Family portraits are crowded when you’re a Russian doll

She is hard on the outside. Some consider her ugly. Others are fascinated by her. Most are indifferent. This is okay. She doesn’t care. Nor do her multiple selves layered within. But if curiosity calls, watch her slowly open and pull her selves out. Chitter chat, once the gals are fat on crumpets and conversation, they hop back inside of one another and give the illusion of oneness—they are a family of sorts. In such close quarters irritations and affinities result, and so, the two in the middle have taken to recent squirmishes, disrupting the whole bunch. The smaller of the two was head-butting the larger from within. She’s a bit of a feisty one, often restless, itching to escape into the ‘real world’. Things seem to have calmed down, though the baby cries too much and annoys the second eldest who has no intention of playing mother. The foetus squirms a lot making sleep uncomfortable for everyone, and when the toddler wants to have fun, everyone knows to watch out. She is always trying to squeeze the baby, and one of the more mature girls – usually the cracked one – intervenes. The older middle one and the second eldest have taken to gabbing about the dreamer, who’s still relatively young, and hasn’t yet noticed the two going on about her. She’s off in her own layer, giggling about boys and butterflies. The cracked one, when out of the shell, is often asked why her wood is ruptured. She mumbles something about ‘hard times’, and every so often, her sensible exterior must remind her that time is history and everyone has a history. Occasionally, the exterior is lonely and wishes love would whisk her away. But her selves are handful enough, and who would take care of them if she were to leave?