Disclaimer :  Oh please let them be mine.  I want to make the third movie and get Brendan and Rachel to be in it.  But I know Rachel won't..so Maybe I'll be in it.  They are not mine..too bad so sad.

 

 

Chapter 2 :  Missing

 

 

It was the sun shining in on her face, which woke Emma.  She yawned and opened her eyes.  This place was a lot less frightening in the daylight.  Instinctively she reached for Annabelle, and didn't feel her.  Emma looked over, and only saw the broken doll.  She frowned and  got up looking under the bed, and all over the room, but Annabelle wasn't anywhere to be found.  Then she had a hunch of where she might be, and ran out of her room down the hall, to another door.  She opened it but it was just an old storage room.  The next two doors were other rooms, and her third try found Alex, who was asleep in his bed.  Not one to cause trouble,  Emma hesitated.  Maybe he hadn't taken Annabelle.  Maybe she was in the room someplace, but Emma had checked, and she knew that she had fallen asleep with her last night.  She checked around Alex's room, in drawers and in his suitcase.  The noise from that woke him.

 

"Hey what are you doing snooping in my stuff."  he asked sitting up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

 

"I can't find Annabelle, and I know you took her just like last time."  He shook his head.

 

"Okay I did take her last time, but she came back didn't she, and this time I had nothing to do with her disappearing,"  Alex said, and he hadn't.  It was clear by her look that Emma didn't believe him.

 

"Come on I'll help you look for her."  Again they searched all of his room looking under the bed, in the Wardrobe, in drawers, but didn't find her.  They went back to Emma's room, and on her bed was the broken doll but not her Annabelle.

 

"Whose baby is this?" he asked.  He had never seen her here before, and the five times they had come here had given him enough time to be all over the house from top to bottom.

 

"She was in here when I got here last night."  He shrugged.  Other families came here too, so he guessed some girl left her baby here then.

 

"Alex you really didn't take her?" Emma asked.

 

"Nope dad said that the next time I did that he would use his belt, so I'm not going to ever hide her."  Emma nodded, cringing as Alex said belt.  Their dad used that as a last resort, and she was happy she hadn't gotten spanked yet, but it was just as bad to her when Alex got them.

 

"Well this doesn't make a bit of since,"  Emma said sitting down on her bed.

 

"Well she has to be here someplace."  Alex said.  They pulled the covers off of her bed, but she wasn't under there.

 

"Alex where is she?"  Emma was getting panicked now.  Annabelle had been her first present from her dad, and she didn't want her lost.

 

"I've got no idea.  Come on maybe if we retraced your steps we will find her that way."  He took her hand and pulled her with him, and they went down the hall to the stairs and down to the large doors.

 

"Now we came in last night."  Emma nodded.

 

"And we both walked in to the middle of this room, and you had Annabelle in your arms right?"  Emma was beginning to wonder if she had left the doll out in the car.

 

"Maybe she is in  the car,"  Emma said.  Alex unlocked the door, and it squeaked as he opened it.  Outside was the start of a beautiful day.  The birds were chirping, and the smell of pine was heavy as most of the trees around the house were pine trees.  The two went to the car and looked in there for her, but didn't find her any place.

 

"Well lets try your room again,  Did you leave her in the bathroom?"  Alex asked.  That was one place she had not looked.

 

"Nope."  She took his hand, and they went back in, just as their parents were coming downstairs.

 

"Are you two going to play out in your pajamas?" Evelyn asked.

 

"No Emma though she left Annabelle in the car,"  Alex said.

 

"You had her with you in bed last night,"  Evie said as she gave both of her children a good moring hug and kiss.  Rick came over and Emma hugged him.

 

"Did you sleep all right?" he asked her.

 

"Yep."  She grabbed Alex's hand and they ran back upstairs, down the hall to her room.  When they walked in both of them gasped because Annabelle was sitting on the bed next to Dixie.

 

"There you are."  Emma hugged her and kissed her.

 

"Emma she wasn't there just a moment ago."  Alex said.

 

"Well she is fine now, and I'm taking her with me on the hike."  Alex left to get dressed, and Emma settled Annabelle back on the bed, and went into her bathroom where she wet a washcloth and cleaned her face.  She brusshed her and teeth and went back out into her room where she got dressed.  She put a new dress on Annabelle, then left to go down and have breakfast with the rest of the family.

 

 

 

 

The hike to the lake took them a half hour, and when they arrived Rick and Alex set things up, while the girls spread out the large blanket they had brought along to watch as the guys fished.

 

"Come on Emms,"  Alex said as he hooked a warm, ready to cast in his line.  She made a face.

 

"No thats all right I'll just watch.  Mum why do guys like to do this sort of thing?" she asked.  That comment got a laugh from Evelyn, and made Emma smile.

 

"I'm not sure.  My father and brother loved to go fishing, I think its just a bonding experience."  She would have said more when Alex called out that he had caught a fish, and both ladies watched as he reeled in his catch.  The fish was big, and Alex brought it over.

 

"He will make good lunch,"  Alex said.  Emma had backed away.

 

"Well good."  He left again.

 

"Do we really have to eat that?"  Evie smiled.

 

"I brought some fruit and bread, so if you don't want to, then no, you can just eat the other food.  Why don't you and I got for a walk?"   Emma nodded, and after Evelyn told Rick what they were up too the too O'Connell women, found a path that Evelyn knew well and hiked ten minutes to a  little stream.  They took their shoes and off and waded in finding the water very cold.

 

"When was the first time you came out here?  Emma asked as they settled on a small rock outcropping by the stream, and dangled their feet in the water.

 

"Well we came out here the first time when Alex was 4, and he got the chicken pox.  We spent the whole Vacation with him in a bath tub of water with Baking soda in it.  He also had a pretty high fever, and a doctor from the next village came and had us keep him in a luke warm bath for almost four hours until his fever went down."  That time had not been fun for any of them.

 

"Thats not very good.  Mum have you ever lost things and then found them.  I mean like this moring I couldn't find Annabelle.  I though Alex had taken her, and we both went to look for her out in the car, and then we came back up stairs and she was sitting next to Dixie."  Emma was frightened by this.

 

"Are you sure she wasn't there?  Perhaps you just looked over her."  Emma shook her head.

 

"Mum she was gone.  I promise you, and Alex was with me so he couldn't have put her back."  She was upset now, and Evelyn held her close.

 

"Honey shh.  I just think you could have over looked her is all,"  Evelyn said, trying to calm her down.  Emma relaxed in her arms.

 

"Maybe so.  I just don't like that house mum."  Something about the house made her stomach churn and her skin crawl.  She had slept fine, but this whole episode with Annabelle going missing, and then finding her where she had not been, really made Emma uneasy.  They walked back to the lake hand in hand, and Evelyn told her that the house had been around a long time, and that perhaps it was just going to take Emma time to get used to things.  The rest of the day was spent around the lake, and they even swam in it.  It was fresh water, and freezing cold, but allot of fun. 

 

 

 

 

 

It was late, and Emma lay awake worried.  She had fallen asleep again with Mum there, and now she was awake.  She had not let go of Annabelle, and wouldn't.  

 

"Emma?"  Alex's voice called out.

 

"Come in."  He did and got in her bed.

 

"Your baby isn't the first thing to go missing.  I usually sleep in uncle Johns room when we come here.  I've lost lots of stuff, and found them again in places they were not before."  She shuttered.

 

"Did you tell mum and dad?"  she asked

 

"Lots of times, and they just told me I overlooked it."  He sighed.

 

"I want to go home,"  she said.

 

"Well we only have two months left to go, and really Emma the only think that ever happens is stuff going missing, and reappearing.  I know this place is haunted, but nothing bad has happened, and there aren't any secrets rooms its just an old house, with a old history."   

 

"Just stay with me okay?"  she asked him.  He nodded and they soon fell asleep.

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