annabelle martelli was the baby of a loving, happy family. she and her older brother were just far apart enough in age to avoid the typical dislike of siblings born too close together, but not so far apart that they weren't able to relate to each other. instead, he was basically her childhood hero, the person who showed her all the ropes and generally looked out for her. there are hundreds of pictures of him holding her in the days and weeks after she came home from the hospital, an adoring look in his eyes. her parents' shared the same look when it came to anna. she was tiny for her age and delicate-looking; they all touched her like she was made of some precious, fragile material. everything she did was cute enough to be put on videotape, even something as simple as getting 'yes' and 'no' mixed up or making a silly face. annabelle remembers little of this time now, but her brother keeps the memories alive with stories and pictures galore.
when her parents passed away in a car accident, anna truly didn't understand what had happened. she was too young and everyone was explaining it to her in ways that implied she would see them again. no one wanted to crush a nine year old's heart, but the result of their coddling was just plain confusion. anger was added to the mix when she was suddenly whisked off to a new place with her aunt and uncle, who she'd only seen at the occasional family event over the years. she loved them, of course, but they weren't her parents. her aunt in particular looked at her strangely, like she was seeing a ghost. annabelle threw tantrum after tantrum those first few months, refusing to go to school, refusing to eat or get dressed or do anything she was told. it wasn't until her uncle finally sat her down and explained to her what had truly happened to her parents that she started the healing process. they weren't coming back, this was her new life now, and the two of them would love her like she was their own daughter.
as she got older, annabelle's early brush with death in the form of her parents' passing manifested in perhaps opposite ways than most would expect. rather than becoming squeamish with the idea of life being short, annabelle relished the morbid and the macabre. she was constantly sneaking into r-rated horror movies and reading the most disturbing books she could find. she began writing dark poetry and sharing it in class, prompting a few teachers and fellow classmates to have some concerns about her mental health. in reality, she was psychologically sound, just a bit of an oddball. tiny and angelic-looking as she was, she had a leaning towards the underbelly of the world and suffered socially for her interests. when she began practicing wicca in high school, she drew the nickname marspelli, which to this day she actually enjoys and thinks is pretty clever.
annabelle was a good student in an invisible kind of way. she wasn't that girl who people shot out of their chairs to have in their groups because of the guaranteed A. no one really even knew how well she was doing in her classes. she always sat in the back and always only spoke when called upon. most of the time, when that happened, her correct answer would be overshadowed by the extra, bizarre facts she would throw in that were loosely related to the topic at hand. people saw her as strange, not smart. when she received the honor of valedictorian of her class due to her spotless academic record, she decidedly did not want to get up and give an insincere speech to a bunch of people she found to be mostly uninteresting and certainly not her friends she'd miss ever so much. so, she gave up the speech to the salutatorian, and but for the extra tassels she wore on her graduation day, no one would have ever known about her real title.
anna was rejected from every college except one due to the fact that she had almost zero extracurricular activities on her applications. she played the cello in her spare time, but wasn't in the school's band. the only thing she did consistently was gymnastics, which she kept up with after the move because her dad had always loved seeing her at tumbling competitions. she didn't want to give that up, and she wrote about it in her essay to stanford, which she suspects along with her top grades got her into the impressive school. there, she chose to major in english and she graduated in three years.
while she enjoys writing novels and poetry, annabelle doesn't know if she wants to be an actual published author for a living, or even at all. it's something she loves to do for herself, and she does share her words in the form of performing them occasionally, but it doesn't feel like it's meant to be her career. she sees herself owning a place where the oddballs like her can feel at home. in the mean time, however, she decided she needed to get out of her comfort zone and do something no one who knows her would expect her to do: work at a bridal store. notorious for her love for the dark and twisted, annabelle is definitely not your average bridal consultant. she specializes in nontraditional bridal wear for the girls who don't want to go with white and frilly for the big day. her favorite clients are those who are getting married on or around halloween; she absolutely loves fitting them and finding them the perfect, eerie outfit. it's definitely been a learning experience and a great first job out of college.
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