Chapter 2

I was still concerned about Annie medically – about her health, and her development – and about whatever there might be in her physical history.

Old Doc Marsh has taken care of the people of this county for decades. That includes me, like the time I broke my arm jumping off a boulder or if I had an earache or needed a vaccination before returning to school. He’s mostly retired now, but about two years ago he took on a young doctor who had already been in general practice for a few years but who’d grown up in an area like this and wanted to practice in a place where he could hunt and fish and snowmobile.

While mostly retired, Doc Marsh still saw patients when “the young feller” couldn’t make it or simply needed a break (often to hunt or fish). So when Annie first came to stay with me (that sounds a lot gentler than saying “when I first took Annie”), I knew that I had to have Doc Marsh examine her. Also, a doctor whose practice is in a small community knows a lot about his patients’ personal lives and about the importance of protecting peoples’ privacy and, sometimes, their secrets, and I knew that I could trust Doc’s “discretion” when it came to Annie’s and my “unusual” situation.

I took her to the doctor to see how she was physically, and also, find out what to do about a child whose vaccination status was completely unknown. Doc had spent only a few minutes with Annie before he knew “what kind of a child she was,” or in other words, what kind of “family” life she’d lived. He looked at me, and I nodded. This was a young child who was going to need a special kind of care.

Doc asked her if she would put on an examination gown. She looked at me like she wasn’t sure what the man was asking her to do and wasn’t sure if she should do it. I explained how this man was a doctor, and he knew about taking care of people, and that he had taken care of me when I was her age, and that in order for him to be able to do that right he needed her to wear a special kind of robe so that he’d be able to see her “completely.”

Apparently my explanation worked, because she took the small gown that he was offering her and he stepped out of the room while I helped Annie put on the strange dress that didn’t seem to have a back to it. I tied the neck ties and in a loud voice said that we were ready.

Doc performed what you’d describe as a “routine” examination, but I could also see that he was carefully feeling her bones for any breaks that might have healed and looking at her skin for any signs of prior abuse – of any kind, if you understand what I’m saying.

When he finished, we left Annie in the examination room to get dressed (I had already untied the neck ties) and Doc and I stepped into his office.

“She’s a ... an unusual girl, Lucas. Overall, she’s in good health – surprisingly good health, actually, a mite small for her age but ... by the way, how old is she?” I had to admit that I had no idea but guessed that she was five or six. That sounded about right to Doc.

“But I think I understand what you really want to know, Lucas. You want to know if the child has been abused. And the good news I have to tell you – well, relatively good news, anyway – is that the only abuse that I can see she’s had is simple, plain-old neglect. That’s good news, I reckon. If I had to guess, I’d guess that in her brief little life, she just been “there,” that she was someone – or some thing – that had to be fed and clothed, but not much more.

“I hope that makes you feel better, Lucas.” It did.

“As for the vaccination thing, if I had to bet, I’d bet that whoever was caring for her wasn’t the kind of person or people who were real attentive about details like that, so if it’s okay with you, I’d just like to assume that she hasn’t had any, or at least hasn’t gotten the full course of anything, so we should probably make sure she gets the whole schedule. We could start today with Hepatitis B and DTaP. There’s no harm if she’s already had any of them, so better to be safe. I’ll give you a schedule and you can get in touch with me or Jeremy when she’s due for the next ones.”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I knew that I could trust Doc Marsh knowing about Annie and me. Now, what to do about other people? I couldn’t keep Annie locked up here in the cabin. One, I couldn’t go somewhere and leave her alone. Two, I didn’t want to. If I was going to be the responsible adult in her life, I needed to include her in my “normal” life which. come to think of it, would need to become her life, too.

People who live in this part of the state are the kind who say what they mean and mean what they say, but they don’t say much. Folks mostly have a “live and let live” attitude toward others and pretty much keep to themselves – some of them by nature, others by upbringing. Still, there’s the matter of explaining how all of a sudden I happen to have a young girl living with me.

The place we’d be encountering people most often would be the gas station-convenience store out on the state blacktop, Cooper’s General Store. I usually go there for milk and bread and coffee and other grocery essentials, plus they also have a small selection of tools and basic household necessities, as well as supplies for sportsmen and snowmobilers, plus the only laundromat for miles around. And gas and kerosene, of course. It’s also where people, including myself, go to drop off mail and pick up their packages, like anything they’ve ordered online or by mail-order.

I began by explaining to people that Annie is “my niece’s daughter,” and that my “niece” was going through a rough patch and asked me to take care of Annie until she got things together. I thought that describing her as “my niece’s daughter” was sufficiently vague and wouldn’t invite further inquiry – potentially a problem, since some of these people who’ve known me since childhood might remember that I’m an only child, with no brother or sister to endow me with a putative niece.

But, of course, when months turn into a year, and then longer, and she’s still with me, people will wonder if my “niece” was ever going to return for her daughter. Then I’ll have to come up with some other explanation to account for her continued presence with me.

Something else that needed an explanation was the matter of her silence. People of course wondered if she was “all right,” and I quickly reassured them that she was “smart as a whip,” and I’d quip that “the fact she doesn’t talk just goes to show how smart she is!”

Anyhow, the few people we’d encounter at Cooper’s generally came to accept her presence with me, and most had a kind word of greeting whenever they saw her, and “old” Mr. Cooper, who’s about the same age my dad would be if he were still alive, usually had something for her, maybe a piece of candy or a sucker, or sometimes it might be a cookie or a small bag of chips – always with my permission, of course.

So people got used to seeing Annie and me together, and quiet as she was, she became a regular at Cooper’s store.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

And so Annie and I developed our routine together. We were pretty much a partners in everything. I told you how we started by cleaning up after eating and washing and drying the dishes together, then moving on to fixing meals together. It started simply with making toast or an English muffin, then the instant oatmeal, then macaroni and cheese. At first she simply assisted me, but then I would have her fill the pot with the water and I’d put it on the stove for her. I taught Annie how to set the timer and turn on the gas and adjust the flame – and make sure that it was out when we finished.

And together we fried eggs in the morning and grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch and hamburgers on the grill outside.

And we cleaned the house, and I taught her how to use tools – to screw in a screw, hammer in nails, saw a piece of wood, and when she got bigger and stronger, how to use a hatchet to chop wood for the grill and the fireplace.

And with a little girl living with me, I learned to pay more attention to my grooming, shaving every day or two instead of every three or four days, maybe not wearing that same shirt “just one more day” – things like that. And while I didn’t completely discard my trusty Corn Huskers Lotion, one time in town I bought a big jar of some kind of hand cream – Nivea, I think it was called – that Annie and I could both use.

And we read. And while Annie practiced picking out her letters and words and numbers on the computer, I started writing again. And it might have been my imagination, or maybe it was just that I felt better about myself and my life, but my writing seemed to be better in some way. I was even starting to think about submitting some of my stories again.

And sometimes I’d look at Annie, sitting across the table from me, or perhaps across the room, and I’d wonder – is she thinking about us – about our situation, about how she got here, and about her life before – before that morning in the supermarket...?

And before I knew it, a year had flown by.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I’d had to guess at Annie’s age, of course. And my guess was that she was now close to the age when children start school. So one Tuesday morning in August I took Annie to the consolidated school in Warrenton to get her registered (promising to come up with her birth certificate – “I shouldn’t bad-mouth my niece, but she’s pretty much – if you’ll pardon my expression – an airhead.”). Then I thought of another detail that might help if the birth certificate continued to be an issue: “Also, my niece’s had to move a bunch of times the last three years and I think she’s lost track of a lot of stuff, like papers and such.”

Then I did what I had intended to do all along – request that I be allowed to homeschool Annie. In fact, homeschooling is quite common in this area. One reason, of course, is that some families live quite a distance from the few schools that do exist in this neck of the woods. The other reason is that many parents in this region are, how can I put this, “independently-minded,” and don’t fully trust the school authorities to educate their children in the “proper” way.

I argued that because our home was so remote, getting Annie to school every day would be difficult, especially since budgetary problems had forced the small district to reduce busing, even cut it completely in some areas. But in the back of my mind, I was thinking that this was a small rural school district and they didn’t have any provisions for students who were non-speaking. So while they tried to make a big deal about my request to homeschool Annie, I think they were secretly relieved that they wouldn’t be compelled to make any adjustments or provide special services for a little girl who is non-verbal.

So twice every year we’d drive to the school and pick up the curriculum for that term, and over the ensuing months Annie and I would faithfully execute that curriculum.

And together we conscientiously worked our way through those curricula, term after term, school year after school year. And once she “got” the idea of school and of structured learning, Annie, to no surprise, proved to be a very quick learner – so quick, in fact, that daily lessons intended to occupy 4 or 4-1/2 hours each “school” day were usually finished in half that time. It goes without saying, I attributed this to the fact that I’m such an excellent teacher.

But this was only one part of Annie’s education. Completing her “school” lessons was just the start for Annie, and with the power of her fingertips on the little black buttons on the computer keyboard, she found that she could discover the answers to a world of questions: “pompeii,” “how does electricity work?” “the solar system,” “bake a cake,” “what does souffle mean?” And, of course, the inevitable, “where do babies come from?”

And what about me? What was I doing all this time? I never even gave a thought to “my” life. My life was raising and protecting a young girl. And if you’re asking, “Do you really mean to sacrifice your entire life to take care of this ... orphan?” my answer would be that I’m sacrificing nothing – that nurturing this girl, raising her and teaching her – is more satisfying, more rewarding, than anything I could ever have imagined. I can’t even picture what my life would be if Annie weren’t in it.

So while Annie probed the universe for answers to her thousands of questions, I wrote.

We’d spend much of our days doing “work:” cleaning the cabin, cooking meals, working around the lot – clearing brush and stuff – tending our garden, fixing things, gathering and chopping firewood. We’d go down to Cooper’s once a week for basic provisions and to pick up any packages, and into Pres-lee now and then. (We don’t go into Marshall very often, despite the fact that it’s closer – I was concerned about bad memories of “that day” for Annie. That, plus the distinct possibility that she or I might be recognized, and people might remember that incident, that time in the supermarket ... So, no, we don’t go into Marshall often.)

But during the evenings, while Annie was either doing school work or searching for information about ... about everything, I started writing again. Only now, the stories, and the words to tell them, seemed to come easily, more naturally, I don’t know why.

And they were better. The first story I wrote after ... after Annie ... was accepted (with the usual revisions) on the second submission. The next two things I wrote were rejected outright a bunch of times, but then my fourth story was accepted on the very first submission, along with the totally unexpected, “Do you have anything else?”

And every evening, after supper and before bed, we read. First it was Winnie the Pooh, and then Peter Pan, followed by Alice in Wonderland. Then A Child’s Book of Heroes, then Nancy Drew (better than the Hardy Boys, I always thought), a book of mythology, Little Women, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, and that got us into more biographies.

I decided to try some plays. These did not go as well, probably because I’m not a very good dramatic reader. Curiously, though, Annie did seem to enjoy Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot and had us read it several times. I think for some reason she sensed the absurdity of it, and that appealed to her.

Deciding that we could use a change of pace, I got out an old atlas, and I explained to Annie the concept of maps as representations of the earth. I found an old road map that the state Tourism Board distributed many years ago and I showed her where we are, and the roads and towns that we’re familiar with, and then the states around us. And for her “birthday” – it wasn’t her birthday, of course, it was the anniversary date of our first day together – I ordered a lovely world globe that was glass and had a light inside. And I explained how this was a “model” of the earth, and of all the continents and countries and seas and lakes and oceans that are on it.

And then, because of Annie’s insatiable curiosity about nearly everything, I found a splendid book aptly titled, “A Short History of Nearly Everything.” Annie loved this book so much that she wanted to read other things by the writer, and this led us to the many books about his travels, and his observations about the people he met on his travels.

So if you’re worrying about my life – don’t. My life was – is – incredibly rich and full of wonderful adventures, and it’s unimaginably satisfying.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

One time when we were in the dollar store Annie came across a package of stick-on letters. She seemed fascinated by them and indicated that she wanted me to buy them.

Later, at home, I saw that she was working on something on the old laptop computer I had given her for her own use. She appeared to be finished with what she was doing. There was this look of satisfaction on her face when she flipped up the top and I could see the letters: “ANNIE’S COMPUTER.”

She’d even snipped off a sliver of the “I” to make the apostrophe.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Annie slept in “her room” almost every night. Every now and then she would come and slide into my bed, I think when she probably had fits of loneliness. Or perhaps she had dreams, memories of her life before ... before. Sometimes she’d snuggle up against me, the way she did the first few years after she came. Most times, though, she’d just lay there, not up against me, but not avoiding me, either. I think she just drew comfort from my presence, my being near her.

Until one night.

A little background. It had been thirteen years since Annie grasped my hand that day in the supermarket in Marshall, and my best guess was that she’d been five or six then (this was Doc Marsh’s guess, too, based on her development at the time I first took her to see him). Anyhow, like I said, Annie slept in her own bed, in her room.

Until that November night. I’d just gotten into bed and pulled the covers up and made myself comfortable when I heard a sound, and then the sense of the covers being drawn back – and then of Annie, slipping into bed with me.

My main reaction was of confusion: Was Annie lonely, or having a nightmare? Or was she confused and had come to the wrong bedroom? Or was I in the wrong bedroom??

And then I felt it – a hand, between my legs, gently grasping a part of me that no one else has touched in so many, many years. And to my surprise, I felt myself starting to thicken there, and this just added to the confusion I was experiencing.

I’ve never, ever done anything with Annie that could be thought of as sexual, in any way. I never looked at her, in reality or in fantasy, in a way that could be described as sexual. No. A lithe, willing Annie had never crept into any wayward dream of mine.

And it’s not that I’m such an exemplar of virtue and saintly restraint. It’s just that there wasn’t anything there to make me experience feelings like that.

First, of course, there is – there was – Cindy. For me, sex meant Cindy, and Cindy meant thoughts of sadness, and that wasn’t an emotion calculated to engender sexual feelings. As a consequence, I pretty much “took care of myself.” Like I did before Annie came. I’d been alone for years, with no desire to do anything about that, and I just continued the practice after she came – more discreetly, of course, but still, that was the totality of my sex life and the full extent of my sexual desires.

Second, from those very first hours, I felt an almost overpowering sense of responsibility toward Annie, of parental feelings and protectiveness that totally precluded any possibility of sexual thoughts.

And finally, well, this might sound terrible, but there’s not much that’s “sexy” about Annie. She’s perhaps five foot four, but she’s so slight that she looks four or five years younger than her age.

And for that matter, just what is her age? She’s been here, with me, since – well, the Doc and I agreed that she was probably five or six when she first came, and it’s been thirteen years now, so she must be 18 or 19. And while the doctor says that she’s quite healthy, hers is still the stature of a 14-year-old – and not a very robust 14-year-old at that.

So, no, it wasn’t a matter of saintly restraint on my part. It’s just that nothing ever lined up for me to experience any sexual thoughts or feelings toward Annie.

And now there’s a naked 18- or 19-year-old girl in my bed, and she’s doing a surprisingly capable job of making my tired body experience things it hasn’t experienced in decades (and the thought intruded: did she learn how to do these things on the Internet?).

And I wondered – is this it? Has it finally happened – that Annie’s body has matured to the point where she’s experiencing sexual feelings, and that it’s entirely natural for her to want to act on those feelings?

And if she is, what do I do about it? What is my role in all this?

I’m sure you can imagine my dilemma.

And I already know what you’re thinking. “What dilemma?? There’s no dilemma! It’s just a lonely, degenerate man, exploiting his position of trust and responsibility in order to abuse an innocent child.”

I can understand how you’d think that. But remember – it was Annie who came to me, into my bedroom, into my bed, touching me, her hands on me – “there.” No, this is what Annie wanted. It’s what she wanted – wants – to happen.

The inevitable occurred, and I got hard, and in the moonlight that was coming through the window I could see Annie smile, the sense of accomplishment visible on her face. Satisfied with her “work,” she raised her leg and swung herself over me and positioned herself right against the tip of my cock, and I could feel something slick there, and I realized that Annie had already prepared herself with some kind of lubrication. She began to lower herself onto me, and I knew what was coming.

I tried to hold her slim hips, to stop her from ... But she seemed to know what was coming, too. In the light I could see her clench her teeth, then suddenly plunge herself onto me, and I heard her gasp, and the little cry. I wanted to die.

But Annie had been prepared – she’d been expecting this. She stopped moving, and she waited, and when I could see in her face that the initial shock and the pain had subsided, she started moving again. Her movements were kind of random, and certainly not those of a sexually experienced woman who knew how to please her lover – or herself. But to me, of course, it didn’t matter. I hadn’t experienced the feel of a woman in 25 years, and my body reacted.

And I could see Annie’s startled expression as she felt my semen jet into her, shooting against her insides for the very first time ever. And she smiled, and there was that look of accomplishment again. She moved her pelvis, like she was trying to spread around whatever it was that was inside her.

I couldn’t help myself. I took my hands from Annie’s hips and wrapped them around her shoulders, and I pulled her down to me, and I kissed her head, and I cried into her hair – I don’t know why.

But as soon as Annie caught her breath, she pushed herself up from me – and she smiled, and she rolled off and onto her back next to me and reached out and grabbed something. It turned out to be a towel – apparently Annie knew exactly what was going to happen, and she was going to be prepared! Using the towel, she wiped between her legs, then reached over and wiped my cock and groin, then looked between my legs at the bedsheet to see if there was anything there to be wiped up.

Apparently satisfied, she put the towel aside – and pulled me over on top of her. Annie spread her legs and looked directly into my eyes, and it was obvious what was expected of me. And amazingly – or perhaps not-so-amazingly – I was still hard. Again, it was Annie who took me in her hand, and I lowered myself and she placed my cock into position, and I leaned into her, gently at first, but then more insistently as Annie grabbed my buttocks and pulled me against her.

I won’t go on describing what we did – I’m trying to be accurate, but not pornographic. And when I came into her, I could see Annie smile again, and she wrapped her thin legs around my hips, almost as if she was trying to keep me locked in place.

I finally withered, and Annie released her legs and her arms and gently guided-rolled me off her and onto the bed. Then she smiled at me – again, that little self-satisfied smile – grabbed the towel, and scampered – yes, scampered – back to her room.

Knowing Annie, it did not surprise me that this scenario was repeated the next night, and for most nights after that, five, maybe six nights a week. And Annie basically directed the action, although I quickly showed her how and where to touch herself to experience pleasure while she was doing this.

But most of the time, Annie wanted me on top of her, her legs pulled back as if she was trying to keep every remnant of our sex inside her.

And of course I thought about pregnancy, and from the second time, and repeatedly after that, I tried to communicate this to Annie, but she adamantly refused to see the doctor, and the couple of times I tried to sneak on a condom (bless Mr. Cooper’s discretion) she noticed immediately and stopped me, with a look that said, simply, “NO!”

And, yes, of course I thought of refusing her “advances,” of trying to dissuade her from this? My concern was, did I dare do anything that might seem like I was rejecting her?

Well, on that I got my answer – and yours.

One night, maybe the second week that Annie had been coming to my bedroom and into my bed, I was, how can I put it, “unable to respond.” This was a complete surprise to Annie, who apparently thought that it was “automatic” – that a woman touched a man there and then he got hard so she could put him inside her. On this night, though, I might have been too tired, or perhaps coming down with something – or perhaps feeling guilt over my role in Annie’s nighttime visits. In any case, I couldn’t get hard for Annie, no matter how diligently she tried.

She raised her head from my mid-section and looked at me – and the look in her eyes was nothing less than pure accusation. I was failing her – denying her something that she was entitled to. She resumed her efforts on my failing cock, and seeing no response, she raised her head and looked at me again, and this time I saw anger.

She glared at me, and she straddled me and she began hammering on my chest with clenched fists. She proceeded to pound on my chest, tossing her head back and forth, almost as in anguish, beating on my chest some more, then dashing out of bed and running, crying, into her room.

I could hear her sobs. I gave her a minute or two, then got up and quietly went into her room. She was lying face down on the bed, sobbing. Literally. Her body rose and fell with each sob. I felt absolutely terrible. I had failed my precious Annie – failed her in some way, some way I didn’t fully understand, but I knew that, yes, I had failed her.

I leaned over her and put my arms around her, and I tried to tell her that a man can’t always do what she wanted me to do, and that it wasn’t her fault, that maybe I was just too tired or maybe a little bit sick, and that, yes, I still love her and care for her, more than anything else in the world, and that sometimes things like this happen with a man, but it doesn’t mean that I don’t care any more, and I promised that I would do better the next time.

The sobbing eventually stopped, and she calmed down, and when I heard her familiar snore begin, I kissed the back of her head and went to my bedroom.

Annie continued to come to my bed – I never went to hers – for nearly a year.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

And then one morning, as I was sitting at the table finishing my Honey-Nut Cheerios, Annie came out of her room, still wearing her nightgown, and there was this strange smile on her face. She stopped, and she made sure that I was looking. Then she rubbed her tummy. It wasn’t the circular rubbing that she’s used since the very start to let me know that she’s hungry. And she wasn’t clenching her stomach with her hand, the way she does when she wants to tell me that her stomach hurts.

No, this time it was different. This time she was holding her hands together, fingers interlaced, down low on her abdomen. And she was making a rocking motion with her two hands.

She was going to have a baby.

I got up, almost spilling my cereal, and rushed over to her and threw my arms around her and hugged her and kissed her hair and rocked her back and forth in my arms, and in a greater display of physical affection than we’d ever done before, we laughed, and then we cried – and then I stepped back and held her at arms’ length, then pulled her to me and we hugged again.

Annie was going to have a baby!

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

She never visited my bed again. I had performed my function, and, apparently, I had performed it well. And I was happy that I had done so.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

And once Annie began “showing,” there was the issue of appearing in public.

I told you when Annie first came to live with me that people in this neck of the woods for the most part have a “live and let live” attitude and pretty much keep to themselves and expect others to do the same.

Still, there was this strange young girl, and she was obviously pregnant, and there was the fond, protective “uncle,” and they lived by themselves, out in the country, with no one else around ... I think that for many folks, they were simply pleased – well, pleased is probably too strong a word, but maybe appreciated the fact that Annie was at least as old as she was before becoming pregnant.

There was also the concern, on my part, at least, as to her health. As soon as I realized that Annie was pregnant, and that her pregnancy (and the subsequent delivery) mandated medical attention, I called Doc Marsh, who first congratulated me – and the young mother-to-be, of course – but also said that he was too old to give Annie the continuing attention she would need but said that “the young fella” – Jeremy Willens, the young doctor that he took in and who now runs the practice – would be happy to help Annie with her pregnancy and look after the baby after it’s born.