What once looked like a baby now spewed smoke, echoing a dreadful, strangled sound through the cramped alley.
Radoslava walked, filthy, bruised, one hand on her swollen stomach, the other clutching the squirming, twitchy thing in her arms.
The baby’s screams crashed amongst clicking gears and churning smoke. Everything here was twisted metal and shoveled coal, polluting the sky until the rain felt dirty.
And yet, in the rain hung the beacon she was looking for; a lantern adorning a back door, swinging in the storm, illuminating the infuriating CLOSED sign.
Radoslava forced her feet forward, slamming her hand on the rain-slicked door as hard as her frail body could.
“Help,” she called weakly, barely able to hear herself.
No answer came.
She balled her hand into a fist. “Help,” she called again, pounding thrice.
The baby screeched, oil dripping from its lips.
In a rage, Radoslava screamed and slammed her body against the door, finally calling out, “Pomoz mi!”
Only then did the store’s lights illuminate. Rapid footsteps catapulted closer, and the door swung open.
A man stood in the doorway, his eyes soft under his thick goggles, just like the day she had met him.
Meet my old boss, her husband had grumbled. He taught me Czech.
The dollmaker had looked at her with knowing, worried eyes then, but now the older man looked horrified, understandably so. Radoslava knew how she looked: pregnant belly swollen, hair matted and oily, a screeching bundle in her arms.
“Help,” she said softly, the words struggling from her trembling lips.
The dollmaker’s eyes flickered with pity, muttering something in English filled with rage.
He caught her teary gaze as he stretched out his hand. His elderly fingers shook. “Safe now,” he whispered.
Radoslava shifted back, fear eating her.
The dollmaker swallowed, extending his hand into the rain as he repeated, “Bezpe?ný.”
His pronunciation was terrible, and yet, it was so comforting.
Radoslava took his hand, and the baby stopped screaming once they were inside.
Radoslava’s eyes adjusted to the dim hallway, gazing upon shelves lined with animatronics and photographs.
All the photos were dusty, but one was perfectly polished– a teenage girl with braids, pimpled and smiling wide.
For a moment, the man paused, glancing at the portraits and smiling tight. “Daughter,” he explained. “She wanted to be a mother, too.”
The portrait’s eyes sawed into Radoslava’s soul as she snuck past them, trying to avoid their gaze. The man guided her by the arm, hands soft.
When they reached the workshop, the dollmaker held out his hands, silently offering to accept the twitching baby.
Radoslava gasped as she let go, feeling as if he was holding her heart in his hands, ready to crush, but he cradled the baby as if it was his own, setting it on the workbench and dutifully getting to work. He gestured for her to sit, focusing his goggles and opening the baby’s chest.
And then, the world was quiet—no screams, gears, steam, only the raindrops on the windows sheltering them from the storm.
Radoslava hadn’t heard this quiet since she was a girl and climbed onto her home’s red-tiled roofs. Up there, overlooking all of Czechia, the world was tranquil. But America’s metal roofs were too hot to climb. Even if she could, stuffy men on airships would stare at her the same way her husband did, like a disobedient child.
And yet, he didn’t always look at her that way. His eyes used to be soft, even if she was a broken Bohemian girl lost in the world of steam and gears. He was the one who bought the training baby, glancing at her budding stomach.
And so he loved her, so she let him yell and berate. And he would laugh at her, loud and cruel.
How silly she was to be attached to a training baby.
How silly she was to scream when he held it out the apartment window, telling her to get on her knees if she didn’t want him to break it.
How silly she was to say no.
The crack of that baby hitting the pavement rang in her horrified ears.
Suddenly, the dollmaker sighed, breaking Radoslava’s train of thought. “Why don’t I get you a new one?”
Radoslava stood, eyes misty as she overlooked the poor, broken baby. “No,” she cried. “No, no, ne?íkej mi, že jsem ji zlomil–”
The old man pulled his oil-stained hands away from the animatronic. “Slow,” he said.
Radoslava shook her head, words tangled in her native tongue. She pointed to the baby, still as death on the workbench, then back to her belly.
Her hands shook as she mimed rocking her own baby, then, with a cry, shoved them away, giving them to someone else—someone who wouldn’t break them.
Slowly, the dollmaker’s eyes widened, understanding. “Why?” he asked.
Radoslava gave him a skeptical look. “Jaká bych byla matka?” she asked, gesturing to her body. “Look,” she ordered.
Slowly, the man did.
His eyes traced her bruises, her swollen belly, her bare feet, her oily, wet hair. She must have looked as if she had crawled out of hell.
But then he glanced up, eyes warm. “Dear, you will be wonderful,” he said, repeating, “báje?né.”
Silence.
The words Radoslava understood, but not the meaning.
She was a broken girl married to a terrible man, and yet he looked at her as if she was perfect.
“Báje?né,” he repeated, insistent.
Slowly, a warmth in Radoslava’s chest bloomed sunlight on a spring day, like the taste of caramel and sound of birds.
Finally, an hour later, the baby clicked back to life and began to cry, the sound as sweet as roses. It fit perfectly in Radoslava’s arms, looking up at her with glassy eyes.
The dollmaker’s smile was warm and proud, and Radoslava’s was, too.
He was probably wrong about her.
But maybe, if he thought she could, she would be wonderful.
Maybe.
Isabel Lesher writes in between college, work, and theatre, trying her best to do what she loves more than anything when she can. Currently studying theatre at Western Oregon University, she dreams of a life of creativity both in writing and in theatre.
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