I was important once, I was somebody. I must have been, though the memories have faded like the painted-on eyes of my cotton head, faded from neglect and age and not a little bit from loneliness. I was the favourite toy of an amazing boy, we loved each other like nothing else and swore in secret we would always be together. Now I sit turning ever so slowly to dust, kept by those who do not value me, but harboured some strange nostalgia like somehow my presence in the back of the attic meant that the Boy was not gone somehow. He is gone. I am not, though here I sit and wait for the end of this neglect and disregard, as he did. The ones who live in the house now know nothing of any of this though, so at least their neglect is honest.
He asked me to call him Boy because he had grown to hate his own name, it had been turned into a profane word by years of being spat from the mouths of his parents like so much snake venom. His mother mostly, he wasn’t sure what he had done to her but it seemed that his birth was a crime. His father wasn’t there most of the time, working hard as he thought he should, probably trying to earn his worth as the Boy tried to earn his own, but neither of them would succeed. He didn’t mean to be born, he didn’t know it was wrong, but in doing so he robbed his mother of her youth and slimness and freedom, and had compounded this offence by reminding her of his father. Ah, his father. His father was his hero and villain, supportive and angry in turns, the hand of guidance often turned to a fist of rage. Still, though his father was mean, his mother was cruel, and though his father struck him often, his mother stabbed him daily with her words. The body will heal, the heart takes longer.
The Boy and I were best of friends, confiding in each other in everything, making grand plans and inventions and sometimes fantasies, always with both of us, together to the end. Only it wasn’t that way. He had to leave me when he was seven. Seven is a magical age, the wonder of the world starts to dawn on a child, and there are no limits in sight. Seven is also tender, when a Boy starts to think to himself that he is wrong, not just ill behaved, but wrong for his very being, as he has been told by words and deeds from those around him. I told him otherwise, told him he was special and wonderful and could do anything he wanted, but my voice was only one and theirs many. He wept bitter tears, some still stain my body, hoping that someday he would be good enough for them, make them proud, make them like him just for who he is and not what he can do. He was always good enough for me, and I for him. He died before his eighth birthday, taken by an illness in the winter, must be a hundred years ago now, before the wars. His mother wept, but they were false tears, she was secretly happy because she hated him for his existence. Now she would get pity and attention for her tragic loss, and could spend all her time on her good child, the daughter she had when he was three. His father was at least dutiful, he stored the Boy in the ice house until the ground could thaw. Daily, weeping, he would check the ground on their homestead, both anticipating and fearing the day when the probe broke through, for then he would truly lose his son, and have to honour his promise to bury him in his favourite spot in the hillock overlooking the brook. When the day came, he kept true to his word, tears falling with every shovelful, placing finally the wooden grave marker which he had lovingly made with his own hands. The hands that struck the Boy, returning him to his peace, crafting a small monument to his life. His father loved him, though he barely knew how to love himself.
The Boy died weeping, and his last words were to ask for me, so we could be together to the end, he wanted me to be buried with him but could not get the words out. I wanted to be buried with him, so I would not have to wait these years feeling alone and missing him, treasuring every detail of every memory and knowing I would never get a new memory with him. Instead I was stored in the attic, a grim reminder of a life cut short, a life that was full just the same.
The people who live in the house now know none of this, they know I am here, and they know of the hillock though the grave marker has long since been turned to dust. On that spot, they now discard brush cleared from the land, and sometimes burn it in a magnificent fire which I can just see through the attic window. I know the Boy would love to see it too, perhaps he can somehow, he loved roaring fires with all their beauty and danger, and especially in the winter when they would warm your house but could kill you while you slept, but the cold would definitely kill you. He thought fire was like his father, power to be respected, changeable in a flash. His mother was ice, slowly creeping in and stabbing at you, making you tired and hating you with every icy breath. I hope against hope that one day I will end up on the brush pile, mercifully burned to ashes at long last, and falling down to nestle in the ground where my Boy sleeps. We would be together again at last, and would never ever be parted again. Just to touch him once more would make all this worthwhile, and perhaps even we could both live again, the power of our love and friendship and boundless reaches of our imaginations restoring our bodies to life. I can hope for this, and I must. He is not gone so long as he is in my heart, and I have not forgotten him.
Today they have come and carried me from my perch in the attic, and have taken me out to the brush pile. If I could, I would weep tears of joy because I am finally going to be with the Boy again, and he with me. I believe we will live again at that moment, and even just being together with him again, dust and ashes, will be the answer to my fondest wish. They are going to burn “that old toy”, they said, saying I am spooky and depressing and worn out. That old toy. No, I was somebody important once, and will be again, I belong to the finest Boy that ever lived and he to me. This old toy feels the licking of the flames, I swear I can feel his father in there fulfilling one last promise, smiling and proud of the Boy at last and understanding of what we meant to each other.
Now I am home, burned to nothing and with the Boy again, never to be parted. And we live again, together, this time forever. At last we are happy again.