“Say Hello to My Doll.”
The doll didn’t look particularly valuable, but it had a lovely face.
Chestnut curls, blue glass eyes, blushing cheeks. The legs that extended from under her dark green apron dress swung back and forth, as if she was bored, and although she had no one to talk to, her high-pitched soprano voice chattered incessantly in a subdued whisper.
As she listened attentively, the doll’s adorable lips, still smiling, spat in an adorably high voice, one hateful complaint after another, like, “That damn third-rate doll maker, I told him to make my eyes out of jade, but he used these cheap glass balls. He can go to hell ten million times,” or, “How dare that black bear grab my leg and swing me around. He deserved what he got, being taken off by the garbage collectors.”
The girl froze automatically, gaping at the doll. The string of abusive language ceased abruptly, and a strange silence settled over them.
A girl’s face rose palely from the darkness, creaking as it turned ninety degrees toward her. The glass eyes didn’t blink, fixed in an eerie state; only her red lips moved, demanding suddenly, “Hello! Stop eavesdropping, and let’s play!”
“!”
The girl drew back in surprise, and her back crashed into someone sleeping beside her. “Hm…? What’s wrong?” came a woman’s sleepy voice.
That instant, the doll froze, regarding her with a chilling smile plastered to her innocent face.
“My doll! She was talking…!” she appealed in a lisp, but the person next to her just sighed in exasperation. “Oh, is that all?” But the woman didn’t say it mockingly or as if politely consoling her after a bad dream; she said it quite plainly, as if such a thing was nothing out of the ordinary.
“Even dolls talk sometimes, when they’re bored. You’d be bored, too, if you had to sit quietly wearing the same outfit all the time,” she said, smiling kindly, and readjusted the blanket. The girl wasn’t at all satisfied with this explanation, but when soft, white fingers brushed the hair off of her forehead, she felt better somehow, and a talking doll started to seem as if it wasn’t such a big deal after all.
When she closed her eyes, she could feel the gentle vibrations of the ship and the low sound of its engine. She felt as if she was in a cradle as she gave herself over to the comforting rocking and finally fell asleep…
“Kieli. We’re getting off.”
A voice rained down on her head, pulling Kieli out of her light doze, and she opened her eyes.
…A dream, she thought vaguely as she turned her groggy gaze to her right and left. Who was that person? She got the feeling that maybe she remembered the feel of those soft hands and that slightly husky voice…
“Ah!”
Once Kieli realized that the other passengers on the train were starting to get up noisily from their seats, she was suddenly wide awake. Before she knew it, the scene outside the window had changed from the endless, monotonous wilderness that had lulled her to sleep on her long journey to the bustle of a station platform.
“SAY HELLO TO MY DOLL.” - 5
“We’re here? You’re kidding.”
“I’m not,” her traveling companion answered shortly, standing on the other side of the box of seats and reaching up to the rack to get their luggage.
“But you promised you’d tell me when we could see the ocean!”
“I told you. It’s your fault you didn’t wake up.”
“Really? How many times?”
“Once,” her companion answered immediately and unapologetically. He was tall enough that he didn’t need to stretch to pull their bags off the rack. He easily freed Kieli’s bag and handed it to her. He caught her glare as she puffed her cheeks out in disappointment and winced. “You’re mad about that? You don’t have to be in such a hurry; once we’re on the boat, you’ll see so much of the same thing every day you’ll start to hate it,” he said curtly, then hung his own backpack from his left shoulder and walked down the aisle.
“Ugh…”
Kieli glared loathingly at his back for a while, but, seeing him favor his right side as he walked with some difficulty, she thought better of it and hurried out of her seat, carrying her bag and down coat. As she began to leave, she turned around and grabbed the cord of the small radio left on the windowsill, then ran down the aisle after the copper-colored head sticking out above the crowd.
She was sad that she didn’t get to see the ocean from the train, but when she thought about getting on the boat soon, her step naturally lightened, and she practically bounded down the steps onto the platform. The shoulder bag she wore bounced loudly against her hips.
“We’re here! We’re at the station!”
When she stretched and took a deep breath, a scent of dry wind from the harbor, mixed with the pleasant outdoor air, tickled the inside of her nose.
They were at the last station on the far east of the continental railroad that ran across the wilderness. Beyond here spread the Sand Ocean—a vast sea of flowing sand said to cover sixty percent of the planet’s surface.