Anna flicked the T.V from channel to channel, bored: there was nothing worth watching. Sighing, she left the news on and flopped back on the sofa, not really intending to listen.
'The war in Iraq-.'
'Oh no, bạn don't,' Anna muttered, grabbing the remote. Her Dad had joined the army after her Mum had died of an overdose. Anna didn't really blame him, she'd have got out of the house as fast as possible too if she was an adult. The whole house was contaminated with the memories of Mum, of her laugh, of her accident... suicide... whatever it was. Even so, Anna missed Dad like it was painful. She'd already Mất tích one parent, and though she'd always thought it would be brilliant to have no one who cared if she revised for her GCSEs, hoặc if she failed them, no parent who forced a curfew on her, hoặc who tagged around embarrassingly at her school prom, it wasn't brilliant at all. She felt she could just die, and nobody from her family would care. Well, maybe her uncle, who had moved in to take care of her when Dad left, would know he was supposed to grieve and cry.
Anna jabbed her thumb against the button to change channels. Automatically, after almost a năm of twinkling when anyone mentioned the war hoặc her father, she grinned.
'-is becoming thêm serious. Many innocent citizens have been shot down, and several British troops-.'
Dad probably wasn't part of those troops. Anna looked down, staring at the remote. It was black with red buttons. She stabbed the button. The T.V was so old it was practically an antique. It didn't change channels.
'-were mowed down. Approximately 1000 are missing, 450 severely injured-.'
Black and white pictures began coming up, and Anna could have sworn she saw her father's face. Anna wrenched her eyes away for a moment, and pressed the 'off' button continuously for ten seconds.
Nothing happened.
It was lingering on a picture of her father- no, a dead man who looked vaguely like her father. He was lying sprawled on the ground, a mangled red cut across his cheek, his face twisted and furious. As the T.V zoomed in on him, Anna saw his face properly. It had been months since she'd last seen it, but even in black and white, with a cut slashed across his face, Anna recognised him as the man who had hugged her goodbye ten months ago.
'He's dead,' she đã đưa ý kiến blankly.
There was no way a man with a cut that almost sliced his face in half could be alive. But Anna saw, electric relief rushing through her, he was moving, stirring, alive... and looking straight out at her.
'And 200 have been confirmed dead,' finished the news reader.
'I don't want to hear this,' Anna blurted, blushing at how shrill and stupid she sounded. It probably wasn't her father. After all, it had been many months since they were together, and the cut, as well as the beard he'd grown, disfigured his face a lot. She was being an idiot.
Anna reached for the remote for one last try, but she didn't want to try to switch it off and have it keep playing. This way she could kid herself she could stop at any moment. Then it zoomed closer to her father's- no, the man's- tortured face, and she grabbed the remote, pressing the off button for ten giây again, then again just in case. And again. The voice didn't even falter.
'Anna.'
She dropped the remote to the floor with a clatter. The voice seemed to be coming from the T.V, but it couldn't be- no.
'Anna.'
This time she saw her father's lips di chuyển on the T.V. He rose unsteadily to his feet, his eyes never leaving hers. They were bloodshot from the long hours, and wild and even cruel. Her father had never looked at her like that before. He seemed, Anna thought, to stumble towards her, not just on the screen, but as if, God, it was stupid, but as if he coming out of the T.V.
Anna jumped up and ran from the room, but the T.V. continued to blare, and Dad's mangled face was printed in her mind. She slammed the door behind her, but the volume remained consistent.
'Anna.'
This time the voice didn't crackle from the T.V. It came from directly behind her, and slowly, very slowly, the door was pulled open. The man who hugged her goodbye ten months cách đây was standing there, a mangled red cut across his face, his eyes cold and wild as he stared at her.