I dragged myself up from the basement after dropping off the garbage and sorting the recyclables. I then went to the first floor to check the mail. Nothing. I was in a pathetic mood. Here it is, I thought, two days before Thanksgiving, and there had been no word from Annabelle in a week. There had been a postcard: My ma is fine and says hello. The weather is here, wish you were beautiful. Back soon.
I pushed the walker off the elevator and wandered down the third floor hall. I was depressed as hell, but I did not want Thatch or Stella to know how unhappy I was. Annabelle, I thought, dammit, where are you? Come home.
Yonkers, Thatch had told me. Her mother lives in Yonkers.
Yonkers? Really, I asked him. Why did she go see her mother?
She said she had a vision that her mother was sick, so she’s gone to check out things.
Why didn’t’t she tell me?
She knew you would try to stop her. So, she waited until you were otherwise occupied.
And so she did. I went out for a doctor’s appointment, and she skipped town with Pebble and Oyster, who promised Thatch they would protect her. Now that their children have grown up and flown away, those pigeons have been looking for a good adventure. Still, I did not like the idea of Annabelle being away from home with two crazy gay pigeons as bodyguards.
I walked into the apartment and gloomily shoved the walker into its space. I looked about the living area. Thatch and Stella sat in the window, watching the hurly-burly on West 82nd Street. How can they be so callous about Annabelle’s disappearance? I thought. The worry is killing me.
Thatch! I called. What’s happening on the street?
Not much, he replied. Did you check the mail?
I did. There was nothing.
I took my cane, which I had left hanging on the stove, and moved into the living space. I sat down at the computer and checked my email. There was a lot of Thanksgiving and Christmas offers, but not much else. Thatch and Stella left the window to climb about the computer table.
Well, babies, I asked, what do you want to do today?
Sleep, Thatch answered. He jumped onto my bed and curled up to sleep.
She really didn’t say when she’d be home? Thatch?
He sat up. She said she’d be back in a couple of days.
Okay, I said. I’m going to lie down with you. Move over. We’ll nap until the soaps come on.
I lay down on the bed and used the remote to change the television channel. I settled back onto the pile of pillows. Thatch curled up next to my shoulder as Stella jumped onto the bed to settle in the space between my left armpit and hip. When everyone had settled, I closed my eyes and fell asleep. It’s the best medicine for a depression.
The day passed with its usual schedule: I worked on some music, a score for City Center Encores! next production and a bit of composition I’m working on for my own amusement. At 2:30, I fed Stella and Thatch, around 3:00 I fed myself, at 4:30 I washed the dishes, at 5:15 I gave the cats their treat, and by 5:30 I lay down on my bed, opened the laptop and played on it as I watched the news. At 7:00, I turned on Amazon Prime or Netflix – I don’t remember which – watched a movie, and turned off the lights around 9:15. I ran through this schedule in a daze; I could not stop wondering, Annabelle, Annabelle baby, where are you?
The next day passed much like the day before. Thatch and Stella tried rather desperately to cheer me up but all they did was irritate me. Thatch spent much of the day crying, and Stella bit me before she went to lie in the bathroom sink. I played at my composition for several hours before I tore up what I had written in frustration. Around 3:00 I took the walker and left the apartment to cross the street and pray at Holy Trinity Church. I’m not Catholic, but the church consoles me when I need a place to isolate myself and try to set aside my agnostic cynicism. I sat in the dark chapel and prayed for my friends and family. I wept, and prayed for those friends who had died, please, God, take them up tenderly, let them know they are loved and missed, I prayed for myself, and lastly, I prayed for Annabelle.
I pushed the walker out of the church and back onto West 82nd Street. As I stepped off the curb to the sidewalk in front of my building, I saw peripherally something running up the sidewalk toward me. Before I could turn to see what it was, Annabelle climbed up my pants leg to my sweatshirt to my shoulder. If I hadn’t been holding securely to the walker, we would have fallen onto the sidewalk.
Miss me? she asked.
Annabelle! I yelled. Where the hell have you been?
Yonkers. Open the door and let me in.
Get off me and I will, Missy.
She dived into the bag on my walker, and I fished the keys from my pocket. As soon as I opened the door, she ran into the foyer where she watched me wangle the walker through the door, hoist myself onto the step and into the foyer. She then had to wait in the lobby while I literally crawled up the five steps to the lobby level, set up the walker, and pull myself to a standing position.
There! I said. You look good, Missy.
I am good, she replied, Did you get my postcard?
I pushed the walker the elevator. Yes, I did.
Did Thatch tell you where I was?
Yes, he did, but I am very upset with you for running off like that.
I had to see my mother.
I pressed the button for three. That’s all well and good, but you . . . you should . . .
Come on, spit it out.
I couldn’t say what I wanted to say: how can you frighten those who love you? how can we live without you? how did I know you were all right? how could I live in peace not knowing where you were?
All I could say as we walked into the elevator was, I think Thatch and Stella will be happy to see you.
Of course they will be happy to see me, Annabelle said, isn’t everyone?
I wisely said nothing.
Did you have a nice time with your bodyguards? I asked.
Who?
You know, the pigeons.
Oh! Yes, I did. We came home today because they were homesick, and my ma was getting tired of me. We had a fight yesterday.
Really?
We stepped off the elevator and walked down the hall to the apartment.
Yes. She said, Annabelle, I told you when you were old enough to be on your own that it was rime to pursue your own life, so it’s time to start. Go back home. When I was a little girl, she told me the very same thing, only she added, These nice people will give you a good home in the Bronx, wherever that is. Goodbye, good luck, and get out. That’s how I ended up in the Bronx.
She did not say goodbye, good luck, and get out, did she?
I don’t remember, but it sounds good.
I opened the apartment door. As I wangled the walker into the foyer, Annabelle ran ahead into the apartment, yelling, Thatch! Stella! I’m home!
By the time I had put the walker in place, taken my cane off the edge of the stove, and wandered into the living space, she was telling Thatch and Stella about the perilous adventure. To hear her, a long walk from the Upper West Side to Yonkers was more perilous than a trip to an African or Amazon jungle laden with cannibals, quicksand, poisonous insects, and boa constrictors and pythons. It had everything but a white Englishman swinging on a vine to her rescue. Wide-eyed, Stella and Thatch listened and reacted strongly to each turn of events. I settled in my computer chair, and waited until Annabelle had finished her tale.
So, Annabelle, I said, things with your mother are okay now?
Yes, but she wasn’t happy when I told her how badly those adopters she gave me to had treated me.
What did they do? Thatch asked.
You remember, Thatch? I told you, I think. They moved away and left me starving in an empty apartment. Luckily, I was found and Daddy adopted me. Then he adopted you!
How did your mother react to that news? I asked.
Well, she said children always blame their parents and that it was time for me to go home and blame you for something. I love my mother, but it isn’t easy.
Family relationships can be difficult, I said. I’m sorry, Missy.
You are so lucky your mother is still alive, Annabelle, Thatch said in a trembling voice before he burst into tears. My mommy is dead, and I’ll never see her again. I miss her.
Sadly, that was true. Thatch came to us from a feral colony in the Bronx. Only he and his sister were rescued when they were a little more than two months old. I knew he still had nightmares, and that he had once told Annabelle all of the horrors the local bullies had inflicted on them from poisoned food to mangling and torture to his broken tail before rescue arrived.
Oh, Thatch! Annabelle cried as she ran to embrace him. I wish I could see your mama and tell her what a handsome boy she had! I’d tell her how kind and loving and generous you are, and how proud she would be to see you now! Don’t cry, little baby; you are safe and loved.
I had never seen Annabelle be so loving and kind to Thatch in several years. I teared up, as I realized I behaved much the same way to the people I cared for. Outside of an occasional “I love you” to a friend or family member, I generally kept my dealings with others on a casual level, afraid to get too close. I could count on one hand the number of people I consider friends close enough to let inside the many barriers I had set up during the last seventy years to protect myself. And the holidays were the worst. I remembered too many family Christmas and Thanksgiving dinners where a reminiscence could dredge up grudges and anger over some action or event that would lead to some hostility that was repressed during the rest of the year.
One Christmas, around 1978, my brother and sister-in-law were late for dinner. The family and guests waited while my mother raged. When my brother’s car finally pulled up, my mother ran to the door and threw their gifts at them while yelling they should get out of her sight. She never liked any of her daughters-in-law, never.
Families are hard to survive, I thought as I watched Annabelle hold and rock Thatch, while Stella looked on, not sure how to react to the naked emotions lying at her feet. After a long minute, she gently moved away from them and climbed onto my lap.
Thank God for love, I thought. Then I murmured to Stella, Come on, little girl. Let’s get a treat.
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.
©2023, Larry Moore
Annabelle & Thatch 