The bell rang for the end of the day, and students lazily filed out of their classrooms. Busy conversations rattled all around her as she made her way happily down the stairs and towards the car waiting for her just outside the gates.
"Hey Dad, been waiting long?" Anna asked, hopping into the front seat and slinging her bag into the back.
"Nope, just got here" her fathered winked, "Oh, before you get too comfortable-", this was met with an immediate exasperated sigh, "-but Elsa left her purse at home and she'll need it to get the bus later." Rolling her eyes, the young redhead took the purse, and crawled back out of the car.
There was definitely fewer students pouring out of the school by now, but she still felt like a tiny salmon struggling against the current as she made her way back in. Her sister always stayed after school for at least an hour, sometimes two, and on days like today, up to four hours. Anna enjoyed listening to Elsa ramble on about how hard she had to work now that she was in her final year.
Room B3. Best room of the science department. Rhythmically knocking five times, she cracked open the door an inch, introducing herself with a "Hey Els, it's me, I got your money". As the door opened fully, she was confronted with a group of five figures sitting in the half-lit room around a table right in the middle of the room, each adorned with paper costumes and with litters of dice and papers filling their hands and the immediate vicinity.
"What" was all Anna could react with.
"Oh, hello!" called out one of the older figures, stepping out from behind his card wall that separated his table from the others'. As he reached out his hand to shake hers, Anna immediately recognised his face.
"Wait, ? What are you doing? Don't you teach languages here?" she asked, perplexed.
"Please, school finished minutes ago. Call me Milo" he answered, bringing her closer into the room, "and besides, I'm only a TA, so don't go all 'sir'-ey on me."
Anna looked round the four other faces, all subtly trying to remove as much of their costumes as they could without being noticed.
"Uh… Elsa? This doesn't look very much like a science class…" Anna pointed out, as her sister's face flushed with red.
"well, that's because… it uh… it isn't." the blonde replied, eyes darting away from the young redhead before her, "Just don't tell mum and dad that I've been doing this instead, okay?"
The utter shock of it all hadn't quite sunk in yet when the bulky man on the opposite side of Elsa began joking about how their parents always acted like she was royalty. The girl held back the urge to mention how his parents were more like cave-dwelling trolls than anything that could be considered human.
"So, uh… the money… for busses" Anna sputtered out while her eyes wandered about the map that was lain out on the desk, her arm raising the purse out blindly on the other side of her gaze. The older sister quickly snatched it up.
"cool, thanks, now you can leave" she snarkily retorted. The redhead's turquoise eyes immediately shot up at her sister.
"Woah, woah, what's the rush to get rid of me?" She asked, slightly hurt. Absent-mindedly picking up one of the pieces on the board and inspecting it, she questioned what exactly they were doing here.
"Well actually," Milo began, slipping back into his chair, "it's a tabletop RPG, loosely based off of D&D, but I mean who could be bothered with all them rules, am I right?"
His joke was met with absolute silence.
"But ah," he coughed, "you basically just pretend to be a character and go on adventures and do what you want. It's a nice break from school work, really."
Anna put the piece she'd picked up into Milo's hands, unsure where it was supposed to go.
"Sounds… interesting…" She replied.
"Oh, you could totally join our group!" the thick-bodied boy said. Elsa's glare burned at him, kicking him under the table.
"Kristoff! No! Besides…" she said, turning to look irritatedly at Anna, "we already have a full group"
"Well... okay then" Anna muttered, never really wanting to accept the offer. As she began heading back to the door, Milo called out to her.
"Well, Miss. Elsa's sister, I could certainly wiggle you in here somehow…" he said, flicking through some notes he had lying on the desk. Elsa shot up from her chair, grabbing her sister's arm and pulling her towards the door.
"oh no, no no no, Milo, that won't be necessary," she shouted back, forcing her sister out the door, "Anna isn't into this kind of thing."
Anna could see just how much the very thought of her intrusion was annoying her.
"Well actually," she started, instantly getting a frozen rage out of her sister, "I think I would like to join up with you guys!"
"Oh excellent!" Milo replied as Elsa steamed up with frustration, "you can get your character sheet filled out right now! Okay, pull up a chair and get started!"
The moment Anna took a step towards them, she remembered the only reason she'd turned up.
"Oh, uh, maybe next time" she said, backing back out the door, "I have a lift home outside. And I wouldn't want to keep our King waiting" she joked, bowing as she shut the door. From the other side, she heard that Kristoff laughing to himself. Picturing Elsa boiling over with rage, she skipped down the stairs and out the door.
Four hours later, Elsa arrived home.
"Oh, hey Elsa!" their mother called out as she shut the door, "did the revision go well?"
"yes mum!" she quickly replied back, darting up the stairs to her sister's room. After knocking, the door opened, and out popped Anna, with a scruffy rendition of what was once school clothes.
"Hey," Elsa whispered, "Milo wanted me to give you this. I'll help you out if you need any help, just not right now." she slipped a folded sheet of paper into the redhead's hands and headed for the stairs.
"Els, wait" the younger sibling whispered back, pausing while the other girl turned to face her, "thanks for the sheet" Her sister nodded instead of continuing the conversation further and gracefully placed a hand on the railing as she hopped down the staircase.
"Elsa? You're not normally this quiet when you just got home from your after-school classes! Come on down, tell us something we don't understand!" the dad bellowed out into the house, beckoning her down. Sitting down and dropping her bags off, she rambled on about all the things she'd done in her classes today. Anna slid her way down the handrail, eager to join the family as the smell of lasagne filled the air and the rumblies filled all their stomachs.
"Anna, nice of you to finally join us!" the mother said warmly as she brought out trays of food.
"How long've you been up there? Four… Five years?" their father joked, thick laughter echoing through his chest. She slapped his arm, taking a seat at his left.
"Dad, it's been like not even three hours." Anna retorted, rolling her eyes sarcastically. Both the other women giggled from across the table.
"yes, actually, speaking of Anna being upstairs all day today," mum said, gesturing with a forkful of meat, "Why exactly did you have to rush up to Anna's room so hastily today? Got some secrets we should know about?" the over emphatic slyness to her voice made it seem like it should be a joke, but just the words alone eased Elsa into a slight panic. Ever since she'd gotten into her last year of school, her parents had a real crack down on studying. Not that she didn't do a lot already, but a lot more was expected of her. There just wasn't time to be lazing about. Or off playing games while there was work to do.
"I uh…" Elsa stuttered out, fork wedged straight into the layer of beef. Sweat dripped on her brow.
"It was one of her friends!" Anna butted in, covering for her faltering sister. "Yeah, one of the people at Elsa's study group! They er… uh…"
"They wanted me to give Anna their phone number" Elsa bluffed, smiling cruelly as she dropped her young sister into the middle of it, "Yeah, you know that Kristoff? Not exactly my liking, but he seems to be into Anna"
"Elsa!" the redhead screeched, her face beginning to match her hair.
"Oh-ho! Someone's got a secret admirer! You know, I started dating your mother as just a secret admirer back in the old days" their dad replied.
"pfft, oh please! Sending me a single rose with your number on it wasn't exactly romantic." quickly replied the mum.
"w- hey! I-" dad began to argue back. Seeing the playful, yet confident glare in his wife's eyes, he gave up, instead resorting to a grumbling laugh. "I guess you're right. Anna, I demand that you let this man prove himself more before you date him."
"whu-... It's not like I want to marry this guy! I don't even like him that much! You heard Elsa the other week! He's gross. He picked his nose, guys! Then ate it!" Anna screeched back.
"You know," mother started, swallowing the bit of food that was in her mouth, "for a 'neutral party' in all this, you're getting pretty defensive…"
Anna slumped back in her chair, resigning herself to the interrogation. The blonde covered her mouth as she giggled to herself. Anna kicked her under the table.
After the meal was over, Anna raced upstairs to complete the character sheet that she'd been given. Over dinner, she'd been contemplating the character she wanted to make. Smart. Handsome. Strong. Charismatic. Perfection. Deciding on a name was easy - she just used 'Andy' as a male version of her own name. But as she started on making the character, she knew help would be needed. What in the hell is a constitution?
Leaving the comfort of her own room, she ventured off into the hallway in search of her sister.
"Psst, Els, you in here?" the redhead asked, poking her head round the door of her sister's room. Unsurprisingly, she found Elsa sitting at her desk with books either side of her, lamp fixed firmly at the table as she scrawled into a notebook. A faint smell of pencil lead and the slight burning of the friction from rubbers permeated the room. Elsa turned from her books, taking an earphone out as she did.
"sorry, didnt want to interrupt... Anyway, I have no idea what the most of this is, and you've already done this before, so would you help me through it?" Anna asked, holding out the paper. The blonde looked between her own papers and the one her sister was presenting to her.
"Sure, I have time to do this later." she eventually answered, sliding out her chair and ascending onto her bed. Anna happily joined her.
"So, first things first..." Elsa said as she pulled out an overly-large behemoth of a tome with "Players Handbook" ornately written across the cover, "what class you gonna be?"
The question went straight over the youngster's head.
"uh... How about you tell me what class you are first" Anna guessed, hoping that wouldnt make her sound any more pathetic. Instead, she was met with a warm smile.
"Oh, yes, our classes! Wouldn't want five barbarians all together, now, would we?"
Anna laughed awkwardly in response, trying to understand what that meant.
"Well," continued Elsa, "We've got a Wizard, a Paladin, a rogue, and a Warlord..." as she listed them off, she neatly and lightly crossed the words out of the contents page, leaving only a few left to choose. Anna flicked her eyes up and down the list. 'Ranger' was one of the few words she understood.
"How about... Ranger?" she asked. Elsa smiled back.
"ah, good choice. Keep it simple. Now, onto the next part..."