the life I left behind me is a cold room

It took me a bit to remember why I'd come out to Domestic-V; when the first thing one sees rezzing in are a bunch of rats scurrying around the base of a carny machine containing a rotating chicken...I mean, really, what had I gone there for?

Then I remembered. I'd finally gotten down to that place in my miscellaneous folder and found the free doll Domestic-V had given out, at some point in the past.

This doll:



This pink-tinged, slightly radiant, floppy bunny doll, with a stitched slit of a mouth, one spiral eye sliding off the faux fur...and did I mention the doll-heads-in-jars attached to the belt?



The belt which seems, for all the world, like a seatbelt torn from a vintage Mustang?

And that was before I looked at the doll from behind:



and noticed the child's handprint in please-let-that-be-fruit-punch on the back of the bunny-doll's head.

The designer calls her Bunbun. I call her creepier than Gloomy Bear.

Sometimes it's the little things, that get under the skin and tear at the muscles and bone. Six months ago, this wouldn't have bothered me. Nine months ago, I was walking around nearly everywhere with a ghostly hand attached to my shoulder. A year ago...

Well. A year ago, a lot of things were different. And some nights, some dark quiet nights, I obsess on the differences.

When I should just let them go. I've moved on, I've moved away from so much, why not this? Why do I care? Why is it still important?

It's not, is the answer I don't want to accept. But there's truth in that, there's truth in the denial, for once. It's not important. It's not my life. I can go on, I have gone on, and I'm still going. I haven't stopped, I haven't ceased, I'm still breathing, still living, still loving, still reaching out--

Just...no longer so far as before. I think...there's just a little touch of fear, as a reminder. As a remainder. Of what I tell myself, keep telling myself, I've moved on from, moved away from, moved on and left behind.

The handprint, though. One hand of might-be-blood matting the pink fur. Makes me decidedly uneasy. Not for what it is, but for what it represents...on some deep level...what it speaks without speaking, to the part of me that never leaves the dark.

I still need to find an animator. I think next week--the days I'm going to be present next week--I'll concentrate on that, and not these fruitless distractions. Then I'll need to call a meeting with the scripters and builders I know, and see if we can get a certain thing done.

It'd be one less project off the list. Then maybe...more eyes. More frocks. I might even try my hand at shoes...