Annie LXV: An Era Gone

(Chronological index: Ray as College Sophomore)

Annie was filing her nails with a grain of rice when Susan came in. She flopped onto Thomas' chair. "Well, it's official. The ERA has expired."

She raised her head and looked around the room. "Where is Thomas?"

"He ran down to McD's for dinner." She blew on her fingers. "Ray's two doors down, helping a classmate nickel another classmate's door."

She turned her hand around to show her work to the other woman. Susan waved back. Annie shrugged and shifted on her cage swing. She looked at her other hand.

"Oh, isn't it depressing, Annie?" Susan asked.

The sylph froze. Her eyes scanned the room as she tried to figure out what the woman was talking about. There was nothing depressing in view.

Well, maybe if you weren't used to living with teenaged men. Was she talking about the smell? The piled laundry?

"Annie?"

"Um... " Oh! The poster was new! Was she jealous? "The beer wench is Ray's," she said. "Thomas...was against it." Thomas had actually given it to Ray for the express purpose of hanging it. But Ray had sworn to secrecy, at least in the face of a girlfriend so...

"What? That hag? Her boobs have more plastic in then than a Barbie doll." Susan dismissed the bikini model and leaned closer to the bird cage. "No, no, the ERA. The Equal Rights Amendment. It's past the last date for it to be ratified."

Annie stared through the bars. "Um, boo? Boo and hoo?" Susan looked scandalized. "What do you want from me, you big giant actualized woman? What would the ERA have given me?"

"You? You only care about you?"

"Not at all, Susan." She slid down from the swing and tossed the rice to a shelf. "I care about lots of people. Revered Master, his roommate, his roommate's love interest, moms and dads across this great land, Crocket and Tubbs and their eternal search for Armani that will stand up to a drug bust shoot out...

"But I live in a cage, Susan." She grabbed the door and shook it. "Master can keep me naked, or on a leash. He can feed me sylph kibble or birdseed. He can cover me with graphically explicit tattoos or electrolysis to remove all my hair.

"And my legal options are to pee in his hand or to cry for God to send retribution down from the Heavens."

She grabbed the base of the door and slid it up. Susan held it in place with a finger as the sylph crawled out onto the desk.

"Thanks. Anyway, the idea of whining because you can have a job, and you might get 10% less money than another voting, driving, independent human being? I don't really see the problem..."

Susan glared. Annie held her hands up. "Now, now, I'm not saying YOU shouldn't be mad. But I'm not lying, Susan, I'm entirely unsympathetic."

The human blew air from her lips, upwards to make her bangs flutter. "I guess. I cried about having no shoes until... But God, Annie, if you're not sympathetic, the guys are going to be even worse."

"Can't argue that," the sylph agreed. "But..." She waved and Susan offered her hand. Annie climbed aboard and was lifted to her ear. "They don't care about the amendment, but they WILL care about you. You need to decide, now, what it'll take to cheer you up."

"Nothing, Annie. Nothing will cheer me up right now."

"Well, I know something that would cheer ME up tonight," Annie said with a smile. Susan raised her eyebrows.

---------

"You want to see a movie with 'Whorehouse' in the title?" Thomas asked again.

"The way the Republicans are acting," Susan said, "it's the only career women are going to have left."

Ray and Thomas looked at each other. They didn't appear to be buying the logic. They also might be starting to suspect that Dolly Parton's tits and 'whorehouse' didn't exactly guarantee that it was a soft-porn movie.

On Ray's shoulder, Annie waved urgently. Susan obediently sniffled. "It's all so unfair," she moaned. The guys fell over themselves trying to take her mind off politics.

"I'll get the tickets! Come stand by me, Susan, while we're in line."

"We'll go ahead and get the popcorn. What do you want to drink, Susan?"

"Diet," she said mournfully. Ray turned to walk off. Over his collar, Annie waved a 'dial it back a bit' warning.

They found seats as the oil-slick distracter crossed and recrossed the screen. Susan sat between the boys. Annie stood on the shoulder between Susan and Ray.

And begged for someone to wuv her enough to give her a popcorn kernel.

Ray refused as he kept finding sylph-hand-full-sized bits in his hair after movies.

Susan muttered something about how 'men' treated 'the little woman.' Annie got four kernels.

The movie started, the credits rolled, the singing began.... Ray earned the enmity of the audience when he half-stood and shouted, "It's a MUSICAL!?!"

Susan had to agree with Annie. The looks on both the guys' faces did cheer her up.



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