Emma’s bathroom light sheds just enough glow over her bed, so that I can give her a kiss while she’s sleeping each night. This night I smoothed her hair before I crept quietly back into the bathroom and pulled her door closed behind me. I tidied up her toothbrush and hand towel and turned to flip the light switch when I spotted the feet sticking out from underneath the linen closet door. The feet were canted to the right and the naked legs were visible to just below the knee. They lay there unmoving, dead.
Even before I knelt down for a closer look I recognized the inert extremities. At a young age these same feet had permanently impacted my fashion sense. As a child I had seen the permanent deformity high heeled shoes had caused. The chronic crook at the base of the toes forced the back of her foot to remain a full centimeter off the ground when she was barefoot. To this day I only wear flats because of Barbie.
This night I kneeled in front of the linen closet door and took a closer look at the askew Barbie legs. I tried to envision the disaster that must have befallen the rest of the doll.
“Poor Barbie,” I thought, “She must have suffered a terrible insult. Her head may have been wrenched around backward or an upper limb torn from its plastic socket. Maybe one of Cabell’s sports cars flattened her or she was left on the tracks of the Brio train.”
Filled with trepidation about the horror I might find behind the linen closet door, I reached up and slowly turned the knob. I opened the door a crack and peered into the darkness. I followed the bare legs into the dimness and gasped as I viewed the source of Barbie’s troubles. Lying across Barbie’s hourglass waist was Cabell’s anatomically correct, proportionally precise, squirrel-sized African bull elephant.
“Oh, heavens,” I cried, “Squished by an elephant. She’ll never recover!”
I threw the large mammal aside and lifted Barbie into the light to evaluate the damage. I was incredulous. Not a hair on her fluffy blonde head was ruffled. Her make-up was unstained by even a single tear. Her lipstick remained smooth across her pearl white smile.
“Humph,” I groused, “And to think I worried even a minute about you.” I tossed her perfect body back into the closet and shut the door.
