Annie’s News

Annie’s fingers were sinewy, overcooked chicken wings which delicately stirred seven sugar cubes into her roadside diner Folgers. She lifted the mug to herpes-scarred lips which slithered past blackened, crooked teeth and away from mottled gums. Annie’s lashless, pinpoint eyes—wide set in that mangy, misshapen skull—were slivers of cool coal jutting from a jagged canyon of cheekbones. A stench of curdled milk mixed with dumpster cabbage wafted across the table as she spoke. Her slurping, sucking, wheezing words slammed into me with the force of a Mack truck T-boning a nun: “Baby, we’re pregnant!”

I’ve never been happier.