All I Need: Ian & Annie

by Callie Harper

  I'd only tried going down on a guy once before. Geoffrey had asked me, using a slightly frustrated tone. We've been together for three months, he’d informed me, as if I'd missed my cue. When I’d taken him in my mouth, he hadn't been completely hard, and it had felt wrong, like trying to suck on something squishy or fluffy, not at all erotic. I’d felt so self-conscious, and his reprimands hadn't exactly put me in the mood. “What are you doing down there?” he’d asked. There was one easy way to answer that question. I'd stopped going down there. Come to think of it, he'd broken up with me not long after.

  Everything from start to finish had been completely opposite with Ian. I couldn't wait to do it all over again soon. But today, I had to head back to my family's house. It was my day off, and my mum needed help.

  Reluctantly, Ian and I said our goodbyes. It was raining hard outside, reflecting my mood. The train ride seemed to take forever.

  Back at the house, everything was a mess. It looked like no one had picked up, no one had done laundry, no one had even touched the dishes for days. Mum had a bad cold, and it seemed as if neither Jess nor Liv had raised a finger to help.

  While I was standing over the sink, scrubbing furiously, Jess had the nerve to try to give me a guilt trip. “It's so hard with you gone,” she sighed. “None of my friends have to deal with everything I have to. They get to go out and have fun, while I'm supposed to stay in and do all the dirty work.”

  I threw the sponge into the sink and turned around, hand on my hip. “Dirty work? Are you complaining to me about doing dirty work? What do you think I've been doing for the last 10 years?”

  “All I'm saying is I've had to pick up all the slack with you gone. And it's not fair.”

  “First of all, from what I see around here you're not picking up much slack. And second, who said life was fair? Do you think it's fair that I've had to stay here and take care of all of you? Do you think it's fair that my one day a week off I come here and clean up after all of you?”

  Mum appeared in the doorway, bags under her eyes, a worn housecoat tied around her pajamas. “Please don't fight,” she pleaded. “I have such a headache. And we never get to see you anymore, Annie. Let's try to be nice to each other.”

  I bit back my response. I didn’t say that they never got to see me anymore because I was off trying to make some money because that was the only way I was ever going to escape this trap. I felt tears burning at my eyes, but I kept quiet.

  Liv walked into the house, earbuds in and listening to music on her phone.

  “Where’s Brian?” Mum asked. Liv didn't hear, she just tried to push past her in the doorway. Mum reached out and pulled an earbud out of her ear.

  Liv acted like she'd been physically assaulted. “Mum!” she shrieked.

  “Where is your brother?”

  “I don't know,” Liv replied, indignant. Until she remembered. “Oh, right, you told me to get him at the library.”

  “Jesus, is Brian at the library without anyone?”

  “I'll get him.” Resigned to my fate, I grabbed the car keys and headed out the door before anyone could stop me. Not that anyone tried. They were used to me doing what needed to be done, cleaning up everyone else's mess. I'd trained them to rely on me far too well.

  Thank goodness we lived in a small town. Brian was behind the main desk with the librarian, greeting everyone who came into the library like it was his job. Mrs. Watson had known him since he was a baby, and didn't think twice about keeping an eye on him until someone came to pick him up.

  “Annie!” Brian tried to climb over the desk, he was so excited when he saw me.

  “Hey, Bri. Go around the desk.” I made my way around and he did as well, throwing his big arms around me. “When did you get taller than me?” I asked him, ruffling his hair. He just kept hugging me. Looking over at Mrs. Watson, I said, “thank you.”

  “Not to worry, dear.” She went back to sorting books.

  We drove home, and I got right back to it, washing and folding laundry, vacuuming, and cleaning the bathrooms. I kept quiet, not wanting to stir up more trouble for my mother. But inside, I was making a resolution. I hadn't minded putting my life on hold while all my siblings had been young. But now? I needed to get on with it. I was 25, and it was time to start leading my own life.

  Around nine, I decided I'd take the last train back to Ian's that night. I usually slept over with my family on Sunday nights, fixing everyone breakfast the next morning and helping them get off to school. But not this time. Tonight, I wanted to get back to Ian. I couldn't wait to be in his arms again.

  My mother had already fallen asleep, out cold with medication. I wrote her a note, letting her know I'd headed back, telling her I hoped she'd feel better soon. I knew she hadn't wanted me to sublimate my own hopes and dreams to raise my younger siblings. Yet it had worked out that way, nonetheless. I didn't resent her, but I did need to assert myself more.

  Heading back, I grew more and more excited. I'd never had this kind of a connection with anyone. Ian and I were still at the start of discovering each other, so much still to experience and learn together. But I felt a deep conviction that there was something remarkable there between us. He seemed to feel the same way. He looked at me as if I were a marvel. He touched me as if he were worshiping my body, making me feel like the most gorgeous woman in the world. He laughed like he thought I was funny. He asked me questions like he thought I was smart and interesting. He framed my art as if I were a true talent. He made me feel so good about myself.

  Until he didn't. When I got back to the estate, climbing out of a taxi and entering in through the giant front doors, the whole place was dark. Had he gone to bed early? I poured myself a glass of water in the kitchen, and then I heard a sound from the library. Maybe he was still up?

  Heading in, I found Ian stretched out on the couch, an empty bottle of scotch lying on the floor, another bottle in his hand.

  “S'you,” he slurred, barely tilting his head up with glassy eyes. Shit. He was drunk. “Mary Poppins.” He lifted the bottle and took a long swig, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

  I noticed a dark reddish smudge at his hairline. Over by his side, I realized it was dried blood. “Ian, are you hurt?” I reached out to try to touch his forehead, but he pushed my hand away.

  “Am I hurt?” He mocked my question, snickering. “What do you bloody, fucking think?” He gestured down to his legs.

  I pulled back. He sounded so bitter. Looking down, I noticed his jeans looked muddy. One of the knees had a hole in it. “Are you okay?” I tried again.

  He laughed. “You're a riot.” He drank another glug. “No, Mary, I'm not okay.” Gesturing at his crotch, he asked “D’you want to make me feel better?”

  Way to make a girl feel good. I recoiled, barely recognizing him compared to the man I'd said goodbye to that morning. Struggling, he worked himself up to sitting on the couch. Now I could see that his sleeve was torn and bloody, too.

  “Ian, what happened to you?”

  “Took a walk.” He held up his hand, waggling a finger at me. “You're the one who gave me the idea.” He began using a fake cheerleader’s voice, making fun of me. “You can do it! Go Ian!”

  “What do you mean?” I felt sick to my stomach

  “I went out. Took a walk in the rain. Rocks are slippery when they're wet.” He took another long sip from the bottle. “Took a bit of a fall.”

  “Ian.” I felt a tear slide down my cheek and I tried to wipe it before he saw, but I wasn't quick enough.

  “Don't give me your pity,” he spat out. “I didn't even want you here in the first place. The only reason I let you take this job was so I wouldn't lose my inheritance. What do you have to say to that?”

  I had nothing to say to that, that's what. I felt like I'd been kicked in the gut. But there was blood at his temple. I couldn’t stop worrying about him. “Ian, do you need to see a doctor?”

  He let out a sharp bark of a laugh. “Yeah, that'
s what I need. More doctors.”

  “But if you're bleeding from your head, maybe you're seriously injured?”

  “I'm seriously fucked up, I know that.”

  “Please—”

  “Give it a fucking rest, lady. Is your mother like this, too? Is this how she drove away your father? Harping on him all the time?”

  “What did you just say?” My back went ramrod-straight. I couldn’t believe what I’d just heard.

  “You heard me,” he mumbled, though he didn't repeat it. He took a swig of his scotch.

  “Did you ask how my mother drove away my father?” He just looked at me through bleary eyes. Choking back tears, I explained what had really happened. “My father died of lung cancer when he was 48. So you can fuck off.”

  He looked down. “I didn't know.”

  I was shaking now, filled with rage and pain. “I don't like talking about it. I try not to even think about it, it was so awful. But if you weren't an asshole, you might have asked me about my dad. Have you ever noticed that I wear his sweaters all the time?”

  “I just thought you liked dressing like you were homeless.”

  So now he was insulting me on top of everything else? “You are such a fucking baby,” I yelled. “You have no idea what I've been through. You’ve never taken care of anyone but yourself. And you don't even do that well.”

  “You're so good at telling me to get up off my ass,” he sneered, his voice venomous. “But you never do it yourself. You're too scared to do what you really want. You’re good at lecturing me and trying to make me feel like a failure, but you're not exactly off following your dreams."

  Tears streamed down my face and I bit my fist, so angry and hurt all at once. I wanted to scream, throw his bottle of scotch into the fireplace, burn the house down with my fury. But that wouldn't do any good.

  He wouldn't change. He'd sober up tomorrow and apologize, but it would only be a matter of time until he had a bad day and this happened all over again. I knew what I had to do. I had to get off the roller coaster. It made me sick and sad, but since when had life ever been easy?

  “Goodbye, Ian,” I informed him. “I'm quitting.”

  “Suit yourself,” he growled. When I didn’t move immediately, he shooed me away. “If you're going to go, then why are you still standing around bothering me? Go!”

  I spun around and left the room. There wasn't much to pack in my bedroom, and I had it all stuffed into my suitcase within minutes. I'd left my family home not two hours ago with the intent of making a break from all the dysfunction. Now it looked like I'd be plunging myself straight back in in no time at all.

  The next train didn't leave until six the next morning, so I spent a sleepless night pacing in the bedroom. Broken-hearted, wounded, I forced myself to take stock. I could blame Ian, blame my mother, find fault with my sisters, but I needed to take a real look at what I'd done to get myself where I stood today. I couldn’t take the easy way out and wallow in self-pity. I needed to figure out where I’d gone so wrong so I could make some serious changes.

  I would head back to my mother's house on the first train, but this time the house would be a way station, not my final destination. I didn't know what I'd do next, but I knew it had to be something different. The choices I'd made up to now had not served me well. It was time to turn my back on the past, and start living my life.

  Just before sunrise, I walked downstairs, not at all surprised to see no sign of Ian. He would probably sleep until noon, then awaken, rubbing his eyes and not quite remembering what had happened the night before. I wouldn't leave him a note. I'd let him fit the puzzle pieces together himself. Perhaps he'd never remember exactly why I quit. It didn't matter either way.

  Out into the start of the early morning light, I made myself a promise. Beginning right then, I wouldn’t accept compromise. I deserved more out of life, and I was going to go get it.

  14

  Ian

  The day Annie left, I barely got out of bed. My memories of the night before were foggy, at best. She hadn't written a note saying she was leaving, yet I could tell. It was as if there was a finality to the quiet emptiness of the house. I knew without looking that she’d cleaned out her belongings. I wouldn't see her out in the gardens anymore. She wouldn't come bustling in the front door with groceries, or fight with curtains in the living room. She was gone for good.

  I felt too shitty to care. Dimly, I was aware that at some point I would, but right then everything hurt. I'd taken a bad fall and managed to smash my knee, bang my elbow and whack my head. Who would have guessed I could do myself so much harm in such a short period of time?

  Sunday morning, it has been raining hard when Annie had left. It wasn’t a day to attempt a walk outside, but the day had dragged on and I felt restless. Over the past month I'd been working out steadily, building both my upper and lower body strength, and I was starting to see results. At least I thought I was.

  I'd clearly overestimated my abilities. Feeling sturdy and sure on a treadmill with sidebars to keep me steady and support my weight was a far cry from walking outside on uneven, slick rocks. I’d meant to simply follow a path around the house, using my cane. I only ventured out to the lookout point because the ocean had looked so tumultuous, churning and gray in the storm. Stepping too close to the crumbling edge, lost in the ruthless view, I’d lost my balance. My cane slipped and I went down hard. I was lucky I didn't break my wrist or shatter my elbow.

  With no one around, and no phone on me because I'd headed out without it like an overly-confident idiot, I'd lain there on the rocks in the pouring rain for a while. Cursing a steady blue streak, I'd blasted the rain, the slippery rocks, my faulty cane. I'd cursed all of the doctors over the years who'd said that they could help me.

  I'd cursed Annie for inspiring me to try. Before she came into my life, nothing could have induced me to head out for a walk in the heavy rain. Back a few months, I wouldn't have found myself lying out there injured in the mud. I might have still been asleep. If I had been awake, at that time of day I would have been enjoying a mug of coffee, maybe doing a crossword.

  But there I was, alone, bleeding, helpless. That's what I got for reaching too high. Icarus had tried it, flying up toward the sun with his wax wings. Heat had melted them when he got too close and sent him plummeting to the earth. I'd let myself catch some of Annie's optimism. Like a disease, her pep talks had infected me, pumping me full of false hope. Look at where that got me.

  Most of all, lying there in the mud, I'd cursed myself. What kind of an idiot was I, heading out for an exercise walk in the pouring rain without a cell phone? Had I thought my 40-minute daily exercise routine had somehow cured me? There was no cure. I’d forgotten that.

  It was because of all the time with Annie. She made me forget myself. But lying wounded in the mud, I remembered.

  I’d managed to drag myself, slowly and painstakingly, crawling on my belly like a rat back to the house. Struggling to the kitchen, I’d downed a fistful of the remaining painkillers Annie hadn’t thrown out, managed to wash my face, hands and bloody elbow, and changed my shirt before the narcotics started kicking in. Once the welcome numbness began creeping over me, I grabbed a couple of bottles and made it into the library to stretch out on the couch. If I’d had my way, I never would have gotten up from it again.

  Annie found me there, hours later. I hadn't expected her until the next morning. I couldn't remember much from our interaction. What I did remember seemed like a nightmare. Images came back to me of her face stained with tears. I remembered calling her Mary Poppins. Worst of all, I remembered why she wore those hideous sweaters.

  Her father had died of cancer. That I remembered clearly, her yelling at me, asking hadn't I wondered why she wore those sweaters? The details were foggy, but I was pretty sure I'd continued to insult her. I was pretty sure I’d pulled off the ultimate trifecta, insulting her mother, her, and her late father all in one drunken blast.

  Picturing her in
those hideous jumpers, too old and big, I felt as low as gum on the bottom of a shoe. Still, indignant, sulky protests popped into my mind. Why had she never even mentioned her father before? How was I supposed to know?

  But even as I tried to find her at fault, I couldn't quite do it. She'd told me that losing her father was too painful to talk about. I, of all people, should understand that some subjects weren't fun to discuss. No, it was on me that I’d made assumptions about her single mom and her family situation. I was the one who’d fucked up.

  I felt physically awful the day after she left. Two days after, the mental anguish overtook the physical. By some stroke of luck, my injuries were minor. The scrapes and bruises would heal. The damage I had done to my relationship with Annie would not.

  She was gone for good. I had lost the best thing that had ever come into my life, and I had no one but myself to blame.

  The thing that most frustrated me about depression was the clichés. Deep in the midst of pain, tormented and ripped apart by the demons in my own mind, I was still self-aware enough to realize there was nothing special about my situation. Songs had been written about it. You don't know what you've got ‘til it's gone.

  My despair and self-loathing left me at the end of the road. I could turn hard left or right, but continuing on as I had been over the past couple of months was no longer an option. Annie was gone, and with her the reawakened hope she'd fostered in me. The small steps I was beginning to take both literally and figuratively, working out, cleaning house, cutting back on the booze and pills? That wasn't going to work anymore. Either direction I chose, it would have to be a dramatic change.

  I could man-up and pick the uphill battle, fighting with all I was worth to get my life back on track. I could explore every option available to restore and improve my physical health. Taking stock of where I was at and what I wanted to achieve in life, I could start going after it like an attack dog.