ANNIVERSARY

November 29, 1995

DONATELLO:

"Anna?"

If she was startled, she didn't show it. She hung her head, hiding her face behind her hair. "Hi, Donny."

"What're you doing up here?" I asked softly. She didn't answer. I didn't press her for an explanation. It wasn't like I couldn't guess.

I approached her slowly and leaned on the cement ledge, looking across the street at the barren site that once was her home. "Three months."

I said nothing, although I knew exactly what she meant. Three months ago tonight, that home fell apart. Three months ago, almost to the minute, the world stopped for just an instant, and when it began again it was without thirty-eight of its children. I closed my eyes and hung my head, offering a reverent silence.

A light snow was falling, and the site looked surreal and ghostly in the glow of the city lights. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Anna brush tears away. I stared down at the street. Every so often, a car passed. This was a remote part of the city, and not nearly as busy as Time Square.

The snowflakes came a little more frequently, and Anna looked up, wiping her eyes again. "When I was little," she whispered, hugging her jacket around her, "my mother used to tell me that the rain was tears of joy that God cried, over another child being brought into the world." She paused for a minute, and bowed her head again. "I wonder if He cries, too, for children who die."

I watched a woman pass by on the sidewalk below. Instinctively, my eyes scanned the area for any sign of danger, but she was perfectly alone. Still, my eyes followed her until she walked up the steps to an apartment complex and slid her key into the lock. With the recent rise in crime, muggings were even more common than they were normally. Anna was watching her too. "Did you know they're fighting over what to do with this lot?" she mumbled.

"No," I admitted.

She laughed cynically. The white flakes rested on her cheeks, and melted to water that ran with her tears. "Yeah, well... they are."

"Why?"

She sighed. "Some people want a memorial, other people want to build another building here. I guess it's prime land for business. And then there's people who want to put some kind of a homeless shelter or foster group home."

"What's that?"

"An orphanage," she rephrased. "Well, sort of. I dunno. We get kids who were taken away from their parents for abuse or whatever, so I guess it kinda is the same."

"But if there's already a place for them, they don't need another one," I observed.

"Yeah," she whispered. "But they don't care."

"Who's they?"

She shrugged. "Developers, city leaders... whoever else wants to give their two cents. It's about a lot of things, but it's not about the kids."

I considered that for a minute, then turned to her. "What do you want?"

She was quiet for a long time, then she looked at me. "I wanna bring those kids back, Don," she whispered. She paused for a minute as I let that soak in. "And if I can't do that, what the hell does it matter who builds what on a plot of land?"

I looked down at the street. "Yeah, but isn't it a little more than that?" I mumbled. "I mean, it's kind of a burial ground of sorts, isn't it?"

She said nothing. I closed my eyes and breathed in the icy air as the snow began to blind me. "I'm sorry," I finally sighed.

"For what?"

I turned and looked at her. She was crying again. Beyond her, a blanket of white was falling over the rooftops. "For your loss."

She shook her head and sobbed quietly. I looked away, but watched her out of the corner of my eye as she shuddered and sunk down into her jacket. She was almost shaking from the cold. I wrapped an arm around her shoulder, hesitating for long enough to see how she reacted. She tensed for just a moment, then leaned into me. She turned and draped her arms over my neck and I hugged her back. "If I haven't told you before, Donny," she sobbed into my neck, "thank you."

"For what?" I asked.

"For saving my life."

I smiled faintly. "Hey, thank Leo. It was his bright idea."

"For everything, Donny," she corrected. "Everything you did that night. The people you saved. You gotta know that those children will never forget you."

I hugged her for a few minutes while she cried, then pulled away from her. I brushed her hair out of her eyes. "You oughtta get inside," I mumbled. She nodded mutely, her eyes downcast. "Hey." I tilted her chin up gently, forcing her to look at me. "Want me to walk you home?"

She stared at me for a minute, then nodded.

ANNA:

"You've never been here before, have you?"

"No, actually, I haven't," he mumbled, looking around nervously. "And I'm not too crazy about the idea of walking around through the halls."

"Why not?" I asked.

He glanced at me. "No place to hide."

I smiled. "You won't need to hide," I assured him. "Everyone will be asleep. Besides, if anyone does see you, they'll just think you're Mike."

That shocked him for a minute. "Mike?" he questioned, as if he couldn't be sure he'd heard me right.

"Yeah, he walks these halls a lot," I grinned. "Or was that a big secret I wasn't supposed to let out?"

He studied me for a moment. It probably was a big secret, and being kept for a damn good reason. Splinter would probably kill him if he knew. I hadn't thought about that, but it wasn't hard to read the look on Donatello's face. "You're not going to get him in trouble, are you?" I asked nervously.

He stared at me for a minute, as if the thought hadn't crossed his mind. "Are you kidding?" he laughed. "That guy's got more blackmail on me than I care to admit there is!"

We made our way to my apartment and he relaxed as I closed the door. "I think I'll take the express elevator down," he mumbled, eyeing the window.

I smiled. "That's fine. That's how Mike and Leo usually come in."

"So Leo comes to see you too, huh?" he grinned, sitting down on the arm of the couch.

I shrugged, and realized that my hair was wet and cold. "Yeah, we talk a lot."

"'Bout what?"

I walked to the hall closet and pulled out two towels. I threw one at Don and he caught it just before it hit him in the face. I stepped in my bedroom, around the corner, but left the door open. "Whatever comes up," I called, stripping my shirt off and throwing my robe over my shoulders. The bottom of my jeans were all wet from the snow, and I didn't think I had another pair at the moment. At any rate, I didn't want to go searching for them. "He... has very strong beliefs."

"Yeah, tell me about it," Don called back.

I laughed quietly as I stepped out of my wet jeans and tied the robe tightly. "And you don't?" I challenged, pulling off my drenched socks.

"Mmm," he acknowledged. I picked up the wet clothes off the floor and draped them over the open top drawer of the dresser. "No, I really don't argue with him too much. Raph does, though. Just the past year, it's started getting a little tense. They always got along fine before that." He reconsidered that. "Well, not always. But usually. They didn't really fight, just kinda bickered, you know?"

He glanced up as I walked back into the room, towel-drying my hair. "Raph likes to see how far the rules can be stretched before they're broken," he explained.

I laughed as I sat down on the barstool and leaned forward on my knees. "Yeah, I can see where that would irritate Leo."

He smiled. "I think a lot of it, too, is that they kind of... subconsciously fight for leadership."

I stared at him. "What do you mean?"

He shrugged. "Well, they've both got these leadership personalities and they have very different ways of doing things. So they butt heads a lot."

We stared at each other for a minute. I couldn't hide my amusement. Leo was always so calm and controlled around me, I couldn't see him fighting with his brother. But I had no reason to doubt Donatello. I smiled to myself. I'd have to ask him about it later.

"So does Leo come over here a lot?" he asked. "I mean, you don't have to answer if you don't want to," he quickly corrected.

I laughed. "No, it's okay. I got nothing to hide. He comes over all the time." I sighed. "Well, at least he did before the gangs decided it was time to take over the city."

Donny nodded slightly, obviously deep in thought. "You like him?" he finally asked.

I felt my face get hot and he laughed quietly. "Sorry," he apologized. "It's just that I was wondering because he's obviously..." He paused and shrugged slightly. "Well, it's not really my place to say anything."

"No, what?" I pried. "What were you going to say?"

He shrugged. "Just that... I don't know. He's been different since he met you. More... I dunno. Secretive? And a lot less demanding. Just a personal observation."

I studied him for a minute, trying to determine how serious he was. I had to wonder what else he knew, that he wasn't going to tell me. He didn't give me much time to figure out what I was going to say next before he stood up and turned away.

"I better go," he mumbled. He glanced back at me as he reached the window. "You'll be okay here?"

I nodded, still slightly dumbfounded. "Okay then. I'll see you."

"Bye."

And with that, he was gone.