Chapter 2: ANNA
They called me Anna. The bringer of joy. Gracious.
They, as in my parents. My real parents. The ones who gave up on me.
I once asked Dad who they were and why they let me go, but he just sort of evaded and told me to continue eating my food because, for God's sake, it was getting cold. Dad used the word God a lot. I used to think that it was because he was a religious man, but then Nancy, my nanny, told me that it was because he thought he was a god, as many others did. But when I asked her what that meant she said that these things are not for good little girls to hear.
I think I was five at the time.
When I asked Mom about my parents she said they were drug addicted, the kind that you see shot at the stage every Monday evening. She wouldn't tell me if they had been shot, too.
I used to hope they had been because it would mean that they hadn't chosen to leave me, they had had no choice. But then Nancy said that I mustn't say that. That good little girls must be compassionate even to the scallywags that abandoned them.
When I asked Mom what a scallywags was, she told me that I shouldn't ask these kinds of things, and Nancy was fired.
But that was OK, I didn't like her anyways. She said a lot of weird words and never explained them to me.
Then Joshua came.
Mom and Dad fought. Dad said that no man would get close to his daughter and Mom yelled back that he needed to stop being such a chauvinist and that I wasn't his daughter. They were silent for a minute and then Mom said that she was sorry, even though I could tell by her voice that she wasn't.
Mom and Dad couldn't have children. They explained it to me when I was really little, and said that the stork was afraid of them. But then I heard Nancy saying that it was because Dad was an alien, and his body wasn't right for humans.
I believed that more because there had to be a difference between Dad and the rest of the world. Grandpa is telepathic and Grandma has element control, but Dad always looked normal to me. So if not having kids is his thing…
Some people said that Dad was strong and had heat and X-ray vision, too, but I never saw him use any of these things. He said it made Mom nervous.
He also told me one day that he considered being a hero in disguise, to help the innocents, and he even showed me his outfit. I thought it looked really stupid and told him that. At first he laughed but later he rebuked me that I shouldn't say these things, or Mom would hear.
I always knew he was a little afraid of her.
So I said that it looked funny instead. That he would have caught a cold wearing only those tights, and in any case, putting on glasses as a secret identity was lame. People would be on to that in minutes.
He agreed with me and told me that this was why he decided there were better ways to save humanity.
He wouldn't tell me how.
One day we had a weird phone call from someone named Chloe, but mom hung up on her. She showed me Chloe's picture and told me this woman was insane, and that if I saw her I should call Dad.
I promised I would but decided that she didn't tell me to call him immediately, so that means that talking to her was OK.
I tried to find her in the yellow pages but there were too many Chloes without pictures so I gave up. I was curious, sure, but I couldn't find her and saw no point in angering Mom and Dad with questions. And I couldn't ask Joshua either, because I knew that he would report anything I asked him to Mom, even if I asked him not to.
I once asked him if he had nightmares and he said that everyone did, and this was nothing to be ashamed of. I made him swear that he wouldn't tell Mom and Dad, and told him that I had this dream of a young man and woman hugging each other, and me. But then the earth was quaking and thunder hit one of them, and he was burning. Then someone took me. They said it would save the world. But nobody heard me crying, that I didn't want to go.
The next time I had that dream Mom and Dad were by my bed and they told me that I had nothing to worry about, the flood couldn't hurt me.
But I never told Joshua about the flood. I liked the flood. It made it harder for the bad man to get me.
Then one evening when it was just me and Dad in the house, we got another phone call. This time from a panicked man. Dad paled and called Joshua, said that he needed to come home and babysit me. But Joshua wouldn't do it, he said that he told us already that his wife was in labor, and that this was the first time he asked anything from Dad. But then Dad cursed and made me close my ears as if this way I wouldn't hear how much he swore. Then he made sure that my hands stayed on my ears tightly, and called Pete.
Dad once said that Pete was a friend, but by the way they talked on the phone he didn't sound like a very good one. Dad yelled a lot and I could hear Pete saying things, too, even if I tried not to. So Dad cursed again and then he lifted my hands from my ears, and hung up the phone so hard that it broke.
I think he sensed that I was scared because then he came to me and hugged me tightly. He told me that we needed to go, so I should hang to him tightly and when we'd reached there, I was not to wander around.
So I grabbed him and for the first time I saw how he flew!
That was the first time I ever saw the Outside. Mom and Dad always told me that the Outside was full of bad people who lie and steal. Some of them would even try to hurt me, even if I didn't do anything bad to them. It was because I'm their daughter.
But this time they wouldn't hurt me, Dad said. Because he was there to protect me.
They were right. I didn't like the Outside. It was cold. And noisy. People were running everywhere, and there was too much dust that got into my eyes. I once heard Joshua saying that the air was polluted outside, but only now I understood what polluted was. I wanted to ask Dad how they could live like that, but then he flew faster and I couldn't open my mouth to ask him for fear of throwing up.
A moment later we reached a small yellow house, and though the air still smelled weird, it was better. There weren't so many cars there, but the place didn't look welcoming. It had a large pointed fence around it and I couldn't see the entrance. But Dad flew right in so I guessed this was probably why they didn't have a gate — they could simply fly in and out.
We landed near the front door and he told me in a harsh voice not to move from the spot where he put me, and then he rushed inside and closed the door.
There were shouts and a voice of something breaking. In about a minute later the door was opened and a blonde woman came outside to me.
"Oh, my baby," she said, tears in her eyes. I remembered her. She was Chloe. The insane. She got me confused with her daughter, I realized, but I decided that I wasn't afraid from her. Only for her. She looked like a nice person.
"Hi Chloe, I'm Anna," I said. I hoped that I was appropriate. Joshua always told me to say "Mrs." to whomever I want to address, but I didn't know her last name. And besides, she didn't look offended.
"Come to me, please." She stretched her arms to me, and I didn't know what to do. I wanted to call Dad but that would mean that I wouldn't meet her and ask her if she knew my mom, the one question I dreamt to ask the first Outsider I would meet.
I then decided that I would come to her because I could always call Dad later, so I stepped closer when the door was opened again, this time Dad standing in the doorframe.
"Don't come any closer, Anna!" he instructed me and then said in harsher tone, "Leave her alone, Chloe."
"Leave her! She's my baby, Clark! I believed you, damn it! Damn it!" she shouted, tears running uncontrolled down her cheeks.
She was very pretty but she had sad eyes. People always say that I have sad eyes, too, but that's because I'm not allowed to play with other children. I wondered if that was why she was sad, too.
I wanted to ask her that but then the sadness disappeared and there was something hard in her eyes instead. Like Mom's eyes when she talked about why we couldn't meet Jonathan and Martha because they only want to take me away from them.
Then a bald man ran to her, shouting, "Chloe, NO!"
But she didn't hear him and I saw that she had a gun in her hands and wondered if she would use it, and I wanted to see what was going to happen, but Dad caught me and closed my eyes and ears fiercely with his hands, hugging me. He told me that everything was going to be OK.
But I knew that nothing was. She shot the gun.