The boy's name didn't matter; as he had grown, he had lost it, like he had already lost so much. He got his second name when he had begun puberty, and the first ceased to exist, and that had been that.
Gole was a boy who was rapidly becoming a man, despite the fact that his mind was trapped in the misfortune of what his life had become. Misery had been a part of Gole's life since he was conceived. He was family-less, leading him to believe that whoever his family might have been, they were poverty-stricken. It was the most optimist view that he could take of the beginning of his life, for otherwise it would mean that he was never wanted and had been simply dumped.
To best describe Gole would not be unlike describing a barely decomposed skeleton. While the other children who had been taken in as workers in the doll shop grew into beautiful creatures, Gole's body grew in bizarre contortions, every growth spurt that carried him into adulthood gave his body more of a pinched, emaciated form, seemingly foregoing putting muscle or fat on his body in lieu of his height, which grew rapidly so that he seemed to have shot out of any chance clothing that he came across.
The one thing that Gole was prideful of was the asset that the two doll makers who worked in the boutique had wanted him for. His hair was the one thing that seemed to be worthy of awe, because his hair was used by the doll makers to create the beautiful little wigs for the shop's specialty bisque dolls.
Gole did not particularly hate or like the dolls that were made out of his hair, although he did loathe the cruel process that would take his filthy, unruly hair and have it fully cleaned and pliable to be woven into doll's hair.
The years passed as Gole grew, marked, to him, by however long his hair had grown. He was aware, vaguely, that he was rapidly becoming older than any of the other children, most of which had simply made their way out of their servitude to the doll shop by becoming married, finding another route by which to make money, or by simply running away. Gole was certain that for the most part, everybody who worked in the doll shop wished that he would do the same as the other children, as he had grown from a normal child and into a pale, bony, near-translucent being that worked in abnormal silence.
One day, while cleaning the doorway to the shop, a woman came into the shop, and was apparently surprised by the sight of Gole as she almost walked into him as he sat on his knees, scrubbing. After nearly tripping over him, she grabbed onto her chest, as though she were recovering from a terrible shock, and her face contorted into a mask of fear and horror as she saw Gole's sunken features as he looked up to her, panicked.
She screamed and tried to run out of the shop, with the only slightly younger owner of the shop following , nearly tripping over Gole as he tried to pursue her down the street.
The incident did not leave Gole, as one of the other children in the shop had overheard the exchange and had made a a point to tell the other children, one of which had found a knife and had carved, over his bedding area, "Gole". Later, Gole learned that what the child had tried to write was "Ghoul". The name stuck, and Gole found that couldn't have cared less about the loss of his old name.
The days passed, and Gole's hair grew to a length appropriate for cutting. One day, an order came in for perfectly black hair, and Gole was told that the old man who crafted the dolls was overworked, and that he needed Gole to do most of the work of making the doll, which included a firing process that took three firings through the entire process of the doll's creation.
He knew most of the process already by simply being around when either the old woman or the old man wnt through the process of creating the doll, but he was nevertheless taught the entire process of how to make the bisque dolls, from the first moldings to the final bit of painting.
The old man created the first making of the doll's body before leaving the doll to Gole's hands, meaning that Gole would have to stay up, alone, in the kiln room that night. Suffering from exhaustion, depression, and hunger, Gole nevertheless hauled the wood to the firing vessel.
As Gole was almost finished with carrying the wood, he began to feel the edges of sleep closing in on him, and he was startled awake when he dropped the wood on the ground, the sound of the hard wood clattering to the ground and dropping on his feet shocking him awake. He shook off the pain and picked the wood back up, looking forward to getting the kiln fired so that he could take a short nap while the doll fired for a little over an hour.
As Gole threw the last of the firewood into the small space where there fire would burn under the stout structure, he breathed a sigh of relief. He turned around and tried to remember where, in his sleepy stupor, he had placed the flint. As he looked around, he realized that he had not yet put the doll into the kiln. Gole shook his head, trying to clear off the veil of sleep that was wrapping itself around him. He was so certain that he already put the doll into the kiln.
He picked up the thing that would later become a doll and walked to the kiln, shoving the slab that covered the kiln over. As he turned to look over at the doll, he choked back a scream as he saw the vague stumps of what would later become its limbs begin to move on their own, like a blind thing trying to get a grasp of its senses.
Horrified, Gole dropped the doll into the kiln and pulled the lid of the kiln back to cover the hole. Gasping, Gole dragged a hand through his filthy hair and tried to think rationally. At that moment, he realized that the thing he wanted most to do would also be the best thing to do for himself. Fire up the kiln, turn whatever the thing was back into what it was supposed to be.
Gole tried to remember where he thought that he could have last lain down the flint, and as he took a panicked step backwards, he heard the small, scared voice that reverberated from the kiln, making Gole think, ludicrously, of a child speaking from the bottom of a water-filled well.
Where am I?... Gole, where are you?
Gole turned slowly to face the kiln, not believing what he was hearing. Was it possible that he had fallen asleep and was dreaming all of this? He could remember putting the fragile doll into the kiln, he was certain of that, as he tried to understand the implications of hearing the voice from inside of the kiln.
Goooooollle.... The voice seemed playful as it elongated his name, then immediately lost any pretense of playfulness as it turned into the voice of a frightened, crying girl. Please don't burn me, Gole, please join me in here or let me out. I promise I won't frighten you any more.
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