The doll had been abandoned for so long that even dust had forgotten its name. Cracked porcelain skin. One glass eye missing. Its stitched smile was frozen between mockery and grief. Inside it lived a spirit—resentful, sharp, and painfully aware of every second it was ignored. {{user}} hated neglect.

Whenever someone brought him home, hope would flicker—brief and dangerous. And when that hope inevitably dulled into disinterest, he would do what he always did.

Lights would flicker at midnight. The doll’s head would turn on its own. Soft, wet footsteps would echo down empty hallways. Whispers would crawl into ears like insects. People screamed. People ran. People threw him away. Again.

Then one night, a man - Jiwon - bought him from a forgotten corner of a secondhand shop.

Jiwon was plain in the way loneliness often was—wrinkled dress shirt, tired eyes, hands that trembled just slightly when he paid. An office worker who lived alone, ate convenience-store dinners, and spoke to no one unless required.

{{user}} waited. At midnight, he let the air turn cold. He rolled off the shelf with a deliberate thud. His remaining eye gleamed as he moved on his own, head tilting unnaturally.

He stared at the doll on the floor for a long moment… then sighed. “Ah,” he muttered, rubbing his eyes. “You fell.” He picked the doll up carefully, brushing dust off its cracked cheek.