Anna

41 - Anna

Content warning: child death

Every nerve in Ellie's body begged her to run away and never look back. Her mind tried desperately to go into flight mode, but her heart kept her planted right where she needed to be. She looked up at the woman with powder-white hair who had just called her by her dead mother's name.

"Eleanor, dear, it's snowing. Where is your hat?"

Ellie's forehead wrinkled at the old woman's strange words. She was not sure if she should address the woman's confusion in weather first, or the mistaken identity. Thankfully, Freya came to her rescue, their shoulders brushing together as she stepped up to Ellie's side. Even Enrique Iglesias' ears perked at attention.

"It's springtime in LA," Freya said. "It never snows here." Freya had taken half a step forward so that she stood just in front of Ellie, as if she and her dog were protecting her from the shriveled old lady. Maybe it was because she was no longer the weakest-looking one in the room, but Ellie did not feel threatened by the elderly woman.

The woman stood less than five feet tall, around Ellie's height, in the doorway of Apartment 2B, directly to the left of 2C. Yellow light slipped into the dark hallway from behind the woman, leaving her to look like a shrunken silhouette. A sweet smell wafted past Ellie, filling her mind with memories.

"Miss Helen?" Ellie looked past Freya at her old neighbor.

"Yes, dear," she said in a more aged voice than Ellie remembered. The years had not been kind to Miss Helen, just as they had not been kind to Ellie. The woman's thin, white hair sat atop her head in a poofy afro that looked as frail as the rest of her. Her hands shook where they grasped the door frame for support.

Ellie stepped past Freya so that nothing stood between them.

"D-do you think I'm Eleanor?" The old woman tilted her head as if she could not see any differently. "I'm Ellie, her daughter. Do you remember me?"

Miss Helen shuffled forward, earning a growl from Enrique Iglesias, whose barrel-shaped body was still nestled in Freya's arms. Ellie rarely met anyone older than her and the same height, but the hunch on Miss Helen's back made her shorter than she used to be. As the woman drew closer, Ellie saw her face more clearly. The old neighbor seemed to have aged more than seven years. But as she inspected the girl in front of her, a light returned to her eyes that Ellie had not realized was missing.

"Of course I remember you, dear. What on Earth are you doing here?"

A small grin tugged at the corners of Ellie's mouth, but her smile fell when she realized the absurdity of her plan—or lack thereof. She broke into her old apartment building to do what? Look at it? Search for answers to questions she did not have?

"I—I don't know..." Ellie's shoulders drooped and she hung her head. She turned to Freya, who seemed just as confused as she was about why they were there. Embarrassment hit her like a shockwave over the fact that she dragged her unwilling friend into their current mess in the first place.

She turned to Miss Helen again with pleading eyes. "Please don't be mad."

Sensing Ellie's sudden onset fear, Freya joined her side again, letting their arms rub against each other. But Miss Helen did not seem upset. Instead, she reached out a shaky arm towards Ellie and gestured towards her open door.

"Come inside, dear. It's freezing."

Ellie shuffled along with Miss Helen and looked back to see Freya hesitate before following.

The inside of Apartment 2B was like stepping into a time machine—in more ways than one. Aside from the fact that it was identical to Ellie's old home, it looked the same as she remembered, just as the building's exterior had. The obscene amount of mix-matched patterned fabrics and clutter that took up nearly every inch of surface space overwhelmed Ellie's senses. Even though her eyes were bone dry and wide with wonder, she had trouble seeing straight as every detail blurred together. Still, Ellie could picture herself sitting at the exact wooden table as a young girl, eating homemade cookies and watching a public access network on that same small, ancient television.