Chapter 1: Anna

Anna longed for the unspoken promise of summer. She remembered skinny dipping under the hot July moon, wading shyly in the murky waters until she could finally jump out and dress without worrying about prying eyes. There were summers at the lake, splashing around in cutoff jeans and an old tee, too embarrassed to show off her bathing suit.

"It's too much like underwear," she'd tell Kristoff, and he would always laugh.

And water tubing down the river during the hottest days of summer. She recalled the relief she felt as she was swept along the cold current after their long hike upstream, although painstaking to get there even after Kai had bothered to drop them off in her daddy's pickup. She'd lost her favorite hiking boots in the river that day.

Sometimes her cousin Elsa tagged along, but she never said much. Anna was three years younger than Elsa and Kristoff, but her cousin always seemed to be the odd one out. They'd be at the drive-in theatre under a blanket of stars watching the movie on the big screen; Anna and Kristoff shooting popcorn at each other like they always do, but Elsa would be on another planet.

There were so many summers lingering in the corners of her mind, threads of memories coming together to be bound in nostalgia. And yet this summer had brought none. Summer was already nearing its end and Anna had yet to see a body of water outside of the cattle watering trough or her bathtub. And the drive-in finally closed before school even let out, a victim of stagnating tickets sales. Except for the hot oven that descended upon the valley every day before noon, Anna had not seen one thread of summer.

But that was mostly her fault. She'd picked up a job application at the Dairy Queen just before break, and when she'd told her father about it, he's offered to pay her regular wages as a cowhand on their farm. They needed a third cowhand quick after Hans had quit without so much as a day's notice. The farm couldn't run smoothly with Kai and Kristoff alone.

"Good riddance," Kristoff had retorted when he first heard the news. "That guy was an asshole. You should've seen the way he was always making eyes at Elsa. Made my skin crawl."

Anna had hardly noticed. Hans had never given her a second glance. After all, she was neither beautiful nor rich. She had none of the desirable qualities that most boys were looking for in a girl. But what she lacked in beauty, she made up for in strength. She could feel the firmness in her arms as she pushed, lifted and pulled repeatedly in the course of a day. And how much easier it was than before. But strength didn't ease the strain from the summer heat.

Sweat beaded down her face in heavy streams as she gripped onto the thin rope and swung her last bale of hay on top of the second tier. It landed in perfect alignment with the second and third tier bales. She let out a sigh of relief, glad to finally be done with it.

"Need a hand down?" Kristoff offered, extending his gloved hand to Anna. But she was only up one tier and easily hopped down.

"Water." Her lungs burned and she couldn't be bothered to muster more than a one-word request. He silently obliged, crossing the loft to the dusty beet-red water cooler.

Anna pulled off her cap and wiped off the sweat that had pooled over her forehead before wringing out the moisture that had gathered in the fibers of her hat, thoughts of rivers and lakes still swimming in her head. As sweaty as she was, her mouth was bone dry, and she could already feel the muscles in her arms begin to stiffen.

She looked up when a soft lyrical voice resounded in her ears, almost like a vibrant hum. It was her cousin, responding to Kristoff's unsolicited attention. Anna could already imagine the sort of inane conversation he had evoked, after all he'd been doing it all summer to get her to notice him.

While Anna and Kristoff had stacked the bales that were pulleyed in with the bale claw, her pretty blond cousin had sat peaceably at the other end of the loft, completely engaged in some tattered old book. Elsa was always nose deep in some book, though. Every few years her aunt and uncle would spend their summers in Greece, and her cousin would never join them. Instead, she'd spend it holed up in the guest bedroom next to Anna's.

They rarely ever spoke.

Her cousin never was the chatty type. They had superficial conversations at the dinner table with the whole family and exchanged awkward back and forth glances, but moments later she was off to her room or being called out to some party, and within minutes she was glammed up and out the door while Anna and Kristoff were shooting each other with water guns in the yard, or making popcorn in their pajamas as they got ready to watch the latest horror rental. She would always pause, if only for a second, to watch her go.

Anna used to wonder if maybe she was only quiet around family, and perhaps was just as silly and obnoxious as all her popular friends when she was with them. But then Anna entered high school, and she saw that Elsa, despite being the popular senior girl, was like that with everyone. If anything, she was like a princess, or a queen. Everything about her screamed it. And it wasn't simply because she was the daughter of a wealthy cattle rancher. It was in the way she moved, the graceful way she flipped her hair and how she spoke; soft but commanding. She was mystery, and elegance, and beauty all rolled into one, and everyone wanted a piece of her.

Even back then, they barely exchanged words. Not that it mattered, Anna wouldn't have known what to say. Whenever she passed Elsa in the hallways, she'd barely muster an uneasy half smile. Her cousin's pensive eyes would lock with hers and she'd reply with a slight nod of her head.

In fact, it amazed her that she could be related to someone who seemed to be such a polar opposite of herself. Anna was boyish and unrefined. She wore long-sleeved plaid shirts, even when she was off the farm, and most of her blue jeans were unflatteringly baggy around the hips. It was a comfort thing. She couldn't imagine wearing snug white jeans or knotting the hem of her plaid shirt and exposing her taunt stomach while working around the farm, just like her cousin was doing at that moment. Even the hats they wore stressed their differences. Anna's baseball cap over two reddish blonde braids in contrast to a leather Aussie hat perfectly shaped over long flowing silvery blond hair. There was really no comparison.

Anna undid the top three buttons of her shirt and pulled at her collar to try to fan some air inside. Just watching Kristoff grin and flirt like some idiot filled her with ire. He'd never flirted with Anna. They'd kissed before while fooling around, or "practicing'" as he liked to call it. But he never looked at her like he wanted her. Like he was doing now with her cousin instead.

She suddenly felt quite self-conscious in her ratty clothes and matted braids, and didn't have to bother to check if straw was tangled in her hair. She already knew it was. It always was. There were a half a dozen family photo albums chalk full of pictures to prove it.

Anna grit her jaw and took a deep breath through her nose before walking over to the other two, her dirt-caked work boots rasping along the wood floor beneath her. As she approached, she stuffed her gloved hands into her back pockets and gave her cousin a mechanical half smile that dropped away as quickly as it came.

"My water?" She asked Kristoff, pointedly glancing at the tin cup in his hand.

"Ah, sorry. I didn't mean to get side-tracked," he apologized as he handed her the drink. "Elsa and I were just sharing our love for D.H. Lawrence.

D.H. Lawrence.

Anna wanted to laugh and roll her eyes, but slowly nodded instead.

D.H. Lawrence my ass, she echoed in her thoughts as she recalled the collection of cliff notes Kristoff kept piled on his bedroom floor, and how she practically had to pull hair to get him to crack them open during his sophomore year of college. And that had required a lot of hair-pulling. All his, of course.

Anna could only assume that the worn book that her cousin held bent at the spine was a D.H. Lawrence novel, though she couldn't imagine which one. She'd only ever read two of his books, and that was enough to elicit eternal hatred of the guy and the baneful words that he tried to pass off as literature.

She gulped down most of her water in large and loud swallows and pulled off one of her work gloves, pouring what little remained into her cupped hand and rubbed it over her neck.

"I mean, the guy was sensual," Kristoff went on. Elsa listened, but her face expressed little, and it was difficult for Anna to tell if she had any interest in what he was saying. Anna certainly didn't, and chose to tune him out for the better part of his peacocking show, instead, observing her cousin. She had small and slender manicured hands that looked like they'd never seen a day's work. Anna subconsciously flexed her fingers, picturing in her mind how rough and calloused they had grown. She didn't have to look at them to know that they were covered in scratches, she could already feel the sting of it.

Elsa was poised and regal, her knees held closed together and her arms resting on her lap. Anna imagined that if Elsa lived ages before, her likeness would have been used to fashion ceramic Victorian dolls. The girl was perfection. On the other hand, Anna stood with legs a tad too far apart and her posture guaranteed her a hunchback in another year or two. She could never compare with someone so beautiful.

"…he was daring and sexy when the world was frigid and cold," Kristoff expounded as Anna tuned back in, and her ears perked up when she immediately recognized the line from the paper she helped him write for his English lit class the year before. She was just a junior in high school then, but she'd still managed to help him get a passing grade. Not that she was a great student or anything like that; it's just that Kristoff was that bad.

"Oh please," Anna retorted. "The guy was a horny misogynist."

She turned to Elsa and, in her most exaggerated and pretentious British accent, proclaimed, "All women hail my chirpy penis! May it stun and arouse you, and quiver your loins to jelly!"

Kristoff palmed his face, torn between exasperated disbelief, and annoyance at her clear attempts to put a stop to his flirtation.

Elsa laughed. Sort of.

It was something between a chuckle and a soft murmur. Barely there. But unmistakable from the look of interest that suddenly sparked in her eyes.

Anna was surprised. She hadn't heard her cousin laugh in ages.

She looks beautifuller when she's like this.

"You don't agree with Kristoff's literary critique?" Elsa asked, her voice soft and low, with an edge of delight.

"Nope," she replied flippantly. "He's just trying to get you to spread your legs for him."

Elsa frowned and glanced at Kristoff.

"No!" Anna nearly shouted as she realized how terribly she has phrased her words. "The writer! Not Kristoff! He was just harmlessly flirting, I swear!"

She searched her cousin's face for understanding but Elsa seemed even more surprised by Anna's self-correction.

Had his face not already been flushing bright red from moving and lifting bales, Kristoff would have been flushed with embarrassment. He rubbed the back of his neck with his gloved hand.

"I should probably go take a shower," he said as he slowly backed away. "I'll see you two tomorrow."

Not waiting for any goodbyes, he turned and grabbed his lunch bag before he disappeared down the ladder. Anna groaned internally as she watched Kristoff go and knew that she would pay for it later.

"You surprised me," her cousin confessed, and Anna pulled her gaze away from the ladder, returning her attention to Elsa. "I didn't think high school girls could be so thoughtful about prose. They don't really teach you to think for yourself in high school."

She set down her book and comfortably rested her chin on her hand as she stared pensively at Anna.

"I'm not in high school anymore," she reminded her, having graduated not two months before. She was feeling self-conscious again. Even as she sat, her cousin's front knotted shirt showed off her pale and slender stomach. Anna impulsively tugged down at the hem of her own plaid shirt, as if subconsciously trying to cover Elsa.

"And you're taking a year off before you go to college," her cousin added, recalling it from a conversation earlier that summer around the dinner table.

Anna nodded.

"And what'll you do during that time?"

"Work here," she replied, her mouth feeling dry once again. It was the strangest thing, the more Elsa spoke, the more Anna found herself fixating on her mouth.

"The whole year?"

"No. I'll be traveling too. But I'm saving up for that." Anna's jaw felt like rubber and it bothered her that she had the strangest urge to touch her cousin's hair.

Elsa stood up and closed much of the distance between them. In Anna's eyes it had happened in slow motion; she took notice of the way her jeans rippled with the subtle sway of her hips and how her knotted top rose and fell over her belly button with each step.

As if she'd been reading her mind earlier, Elsa reached for one of Anna's frazzled braids and stroked the woven strands.

"You're always in braids," she noted. "Do you ever wear them down?"

"When I go to bed."

She didn't bother to explain that she never dared come out of her room without them while her cousin stayed over.

"Do you think I could pull off braids?" Elsa let go of Anna's hair and played with strands of her own silvery blond locks, twirling them around her finger.

You could pull off wearing a potato sack over your head, Anna thought.

But instead she said, "Yeah, but a long French braid would suit you better." And without thinking, she pulled off her other work glove and reached for her cousin's leather Aussie hat, sliding it off slowly as she took a chunk of Elsa's hair in her hand and feathered it through her fingers.

"I could do it for you now," she offered. There was a tightness in her chest as she spoke. It was hot and fluttery, but it wasn't unpleasant.

"I'd like that."

And that's how she found herself sitting behind Elsa and straddling one of the bales, their bodies just inches apart as she wove her fingers through her hair. Silence had once again been cast over them after some more awkward conversation, but Anna was actually grateful for it.

Has she always smelled this good? She wondered. Like winter and flowers?

She was slow and meticulous as she worked her fingers through the soft strands, her hands habitually brushing against the back of her cousin's smooth and pale neck. Anna didn't dare admit it to herself, but her fingers often lingered longer that was normal when she touched Elsa.

It was only when she was knotting the braid into place that her cousin broke the silence.

"I always thought you and Kristoff were dating," she said, her words imbued with the question she'd carefully circumvented.

"Everyone did," was her nonchalant reply.

"But you weren't?" Elsa pried.

"Well, we weren't dating."

"But you two were together?"

The question gave her pause. She dropped her arms down to her sides and squeezed her hands into fists.

"Nah, we never were. Not really," Anna answered glibly, unclenching her hands.

Elsa turned around, adjusting herself on the bale they shared, her legs pressing against Anna's left leg.

"What does that mean?"

Anna looked down at her hands and picked at her cuticles wishing she could sink into the floors.

"We fooled around a bit a couple summers ago," she admitted with a small laugh. "We wanted to see what it was like, since everyone was making a big deal out of it. But it's not like we were together. Kristoff's never seen me that way."

Anna had meant to say that last part for Kristoff's benefit. Because he likes you, she meant to imply, but it only made her feel small and pathetic.

She was surprised by the sudden wave of self-loathing and shame that came over her with her admission. Anna had always told herself that fooling around with Kristoff had been nothing more than a mutual curiosity, but in truth, she never thought that she was attractive enough to bother holding off for someone who was actually interested in her.

Nevertheless, it was already in the past and nothing could ever change it, so Anna tucked her feelings away behind a goofy lopsided grin.

"Don't do that," Elsa insisted gently, pressing her hands on Anna's legs and gingerly squeezing. "It's not nothing."

"It's just sex."

"Is it?"

Anna didn't really know where she was going with this. For someone who had mostly ignored her since hitting puberty, her cousin was being far more invasive than she was comfortable with. She was about to say so when Elsa took her by the collar and pulled her into a kiss, the startled gasp she exuded lost between lips.

Anna hadn't expected her cousin to press hotly into her mouth. Elsa's lips consumed hers. Her mouth may have been small, but it had a voracious appetite that left Anna with pangs of aching.

And her hands. She slid them down Anna's sides until they were back at her thighs, groping and squeezing with each penetration of her tongue.

It has to be insanity. Or maybe a sunstroke. Her mind couldn't enable reason. There was no reason to be found in the throbbing wetness that flowed and contracted from inside her. When Elsa brought her lips down to Anna's neck and suckled, it sent a spark down her spine that sprung her to her feet.

The pupils of her eyes were dilated with undeniable arousal and her face was flushed red. She could feel the heat spreading down her neck and expand in her chest with every pant, as she struggled to catch her breath.

"Wh-what was that?" Anna sputtered angrily and completely rattled. She pressed her fingers over her mouth, alarmed by the swelling and pulsating inflicted by Elsa's forceful lips.

"Just a kiss," she coolly replied, with a trace of mockery in her voice, hardly seeming like the same person that had been in her place just moments ago. Her cousin rose to her feet and dusted off hay from the seat of her pants. She had that ice queen look in her eyes that Anna used to catch glimpses of in high school; distant and haughty and completely befitting of her old nickname.

"You're an asshole."

She grit her teeth and snatched her cap off the floor, pulling it snugly over her head as she stormed off. Anna tugged down on the brim of her hat as she descended down the ladder, glad that Elsa could not see the bitter tears that threatened to overflow.

…to be continued...

Author's Note:

What started as a one-shot diversion from my main elsanna fic has now expanded to a two-parter. I'm pretty much breaking all my rules with this one: Modern AU, OOCness, but I figured, "Why the hell not?"