Chosen One - Black Sheep

One broken window later, they were in the house.

“Are you happy now?” Paul hissed. “Look at this mess we’ve made.”

But Anne didn’t hear him. She heard her footsteps against the wooden stairs. She heard her breath escaping her. She heard the child sleeping in her stomach, the baby she knew was a son, and his heartbeat against her ribcage. She listened for any sound that Helen was okay, for any sound that her fear was unjust, for any sound at all.

There was none.

She first laid eyes on Helen from the sliver her bedroom door had been left open. She was lying too peacefully in her bed with her hands crossed on her chest. There was vomit everywhere.

Her glasses were on her bedside table. Her hair was curled. She was wearing the pink dress she wore to church every Sunday and her patent leather shoes. She was wearing gloves. Her face was caked with make up. Red lipstick, garish rouge and blue shadow smeared all around her eyes. It had been applied with little girl hands.

She looked so young.

For the rest of her life, Anne would remember that face.

She’d wanted to leave beautiful.

“You’re a stupid girl. You’re a stupid, stupid girl,” whispered Anne, running towards her on the bed. She lay her head against her chest and heard a faint heartbeat. She tried to lift her.

Paul stood, frozen, in the door frame.

“Help me!”

He didn’t move. She’d married a coward and, as time passed, that remained the most terrifying discovery of the day.

There was a hospital visit. There were doctors and nurses, and blurred images on ceilings that would haunt Helen for years as she tried to sleep.

All that Helen concretely remembers is Anne, whispering in her ear. “Listen to me. I’ll keep this between us. Just you, me and your brother. I’m not worrying your mother with this. This is between us.” She pretended to sleep in the assigned bed.

When Anne woke up the next morning, she was still crying.

Helen spent the next two weeks, on her knees, praying. He’d sent someone to save her. That was all she needed. He’d loved her enough to let her stick around.

Through death, she found God.

“I owe Anne my life,” Helen would tell her friends in another language, with one too many drinks of wine as decades past.

“What do you mean?” they’d ask.

“I owe them my life,” was all she’d say.

Then she’d find her way home, lost on the cobblestone streets, speaking to some angel high above her that kept her company, alone, in the most beautiful city in the world.