Annabelle E-Book

Ethan Shaw

• Herausgeber: Next Chapter
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

Virginia, US, late 1860s. After northerner James travels to Virginia, he falls in love with the daughter of an affluent former slave owner, Annabelle.

The two are deeply attracted to each other, but their relationship is tainted by James’ professed disdain for the society Annabelle was raised in. James views most of Southern society as beneath him, and has a distinct hatred for Annabelle’s father, who represents everything he feels is wrong with the South.

Soon, tensions between James and Annabelle’s father reach a breaking point. After James is drawn back into the complicated situation, he also comes into contact with another woman who seems to understand him, and who sees the world in the same way he does.

James finds himself in a situation where he must choose between Annabelle, who he loves deeply despite their differences, and the other woman, who sees the hazy Virginian countryside the same way he does.

Leseprobe

ANNABELLE

ETHAN SHAW

CONTENTS

Book I

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Book II

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Book III

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

About the Author

Copyright (C) 2023 Ethan Shaw

Layout design and Copyright (C) 2023 by Next Chapter

Published 2023 by Next Chapter

Edited by Charity Rabbiosi

Cover art by Lordan June Pinote

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the author's permission.

BOOK I

CHAPTERONE

I have a hard time recalling much on the topic of my father, but I have a general recollection of the kind of man he was. He was a good sort of man. He was raised in the northern Appalachians, and he spent his early years living almost like a nomad. Later on in life, he settled down and made a considerable fortune out of nothing but hard work. These two contrasting periods of his life shaped him into a very wise and tough man. He was a survivalist, both in the wild and in society.

He liked to exercise his wisdom onto my brothers and me. “Most of the people you’ll meet in life will not be your ally,” he would say. “Most people will try to either take advantage of you or assert their dominance over you. Don’t let them do either. I didn’t get to where I am in life by playing nice. I fought back. I showed them I was strong. You boys will be stronger than I ever could be. But you can’t let anyone get the best of you. If someone ever tries to intimidate you or make you feel small, then you must fight back. You can’t run away in those situations. Otherwise, they’ll just continue to do it.” It was easy for him to say that. He was tough as nails. He fought in one of the Indian wars, but we never brought it up because we could tell that he didn’t want to talk about it.

I did my best to take his advice, recalling one time as a boy when a larger boy threw me to the ground over something I cannot recall. I pulled that massive boy onto the ground with me, and we tumbled around in a deathroll for what felt like an eternity. He punched me in the stomach until I threw up, but when I told my father what had happened, he was so proud of me.

I had a considerably high opinion of myself at that time. I saw myself as better than most of the people around me. Keeping me humble however, were regular occurrences of melancholy. Most of the time, I was successful in managing it.

I never could fully decipher what my peers thought of me, but I cannot imagine that I would be pleased to hear what they thought.

I did a number of unwise, ill-advised, and generally idiotic things in the waning years of my adolescence. When I reached the age of a proper “adult”, my decisions had never been more ill-advised.

I attended Henry Lee University in the fall of 1868, and I remained a student there for two semesters. Henry Lee University was one of the premier educational institutions in the country. It may seem hard to believe, but in that time it rivaled institutions such as Harvard University in its level of esteem. I was an intelligent boy, and my family had the kind of money that could get me into a reputable school. Obviously not Harvard mind you, but definitely one of its lesser-known associates. It seemed very natural for me to go to Henry Lee. I failed to make the connection prior to going, but later found out that Henry Lee was the father of old Robert Lee from the war. The school itself was situated in the middle of nowhere in the part of Virginia where you could stand on the beach facing east and see land on the horizon. That body of water separating the two landmasses was the same one Admiral Cockburn sailed upon on his way to burn down our capital fifty years earlier. It was very quaint.

The town Johnston’s Ridge was located a few miles from the university, surrounded only by scattered plantation houses. I would become familiar with two of those old relics in particular. The population of the town was close to six hundred when I lived there. The school had around two hundred students. The history of the town was mildly interesting. Apparently, there was a man named Johnston who died spectacularly at that very spot during the war.

I quite liked the physical features of that place. It was very green, and you could smell the ocean on the windy days. Had it been a landscape painting or a pastoral poem, it would have been perfect. My only issue was the people.

I found myself there at a particularly terrible time. Everyone seemed to have either fought in the war or knew someone who did; all on the rebel side. Imagine two mountains side by side. One mountain is named rejection, and the other is named acceptance. Johnston’s Ridge was stuck directly in the middle. They had fought so tirelessly for years, and now it was all they knew how to do. It took years after my departure for them to finally move past it all. Even to this day you can find a few people who remain entrenched in the war.

I will not claim to share any of the pains felt by those poor souls sent off to die by the thousands, nor will I pretend that the war ever involved me. I was simply too young to fight. My brothers, of which there were two of them, were not. My oldest brother William made no small name for himself as a volunteer in the 10th Connecticut. In fact, he was promoted to Captain before the conclusion of the war. My other brother faired in a different manner. Robert was fortunate enough to survive the war, but in doing so he sacrificed his legs somewhere in South Carolina. The loss of such an important function changed him when he returned home. We never saw him much because he preferred to be left alone and he ate only when forced to. It was heartbreaking to watch.

I never did consider myself a Virginian, despite living in Virginia for the better part of two years. Unlike most people, I never could excuse the terrible practice of slavery that everyone was so fond of. It wasn’t just the rich people who lamented over the abolition of slavery. The poor men, the ones who could never afford to own slaves, were equally upset over the recent change. This was the same mindset that many of my fellow students had, and it made them very unlikable in my eyes. They disliked me as well. I was the “Yank” as they decided to call me, much to my chagrin. The student body included an overwhelming number of racists, bigots, and other morally destitute people. I remember once seeing a sign advertising the student-led branch of the White Southerners Union, or some equivalent group of lowlifes carrying out more or less the same purpose. These groups were a dime a dozen, and they very nearly caused me to rethink my decision to stay, but in my ignorant and selfish youth, I allowed myself to continue to pursue my fancy education and to turn a blind eye to the wrongdoings I witnessed.

My isolationist attitude was first forged on the train-ride to my new home. I caught the early train, which left the New Haven station sometime in the morning. It was on this train that I experienced Virginians for the first time. I do not like to stereotype, but the majority of folks from that area were truly miserable people. Before I even reached my seat, I collided with a man who had a thick Southern accent. My belongings tumbled onto the floor of the train car. Based on the gumption with which this man verbally attacked me, you would think he had just caught me in bed with his mother. I pictured myself pummeling him into the carpeted floor of the car, but I saw the absurdity of that idea and instead chose to ignore him and went about my day. After that I sat in silence and followed the dynamic American countryside shift from the familiar cool and rocky earth to the alien red and dusty clay of the South. It hung in the air like a haze, choking everything out. As I would learn, this haze was all-permeating, and it never dissipated. You could walk outside and take only a handful of steps before being utterly suffocated by a combination of blinding sun and red haze.

To pass time on the train, I observed my surroundings. I watched an ant make his way from one end of the car to the other unscathed, only to be crushed by someone sitting in one of the rear seats. It made me wonder if that was some kind of parable.

My first priority upon my arrival was to get to my new residence. It had already been paid for by my parents; negotiated and haggled long before I even left my home. It was some modest plantation house belonging to a widow of a late “farmer”. All of these plantation houses were beautiful. Many of them were ornately decorated with artwork and statues and such. This one lacked most of that. When I stayed in that house, I noticed there were other prepared rooms, but I never saw another tenant. I didn’t mind. Most of the time I kept to myself. My favorite activities included standing on the balcony of the house and overlooking the fields. Nothing ever grew during my stay. I had a few friends from classes who came by once in a while. We would sit together on the balcony and solemnly look over the barren field. The university, my home, and Johnston’s Ridge were all within walking distance from one another and formed something of a triangle when mapped out.

Naturally, I did make a handful of acquaintances. Also naturally, I thought myself to be far superior to them morally. We rarely ever went out, but we caused quite the ruckus when we did. It was the liquor. There was more than enough to go around. Whiskey was the backbone of the medical field during the war. Everyone was drinking it, and everyone was making it. One time I had been coerced into joining some friends for a night out on the town. The liquor flowed like water on the Niagara. It was all graciously supplied by a girl named Annabelle who had made her way into the group. Annabelle was like a bottle of the strongest alcohol. Something about her just got you talking. She would listen, too. She loved to hear everything that there was to say. She would even interject her own additions into whatever you were talking about.

She told us that her cousin owned a liquor distribution company. Coincidentally, we were all drinking the same brand of alcohol that her cousin distributed. I would not be surprised if the inventory losses caused by Annabelle were never checked out; rules never really applied to people like her.

Somehow, I had been brought into a conversation with her, likely due to her remarkable ability to make you speak. It began with some probing from my peers. “Say Yank, how come you never come out?”

I didn’t get a chance to respond, not that I would have. They called me Yank. This bothered me. I wanted them to call me James, but they refused to. I would have even tolerated being called Jamie, like I was as a boy. Another member of the group answered for me, a balding, stout fellow. “He’s far too high and mighty for the likes of us, aren’t ya princess?”

I was racking my brain for some sort of hair-loss related insult when I was stopped short. “Quit it, both of you.” Annabelle interjected, smiling at me from across the table and flashing a stern, disapproving look at everyone else. “You know, if we perhaps talked about things he likes, he might actually want to say something. Ever thought about that?” She looked to me and smiled, then took a slug from the bottle she was grasping. “Well, you’ve got the floor James, what is it you like?”

Caught off guard, I thought of a reply. “Well… I suppose I like to read. Charles Dickens? The author? Do you know him? No?”

Having avoided making eye contact with her before, I flashed a passing glance at her, expecting her to be looking off somewhere else. She was, however, looking directly at me and our eyes briefly met. She was very intoxicated, and very beautiful. She was so beautiful that you might expect her to be stupid. She was actually very intelligent, and she knew when to turn it on and off. Her hair was suspended down the sides of her face, draped over her ears, and formed a low knot on her neck. Her hair was such a light shade of brown that it was almost red or blonde, and she had eyes that looked brown in low light but green in the sun. She was a very dynamic woman in this regard. On some occasions she seemed to have brown hair and brown eyes, and on other occasions she seemed to have blonde hair and green eyes. She had a soft face that indicated a life of relaxation and carefreeness, and she wore a necklace of genuine pearls.

She was giving off a look that said she was entirely lost, but she and I knew that it was a game. Of course she knew Charles Dickens. But everyone else did not, and she preferred to turn off the intelligence on nights like these. She winked at me subtly and acted aloof and dull but thrilled to have opened up this discussion. “Dickens? I remember my Daddy knew a man named Dickens. He was in…” She leaned into me, and having misjudged her angle of approach, she pressed her face directly into the side of mine. “…the war.” This was of course a staged act. She kissed me on the cheek ever so slightly so only I noticed and then pulled herself away somewhat. “My daddy downright hates you northerners; he says that we should have kept fighting that war for another five or ten years or so.” All of us boys watched Annabelle’s every move as she gestured her hands wildly, still clutching the bottle of alcohol and taking intermittent swigs, even spilling some now and then. “And he said that if it weren’t for that Lee, we could have won the war. I’m glad the war is over. All that death and pain.” At this point, she began to cry. “It’s just… I just… oh, I don’t know…” She rested her forehead on my shoulder as she wept. We all sat in silence watching the spectacle. The others started laughing and talking with each other. They loved how she drank like a soldier about to have both legs amputated. Everyone was at least a little sweet on Annabelle. Her sobbing slowly faded away, having never been legitimate in the first place, and she whispered to me.

“James. James! When I get up, tell me that you think I’ve had enough and that you are going to take me home now.” I whispered back to her that I would, tremendously excited.

“Annabelle,” I said loud enough so everyone could hear. “I feel as if we should get you home now, would you agree?”

She muttered through a well of “tears” that she agreed, and I told my company that I was going to help her get home. I inquired as to her address from one of the others at the table, and we set off on our merry way. Now outside, Anna stopped me. “James! Fantastic job playing along in there. We’ll make an actor of you yet!” She looked out and realized it had rained while we were inside. “No! This is terrible! These boots were expensive, they’ll be ruined. James, will you be a dear and take them off for me. Please, James, they’ll be ruined if I walk all the way home in them. Take them off for me, will you, darling?”

I looked down at her feet, which were covered in their own lavish white boot. She repeated that they were new and that they needed to stay clean. She demanded once more that I take them off for her. I obliged. I unlaced each boot and tugged at the heel while holding her ankle until both shoes slid off. All the while, she held on to my head to keep her balance.

I held her boots by the laces, and they dangled freely, bumping into my leg while we walked.

“Why do you pretend not to know things?” I asked.

“It’s much more fun that way, trust me. Those boys know nothing, and they get angry when you actually do know something. They’re good boys. Stupid, but good.”

“That would be one way to put it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Nothing really, I’m just not fond of the name Yank.”

“So, are you really from the North?”

“Yes, Connecticut.”

“Well, then my Daddy is not going to like you. But I don’t care. If you’re what the Northerners are like then he’s got things all mixed up.”

“And what does he say we’re like?”