"Is that it?" Elsa asks, not bothering to hide her disappointment.
"Your sister Anna," Mama says.
Three-year-old Elsa looks down into the crib and wrinkles her nose at the baby, all squashed up and wrinkly like a particularly ugly raisin. She's been waiting almost a year for this? It can't play with her. And it smells funny. Elsa turns her nose to the baby and then back to Mama with her best thespian performance, eyes widened and bottom lip jutted out precariously, a trick that's worked for three years.
"Can we get another one?" Elsa asks. Maybe there's some exchange station out there for babies, and Elsa can get one that's not messed up and weird. Where exactly do these things come from anyway? She has some seriously strong words for the manufacturer. "One who can play?"
"We're not getting another baby," Mama says, gently, but Elsa looks down at the ground and frowns. This Anna is turning Mama against her already. Whatever, Elsa thinks, because to her Anna is always going to be the baby or it. Even if her parents don't see it, Elsa knows Anna is bad news.
Maybe Anna feels the negativity because she starts wailing loudly, face reddening like a tomato and gaping maw of a mouth – toothless, Elsa thinks with horror, toothless – opening wide. Elsa feels a surge of vicious satisfaction when the conniving little demon cries, but that lasts for maybe two seconds before her sensitive eardrums start pounding. Nice set of lungs on the thing.
"Stop that," Elsa says, but maybe the baby is stupid or pretending not to hear because it keeps crying. If anything, it cries louder, until Elsa feels a headache building up. She claps her hands over her ears.
"Shh," Mama tries, picking the baby up and swaying from side to side, trying her hardest to placate the thing – Elsa frowns again because it has honestly done nothing to merit such good treatment. It's just sort of sat there the whole time, blinking quietly with large blue eyes that are maybe its only redeeming factor – Elsa has blue eyes too, so obviously blue is the best. But still. Weird. Mama pats the baby's back, cooing, "It's okay, Anna, shh, shh."
"Why are you hushing it? It's obviously stupid," Elsa says. "Look, it's not even talking."
"Elsa," Mama chides, and Elsa guiltily quiets.
The baby won't stop crying so Mama puts it back down and tells her to take care of it for now. Elsa nods dutifully and watches as Mama leaves to maybe find Papa or a doctor, and then peers over the crib again to take another look. Still ugly, still crying. Elsa makes eye contact with the baby and frowns, and it only cries harder, now flailing its arms around and looking back and forth.
"All right, what is it you want?" Elsa asks, but the baby doesn't respond. Elsa's eyebrows furrow and she leans in closer.
Then she shrieks.
The baby's caught on to her hair.
"Let go!" Elsa screams, but the baby has a death grip on her hair and drags Elsa closer. Elsa is unwilling to relinquish a chunk of her hair so she lets herself be pulled without resistance. "Let go – hey – Anna!"
Of course, the baby would choose now to stop crying. Was it her name? Whatever it was, Elsa breathes a sigh of relief when the irritating noise stops, and Anna makes a little joyful gurgle in her throat. Of course, Elsa would be even morerelieved if her hair was free. Her neck is still craned at an uncomfortable angle like some sort of misshapen giraffe, and forget the crick she feels building up, Elsa is dreading it already when she realizes Anna is eyeing her hair with predatory delight. If she puts it in her mouth…
"No, no, no, no, no. Will you please let go?" Elsa tries again, not really expecting anything out of it, but to her surprise the thing – Anna – really does loosen her grip. Elsa immediately whips her hair free and for good measure shifts the long strands to her back, safely out of reach of any grabby hands.
Anna claps her hands and smiles, and Elsa can't help but smile a little back at the monster who actually does listen. Maybe the whole toothless thing isn't too bad. Just takes getting used to.
"So you really can't talk?" Elsa asks, and she assumes so when Anna just blinks at her. Elsa blinks back slowly. "Oh. I apologize about before, I thought you were ignoring me. Truce?"
Elsa carefully extends a finger. Anna eyes the slender digit for a moment before latching on gleefully with both hands. Elsa pulls back a little and feels Anna tug her gently in response, and she smiles at her little sister chortling in genuine delight. When Anna pulls the finger closer to her mouth though…
"O-Okay, that's good, you can let go now," Elsa says. Anna looks up at her face, then back to the finger, then back to her face, and Elsa gives an encouraging grin. "Please?"
Anna lets go, and Elsa gratefully retreats. Then she notices Anna putting her chubby, diminutive arms up like she's asking for a hug. Well, it can't hurt to keep being nice to her, and she doesn't smell too bad, so Elsa picks her up like how she saw Mama do it.
Elsa frowns at the weight in her arms, which forces her to sit down. "You're fat." Anna giggles in response, and Elsa sighs. "We can't play, but I guess you're not too bad. I really wanted to build a snowman too, but you're small and you can't even talk."
"Give it time." Mama walks back in with Papa, and they're both smiling at the sight of Elsa sitting down on the floor with Anna in her arms.
"Huh?" Elsa looks down at Anna and as though understanding, the baby gives several encouraging nods of her head.
"You were like that too," Papa explains.
"No way," Elsa says, wrinkling her nose again. "I can't have ever been this gross." Anna frowns at her and Elsa silently apologizes through her eyes. Placated, Anna starts smiling again.
"All babies are like this," Mama says, laughing, but Elsa still doesn't believe her. "Give them time to grow up though, and they'll learn to walk and talk, and…"
"Play?" Elsa asks.
"Play," Papa agrees.
"Oh," Elsa says. She grins down at Anna. "Hey, so we can play once you're grown up. That's good! I already had so much planned out for us. Hopefully you won't be all wrinkly though. All right, promise?"
Elsa holds out her finger again, expecting Anna to take it as usual.
Anna bites her instead.