Becoming Anne Again

Chapter Sixty

A/N Hello loves! I am posting today because there is actually zero chance that I will be able to post on the usual Friday upload. I hope you all are having a lovely week!

Another twenty-four hours passed, and then Anne was released from the hospital. This was more surreal than even being admitted into the hospital—waking up when she expected not to wake up at all was strange enough in an environment completely apart from her own life. But to step back into the place that she had called home, a return to life as usual? That was something completely different.

But before life could go on—although life never truly went on, just as shattered lives don't simply get put back together like an elaborate puzzle, and Anne knew that—Anne had to do what she was dreading. She had to give a statement.

Anne was fidgeting in her seat, her eyes darting everywhere around the room except at the camera. One of the officers, who had introduced himself as Benson, was busy trying to adjust the camera, but he could still feel her anxiety. He clenched his jaw. He became a police officer to help people. He knew people could be evil, heck, maybe he would go as far as to say that evil was just humanity's factory setting, but nothing could prepare him for this moment, interviewing a middle schooler who still had bruised handprints around her neck.

"Alright, Anne," he said, sitting across from her, trying to smile reassuringly. "Can you tell me why you were at the school?"

Anne's mouth went dry, and she stared down at her hands. "Um, I knew something was wrong," she said, her eyebrows knit together, searching for the words.

"How did you know something was wrong?"

"Little things. Like once, she told me Mr. Phillips got her beer."

"When did she tell you that?"

"I don't know, like a month ago. We were all at hanging out at Ruby Gillis's house, and she said that. And I knew something was wrong." Just thinking about it made her blink faster. She should have known, she had known, so why did she wait so long? Maybe, if she had gone after it then, maybe Prissy wouldn't believe she was in love, maybe she would see Mr. Phillips for the monster he was, maybe, maybe, maybe...

"Hey, it's okay," Benson said, reaching out to rest a hand on Anne's, then quickly retrieved it, thinking better of the idea. "Take your time."

Anne nodded her head, and resolutely, she raised her head, looking straight in the camera, as if daring anyone to say she was lying. "And then, it was a little things. Like, she told me she got stomach aches a lot, and I knew that was a sign of sexual abuse. And Mr. Phillips was really weird around her, and, I don't know, he always kind of bullied me, so I knew he was capable of really bad things."

"Can you tell me how he bullied you?"

"Um, yeah. Like, once, he accused me of beating up this other girl—I didn't—so he started dragging me by my hoodie." Benson nodded his head, and she took it as the okay to go forward. "And, I could just feel something was wrong, you know? I recognized some things in Prissy, like the tone of her voice, how she was making excuses for everything, the way she seemed skittish, that sort of thing."

"And why did those things create red flags for you?"

Anne bit her lips, her eyes dropping down for another second. She took a deep breath, and then looked at Benson again. "Because I was one of the O'Keafe girls." Benson dropped his pencil, his face suddenly turning white. "I'm sorry, I don't have to go through that, do I?"