Daniel Christopher Thomas

Annie

Roxanne sat on her luggage in her empty townhouse. She fiddled nervously with her phone. She’d checked her ride share app a dozen times. Nothing could distract her from her extreme impatience to leave this life behind her. She had lived here briefly, only two years. However, to her, it may as well have been 200. Just a few short years ago, yet lifetimes ago, Roxanne lived in a suburban mansion with her husband, Gordon. She lived comfortably, her marriage was happy, her grandmother, her beloved grandmother, Mary, was alive and healthy. Soon after, she spent most of her time caring for Mary while neglecting her husband. She then took a leave of absence from the hospital where she worked as a nurse. She watched as her grandmother and her marriage both died, along with her desire to ever be a caregiver again. No memory of the past 15 years sparked any kind of emotion, positive or otherwise. Nothing she had known as security or accomplishment remained. She felt completely empty.