Orbit

The last smile Annie gave me wasn't even that big.

It was more achy, it was small and crept out from her often-quiet angel-like face. Granted, the poor girl had just lost a tooth and her gums were still crying out in a gentle swollen pain. She had laid out her half-finished drawing of a butterfly, her fingers twitching as she loomed over the rainbow crayons. Yellow she’ll pick I’m sure for the wings. That familiar little hum Annie always gave came out; music was her soul. After a moment, she picked up the darkest blue, shocking me but not too astonishing. Underneath the table, her feet swung methodically. One sock hiked up towards her knee and the other, a dainty white sock bundled in a bunch on her ankle.

"I think I'm sicky,'' she blurted. Annie had lifted her eyes to look at me from her face plastered with sweaty bangs, like she wanted to hide from her own confession.

Annie had insisted she was a ‘big girl’ enough to cut her own hair. She had plenty of days practice on her stuffed tiger, but I had allowed just that one night. I still remember the way her fingers clutched the scissors awkwardly. Her tongue out in pure concentration. Dedicated to the last snip.

Her hope was too big for the world, but I let every inch of it seep into mine. Adults always seemed to lose that charm. I sometimes wished Annie could remind me this world wasn’t as gray as they said it was.

''Sick?'' I echoed, placing one hand over her forehead, her skin warm as it always was.

She had tried this story nearly every morning for the past seven years of her life. I attempted a different angle, cupping my palm underneath her eye before pulling away. "I don't feel any fever honey."

"Well Daddy,' Annie grumbled for a second, dropping the crayon against the table, ''I am."

"Well Annie, if it's too bad you just come give me a call, and I'll be right there,' I crouched down to her spot, where she had slipped the other sock down to her ankle, her arms crossed. Stubborn as a mule, but with the heart of a lion.

Even when she had fallen off her bike, she had dragged it home with blood streaming down her arm. I never forgot that proud smiling face, practically hyperventilating, “I went farther than last time!”

''Fine,’’ Annie pouted for just a moment. ‘’But promise you'll be faster than-' she eagerly glanced at me.

''Lightning,'' I finished for her, kissing the side of her sticky cheek.

Annie hopped out of the seat as if she had been electrocuted with the will to take on second grade. She wrapped her arms through her pink backpack, because she loved how it brightened the hallways, fiddling with the end strap. I remembered the first day she wore that big bag. Shaking off my hand even if she toppled sideways to handle its weight. Fear was an enemy of Annie’s, even for a seven-year-old.

''Alright come give your old man a hug now,'' I beckoned, holding both arms out as we did every day.

Everything with her was routine. The way she’d squeal when her alarm chimed at 7:00 each day. Her tracing the “funny bump” on my bald head during move nights. Every Tuesday because Fridays are reserved for Taco Night of course.

Every time those little hands wrapped around my neck I’d wish they could be cemented, plastering them to my skin.

Every single day my little girl was one step closer to graduating, and a family and chasing freedom. Outgrowing her just finding joy in lifting a rock to find the juiciest worm. Or even worse finding someone else to pour her tea for her stuffed bear.

But we had time.

We'd have plenty of time together.

I closed my eyes, just in one moment letting her sticky little face and fingers tussle the hours I had taken to gel my hair, just to savor the closeness no other person would understand. It was always Annie and me.

She was my orbit.

When the bus pulled up, smoking and chugging along on our empty country road, I kept in a sigh. Annie had finished setting up her tea table when she returned home every day. Each pink napkin folded just slightly crookedly, her Bear’s arm fixated on the pot.

I held our creaky door-the one I kept forgetting to grease- watching her excitedly jog out the door, pausing to once more flash that smile over at me. In those hazel eyes were brimming life and excitement.

My little girl going to school. Another ordinary day in February where the clouds hung low in the sky weighed down by snow.

Annie paused for a moment, breathing out heavy to watch with a giggle the way her breath came out in a puff. How many times have we created snowmen that never lasted, rolling the balls up and storing them in the fridge. Winter is a wonderland to Annie, she’d admire each and every snowflake until she was 100.

Yet this time something panged in me, a small jolt to my heart. I had almost wished she was sick so I could take care of her for just one more day. Annie tilted her head beneath her slightly frizzy hair, giving me that missing tooth smile, the one that felt like a promise.

A promise that she’d come back home.

--

Her room was always a silent artifact when she went to school. Her covers draped off her bed, the rainbow suncatchers casting a warmth that only I knew to be her. Her shirts draped over her lampshade, and hidden lipstick underneath her pillow. A few of them were streaked across her sheets, and I quietly smiled to myself, beginning to tug the edge off.

The phone rang, shaking me from my job. I tried to rip the other edge off, but it went off one more time, the ring seemed urgent like the phone was screaming but only at me. Something in me wanted to ignore it, but of course, Annie had been sick after all. Maybe I’d let her go too easily today. I could envision it now, her coddled up in the nurse’s dingy blanket, her teeth chattering. “I told you Daddy!”

One last ring made me drop the sheet altogether, hardly shutting her door closed before picking up the phone.

“Hello? Annie, you aren’t feeling well, are you?”

There was a pause at the other end, a very very long pause.

“Mr. Barnes, I’ve been told to notify you in the event of an emergency, or as emergency contact.”

“Emergency? Annie’s flus are hardly that.”

“Mr. Barnes, listen now to me. There’s been an incident at the school.”

“Incident?” My voice caught, my finger tightening around the cord.

“Yes, Mr. Barnes at the school. There’s been a shooting.”

-

The phone slipped from my hand, clattering to the ground before I had.

And I saw her again, the way she had smiled that morning-one sock up, one sock down, sticky face and bright eyes. In that moment it became everything I could carry of Annie-her orbit, her promise and her presence-and somehow it would have to be enough.