I just realized something with how Annabelle is answering questions. At first I was confused with Martin saying she wasn’t giving straight answers. She is; she’s just answering a different question.
“MARTIN
Are you going to stay silent the whole way?
ANNABELLE
Perhaps… that’s because you didn’t seem to like what I had to say.” (MAG 196; these quotes will all be from there)
It took me a strangely long time to realize this doesn’t actually answer the stated question. Martin was asking this because he was curious why she wasn’t talking to him, and because he didn’t like it (I guess). So Annabelle tells him why instead of if. She jumped ahead of the question to address his actual reason for the comment. (It also kind of answers his question, with an implied yes.)
This also gets really really long, sorry. (This post is in total 719 words, but it goes really far down the page.)
“MARTIN
No, it’s because you weren’t really saying anything, were you? It was all just ominous foreshadowing again.
ANNABELLE
Perhaps I was just trying to make things feel… familiar?”
Annabelle is answering the question of why are you being ominous rather than directly answering the accusation of ominousness. (Which answers his question by admitting ominousness.) Each time, she doesn’t answer Martin’s yes/no question because it’s hard for her, so she tries to explain something that will help answer, tries to answer a related question.
“MARTIN
So what if it does? Is that a problem?
ANNABELLE
Actually, I find it very reassuring.”
Again, not a yes or no. (It could be both reassuring and a problem. But the implication is no.)
Annabelle is working around the problem of her not being able to answer yes/no questions, and very well at that. I don’t think her answers are that hidden, really. They are implied, but not exactly secret.
“MARTIN
[Sighs] Is it much further?
ANNABELLE
Less so than last time you asked.
MARTIN
Could you just try answering a question properly? Just once?”
Look, even non-Web-avatars say things like this. Martin, that is a proper answer to your question, in a sense. The question is also vague. She goes into more detail but still doesn’t answer the question later.
“MARTIN
So this is what you wanted me to see?
Annabelle?
ANNABELLE
[Wistful] It’s a real shame, you know. I was so looking forward to filling you with spiders.”
Now, this is a real non-answer. /hj She goes on about this being her great plan and how, like any good writer, you have to kill your darlings. And then she says that she isn’t planning to do that anymore, eventually.
It is an odd question, what you wanted me to see. See what? He just read a statement. I guess I know what he means: you wanted to tell me about the hole in reality. Ah, okay, I see (haha). Filling Martin with spiders is a lot more like trapping him then chatting about a hole. So Annabelle may be giving an implied no here. No, it wasn’t, I want to use you as bait, but I can’t tell you that.
“ANNABELLE
[Strained] Because… explaining things, giving answers, like this… it’s not what I am. It’s difficult, against my nature.
And I’m trying to practice.
MARTIN
Why?
ANNABELLE
Why do you think?”
Martin groans at this, and at this point…Martin, the answer is fairly obvious. (Which could very well be Annabelle’s point.)
Sometimes, she does give actual answers, clear ones. But (almost, see below) always to open-ended questions.
“MARTIN
Oh, will we?
ANNABELLE
Yes.”
Wow, a straight answer. I mean, I think I can chalk this up to Annabelle practicing. Also, this is in answer to the question “will we really do as you ask if you tell us everything?” Perhaps she is simply absolutely sure of it.
“MARTIN
What? All this time, through all of this, it, it was just you spying on us?
ANNABELLE
Oh Martin. You have no idea who’s listening, do you?”
This actually feels more like a ‘no’ than a 'yes’, as if Annabelle was not listening and it was someone else. Which is intriguing.
I guess my point is a) Annabelle is attempting to answer his questions if b) Martin thought about it for a while. And maybe asked a follow-up question.