notes: you guys are so cool. literally, i cannot thank you enough for the awesome response this story has gotten thus far. every review, favorite, and follow means the world to me. this chapter is, um. probably not exactly what you were expecting and/or hoping for, but i do sincerely hope you enjoy it regardless. x
Sucker Love
- Chapter II -
You freeze, and turn to her in what feels a little like slow motion, toes just barely touching the hallway floor. "Yeah, Elsa?" you ask, voice shaking in a way it usually doesn't and your heart is thudding on cymbals as you strain to look into her eyes through the growing darkness in the hall.
"I, um. I was just wondering," she breathes, hands reaching up to fiddle with the end of her braid. "I was wondering if Hans has said anything to you about asking me to homecoming?"
"Oh," you say lamely, unable to mask your disappointment. You mentally chide yourself, because really, what were you expecting? Not that. But you've always been an overly optimistic person, anyway. "Um, no. He hasn't said anything, but then again, he doesn't really talk to me. Why?"
Elsa bites her lip, shifting her gaze to the carpet. "I was just wondering. I'm just, uh. Not sure if I'd want to go, and I get the feeling he's going to ask me and I can't explain to him why I don't want to," she blurts, and you swear she looks like she's about to cry.
You frown a little, wrapping the towel tighter around yourself. "You don't like dances? Didn't you go to any back at your old school?"
Elsa nods timidly. "Yeah. I just...don't know if I want to, um. Anymore."
You squint a little bit, confused beyond belief by the girl's strange behavior. She's a mystery and instead of figuring her out piece by piece she's just getting harder and harder to understand.
"Well," you start, rubbing the back of your neck with your hand, "I can talk to him about it, if you want?"
"No!" It's the closest she's come to snapping, icy blue eyes wide in panic. "No, it's okay. I overreacted. I'm just being silly. Sorry to bother you, Anna." And before you can reply and assure her that she isn't bothering you in the slightest - in fact you'd love to sit her on your bed and listen to her talk all night, if she'd let you - she's slipping away, trotting down the stairs and you're left standing there shivering, defeated and bewildered.
After hurriedly slipping into your pajamas and brushing your teeth furiously, you collapse onto your bed and cover your face with a pillow, groaning noisily.
And if your dreams consist of of platinum blonde hair and pale skin and bright blue terrified eyes, well, that's nobody's business but your own.
Typical Friday night: you're at home, babysitting Olaf with Kristoff while Hans is out with his ostensibly never-ending group of friends - and Elsa, of course - doing whatever it is popular kids do on Friday nights. Even your parents are out. Without a doubt, you are living the teenage dream.
Olaf is sitting on the couch while you've got the whole upper half of your body inside the entertainment center, looking around for a DVD to keep the kid occupied until Kristoff gets here. Olaf adores Kristoff, but due to the child's overzealous nature their previous amicability has been reduced to Olaf intentionally annoying Kristoff as frequently as possible while Kristoff groans and looks to you for advice. Still, though, he's better at wrangling the kid in than you are, which is why you like having him around when you babysit.
"Honey, I'm home!" Kristoff announces when he barges through the front door, and you laugh fondly, promptly hitting your head on the edge of the entertainment center and wincing.
At the sound of Kristoff's voice, Olaf nearly leaps off the couch in excitement, running to the foyer and hugging Kristoff's legs. "Hi, Kristoff! Did you bring Sven?" His dark eyes widen as he peers around Kristoff, looking anxiously for the sweet Collie.
"Not today, kiddo," Kristoff laughs, ruffling the child's dark hair affectionately. You can't help but feeling a little disappointed — Sven is kind of like the dog you've always wanted, and Olaf gets a kick out of the voices Kristoff does for him.
Luckily for you Kristoff suggests watching E.T. which is both his and Olaf's favorite movie, like, ever, and is the one thing they have in common. This gives you ample opportunity to curl up in the corner and work on some homework and it's actually distressing how many times Elsa crosses your mind. Just little things, really; you wonder what she's doing right now, with Hans and all of his loud friends and all of the cheerleaders that are too loud and in-your-face for someone so apparently delicate as Elsa is. You wonder if she's having a good time, or if she'd rather be at home, curled up on the couch watching her favorite movie.
You wonder what her favorite movie is — is she into romantic comedies like you or does she prefer obscure indie films? Or maybe she's a horror junkie. Maybe she's more of a musical person. Maybe she likes to sing when she's alone. You already know she likes books, and you find yourself wondering what else you have in common with her.
And then you wonder why you care so much at all.
By the time the movie is finished, you've downed three cups of green tea in a feeble attempt to keep yourself sane and Olaf is dozing. His parents will be by soon to pick him up, and you tip your face to the ceiling and thank whoever is up there for making this a fairly peaceful night, all things considered.
You hoist yourself onto the couch where Olaf is curled up loosely and Kristoff has made himself at home, feet resting on the coffee table. As you sit quietly with the two of them you have this weird vision of yourself ten years into the future with a child and a husband like Kristoff, loyal and handsome and funny. It's bizarre, to say the least. All that green tea is starting to mess with your head.
"Are you and Kristoff..." Olaf murmurs sleepily right on cue, the beginning his question punctuated by a yawn. You grin fondly. "Are you and Kristoff gonna get married?" This kid is clearly high, or at the very least just really exhausted.
You snort obnoxiously, and Kristoff glares at you, his lower lip jutting out as he crosses his arms over his chest.
"No, kiddo," you laugh, running a hand through Olaf's short dark hair. "Where would you get a silly idea like that?" His eyes flutter shut, and it'll only be a matter of minutes now before he's out for the count. You couldn't be happier — Olaf is a sweet kid, but he's a bit of a handful and he manages to wear you out every time without fail.
"Dream killer," Kristoff hisses at you, but he's just kidding. You know he's kidding, but you frown anyway because you're tired and the vision of you being married with children still lingers and somehow for just a second it feels like everything might be okay, like you could kiss him right now and you might actually like it.
For a second you actually consider it. Kissing him. Just to prove to yourself that you're being stupid and you're not actually having a sexuality crisis, but the thought of kissing him and feeling nothing at all is enough to scare you out of doing that pretty quickly.
A headache threatens to erupt inside your skull, so you excuse yourself to brew another cup of green tea.
It is three thirty in the morning and Hans still isn't home.
Your parents arrived home around a couple of hours ago, right after Olaf left with his parents, followed by Kristoff an hour later, and they promise you that Hans is going to be grounded for a year aka two weeks as soon as he actually comes home.
That should be enough to ease you into a blissful slumber - well, that and the fact that it's three in the morning - but the moon is so bright tonight, bathing your entire room with pale white light even with the blinds drawn. You toss and turn and you just want to sleep because you're feeling awfully vulnerable right now and maybe sleep will help but you can't sleep because it's too freaking bright and no, you're not gay, you're not.
It shouldn't be a big deal, but it is.
You wish you were the kind of person who could let this sort of thing just roll right off your back like water droplets sliding down your spine and usually you are, but not with this. Not with this, because you're sixteen and you thought you'd had yourself figured out for the most part: you are Anna Westerguard, lover of romantic comedies and theater and puppies. That's it.
It sounds kind of lame, really, but it's okay because you know enough about yourself to keep your head up and coast through your life like you're supposed to and these stupid thoughts are screwing everything up.
You've had your fantasy wedding planned out since you were six, for christ's sake. It's not like you're amongst a family of homophobes or anything, because you're not. You're not scared of being made fun of, or of not being accepted or anything like that.
But as the years have trickled by you're feeling less and less like Anna and more and more like somebody you're not familiar with and it scares you half to death. Your insides are changing and shifting while your outsides remain the same and it's like something out of a horror movie, looking in a mirror and seeing yourself but feeling like somebody or something else entirely.
Feeling tears prickling the corners of your eyes, you roll out of bed and take another scorching hot shower. It feels like the water is going to melt your skin off, but you would gladly welcome that. You want your flesh to melt off so you can tear yourself apart and rip out whatever is making you feel like this, extract it from a place deep within your ribcage. You're infected. You want to rip it out and grow new, shiny smooth skin so your insides will feel familiar again.
For the first time in your life, no matter how long you scrub and wash, you still feel dirty.
You wake up on the bathroom floor the following morning at a time that is closer to lunchtime than actual morning, sort of wrapped in a blue towel but not really and with your hair a ridiculous mess. It's hard not to grin at yourself in the mirror; you're a mess.
You still aren't feeling a hundred percent but you are awfully hungry, so you hurry down the stairs two at a time after getting properly dress and taming your hair to the best of your ability, stomach rumbling and an extra big bowl of Lucky Charms on your mind. Mostly just the marshmallows. Hans can eat the gross cereal part, because he sucks.
Hans is already sitting at the kitchen table, head resting on the edge as he rubs his temples. You flick his ear as you walk by, and he swats at you halfheartedly, clearly agitated.
"Fuck off," he grumbles, raising his head a little to glare at you. There are bags under his eyes. "I'm so hungover, shit."
"Don't do anything you're going to regret in the morning," you chide him, pouring yourself a bowl of cereal and digging in unceremoniously. You're always playing second mother when your actual mother isn't around to scold him; it's hard to pretend the thought of him getting drunk around Elsa doesn't bother you. It's just, being around intoxicated people probably makes her uncomfortable, and wow, since when did you invest so much thought space on your brother's romantic affairs?
"Shut up," he mumbles miserably. "I do regret it, though. I have a game this afternoon."
It takes you a minute to process this. Football game. Today. Football means cheerleaders. Cheerleaders means Elsa. Before you can stop yourself, you blurt, "Can I come?"
Hans looks at you as if you've sprouted wings. You can't really blame him, though — you don't have any interest in football nor have you ever had any interest in football. His eyes narrow skeptically, but after a second he just shrugs, looking too tired to press the issue.
Three hours later, you're sitting on the cold metal bleachers, bundled in your favorite green sweater as you watch the cheerleade— no, as you watch your brother's football game. But also the cheerleaders. Mostly just Elsa. Definitely just Elsa.
It's not so strange, right? Elsa is mesmerizing not just in the way she looks but in the way she moves, swift and graceful. She's like a fairy. You could watch her for hours, but every so often the stupid whistle blows and the cheerleaders are hustled off to the sidelines or another cheerleader obnoxiously blocks your view of the pretty blonde girl.
From here, you can't see her eyes — can't see the distrust and worry. All you see now is a smiling, happy teenage girl, bouncing around on her toes and thrusting her silver and blue pom-poms in the air, waving them excitedly. You can't decide if this is better or worse.
But when the cheerleaders are hustled off to the side again so the crowd can focus on the game again, you spot Elsa, sitting alone on the bleachers, a good three or four feet away from the rest of her team. The other girls sit clustered together, on their phones or fixing their mascara or chatting away, but Elsa merely sits, eyes cast downwards. Every so often one of the other girls will nudge Elsa and ask her something, or show her something in their phone, but Elsa merely nods and musters up a tiny smile before returning to her self-imposed exile.
The sight makes your heart ache, and as a cold gust of wind blows across your face, you pull your sweater tighter around yourself and turn back to the game.
You don't even know what the score is.
You have never experienced such painful secondhand discomfort in your entire life.
Your parents seem to have conveniently forgotten that their son was out all night doing god knows what with god knows who, because they decide it is one of their parental duties to treat him to dinner at his favorite restaurant in honor of the big win at the game. They've always liked him better. It sounds bitter, and, well. It is, but it's still true. And, because they hate you so much, they decide it's a great idea for Hans to bring his new girlfriend along.
Well, shit.
So your parents take you all out to dinner at this really corny Italian place that's Hans' favorite but they have really awesome pizza so it's cool. You throw a bit of a tantrum and demand that since Hans gets to bring a guest (albeit a really beautiful one who you most likely will be ogling all night) after the stunt he pulled last night, you should too. So you bring Kristoff, because, well. Duh. Also, you need somebody to keep you grounded during this dinner.
The meal is, at best, decent, and, at worst, ridiculously awkward.
Hans talks a lot. Kristoff talks a lot. They talk to each other quite a bit, and you think you can see a bromance forming. Your parents ask Elsa a lot of questions. She answers in quiet, clipped, vague sentences. When she excuses herself to go to the restroom, you hear your mother whisper sarcastically to your father, "Well, isn't she a friendly one?"
You kind of want to scream.
Elsa returns to her seat directly across from you after a few minutes. She looks like she might be crying, and you want to say something and/or reach across the table and squeeze her hand but you can't because you're at a crowded dinner table and it seems like an innapropriate time to be doing so. By the way she squeezes her eyes shut tightly, you can tell she'd like to go unnoticed.
"I'd like to propose a toast," Hans declares loudly, wrapping one arm around Elsa and raising his glass of freaking Coke with the other like it's champagne or something. "To an undefeated season, and to my wonderful parents, and my beautiful girlfriend." Elsa turns beet red. "Oh," Hans adds as an afterthought, "and my pest of a little sister, Anna." He grins smugly at you. "And her friend Kristoff, who is actually pretty cool."
Kristoff beams ridiculously.
"Don't strain yourself, Hans," you mutter under your breath. Elsa giggles, and at first you think it's directed at something else but after a few seconds it becomes apparent she's giggling at your little quip. You look at her. She's regained her mostly vacant exoression, eyes gazing at the clean white tablecloth in front of her, but a smile small remains on her lips.
As everyone else clinks their glasses together goes back to their conversation, you look down at your lap, smiling victoriously.
Anna: 2. Everyone else: 0.
i really, really love hearing your guys' guesses and ideas for this story. i don't want to give anything away, but i'm trying to keep the characters realistic as possible in the sense that nobody is going to be 100% good or 100% bad. i just want them to be human, assets and flaws and all.
therefore, i'd like to keep the progression of elsa and anna's relationship fairly realistic as well — this isn't going to be super slow burn or anything, but i don't want them to be head over heels in love within the first five chapters (well, i actually do, but that's no fun.)
ideas for this story continue brewing, so expect fairly frequent updates.
as always, this is the part where i whore myself for reviews. so, um. review? DO IT FOR THE VINE. or at the very least, do it for elsanna.