The Haunted Doll, Monica T. S. Flores

The Haunted Doll

Monica T. S. Flores

The Haunted Doll

Our mom was a sewer and quilter, and often created patchwork quilts, embroidered cloth, and lap blankets while we were growing up.

She must have liked something about the sentiment of the Amish and their quilts and their measured, quiet ways–this must have been attractive to her in contrast to our loud, chaotic family, with music practice going on every afternoon, and swim practice, bowling practice, piano recitals, CCD, all of the demands of three children and regular neighbor playmates running up and down the halls, or into the street.

The Haunted Doll

She sewed a doll for me and my sister that had a fluffy elongated head with sewed-on eyes. It had a thin floppy body, and outsized arms and legs, made of colorful blues, and greens, and reds, all from quilt and clothing scraps.

We were living in Florida at the time, and my sister and I shared a room. We kept the doll in the box on the shelf attached to our bunk beds, in our shared room at the end of the hall.

I swear to God Almighty one night we heard knocking in the box, and my sister and I didn’t know what to do. It was late at night, past bedtime, and both of us were trying to go to sleep, and we heard a rapping sound, so I asked my sister if she heard it, and she said she did.

The Haunted Doll

I jumped out of bed and turned on the light and we looked at each other. She would sleep on the top bunk and I was on the bottom, so we both frowned at each other and then looked towards the shelf, and heard a knockknock from inside the box.

We were trying to think if it could be anything else, like perhaps a beetle clicking? Or a wind-up toy?

Or one of those Florida lizards that would expand its miniature lungs and make rasping sounds on the patio?

The Haunted Doll

I didn’t think so and she didn’t either. It was definitely the doll. It was knocking to be let out of the box, but neither of us were willing to open it to see. Both of us said “nope” and ignored it, and kept the box closed.

I don’t know what we did next, we just left it there, probably, or threw the doll and the box in the garbage the next day without opening it, because even though our mom put a lot of time and effort into it, we didn’t think it was worth looking inside because what if an evil spirit had possessed the doll, or what if it was a demon, or a ghost, or some other supernatural scary thing that wanted to be let out and into our world?

The Haunted Doll

We figured we would ignore it, leave it alone and go to sleep. We just left the light on the rest of the night, and we didn’t hear knocking again. I don’t have any lessons to learn from this, as we have no idea what it was, and we didn’t discuss it further.

Decades later, our cousin Gerard posted a “haunted doll” video on Facebook, and we both commented on it about this particular doll, but the agreement was to nope on out of there, and the original poster deleted that video.

If the doll was haunted, what did it want?

What could any creature from the other side possibly want from an immigrant Filipino family in south Florida?

The Haunted Doll

We wouldn’t be able to do anyone’s bidding, we were far too preoccupied with school and church and family requirements.

My sister played violin, and the toddler was a constant bundle of activity. The toddler, our bunso youngest, must have been three, so my middle sister must have been eight at the time, so I would have been thirteen at the time.

This was a wholly inexplicable and unique event and will most likely remain so.

The Haunted Doll

Late at night though, if I’m scrolling, sometimes I see videos of the real-life “Raggedy Ann” in the Warren Occult Museum or Okiku at Mannenji Temple in Hokkaido, whose hair is continuing to “grow,” or Robert the doll that skitters and can be seen in the top floor windows of an old house, I’ll get heebie-jeebies again.

I’m afraid, natatakot ako.

“It’s just CG, why’re you

scared?” quizzed a friend who is much more hard-nosed and clear-eyed than

me.

The Haunted Doll

I suppose the videos can indeed be computergenerated.

It

was a haunted doll.

But I know what we heard in the eighties in Palm Gables in our back bedroom on the corner of 91st Street and Shadow Wood Boulevard. Some spirit, or being, or thing crawled in and remained seated in an empty shell of a doll that our mom made with her own hands, that we stored in a cardboard box.

The Haunted Doll

Then one night, it knocked, to get our attention, to try and get out.

All rights reserved. Monica T. S. Flores February 2026. It wanted to knock, to say hello, but we kept its door closed that night, and never let it see the light of day.

-The End