-eng- Female Doll - Xa -rj01288937- 90%

He should have put her back in the crate. He should have smashed the key, burned the velvet, called the number on the manifest. Instead, he walked over and knelt in front of her. She cupped his face with her cool hands.

The upstairs phone stopped ringing the next day.

He turned the key. Three clicks. Her eyelids fluttered. Then opened. -ENG- Female Doll - XA -RJ01288937-

"You knew," he said.

was etched into the small of her back.

By the third day, he was sleeping on the floor beside her crate. By the fifth, he had stopped going upstairs. His phone buzzed with missed calls. His plants wilted. His reflection in the bathroom mirror looked thinner, grayer, hollow-cheeked.

"Stay," he said.

She, meanwhile, grew more vivid. Her porcelain began to warm. A faint pulse appeared at her throat. When he touched her hand, he swore he felt it squeeze back.