Annie's Room

by Amy Cross

  “Dad told Mom he's keeping the keys on him,” he replies. “He told her he doesn't trust her anymore.”

  “He said those exact words?”

  He nods.

  “Well...” Although I want to dismiss everything he's saying, I can see the genuine fear in his eyes, and even though I don't want to admit it, I really don't think my little brother is capable of pulling off such a convincing lie. He is, however, capable of putting two and two together and coming up with completely the wrong answer.

  “I heard scratches, too,” he continues.

  “Scratches?”

  “Like something scratching under the kitchen floor last night. Mom and Dad were in the front room, so I know it wasn't them.”

  “It must have been a mouse or something.”

  He stares at me, and I can tell he isn't convinced.

  “Don't worry about it,” I tell him, hoping to ease his concerns. “I'm sure everything's fine, Dad hasn't suddenly turned into this monster and even if he did, there's no way Mom would stand for any of it. Two people can't just change their whole personalities overnight. And a house like this is bound to have mice.”

  He continues to stare at me.

  “Wanna watch me struggle to get to the door?” I ask, hoping to cheer him up.

  He shrugs.

  Adjusting myself on the crutches, I get ready to traverse the couple of meters to the doorway. “This might not be pretty,” I point out, and then I wait for him to say something. “Then again,” I add, “when is anything I do pretty, right?” I wait for him to laugh, but he's just staring down at the floor. For my brother to miss an opportunity to make fun of me is unusual. Figuring I just have to get on with things, I take a deep breath, focus for a moment, and then put just the slightest amount of weight on my right leg, just enough to send a shudder of pain up through all the cracked bones.

  I let out a gasp of pain.

  Scott doesn't laugh this time.

  And then I shuffle forward, scratching the leg of my left crutch against the wooden floorboards and, in the process, producing a sound not unlike fingernails being drawn down a chalkboard.

  Scott winces and puts his hands over his ears.

  Glancing at the floor, I see with a hint of satisfaction that I've carved a faint line in the wood.

  “Well,” I mutter, feeling the sting of under-used muscles in my shoulders, “I guess I won't be able to sneak up on anyone with these.”

  After taking another deep breath, I shuffle forward again, and this time the scratching sound is even louder. Finally, almost unbelievably, I reach the doorway and lean against the frame for a moment, before peering around the edge and looking along the bare corridor. To my surprise, I find that nothing has changed since I was carried up to my room three days ago.

  “Huh,” I mutter, “I thought Mom and Dad were gonna start decorating this place.” I look back at Scott. “Are they starting downstairs instead?”

  He shakes his head.

  “Haven't they started at all?” I ask.

  He shakes his head again.

  “So what have they been doing?”

  “I don't know,” he replies, “just... Dad seems to be watching Mom a lot, like he wants to see what she's doing all the time. It's like he doesn't want her to be alone.”

  “Dad's way too laid-back to be like that,” I point out.

  He shrugs.

  “None of this sounds quite right,” I continue. “I haven't seen Dad today, but yesterday he seemed his usual, happy-go-lucky self. I mean, he was a little snappy when it got late, but that's understandable.”

  “Then Mom had that nightmare,” Scott points out.

  “Has she told you anything about it?”

  He shakes his head.

  “Has she told Dad anything about it?”

  “I think they were talking about it earlier. When I walked into the hallway, they stopped but... Dad looked angry.”

  Figuring that what he's saying doesn't make much sense, I glance down at the side of the door-frame and spot the words 'Annie's room' carved crudely into the wood. The lettering is basic and almost infantile.

  “So did you do this or not?” I ask.

  He cranes his neck to see what I mean. “No,” he says after a moment. “That wasn't me. Was it you?”

  “How would I do have managed to do it?” I ask. “No, it must have been the other -” I stop myself just in time, before I can mention the other Annie, the one who disappeared seventy-one years ago. Staring at the carving now, it's more than a little creepy to think of my namesake standing in this exact doorway one day and scratching her name into the wood. For a moment, I try to imagine what she was like, and I can't shake the feeling that since Mom and Dad haven't started decorating yet, the house is probably more or less in the same state it was in all those years ago. Looking out to the landing, I try to imagine the other Annie running from her murderous parents, but the image falls apart when I realize I can't possibly imagine what could have driven two people to murder their own daughter.

  “I don't like this house,” Scott says suddenly.

  I turn to him. “I've barely seen beyond the end of my own -”

  Before I can finish, my left crutch shifts, slipping across the floorboards too fast for me to correct my position. I try to grab hold of the door-frame but it's far too late and, instead, I tumble forward, crashing into the end of my bed and letting out a yelp of pain as I over-extend my right leg. I immediately slip off the side of the bed and hit the floor, banging my leg again and gasping as I feel a jolting pain in the bone, racing up through all the cracks. Seconds later, before I even have a chance to get to my feet, I can already hear frantic steps racing up the stairs and finally my father appears in the doorway.

  “What the hell is going on in here?” he asks, his eyes filled with shock.

  “I didn't do anything!” Scott shouts, drawing his knees up as if to make himself as small as possible. He's scared.

  “I'm fine,” I splutter, even though – as I try and fail to haul myself up onto the bed – it's clear that I'm not fine at all. Even though I don't want to ask, I'm relieved when my father grabs hold of me and pulls me forward, and then he rolls me over and drags me all the way onto the bed before taking a look at the casts on my legs. To be honest, he seems much rougher than before, as if he's annoyed.

  “Are you completely crazy?” he hisses, examining the plaster before stopping when he gets to the lower part of my right leg. “There's a crack here.”

  “I'm sorry,” I reply, leaning back with tears of frustration in my eyes, “I just wanted to get out of this goddamn room! I'm going crazy in here!”

  “Well,” he continues, “you've probably slowed your recovery down now. Does it hurt?”

  “No,” I lie.

  “Annie, be honest.”

  “No more than usual.”

  He touches my bare toes. “Can you feel that?”

  “Yes!” I reply, starting to feel increasingly impatient with my own body.

  “I should call the doctor,” he mutters, “but... We'll see how it goes.”

  Wiping the tears from my eyes, I prop myself up on my elbows and watch as he continues to examine my casts. Dad has always been quick to call a doctor whenever anything happens, so it seems odd that this time he's not going to bother. It's not that I want a doctor to come, but at the same time, I want my father to be his usual self, especially after everything Scott was saying earlier.

  “It hurts a little,” I tell him, hoping to nudge him back to his normal self.

  “I'm sure it's fine.”

  “But if the cast is cracked -”

  “It's only a hairline.”

  “But -”

  “Annie!” he snaps, glaring at me with barely-concealed anger. “Just stop! I can see your cast properly, which is more than you can claim. Trust me, there's only the faintest of hairline fractures, and it's obvious your leg isn't too badly damaged.” He pauses, before taking a step back and seeming to
reset himself slightly, becoming slightly more like his usual self. “I don't want you trying to get out of bed like this again, okay?” He picks my crutches up from the floor. “These are going to be kept well away until I decide you're ready for them.”

  “Can I try my wheelchair instead?” I ask. “I'd at least like to roll around for a while.”

  “You wouldn't be able to get down the stairs.”

  “But -”

  “You need bed-rest,” he continues, “and that's what you'll get, even if I have to tie you down.”

  “I need the toilet,” Scott says, climbing down from the chair and hurrying out the door. It's clear that he just wants to get away from Dad, and a moment later I hear his bedroom door slamming shut.

  “I'm not going to tie you down,” Dad adds, almost as if he was truly considering that option for a moment. “Annie, you need to consider your health. If I have to lock the door to your room, then -”

  “No!” I blurt out, suddenly panicked by the idea. “Please don't do that, Dad, I swear I'll stay in bed!”

  He eyes me with caution for a moment. “Well, you'd better. It's not so bad in this room, is it?”

  “It's boring as hell.”

  “Then you'll appreciate things more when you're up and about, won't you?”

  “Where's Mom?” I ask. “Can you send her up when she gets back from wherever she's gone?”

  “She hasn't gone anywhere,” he replies, heading to the door. “She's downstairs, reading.”

  I frown, surprised that she didn't come with him when they heard me fall.

  “Well, can you get her to come up?” I ask, but he just walks away and a moment later I hear him heading downstairs. “Dad?” I call after him. “Did you hear me?”

  Sighing, I lean back as he leaves the room. There are still tears in my eyes, mostly due to frustration at my own miserable failure. If I'd just managed to stay on the crutches, I could have proved to them that I can get about, but I guess maybe I tried a day or two too early. I swear, sometimes I feel like I'm never going to get out of this stupid room.

  Twelve

  Seventy-one years ago

  Watching myself in the mirror, I reach back and start to tie my hair. I know it's a little vain to spend time bothering about my personal appearance, but I feel the need to look more grown-up. After all, I'm no longer a child and it won't do to look like one, so I have begun to experiment with various subtle changes. Fortunately, Mother's dresses fit me rather well, and I intend to take them in a few inches at the waist. My hair, meanwhile, looks much better when it's tied back.

  I swear, just these few simple changes make me look ten years older, perhaps even more.

  Once I'm certain that I look my best, I head out of my room and down the stairs. It's still early and I intend to reorganize the kitchen, to make it fit my needs a little better. All last night, I lay in bed planning some alterations I intend to make around the house, and although I haven't mentioned any of these out loud yet to Father, I'm quite certain that they will meet no resistance. After all, every single one of them is rooted in common sense and -

  Stopping suddenly in the kitchen doorway, I stare in horror at the sight of Mother working at the sink, washing breakfast dishes.

  Father, at the table, glances at me for a moment with somber eyes before looking back down at his plate.

  “What...” I pause, convinced that this has to be some kind of mistake. “What's happening?”

  “Your Mother has come back up,” Father mutters. “She's learned her lesson.”

  I watch as Mother limps to the cupboard and sets a plate on the shelf. She has to tilt her head, as if she's trying to see out through one of the less scratched parts of her damaged eyes; although it takes a moment, she's able to find a cup on the counter and take it back to the sink. She glances at me, and although there's a great deal of fear in her eyes, there's also some self-satisfaction. She's wearing a proper dress again and her hair is more or less back to its old neatness, but as she starts to wash the cup I can't help but feel she looks like a savage dressed up in civilized clothes. As if to prove that point, she almost knocks a stack of pots over, and it's clear that her damaged eyes make it much harder for her to work. She's still blinking furiously, almost non-stop, as if the scratches are unbearably uncomfortable.

  “Father,” I continue finally, turning to him with a sense of cold steel in my chest, “you didn't say that -”

  “It's done now,” he replies. “I made the decision this morning.”

  “But -” With tears in my eyes, I start to feel an incandescent rage building through my body. I clench both my fists, filled with the urge to go over and beat Mother back down into the basement, but I know Father would stop me and I also know that I wouldn't get what I want by letting my anger overflow. I take a series of deep breaths in order to stay calm, and as I watch Father eat, I try to work out what I could have done to displease him so much that he would rather have Mother back. He never acted as if I had disappointed him, but clearly I must have done something wrong.

  “Annie -” he begins.

  “Excuse me,” I stammer, turning and hurrying to the bathroom, my eyes already filling with tears.

  ***

  Father is chopping wood and Mother is in the kitchen, and I am sitting on the porch steps. Mild spring sunlight shines down, but I feel sick to my stomach as I watch Father work and hear, from over my shoulder, the sounds of Mother shuffling about in the kitchen. Barely able to see at all, she works so slowly, I feel as if she should just be put out of her misery. The fact that she's trying so hard only makes her even more pitiful.

  I hate her.

  No, it's more than hate.

  I'm repulsed by her. I'm offended by the fact that she exists.

  Getting to my feet, I briefly consider going over to talk to Father some more, to work out what I did wrong and how to set it straight. He's not a man of many words and our conversations are usually brief, but I still feel the urge to make him tell me how I could have been such a disappointment. Those days when Mother was down in the basement were among the happiest of my life, and although I have gone over every moment in my mind a thousand times, I still can't think of a single thing that I did wrong. Perhaps I did not excel at certain duties, but I showed I was keen to learn. Still, by bringing Mother back up, he has rejected me.

  Even worse, he has barely spoken to me all morning. He even avoids eye contact.

  Perhaps if I were to plead with him...

  “Annie,” Mother calls out suddenly from the back door. “I need your help.”

  I shiver at the mere sound of her voice, and at the idea that she should call on me for any kind of help at all. I had begun to make that kitchen mine, yet now she thinks she can reclaim it. Does the woman have no shame at all?

  “Annie,” she says again. “Come.”

  Another shiver passes through my body, so intense that I have to squeeze my eyes tight shut and clench my fists just to keep from crying out with rage. I can feel tears welling in my eyes, but I force them back, determined to remain in control of my own body. I will not let this woman beat me.

  “Annie! Don't make me tell you again!”

  “Coming!” I reply, opening my eyes wide and watching for a moment as Father continues to chop wood. Turning, I walk up the steps toward the back door, my whole body stiff with rage. When I reach the kitchen, I see that Mother has set various pots and pans on the table, along with the ingredients to roast a leg of lamb. She knows that leg of lamb is Father's favorite meal, a luxury we can only afford once or twice a year, and I feel sick to the stomach at the thought of her trying to inveigle herself back into his good books like this.

  “I need you to help me,” she says, with her back to me as she sets out a block of butter and some herbs. “I can't see more than a few shadows but there's a lot to do, so you must go to the garden and fetch plenty of carrots and parsnips. And two turnips. Those are your father's favorites, you know.”

  Lookin
g down at the knives on the table, I want nothing more than to drive one of them into her pathetic head.

  “After you've brought the vegetables in,” she continues, “you must scrub enough potatoes for the three of us and then peel them. Get started on that nice and early, because I intend to roast them very slowly and I don't want dinner to be too late. I'll have more jobs for you after, too, so there's really no time to waste.” She turns to me and smiles a cautious, reticent smile, as if she's nervous. Her damaged eyes are staring almost directly at me, the scratches barely visible in the morning light. “I want to make your father happy. I want to give him the best meal he's ever eaten.”

  I feel a knot of horror in my belly, twisting in disgust at the thought that she thinks she could ever make Father happy. What gives her that right? She's failed enough times, and now it's my turn. I want to crack her head open, but I know I must be patient.

  “Annie, you must get started,” she adds, turning back to the chopping board. Her hands fumble for the herbs since she can't see them very well. It's almost like watching a child trying to prepare a meal. “There really isn't any time to lose. I haven't told your father that I'm doing any of this, and I'd like to get it started while he's out there working. I'd like it to be a surprise for him.”

  Stepping over to the table, I pick up the largest carving knife. The leg of lamb is resting on a plate, its skin all stripped away to reveal the sinewy muscle beneath. There are traces of blood on the plate, and at the nearest end the bone has been broken away, revealing a rich seam of marrow running through the center. Mother has already arranged plenty of herbs over the surface, but I reach out and brush them away, feeling as if the meat should be pure when it cooks. Pressing against the leg's muscle, I feel its firm, smooth surface and I think of all the blood still inside. Mother is right, Father does love this meal, but it feels wrong that someone like her should be the one who gives it to him. She's trying to buy back his affection, and to my mind this only makes her more pathetic.