{ because i can't b r e a t h e } | annie blitz series

sometimes she still pretends that
she's just a nurse at the medical center
and nothing has changed.
still, those sterile halls
don't feel the same.
but she supposes,
it's better than nothing.

she's sixteen;
it's been over a year —
but somehow it just feels like an eternity.

she's tending to a patient
when her mother finds her.
she pokes her head out from the hallway,
and for a moment annie wishes
that her mother would just disappear.

"bells, there's a peacekeeper calling on you," her mother says.
she still persistently calls her bells,
but annie abandoned the nickname
when she abandoned annabelle.

"now?" annie asks.
"it's three o'clock."

her mother says nothing,
just stares at her with empty dark eyes,
as if to say,
"you have to do your job anyway, annabelle.
the time doesn't matter."

annie shakes her head
and apologizes to the patient
before she leaves out the door.

she sobs in the bathroom
as she changes out of her hospital scrubs.