Elsa didn't think it was possible that anything could cause her as much emotional pain as the thought earlier that she might have died without ever getting to tell anyone good-bye, but she thought wrong. She just couldn't believe that it could be true. Janine couldn't just be dead. She couldn't.
"What happened?" Elsa asked, forcing herself to sit all the way up. "Cronan, please tell me what happened."
Cronan nodded as they walked over and then leaned against Elsa heavily. They hadn't felt a sense of loss this great since their grandfather had died over 12 years earlier. "There was a car accident. She was going to get groceries, like she does every Sunday. A truck ran a redlight and t-boned her." Cronan was crying as they talked. They took a deep breath to try and steady themself but started when they felt another hand on their back that wasn't Elsa's.
"The nurses thought it might make us feel better," Reggie said, nodding to the nurse who had led him up to Elsa's room, "If we were with family."
"They told us that she died instantly. Didn't feel any pain, or so they think," Cronan said. Somehow it wasn't as comforting being up here with everyone else as they had thought it might be. Maybe it was because everyone was asleep, or maybe it was because Elsa wasn't saying anything.
"Cronan," Elsa said quietly. "As helpful as I wish I could be right now, I think you need to rely on Reggie or one of my parents more than me in this situation. I just really think that would be better. It's not that I'm not upset over this." No, she was definitely hurting, she was just good at working through it. "I just think you need someone a little older, a little more used to this. Someone who was actually close to her."
Cronan looked up at Elsa for a moment. They could see that she was trying not to let herself cry. For a moment they even thought that they could see her starting to work through it emotionally already. That made them realize that Elsa paid a lot more attention to what the therapists say than what they did. Elsa was right. "I don't really know why I came up here. I guess, I just don't want to bother my family at three in the morning," Cronan said quietly. "I just can't believe she's gone."
"She's only gone physically," Elsa said. "And as long as you remember her-"
"And love her," Reggie added.
"She'll only ever be gone physically. She'll always be with you in spirit. Part of her lives in you. We are all part of the same great circle of life."
Cronan almost told her not to quote Lion King to them but something about what she said just made her feel a lot better.
Cronan and Reggie left together about an hour later, Reggie promising to make sure that Cronan got to her family safely. When they were gone, Elsa turned to her mom and said simply, "Anna is going to get mad when she finds out, I can almost guarantee that. Anna always gets mad when she didn't get to say a proper goodbye to someone she'll never see again."
Adrianna nodded and looked to see if either Anna or Lukas had woken up, but they were sound asleep. "Go back to sleep Elsa. It'll be alright in the end."
Elsa smiled and laid back down.
Monday came with a 6 am automated call from the principal of the high school alerting parents to loss of "a valued faculty member". It came with a 7 am call, not automated, for Adrianna.
"Mrs. Arendelle," the principal said on the other end of the call.
"Yes?" Adrianna said.
"Firstly, I'd like to say how sorry I am about what happened to your daughter, and to Anna. Secondly, I'd like you to know that Ms. Neprud made a strong case for both Elsa and Anna to be excused from school. Elsa is excused, given the circumstances, until 2 days after she gets out of the hospital. The day she gets out and the day after, excused. That second day that she's out, not excused. As for Anna, she's excused for today and tomorrow. I'll be meeting with the attendance board tomorrow to decide how long she's good to be excused for."
"How will I find out the decision from that?" Adrianna asked. She was talking in hushed tones because Elsa and Anna were both still asleep.
"I'll call you," the principal said.
"Is that all you wanted?" Adrianna asked trying not to sound rude, she was still tired.
"No, I want to request that you keep Anna close. Don't let her come near the school, until at least Wednesday."
"Can I ask why?"
"Anna's got a history of fighting people over things that get said about Elsa. Given the circumstances, the fact that Elsa and Anna were the last two students to see Ms. Neprud alive, there'll be talk, hearsay and rumors. A lot of it. We're going to do our best to put a stop to them, but there's isn't a lot we actually can do. It's best to keep Anna away, especially given that not only is there a great personal feeling in this, as most students loved Ms. Neprud, there's also a political end to it concerning the governor's speech and Anna's role in it. It's just safer to keep her away until we've got a handle on the situation here."
"I understand," Adrianna said. "I don't mean to be rude or anything, but if there's nothing else, I'd like to end the call. I didn't get much sleep last night, and I'd like to try to get some more before the girls wake up."
"No problem, if anything else pertinent comes up, I'll make note of it and call you when I have time, Thank you for hearing me out."
"Thank you for actually calling and letting us know the situation."
The call ended with that and Adrianna settled back to get more sleep.