Author's Note: Thanks be to Calenheniel, who agreed to look this fic over and call me out on some of my authorial bullshit. This fic would suck without you.
The title comes from John Green's novel The Fault in Our Stars.
One
It was a rare occasion for Arendelle's royal family to be spending time together; the King and Queen, seated in the garden, their two daughters playing with their dolls a little way from them.
The adults' conversation was interrupted when Anna, her doll clutched firmly in chubby arms, walked away from her older sister and approached her parents. "Papa?"
"Yes, sweetheart?"
"When I grow up, I'm going to marry you." The statement was given a semblance of dignity by Anna's bearing; chin up, back straight, she carried herself like the princess she was born to be. However, her mussed hair and dirty clothes somewhat ruined the effect even if her eyes were completely serious.
Agdar couldn't help himself. He laughed, and Anna's mother hid her own giggles behind a hand, coughing delicately as she fought to compose herself. The youngest princess stared between her parents, perplexity written all over her face. "Oh. Oh, my precious girl," managed her father at last. "I'm afraid we can't."
"Why not?" The smile was beginning to falter, the pouty lips turning down at the unfairness of it. "You said when two people fall in love, they get married!" A knee, red and scabby, was proffered for inspection. "See, I fell down the other day. You fell down when you slipped on Elsa's ice –"
Elsa looked up upon hearing her name, blue eyes wide with curiosity. Her mother smiled back; reassured nothing was the matter, she went back to her games.
"– and we love each other," finished Anna, practically glowing at the flawlessness of her logic. "Don't we, Papa?"
Her parents exchanged glances, laughter was threatening to bubble up behind Idunn's lips, even as Agdar looked even more dumbfounded. "Anna, sweetheart," her mother attempted to explain, "it doesn't work like that; you see, Papa is your father, and fathers can't – "
Anna's face was screwing up, like a crumpled piece of paper. Before she could burst into tears, her father had an idea.
"Anna. Come here, love." He knelt down, opening his arms to her and letting her run to him, burying her face in his jacket. She sniffled into the gold braid. "I would love to marry you, Anna," he began, searching for and holding his wife's gaze, "but I'm already married to Mama."
She peeked up at him, eyes overbright with unshed tears. "Oh?"
He nodded vigorously. "You can only be married to one person at a time." He gestured, pulling his wife down into the hug. "Mama would be upset if I didn't want to be married to her anymore."
"That's right, dear heart," added Idunn, resting her head on her husband's shoulder. "I would miss your Papa very much."
"People can't be married to more than one person at a time?"
"That's right. Once you've fallen in love with that special person – and he's fallen in love with you – you'll want to stay together forever."
"Forever's a long long time," said Anna, furrowing her brow in concentration. "That's like... next next next week."
"And farther away still."
Anna took a moment to consider this, and then finally nodded. "Okay. Then I'll marry Elsa."
Agdar's mouth gaped open, his wife equally at a loss for words. "Anna – that – "
When she met no immediate objection, the littlest princess beamed widely. "Elsa!" she called, waving from her dumbfounded father's arms. "We'll get married when we grow up, okay? And we'll stay married until next next next week and after that."
Elsa looked up. "Okay, Anna," answered Elsa, her expression just a little confused. Anna squirmed free of Agdar's embrace and ran to her sister, babbling about wedding dresses and roasts and dancing; Elsa took the news of her engagement in her stride, nodding in agreement to Anna's plans and adding ideas of her own.
Their parents exchanged looks again. "When do you think – " began the King.
"– they'll grow out of it," assured the Queen, resting her hand on his shoulder. "Let them have this. It'll be an amusing childhood anecdote for when they're grown."
"We'll never let them forget it," he smiled, his eyes twinkling with mischief. "When they get married, I'll be more than happy to let their future husbands know what they're in for."
As they watched, the girls soon grew tired of their wedding plans, and resumed playing with their dolls.
Two
Perhaps her childish desire to marry her father had been just that: childish. Anna had just turned eight, and eight was a very mature age to be; so much more grown-up, and sophisticated. She no longer wet the bed (Gerda had been sworn to secrecy to deny such a thing had ever happened in the princess' life), she sat in a grown-up chair at mealtimes (even if her head only peeked over the top of the table), and she was allowed her first ever sip of wine on her birthday (it tasted bitter and made her head spin, but she wasn't about to let that spoil her treat).
She might not have been able to spend enough time with her sister, but Anna never lacked for company. There were tutors and Nurse (she was too big for a nurse, really, but she did enjoy it when Nurse read to her) and the servants; Mama and Papa were busy but they made time to eat meals with her and Elsa.
But on those (gradually more frequent) occasions she was left to her own devices, Anna went to visit Joan.
Papa had told her about Joan some time ago, and even given her a book about her; it was long and filled with difficult words, and her tutor had said we can learn it together later, Your Highness, but for now please open your history book.
She didn't get it. Joan was real, she had lived years and years and years ago. Didn't that make her history?
Don't be impertinent, Princess Anna, her tutor had said. And that was that.
But the portrait didn't really need a whole book to make sense. It was just Joan, looking brave and determined, wearing her armour and carrying weapons, riding her white horse. It looked like she was in the middle of battle. Anna wondered if it was because she was so busy, she didn't have time to wear a dress and pose like the others. She appreciated her all the more for it.
"Hang in there, Joan," said Anna. It was her ritual greeting, a reminder to them both never to give up, no matter how tough things got.
Joan wasn't Anna's only friend; there were so many other portraits in the gallery. There was the woman on the swing (Anna decided her name was Geneviève), her skirts flying; the princess spent hours bouncing up and down on the seat, trying to get her own to puff up just so. There were the dancers, the people talking, the man kissing the woman's hand (she wondered what kissing was for, did people taste good? Her parents certainly seemed to think so, judging by how often they kissed her). There was the man in funny clothes, who always seemed to be smiling for her.
But Joan was, by far, Anna's favourite. She was the only woman in the paintings in armour. She wasn't painted with a sweet smile or a cute expression; she was grim and tough. It was an appealing beauty, despite being different; it wasn't Geneviève's delicate features, nor was it the other women's softness. Joan was determined and proud and wonderful, and Anna wanted that kind of beauty.
Nurse fussed and said things like now Princess Anna don't spoil your pretty dress and if you make that face it'll stay that way forever you wouldn't want that now, would you? Sometimes Mama fussed about her pretty face. Sometimes they would talk about when she was grown, years and years and years in the future, and won't you be a beauty then.
Anna scowled. Pretty wasn't what she wanted. Beautiful. She wanted to be beautiful like Joan.
Elsa was beautiful like Nurse and Mama and Gerda said, and from what Anna could see from being just high enough to see over the top of the table in her grown-up chair, beautiful meant being blonde and well-mannered and saying yes please and no thank you when spoken to, and not much else besides.
Elsa also wore gloves. Anna tried wearing gloves once just so she could be like Elsa, and maybe Elsa would want to play with her if she did. But the gloves got muddy when she went outside, and the little finger of one side was torn when she slid down the bannister, and Anna knew this was why she wasn't allowed to play with Elsa.
All this she told Joan. Joan heard everything, from the chocolate cake she was allowed for being a good girl at the fancy dinner party, to the new bike Papa had promised her for her next birthday, and her latest idea on why Elsa always wanted to stay in her room.
"I got really sick once," said Anna. "I had to stay in bed for days. Mama said I couldn't go out and play because I might make Papa and Nurse and Gerda and Kai sick."
Joan didn't respond. Anna flopped down on the seat, her dress pooling around her. "Being sick is nasty. Maybe Elsa's really sick too. That's why she can't leave her room. She doesn't want to make me sick." She nodded, pleased with her reasoning.
"Do you ever get sick, Joan?" Probably not. Joan looked like she had never gotten dirty, torn her dress, or ate too much and had a tummyache. Anna did all of those things.
If Anna stood up on the seat, on her tiptoes, she could almost reach Joan's face – not that she would. Papa had expressly forbade her from touching the paintings.
Don't touch the portraits, Anna.
Why not?
They're very delicate, and if you touch them, you might damage them. Don't you want them to stay beautiful?
Yes, Papa, but why? I'll be careful, I promise.
No, Anna. Even if you're very careful, the paintings aren't meant to be touched.
Like Elsa?
She remembered that conversation clearly, because it was the only time she'd seen Papa make that face.
Elsa won't let me touch her. Is it because I'll damage her?
After a long long pause, he shook his head. No, Anna. You won't hurt Elsa, but Elsa doesn't want to hurt you.
"I won't hurt you, Joan," said Anna, "and you won't hurt me."
Joan said nothing, continuing to stare ahead with purpose.
She sighed and flung herself backwards, legs up in the air. She'd found it to be the most comfortable position to stare at Joan, since her neck tended to ache if she craned it upward for a few hours at a time. Anna tilted her head to the right just so, spread her arms out, and squinted.
When she did that, Joan looked less like a painting and more like a real person.
"Hi Joan," said Anna. "How are you today?"
Of course, she wasn't expecting an answer. This was just how people started conversations, and Anna was expected to smile politely and answer I'm fine thank you regardless of whether she was actually fine or not, or even how fine she was.
Papa said it was important for a princess to always smile and be gracious and well-groomed (this after an incident in the garden with the ducklings and the mud).
Papa knew a lot of things. Papa knew why the sky was awake at night when everyone else was sleeping (the spirits are out at night, just like you're out in the day), why the gates were always closed (to keep bad people out), and why Elsa couldn't play with her anymore (Elsa needs her alone time).
But being tidy and groomed and neat was oh so very very hard, and no one but her wanted to see the spirits, and if there were so many bad people out there, why do people still need to go in and out?, and she missed Elsa so very much.
"I'm very well, thank you for asking." She kicked her feet against the wall in a manner that Gerda would scold her for because you'll scuff your nice shoes, Your Highness, but Joan wouldn't scold. Joan never minded if she crashed into Sir Eirik (the nice suit of armour at the foot of the staircase) or if she muddled her lessons (her tutor was always so upset if she forgot her letters) or if she stole chocolate from the kitchens.
Joan listened to all her problems (which Mama and Papa listened to sometimes, to be fair, but they weren't around all the time) and (in her head) Joan gave her advice.
Joan didn't shut her out.
"I love you, Joan," said Anna. She got up and stood on the seat, on her tippy-toes, and found she could just about reach Joan's face.
She puckered her lips like she'd seen the paintings do, and kissed her on her painted mouth. It tasted bitter and gritty, nothing like kissing Mama and Papa and Nurse, and certainly nothing like the fuzzy warmth that thick book in the library full of long long words and men and women doing funny things with each other said.
Anna decided she would love Joan from a distance.
Three
Hans was really like the handsome princes of her books (now that she was old enough to understand what was written there, and older still to blush at their meaning). He was charming and polite and most certainly very handsome (he wasn't bearded and dried-up like her tutors).
Of course, it helped that he looked at her, Anna, like no one had done in three years. Not the servants, and certainly not her locked door of a sister. To him, she was more than just Anna, and in his eyes she felt like she could even be special – even when she was falling down and tripping over things and just being Anna.
She desperately wanted him to whisk her away from everything. Her loneliness, her sadness, her feelings of inadequacy; why, she wouldn't need to think of those anymore, so long as Hans was by her side!
They sang a duet together – and that's how it always started, didn't it? They danced. She didn't miss how well her hand fit in his. He didn't mind that she rambled – he said it was adorable. She showed him all her secret places in and around the castle. He agreed with everything she said. Hans didn't laugh when she told him about Joan and gloves and chocolate. They even finished each others' sentences and sandwiches.
"I would never shut you out," he said, and it warmed her heart.
It wasn't impulsive at all, that he would propose and she would accept; she was certain that Elsa could at least understand true love if it was right before her without a door coming in between.
"Oh, Anna." A pause as she searched for the warmth his voice was lacking. "If only there was someone out there who loved you."
"What?"
Ignoring the constricting of her throat, the coolness of his eyes, the pain of her cold heart, she said, "You said... you did," her voice catching.
He was talking, saying so many cold things even as he walked around making it colder still; Anna would have listened harder if she wasn't already cold, so cold.
She tried to cry, but no tears came, just a burning rage as he threatened Elsa. She welcomed it, her anger keeping her heart just a little less frozen.
He had lied. She had believed.
Had she fallen? She wasn't sure, she was numb. Elsa. There was still Elsa to protect. Elsa was all she had left – now that Hans had revealed his true colours.
"You're no match for Elsa," she managed to force out through stiff, numb lips, and then he had knelt and seized her chin before she could finish her sentence. "No," he said. "You're no match for Elsa."
You're no match for Elsa because she's better than you, thought Anna furiously, her mind not yet affected by the frost, her anger simmering just below the surface and keeping it functioning. Better than me. A tear threatened to fall.
He was leaving. A cry of frustration left her as she stumbled after him awkwardly, her legs refusing to cooperate. "You won't get away with this," she said.
"I already have."
And so he had. He had taken her naive ideas of love and her fantasies of Prince Charming, and extinguished them as coldly as he had the fire in the hearth.
Fueled by a burst of anger, she threw herself forward; her fingers scrabbled at the locked door. A shiver ran through her body, and the auburn in her hair faded away a little more.
He had taken so much from her, but even then her heart was still Elsa's. Even if the frost pumped through her veins, and with every heartbeat, Elsa's love was killing her, it had belonged to her long before.
And even when she was convinced her life was coming to an end, when her tears of despair froze and pattered to the fjord, and every step was agony on feet of solid ice, Anna could only think of her sister.
"Elsa?"
It was the end, but all she could think about was Elsa Elsa Elsa, and she found the strength for one last run.
Maybe it was shallow – like most of her life was, she thought bitterly – but all Anna could think of when she raised her hand to his sword was I'm not even sure I know what love is.
Four
Kristoff was the quintessential (she remembered that word from her lessons) gruff mountain man with an icy exterior and a heart of gold (better than ice).
He was probably more of a fool than she was, having fallen for the first girl he met, and after spending a handful of days in her company.
Certainly, he was kind and sweet and such a dork sometimes, but he was... different. Not elegant like Papa. Not fierce like Joan. Definitely not evil like Hans.
He was just... Kristoff, but she wasn't sure if that was what she wanted; after all, the princes in her books were dashing and romantic and wonderful. Kristoff smelled pretty dubious on his good days, his idea of romance was sharing a carrot with her, and he preferred being out in the mountains than spending time with her.
But then she would remind herself that Hans had been dashing and romantic and perfect.
Sure, Kristoff was the farthest from that ideal image (which apparently wasn't so ideal after all) but he was kind; when she fell sick, he stayed by her bedside for the whole week she was bedridden, holding her hand and putting frozen towels (courtesy of Elsa) to her forehead to bring down the fever.
He was thoughtful in his own way; despite very vocally declaring his dislike of formal events and clothing, he put on a suit for her nineteenth birthday ball and didn't utter a word of complaint, even when Elsa caught him massaging his pinched feet. He'd even bathed beforehand, and smelt oppressively of lilies for days.
Above all, Kristoff was patient. He cleaned the small cuts and grazes from her expeditions without a word. He cooked for her when she'd drop by, even if it meant eating a little less himself (she had quite the appetite, she'd heard). He pretended not to have seen her as she hid in the stables with Sven from her tutors. He indulged her that one time when she decided she wanted to try harvesting ice with him, and let her carry her own little block back to the castle to show Elsa.
And those quiet moments when nobody spoke were those Anna found most precious, for that was when she knew just how much Kristoff loved her, just by being Kristoff.
Just Kristoff was perfect on those bad days, when she started to doubt herself, when she looked at beautiful, smart, capable Elsa and hated being the spare.
Just Kristoff was the ideal companion when she was being Anna-ish, all gangly limbs and awkward enthusiasm for whatever she was doing – even something as mundane as bringing carrots for Sven in the stables. He smiled at her in a way that made her feel warm and fuzzy inside when she rubbed Sven's coat down and squealed at his harrumphing.
Just Kristoff was the person she turned to when she had something to get off her chest. He was as good a listener as Joan, but the main difference was that he could actually respond, and he gave the best warm hugs (Olaf still gave the best hugs, but his weren't as warm and comforting).
And because he was just Kristoff, and to him maybe she was more than just Anna, she gave him her first kiss, and the many more after.
Maybe even forever.
One
"Elsa? Do you want to build a snowman?"
Her sister was trying and failing to hide her laughter with a glare of mock-annoyance. "Again, Anna?"
"Again," said Anna cheerfully. "Yesterday didn't count because you got distracted."
"Some people have kingdoms to rule, you know."
"You know, I always wondered about that," quipped the princess, hopping onto Elsa's desk. "Kingdoms usually have kings, but you're a queen."
"Very astute," observed Elsa dryly, but Anna ignored her.
"Why don't they call it a queendom or something?"
The queen shrugged. "I don't know. That's how things have been for years."
"Then change it. You're the queen, you make the rules." The redhead assumed a haughty air, turning her nose up at imaginary subjects. "You there. Bring me some chocolate. What do you mean, there's no more in the kingdom? Bring some, or I'll freeze your ugly sideburns solid!"
"Anna, I'm a queen, not a tyrant," said Elsa through her giggles.
"You don't know what you're missing until you've tried it."
The queen rolled her eyes. "I think I'd better not make you my heir, if this is a taste of what life under Queen Anna would be like."
Anna stopped short. "Wait, what? Me, your heir?"
"Since I'm unmarried, you're the next heir to the throne, Crown Princess Anna." This was followed by a smile and a pinching of the Crown Princess' cheek.
The possibility of Elsa's marriage, however, rather dampened Anna's spirits. "But don't you want to get married and have kids of your own, Elsa?"
The queen's smile turned wistful. "We'll cross that bridge when we get there." But her expression warmed almost instantly as she turned to look at her sister. "Though I suppose you'll beat me to it."
Anna turned bright red. "Wait, what?"
"Don't think I didn't see it, Anna," said Elsa, her expression turning sly even as her cheeks pinked. "I think the whole kingdom did, actually."
She buried her face in her hands. "Do you mind if I died of embarrassment now? Because I'd like to be alone for that, thanks."
"You should have thought of that before you kissed him."
"Yes, well, noted now."
They fell into a comfortable silence, and Anna took the opportunity to relish the feeling of Elsa; the platinum-blonde spilling over a shoulder, the elegantly-tapered fingers making equally-elegant words on paper, the warm icy-blue eyes she had always remembered from her earliest memories.
"I've missed you," said Elsa suddenly, reaching out to take Anna's hand and squeezing it.
"I've missed you too," Anna smiled, "and this."
She squeezed back.