Charlotte’s POV

The days passed, and the long nights continued but began to shorten again as January turned to February. It had been an uneventful month for the most part, with no breakthroughs made and our libraries exhausted, it seemed that every single avenue of questioning that we had gone down had turned out to be unfruitful.

And now, we had run out of paths to question. It looked like the answer to why I was what I was would remain unanswered.

That no longer bothered me that much, truth be told, I had never put much stock in Charlie's promise that he would find a way to reverse it. It sounded too good to be true, and the more pressing matter of his illness overtook any concerns of that happening.

One night, Charlie walked in, looking happier than usual. “Is there something special today?”

“Oh, you don’t know?”

“Ah, I don’t keep up with dates that much, I haven’t had to.”

“It’s Valentine’s Day!”

“Right, yes…” I said.

“You completely forgot, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” I admitted, there was little point in hiding it. But from his expression I was getting the feeling that he had something planned out for today, much like Halloween. “Alright, close your eyes!” He kept his hands over my face.

“Is this necessary?”

“Did I complain when you did it?”

“That was different!” When the two of us had started courting, I had a bit of a mischievous streak in me that I had to let out and I had taken to jumping out and trying to scare Charlie. I stopped doing that when he had accidentally landed a blow to my head once, but putting my hands over his eyes when he wasn’t expecting was one of my favorite things to do before then.

Of course, right now, I could not do something like that as it would make me feel guilty.

He led me downstairs, gently holding my hand as I descended the steps. “Here!” he said as he led me to the dining room - even blind, I could make my way around the house with ease.

The room was set up much like that time on Halloween, though with a different spirit of course. It was still dark, but the candles lighting the place up were different. I could make out the decorations, many of which matched the shade of my dress, hanging around.

“I-I really wish you wouldn’t go through so much trouble,” I said. “I don’t want you to overexert yourself.”

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“Lying all day on the sofa thinking about things isn’t going to make me better,” he said. I then realized there was something I hadn’t told him at all.

“I, I truly love it!” I said to him. I wanted him to know that I did appreciate what he had done. “But, remember what happened to your chest?”

“That bruise has already completely healed, you know,” he said.

“Still…”

We had something that he had made, and then he sighed. “Sorry, I would usually have something else planned, but I can’t really think of anything else to do while we’re both indoors at this time.”

“We don’t have to do something extravagant,” I said. “We could just go and drink lemonade while watching - what’s it called, right, Transformers together.”

That movie was nearly incomprehensible to me - I couldn’t even begin to fathom how I would try to explain it to someone like May if they were still alive. I didn’t understand half of it the first time that Charlie asked me to see it, but he was quite excited about it so I decided to play along the three times he had decided to watch it. That said, it seemed that he didn’t really enjoy it in the same way that you would enjoy something with artistic value, and more of that he enjoyed it like you might enjoy something like the circus. In other words, it was a spectacle, and one that made him happy. And I wanted to do something for him that made him happy as well.

“Sounds like a great time,” he said. “You still have room for lemonade though?”

“Half a can,” I told him.

We were about a third of the way into the movie, and before the part with the many explosions, while he was running his hand through my hair, when he stopped the movie.

“Hmm? Did something happen?” I asked him.

“I just… I think I realized something,” he said. He went to go somewhere with no more explanation than that and I was left scratching my head when he came back holding something in his hands.

It was the ‘doll’ I had found along with the book. “What about this?”

“I think I know what this is made of,” he said. “Hair. Human hair.”

I took a look at it. That certainly could be possible but, “If it’s been there for so long, wouldn’t the hair degrade?”

“You can put hair in preservatives that will stop it from biodegrading,” Charlie said. “And… maybe this sounds crazy, Charlotte, but…” He held it up near my head. “The color would’ve of course faded somewhat but…” He seemed to be hesitating to say what he wanted.

“What’s the matter?” I asked him.

“I think that this was made with your hair,” he said.

I took another look at it. Well, it was dark, and as I felt it again, I could accept that it was made of hair. “But… if someone cut my hair I would’ve known.”

“No, not as a doll,” he said. “What if that’s from when you were alive?”

“Eh?” I exclaimed. That seemed nearly impossible. “That was over a century ago!”

“We have hair that is perfectly preserved, from mummies and the like, going back several hundreds of years,” Charlie said.

“Why would someone do that?” I asked.

“What if it was involved in, y’know, making you?” he asked.

“I suppose so…” I said. “Anyway that we could confirm it?”

“I don’t have access to a private lab…” he said. “I guess I could figure it out if I had more time…”

Those words made me bolt up from where I was sitting.

“Why do you say that? Aren’t you getting better?”

“Yes, yes,” he said reassuringly. “I just meant with work going on and all I don’t have that much free time.”

“Of course,” I said. However, that comment left a nasty feeling in the bottom of my stomach. Charlie did seem to be getting better, but there was going to be another slew of tests coming up, and I could only hope that everything turned out to be fine.

I adjusted myself in his arms as he sat back down to watch the rest of the movie, trying to forget all of my worries and focus only on huge machines fighting each other. Perhaps that was why it was so popular? Because it felt like it could take you someplace far away…