Chapter Twenty-One

 

Anna smiles for real, for only the fourth or fifth time in what feels like a couple of days. She's supposed to hear from Josh again some time later. He's promised to call. She believes him. But right now, it's time for life to go back to normal.

Mom and Dad invited her over for dinner, to celebrate Ava's safe return, and she couldn't possibly be happier. It's better than cooking herself, after all. Not having to clean up, not having to deal with going out to buy stuff and decide what to make—all of it makes it worthwhile.

Being with family, which might be enough reason all by itself, is almost just a bonus.

"So everything's alright now?" Mom's smile is hopeful, but not yet to the point that Anna would describe it as wide or confident.

Things could always get worse. That's the lesson that Anna's had to learn several times now. This time, maybe it'll stick. But then again, maybe it won't.

She straightens up and looks down at herself. She watches her elbows. They stay tucked in close to her body. Her back is straight. Head up, and she's got good posture. She looks good at the table. It should be second nature, but it isn't.

"Well, there's a lot going on. I'm sure that it was on the news, right?"

Mom shrugs. "I didn't see anything about anything, sweetheart. I just know what the Detective told us, and I know that our little sweetheart is back, and we couldn't ask more than that."

"They, ah… whoever took Ava. They took Mr. Queen."

"What? You're not serious, are you?"

"It was right in front of me. I guess I should've stopped them, huh?"

Mom's eyes are wide as saucers, and she looks back and forth from Anna to Dad so fast it looks like she's shaking her head.

"Well, no! No way! Those people, they're dangerous! You're not supposed to get involved at all! The police should've handled it! I'm just glad you're safe!"

Dad's reaction is a little more measured. "Nobody would be upset with you for not stopping something like that, no, that's perfectly reasonable. Not with the baby in your arms. Especially considering—if they can take a man that size, well… you're a small girl."

Anna nods, not really looking up from her food. Filet, a bit of pasta on the side. Broccoli for a green. She should be happier. She shouldn't let this get to her. They're absolutely right that it's not her fault. Nobody would blame her for what happened.

That doesn't mean she doesn't blame herself.

"Thanks. You're probably right."

She takes in a breath and holds it, lets it out again. No problem. She's got complete control over the situation. She chooses to be upset, she chooses to be panicked. It may not seem like it, but that's absolutely what's happening.

And she can choose to calm down. It's hard to do, but it's not impossibly by any means. She can choose to be happy, and stress-free, and she can choose to do better. She does.

"So what's been going on with you guys?"

"Oh, nothing," Dad says. Mom keeps eating. It's typical from her—she gets to talking, and then decides she's talking too much so instead of dialing it back a little she just stops until it's her 'turn' to talk too much again.

"No good stories about the apartments? Nothing good on the news?"

"You know what your mother and I say," Dad says, leaning a little into her conspiratorially. "There's never anything good on the news. If it's on the news, it's not good."

Then he sits back and smiles, as if the joke's already landed perfectly. Anna smiles back. He's said it a thousand times if he's said it once, but it feels good to be back in her routine. Back in her real life again. Not having to constantly worry about what can possibly go wrong next.

It seems like every day or two lately, she's been getting another reminder, spaced out just long enough that she has time to forget again before she learns the lesson: things can always go wrong.

You can go to sleep with your only concern being that little Ava's been a little squirmy lately. Nothing wrong with that. The only long-term concern being that her life kinda got away from her… but that was seven, eight months ago. No problem.

Then you wake up to a problem so God damn big that there's nothing you can imagine being worse than that. So you try to fix it. You go to the police.

But they can't find anything, until something gets worse again: Mitchell finds out. There was a time after he left that there was nothing that Anna wanted more than to have him back in her life.

For a moment, with Ava gone, she wanted him back again. But it's hard to think how he could have helped her. How he could have fixed the problems that she was having.

He couldn't have, that was the only answer she could find.

So now things had gotten that much worse—Mitch had to pay for everything going wrong in her life, and that brought his attention back down on her. Brought her back into the line of fire.

She couldn't have imagined things getting worse than that, though. Things couldn't get any worse.

Then they'd blamed her for not paying. Said that even though she did her best to pay them the way they wanted, even though she was trying to follow all their instructions as carefully as possible, she'd screwed it up and now they were going to punish everyone for her screw up.

That was as bad as it seemed. And now it seemed like things were looking up. Maybe that was the end of it. Maybe things couldn't get worse again.

Anna knew, instinctively, deep down, that wasn't true. She knew that things could absolutely get worse, and like anything she knew that it was as likely to happen as it was not to happen.

The one thing she didn't know was how it was going to happen, and when it was going to happen. Maybe she'd have another day, maybe she'd have another week, maybe she'd have another year without things going really wrong.

Maybe she wouldn't. There was a knock at the door.

Mom gets up to answer it, dusting her shirt off just in case some drippings have splashed onto it. She looks fine, but she always seems to be concerned with it. Preoccupied.

Anna can hear her opening the door.

"Marty? What's the problem?"

Marty's their manager. He's supposed to have gone home about five minutes ago. Apparently he hasn't. Apparently he's come here, instead.

A second voice, one that Anna doesn't recognize, starts speaking. "Mrs. Witt? Mrs. Allison Witt?"

"Yes?"

"Do you know where we could find an Anna Witt? She's not in her apartment. We thought you might know where she is."

The voice sounds official. Not someone that Anna's ever met, but if she's not wrong, then the woman is probably some sort of government person. Maybe a policeman. She's known enough police people to last a lifetime, these past couple of days.

"Yes, she's eating supper in our apartment. May I ask what this is about?"

"And where is her daughter, Ava? Is she here as well?"

"Yes. What's this about?"

"Please excuse me, ma'am. I'm not here to cause any trouble, but I've been asked by the court to take custody of that child until such time as court has been convened to determine preliminary custody."

Anna's heart felt as if it was stopping in her chest. What? What were they talking about?

All she knew for sure was, they were here to take her baby. And there was nothing that she could do to stop them.