ReaderxCursed Doll! England-- I'll Help You Pt 5

The next morning, you woke up and immediately went to find Arthur. You found him, back to his doll form, lying in a puddle on the floor. You were surprised to find that the clothes you bought for him shrank down to a dolls size and were still on him, even his shoes shrunk down to fit on his stubby little feet.

On the counter by the sink there was note, written in elegant calligraphy, sitting on top of a pile of spotless dishes.

Dear _______,
It took me quite some time, but I finally managed to figure out how the water pump in your kitchen worked. I really must say, the modern world is a mysterious place indeed! The marvels that you have never cease to astound me! By the way, I do apologize for the mess I've made with the water. The pressure of the water was more powerful than I anticipated and it splashed everywhere!

Also, I hope it's alright, but I used some of that soap stuff you keep by the water trough on the dishes. I don't really know what it is but, according to the bottle at least, it's supposed to help clean the dishes better. I don't really know how it works, but when I used a towel and scrubbed the stains on the dishes it came off easily. Just another miracle of modern science I suppose. I wish we had it back in my day!
I'll se


The note cut off there. You looked at the floor and saw a pen by Arthur's tiny little hand, meaning that he had written the note just minutes before sunrise. He had spent his entire night cleaning up after your dinner. You read the note again and smiled at how amazed he was at the things you took for granted, like running water and soap. He was like a little kid, just discovering how the world worked. You looked at each of the dishes and saw that he really put a lot of effort in to make them look like new. You also saw, from the nearly empty soap bottle by the sink, that he used WAY too much soap. You'd have to explain how it works later on.

You lifted Arthur out of the puddle on the floor and sat him in the sun to dry. You dried up the floor with the mop before you went to shower and change.

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In the time following that day, you had taken it upon yourself to modernize Arthur. You showed him how the sink worked, you introduced him to television (apparently he thought that it was a strange sort of magic mirror until you explained it to him), you showed him how electricity worked, you took him for a ride in a car (where he freaked out because you drove three times faster than a horse ran), and sometimes you just showed him little things like modern toys and trinkets or modern music (which he really didn't like, claiming that it sounded more like someone dragging their nails across a chalkboard). And everything you showed him, from little things to big, he hung on your every word, listening intently. He acted like you were telling the most interesting story that's ever been written.

But every moment of everyday you still had that story lingering in your mind. You knew you had heard that story before, but where could you have heard it? Whenever you heard it, it was a long time ago, but that's all you knew.

Still, even with mysteries surrounding him, you found yourself falling for your naïve housemate. In your head it seemed ridiculous and even foolish to have such feelings for a toy, but you heart told you that it was the most logical thing in the world. Meanwhile, your mouth said to keep your yap shut about it. You loved Arthur, you knew it, but you didn't want to put him in an awkward situation. After all, he was cursed because his supposed 'lover' left him two hundred years ago! How could he trust anyone with his heart again?

One day, a good five months after you had met Arthur, you were digging through some things in your attic, clearing out the old junk. Arthur meanwhile sat in your living room as a toy, waiting for midnight when the two of you could be together again. As you were digging, you came across an old box of books. You opened it and began going through the dusty works of literature. You began thinking that you should introduce Arthur to modern writing. He might enjoy a good book, since television hasn't really interested him at all. You took the whole box downstairs to your bedroom and began sorting through which you thought he would like.

You had put aside "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", "The Five People You Meet in Heaven", "Their Eyes Were Watching God", "Pippy Longstocking", the entire Harry Potter series and the Series of Unfortunate Events, and several others. You found books in this box that you haven't read since you were a little girl! You came across a book of fairy tales that your grandmother used to read to you. You opened it to the table of contents and looked through the stories to read; 'Cinderella', 'Hansel and Gretel', 'The Coat of Many Colors', 'Snow White and Rose Red', 'Jack and the Beanstalk', 'One Grain of Rice', 'Rapunzel', 'Little Red Riding Hood', 'The Cursed Doll', 'The Wise Little Hen'…Wait, 'The Cursed Doll'?!

You immediately flipped open to the page where the story began and started reading excitedly.

The story told of a man and his wife who lived in a small town in a land far away. The man's wife, who was small and frail, became very, very sick. To keep her from dying, the man went to a witch who gave him a potion, saying that it would cure his wife of her sickness and of all sickness for the rest of her life, but that if she did not love him, the husband would pay the price.

Believing that his wife loved him true, he accepted the terms of the magic and gave his wife the potion. She was cured and they were happy. But then, while the husband was away at his work, the wife was secretly being courted by a handsome, rich young man. The two agreed to be married and to run away together to a different country. When the husband returned home, the wife bid him farewell and left him.

As soon as she was gone, the husband had turned into a doll. He was found by a little girl, who loved him instantly. She took him home and intended to keep him. But then, in the light of the midnight moon, the doll transformed back into a human. The girl, terrified, gave the doll to her friend. The friend, upon discovering the doll's curse, gave it to another friend, from that friend to another and another and another.

You realized that you truly had heard the story before; from this book! You kept reading, trying to discover a cure, a way to lift his curse.

Apparently, the doll was eventually given to a young woman who had lost her husband due to illness. She did not fear the cursed man, but instead came to love him and the man came to love her back. One night, the two kissed and the man's curse was broken…

So the cure to Arthur's curse, as the book put it, was "the kiss of two lovers". The only way Arthur could be cured was to kiss someone he loves and to have someone who loves him kiss him back. Maybe you could break his curse after all!

But, wait…he would have to love you too…What if he did love you? Then he could kiss you and break the curse and the two of you could live happily ever after! But, then again, what if he didn't…then you'd likely lose him. Or worse, what if you tell him and he only says he loves you so he can break the curse and then he leaves you as soon as he doesn't need you anymore? What if he really did know how to break the curse all along and he was only pretending this whole time?

"There you are _______!"

You practically jumped out of your skin and slammed the book shut when you heard Arthur's voice.  You glanced at the clock; 12:01 A.M. You had failed to notice how late it had gotten.

"I was a little surprised when I transformed and saw that you weren't waiting for me like you usually do. What are you reading?" he tried to glance at the book in your hands.

"O-oh! I-I was just paging through some old books I found." You replied nervously, hiding the book as best as you could "I-I thought you might like to, you know, look at some modern literature."

"Splendid idea, love! I do enjoy a good book! What was that you were just reading? You seemed really captured by it."

"O-oh, t-this old thing? I-it wouldn't interest you, it actually written poorly even by today's standards."

"Are you sure? It really seemed to have captivated all your senses."

"N-no! I mean, it didn't do anything of the sort! You just…caught me off guard is all! I was just so preoccupied with finding stuff for you to read that I lost track of time!"

You shoved the book into the old box as deep as you could and kept Arthur distracted with the other books you had picked out. But inside, you were having a battle with yourself over what to do; should you tell him how to break his curse, or wait and hope he falls for you so he can break it on his own?