Annie
Brian Malone
The only one who gives me recurring nightmares, out of everyone who has died, is the hamster I owned in elementary school. Her name was Annie. I got Annie the summer before third grade. I thought maybe it was because my grandfather had died and my parents wanted to comfort me. Then I wondered if it was because we were moving and my parents wanted to ease the transition. I called my mom to check my hypotheses. Turns out my grandfather died two years before I got Annie. Turns out we moved two years after I got her. Turns out I wanted my own pet, and someone bought me one for my birthday. Anyway, I got a hamster. I wish there was more of a story. When I was a kid, I told anyone who would listen that the hamster named herself. The truth is I offered the rodent a choice: Holly or Annabelle. I have no idea how Holly became an option, but Annabelle was the name of a cow in a Christmas movie my mother liked to watch with us. The truth is, I knelt on my bedroom floor and placed the rodent on the crux of my outstretched arm. Before I let her decide, I told her, “Straight for Holly. Toward me for Annabelle.” I lifted the hand I was using to steady
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her. She dug her claws into my forearm and blinked before scampering up my shoulder. The truth is, hamsters are prey animals. To run out to my open palm, which hovered an unsteady three feet above the carpet and offered her to any one of the hawks that could have been circling my ceiling, perhaps went against her nature. But I caught her again with my free hand and hugged her to my chest. “You’re Annabelle,” I said. “Annie.” I wish my other memories were as gentle. Typical of dwarf hamsters, Annie nipped, and I was too young not to scare her. Her teeth slipped underneath the dermis easy, a sharp pinch, and she didn’t like to let go. She clung to me, dangled from my index finger when I pulled my hand away. Pawed the air like a dog on a chew toy. The pet store sold me a transparent exercise ball with holes to breathe. We let Annie run around the kitchen at the old house with us, the only large, uncarpeted room. Annie had an easier time maneuvering on the linoleum. She was not always safe when the entire family gathered there. Once, she scurried underneath my father as he stepped backward, my father the former college soccer player, and she spun clear across the kitchen. Her plastic