Skinny • Book 1 In The Reality Series

Anna

I don't have a key.

I know exactly where the keys are.

One is on Calum's desk.

One is in Dad's pocket.

Mine is on the counter.

A lot of good it does me in there.

It's not too bad, sitting outside. There are birds to look at, and lizards dart out of the grass and towards my feet at random, acting as sporadic bursts of relief from the otherwise crushing feeling of grief twisting my soul.

The girl that lives next door is outside too. She's only a few years older then me but she's already married to a guy my Dad's age.

They're always yelling in that house, screaming and shouting, slamming doors and breaking things.

Sometimes the police come, sometimes they don't. I like when they do. The neighbors are violent, one of them is going to end up dead, I just know it.

The girl has a fat lip today. Sometimes it's a black eye or a bloody nose but today, it's a busted lip.

There's a baby on her lip, he looks like her, same olive complexion, same dark hair. He's eating a popsicle, it's blue and now his lips are too.

He's wearing a diaper, she's wearing a wrinkled button down shirt, that's it, nothing underneath. She's also smoking, puffing it right in the kids face.

I watch her husband's kids leave for school. I've seen them when I go to Calum's parent teacher conferences when Dad can't make it.

They look like their dad, blonde, blue eyed, wealthy, arrogant.

I watch the girl with the busted lip and the blue mouthed baby remove her cigarette from her mouth and extinguish it in her McDonald's cup.

I know how she met her husband, everyone does. She was working and he was a client.

She gets judged for it. Most people judge her, I don't. Nobody wants to do what she did. It's sad.

Noticing me watching her, she reaches up and runs her fingers through her curly hair.

It's incredibly awkward.

I wave.

The baby waves back.

She smiles.

"Hi." I greet from my porch.

"Hi." She answers.

"I'm Anna."

Her face lights up momentarily, "No shit! Me too."

"Really?"

She nods, "This is Noah."

"Hi Noah."

He's too focused on the Popsicle to notice.

"Is your mouth okay?" I ask focusing once again on Anna.

"Oh yeah." She laughs, "You know babies they throw their heads back n' shit."

I don't believe her. She can tell, I can tell.

It's her turn to change the subject. Placing Noah on her hip she crosses the dew covered grass which divides me house from hers.

She's barefoot. I notice, her toenails also need to be cut.

"Everybody okay over here?" She asks, "there was an ambulance or some shit here last night."

She likes the word shit.

"My brother is sick." I say, not wanting to get in to details.

"Aw shit, he okay?"