Strange in Skin (30 page)

“I’m just trying to tell you that sometimes we don’t think we’re doing the right thing at the time. Our
hearts blind us by love even when we know we should move on. The hardest thing I ever had to do
was leave Russell. But I did. And it was the right choice. I can honestly look back now and say that.
And you will too.”

So she thought I was being forced to give up. Well, she didn’t know me that well then. I would
never give up. Never.

“Thanks for the pep talk,” I said, a little on the sarcastic side. “But you have no idea what you’re
talking about.” I stood and tossed the blanket back down on the couch. “I doubt you’ve ever been in
love if you think you have to manage it.”

My mother looked horrified. She probably thought I was the bipolar one now. But I didn’t care. I
couldn’t believe I had actually felt sorry for her a moment ago. What was wrong with me? This
woman was as crafty as Mrs. Anderson. She worked the angles she knew were my weaknesses. I was
proud I hadn’t gone past any boundary. She still knew nothing.

Carlin stepped into the living room just then. She had on a gold sweater and a tight black skirt. She
looked annoyed as usual.

“Did I overhear you two talking about love?” she asked, raising her eyebrows pettily at us. She
threw back her head and chuckled. “True love doesn’t exist. You’re a stupid woman, Annie, for
putting all of your trust in something that isn’t really out there.”

I wanted her gone so badly. She was such a nuisance around here. Why was she still hanging
around since mother was getting so much better now? I couldn’t stand to look at her for another
moment. Carlin turned around and left the room.

“So,” I said calmly to my mother. “You keep bringing Russell back up. Do you still think about
him?”
“Every day,” she confessed.

“Huh,” I said. “Maybe you really did love him. Maybe you shouldn’t have given him up for
that
.” I
looked toward the entranceway of the living room indicating Carlin. “Seems like a waste of life to
me.” And without bothering to look and see what kind of face my mother was making at that moment, I
turned around and stormed out of the room.

Chapter 15

I had become so utterly disgusted with my life, I couldn’t even get out of bed anymore. I locked
myself away in my bedroom, each day passing and blurring into the next. I had nowhere to go, no one
to see, no one to turn to. I had no responsibility to anyone else. I felt completely hopeless, the very
life sucked out of me. I didn’t care if I laid there and rotted to death. What was the use of trying to
even put on a show anymore? I was too worn down for that.

Sometimes I wouldn’t think at all. I’d just stare at the ceiling and trace the way the plaster circled
around the ceiling fan. Then when I thought I had almost reached the brink of insanity from the
repetitive eye motions, I would return to my misery and overanalyze everything that it brought along
with it.

Why had Emry even bothered to say he loved me? Why would he had chosen
that
exact moment in
time? Was it because he truly did love me and had to confess it that second or he’d explode from
keeping it in? Or, was it for a different reason altogether? I started to think that maybe Emry knew that
was the last time we’d see each other. It was his way of telling me that it was the end. It was more
like a
thank you
instead of an
I love you
.

Life was unjust. It had teased me into believing that I could find some sort of happiness here, and I
had been just naïve enough to believe it. What an idiot I was. How could I allow myself to get mixed
up with someone that was impossible to be with? Why had there been such a connection? Why did I
still miss him so much that my heart felt as if it were being ripped apart little by little, the torment
slowly killing me from the inside out? I wanted to scream. I even tried once, but no sound came out. I
was becoming a hollow shell now. The emptiness consumed me.

I hated this house. I hated this town. But where else was there to go? Everywhere else would be the
exact same, and I didn’t even feel I was independent enough to try to make it on my own. My misery
would follow me wherever I went. I was sure of that. But I didn’t belong here, with
them
. I wasn’t
even really a part of the family. I didn’t have a family. I had no one. How did it come down to this?
Wasn’t I happy just a year ago at this time? I shouldn’t have found any of this out. I should have
continued being who I had been. But then, I wasn’t happy then either. I was merely fooling myself into
believing that I was. Meeting Emry opened up a part of me I never knew existed. What a terrible
waste I had been.

I missed those blue eyes. How unfair it was to have met such a man and feel like I was so in love
with him and yet, on the other hand, feel as if I barely knew him. We should have had a life together.
We could’ve lived in Evadere, our perfect escape, where no one would be able to find us. I missed
the way he pushed back his hair out of his eyes with his hand only for it to fall right back down again.
Now I knew what it felt like to have a broken heart. Such relentless agony.

The desolation poured into me, clawing its way into my soul so that I could almost feel its grasp on
me. Slowly it would suffocate me, wouldn’t it? I could only pray for some sort of death here. I
welcomed it. There was nowhere left to turn to.

Day turned into night and night into day. I barely noticed. My curtains were drawn closed so that
not a single speck of light could come in. I needed a shower. I needed to eat. But I just didn’t care.
Sometimes I would hear whispering outside my door. Sometimes I’d hear knocking on the door, but
it was too faint, too drowned out by the pain. I wouldn’t move a muscle knowing they wanted to come
in. I really just wished they’d all disappear. The mere thought of them totally vanishing actually made
me feel slightly better. Knowing they were here just plummeted me further into the depths of despair.

“Anna? Anna?”
My eyes flickered open momentarily. Had someone been calling for me?
“If you don’t open this door, it will forcefully be opened.”
A threat. I didn’t budge.

Soon I heard the noise of some sort of power tool as my door was being taken apart at the hinges. It
swung open from the wrong way. A pool of light filtered in through the hallway. It was bright. I
shielded my eyes with a blanket.

“Leave me alone,” I grumbled.

 

I heard a sigh and a few more whispers. It was my mother and father. I didn’t know why I still
referred to them as that. I really should start referring to them by first name now.

“You have to get up and eat something. Please,” she pleaded with me.
I closed my eyes again and pretended they weren’t there.

“If you don’t get up and eat something, we’re taking you to the hospital. They’ll put an IV in your
arm and give you nutrients that way,” my father threatened.
I knew he wasn’t bluffing by the tone of his voice. Very slowly I rose up on my elbows and made a
good attempt to sit upright. My muscles were so stiff, they burned in agony at my trying to disturb them
for use now.

“Fine,” I mumbled. I watched my mother reach for the switch on the lamp beside my bed. “No,
don’t turn it on.”

She hesitated and then her arm retreated. She set down a bowl beside me on my nightstand and a
glass of water. My stomach growled and actually hurt when I saw the food. Nausea overcame me, and
I almost threw up.
So this was what starvation was like
, I thought. How long had it been since I’d
eaten anything that had even a little bit of substance to it?

I realized that they weren’t going to go anywhere until they actually saw me eat with their own eyes.
I huffed for a moment before picking up the bowl and shoving a few bites in my mouth.
“Anna, you have to talk to us,” my mother pleaded, her voice full of desperation. “You have to tell
us what’s going on with you. I’ve never seen you this way before.”

“A lot has changed,” I told her, my voice still soft but grim. The bites of soup went down hard as I
swallowed. I reached for the water to wash it all down. “I don’t want to talk to you. I want you to go
away and leave me alone.”

“I’ve had enough of this!” my father yelled out. “You are a grown woman acting like a child! You
will eat all of that, and when you’re done, you’ll take a shower and come downstairs and at least
spend a little bit of time with your brother!”

“He’s been asking about you,” my mother added.

Ah, Matthew. A soft spot. I suddenly felt guilty that I had left him down there to deal with them,
although in his mind, he still thought they were wonderful. A wonderful, united, faithful, devoted
family. I almost threw up all the bites of food and water I had just eaten. They really did make me
sick.

A little while later, after a hot shower and clean clothes, I physically felt better as I sluggishly
walked down the stairs, my hazy mind and heavy heart tagging along with me. I took one step into the
living room and immediately everyone stopped talking and just stared at me. They were all there, my
parents, Matthew and Carlin. They had been waiting for me. It felt like a trap.

“What’s going on?” I asked them.

My mother stood up and pointed to the couch. “We want to speak with you, dear. Please, just take a
seat.”
I took two steps backwards, the sight of all of them together and all wanting to try to intervene on
my life suddenly pressing upon my chest. I could feel a slow panic taking over me.
“Sit down, Anna,” my father said in a stern voice.

I stared at them for a few more seconds before pressing my lips together, and against my better
judgment, taking a place on the couch.

“Matthew, why don’t you go into the office and draw for a little while?” my mother suggested.
Carlin reached for his wheelchair. “I’ll take him.”

My eyes trailed the back of Matthew’s wheelchair, then returned to the other sets of eyes in the
room staring at me. Carlin returned quickly.

“What do you want from me?” I snapped, wanting nothing more than to return to my tomb upstairs.
The three of them exchanged glances amongst themselves.

“Well, we realize a lot has happened over the past couple of months for you,” my mother began.
“And now you’re not able to handle it anymore.”

“I’m handling it!”
“By locking yourself up in your room?” Carlin said.
“Why are you even here?” I asked her in an angry tone.
She glared at me and then pressed her back up against the wall.
“We have all talked about this,” my mother went on. She looked up at my father hesitantly.
“About what?” I asked.

My father sighed. He too was standing. “We’ve all agreed it would be in your best interest to take a
little trip, get away from what’s bothering you.”

 

Now they wanted rid of me. How convenient. Was their spotless reputation in this town blotted
black by their once seemingly perfectionist of a daughter?

“I’m not going anywhere.”
“Anna, just listen to us for one moment …” my mother pleaded.

“No!” I shouted. “You don’t get to decide my life for me. I mean, where do you think I should go? I
don’t have money to go somewhere. This is ridiculous.”

 

My mother bent down on her knees in front of me as if making herself a human barricade so I
wouldn’t run out of the house. “I know you’re upset.”

“You have
no
idea what I’m going through,” I snapped, giving her the dirtiest look I possibly could.
She let out a frustrated sigh.
“You can go anywhere you want,” my father told me. “Anywhere in the world. I mean it. We have
money saved up. Just get away. You won’t be going alone.”

“Oh, yeah? And who exactly do you have in mind to go with me?”

 

They all looked at each other. They had obviously planned this all out way in advance, and it
irritated me that they had been talking, scheming about me in such a way.

 

“Me.” Carlin took a step toward me.

 

“What?” The thought horrified me. “I can’t stand to be in the same room with you. What makes you
think I’d want to take a trip with you?”

 

She smiled, a smug look on her face.

I felt the fury rising in my throat. It took a hold of every aspect of me. I wanted to lash out and hit
her. I loathed this person. Only she could make me so infuriated that I couldn’t even think anymore.
“Anna, be reasonable,” my father said, his tone still relatively calm as he tried to convince me.

“Reasonable? You want me to go with
her
?” I couldn’t even say her name. The very idea of her, let
alone her name, made me want to vomit.

“Take a few weeks … months, whatever you need.”
“You think time is what I need?”
“It is what you need,” my mother blurted out. “Time heals all.”
“You’re so stupid,” I told her. “You all are. You have no idea. It kills me that you have no idea.”

“You think you’re the first girl to have your heart ripped out by some jerk?” Carlin asked. “No,
you’re the stupid one. You really need to grow up, Annie.”

“Ugh!” I cried out, jumping to my feet, my hands balled into fists at my sides. “I will
never ever
go
anywhere with
you
!” I screamed out at the top of my lungs, my voice sounding like a raspy growl as
the words came out. “I hate you!”

“Anna, don’t, please,” my mother begged.

 

“Don’t what? Say what you can’t? You hate her, too. You say you love me, but yet you want me to
go away with someone that you can’t even stand yourself?”

 

“Carlin’s the one with a lot of travel experience here,” my father tried to explain.

“No, it’s all right.” Carlin crossed her arms, but she wasn’t raising her voice at all. She narrowed
her eyes at me and then lit a cigarette in the middle of the living room. “It’s totally fine that she
doesn’t want to go with me. It’s not really about me anyway.” She exhaled, the smoke fleeing from her
nostrils. “None of this is about anything that’s been going on with us. All of this has to do with
him
,
the one she’s supposedly in love with. What was his name again?” She took one more hit of the
cigarette, and then a smile crossed her lips. “Oh, that’s right.
Emry Logan
.” The way she pronounced
his name so slowly and with such arrogance made me almost lose what little self-control I had
remaining.