By Gary Fincke

Five: Newborn Baby Doll

She’s finishing kindergarten, a big girl now, able, she insists, to take care of a realistic child. “This doll is lifelike, eighteen inches from head to toe,” her mother reads from the box. “This baby girl is soft, durable, and safe. Its perfectly weighted body is designed to feel just like a real baby.” She watches as her mother points out the eyelashes and the blushing on the hands and feet. “Look,” she says, moving the arms and legs. “Isn’t she adorable? Your other dolls are just dolls, but this one has veins. They will remind you to take care, that a child can easily cut and bruise.”

Six: Baby Laugh-a-Lot

Her mother decides to shop for her dolls only on vintage sites so she is sure to receive something special. “There’s more stress with a second child,” she says, “but this one is good-natured and easy to love.” As if it has been listening, the baby laughs as soon as the girl picks it up. Soon, she learns to hold it carefully. Almost any movement makes her laugh. Like it’s a sickness. She is afraid to tell her mother that this baby will grow up to be evil, that it sounds cruel, awful enough to be recalled from stores.

Seven: Reborn Baby Doll

Her sister, it isn’t, yet her mother selects the model featuring the optional beating heart and carries the baby home bundled as if sleet has begun to slant from a terrible sky. Bernadine, the girl whispers, my Bernadine, feeling its heart sound its code of dependence against her body. As soon as she kisses its face, she packs away her other dolls like winter clothes. One morning, when she presses Bernardine against her, she discovers no pulse. She presses her ear on the small chest and hears the silence inside the “keepsake box.” She gropes for the spring that frees its music. After a while of silence, she places her fingers upon her own wrist, listening to its small, demanding song.

Eight: Breast-Feeding Doll

The first night, after the girl closes her door, she repeats the package’s one large-print sentence: “Because you shouldn’t have to wait until you have breasts before you start breast-feeding.” Cuddling her child to her skinny chest, she examines herself in her mirror. She guides the small mouth to each nipple as if her promises will bloom.  At last, she lifts the flowered bra from the box and straps it on. Two of those flowers will welcome that baby to suck, its mouth fitted perfectly as a lesson. She loves her child’s hunger. It insists there are fierce secrets that mothers know. Lips and hands will want you.  Tongues and teeth.

Nine: Growing Up Skipper Doll

Excited, her mother says, “This one was hard to find, but it’s perfect. Skipper is an older sister to love. Someone to rely upon for advice.” When she twists her new sister’s arm, Skipper not only grows taller, but also develops breasts. Her two best friends are fascinated. Both of them have begun wearing training bras, but this year she is secretly horrified as they twist Skipper’s arms, the near future swelling as they laugh and coo as if this is the only change Skipper will experience.

Ten: Teen Talk Barbie   

“What special things will I say to you?” this Barbie asks at once. “Do you have a crush on anyone?” As if she knows what middle school is like in the halls, at lunch, on the bus. “Math class is hard!” Except she’s wrong about that. Math is fun. But what’s hard is “math class,” raising her hand to answer. Being the best until she needs to hide that as if Barbie has been right all along. When she looks at her face, she sees the secret is silence, keeping her expression vacant in class. As if she’s as bored as the other girls. As if she no longer understands even the simple task of finding the lowest common denominator.

Eleven: Midge and Baby

Barbie’s friend Midge is pregnant. “How old is Midge?” she wants to ask her mother. She stares at Midge’s belly and does not ask. When her mother leaves, she feels the shape of it. A week passes before she removes that belly to free the baby inside. Because her mother has no visible scars, the girl replaces the baby and closes the body, allowing Midge to indefinitely age.

Twelve: Her Look-Alike Doll

After her mother selects the photo most flattering to form its pliant face, the girl recognizes her infant self. She gazes at that familiar baby, mothering its small, resilient body. She believes she remembers a world without speech, how her beautiful head was carefully held for months. All night, as she sleeps with herself, she dreams of shrinking.  She asks to be photographed.  She asks again, and among those faces her mother shows, she looks for one that will fit the body she’s terrified to lose. One morning she crawls inside the closet where everything too small to wear is stored. She whimpers with her forgotten voice, stuffs two fingers into her mouth for comfort and sucks on those toys to keep from screaming.

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Gary Fincke‘s latest flash collection is The History of the Baker’s Dozen (Pelekinesis 2024). His newest book is After Arson: New and Selected Essays (Madville Press 2025). He is co-editor of the annual anthology Best Microfiction.