ANNIE    

A fictional story                     

by Miriam Weiser

      I was a homeless girl, barely fifteen years old. I had been roaming the 

streets for who-knows-how long, eating out of better people's garbage and sleeping wherever I could find space for my 5'1" body. I didn't know for sure that I was 5'1", but according to the chart in front of the mall, the one with the Loony Toons character hovering over it, I was. I about reached the height of the chart. That was how I determined my height. As for my age, I guessed. Although I'd been fourteen for who-knows-how long, I didn't know when my birthday was. No one ever told me. 

Oh, maybe when I was one year old, they gave me a big birthday party but, of course, I wouldn't remember it. That was a long time ago and I was too young. And maybe when I was two and three, I had the same big bash, this time inviting my little friends from the private school which I probably attended. I must have had birthday hats and all that stuff, I'm sure I did. Then again, maybe I didn't. After all, where were they now, those people who gave me those parties. Wouldn't they be worried about me? Wouldn't they try, with all their means, to find me and take me back in and wash me and nurture me and feed me until I was back on my feet again? And I could attend school every day and play with my friends and my computer and go shopping at the mall, like I see all the fifteen-year-olds doing every time I hang out there with my torn clothes, the same ones I've been wearing for weeks, hungrily watching those neatly dressed teenagers happily licking their frozen yogurts and talking and yacking away about what they will buy and where.

They would. But they didn't, did they? I didn't know how long it had been. Months, maybe years. Another holiday passed as I watched the better people running around shopping for gifts for their family and loved ones. I watched as they giggled and laughed and complained about their hardships, about having to buy all those gifts. Why can't we buy just for the kids? I heard someone once ask. So many gifts so many friends, sigh, sigh, terrible to have to live in a world full of people around you that care. So many friends and family. I have to go to my in-laws for the holidays, one lamented, all those people, the whole family, oh! I really felt bad for these unfortunate humans. To have to share their lives with so many.

I watched, one day, as a couple of businessmen hurriedly passed a couple of my older comrades-of-the-streets and barely glanced at them as they tossed a couple of coins their way. My friends had to scramble on the floor for the change that would barely get them through breakfast. I thought it was horrible of those men. The better people, my foot. My cold, blistered, wounded foot that was encased in some old, dirty, torn fabric that I found once while scavenging for some food in a back alley. I vowed as I glared at them that they will not see a good day. I thought maybe there was some divine spirit or something that would hear my thoughts and actually make them come true. I pictured those better people entering their offices and finding nothing to do. No phones ringing. No one buying anything from them.

I'd never even been to an office building. At the mall I could get in. Not an office building. Impossible with all the guards at the door and on every floor, probably. 

Anyway, what could I possibly look for in an office building, a job? Ha.  

I was sitting around one night, contemplating my next step, when something bounced in front of me. I was in a back alley, again, looking for food. I was always hungry. It seemed I could never get enough. It was dark. Long after supper time. But then, they didn't have me wash up and sit at a large table with a few forks and spoons set for each setting, did they? They didn't feed me a healthy, filling, satisfying meal, about which most children complain they don't like, did they? I didn't get any dessert, and that wasn't because I wasn't a good girl. Because truly I was, honestly. I hadn't thrown my clothes around my neat little bedroom. I wouldn't have missed my school bus if I'd had one to catch, honest, I was up since dawn. When the sanitation trucks and the delivery trucks go roaring up and down the avenues waking the dead. I sure wouldn't have disrupted my class in the middle of a lesson, I'm sure I wouldn't have done that, given the chance.  

So this thing bounced in front of me nearly knocking down the carton of bones I was holding in my hands. It fell on my knee and then landed on the ground right next to me. After I'd polished the bones with my fingers and lips and teeth, I must have been very, very hungry that particular night, I wiped my hands on my now filthy skirt and reached gingerly for the shiny object that looked vaguely familiar. I held it up to the alley light and lo and behold, I was holding the briefcase of a better person. A businessman's briefcase! I couldn't believe me eyes and stared at it for a long while. Until I realized that it was strange. Why would a businessman want to throw away a briefcase that, by the looks of it, was his life. He seemed to carry it all over. I had seen them carry it in the morning on their way to work, when they entered the ominous office building, and again when they reappeared for their lunch break or meetings, for I'd seen them meet people for lunch at restaurants. I could see them eating all those fancy things and then leave over half of it. I used to run to the back of the restaurant then and scour the garbage thinking that they must put those leftovers somewhere. Sometimes I'd find them and sometimes they would find me and shoo me out of there. Like I was there to do trouble or something. So, there I was holding the precious thing and who-knows-what is inside. Then I asked myself, who knows what is inside? After all, they threw it away, didn't they? So, I opened it and stared. I saw pictures. I'd seen horrible in my days, but these were horrible. Extra horrible. I couldn't, at first, look at them so I pushed them aside and looked deeper in and stared again. There was money. Lots more than I had ever seen.  

There were checks too. Those I'd really never seen. I'd have to throw those out, I thought. The computer looked nice, but I would never know how to use it, and neither would my friends, I thought, as I scratched my dirty hair. Garbage flies were all over me, but I was afraid to move, figuring maybe it was a dream. I'd buy me some breakfast first thing in the morning. I'd go into a store and show them the money and they would give me what I wanted. I didn't know what I was going to have first. Then I was going to buy breakfast for my comrades-of-the-streets. I'd buy a few of those piping hot bagels and warm my frigid body with a cup of fresh warm coffee. Then I'd get coffee for all my friends.

I could use a sweater. Hey, I could buy a coat. It is almost winter. I could buy a coat and then I could buy a coat for all my friends. I'd probably have enough money to buy lunch, too. I remember smiling for the first time in months. I pictured my friends smiling and thanking me for my gifts to them. My heart was so happy. I could act like a better person for a few days. Then I remembered the pictures I'd seen when I first opened the briefcase. I moved over to the alley light and adjusted myself underneath it so I can inspect them. It was awful. There were a couple of pictures of a man, a scary looking man. I moved them around and came upon a picture of a body. That was what it looked like. From what I knew, which was little, there was probably a murder involved here, and I felt like I was transported back to the time when they still allowed me into the library, which was long, but not too long ago and I'd fall into a novel for a few hours. It sure helped me pass the time. Just as I was getting used to the idea that a crime had been committed and this briefcase that I was so happily holding in my hand, was somehow involved, I heard a car screech. A couple of voices started whispering too loudly. They were looking for something. I quickly hid behind a large container amid the bunches of garbage, and held my breath, scared out of my wits, as a burly man entered my alley and sauntered about barely touching anything. He was looking for the briefcase and was breathing heavily. 

He was as tall as the statue in the park, and just as wide. Only he wasn't a piece of stone. He was real and scary looking. His hair was a little bushy and it looked as if its' owner had a hard time keeping it tame. The brown curls were a shiny damp and haphazardly combed to the back of his head. His breathing was rapid as he tried to hold his nose against the stench of the alley. The small, dark space reeked, a smell I was getting used to. Not that I liked it at all. I was just getting used to it for lack of a better idea for food.  

"I don't see it, let's get out of here." Burly said to his partner.    

"What do you mean? We'll get killed." The other one said, sounding very scared himself. He was smaller than his friend, but just as scary looking.

"We'll say we burned the briefcase, c'mon, I can't stand this smell." Burly was already leaving my space.

 "But what if he doesn't believe us? We'll end up just like Hammer." The second one was shivering.

 "You'll end up just like John. He'll kill you, not me," he hissed. "You were the one that so brilliantly threw it in the alley." 

 "I didn't know there was incriminating evidence in there!" 

 "We'll come back when it gets light. Maybe. Meanwhile stick with me on this." They left just as fast as they arrived, the car screeching away and I couldn't move for a good five minutes. Then I realized that I had to get out of there. They said they would be back, didn't they?  

I couldn't carry the briefcase in my hands as I headed into the street, what if they should see me? Wouldn't that look a bit conspicuous? I pictured myself, a rumpled dirty, tired, homeless girl carrying a good briefcase. I almost smiled at myself. I felt in the briefcase for the money and counted it. There was $1,000 in the briefcase. I decided to leave the money there and take only a little bit for breakfast. 

I was petrified that maybe something would happen to me and then they would find all that money on me. I really don't know what I was thinking. I just felt uneasy about taking so much money with me, so I took ten dollars and put the rest back in the briefcase along with the pictures and I searched for a place to hide the briefcase. If they do come back in the morning, I didn't want them to find it. I'm not sure why. It just felt right at the time.  

I hurried out into the street, looking both ways, and when I was sure that nobody was there, I headed toward the mall where I liked to hang out in the morning. When they would open at six o'clock, I'd go and buy myself breakfast from the deli. I was content to sleep on the bench in the parking lot, knowing that I would have a good breakfast in the morning, and also, the guards usually only checked the grounds at night. They didn't bother to look again at this time. When I looked at the big clock on top of the bank a half a block away, it was three o'clock. I nodded off to sleep with happy thoughts two minutes later.

At 6:30 I was awakened by a security guard who was checking the parking lot for people like me who had nowhere else to sleep and shooing them and me off the property. But I was happy this particular morning, scooting off the bench and out of the guards’ way. He eyed me with a funny look on his face, and I smiled to him. He must have thought I was a bad girl, up to no good or something. And maybe I was. After all, I had been planning all night how to use money that was not mine. Of course, this businessman probably had lots more and won't even notice it was missing, but still, I knew it wasn't mine. I started hating myself for thinking such thoughts. All I wanted was breakfast, after all. Why couldn't I enjoy this newfound wealth for a few days without a guilty feeling? All I wanted was a warm meal. That was all I had wanted.

I slowly entered the cafe‚ along with the other people coming for their morning coffee with a muffin, or a bagel with eggs, or whatever they fancied this morning. This time I was inside looking out and not the opposite. I listened to what people were ordering and thought about what I should order as I stood in line in front of a patient man. He was patient because instead of hollering and yelling for people to make up their minds and hurry on, he was calmly reading a newspaper that had that day’s date on it. I couldn't help but catch the headlines, because he was standing sideways instead of his back to me and he was reading the sports in the back of the paper. It sprang out at me and hit me in the heart so that I had to lean on something and take a deep breath. The headlines read: Businessman Missing; and there was a picture of him, holding his briefcase and smiling into the camera as he waved to the photographer. The briefcase looked just like the one I'd hidden. I stared so hard and when the man in front of me moved on to the counter, I couldn't stand there any longer. I walked straight out of that store. So, he didn't throw out his own briefcase, somehow, I'd already known that! Was he the one that the goons were talking about in the alley? If yes, that would mean that he was killed! Oh, my gosh! I thought. I walked briskly, as briskly as I could, rather, to the newsstand at the corner and took a peek at the cover of a newspaper. Businessman Missing, it screamed, and in smaller letters I could just make out, before the newsstand owner shooed me away from there, John Hammer, it said. I just stood there, a few feet away, not moving. The streets were getting busy with the beginnings of a new day, the better people going to work, the homeless scavenging for food for breakfast, the children hurrying off to school and me, standing there like a fool, not knowing what to do. 

I had to start moving, eventually, if not I would have been thrown into the gutter by the throng of people, right into the oncoming traffic! Nobody would have cared, but still, I had to do something. But what? Go to the police? They'd laugh me right out of there. They would never listen to me. They would think that I just wanted a place to sit where it was warm for a while. They would think that I was making up a story. I was at a loss for what to do, but I found myself walking towards the police station, composing a nice way of telling my story.  

I had a better idea, then, and I decided to wait outside, like that they wouldn't think that I wanted to stay warm. Not that I didn't want to stay warm. It was getting colder every day. But they had to see I was sincere. I'd wait outside, that was my plan, and when an officer, preferably one that looked nice and not mean and scary, passed by I'd stop him and plead my story. I'd tell him where to find the briefcase, which should convince him I was telling the truth. Then I realized what that would mean. No more money for me, that's what! I could forget about the breakfast for my friends on the streets. No more sweaters and coats for any of us, if they find the briefcase and take it into the police station. I considered going back to the alley and retrieving the rest of the money, and then going to the police. 

They wouldn't know how much money was in there, after all, isn't the man dead? I recoiled at my horrible thoughts, and almost slapped myself, right there in front of the police station, because that was where I was standing, and a cop, a nice looking one, was sauntering my way with a look on his face like he will take care of the situation. Nicely, of course. But when he came close it was all I could do but stammer my story with tears rolling down my cheeks. I told him all about the briefcase and where it was so if he didn't believe me he could go and check it out. I also told him to be careful because the goons mentioned that they might come back to look for the briefcase. The cop was nice. He escorted me into the station and seated me in a folding chair next to a desk. He called another cop over and made me slowly repeat my story.

"I think you should go and see if the briefcase is still there, where I hid it, because they said they will come back in the morning to look for it, because they'll be killed just like John Hammer was if they don't bring it to him!" I said forcefully.

"Who is Him?" The second officer asked me.

 "I don't know, they didn't mention his name, they just said he'll kill them!" 

The officers looked at each other and then at me. I guess at that time they decided to believe me and got some secretary to look after me while they left to look for the briefcase. I really hoped they would find it. It would definitely help them to believe my story, wouldn't it?

The secretary, Mariah, gave me a cup of warm coffee and a couple of donuts. So I had my breakfast without spending any of the dead man's money, and that reminded me that I still had the ten dollars in my pocket. I told Mariah, for she was a nice lady, that I took ten dollars from the briefcase for breakfast, and does she think they, the cops, would mind, and she said she didn't think so, but that I didn't have to pay for the coffee and the donuts, and we'll tell them when they get back. 

Mariah smiled at me, and I felt good. I liked Mariah a lot. She was nice. I wondered, as I watched her work, how come I had never seen her around on the streets.

A half hour later the two cops came rushing into the station with one of them holding the briefcase and huge smiles on their faces. I was afraid of what might happen next. Would they send me back to the streets so soon? What will I then have for lunch? I looked at the briefcase, remembering all that money, and I looked at them fearfully, afraid to even utter a sound and they came closer to me and looked at me like they were my father or something, although I had never had, or maybe I don't remember having had, a father. The first one knelt by me and asked me where I lived. I said "Here and there, nowhere special." Then he asked me what I ate for breakfast, and I smiled and told them what Mariah had given me. I told them how much I'd enjoyed it and hoped that I didn't eat up their food. They smiled and reassured me that it was OK. That it was extra. Extra? I wondered if I could take some out to my friends but I was afraid I would be asking for too much.

And before I knew it, somebody came into the room where I was sitting, waiting for who-knows-what, maybe that they should send me back to the street, where I lived, and held a bag out to me. I asked what was inside and they said it was clean clothes that they thought for sure would fit me. I didn't know if I should accept it but they reassured me that it was for me and I wouldn't have to pay for them. Then Mariah said she was going out to lunch. I had been sitting there for a while, looks like, because apparently, it was already lunch time. I guess I was mesmerized by the hustle and bustle of the station and also it was warm in there. Mariah said to come with her, that I would be safe with her, and I realized that my life was in danger. Because what if the goons saw me talking to the police and put it together, they could come after me and do the same thing for me like they did to John Hammer. Mariah took care of me from then on. I loved her like a mother right away. She gave me lunch and assured me that I didn't have to pay for it. She said that I could come to her house after work and that I could help her with the children. 

I was a little scared and bewildered. I'd never taken care of kids before, but she said that I could play with them. That, I was sure I could handle. I didn't understand why, but Mariah said that I could sleep in her kids’ room that night and a lot of nights thereafter, I slept in the kids' room. I loved the kids like a sister and a brother right away. They were so sweet and called me Aunt Annie. I really liked that.

About a week after the encounter with the briefcase, I was getting used to the warmth and the meals and the company of Mariah's house, she took me to work with her. She said they had brought in the bad guys, and I had to show the cops if these were the ones from the alley. I was scared, but Mariah stood next to me the whole time as a few gooney men stood behind a glass window and I pointed out the two from the alley. I recognized them right away because they put a fear into me like no other, and I'd seen fear in my short life, didn't I?

I was afraid of what they would do with me after that episode and I asked Mariah that day at lunch. "What do you mean, Annie," She asked "we can't let you go now. We need you." The way she said 'we need you' sounded like she couldn't go on living without me. Of course, that probably wasn't all true, but that was what it came out sounding like, anyway.  

"What for, Mariah?" I asked quietly. 

"Well, you need to testify at the trial," she said, starting to tick off her fingers. That is if you want to help us. And I need you to help me in the office. And the kids need their Aunt Annie to play with and to teach them songs, you know." I really felt like standing up and hugging Mariah, right there in the middle of the crowded deli, where we were eating lunch. But instead I started crying. I don't know why, but I did. My heart was bursting with gratitude for this wonderful lady. I wanted to stay with her for the rest of my life.

"But, Mariah, why?" I croaked. She smiled through tears of her own as she answered me in a quiet voice. "Annie, I want you to stay with our family. I've come to like you very much in the last week. The kids have come to love you, too, and I am offering you a job in the office to be my assistant." I couldn't believe what she was saying. A job? Ha, it was a joke, wasn't it? But she wasn't laughing, not jokingly, anyway. She looked totally happy for me. She then explained to me how she had tons and tons of work to do and she had asked her supervisor for an assistant. She said that I would get paid a weekly salary. I smiled when I realized that she meant it. Even after I told her I didn't really know anything. She said that for this job, you don't really need to know anything, and that I was the perfect candidate for the job.

Then she said, "Let's go shopping."