House of Dolls Read online

  And, last of all, Madison Blackberry went into her underwear drawer and took out the matchbox she had hidden there. Do you know what was in that matchbox? The thing that Miss Selene missed but had forgotten because it was too painful to remember.

  Madison Blackberry brought back all of the doll clothes from the rose-covered hatbox and put them into the wardrobe and the drawers. Then she dusted off Guy and B. Friend and put them in the dollhouse where they belonged.

  Wildflower brushed her arm up against Guy’s arm. Her whole body tingled as if she were made of flesh and not celluloid, or at least that was what she imagined flesh tingled like. It did not matter that he was a much newer doll than she was, a younger soul with darker skin and army fatigues.

  “What was war like?” Wildflower asked.

  And Guy whispered, “War is being blinded and locked in a box, unable to see, hear, or touch you, my wildflower. War is being reminded that you are completely at the mercy of death at every moment, without the illusion that you are not. Without the distractions that make life worth living.”

  Rockstar dressed B. Friend’s wounds with tiny cotton balls dipped in water and tiny cut-up Band-Aid strips that Madison Blackberry had given her. Then Rockstar read to him from the books she had discovered.

  He said, “You have changed.”

  And she said, “I wanted to change. It’s all I could do.”

  “I’ve changed, too,” said B. Friend. “I can’t touch the hollow of your back when we dance. I can’t be of much help in the kitchen. If I lie next to you in the canopy bed, I can’t touch your arm with my arm because it isn’t there.”

  “You can rest beside me, though,” Rockstar said. And when Madison Blackberry put them into the canopy bed that night, side by side, staring up at the dark ceiling, that’s exactly what they did.

  As for Miss Selene: Madison Blackberry put Miss Selene’s long-lost baby gently back into her arms, rather than in the cradle beside the wrought-iron bed, because Madison Blackberry had always wished she could have slept like that with her mother, and Miss Selene and her baby lay together every night, wearing the matching lace nightgowns Grandmother had made for them.

  That night, as if she knew, as if she had heard the secret voices of dolls, or the unspoken wish of her daughter, Madison Blackberry’s mother came into Madison’s room. She was not dressed for a party but wore blue jeans and a cotton T-shirt and there was no makeup on her face.

  “I decided to stay home with you and Dallas George and your father tonight,” she said. “Would you like me to read to you?”

  Madison Blackberry nodded and then her mother sat on her bed with her arm around Madison and read to her from a little, worn, red-and-white book called The Doll’s House, a book that had belonged to Madison’s mother when she was a girl.

  Madison’s father was not away on a business trip that night. He had been home watching the news. He came into the room as Madison was falling asleep. He stood in the doorway, a tall shadow surrounded by light from the hall. Madison and her mother looked up at him. Then Madison’s father spoke. His voice was soft with tears, almost unrecognizable.

  “The war is over, my loves,” he said.

  Madison saw him through her half-closed eyes. She knew he was right; it was.

  About the Author and the Illustrator

  FRANCESCA LIA BLOCK, winner of the prestigious Margaret A. Edwards Award, is the author of many acclaimed and bestselling books, including WEETZIE BAT, DANGEROUS ANGELS: The Weetzie Bat Books, the collection of stories BLOOD ROSES, the poetry collection HOW TO (UN)CAGE A GIRL, and the novels THE WATERS & THE WILD and PRETTY DEAD. Her work is published around the world. You can visit her online at www.francescaliablock.com.

  BARBARA MCCLINTOCK has written and illustrated many acclaimed books for young readers, including ADÈLE & SIMON, DAHLIA, and MOLLY AND THE MAGIC WISHBONE. She is also the illustrator of many more, including Jim Aylesworth’s retellings of THE TALE OF TRICKY FOX and THE GINGERBREAD MAN. She lives in Windham, Connecticut.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.

  ALSO BY FRANCESCA LIA BLOCK:

  Weetzie Bat

  Missing Angel Juan

  Girl Goddess #9: Nine Stories

  The Hanged Man

  Dangerous Angels: The Weetzie Bat Books

  I Was a Teenage Fairy

  Violet and Claire

  The Rose and the Beast

  Echo

  Guarding the Moon

  Wasteland

  Goat Girls: Two Weetzie Bat Books

  Beautiful Boys: Two Weetzie Bat Books

  Necklace of Kisses

  Psyche in a Dress

  Blood Roses

  How to (Un)cage a Girl

  The Waters & the Wild

  Pretty Dead

  Credits

  Jacket art © 2010 by Barbara McClintock

  Jacket design by Torborg Davern

  Copyright

  HOUSE OF DOLLS. Text copyright © 2010 by Francesca Lia Block. Illustrations copyright © 2010 by Barbara McClintock. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Block, Francesca Lia.

  House of dolls / Francesca Lia Block; illustrated by Barbara McClintock.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Madison Blackberry’s dolls—Wildflower, Rockstar, and Miss Selene—have lives that she envies, with their beautiful clothes and warm, cozy house, while she is lonely most of the time.

  ISBN 978-0-06-113094-6

  [1. Dolls—Fiction. 2. Dollhouses—Fiction. 3. Loneliness—Fiction.] I. McClintock, Barbara, ill. II. Title.

  PZ7.B61945Ho 2010 2009020694

  [Fic]—dc22 CIP

  AC

  FIRST EDITION

  EPub Edition © April 2010 ISBN: 978-0-06-199736-5

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

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