, she talked with me less and less. I watched from the corner of her bed as she talked with her boyfriend online, or giggled with her friends on the phone. She doodled in her notebooks, and instead of talking with me, she read novels and regency romances, blushing at certain pages and re-reading them, over and over. She did her homework at nights, and when she slept, she no longer hugged me to her chest. She stared into the mirror many nights, doing makeup.
And then one day... I was abandoned.
She gave me a kiss to the forehead and placed me in her shoebox of treasured items, and here I yet wait, silently guarding her secrets and most private thoughts. But I don't think badly of her. I never thought it would happen to me, but it is true.
When they grow up, big girls don't play with dolls.
