After Annie: A Novel

Bill’s mother, Dora, arrives, along with Annie’s sister, Kathy. Bill is still in shock and struggles with how fast everything is moving. Incapacitated by his grief, Bill spends most of his time isolated in the bedroom while Dora and Kathy make all the funeral arrangements. Bill’s mother handles the newspaper obituary, and the children are angry that she uses their full names instead of their nicknames. Kathy is an accountant and handles all the financial concerns, but she stays at a hotel across town because she and Dora don’t get along. Mimicking how her aunt and grandmother operate, Ali prepares lunch for her dad and insists that he eat. When he is alone again, Bill pushes the food aside and thinks about the funeral eulogy that he has been asked to prepare. He cannot get the image of Annie on the floor out of his mind, and her hand stuck up as if saying, “Hello, Billy. Goodbye, Billy” (22). Bill can’t think of what he might say about Annie in public, as they have many secrets in their marriage, including the fact that they got married because she was pregnant. Now that Annie is dead, Billy wonders if she knows that he didn’t want more than two children. Bill is a plumber, and his coworker, Jack Bessemer, temporarily takes his work orders.

Annemarie calls, but Dora tells her that the family is handling everything, even though Annemarie is like family to Annie. Annemarie offers to take Ali shopping for a funeral dress, but Kathy says that she will handle it (Kathy knows the complicated history between Bill and Annemarie.). Kathy selects a dress to bury Annie, and Bill sees her smelling Annie’s clothes and crying. Bill also overhears Kathy explaining to Ali that her mother had an aneurysm. Ali’s funeral dress is too big and matronly, and Bill observes that his daughter has been forced to grow up overnight. He lies when she asks whether he ate his sandwich.

Annemarie arrives at the funeral home early and goes inside to view Annie’s body alone. She asks the funeral home director, Mr. Grant, who knows about her close relationship with Annie, to hide a bottle of rosé in the casket. Annemarie reflects that Annie’s body doesn’t look like her, especially since no one can see her eyes. Next to the casket is a family photo of Annie with all her children. Later, Annemarie watches from her car as the guests arrive for the service. She notices how tired and grown-up Ali looks and wonders what Annie would think about all the attention given to her death. Overwhelmed by her grief, Annemarie wishes that she could take something to numb her pain, and she begins thinking about the history of her friendship with Annie.

Annemarie and Annie met in the first grade and remained best friends through high school. When Annie found out that she was pregnant with Ali, Annemarie had just gotten her wisdom teeth removed, which is when her substance use disorder began. Annemarie feels as though Ali replaced her, for Annie’s life completely changed after Ali’s birth, and she became immersed in motherhood. Ali noticed the complicated dynamic between Annie and Annemarie, sensing that “[t]here was so much history between them […], there but unspoken, or at least unexplained” (33). Annie felt obligated to name her sister Kathy as Ali’s godmother, but when Ant was born, she asked Annemarie to be his godmother. When Annemarie showed up for Ant’s christening, she was high and arrived a day late. Annie exploded, explaining to the priest why the godmother was absent and calling Annemarie a “trainwreck.”

Through the years, Annemarie was with Annie when she first met Bill, when she had her first ultrasound for Ali, and when she lost her last pregnancy. Annemarie’s husband is a successful businessman named Tom. Life with Tom isn’t exciting, but Annemarie likes the fact that he is “stable.” She once shared with Annie that she and Tom were considering in vitro fertilization (IVF), and she and Annie joked about Annie having plastic surgery to recapture the state of her body pre-motherhood. Annemarie recalls that they never believed in their mortality. Now, as she watches the last of the guests file in for the funeral service, Annemarie imagines that Annie is speaking to her. Annemarie believes this to be the worst day of her life, but she thinks that Annie would argue that her worst day has already happened.

The boys refuse to wear their clip-on ties, and Bill’s suit doesn’t match. At the funeral home, Ali notices her father struggling to hold back sobs. She suggests that the younger boys not view their mother in the casket, but Bill isn’t listening. He just follows Mr. Grant and goes through the motions. When Bill sees Annie, he cries and begins hyperventilating. Guests begin filing through the room, offering condolences, but Ali quickly becomes exhausted with their trite platitudes. She doesn’t think her mother looks real and wonders briefly if she isn’t dead and is hiding somewhere inside the funeral home. Ali’s friend Jenny files through, and Ali cries for the first time, touched by her friend’s empathy. Kathy speaks to many high school friends, and Ali notices Kathy’s discomfort in acknowledging their parents’ absence. Annie and Kathy’s parents divorced when Annie was in college. Their dad lives in Colorado, and their mother lives in California and refuses to fly.

Annemarie walks into the room and tearfully embraces Bill. They stare at Annie’s body together and cry over how much they will miss her. Annemarie pledges to Ali that she will care for them because Annie once saved her life. Ali thinks about how her mother always kept her phone nearby so that she wouldn’t miss Annemarie’s calls. Ali knows her mother’s phone is still by the bedside, and she calls it to hear her mother’s voice in the message. Ali heads for the bathroom but chooses the wrong door and ends up outside. She breathes in the cold, fresh air, happy to escape the grief-filled room. Ant joins her outside and asks what happens next. Ali thinks he is asking about the funeral, and she explains the graveside service. However, Ant wants to know what happens now that their mother is dead. She explains that their father will care for them.

Back in the room, Bill lingers over the casket until the last moment, when Mr. Grant closes the lid. Jamie falls asleep on an unfamiliar woman’s lap, and Ali is confused when the lady calls her father “Billy,” a nickname that only her mother uses. On the car ride home, Bill stifles his sobs again and tells the children that even though their mother is gone, her memory lives on inside them, but the younger boys do not understand this concept. Ali plans to call her mother’s phone again as soon as they get home so that she can hear her voice.

Tom joins Annemarie for the graveside service. The whole scene feels surreal as she watches the funeral home employees lower the casket into the ground. After the funeral, close friends and family gather at the Browns’ home. Having never felt comfortable in large groups of women, Annemarie hovers on the periphery, eavesdropping on their conversations just as she and Annie did as children. Bill’s mother Dora converses with her friends: Betty, Sally Lankford (the Browns’ nosy neighbor), Sally’s sister, and two home health nurses. Dora coldly avoids questions about Bill and the children’s emotional state and instead obsesses about the large quantity of food in the kitchen. Annemarie dislikes Dora because the woman was often unkind to Annie; although Dora allowed the family to live in her home after she moved, she still charged them rent and wouldn’t let them purchase the house or make any changes or improvements. Moreover, Dora bragged at the funeral about giving Bill her cemetery plot for Annie since he hadn’t yet purchased one.

The women agree that Bill is in shock but must carry on for the children. Betty asserts that Bill is a good man, insinuating he is a good catch. Dora mentions that Bill’s high school girlfriend, Liz Donahue, was at the service. Liz is a single, successful real estate agent, and Dora remarks, “She’s really kept her figure” (65). Disgusted by the conversation, Annemarie escapes to the bathroom to hide her emotions. She later checks on the children and finds that a family friend, Mr. Bessemer, has given Ant and Ali a beer. Ali tells Annemarie that Annie described her as being very successful in her business, which sells Amish and Mennonite crafts to stores nationwide. Annemarie thinks to herself that Annie was the more successful one in building a family.

Kathy offers Annemarie a glass of wine, but Annemarie declines, citing her recovery. Kathy promises to help the family with their financial planning and urges Annemarie to “keep it together” because the family will need her help in the future (71). Annemarie admits to Kathy that she called Annie’s phone. Later, in the car alone, Annemarie thinks about how life continues after someone dies and wonders how she can move on. She ignores several phone calls and tries to use strategies she learned in rehab, like deep breathing, to calm her emotions. However, nothing works, and when she reaches into her purse and feels a pill bottle, she must pull over on the side of the road to calm down. She hears Annie’s voice telling her to have some mints and fight the urge, but Annemarie thinks that she isn’t strong enough to handle this grief.