Annabelle
Ben sits on the edge of the bed. He’s been sleeping downstairs in the study, though by his puffy face you know sleeping isn’t the right word.
“Iris—I mean—God. I don’t even know what name to call you.”
“Tell me everything,” Ben says. “Please. Just tell me.” You hear in his voice that you might break something so finally and irrevocably in this man you did love so much, and who had loved you so well, if you did not tell the truth.
So you do.
How you carried the child to the side of the road, waiting for headlights to find you.
The baby had stopped moving. She looked too small.
You walked and walked, dizzy and disoriented in the night.
And then, the clouds blew past the moon for a second, and just enough light came back into the sky. Enough so that you could see the bracelet a few steps in front of you. As if Sabrina was trying to warn you, take care of you, one last time.
Your mother’s precious beads scattered in the dirt, the string broken.
And you knew then that Sabrina wouldn’t be here in time to help you, to tell you what to do now.
You stared at the beads like they might spell out a message.
There was no meaning in it that you could make out, though as you stared you could feel it, her desire to help you, to be with you, the faintest tingle along your nerves.
But still, the feeling didn’t change anything, and she would not be there to guide you like she promised she would. You had to act, completely on your own.
This realization freed you to take stock of your situation with more clarity, the kind of inventorying of your circumstances that you had been avoiding for so long.
No cars were going to come. It was the middle of the night.
You were getting dizzy, lightheaded. Every inch of your body ached, your very bones ringing with pain and cold.
You were both so cold.
Her weak, mewling cries had gone quiet.
She had never opened her eyes.
You set her down, gently, gently, in the grass.
In the darkness, looking at that bracelet, aware for that moment of all that had been destroyed in your life, you felt something in you like a match struck and held up against the night. Small and subtle, but undeniable.
You picked up a single bead, held it tight in your fist, to remind you that you were real, you were still here.
Your body hurt in so many ways, and yet what you felt when you turned your back to her made you double over, made you see white stars behind your eyes. You clutched the bead harder in your palm, feeling it press against the bone.
She was already gone, you told yourself.
There was nothing anyone could do. It was the only thing that let you lift your foot off the ground and take that first step in the opposite direction.
She was already gone and one of you had to survive.
Your gait was heavy but lit with grim purpose as you walked back to the house.
Faster, and faster the closer you got, even as each step made you want to cry out.
Even as you felt every cell in your body straining back toward that place in the grass.
It was like everyone kept telling you. One of you had to get out. Had to live.
Ben wraps his arms around you. Hugs you hard, as though he is trying to save you from some immediate physical danger.
“Maybe I could go by Anna,” you whisper. Because your life has broken open yet again. Because you will need to answer for who you had been and what you have done. Because here you are, starting over once more.