XVIII Broken

As planned Danny called up Anne in 2 days to check if she was ready, Annie picked her phone and was immediately sobbing, Dan realised she was drunk and probably was on alcohol ever since she left him at the rehab, Dan remembered Annie saying that the rehab was such a nice place and she would one day want to spend some time there because she thought the rehab made her feel "less like a whore" and laughed now on the mobile phone she was saying ‘I’m such a bitch, a whore, a slut good enough for just fucks, I’m’ ‘I shouldn’t have come to Harvard, should have instead taken up prostitution’ and silently wailed, Dan was left without a chance to react, even if he had heard Annie say such things before, especially when she was down and low, but every time he heard her spraying out those words he knew he had to act and quick, so he enquired as to who was with her and where she was, Annie said she was in her apartment and that she had already asked Richard to fuck off, which he had promptly done. Dan then told her to put the phone down and that he was coming over.     

Dan rang the bell, and what seemed like an eternity Annie opened the door, she was topless, all she had was something that looked like a bed linen cloth hurriedly tied sideways on her hip not surprisingly she looked every inch ravaged, wrecked and abandoned in the mind, besides being drunk and, Dan suspected, drugged with some kind of an overdose of pills too. Dan guessed all of that  on the basis two premises one Annie looked too cracked which no matter how drunk one is the person still gets to talk  or look or sway or do some such thing its when one gets drugged is when you droop and generally look hollowed out the second premise of course was past experience. Dan, stepped in, the apartment was a single bedroom studio apartment close to Cambridge. It was a simple but tastefully done up place - a good love hole Annie called it - located on the 12^th floor overlooking the campus at a walkable distance. 

Today, the house was dark, all curtains were drawn and it managed to give out a very broken feel. Like a glass bottle dropped and left unwiped.

Annie did not bother waiting she just floated back to her bed and threw herself onto it, crying. Dan, noticed the apartment was in shambles, sheets of old news papers , damaged carton boxes, beer and vodka bottles, used condoms, cigarette butts and empty packs and all sorts of half open draws and cabinets some even thrown out of their shelves lying in different stages of rash use, by the looks of it Dan guessed it had happened a few days back and also guessed it wasn’t anything pleasant. Dan kicked off some of the debris then found himself a deck chair that had old copies of the Times Literary Supplement placed on it , he shifted the trash out and eased himself down on the chair all the time watching Annie who had her back turned up and was sleeping with her head below.

The room reeked of alcohol and smoke and just beside the chair where he was seated on a table that had a reading lamp lay a British airways ticket to London, Dan stretched and took the ticket in his hand and read it for details and realised it was for the same day on her name and then noticed that the flight was just past midnight. So he still had time to see if she could make it but then he also thought about the other problem that Annie had proposed, which was the real purpose of his visit - to go for a D&C and clear her womb.

As Dan kept reflecting on the course of action, Annie turned around wiped her tears and sat up on the bed and then lit a smoke, Dan, got up and opened a few windows to let the stifling, heavy air out. And then came back and showed Annie the air ticket, she just said ‘fuck it’ and tried snatching it from Danny’s hands , Dan easily withdrew his stretched out hand and just then noticed that she had bruises all over her hands and eyes, even some cigarette burns on her arm, as he tried evaluating the seriousness of the bruises Annie’s iphone gave out an alert, it was a message, Dan took the mobile and among several messages from Richard also saw a new message from Prof. Bernstein, which was on top, he opened the message and read it out aloud, Prof. Bernstein was asking Annie as to when he could pick her up on their way to the airport. Dan suspected that the Prof. knew the situation here. Dan knew that Bernstein was Annie’s agony saint besides being her research guide and mentor at Harvard.

Dan, replaced the mobile. And once again shifted his gaze towards Annie, and her bruises and wondered how men could stoop down to such levels of violence , especially men of such high calibre of such intellect and such extra ordinary rational maturity like Prof. Richard, he was about to speak but then stopped short as he watched Annie make all the clichéd actions of a forlorn and abused lover, she looked blank, allowed the cigarette ash to grow in size, she had had her leg sprawled and her head cocked on one angle and eyes looking somewhere between the ceiling and nowhere – with her open breast hanging low, she looked every inch ready for an European artist to walk in , sit down and paint her on to a canvas, Dan looked again into Annie’s face and gave a wry smile as he imagined the brush strokes and the pastel shades of the painting just then Annie suddenly stood up took his hand and rushed to the washroom and headed straight into the commode throwing up exactly when she reached the commode with such violence that Dan was a little taken aback at first Danny swore and then helped her get most of what was coming out, the stench wasn’t the most pleasant of things which Annie realised soon and then pushed Dan away asking him to go out but Dan stayed on anyways.    

Soon, Annie was washing up and asked Dan to move out since she wanted to pee Dan refused to move so Annie simply squatted on the commode and eased herself even as Dan watched, Dan just stood there waiting, once She was done Annie got up took a tissue paper and cleaned herself up and then looked at the tissue, it had traces of some blood marks which even Dan noticed but without looking at Dan She just threw it and moved over to the cabinet, took her brush and paste and started brushing. Dan moved out, leaving her inside the bathroom and quickly tried putting back the strewn out draws and cabinets back to their places and also tried his best to clean up the mess, Annie watched him through the mirror, quickly washed up , came out of the bath and for the first time spoke asking if Dan would care for some Coffee, Dan nodded and Annie moved into her kitchen, Dan heard her swear, from where he stood Dan noticed that the kitchen sink was full. He then raised his voice and suggested they walk towards the nearby starbucks. 

Annie, waited a while looking at the mess and then quietly searched around for something to wear, found a denim short and a hooded jersey of the Boston Globes, slipped into them, Annie was a free lance feature writer and critic with the newspaper, Danny was by then near the door waiting as Annie neared the door, as She came close to him She just pulled Danny in and hugged him tight and started crying again, her whole body shook, it felt like a few thousand volts of stored up energy released, Danny gave her a squeeze and then patted her head softly and held her for a while, he sensed she was running a little temperature.

They both stepped out, Dan took some tissues and gave it to Annie, she used it to clean her nose, soon they were at the coffee shop, a soft Boston summer sun had a broad golden shaft of its warm light thrown in through the glass pane facing the street, Annie and Dan took a seat right in the midst of the sunlight and ordered – Coffee and breakfast, it was almost lunchtime actually.

Annie and Dan sat and watched the scenes outside, they were on Brattle Street, on the west end side of Boston, one of those American geographic points whose glorious past took you right back to the American Revolution and the Boston Tea party, Annie and Dan had often time to visit some of the landmarks around , Annie seemed to really the enjoy when they visited the place belonging to the American poet H.W. Longfellow , she had recited a first part of his poem ' A Gleem of Sunshine' 

This is the place. Stand still, my steed,
Let me review the scene,
And summon from the shadowy Past
The forms that once have been.

aloud then, to the amusement of people around, from his seating position Dan could see portions of the calm bluish silvery mane of the humble Charles River in the distance, as he sat contemplating how to start his conversation with Annie, the delicacy of it, to start something without triggering her back into the dark state of mind she was in; 

But the more he thought the more his mind was conjuring up images of the Boston harbour and the drive Annie and his friends had had to Montreal a few months back.   

The food and coffee arrived, served by a pleasant University intern, Annie managed a smile. Dan was about to ask Annie about her plans but Annie had already decided, she just stood up asked the barman for the check, simply threw some bills from her purse took hold of Dan and started heading out Dan as usual wasn’t prepared but he was starving too so he just grabbed whatever he could from the table even as some of it spilled out , the intern who served them came running asking if she could help wrap some stuff into a take away cover but by then Annie was were already out, Dan rushed after her asking through his stuffed mouth 'What the fuck'? Annie ignored him and simply gestured a cab pulled him in and directed the Cab to move towards the Mt. Auburn Hospital, Dan cursed and sat inside lost for words, still munching whatever he had grabbed from the coffee shop, by now Annie was on the mobile, talking to a friend someone she knew at the hospital she was saying “listen Rachel, I need this help, don’t know what you do, I’m reaching in about 10 minutes just tell me whom to talk to…” by the time Dan knew what was going on the cab had reached the hospital, Annie asked Dan pay the cab an She was off. 

Dan had to jog to catch up as they entered Danny noticed someone waving at Annie and guessed her to be Rachel , the lady that Annie had spoken to just a while back, she looked familiar, in all probability another of those interns – they were all over Boston – apparently all that she had to be told was already passed on even before reaching , so She quietly directed Annie towards the patient registration desk while dialling a Dr. Allen while she was making arrangements the lady at the desk asked Annie if she had someone to sign as a witness She said yes and then turned towards Dan and said “my husband to be” smiled at the lady and then took the pad from her and showed Dan the spot where he had to sign, Dan looked at her, with a raised brow , she just kept jerking her face and neck askew vigorously indicating ‘just do it, just do it’ Dan realised he had no choice so he simply picked the pen and put his signature.

As Dan was handing over the pad he saw Rachel waiting, She explained to the front desk lady that they were her friends and that she would be responsible to ensure everything was taken care of and requested the front desk lady to send across the papers to Dr. Allen’s chamber, the lady smiled and nodded her concurrence and said not to worry and so they moved off. Shortly after, Dan was made to wait outside Dr. Allen’s chamber, Annie had managed to pick up a book from the Dr’s desk – a copy of Readers Digest ( even the wrapper that promised huge freebies for subscription renewal was intact)  – and sent it across through Rachel to Dan , as Dan kept looking at the mag Rachel started talking to Dan saying that there was nothing to worry and that the procedure would hardly take a few hours and that She’ll be back once the procedure was done and then vanished leaving Danny with the Readers Digest and a feeling that bordered on the helplessly helpless, he just dropped down on a cold metal chair in the waiting hall, watched a bit of Wimbledon that was being shown on the television, soon dozed off.

But somewhere inside his head the questions raged on, how can women render themselves to such treatment? What makes them choose such abuse? Leave alone the physical bruises, what about the scars of the mind? How? Why ? Especially women of Annie’s caliber ? they could pick a man from the campus at will, and they could talk down a so called patriarch of the campus and hold them by the scruff of their necks ! But, then still end up broken, but why? they were successful, well to do, young, great on looks, terrific body, respected, had a huge future beckoning leaving no reasons to be dependent or feeling insecure – then why ?  the answers that came back were simply not convincing especially since Dan subconsciously also thought from the other side; Prof. Richardson how could he? what is it that brought the beast in him? He, a teacher , a mentor a thinker? Where in a human mind were these bestiality hidden? how do they creep to the surface ? from a deep, unpredictable primordial land? making one a foreigner to ones own notions of civility ? how much more of human evolution will it need for men to stop from abusing women?

Dan, half opened his eyes and noticed the Boston Sun setting spreading a binge of magenta and purple hues all around, the glass panes of the Mt. Auburn hospital transformed themselves into a display classic art displaying the dark haloed nimbus clouds, the shades and gradations formed by the skyline looked unreally beautiful, poor river Charles had turned dark and the boats on it had become distant lonely ghosts moored with a necklace of weak and loosely arranged electric lights, their make up for the night.

Dan for a while felt he was up there in the sky on a flying chair, sleeping and yet witnessing something celestial, very unreal.