Annabel, Unwound
Chapter 1: Annabel
I'm Annabel. Nice to meet you.
I'm not really sure why I'm sitting here, writing this. But I'm sure someone's gonna read it eventually. I don't know what to write, I don't know why I need to write this, but I feel like I have to.
I'm sentenced to become an Unwind. And I'm already part-whole. Not fully-whole. When I was younger, there was a really bad accident. Six-car pileup. I was one of the lucky ones. My parents, they weren't so lucky. They died in the fire…and somehow, I survived. A few Unwinds supplied the blood I needed, a lot of others supplied the rest of what I needed - a few brain cells here, an eye there. That kind of thing. Somehow, my parents' health insurance paid for everything.
Twelve years later, I'm sixteen and the money's run out. There wasn't too much to begin with. I bounced from foster home to foster home, nothing's really worked out for me. They won't let me try living on my own, they say I'm too young. I've virtually been living on my own for eight years now. Since the first foster home gave me away. I guess my personality just got to be too much. I'm an intense person, they tell me...from what I've heard, the years haven't mellowed me.
Two months ago, the current foster family sat me down with my social worker. Told me, "We're sorry, but we just can't handle you anymore...and we were the last suitable family for you. We haven't the money, the time, the strength."They may as well have told me "Welcome to Golden Tulip Harvest Camp," since it basically means the same thing: "We're unwinding you."
Then, I lived in Akron, Ohio. Home of the Akron AWOL. Now, I live in the Graveyard. Home of the Akron AWOL. It's a graveyard for planes. We live and work in twenty or so of them. There's an entire A380 from the early 21st that we use as a library. The Akron AWOL himself lives in an old 747, the rest of us are in A320s and the like. Stuff from the early 21st. Right now it's late in the 21st, 2088 to be totally exact. The AWOL demands accuracy. We keep this place running. It's a sense of community, it's the way we all work together and we hide when people come, and we keep ourselves from being unwound. We're pretty tightly Wound - but you need to be that way to live here. Humor is sick, and more twisted than a ball of yarn. We've got the most tangled personalities on this planet. And somehow, it all weaves a calm tapestry that keeps us warm at night.
It's kinda weird how we all live together. Guys and girls don't see each other much unless they're on the same force. I heard the guy who ran this place before the AWOL made it that way, and the AWOL kept it that way.
The AWOL runs this place. He tells his story to every new flight. "Publicly, I'm E. Robert Mullard, but to you I'm Connor Lassiter. I was an Unwind myself...the Akron AWOL. Whatever rumors you've heard up until now probably aren't true. Here's what really happened..."
I've heard the story at least five times by now. Connor also started the whole flights thing. The first one to come in after he took over was 400. I was part of Flight 483.
Connor has a girlfriend. They're technically fiancées, but the thing is, they act more like teens in love than twentysomethings about to be married. Her name's Risa, and she's a virtuoso pianist...she's paralyzed from the waist down and she tells her story to every new flight. "I'm Risa. No last name, but I used to be a Ward. Some call me crazy, for remaining paralyzed like this. But I'm not...I did it to keep from being unwound."She usually takes a pretty big breath around here. Almost like she's bracing herself for what she's gonna say next.
"I was paralyzed in the accident at Happy Jack. Clappers went off in the building...one right below where I was standing, playing the keyboard. They offered to replace my legs. As of right now, I'm still refusing that offer. Even though I'm in no danger of being unwound, I still want a reminder of what happened. And I want my legs to be my own, not someone else's."
When she told that to my flight there wasn't a dry eye. We all started tearing up... it's cause of the feeling she puts in it. And what I put down up there was just a summary...the real story is longer.
Anyways. I've been working in the library for the past two weeks...they assigned me a job as "Librarian". I just re-shelve books all day long. Until three days ago, when Connor came up to me. He asked if I wanted to do something for the library.
"I'm already doing it." I kept shelving the books.
"No. What I mean is do you want to add to this library?"
"How?" He interested me with that question. I turned and faced him.
"Write a memoir."
"Oh?" There was a challenge discreetly laid in my voice. For him to find, of course.
"Yeah. You know how I'm the Akron AWOL?"
" 'Course. Doesn't everyone?"
"I've heard your story's nearly as good."
"Doubt it." He lost my interest and I went back to shelving.
"Still. Consider my offer. Find my jet when you want to take me up on it."
A day and a half later, I showed up pissed on his doorstep.
"Sure. I'll do it."
He took me inside and gave me a slim laptop.
"Only a few basic programs run on this baby. Open up Notepad and write. Unless you want paper?"
"I'll take the paper first."
So here I am, sitting and chickenscratching away like an early-21st schoolkid. On paper. With a pen. Not a pencil...those smear. And besides, pencils are hard to find.
I guess I'm supposed to end here? I don't any case, I'm glad I learned how to write with pencil and paper.
A/N: Nope, no words missing, even though it might feel like there are. Revised slightly on 8 June 2011. I'm thinking of continuing this finally, and I've started a second chapter. The hardest part about it is trying to make the next character have a different 'voice' from the bitterness that Annabel carries.
Anyways…his name is Jericho. He's seventeen, and he's from Wichita, Kansas. He's starting to really develop in my mind right now, and I like how he's developing…I just hope I can make him develop as well on paper as he is in my mind.