3:AM Magazine

By Elizabeth Fallon.

You remember Anne Hilldale. Everyday, lips stained with Berry Blue Kool-Aid. Nickname: Annie Blue. She sat behind you in middle school, and you used to poke the top of her cervical bone through the nape of her neck with the eraser end of a blunt pencil, just to see her wince. Knowing there was nothing you could do to provoke her. Some of the other children called her “blueberry lips,” “fish lips,” more cruelly, “corpse mouth” or simply, “blue.” Annie was the type of child who ate two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches at lunch, but always appeared malnourished, whitish, skin of her face showing tiny blue veins underneath her large, blue eyes. Sometimes the blood from her dry, cracked lips got in her mouth, staining her top row of teeth. Billy Wesley sprinted around the schoolyard, shouting “Vampire, vampire, Annie is a vampire.” Fingernails trimmed to the quick with those teeth, and brittle, little splotches of white underneath the nails. When she scratched her head, her scalp shed tiny, white flakes.

You also remember the day she went missing. Because you had seen the big Chevrolet cruising the block in front of the school building at recess, the fat man driving with only one hand on the steering wheel, the other dangling out of the open window, waving at you and your girlfriends while some of you jumped Double Dutch and others clapped hands -

Bubble gum,

bubble gum,

in a dish.

How many pieces do you wish?

When Annie tried to jump rope, her feet usually went crooked and she fell over, lopsided, bright blood streaking the porcelain skin of her bony kneecaps. And she just didn’t plain get the clapping games - she lost track or lost count. So you left her out, hovering on the sidelines, watching, occasionally letting out an awkward snort at your antics, but never invited.

The fat man in the big Chevrolet used to park near the fire hydrant, you noticed. Sometimes the cops chased him away, other times they weren’t around and he sat idle for hours. One time when you glanced out of the filmy window during Sacrament, you saw him peering up at you, waving. You didn’t wave back. But after Annie disappeared, you knew what it meant - it could’ve been you instead of her. Sister Frances held a steady finger in the air and said, “Young ladies should mind their own business,” when you told her about the fat man opening his car door when you were outside playing tetherball and calling you over from behind the chain link fence. “What’s her name?” he had asked you, pointing to Annie, leaning against the splintering brick façade of the school. And you had told him her name even though when he smiled at you, you saw that he had little yellow teeth and his breath smelt bitter like beer, yet sweet, also, maybe mint.

On a Tuesday morning, as Sister Margaret leaned over to whisper into Sister Joseph’s ear, you saw how the sagging skin of her powdery neck brushed past Sister Joseph’s cheek. And the Sister’s face had flushed a beet red like she was embarrassed, only soon her skin lost the crimson tone and at once, she looked both lost and pallid. When the Sisters left the classroom together, you and the other children roared with delight at their absence, books were tossed to the floor, and the chatter created a deafening clamor, until Billy Wesley got up to dance and everyone was silent for a moment, but then screamed with delight when his quick footwork came to an abrupt halt as Sister Joseph returned to the classroom, hot tears streaking down her stout face. Her lips turned downward into a somber frown, her voice was subtle as she uttered, “Children, unfortunately, we must have an early dismissal.” But neither you nor any of the other children thought that it was unfortunate. And all you knew that day was that this meant you wouldn’t have to attend religion class and you could go home early. You were happy because your mother had made chocolate cupcakes before you left for school, but said you couldn’t have them until you came home from school. And now you were going home.

In the days following, everyone in the town was talking about Anne Hilldale and the quarry - Annie at the quarry. A frightened, little thing like Annie. What was she doing down there? And when you asked your mother where Annie had gone, she had wiped the corners of her eyes and whispered, “She went to live with her father in Boston.” But a few days after Annie went missing, you saw her mother in the grocery store when you were with your mother and your mother had told her “I’m so sorry,” and Annie’s mother started crying and you knew that Annie hadn’t just gone to live with her father.

In homeroom, the headmistress had made an announcement over the loudspeaker, “Tomorrow there will be a half day, so that we all may attend services for Anne Hilldale in the morning.” Of the funeral, you remember very little. Before you left, your mother had fussed over the dress that you chose to wear - it was midnight black with a large, red bow in the back. “Red isn’t appropriate for funerals,” she had told you, before making you change into your dark blue one. At the church, Annie’s small, white coffin lay on the pulpit. A slender stripe of pink ran all the way around it. The coffin was closed. Why hadn’t it been open? To the right, a young priest who you recognized from your older brother’s high school stood behind a lectern, flipping the pages of an enormous Bible. Before he read, he put on a pair of thin-rimmed spectacles and cleared his throat like he was impatient. A wreath made of white and pink roses stood on a metal stand behind the coffin, the word “Daughter” written in glittery, gold letters across a white stash. You had the last seat in the middle row, in front of a girl who you sometimes swapped brown bags with at lunch. The girl tried to stick a booger on the back of your dress, only you sensed it and were able to duck out of her reach. Once in a while, you leaned over and stuck your head out into the aisle to glimpse at Annie’s family in the front row. Annie was an only child. Her mother wore a huge black hat. Her father from Boston sat close to his new wife, his arm snug around her skinny shoulders. And you wondered why no one had their arm around Annie’s mother.

As you got older, you’d sometimes see Annie’s mother walking alone in the park when you were sitting, slouched, on the park railing with your friends, laughing, and stomping your cigarettes out just at the sight of her. She always carried a crinkly paper grocery bag. You’d smile at her, sometimes, and once, she reached out and grabbed your hand. You let her hold it for a second, and then you pulled away. Many times, you turned around as she exited the park and saw that she was headed towards the fortune teller’s shop. But when you got near the end of high school, you didn’t watch her anymore. She was still there, only you didn’t notice her. You’d continue kissing a boyfriend, or laughing with one of your girlfriends as she strolled by, quietly hoping that you’d notice her, you knew.

It wasn’t until six years after they had found Annie and you were eighteen and leaving for college, that your mother showed you all of the newspaper clippings she had saved in a shoebox on the top shelf of the closet in the bedroom that she shared with your father. You had acted surprised about what had really happened to Annie Blue - only you weren’t, you had figured it out long ago.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Elizabeth Fallon is a young writer, and is currently completing a BFA in creative writing at Goddard College in Vermont. Her fiction has recently appeared in Word Riot and The North Central Review.

First published in 3:AM Magazine: Friday, May 1st, 2009.