Anna jolted awake with a gasp. Staring wide-eyed around her empty room she took breath after shuddering breath, barely recognizing the fact that she was sobbing with tears streaming tracts down her face.
Bringing her knees up and wrapping her arms tightly around them, the Princess bowed her head and began rocking back and forth gently; all the while muttering reassurances to herself.
"It's okay. It's okay. Calm down. It's fine. Everything's fine. It was just a dream. A nightmare. You're fine. Elsa's fine. You're both together again. It's fine."
'Are you sure about that?' a traitorous voice in her head asked.
"Yes, I'm sure!" Anna snapped, though her eyes remained squeezed shut. "Elsa has control of her powers now and everything is alright! It was just a stupid dream!"
'What if it wasn't?'
'What if you have it backwards and nothing has changed?'
"Things have changed," the princess said, but with less conviction than before.
'What if you're wrong?'
'What if you dreamed it all up?'
'What if Elsa is still distant?'
'What if you still don't talk to eachother?'
"Stop it," Anna begged, clamping her hands over her ears though she knew it would do no good.
'What if the door is still closed?'
That thought caused the strawberry-blonde's eyes to snap open fearfully. Before she could even comprehend what she was doing, Anna tore off her covers and almost tripped because them in her haste to reach her bedroom door. Wrenching it open, she dashed down to hall and slid to a stop in front of Elsa's own white and blue door.
She raised her fist to knock, but hesitated, the cruel voice in her asking, 'What if she doesn't answer? What if she does and says to go away? What if nothing really has changed?'
Swallowing hard, Anna moved her hand before she lost her nerve. She tapped on the door three times, each one seeming to echo loudly in the deserted hall, and waited.
And waited.
And waited.
No sound emanated from behind the painted wood.
She knocked again, a bit louder this time; her heart beat beginning to speed up.
Still her sister did not answer.
"No," she whispered to herself. "Nonono-Elsa! Elsa please! Open the door! Please!" Anna began to knock harder and harder on the door, almost pounding, all the while begging her sister to please open the door.
Moments passed and with no answer, her knockings slowed down before stopping, the final knock being her head dropping against the door in defeat and despair.
'Nothing has changed.'
Quietly crying and sniffling, Anna was about to retreat to her own room when she heard the doorknob being jiggled. Lifting her head slightly to stare at it uncomprehendingly, she let out a small yelp when the door swung open and bopped her right on her nose.
Staggering back slightly, and holding her nose, the strawberry-blonde stared as a head of platinum hair stuck out from behind the door and began looking around almost frantically.
Struck mute, Anna could only watch as her sister finally looked behind the door and saw her standing there.
Letting out a small sigh, Elsa stepped all the way out from her room and began looking Anna over briskly and let out an avalanche of questions.
"Anna! What's wrong? Are you hurt? What happened? Are we under attack? Why are you holding your nose?"
The princess could only gawk at her sister.
Her sister.
Her sister whose normally flawless hair was messy and sticking up in all directions and whose clothes were rumpled like-like-
Like she had been sleeping.
Anna felt her eyes water and begin to overflow again, which set off another round of questions from Elsa.
"Why are you crying? What's wrong? Did you hurt yourself again?"
'She wasn't ignoring me,' Anna thought as the tears fell, 'She was just asleep and didn't hear them. She wasn't ignoring me.'
At her sister's silent tears Elsa grew only more frantic and was sure that something was wrong.
"Anna! In the name of the trolls, tell me! What. Is. Wron-oof!"
"ELSA!" Anna cried as she threw herself at her sister and squeezed her as hard as she could.
The Queen could do nothing but hold her sister back as her body wracked with sobs.
"I was dreaming that nothing had changed-you still closed the door-and ignored me- and I was alone-and I begged you to come out-but you laughed-and you closed the door-and I tried to open it-but it wouldn't budge-and I begged and I begged and I begged-but you wouldn't come out-the door was still clo-ho-ho-sed-" the Princess told Elsa of her dream amidst her hiccups and tears, and as the Snow Queen listened she could do nothing but hold her sister tighter and tighter until she finally cried, "Enough!"
As Anna's tears finally began to slow, Elsa gently pried her off of her own body and gently held her face between her hands.
Fighting off tears of her own, the Queen said, "Anna, look at me. Look at me," she repeated more sternly when the strawberry-blonde didn't immediately comply. As she finally met her sister's eyes, which were so much like her own, she unknowingly echoed her sibling's previous words and stated, "It was just a dream. Everything's fine. We are fine. Everything is going to be okay. We are together. Alright?"
Sniffling, Anna wiped her nose on her sleeve and gave her big sister a watery smile.
Giving her a watery smile of her own, Elsa pulled her little sister back into her embrace, and they both stood there in the middle of the hall, swaying back and forth gently as they both sniffled and smiled.
It is unknown how long they two of them would have remained standing there, had the grandfather clock a few hallways over had not let out two gentle tolls.
Lifting her head and peering out the windows to see that it was still pitch black outside, Elsa remarked, "It's late; or early, as the case may be. Time for all royals to be in bed," smiling at her sister as Anna tried to cover her yawn and sniffled again.
"Oh. Okay," Anna replied sadly as she gave her sister one squeeze before turning to return back to her room. "Good night then, I guess."
"Anna?" Elsa called as her cool hand wrapped around one of her sister's warmed ones.
"Yeah?" the strawberry-blonde responded, trying and failing to keep the hopefulness out of her voice.
"Could you-I mean-would it be alright-if you wanted to that is-" Elsa stumbled over her words, a bit embarrassed about what she was about to ask.
As much as Anna enjoyed seeing her normally composed sister looking and sounding flustered, she decided to end her sister's misery and said, "Elsa. Just ask me."
Ceasing her babbling, Elsa took a breath and asked, "Would you like to sleep with me tonight?"
She had barely finished asking when Anna practically bowled her over with her enthusiastic hug as she cried out, "YES!"
Chuckling at her sister's antics, the Snow Queen led them both back into her room, closing her door behind them. Crawling under the covers together, Elsa could have wept at how much like old time it felt like when Anna buried herself into her side with a sigh of contentment.
Laying back and absentmindedly running her fingers through her sister's hair, the Queen closed her eyes sent a silent prayer of thanks to whoever had allowed her and her sister to be together again.
"Elsa?" Anna murmured from where her face was buried in Elsa's shoulder.
"Hmm?"
"Thank you for opening up the door."
Elsa's eyes reopened as she thought of what had occurred only minutes ago. She'd been sound asleep until something had startled her awake. Disoriented for an instant, it took a moment to recognize that her sister was knocking at the door. Thirteen years of an old habit made her resist the temptation to respond to her sister's knocks, and she tried instead to bury the hurt and fall back asleep.
Then her sister began to beg and knock even louder on the door.
At her sobs, Elsa's drowsy mind cleared and she remembered that she no longer had to hide from her sister-a sister who sounded like something terrible had happened.
Fear choked her as she scrambled to get out of bed, the covers impeding her progress, and only grew worse as the sobs grew silent.
A thousand and one horrifying scenarios had flown through her mind as she finally freed herself from her bed and made her way to the door. Shoving it open she'd come across what appeared at first to be an empty hallway before she ultimately turned and found the disheveled form of her sister standing in the shadow of her door.
Elsa had been terrified up to that point; firmly believing that something unspeakable had happened once again to her sister; her heart pounding at the thought that she may have lost her again.
Her fear had abated at laying eyes on her sister, but it soon rose again when Anna had simply stood there crying and not answering Elsa's near frantic questions of whether or not she was all right.
The Queen shook her head and willed the recent memory of her fear and panic away, lest her powers went wild again, and instead focused on the present.
On how she could speak with her sister again.
On how said said was now curled up tight against her side like a cat.
On how she would never have to ignore her sister's knocks ever again.
Drawing Anna even closer to her, Elsa placed a gentle kiss into her hair and murmured softly, though she could feel that her sister had already fallen back asleep,
"No Anna. Thank you for knocking."