A HUGE thank you to the person who commissioned this story! It was amazing getting to work and collaborate with them, especially practicing a slightly different than usual approach with a pseudo-dual narrative from two characters. And to make it brief, yes this has continuity with other stories of mine!
If you haven’t read “It’s Christmas, After All” or “Digital Remains,” I highly recommend reading those shorts first just to put yourself in the exact context this story plays off of. It makes some of the themes that this story tries to poke at a bit more meaningful, as well as some of the subtle references. But that’s my rant; enjoy!
I'm taking story commissions! $10/1000 words! Read until the end for more details!
Freedom at Last
“Mhm? Uh-huh?”
Shut up.
“Really!?” A faux chuckle came from the giant on the giant couch. It was always fake when it was over the phone. It was all fake. All superficial. All a bunch of misery dressed in makeup.
“No! Stop it!” the Amazon went on and on with her exaggerated tone, gossip and gabbitry.
“Oh? Anna? Good as always! –Well, sometimes the occasional temper, but it’s not like you can expect any less,” she continued to laugh.
The girl from her four-walled prison cell narrowed her eyes, trying to focus on the digital screen. Why couldn’t these conversations happen anywhere else? Somewhere that Anna wasn’t, or at least far enough out of earshot to completely muffle or tune out the noise. Pay a bit more attention to the subliminal cartoons, plug her ears with the stuffed animals littered across the multicolored mat. Hell, take a nap, even.
But that’s just who Mommy was. Mommy, Mama, Mother, Mater, Mummy, Ma; anything that sufficed as a hardwired substitute for the name Anna did but did not know. With dwindling confidence could she even put a spelling to the she-who-must-not-be-named. Not “must-not,” but “could-not.” Whenever she tried to speak it nowadays her tongue would make a sharp turn and babble into gibberish, or the part of her mind that wasn’t hers would steer completely into the indoctrinated lane straight for Mommy Town.
It was from a bygone era, but in a distant life when Anna was free and her actual independent self, she could remember people exactly like Mommy. Brazenly strutting about in public with a phone glued to their ear, walking and talking like their surroundings were just dressings to their own personal fantasy. Apparently Mommy didn’t consider this kind of space public, not that it mattered. It never mattered when it was time for diaper checks or even performing a diaper change. Poor Anna wished she could still find the embarrassment in herself to care, yet enough public changes on the park bench had become sickeningly desensitizing.
“Yes! That’s right!” Mommy made a small squeal of glee. “Third year of daycare! Awh, really– I’m so proud of how far my little Anna’s come!”
Just focus. Focus on the cartoons…
“She’s made so many cute friends at daycare, honestly. It’s like a revolving door with all the playdates she goes on!”
What is Jessica the Jaguar doing today? Stopping Freddie Ferret from stealing all the oranges from Mama Mary’s Meadow again? So interesting. So very interesting.
“Hm? Oh, yes. Plenty of times, trust me. With how many messy diapers I have to deal with in the mornings, it almost makes me wish I potty trained her. Almost!”
Thankfully the mat Anna sat on was plush, trying to forget that the very world existed with her short, rounded fingernails plunging into the ground like a giant stress ball. It was all old, it was all the same. She’d heard it all over and over again, but the feelings stayed the same. She’d lost out on the battle against embarrassment. It’d come and come until nothing was left. Nothing but anger and frustration. That never seemed to leave, yet only with time it went out faster and faster once reality made it clear that there was nothing she could do. No one she could turn to.
It made her feel sick, like a knot was tied twice-over in her stomach, tumbling and adding all sorts of discomfort. She was stuck, and it’d been that way for years now. Approximately three. Her concept of time was vague and restricted, to say the least. She tracked the day by events, not numbers. Her morning b
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Freedom At Last (Short)
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