Silent Doll by Sonnet O'Dell Page B

before. You saw it all the time in horror movies, especially the scream movies, where the killer would call their victim to mess with them. Well, I told myself, throwing the duvet back, now well and truly awake, I wasn’t in a horror movie–so whatever freak show was calling me only to say nothing could just go straight to hell.
    I padded into the kitchen in my pajamas, putting on the kettle to make some coffee, then opened and closed cupboards, looking for something to eat. I made Coco Puffs, watching the milk turn brown as I poured it over the saturated corn puffs. I leaned back against the counter, spooning the cereal into my mouth, putting it down once or twice to tug at my sleep shorts, which had ridden up a bit too much in the night.
    I had this nagging thought at the back of my brain, an idea that wouldn’t quite form. It was as though I had forgotten something, and the back of my mind was working hard to recall it. I hoped I remembered what it was before it developed into a headache. I put the empty bowl down, deciding to wander down to get my mail. I palmed my keys, went to open the door and nearly tripped over a box sitting against the inside of the door. I smacked into the door, knocking it closed again, palms flat against it to steady myself. I looked down at the offending package.
    It was a square box, white, trimmed in green ribbon. It looked a lot like the box that the roses were in. It was left right up against the door so that I couldn’t help but trip over it. How had it gotten there? I didn’t remember if I had carried any packages or anything up with me last night. I bent down to peer at it and poked it with the end of my key. It didn’t blow up or wriggle about, so I picked it up and took it into the kitchen, the rest of my mail forgotten for the moment.
    I placed the box down on the counter and pulled the ribbon slowly so that the bow unwove and fell away. Carefully, I peeled back the lid, releasing faint floral smell. I peered into the box; it held a potted plant with deep purple flowers and lots of green leaves. I lifted the plant out into the light and saw another card flutter down to the countertop. I set the plant down and flipped the cream-colored card over to read the message.
    Violets are blue.
    I looked between the card and the plant, assuming that they were violets.
    “Well, these are actually kind of purple.” I flipped the card between my fingers and searched through the box for anything else. Empty. I reached out for my phone and dialed one of the numbers that I had on my speed dial. A sleepy voice answered.
    “What?”
    “I got another box.”
    I heard the creak of her bed as Incarra rolled over.
    “Box? You woke me to tell me you got a box?”
    “It’s almost lunch time, lazy bones. I thought you had classes today?”
    “Evening classes. What box?”
    “A box with flowers in.”
    “What?” she asked, screaming excitedly. I now had her attention. “What was in it? Was there another card? A name? A self-addressed envelope?”
    I laughed.
    “Nothing like that. It’s a pot of African Violets, I think. The card simply follows the next part of the rhyme.”
    “Violets are blue?”
    “Yeah,” I said leaning against the counter and reaching out to sip my coffee. “Which is silly, because they aren’t blue, they’re violet.”
    Incarra tsked me. “You’re getting flowers from a mysterious party and you’re complaining about accuracy in color spectrums?”
    I switched the phone to the other ear and headed to flop down on the couch. “I’m not sure that’s a good thing, considering that my first phone call this morning was heavy breathing. It could be a very clever way to kill me, if I keep tripping over the damn boxes.”
    “Do people try to kill you a lot?”
    “More often than I like.”
    “I’m not sure I really wanted to know that.”
    “Sorry,” I said, giving a gentle shrug, then realized I was being silly; she wasn’t in the room with me and couldn’t