1642734778_punk-57-pdf

road for hours alone while your new kids,”—I shove at a picture frame on
her desk, making it tumble forward—“in your new house,”—another
picture frame—“with your new husband,”—the last picture frame—“were
all tucked safe and warm in their beds, but not Annie. She was dying alone,
having never felt her mother’s arms around her.”
She hunches forward, breaking down and covering her mouth with her
hands again. This can’t be a surprise. She had to know this was going to
happen someday.
I mean, I know she hasn’t seen me since I was two, but I thought for
sure she would know me. That first day, seeing her in the lunchroom, I felt
like she was going to turn around. Like she’d be able to sense me or some
shit.
But she didn’t. Not then, not when she pulled me into her office for a
“Hey, how are you?”… and not any time after that.
She deserted us and moved away when Annie was just a baby. After a
time, I heard she went to college and started teaching, but honestly, it barely
hurt.
I could understand being young—twenty-two with two kids—and not to
mention the cut-throat family she married into. But I thought she’d
eventually find her way back to us.
And later, when Annie and I found out she was only one town away,
married to a man who already had a son, and she’d started a family with
him and still hadn’t made the slightest effort to seek Annie and me out, I got
angry.
Annie did everything in the hope our mother would hear about her or
see her team in the paper and come for her.
“Now…” I say, my tone calm and even, “I don’t want any of those
things. I just want my sister back.” I lean forward, placing my elbows on