People like us. What was it about those words that created such an intense feeling of anger inside of Annie? Her fists balled up, almost on cue, when the memory of her disappointment returned and sharp little fingernails, painted a blushing shade of pale pink, dug in, an instant reaction to the rejection felt inside. Was it the way they were said or was it just because they were coming out of her mother’s mouth?

“Mom,” she said in her most endearing voice, all the while twisting a thick cord of soft brown hair around her finger, “I want to be famous when I grow up!”

This was said with an expectation that the announcement would be received with great excitement, just as it was announced but, her mother just continued ironing, with her back to her young daughter.

“Mommy…did you hear me?” Low, hesitant words escaped Annie’s lips with a slight tremble.

The iron was suddenly forced across the board harder than necessary and as she turned Annie could see the annoyed look on her mother’s face, much like the look she gave the dog when it decided to take a shit in the middle of the kitchen floor.

From behind thin, tight lips that looked incapable of experiencing any pleasure her mother responded, “People like us shouldn’t hope for much in life or wish for more than what we are given.”

Annie wasn’t asking for anything at all, “My friend Sophie says she will be famous all the time so why can’t I?” (The very same Sophie that had loaned Annie her favorite bottle of nail polish because, “Everyone uses this kind!”)

Her voice declared her intentions clearly, with no hint of question so why didn’t her mother understand? What exactly were “people like us” Annie would wonder as she thought about her friends who lived in houses without broken window panes and whose parents drove cars without rust and torn front seats. She saw them as no different from her physically so did they possess a kinder heart than her or a more capable brain? Annie wanted to know because the thought of being different without a real reason troubled her. What was her mother’s deal and why couldn’t she ever just smile once in a while when Annie looked her way? A thought crossed her mind and before she had time to consider whether it would piss her mother off more or less than usual out the words came.

“How are we any different than Sophie’s family?”

Just had to push your luck little girl, Annie’s brain screamed above her glowing crimson cheeks while her body awaited the coming blow. And it came in a response that was yelled back at her with such force it caused an instant feeling of regret to form in her knot- twisted stomach. A low, almost growling voice said, “Poor! We are poor so just get use to it and quit dreaming about things you will never have because that is just the way it is!”

This had not been the first time that Annie made the statement about wanting to be famous but on this day it was the last time she spoke to her mother about what she wanted in life. She would just do it. It was the last time she shared a dream with this woman who acted as if such a thing was worth nothing more than the old, stained shirts she savagely tore apart to make cleaning rags while muttering under her breath about how she deserved better.

As a four year-old Annie wanted to be a singer, at five, an actress, six, seven and eight, a model and now at ten, the ultimate dream of all; famous. With each dream change she never really understand why her mother just nodded dismissively, “Uh, yes dear. Right.” so she would just go back to playing with her dirty little doll, with one eye gone, whispering her plans into an imaginary ear. And the doll would answer back, through Annie, “You can be anything your little heart desires.” These were the words she wanted her mother to say.

Many years before, Jeannie Lee grew up knowing that her mother always wished she were a boy instead of a curiously quiet little girl with large hazel eyes. Her eyes would follow the tall, masculine built woman around begging for the attention that she would never receive.

“I don’t know what to do with her,” were the words her mother threw out to no one in particular as she turned to shower attention instead on Jeannie’s two younger brothers.

She was good and she was quiet yet her mother seemed to prefer the company of her loud, sticky-handed brothers who never even got so much as a swat on the behind when they broke things. They knew she was different in the eyes of their mother and soon they also treated her as if she were from another planet, an oddity to be viewed but never directly addressed. In Jeannie’s mind she was always the “her” to their “us” and so this division set the tone for her interactions with everyone around her. If she was unseen by her family then she would do her damned best to get their attention. In school she excelled in music, art and math but it was her youngest brother’s latest Boy Scout badge that took the center stage at the dinner table.

“That is so wonderful Henry,” her mother said with such pride in her voice. “I always knew you could do it.”

That elusive praise, reserved only for the males in the family would never be Jeannie’s and she knew it. Right after she turned sixteen she became pregnant, by the first boy who asked her out to the movies and told her she had pretty eyes. She couldn’t hope for much more so he would have to do, she told herself, as she looked down at the glistening blue plus sign shining up at her from the end of the stick shaped pregnancy test.

All her mother said was, “He had better marry you darling and don’t expect me to baby-sit.”

The day she gave birth her only thought was that this baby cannot be a girl! Jeannie willed it to be a boy despite what the doctor told her. Life would be much easier that way she thought because she had nothing to offer a little girl, one who would need so much attention and love. Jeannie knew it wasn’t the right but the thought came anyway.

“What are you going to name her?” The doctor asked as he handed the screaming, slippery bundle of afterbirth mixed with baby to Jeannie.

“Her?”

“Yes, what are you naming your little girl?” the doctor asked her again, slower this time, as if he were talking to a dimwit.

“Annabelle,” chimed in Jeannie’s young husband of seven short months from the back of the delivery room, “That is her grandmother’s name too.”

Jeannie shot a look of anger toward the father of her child and he just laughed. She was too weak to argue and in a flat tone said, “Fine.”

Now, that little girl sat at the small kitchen table, purchased by Jeannie’s mother, eating Cheerios from a stained plastic bowl that once contained butter. The torn vinyl on the seat of the blue and white, thrift store chair scratched Annie’s legs each time she turned to watch her mother walk through on her way to the clothesline in the backyard. Look at me! It didn’t hurt that much she would tell herself and as if to test her growing bravado she twisted hard to the left, feeling one particularly sharp strip of cheap vinyl drag across the back of her thighs, leaving a small drop of blood as she got up to run outside.

“Can I sit out here with you?” She asked her mother’s back, catching the tensing of those less than eager shoulders right away.

“If you want but I am going in once I have all the laundry hung out,” came the reply from behind a blue sheet with pink little rosebuds on it.

The wind caught the tail her mother’s shirt, a shirt that had once belonged to her father, flipping it up over and over with each new gust. Annie had moved to a better spot, on top of her last dog’s battered little house, to watch her mother move rhythmically back and forth from basket to line, clenching old, wooden clothespins between her lips. The sight fascinated her and she imagined that her mother was really a robot, no heart, just a hard metal casing with wobbly springs for arms. The thought made Annie laugh out loud in a half snort, half giggle that caused the robot to suddenly pivot around, flashing red eyes zeroing in on her.

“If you are going to sit out here then you need to be quiet! While you flit around all day with your little friends I am stuck here, always cleaning up after you, so is it really too much to ask for just one moment of quiet?” The words shot out with bullet speed causing Annie to want to jump from the roof of the small doghouse with great dramatic force but instead she fell hard into the dirt below after the edge of her tennis shoe got caught on a loose board.

Making quick work of brushing the remaining dust from her jean shorts Annie then decided she better move out of grasping range. “I couldn’t help it! It just sort of came out. I will be quiet, promise,” the well rehearsed speech came spilling out of Annie’s mouth as she tried to look her most sincere.

“Go back inside and read a book or something,” her mother said in the mean, low voice that always signaled an impending fight if the response was anything other than, “Yes Mom.” “I don’t have time for your nonsense plus, I warned you.”

Warned? She never gave real warning thought Annie. It was always one shot and if Annie screwed up, which she always seemed to do, and then it was banishment. At school she fared better because she was dealing with an adult who actually seemed to know the meaning of the word. Her teacher had to know the meaning Annie surmised with a nod of certainty. She was a teacher after all.

“Annie! If you hit Harper again I will send you to the office,” her teacher would say clearly, distinctly and with no take-backs. She liked that because few adults seemed to make any sense to her so when she found one that said what they meant and meant what they said, she latched on and held tight. “Can I come live with you Mrs. Bell?” Annie asked her teacher once. “Your parents would miss you too much sweetie and you would miss them,” she responded, a little shaken by the request. Secretly Annie always felt that her teacher really knew that she wouldn’t be missed or do any missing and that her answer was the best she could muster without letting the real truth slip.

As Annie ran through the kitchen she could hear the engine of her father’s rusty, old Buick roar into the carport, balding wheels squeaking to a final stop, just inches from the stacks of old Ladies Home Journal magazines that her mother couldn’t seem to part with. Being with her frowning mother all day, during summer break , was much preferred to spending any time at all with her father, a man who refused to show normal human emotions and declared everyone who did not agree with him, “stupid beyond belief.” Her father swung the screen door wide, letting it hit the door frame with one loud bang followed by one lesser ricocheting bang. He never announced his entrance and liked to say, “I just arrive and everyone knows it.” He was right and Annie could usually sense, within five minutes or so of him actually pulling into the drive, that it would happen soon by the uneasy feeling she could feel building in her gut.

“Oh, no,” she said a little too loud and quickly tried to disguise her mistake by adding; “I left my doll outside.” This wasn’t really the case but it was easier to direct him toward another target than herself, much like throwing a wild animal a chunk of bloody meat and then high-tailing it to safety.

“Well get it then damn it because rain is coming in. I don’t like buying you things only to see them left outside in the dirt and rain,” her father said as soon as he walked into the living room, where Annie stood.

No “hello baby” or “how was your day kiddo,” instead his typical response left her always at the ready to dart down the long hall to her bedroom once he made his presence heard. He never needed to lay a hand on her because his words had the power to stop her in her tracks, dead, just waiting for the next verbal punch but the times he did feel the urge to strike out his aim was remarkably sure. This always irritated Annie because she could easily outrun him for, in her mother’s words, he had “a minor case of polio” as a child which left him with one leg shorter than the other.

Even with a very noticeable limp he routinely denied being disabled and the times Annie did run away from him he would wait, sometimes hours later, when she was sitting in a chair reading or watching television to deliver his punishment. A sharp thump from his knuckles, delivered to the top of her head, was the preferred retribution and her tears always brought a smile to his face, signaling pleasure with his work.

As Annie slinked quietly through the kitchen to the backdoor, in pretend search of her doll, she could hear the not so quiet words being exchanged between her mother and father. “You need to make her take care of her things,” boomed her father, “We aren’t made out of money you know!”

“I know that darling,” said her mother and even at ten years old Annie easily recognized the sarcasm and anger in the words. Don’t do it, she silently sent this wish to her mother even though she knew it was too late to stop him. The fleeting thought that her mother didn’t really deserve or want her concern came to Annie but she had more important things to worry about now.

The loud slam of her parent’s bedroom door echoed through the house, much like any other night after her father got off work from his job as a part-time bailiff, with the small county court, in the next town over from theirs. He would go to their bedroom, carefully hang his uniform on a hanger, leaving only his undershirt and boxers on and then slowly limp back in the kitchen to continue the argument he had started on his way in the door. But tonight the thunder of an incoming storm, accompanied by sudden flashes of lightning, intensified the feeling of danger driven panic, a feeling that Annie couldn’t seem to shake as the shouting continued over the sound of the brewing storm.

Her father had wanted to be a police officer, on their small town force, but could not pass the endurance exam so after being denied a job he complained loudly to his wife that the local police department was filled with idiots, “a bunch of Barney Fifes.” He claimed that his new job was much more prestigious, allowing him to carry a better gun and be in charge of the prisoners who came in every week, from the county jail, to appear before the judge for whatever crime they had committed. They were unimportant to him though, just more imbeciles he had to deal with on a daily basis, but he had a gun and was in charge so they had their place.

“Oh, so you think you are so damn smart?” the argument between her mother and father started. “Pretty brave coming from a slut who was too stupid to keep from getting pregnant and hasn’t worked a day in her life!” her father shouted followed by his fist hitting a cabinet door, making a splintering sound.

“That is so unfair and you know it! Believe me, if I had known what I was really getting when I met you I would have kept my legs shut tight!” Annie had heard her mother say these words many times before during other fights and after asking an older girl down the street what they could have meant she too wished that this simple act, on her mother’s part, had happened as well. Her mother finished with, “You always break my things! Why must you always ruin what little we do have?”

The sound of her father’s open hand connecting with the pale flesh on her mother’s cheek brought a whimper from deep within Annie as she sat, huddled against the wall between the couch and the kitchen door, trying not to watch but drawn to anyway out of fear. She had to know where he was so she could determine where she needed to be next.

“Please don’t…,” the words trailed off into a whisper as Jeannie looked around to see if Annie was watching. “She can see us.”

“Who the fuck cares? Do you care Jeannie? Do you?” Her father said as his hand moved upward to grasp her mother’s throat, giving it a tight and deliberate squeeze, just long enough to ensure the look of terror that Annie saw in her mother’s eyes. She could see her father’s face, inches from her mother’s, laughing as he squeezed once again and then he pushed her trembling body, hard into the stove with a crash and she slid to the floor, falling on her side.

A small gurgling noise was erupting from her mother’s open mouth, unlike anything Annie had ever heard before. Was she dead? A long, gasping breath shocked Annie into motion, she knew her mother was alive but now her father was walking into the living room. Move. Move fast, she told her body, not wanting him to see her as she scrambled down the hall, on hands and knees, to the first open door she could find. It was her parent’s room and even though she knew she was not allowed to be in this room, tonight, he had given her no choice.

“Where are you Annie?” he said in a falsely tender voice, seeking to draw her out of hiding so he could justify why he always needed to do what he had done. “It’s okay. Mommy and Daddy were just arguing a little. I won’t hurt you.”

The words rang untrue in Annie’s ears; she could only believe that he would do what he always did. He’d grab her too tight and say, “She shouldn’t have said that. You wouldn’t say that to me right?” When she refused to tell him, “You’re right Daddy,” he would punch her, hard in the chest, causing her to lose her breathe or he would deliver a stinging slap to her face saying, “Just like your stupid mother.” He would also tell her it was shameful to talk about what a man does inside his own home at school or to any of her little friends. Anyway, according to him, they deserved it for being ignorant enough to make him mad.

“I am not playing a game with you little girl! Your mother is just fine so get the hell out here now!”

Annie could hear her mother crying and usually she would come, soon afterwards, to tell her daughter she was fine but this time she didn’t. Why should she? She never answered the question about whether she cared if Annie saw what her father had done so there was no reason to believe her mother could rescue her this time.

Her father’s voice moved through the house and she could hear him crashing around in her room, turning over her bed, ripping posters off the walls, yelling her name. “Annie, come here now!”

The sound of his footsteps pounded down the hall toward her and from the kitchen her mother finally screamed, “Leave her alone you sick bastard!” Leave her alone…leave her alone…leave her alone, echoed back to Annie as she moved from her hiding place in her parent’s closet to the dresser where her father’s work uniform hung from the mirror on a hanger. With a quick jerk it fell to the floor and the heavy belt, which her father wore around his waist, hit her foot causing her to jump in pain. It’s nothing, she said to herself. Didn’t hurt me! The black handle of her father’s gun rested against the big toe of her right foot, cold and heavy but also strangely welcoming as she bent to place it in her hand. Annie had some idea about how to work it but did not know whether her father even kept it loaded. She knew, without any doubt though, that if he came in and saw her holding his “metal joy,” the name he gave his gun the day he received it, he would be more than his usual angry. This was just fine with her.

She could hear her mother shouting again but the words were garbled, like she was underwater, “Leee…herrr….nooo.” The blood pulsing through Annie’s ears increased in volume to match the wild pounding of her heart and all she could do was watch as the door swung wide, her father standing in the doorway with a raised fist.

“What the fuck do you think you are doing in here?” The words came out of his mouth but Annie could not hear them, she only saw his lips moving, spittle gathering at the corners, all foamy like a rabid dog.

Her arms rose instinctively, acting to soften the coming blows and right then she understood what she had in her hands. Her father understood too, screaming, “You dumb little bitch!” A searing blast ripped through Annie’s ears and her body was flung backwards onto the bed, leaving her unable to move, staring up at the ceiling fan in a daze. The sound of metal hitting wood thudded as she fell into the softness, her hands falling empty to her sides.

“What did you do you monster?” Her mother’s frantic words came closer and closer until Annie finally heard her clearly, followed by her screams. Squeak, squeak, squeak, Annie stared up at the ceiling fan, listening closely, waiting as each blade went round and round.

“Oh God, Annie, I thought he…,” her mother’s words trailed off into stunned silence as she glanced down at her husband, face up in the bedroom doorway with a gapping, red hole in the middle of his chest. Blood trickled from his now silent mouth, lifeless eyes wide in surprise.

“Will we be on T.V. you think?” Annie calmly asked as her mother slowly curled up next to her on the bed, her head carefully fixed toward the doorway in anticipation. The light, shining from the hallway, reflected off the bedroom door showing the glistening sheen of red, sprayed in a high arch, clearly.

“I don’t know baby,” the words came out shaky and uncertain. After a long pause, “Well, more than likely,” her mother said as they sat together, holding one another, waiting for the distant sound of sirens to come to them.