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Title: Anabelle 03. Cornwall Redux Summary: Anabelle feels the after-effects of a long ago trauma, and moves in with Mulder earlier than planned. Here's part three in the Anabelle series. This story more concentrates on the relationship between Mulder and Anabelle, and Scully is only in the background for this one. The next part though will hopefully have some of that shippiness we all love. And for anyone who hasn't read the other two stories, Anabelle is Mulder's daughter, not the competition. I really recommend reading the past two stories in order to understand what is happening here. My thanks to Lucy, Kayla, Helena and Ashley for beta'ing. Archive: wherever, Gossamer especially, just tell me where it goes. Feedback: Hey, it can never hurt. Flames my sister's dragon takes care of. The addy is RhiaRamsay@aol.com Disclaimer: I own Anabelle Mulder, and Aunts Kate Morgan, Brigid MacKinnell, and Mary Coretti. Mulder and Scully are not mine, they belong to themselves. Wednesday, March 2, 1998 Manhattan, New York Kate Morgan's House 7:10 a.m. Anabelle Mulder (she now called herself that) paced around her room restlessly. Ever since the developments of a week and a half ago, and Mulder's story five days ago, she'd been feeling strange. It actually started the Saturday night she found out Mulder was her real father. She had a nightmare that night about the time when she was attacked. It was in the summer of 1991. Anabelle was spending a few weeks on vacation with Mulder and his two friends Nicholas Slider and Cecily Duncan in the beach house they had bought ages ago in Trewissick, Cornwall, England. One night she and Mulder went to dinner at the house of an old college friend of his. After dinner, while Mulder was out of the room the friend suddenly, unexplicably turned on her and broke an empty bottle of Vodka over her back. Her memory was hazy from that point on but she remembered Mulder eventually coming back in the room, picking her up, and holding his gun on the woman who attacked her. The attack itself wasn't bothering her so much all these years later, it was the woman who had attacked her. The woman was Jennifer Fairchild, her birth mother. Since she'd found out that she was her mother, the question 'why?' kept running through her head. Why had she attacked her? Was it just because she was her daughter? The one she so obviously didn't want? Or was it something that Anabelle herself did to make her mad? And then she thought, why did Aunt Kate and Aunt Mary and Uncle Tony keep it from her all these years? 'They lied to me,' kept repeating itself. She couldn't face any of them for more than five minutes without wanting to go off and scream at them, or she began to see Jennifer's face, ready to attack her. For some reason she wasn't considering Mulder in this group, but she knew it wasn't really his choice to not tell her the truth. The thing was Anabelle couldn't confront Jennifer. That same night of the attack, she was found dead. She'd died by drinking herself to death with three more bottles of Vodka just like the one that was broken over her back. It wasn't an accident either; she left a suicide note. In the past week and a half, things got worse. Anabelle couldn't sleep, she kept having the nightmare. She'd fallen asleep during the week in school and woke up screaming. She even began seeing her face while she was awake, getting the sense that someone was standing right behind her and when she turned around she saw Jennifer standing there with bottle poised to attack. The only time she felt even remotely normal was when she'd visited Mulder last Friday and slept over there. She'd only had the nightmare once that night. She felt safe knowing Mulder was in the next room. He always protected her. Pushing a strand of orange colored hair behind her ear, she went to look at herself in the mirror. She looked horrible. There were dark circles under her eyes, which, instead of being their normal deep blue color with a slight bit of gold around the pupils, were a bland grey color. Her rainbow colored hair had lost its shine and hung limply around her face. Today, she didn't even manage to get changed out of her pajamas, a pair of boxers and a button-down flannel nightshirt. She pulled open the door to her room and headed down the stairs to the kitchen. She was going to ask Aunt Kate for a day off from school. She figured when Aunt Kate saw her looking like dreck she'd agree with no problem. She got to the head of the stairs leading down to the kitchen, and heard Kate's voice talking on the phone to someone. Suddenly she heard Kate curse and a second later heard a glass shatter as it apparently hit something and broke. Anabelle started at the sound of the broken glass. The sound automatically brought her back to that house in Cornwall. She whipped her head around to see Jennifer standing behind her, the bottle quickly descending on her back. She dropped to the floor, feeling pain shooting through the veins of her back. But what she didn't feel the cold glass grating against her skin, and a few minutes later she lifted her head out of her hands. Aunt Kate was still chatting away on the phone, oblivious to what was going on in the hallway. Anabelle hauled herself to her feet on shaky legs, and managed to get back to her room. She slammed her door shut and locked it behind her. Anabelle knew that something was wrong with her. These things didn't happen to normal people. She climbed up on her bed and picked up the phone receiver on the nighttable. She'd call Mulder. He'd know what was wrong with her. He'd help her get back to normal. As she hit the speed dial for Mulder's home she wrapped her arms around her knees, desperately hoping that he would help her get better. Mulder's apartment 7:15 a.m. Fox Mulder moved around his apartment, going through the motions of getting ready for work. He pulled his tie off the coffee table from where it was buried under the real estate section of yesterday's paper. He was going to have to find a new place, and soon, if Anabelle was going to move in with him on the fifteenth. There was only one problem with this. He still hadn't told the Aunts that Anabelle knew who he was. He was trying to find the right way to bring it up, but he couldn't think of the subtlest way. The phone rang, disrupting his tying and getting the tie tangled up in his fingers. He reached over for his phone. "Mulder," he said. There were a few seconds of silence, then a quiet, shaky voice came through. -Daddy?- it asked. Mulder's brow wrinkled for a minute in puzzlement, then it clicked in. "Anabelle?" From the tone of her voice and the fact that ever since she found out the truth she hadn't called him anything close to 'Dad' that something was very wrong. "What's wrong?" He heard a plaintive sob over the lines. -Something's wrong with me,- she whispereed. Mulder sat down on the couch. "What's wrong, Belle?" he asked, his heart beginning to beat faster, his mind working frantically to figure out what was wrong. She whimpered. -I keep seeing her. She's always ready to attack me,- she said, and sobbed again. "Who is?" Mulder asked, wanting to hear who she thought it was before he voiced his thoughts as to who it was. -You know!- she gasped out. -Jennifer! She's always ready to hit me again. I keep seeing her in my sleep, even during the day I keep seeing her...- she trailed off. 'Oh shit,' Mulder thought. Before he could speak again Anabelle broke in. -Come up here Daddy, please,- she begged. "I will be there as soon as possible," Mulder said seriously. -Kay, bye,- Anabelle whispered and hung up the phone. Mulder hung up his phone and dashed into his little used bedroom to get changed out of his suit and into jeans and a sweater. He had no intention of going into work now, but rather up to New York, and he wasn't going to stay in the suit if he had a choice. To tell the truth he'd almost expected something like this to happen. For all of Anabelle's cool, collected facade he knew instinctively that it was bothering her more than she let on. A little bit of it had slipped through on Friday, but nothing concrete he could put his finger on. Mulder walked out of his apartment and locked the door behind him, and soon he was in his car, heading for Dulles airport. "Thank you," Mulder snarled at the woman at the ticket counter for the airline, who was glaring at him with a similar look on her face. She'd given him the run-around when he'd asked for a seat on the next shuttle up to New York, but eventually he'd gotten one. He hoisted the overnight bag that was always kept in the trunk of his car over his shoulder and pulled his cell-phone out once more. He'd been trying to call Scully since 7:30. It was now 8:30 and he still hadn't reached her at her home or on her cell-phone. He figured by now she was probably at the office and dialed in that number. -Scully,- Dana Scully had answered after the first ring. "Hey, Scully, it's me," he said, making his way through the terminal. -Mulder, where are you?- Scully asked, afraid that he'd gone off on another wild goose chase of his. He, smartly, decided not to bring up the fact that he couldn't reach her for an hour. "I'm at the airport. I'm going to catch the next shuttle to New York." Before he could say why he was going Scully asked the question. -Why are you going to New York?- Mulder sighed into the phone. "Something's wrong with Anabelle. I got a call from her this morning asking me to come up there. She won't say what's wrong, but I think it's something serious. Scully, I need you to get me emergency leave for the day." -Okay, Mulder,- Scully said, her voice growing somber. -I hope everything's okay,- she said. "So do I," Mulder said into the phone. Manhattan, New York Kate Morgan's House 10:45 a.m. Mulder pulled his rental car up in front of the old brownstone, not at all surprised to see Kate's car still there. He was surprised to see Mary's Explorer there along with Kate's twin sister Brigid's car there too. He got out of the car and ran up the stoop. He let himself in with his own key and made his way up to Anabelle's bedroom, where he found Kate, Brigid, and Mary standing around the closed door. Mary spotted him coming up the stairs first. "What the hell are you doing here?" she asked, the surprise evident in her voice. Kate and Brigid turned to see him draw to a stop next to them. Mulder waved a hand at the closed door. "I got a call from her earlier this morning practically begging me to come up here. What has she been doing all morning?" Kate sighed tiredly and ran a hand through her short brown hair. "She's locked herself in there. When she didn't come down for breakfast I came up here to say she could stay home; she hasn't looked too good all week. I tried to open her door but it was locked. When I called out to me she yelled to me to go away and that she didn't want to talk to me. Then I called them, and we've been standing here ever since." "Did you try calling a doctor? Or maybe her old therapist?" Mulder asked. The puzzled looks on their face told him that he probably knew more about what was wrong with Anabelle than the three of them combined. Suddenly Anabelle's door opened, and quick as anything with a show of strength unusual for her Anabelle's hand shot out, grabbed a hold of the back of Mulder's leather jacket and dragged him into the room. Mulder spun around to face her, and almost immediately she threw her arms around his waist and sobbed quietly into his stomach. Mulder's arms came up and rubbed her head and upper arms. He bent his head down and kissed the top of her head. "It's okay," he whispered. "It's going to be all right." After a few minutes of that her sobbing finally quieted down. Mulder gently picked her up, made his way over to her unmade bed and sat down with Anabelle huddled in his lap, a few stray tears trickling down her flushed face. Mulder rubbed her back comfortingly. "What's wrong?" he asked quietly. Anabelle sniffled and ran her hands over her face. "I keep seeing her." "Jennifer," Mulder confirmed. She nodded and began to ramble. "Yeah. I keep having the worst nightmares about when she attacked me. I haven't had a good night's sleep in days. I fell asleep in school one day this week and woke up screaming. I even keep seeing her during the daytime. I can feel her hitting me and my back always hurts like it's burning. Aunt Kate broke a glass this morning and I was right back there with her breaking that bottle over my back. And then there's the Aunts! I can't stand to be in the same room with them for more than five minutes without thinking how the lied to me all these years, how they never told me the truth..." her voice petered out to a gasp and another sniffle. Mulder leaned down and kissed her forehead once more. The pieces were starting to come together in his head, but he still wasn't sure of the whole picture. "When did this start, Belle?" Anabelle rested her head against his shoulder. "Two Saturdays ago. When I overheard you and Aunt Mary talking in the restaurant." She closed her eyes tiredly and slumped against him. 'Oh damn,' Mulder thought. He was pretty damn sure that Anabelle was suffering from some sort of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. She'd had a mild form of it after the initial attack, as was expected, but had gotten over it fine and managed get on with her life. However, he was guessing, finding out she was lied to her whole life and that the person who had attacked was really her birth mother had opened up fresh wounds. Even being around certain people was difficult for her. That settled it for Mulder. It was clear she wouldn't be able to live in this house much longer and be healthy. He figured that since she was moving in with him in a few weeks anyway that he might as well move up the schedule a little bit. His eyes wandered around her room, and something struck him. "Hey Belle, did you do something to your room? It seems less cluttered or something." Anabelle giggled into his shirt. "I figured I'd get an early start on packing if I was going to be leaving here in a couple of weeks. All the boxes are stacked up in my closet." Mulder gently moved Anabelle off his lap and onto the bed. "Why don't you get dressed. I'm going to see if I can move up the Aunts' plans a little and have you come back with me." Anabelle nodded, and Mulder got up off the bed and walked out of the room. The Aunts were still crowded around the door in quiet conversation. "Well?" Kate asked. Mulder figured he'd cut through the bullshit and come right to the point. "I'm bringing her back down to D.C. with me." "What!" "Why?" "Why-the hell-are you doing-that?" Mary said, the one voice that got through to him. "Why not?" he retorted. "It's not like you weren't going to do that anyway," Mulder said. The three Aunts looked at each other, and then back at him. "How did you figure that out?" Kate asked. Mulder jerked a thumb back at the closed door behind him. "From your niece in there," he said emphatically, "who's a whole lot smarter than you give her credit for." "Okay, Fox, what are you saying?" Mary asked. "What I'm saying is that she overheard us having that little conversation in the restaurant a week and a half ago. That's what's causing this whole thing!" Mulder almost screamed. "Oh," all three aunts said. Mulder continued on, having calmed down a little. "She's not taking this that well, actually what she isn't taking that well is the fact that you hid it from her all these years." Brigid spoke up. "You helped with this too." Mulder shrugged. "I can't explain her feelings. All I know is that she isn't going to get better if she stays up here. I know some good psychologists down in D.C. I can get her help down there, but it isn't going to help her being here." Kate sighed explosively. "What the hell. It isn't like it wasn't going to happen anyway. Just make sure whatever's wrong with her gets better." Mulder nodded. "You know I will." Brigid motioned to her sisters and began to walk down the stairs. "Well, we should move out of the way then." She walked out of sight and Mary followed. Kate stayed behind to talk to him for a second. "Since she's going with you now I can have any stuff of hers that you don't take back with you today sent down by the fifteenth." "Okay, that's fine. I think she's got some stuff packed up already anyway." Kate looked surprised at that, but then began to walk down the stairs. Mulder turned and knocked on Anabelle's door. "You decent in there?" he asked. A muffled "Yeah," came from inside the door, and Mulder opened the door. Anabelle had managed to pull on a pair of jeans and a black t-shirt, with a kerchief tied over her rainbow colored hair. She'd decided that it wasn't worth the struggle to get into one of her custom made outfits today. "Well, you're coming with me now," Mulder said. "Do you have enough stuff packed to manage down in D.C.?" Anabelle nodded. "Most of my clothes are packed up. I've been living in mostly jeans and t-shirts the past few days. Can I pack up some more books and CD's and videos before we go?" she asked. "Whatever you like. Kate said she'd have the rest of your stuff packed up and sent down by the fifteenth." Mulder moved to sit down on the bed once more while Anabelle moved around. "Look, Belle, I want you to see a psychologist when we get down to D.C." She looked up from where she was loading videos into another box. "Why?" she said, then rephrased it. "Okay, I know why. This little episode couldn't have been healthy for anyone. Just...please make sure whoever it is is nice. And a woman. The last shrink I went to was a guy and he just creeped the hell out of me." Mulder nodded. In a few minutes Anabelle was done packing up the basics, and they had managed to stagger their way down to the car, their arms loaded up with boxes, and they began the long drive back to Washington D.C. 3:30 p.m. On the Highway heading back to D.C. Anabelle slept quietly, curled up in the passenger seat of Mulder's rental car. Mulder let one eye wander over to her, and he sighed. He'd been gently urging her to get some sleep since they left the rest stop nearly a half hour ago, and she finally did, even though she asserted she'd be up in an hour when the nightmare kicked in. Mulder awkwardly reached for his jacket and pulled out his cellphone. Now would probably be the best time to call Scully, it was a long stretch of quiet highway with hopefully no distractions. He hit the speed dial and held the phone to his ear. -Scully-, her familiar voice said. "Hey, it's me," he said. -How is she?- was her first question. Mulder looked over at her once more. "For now, she's okay, but she's got a lot of problems to work through. I think it's some sort of PTSD." -Is there anything I can do to help?- "Yeah. In my rolodex I've got the number for a good psychologist. Cassie Tallis." -Isn't she the profiler that quit right after she got married?- "Yeah, she left the BSU shortly after I did. I'd rather go with someone I knew for this rather than a total stranger." Suddenly, Mulder let out a tired sigh. Scully picked up on Mulder's tiredness. -How are you handling this, Mulder?- she asked sympathetically. He sighed once more into the phone and ran a hand over his face. "It--it's hard. I mean, it's hard now, and when she gets into therapy it's probably going to get worse." After a brief silence she began to speak again, but hesitantly. -Do you want me to come over tonight and help get her settled in?- "That would be great," Mulder said sincerely. -Okay. See you then,- she said and they mutually hung up. Mulder's eyes moved over to Anabelle who was moving restlessly in her sleep. Mulder reached a hand out and caressed her head, and she gradually calmed down. Mulder turned his eyes back to the road and settled in for the drive. 8:30 p.m. Mulder's Apartment "You know, just because I'm moving in with you doesn't mean I'm about to become your personal cook!" "You? Cook? The last time that happened you broke the oven!" "Judging by what I've seen of both your eating habits you'll both be dead in a month!" That was Scully, trying to break up the argument brewing between Mulder and Anabelle. It worked. They both turned to her where she was standing in the doorway to Mulder's kitchen. "Mulder," she began, "you've lived on your own for a good number of years, you have to know how to cook some basics. You can't survive on take out alone." "Wanna bet?" Mulder muttered under his breath. Anabelle spoke up here. "Let me just say that breaking the oven was a one time thing. I'm not that bad at cooking either. But I refuse to do it every day!" "I never said that!" Mulder retorted. "Why don't you just take turns at it?" Scully suggested. Anabelle grinned evilly. "That seems fair. That way I can make you eat tofu burgers," she said looking at Mulder. Mulder winced and made a gagging noise in the back of his throat. "In the meantime," she continued, "I'm going to have some ice cream you know you have in your freezer." As she walked over to dig through his freezer Mulder turned to Scully with his whipped puppy dog look on his face. Scully valiantly tried to bite back a grin. It was good to see both of them so lighthearted after this afternoon. Cassie Tallis had said that the best thing for Anabelle would be therapy, and at the time avoidance of anything or anyone that would trigger an attack, which meant it was a good thing Mulder had brought her down to live with him now. So far, Anabelle seemed to be doing okay. She was acting close to her normal self, which wasn't quite normal to begin with, but Scully was learning fast that for the members of Mulder's family, normal was a foreign word. Being around Mulder seemed to be the best thing for her at the moment. Right now, Anabelle was getting into yet another good-natured argument with Mulder. Scully caught the end of the conversation. "Look it, one more comment like that this ice cream's going down your shirt!" Anabelle said, holding up the spoon. "Whatever," Mulder said with a smirk on his face, and he turned around to walk out of the kitchen. Behind him, Scully saw Anabelle's temper begin to steam and the evil glint in her eyes. Scully stepped off to the side as her and Anabelle's eyes met and she got the idea of what was going to happen. Anabelle took a spoonful of ice cream, positioned the spoon as if it were a catapult, and let fly. Mulder never saw it coming, and to Scully, this was a sign that things were getting back to normal. The end, until the next story. There is no town in Cornwall called Trewissick, but it's a tribute to the wonderful series of books by Susan Cooper.
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