Anna walked over to the master bed room.
It was the night of the party, she was walking around, seeing her dad fixing his hair in the bathroom, it made her smile. She smiled her dad as he came out.
He ruffled her hair making her smile more and move his hand away. He smiled and walked away. Anna walked to the bathroom and saw Rachel was in front of the mirror applying makeup to her face while she had her hair up in curls.
Rachel looked over in the mirror at the teen, who was watching her while messing with her fingers, a nervous thing Rachel knew Anna did. She gave the girl a smile. "Hi sweetie. Come in." Rachel said happily.
Anna walks fully into the room. "Come sit here." Rachel said, and stood putting the liquid lipstick on the counter. Anna listened to Rachel's words. Rachel plugged in another curling iron.
Anna watched as Rachel pulled another chair over and sat in front of Anna. She smiled at Anna, the wheels working in Rachel's mind on how to do Anna's make up, and hair. "Can I do your make up and hair?" Rachel asked.
Anna nodded. "Yeah. I wanted to ask Alex, but she wasn't in her room." Anna said. Rachel had to stop herself from rolling her eyes. Of course Alex wasn't in her room. "Well that's why I am here to help." She said to the girl.
Rachel started looking for a lip color for Anna to wear. She found one and opened it turning to Anna, starting to put the color on "Anna, when a guy tries to hit on you, and they talk about your eyes. Just know their lying." Rachel told her.
Anna looked into Rachels eyes as Rachel worked on her lips. "Men will go on about a woman's eyes, but that's bullshit. They love a woman's lips. And you have very pretty lips." Rachel said, putting the last stroke of lipstick on Anna's pouty lips.
Rachel smiled and turned to put it away and get some eye shadow and a eye brush. Anna turned to look at herself in the mirror, rubbing her lips together to blend the color on her mouth.
Rachel turned back around and smiled at Anna. "You are a beautiful young woman Anna, so you don't need a lot of make up. And while you have pretty eyes, just know that a little of darkness can make them pop more. Just some eyeliner can either make them pop or hide them." Rachel told her.
She started putting on some dark brown eyeshadow low on the girls eyes. Then took a light brown and put it above the dark brown. She then took the eyeline pen and she told the girl how to do it and did it for Anna.
She took a little blush and added it to the younger girl's cheeks. She smiled seeing the girl looking shocked at how different she looked. "Now on to your hair." Rachel said excitedly.
Anna looked at her reflection in Rachel's mirror. She looked less like the homely girl to a sophisticated young lady.
"Anna, you need to realize how beautiful you really are. Show it off a bit. Try not to be so shocked." Rachel said to her, rubbing the girls shoulders.
"Girls need to realize that. We have the power over men. We have what they want, so we need to use it against them. So if you see what you want, take it. But don't do what I did Anna." Rachel told the girl.
Anna just looked at her listening and soaking in Rachel's words. Rachel gave a quick smile before standing. "I want to try something." Rachel said. Rachel walked away and soon came back with that pearled necklace.
"You're mom looked so beautiful in these, so you will too. How about tonight, you can wear them?" She asked putting it over Anna's pale neck.
"So beautiful." Rachel said, hooking the necklace together. She was looking at Anna in the mirror, Anna was looking back. "Now onto the hair." She said taking the girls hair out of its normal ponytail.
Anna stood with Alex watching as Rachel and their dad greeted people into the house. Anna was playing with her fingers nervously. She wondered which one of the males was that Dr. Lector.
Anna was wearing maroon dress that Rachel got her after catching Anna staring at it in the window of a shop. Ales was given a dress as well, a nice grayish tan floral dress. Anna was actually surprised to see her sister actually put it on at all.
"Who do you think it is? That Lector?" Anna asked, still looking out from the hall she was standing in. "Who knows, a lot of people here." Alex responded. The two still looking out at the people coming in.
Anna saw a man with curly hair enter the room with a well dressed man who was holding a case. "Their cute." Alex said, playfully nudging Anna. She gave her older sister a small look before looking back at the two males.
Rachel seemed really happy to see the older male of the two. "I think that's Dr. Lector." Anna said nodding once to the male with brown somewhat blond hair that Rachel had forced into a hug.
Anna got her answer when she saw Rachel and her dad looking around the room, before their eyes landed on Anna and Alex. The sisters were waved over by Rachel and Steven.
"Time to be shown off like fucking show ponies." Alex grumbled to Anna as she passed her. Anna took a second to fix her dress and then followed her sisters steps over.
"Detective Graham, and Dr. Lector these are Steven's beautiful daughters, Alex and Anna." Rachel happily introduced. Anna looked at the man with curly hair and glasses. He reminded her of a teacher. A nervous one but a teacher all the same.
"Please.. just Will is fine." He told Rachel. So he was a detective. Interesting, didn't look like one really. "Anna, Alex, this is Dr. Hannibal Lector and his friend Will Graham. They work together with the FBI. Anna Dr. Lector is becoming your therapist." Rachel said.
Anna looked away from Will Graham, to Hannibal who was looking at her. Anna felt a bit uncomfortable under his steel gaze. She felt like she was naked in a small room surrounded by his eyes. Judging her. Mocking her.
But she put on a small smile. "Hi." She greeted him. She felt Rachel's arm wrap around her shoulders like they did when Anna was talking to Matt. "Anna is a bit shy." Rachel said, giving Anna a motherly smile.
"Anna also doesn't like talking to people who judge her." Alex grumbled which earned her a stern look from both Steven and Rachel.
"Well Anna. I promise that I am not here to judge you. That's not my job. My job is to hear your words, prosses them, and then help you with what you tell me. I am not judging you, since there is nothing to judge." Hannibal said.
He was studying the young girl in front of him. She was a lot prettier in person then in her picture. She was looking at him, and freezing him in his spot with those haunting eyes of hers.
He made himself look away to look at Rachel and Steven. "I brought Will along with me, cause today was his birthday and he is a fan of your work Mr. Invers." Hannibal said, seeing Will looking the sisters over.
The sisters were similar in looks to an extent. Both had the same brown hair, green eyes, face shape, and lip shape. Anna though was paler and had a more innocent aura around her. While Alex was a beautiful woman, Hannibal's eyes was continuously drawn back to Anna.
Steven pulled Will to his office to talk about his newest book. "Anna, can you take Dr. Lectors bag to the kitchen?" Rachel asked. Anna nodded obediently, reaching her tiny hand out for what was in Hannibal's hand.
He felt the strangest urge to just... Hold her tiny pale hand in his own larger hand. But he refrained, handing his case that had some wines in it. She took it to the kitchen and he followed her. Some of the wines needed to be put in the fridge.
"So Anna. Dr. Chamberlin was the one who gave me your file. I'm glad to see that you haven't hurt yourself in a long time." Hannibal said, attempting to get the girl to open up to him. She nodded, putting the case down gently.
He walked over to her, opening the case. He gave her a kind smile as he pulled some of the wines out so he can put them in the fridge. He took a small sniff to smell that the girl was wearing the same perfume as Rachel was that evening.
He started putting the wines into the fridge, and heard tiny footsteps walking away, so he knew she left the kitchen. He looked around to see a hot roast, resting in its juices on the counter by the stove, some wine bottles and glasses on the movable Island in front of the stove.
So he put the rest of the wines on that with the others.
He walked out to see Anna walking around, looking like a lost sheep. He saw that her sister wasn't around. So Anna probably felt much more uncomfortable.
He saw her sit and look up as a man walked up to her. Both Anna and Hannibal knew that people seemed to know about what happened to her. She WAS the reason for both Steven's Hiatus, and publish time of the newly published book of her fathers.
She was a child to them, a child who made a loud crash and was put into time out after what happened to her. That's what some of her father's business partners thought. Anna didn't care anymore.
She was just here to meet her doctor, and be supportive of her father. So, unlike Alex who seemed to have just disappeared, she was going to stay at the party till nine. Hannibal gave the man a glare, and it made him leave her alone.
Before Hannibal could go over to see what happened, her father was there. So he walked over. "May I inquire what had upset her?" Hannibal asked. Steven looked at the good doctor. "She was just upset that he asked about the hospital. I am going to be talking to him about that." Steven said.
Hannibal nodded, and looked at Anna, who didn't look at neither of them. She was just glaring a hole into the floor. "Anna. How about we get to know each other a bit." Hannibal offered. When she didn't move or answer, her father gently made her look at him.
"Anna why don't you talk to Hannibal a bit. It will help." He asked her. She sighed and nodded. She would only do it for her fathers happiness. Steven smiled at his youngest daughter and nodded, kissing her head before going to entertain his guests with Rachel now by his side.
Hannibal pulled a chair over and sat to look at the girl with the haunting eyes that have haunted his mind and dreams since he first looked into them in her file picture.
"Anna, tell me what you are feeling right at this moment." He told her. She just raised an eye brow at him before sighing once again.
"Over crowded, embarrassed, nervous, anxious..." She drawled out with a small shrug. "The last time my father had a book party like this was before my mom got sick. I wasn't labeled the nut job then." Anna told him.
He just looked at her making her look away. But he felt sadness that she looked away. "Well to me, you don't look like a, in your words, 'nut job'. You look like a broken spirit who needs a little help with putting their spirit back together." He told her.
He then tried talking her, just about his job, cases he helped solve. Trying to get her to open up.
He even cracked the very rare joke. She actually giggled at it.
Anna started feeling a bit better around Hannibal. His jokes weren't all that funny but she could tell that he was trying. Which made her smile, which in turn made him smile.
"You are a pretty girl Anna, are you in a relationship? That can help you become better adjusted to being home once again." He told her. A part of her wanted to hear that she wasn't seeing anyone.
He knew he shouldn't even think that. She was a minor. Well for only a little while longer. Then she will be eighteen. Then legal.
He mentally shook that out of his thoughts. He shouldn't be thinking that way any way.
"No... There's only one guy in this town that doesn't think I'm a loss cause. I guess he's cute, but... I get uncomfortable easily." She said. Hannibal nodded. "You have history with this Matt?" He asked her.
She shrugged, blushing.
"We kissed once, but that was it... It happened the day my mom died." She said, obviously not wanting to talk about it. Hannibal made a mental note to talk to her about that kiss, when they have their session.
Anna looked over and her face dropped. Hannibal turned to see Rachel come up. "Hannibal, There's a group of men wanting to talk to you. Their over by Steven." Rachel said. Hannibal nodded, and gave the two girls a smile.
Anna listened to Rachel talk happily about how great everything was going. Anna followed him with her eyes. He seemed a lot better talking to the men he was around, then with her.
"So. What did you think about Dr. Lector?" Rachel asked the girl, who was looking at the said doctor they was talking about. "He's alright." She said.
Anna looked back at Rachel before standing. "Can you do me a big favor Anna?" Rachel asked. Anna sighed and looked at her. "I just want to go to bed." Anna told her dad's girlfriend.
"I just need you to help me by taking the trash out for me?" Rachel asked. Anna sighed but nodded. She walked into the kitchen with Rachel. She watched as Rachel taking the tray of wine glasses out to the showing table in the party room.
Anna went to the trash, and gathered the bags. But there was something that fell out. Anna huffed and bent down to grab it. She yelled out as a dead hand reached out and grabbed her wrists.
She jerked on her captured wrist. It pulled the dead body out of the little read headed girl. Anna fell in shock backing away not even hearing the falling and breaking of glass. She didn't feel the pain in her hands.
"You're not safe." The girl said, before screaming and went back under the oven as if she was dragged back under.
Anna was panting from her fear and from her screaming, when Rachel rushed in and shouted in horror. Anna looked around no longer seeing the dead girl, and saw she had knocked over the glass bottles of wine.
Them breaking and she had her wrists in the wine and glass. She was bleeding from it.
"What did you do?" Rachel shouted at Anna, she had a poker cause she was about to cut the roast.
"Look she didn't mean to do that. Stop yelling at her." Alex snapped at Rachel. "What happened?" Hannibal asked as he came in with Steven. Anna knew she couldn't tell them she saw a dead read headed girl.
So she quickly thought of a quick lie.
"I... I accidently dropped something while taking the trash out. I went to pick it up and I saw a big spider. It came out of no where and scared me. I fell and bumped into the island, knocking your wines over. I'm so sorry Rachel." Anna said.
Rachel just raised her hand, to emotional. "I am also sorry to you Hannibal." Anna told the doctor. He gave a smile. "Rachel. Have no worry. I have more wines that I brought." He told his old student.
Rachel looked at him.
Hannibal went to his case that was on the breakfast table. Everyone watched as he pulled out more wines. Rachel looked over and saw that Steven's daughter was bleeding. So she apologized for yelling at Anna, then she wrapped her wounds up.
_
Anna looked out the window of her bedroom.
She saw that someone was walking around the boat house. She wanted to know who was messing around out there, so she snuck downstairs and went threw the door by her fathers office to make her way to the boat house.
As she got close, Anna noticed that it was Will Graham. "You shouldn't be out here." Anna told him. He jumped and turned to face the young pretty girl. "I'm sorry Anna. But I was just curious. I read the file about what happened. And I wanted to see it for myself." He told her.
"Can I go inside?" He asked her. She stood there for a moment before nodding. She walked over and opened the door. She walked inside the empty room and held herself as she looked around. Memories of what happened to her mother, and the night she saw her dead mother went threw her mind.
"Where was your mother?" He asked squeezing his eyes shut. "By the window. She told us she had it moved there so she could look out at the lake. She liked to see the sun setting." Anna said softly.
Anna answered his questions.
"Did you guys have her moved out here so you didn't have to watch her die?" He asked. She glared at him. "I think you should leave." Anna told him, angerly.
He saw he hit a sensitive spot. "I am sorry for saying that... I'll be going back to the party. Good night Anna." He told the girl walking out of the boat house. "Good night Graham." She said mad.
She went to bed angerly that night.