Hope you enjoy :)

The art of war, Sun Tzu once said, is a matter of life and death. It is a road that will lead to safety or to ruin. However, a clever warrior does not win with their body, but with their mind, and as such, all warfare must be based upon the act of deception: to attack, one must seem unable. When one is near, one must appear as if far away. When using forces, one must seem inactive. The key, he also wrote, is to pretend to be weak until the enemy grows arrogant, and if your opponent is of choleric temper, you must seek to irritate him. Thus, in war, one cannot afford any mistakes, for it is this which will secure a victory over the enemy...

"AAAHHHHHH!"

"Stop screaming every time you shoot!"

Anna clamps her mouth shut. She redirects her fury towards the controller, aggressively pressing the buttons as she watches, on the screen, her gun firing at the enemy. She's giving herself whiplash with how much she's moving but there are too many things happening at once and she can't keep track and somebody is shooting at her from somewhere and a grenade just went off, and which of these buttons is making her jump?

"Pick up the rifle! THE RIFLE!"

"WHICH RIFLE!?"

"The assault!"

Anna screams again. She chooses to retreat for a moment because that's a choice a wise warrior would make. And also because she's growing agitated and Eugene's voice is putting her on edge. Or maybe she's putting herself on edge—she doesn't know. The sound of gunshots and explosions blast from the speakers of the television as Anna tries to gather her surroundings.Where the fuck am I?

"Just stick to the assault rifle," Kristoff mumbles from the armchair, a chunk of pizza in his mouth. "You need more accuracy for the sniper."

She returns her eyes to the screen, resolution pumping her veins as she tightens her hands around the controller. Whoever said video gaming was relaxing was clearly off in the head. Anna gets mad jitters just thinking about stepping out there to shoot and kill and jump and run. Psychotic exhilaration, yes. Relaxation, no. But just like Kristoff suggested, she sticks to the assault rifle. It rattles angrily the moment she aims at the red enemy and shoots (more than is probably necessary) to kill. The enemy moans in pain and dies, while Anna keeps moving, hides again, picks up the thing that's supposed to make her invisible.

"You got a red coming from around the corner," Eugene warns her.

"How do you know?"

"It's on the screen, the little red arrow."

"I can't see it."

"It's right there!"

"I can't multi-task, Eugene!"

"Just look at the—"

"AHHHHH!" She shoots again, and kills the enemy. Her chief switches guns without her meaning to as she continues her strut through ominous hallways. She vaguely registers Eugene standing up from the couch and Kristoff saying something about grabbing him another beer. She can only shake her head when she's offered one, far too focused to tell Eugene to stop talking. On open ground, she makes a jump to the second level, squeals lowly at the sight of a red enemy, and shoots. The sniper rifle fires with a loud bang, but it seems like she's missed by a hair so she hops away, praying that she doesn't get shot in the back. A hysterical laugh bubbles up in her throat for no reason. This is not relaxing.

She bumps into one of her blue co-players, yells at him for being in her way, then keeps marching forward. If she were being honest, she's surprised she's lasted this long. But a victorious warrior is never too confident, never arrogant when it comes to—

A grenade goes off. Her chief collapses to the ground.

"Ah, fuck."

Eugene sits back down with a grunt. "My turn."

She drops the controller on his lap. He adds: "You're such a sore loser."

"Am not."

Kristoff says: "Never forget the time you almost flipped the table when you lost UNO."

"That was like four years ago, Kristoff. Get over it."

He stops chewing his pizza. "You get over it."

Next to her, Eugene snorts. "You changed chief's name to Sun Tzu? What a fucking nerd."

"It's a perfectly respectable name." She doesn't disclose the fact that it took her some time to figure out how to do that.

Eugene resumes the game as she reaches for a slice of pizza and kicks her feet back on the coffee table. Now this is more like it. This is relaxation; just what she agreed to when they invited her over for an evening of Halo. Was she a gamer? No. Clearly. But the distraction had been guaranteed and Anna had jumped at the opportunity the same way a dog jumps at the word 'park.' More or less. She didn't display that much emotion. But put quite simply, she needed a break. Work had been busy the last couple of weeks, and her creative ideas kept overlapping and becoming one big conundrum in which she didn't know where one began and the other one ended. To spend a few hours screaming—much to Eugene's chagrin—, eating pizza, and plotting the best way to get past five minutes of gaming without dying had sounded like the perfect distraction.

She watches Eugene move skillfully on the screen, mastering that sniper rifle while he zooms in and out as if the device were actually broken. He shoots nonstop. Triple kill, some deep male voice says. Eugene glances at her with a smirk. Anna rolls her eyes. Of course, if she spent hours glued to the screen she would also get those stupid triple kills.

When she bites into her pizza again, Rapunzel's head appears in front of her line of sight, upside down.

"Hi," she says.

"Hi," Anna responds with a mouthful.

"Can you come with me for a sec?"

"Sure."

Anna stands up and follows her to the room she turned into a small studio soon after she and Eugene moved to Brooklyn together. Inside, half of the floor is protected by a drop cloth stained with splatters of paint. To the left, leaning against the wall, various canvasses of all sizes; some completed and turned into works of art; others halfway there, ready for inspiration to pick up again. Across from them, a rectangular table even more stained than the drop cloth is, where tubes and bottles of paint are set in disarray. Two mason jars with brushes of all kinds—their ferrules speckled with dry paint—and a handful of other objects Anna would have no idea how to use or what to call them. A portable speaker. Two mugs that probably belong in the kitchen sink by now. In the middle of the room, a stool, and an easel holding a canvas that faces away from them.

Anna takes everything in with her slice of pizza still held in her hand.

"Wow. This is..."

"Awesome?"

"Messy."

Rapunzel chuckles. "There's order in my disorder." She takes her free hand. "Come, I wanna show you something."

The canvas that sits in the easel is finished. On it, an anatomical heart has been drawn and painted with saturated hues of red and blue while vibrant-colored flowers bloom from its crevices; its arteries and its veins. Anna recognizes a few of them by name from having Elsa teach her so long ago; back when she would sit behind her on the bed as she guided her finger across a textbook's page, whispering terms in her ear, inciting goosebumps out of her skin.

"I thought of using the Hippocratic oath," Rapunzel says, refocusing Anna's attention back to the canvas, "but that felt... wrong? So I bought this old cardiology encyclopedia thing, ripped a few pages off it and adhered them to the canvas. Then I let it dry and painted over it. I know I could have just bought something similar but that takes the joy out of it."

Anna steps closer to take a better look. The finish of the background is glossy. The pages on which the heart has been painted list numerous terms: Heart murmur, Hypertension, Hypotension, Ischemia, Myocardial Infarction...

"Is this for Elsa?"

"Oh, yeah. Didn't I mention that before? Sorry. It's just that her walls are so boring I wanted to give her something so that she'll get the hint and start decorating."

Anna moves on to the painted details of the heart. "Have you tried telling her?"

"Of course not, but that's not the point."

She snorts. "Gotcha."

Behind her, Rapunzel pauses. "So what do you think?"

"I like it," Anna says, finally stepping back. "I really do."

"Yay," she says sheepishly. "I really wanted to see your reaction."

"Why?"

She shrugs. "Because you're like an extension of Elsa."

Anna feels the need to suppress the physical effect these words have on her so she bites into her (cold by now) pizza and takes her time chewing. She averts her eyes again, around the room and back to the terms on the canvas. Palpitation: A fluttering sensation in the chest that is often related to a missed or rapid heartbeat. She hums internally. Such peculiar coincidence.

"How's it going between you two?" Rapunzel suddenly asks.

She decides to step away, take a look around the studio. "It's going okay," she responds, eyeing the acrylic paints on the table as she thinks: I have words and she has colors. She turns to Rapunzel. "We're just taking things slow right now so we've kept texting and calling to a minimum. Same with seeing each other."

"And you're okay with that?"

The answer is already tumbling to the tip of her tongue. "I am," she says lowly. "She's busy with work, which I understand." She picks up the finest brush she can find and examines it thoroughly as she continues. "I don't... It's kind of different now. It's like I know she's there in a way I couldn't grasp before, and that feels like reassurance enough. Whereas before I just... I don't know. I wasn't in the best of places. I was demanding too much of her."

"I'm glad to hear that," Rapunzel says with a smile as she leans back on the stool. The engagement ring around her finger glints a little under the light as she crosses her arms. "'Cause I invited her to our cooking class."

Anna nearly drops the whole brush jar. "Wait what?"

"She hasn't said yes or no, but it's out there now."

"Well this is mortifying," she laughs nervously.

"She needs a break too, you know? Couple years ago there'd be times where I wouldn't see her for weeks. I have no idea how many hours she worked at the hospital but they were enough for her to lose weight she did not need to lose."

Anna can't hide the concern that mars her brow. "Is it the same now, you think?"

"No," Rapunzel answers. "I think she's settling in somehow. I mean she still practically lives there but for a while I think she's been trying to give herself more time."

She nods in understanding. This, she realizes, is something she had never considered when it mattered the most. Working at a hospital wasn't just a job, it was a full-time commitment, and for Anna to have been unable to see it as such; for her to have expected Elsa to juggle a relationship that no longer felt equal at the end while still maintaining the same dedication to those she had sworn to aid had been... Well, it had been selfish. And Anna, deep in the sorrow she had dug herself in, had not been able—had not wanted, perhaps—to see that Elsa had given it her all until she couldn't anymore. But to see the path is to be able to tread on it without falling, and this, Anna knew, she felt ready to do.

For Elsa, she would walk for as long as she had to.

From behind the door of the studio, Kristoff peeks his head. "Are you still playing?"

"Yes. Why?"

"Eugene already played like, three times."

"You weren't supposed to tell her that!"

Anna turns to Rapunzel. She asks, "You're marrying this doofus?"

Laughter resonates just above the sound of gunshots.

Waiting outside alone had not been her idea, but she'd had no reason to oppose it. The class would be starting soon. People had already arrived, the last of them trickling in without a worry in the world. But while everyone had made it on time, Elsa was running a little late. She'd left the hospital, dashed home and was now on the train on her way over. She'd said this specifically to Anna, which technically shouldn't have mattered that much but still had her feeling giddy and special.

It had been Rapunzel's idea that Anna wait for Elsa while she and Kristoff reserved two spots at the table. She agreed, nodding sort of dumbly even though the two of them were already stepping inside the building by the time it fully dawned on her what she'd agreed to. So here she was now, pacing back and forth, bouncing on her feet as if she were trying to keep warm; as if it weren't late July.

She could count with the fingers of a single hand the amount of times she has seen Elsa in the past month or so. Each and every time she has felt this way: a case of nerves that is mollified as soon as Elsa is around—her presence a reminder that there's little to worry about. Yet, each and every time Anna has to wonder when will be the last time a shiver must run down her spine at the thought of seeing her.

Suddenly, Anna stops fidgeting. Elsa has crossed the street and is now walking towards her.

Her smile is instinctive. She doesn't know where to place her hands as she takes Elsa in, what she's wearing, the way she's walking. She could shake her head in disbelief right now, reprimand herself for having been an idiot in the past or pat herself on the back for the chance at a new start. But the moment Elsa is within earshot, all she can truly think of saying is: "You look nice."

Rose tints Elsa's cheeks. "Thank you," she says, looking down at herself. "I just put on the first shirt I could find, to be honest. Well, a white shirt came out first but since we're cooking I didn't think that was a good idea."

"It's okay. We wear aprons anyway."

"Right." When Anna continues to stare she gives out a nervous laugh and tucks an invisible strand of hair behind her ear. "Should we, um, go inside?"

Anna shakes herself out of her reverie. "Yes. Right. I'm sorry."

In the kitchen, everyone seems to be ready to start. Aprons have been donned, wine has been served, casual conversations have filled in the space like a welcoming hum. Rapunzel waves at them from their place at the table while Kristoff appears to be striking a conversation with the pretty brunette he's liked since day one. They step further inside before being briefly intercepted by Abigail, who introduces herself to Elsa and welcomes her into the kitchen.

At the large, communal table, Anna hands her an apron just as they're offered wine by one of the attendees. Anna declines with a smile, which makes Elsa ask, "You're not drinking?"

"I'd rather not," she responds easily, busy tying the apron behind her back.

"I'm good, thank you," Elsa tells the man. She gives Anna a smile and a shrug when the girl eyes her with a curious expression.

Things unravel smoothly from that point forward. Tonight's recipe: saffron risotto. A simple, exquisite meal Anna would have never thought of previous to that night because she had no idea what saffron was and thought risotto was just a fancy name for rice. And since they're cooking with rice, Abigail says, it is better to split the group into duos and trios, which is the perfect kind of match-making for Kristoff and good enough for Anna, who doesn't have to act like a total ass clown while standing in between Rapunzel and Elsa, pretending to have to decide who to pick.

Abigail talks them through the first few steps. Finely chopped shallots and butter added to a frying pan. Wait 'til softened. Add the rice. Elsa moves with so much ease that Anna has a hard time focusing on things. She watches her take care of cutting up the shallots, her bicep flexing beneath the black shirt she has on. And are those muscles? Sweet baby Jesus they are. Anna almost spills the broth she's supposed to be taking care of.

Next is the white wine, then the saffron, then the broth at intervals of ladlefuls. The three of them begin conversing about Rapunzel's engagement and any wedding plans—or dreams—she might have so far. This is easy, Anna thinks. This doesn't have her wondering about the strength of Elsa's arms or how she got those lean but sexy muscles to begin with.

The act of stirring the rice is a slow, patient one. For minutes on end, this is what Anna has to do while Elsa takes care of adding in the broth and Rapunzel provides the moral support. Abigail tells them all to pay close attention to the way the rice cooks, for it is its consistency which sets the risotto apart from the rest. The problem is that, every so often, when Elsa moves the ladle to pour more stock onto the pan of rice, their forearms accidentally brush, leaving behind a searing sensation on Anna's skin that makes it hard for her to concentrate.

"The last of the butter is next," Abigail announces to the group while Anna is still stirring, lost in thought. "Now you may add the parmesan..."

"Anna."

"Hm?"

Elsa looks amused. "I think you're supposed to stop stirring by now."

"Oh." She lets go of the wooden spoon, blushing.

The risotto turns out great, and so does the rest of the evening. Surrounded by twenty and thirty-somethings who take the whole bonding part of the session seriously, Anna spends little to no time with Elsa alone. In between spoonfuls of risotto, sips of water and wine, she and Rapunzel take care of pointing out to Elsa the usual attendees. There's Raj, the architect who works at a fancy firm and who tends to laugh at his own jokes. There's Tim, the dick, and Timothy, the nice guy. There's Esther, who once let it slip that she was sleeping with her boss, and Sergio, the boss. There's Kristoff, who likes Maren, and Maren who's a yoga instructor and overall neat human being.

There is Allen, who is a radiologist and who ends up striking a conversation with Elsa for the rest of the night when he finds out she is a cardiology fellow. Anna glances at them every so often, noticing the way she keeps her distance, sticks to brief replies and does most of the listening. She subtly switches her weight to the other side when Allen touches her arm, which has the corners of Anna's lips twitching. She hasn't changed much, Anna thinks fondly.

By the time they've left and found themselves outside again, Allen is barely saying his goodbyes. This fact unnerves Anna but she tries to ignore it by focusing on Rapunzel instead. She's saying she has to get going; something about Netflix and Eugene. A new show. And "Have you seen Dead to Me yet?" Anna moves her head distractedly just as Kristoff rejoins them.

"How long should I wait before I text her?"

"What?"

"Two hours."

She watches Allen leave and Elsa return, who barely conceals a weary sigh. "Finally," she says.

"Allen likes you," Rapunzel points out. Anna squirms uncomfortably.

"He just likes what I do."

"That's what they all say at the beginning," she retorts, already stepping in for a hug. As soon as she's said goodbye to Anna as well she turns to Kristoff, who is fiddling with his phone, probably still thinking about a pair of pretty brown eyes. "Are you coming?"

"Where?"

"Not... to here. Let's go. I need a man to keep me company."

Kristoff eyes her warily. "Okay..."

Anna watches the two of them leave with panicky eyes. What is she going to do now? How is she going to act? She glances at Elsa while the girl is still looking away. She opens her mouth. Closes it. She panics. Think, think, think, THINK!

"So... which way are you going?"

"I..." She nibbles at her lip. "Do you have anywhere else to be right now?"

"Um... no. Why?"

Elsa glances down, rubs her forearm with her hand. "I just—I'm not sure I feel like going home just yet."

"Oh." Her heart begins to beat wildly inside her ribcage. (PALPITATIONS!). Surely she doesn't... "Does that—do you—I mean," she clears her throat, "Do you want to go somewhere?"

A smile plays on Elsa's lips before she chuckles, begins to laugh nervously, and covers her reddening face. "This is so embarrassing."

"No, it's okay." She begins to take a step forward but thinks better of it. "I mean, it is a little embarrassing. But I'm right there with you."

She bites her lower lip again, and Anna can't keep herself from following the motion with her gaze. "Okay," Elsa says lowly.

"Okay," she mirrors with a smile. They stand where they are, looking at each other for longer than is necessary before Anna takes a step backwards and tilts her head in the same direction. "You wanna go to a pier?"

With a nod of Elsa's head they begin walking, side by side, like many other times before.

Unsure of what to do with her hands, Anna buries them deep inside the pockets of her jeans. There is a strange swirling of emotions going on inside her heart, pulling at every direction as she tries to settle on feeling nervous, content or giddy. Next to her, Elsa has hidden her hands as well and is looking ahead with a softened expression that Anna cannot discern. They walk without speaking much, letting their surroundings become their primary focus; as if they were barely settling in with one another, becoming once again acquainted with the comfortable silence that used to be so inherently a part of their relationship.

Not far from the Hudson, on a small pedestrian zone, a group of men play an upbeat, Latin rhythm. Couples dance, misstep, laugh. One girl is pulling at the hands of another, inviting her to a dance. The man playing the bongos whistles when the two finally join in.

Anna wonders what it would be like to do the same with Elsa; to take her by the hand and pull her body closer. To watch her throw her head back in a laugh when the two realize they're not very good at dancing this type of music, and to try anyway. She wonders, as they leave the music and the laughter and the couples behind, what it would be like to have Elsa in her arms again.

By the river, it is quiet. Across from them, the city lights of New Jersey gleam and cast a subtle reflection on the water. They sit on a large concrete bench not too far from where some teenagers are playing music from a speaker, practicing vogue on the green lawn of the pier.

"I used to come here a lot last year," Anna says as she brings her legs up and hugs her arms around them.

"Why?" Elsa asks, facing her by settling her bent leg on the bench.

"It was soothing, I guess. And it's a good thinking spot."

She fixes her eyes on Anna. "You seem to have done a lot of that."

"What?"

"Thinking."

"Oh," she glances down. "I had a lot of time on my hands for that."

"Isn't that a good thing?"

"Well, I kicked my own ass constantly. You can take that however you want."

Elsa chuckles before she looks away. The dim lights of the pier delineate and soften her features as the breeze briefly picks up and ruffles her hair. Anna loses herself in the sight before Elsa speaks again. "I don't think I had a lot of time on my hands for that. My days just kind of got mushed all together."

"All these years?"

She turns back to Anna. "All these years."

"You didn't have a single vacation?" she asks in disbelief.

Elsa gives her a look. Yes, silly, it says. "Days or a week every now and then. But to be honest, I tried to avoid those. That's why I put in more hours than I should have."

Anna thinks of saying that she shouldn't have, but that is as flat and pathetic as telling someone to watch out when they have already fallen and hit the floor. So she settles for something entirely different, even if she knows this might lead to a conversation neither of them may have thought of touching tonight.

"Why did you?" she asks, but quickly notices her struggling to find an answer. "We don't have to talk about it if you don't—"

"Because I missed you," Elsa confesses, not wanting to look at her as she does. "And because if I worked I wouldn't have to think about you, and if I didn't think about you, I wouldn't be able to hurt."

Breathless, she can only whisper, "I missed you too, Elsa..."

For a moment, they give themselves into the silence. In the distance, a firetruck wails with desperate urgency.

"Do you know the five stages of grief?" Elsa asks, her voice light but sober.

"Not in order," Anna replies sheepishly.

She lifts up a hand, begins to count down with her fingers. "Denial. Anger. Bargaining. Depression. Acceptance." She lowers her hand, nestles it with the other. "I've seen people in every one of those stages. And when I lost you... When I thought I'd lost you, I felt as if I'd gone through all of them in a messy, complicated order. Did you feel like that too? Did you feel like... like you'd lost a part of your heart when I left?"

Unprepared by the weight of it all, Anna feels her throat beginning to close up. She has to force herself to take a deep breath before she can finally answer. "You have no idea."

"Do you regret it?"

Anna exhales a weary sigh through her lips. Her eyes are stinging with tears. How utterly unprepared she had been for this. "I regret the time that feels wasted and I regret not having learned things much sooner, but I don't... know, Elsa. Looking back, I feel like it would have happened one way or another. I think it was necessary, no matter how much it hurt."

"You don't think that's something you only thought of to make yourself feel better?"

"Do you?"

Elsa's smile carries with it nothing but sadness. "No... I don't think so."

She nods weakly before she glances at the teenagers dancing on the lawn, goofing around, recording each other. "Elsa, did you really lose weight?"

"Who told you that?"

"Rapunzel."

Elsa rolls her eyes. "I lost some weight, yeah. But half of us lose weight and the other half gains it. She's just being dramatic."

Anna giggles despite herself. "I think it's called caring."

"You can care and be dramatic at the same time. My cousin excels at both."

She laughs lowly this time, feeling the last of her gloominess leave her body. It makes her feel just a little bit lighter again in this warm summer night.

"You must be excited about being almost done."

Elsa lifts her shoulders before sighing deeply, as if the question didn't provide for a yes or no answer. As if it were more than just excitement, more than just being done. "Two years still feel like a bit of a stretch."

"Hey, it's still better than six."

"True," she concedes, then chuckles. "I remember how you would always ask me how many years I had left. As if that was supposed to make time go faster."

"Are you saying it didn't?"

Elsa grins. "Definitely not."

She clicks her tongue. "It's fine. I'm still working on the logistics."

Amused, she shakes her head. "To answer your question, though. I am excited. And nervous. But mostly excited. When you start you don't really see the end, so when you're closer to it it almost feels like it's too good to be true."

"But I'll be there," Anna says without thinking. "When you get to the finish line I'll be there to tell you that you made it, so that you don't have a single doubt left anymore."

"Should I take your word for it?" she asks in a near whisper.

Anna doesn't look away when she says, "Absolutely."

Behind them, on the lawn, the teens have paused the music and sat on the grass. They talk animatedly, throwing hands in the air, briefly capturing Elsa's attention. "They're from the LGBT youth center," Anna tells her.

"How do you know?"

"Because I asked them once."

"Of course you did," she teases. "Do they come a lot too?"

Anna rests her chin on her knees. "I don't know all the details but I think so, yeah."

"It's late for them," she notes.

A half shrug. "Just makes you wonder how many of them don't feel like being home this late at night. Or even if they have a home to go to at all."

Elsa sighs. "We need more Theos in this world."

Anna can't bring herself to muster a smile. The thought of Theo brings her a great deal of pain. To lose her, she knows already, is going to break her heart.

"How are your parents, by the way?" Elsa asks, cutting in on the silence.

"They're fine," she replies weakly. "Just doing their thing. I don't see them all that often."

"And how do you feel about that?"

"I feel okay, doc." This elicits a playful rolling of the eyes. "But seriously, I've made peace with it. Or as much as I could, at least. I've sort of learned to live without them being as present as I once wished they would be."

"You learn to live with absence," Elsa provides.

"Doesn't mean I want to," she says, drawing a soft smile out of the girl that tells Anna she's caught the meaning behind her words.

As time slips away from them so too do the expectations. The pier does not grow darker, but quieter, until the last of the teenagers have left and no one remains behind to listen to the water lapping except for the two of them. It is this which Anna realizes she had missed the most. This ease; this effortless yet precious comfort that came along with the presence of Elsa in her life. This company of hers that Anna may have learned to live without but never once hoped to miss again.

It is two hours later when, at the first signs of Elsa's caught up exhaustion, they agree to return.

Traveling up the lonely pathway, Anna recalls something rather important. "Do you remember Lauren?"

"Your ex boss?"

"Yes. Well, the boss of my ex boss but yes."

"I remember. What about her?"

"She told me to write a book," she says, excitement creeping over her body. "And to tell her when I did."

Elsa frowns. "Why would she want you..." she trails off. Realization dawns. "Oh."

"Yes."

"So she wants to be your agent?"

"I don't know. She didn't explicitly say it. But I think she wants to help me with it at least, which I think is a pretty amazing deal if you ask me."

Despite having her arms crossed over her midriff, Elsa is fully open and genuine when she tells her, "I'm really happy for you."

Anna waves her off. "Not yet, not yet. I'm still trying to find my teddy bear."

"Your teddy bear?"

"I have this thing," she explains, "Where I'm standing in front of this claw machine that's full of book-worthy ideas, right? And they look like teddy bears. And you know how the machines are rigged and it's practically impossible to get a toy out of it?" Elsa nods. "So that's where I'm at. I'm trying to claw a teddy bear slash idea out of that machine."

"And how is that going?"

Anna looks her in the eye. "The machine is rigged, Elsa."

She bursts out laughing, making Anna look like a fool in love which, in fact, she is. But that is a line they shall not cross just yet. Baby steps, Theo would say. You haven't even shared a platonic hug, sugar.

"I think you're pretty good," Elsa says, "Even if the machine is rigged."

"And I think you're biased."

"Doubtful."

Anna hums. They continue on the pathway for a few more steps until they reach the crosswalk on 14th Street. As they wait for the green light, Elsa turns to her with a suggestion. "Why don't you try a writing workshop? You know one of those where you go, work on some prompt, then present it to the group. Is that a thing? Or does that just happen in movies?"

She sniggers. "It's a thing."

"Then go," she encourages her. "Maybe it'll help you find your teddy bear and you'll get some real feedback since mine is so biased."

Anna bites her lip. They cross the street while she distracts herself by trying to decipher the faces shadowed by the cars' headlights. More than strangers, anonymous people.

"I'll go with you if you want."

Surprised, she whips her head back around. "But you're busy."

"I did come out for a cooking class." Anna's expression goes from hesitant to conceding. So Elsa continues. "How about you figure this thing out, give me a day and I tell you if I can make it."

Anna eyes her closely, trying to find in Elsa's demeanor any sign of compromise; anything that may show that she is only doing this for the sake of being accommodating or, even worse, out of pity. But she finds nothing except for a genuine interest to join her on this self-fulfilling shenanigan. Which then makes Anna wonder: Why should she be doubting her in the first place?

"Fine..."

Elsa tilts her head as she searches to get a smile out of her. "Okay?"

Slowly, she caves in. "Okay."

Elsa makes it, and she makes it perfectly on time—because maybe, just maybe, Anna took the time to search through many workshops to find one that would be scheduled during the evening, on a weekend. And maybe it had been a bit of a coin toss luck, a bit of hoping, a bit of fingers crossed. Because yes, being around Elsa gave her some mild palpitations—which was probably both medically inaccurate and an exaggeration—, and yes, Anna would have still attended the workshop had Elsa not been able to make it. But the thought of Elsa being there with her provided a sense of ease she did not know she would need until the two of them were standing in the middle of the cozy, spacious living room, picking out a piece of furniture to settle in.

So yes, Anna hoped and crossed her fingers, and didn't toss a coin because that would have made no sense.

They find a place to sit in close to the bar where bowls of vegan chips, popcorn, grapes and Hershey's kisses (that Anna's taken by the fistful) have been arranged. Bottles of water line up one side while a couple of candles have been lit on the other—the rest have been scattered throughout the surfaces of the living room. People talk in low voices, preparing for the workshop as they pull out notepads, journals, loose pages; pens of all kinds.

"I had to search everywhere in my apartment for a notebook," Elsa mumbles, crossing her legs, pulling out of a tote bag a new-looking notebook and a pen.

"You should've told me. I have my own collection for emergencies like this."

Elsa smirks. "I really should have known." She opens the notebook, skips the first few pages that appear filled with scraps of handwritten notes and settles on an empty one. "I don't remember the last time I properly wrote anything."

"You don't keep notes on your patients or something?"

"Not in notebooks."

"Well, excuse me."

Elsa sniggers, which causes her to grin. For the past couple of months, in the sporadic hours they have shared—both planned and unplanned—Anna has come to relish brief moments like this, staggering in their simplicity, yet somehow monumentally sweet. Little capsules borrowed from time's grip: extracted from their past.

"Are you nervous?" Elsa asks her.

"No." Yet she's been rubbing her palms over her thighs for the last few seconds. "A little."

"What are you nervous about?"

Anna feels like laughing. "That is a good question."

She placates her with a softened look but before she has the time to say something their attention is called to the front. Lin, their host, gathers everyone around with a personal glance. She welcomes them all, tells them a little bit about herself. Anna sinks back into the wingback chair, trying to relax. Her hand sits atop the arm rest, inches away from where Elsa occupies an ottoman chair. Being this close to her, she can register traces of her scent: the mint of her body lotion, the jasmine of her shampoo. Anna's gaze travels from her own hand to the bare skin of Elsa's arm, up towards her shoulder and her neck, her long hair secured in a ponytail; the soft shell of her ear, the eyes that are staring back at her.

Embarrassed, Anna looks away. She realizes she's missed most of Lin's introduction.

"Tonight's prompt," Lin says, "is something we call What You Don't Know. This might refer to a secret, or a side of you that you've kept from someone else—that is, of course, anything you're willing to share." A rumble of nervous laughter. "It also doesn't have to be you, it can be a character you've been working on, or a new character from a new story. What matters is that you find the means to write tonight."

A girl raises her hand, asks a question. Anna braves a look in Elsa's direction and finds her paying attention to what's being said. Funny, she thinks. She had not considered how distracted she would be by Elsa being here. A guy follows with another question, and Anna decides it's time to focus as well.

"What's the time limit?"

Lin says, "One hour." Still looking ahead, Anna buries her hand inside the front pocket of her plaid shirt. "Again, once our time's up you'll have the chance to share your writing aloud." She withdraws two Hershey's kisses before gently poking Elsa in the arm. "Our feedback should be positive and supportive." She offers her the chocolate and Elsa accepts it with a sly smile. The tips of her fingers graze her palm, and Anna's concentration wavers. "Do we have any more questions?"

A series of shaking heads ensue. With one last look at the time, Lin announces they may begin. Anna shares a look with Elsa before they, too, shift their attention to the notebooks on their laps.

The room falls quiet.

How intimidating is a blank page to the writer? As intimidating as an empty canvas is to a painter, and staff paper is to a composer. You have more possibilities lying ahead than you know what to do with. What is the hardest part of creating? Beginning. Anna taps twice the end of her pen against the page of her journal before realizing how annoying it will be if she were to continue. The sound of rustling paper fills the air; one or two sighs through the nose; the nervous clicking of a pen. Beginning: she writes out the prompt at the top of the page. She glances over at Elsa, like a student copying during an exam, and finds that her sitting position covers the notebook on which she actually appears to be writing. Well, she thinks, smiling, I shouldn't have worried that she'd be bored. She looks back to her page, the black tip of her pen hovering above. She soon senses it: a wave tumbling out of an emotion long before the mind has the words to describe it. The pen touches the page and, slowly, she begins to write.

The time is up faster than she'd expected. The group stirs, shaking themselves off the room's placidity as if from a slumber. Lin's voice is equally low; kind as she lets them know they will be taking a fifteen minute break before they gather around for whomever would like to do a reading.

"How did it go?" Elsa asks when most begin leaving their seats.

Anna stands up to stretch. "Good," she groans. "Somehow it went... What about you?"

"I wrote... some," she admits. "It was harder than I expected."

She watches her stand up as well. "Is this going to become one of those things where we switch for a day? You spend hours alternating between staring into the distance, crying, chugging coffee and writing, and I spend a day at the hospital."

Elsa crosses her arms. "Sure," she says. "You can work my graveyard shift, sleep for about an hour, eat off the vending machine. I'll give you my list of patients so make sure you learn how to resuscitate a person, read EKG's, perform a catheterization. Oh and memorize a few terms too. You don't want to misdiagnose someone and bear the guilt of—"

"Okay, okay, okay!" Anna raises up her hands in defeat, laughing. "I take it back. I did not think that through."

"Nope," she smirks as she reaches for a bottle of water behind Anna, whose breath catches in her throat.

As soon as the break is over and people have taken up their seats again, Lin provides the opportunity—and the floor—to read aloud. This Anna came with the intention of doing. However, she lets three people go before her, which leaves her with enough time to psych herself up.

"Any more volunteers?"

Anna's hand shoots up. As soon as Lin nods she scoots closer to the edge of her seat and chuckles nervously. "I've no idea what I just wrote." The room assuages the tension on her shoulders with quiet, understanding laughter. She steals a glance Elsa's way, and finds her smiling. "Okay." She clears her throat, then begins.

"When I was eleven," she reads with a steady voice, "I chipped my tooth with a lollipop. It was a silly accident; the kind we look at from a kid's perspective and think of as the end of the world. I cried in the bathroom as I examined my teeth in the mirror, propped on my tiptoes and with a runny nose. I was terrified of what this meant; thought that I would spend the rest of my life—so unfathomably ahead of me—covering my smile." She pauses, wets her lips. "What you don't know is that the thing I was most scared about was seeing my parents' reaction. Not because they would scream at me for having been careless, or be angry because they would have to spend money on a dentist—whom I hated—, or be disappointed because their daughter now had a chipped tooth to show the world. But because my heart knew what my mind was too young to understand: I was scared of their indifference.

"The funny thing about keeping silent about certain truths is finding out they're universal in their nature. Another funny thing is realizing how little this matters. For years I fought tooth and nail guarding my own universal truth; that I was in desperate need for love. I kept it to myself, nourished it and cradled it close to the bosom of my insecurities. Ironically, though, the moment I found that I had it, I lost it. Because love can be one of those things that you guard to the point of madness. You suffocate it the same way you can so easily suffocate a flame. You take it for granted."

Anna takes another pause for the sake of a breath. She is close to the end.

"What you don't know about me is something you probably do know about yourself. But fears and emotions, while universal, are so intrinsically personal that they are the one thing we could guard until the end, in silence and alone."

After a moment, the group begins to clap lowly. She huffs out a sigh of relief, her heart thrumming as if she were coming down from a high.

"Thanks for the call-out," a guy jokes, breaking through the gathered vulnerability of this moment.

"Thank you for sharing with us," Lin contributes.

Feedback follows, which is not as hard as the act of sharing itself. Pace, purpose, the suggestion of synonyms, the discussion of where she could go with this if she were to pick up where she left off. Anna absorbs all of it, surprised by how helpful the contribution of a few strangers actually is. She had forgotten what it felt like, to witness the effect of her words.

When she scoots back in the chair, she finds Elsa watching her with a penetrating gaze that slowly draws the air out of her lungs. She recognizes it, like a vague memory, in the glint of her eyes. She'd seen it many times before, after all, when Anna knew of nothing more certain, more genuine, than Elsa's love.

"What?" she murmurs.

"I..." Blinking slowly, Elsa shakes her head. A faint, secretive smile plays on her lips before she finally says, "Nothing. You did great, Anna."

"Romeo and Juliet."

"Overrated."

"The Color Purple."

"Underrated."

"Pride and Prejudice."

"Gentle."

"Gentle?"

"You said the first thing that came to mind."

Anna snorts. "Fine. A Hundred Years of Solitude."

"Arcadio."

She nods. That's a good one. "Brothers Karamazov."

"I haven't read that one."

"Me neither."

"Next, sugar."

She's distracted by a bird sitting on a fence. "I'm drawing a blank."

"You worked at a bookstore and you're drawin' a blank?"

"That was years ago."

Theo hums. She pauses. "Mrs. Dalloway."

"Peculiar," Anna says. "Or, flowers."

"The House of Spirits."

"Epitome."

"Of what?"

"Magical realism."

From behind the wheelchair she sees Theo nod her head. "Give me five words that come to mind when you think of magical realism..."

Words, as it turns out, were the strongest link that bound Theo and Anna together. This, they had known since the beginning. Back when Anna was still a college kid working the aisles of poetry, anthology and classic literature. Back when dreams still appeared far in the horizon, immeasurable yet attainable. They understood the value of words, their depth, their persistent longevity. They cherished them, yet toyed with the idea of them the same way one sets an object apart then works on reconstructing it. The same way Theo would always spread the pieces of a puzzle on the table before slowly, patiently, putting them back together.

Anna has come to Queens this time, a late afternoon so that the sun won't burn their skin as they make their way to the park. It had not taken much to convince Theo to come out with her, but the energy, the physical strength to appear delighted had only gathered around the softness of her eyes and the tiredness of her smile. Chemotherapy was finally taking its toll.

She pushes the wheelchair at a leisure pace, firing words at Theo and having her fire some back. Descriptive. Fantasy. Mundane. "How does a thing become mundane?" Theo asks with a low voice and Anna groans despite her amusement. It has never been hard for Theo to keep her on her toes.

At the park, she finds for them the closest vacant bench. It is not hard. The place has mellowed out and those who are still here do not bother sitting on benches, but on the grass of the lawn.

"Is this good?" Anna asks her for the third time in the last few minutes.

"Yes, honey." Theo closes her eyes and takes a deep breath as she faces the warm setting sun. Her cheeks, once healthy and full, are now on their way to becoming hollow. Her hair, thinning, is protected by a white and blue scarf that Anna took care of wrapping for her. Intrinsically, just the way Theo liked and was accustomed to. She sits, with her hands resting on a shawl and a worn journal, saying nothing. And Anna lets her, for as long as she needs to, in this silence that is both painful and calm.

"I dreamed of my momma last night."

Anna watches her open her eyes slowly and waits for her to continue.

"I was back in the South," she says, "in the old house we grew up in. And I was sittin' in the kitchen watching my momma make her Sunday cornbread. She was singin', lost in herself like she always was." Theo pauses and breathes, tired, for a couple of seconds. "I was a kid in my dream, I think. My feet didn't even touch the floor. But my momma... she turned to me, blocking out the sun, and she told me, 'I'm waitin' for you, Theodora.' And then I wasn't a kid anymore but me, now. And I said to her, 'No, momma. It's not my time yet.'"

Anna swallows hard before she asks, "What did she tell you after that?"

Theo shakes her head slowly. "I don't remember." She moves as best as she can in the chair so that she can fully face her. "Can I tell you a little secret?"

"Of course."

Her dark eyes glint under the sun; with salt and with water. With tears, unshed.

"I'm scared."

Anna inches closer, reaching out for her hand. She squeezes gently as she wills herself to be brave for the two of them. To muster the courage Theo may not have right now, to find the right words in the depth of her sadness.

"It's okay to be scared," she murmurs, "But you're right about what you told your ma. It's not your time yet. Treatment is not over and you can still have many years left. It's not your time yet. It's not." Her voice is soft. She's afraid that if she raises it, it will crack, and the sob percolating at the base of her throat will escape. It's not her time, she wants to scream at the heavens. It's not her time. It's not her time.

Theo pats the back of her hand as if the action were soothing to her somehow. "I don't feel ready..."

"There's no reason for you to have to feel ready right now. We take it one day at a time, remember? The three of us. And Gaby, because you kind of already turned her into your personal nurse."

Theo chuckles. She stops again to recuperate. "I don't know how I got so lucky with you two," she says.

"We're the lucky ones. I can't speak for Elsa, but you have no idea how many dumb things you've gotten me out of."

She gives her a tender smile, then lifts up her hand to cup her cheek. "You're going to do many great things with your life, you know that?"

"Don't tell me things like that, Theo..."

Her shoulders barely shake with the weakness of her laugh. "Can't an old lady say nice things anymore? I'm not tryin' to scare you. It is the truth. I need you to know this and I need you to believe in it as much as I do."

Anna looks down at their hands connected, sitting atop the old journal; at their ages, their years of lives lived reflected in the lines that make them. And suddenly, Anna feels like crying. "I want to make you proud."

"You've already made me proud, honey."

The first of her tears escapes her before she wipes it away furiously, frustrated at herself for not having been able to keep it together for the sake of Theo. She looks away, inhales a deep, shaky breath. From where they sit under the canopy of a large tree, the world looks benign, the same as it always has.

"I have a present for you."

She shifts her gaze. Theo is moving the shawl—indigo, because blue is today's color—, taking hold of the journal Anna had seen her write on many times before, handing it over to her. Its deep brown leather is marked by scratches, by lines telltale of its use. A strap is loosely wrapped around it and its pages, when opened, are filled from start to finish with Theo's handwriting. Anna does not yet read any of it, but she places a reverent hand on a page before she looks up with a question already forming in her mind.

"It's my life," Theo says, her voice hoarse and her breathing growing heavy with fatigue. "I want you to have it and do what you think is best with it."

The monumental weight of this moment robs Anna of her words. "Theo..."

She waves a hand. "When you reach my age you stop dreamin' big. But you're so young still, so full of dreams... I didn't get to have a chance in this life, but I know you will."

"It's never too late."

Theo props her elbow on the arm of the wheelchair and cups her cheek in her hand. She smiles with heavy-lidded eyes. "All I know is that my life's in good hands now."

Anna nods weakly, not wanting to push this any longer. Instead, she takes the journal in, her vision blurring with tears that she knows she won't cry today. Because it is not the time yet, and because in her hands, Anna holds a story that she knows exactly what she will do with. Because there are book-worthy ideas, and there are stories meant to be told. Because this isn't just for her, but for Theo; her life and the chances she didn't get to have.

She brings the journal up to her chest, hugging it as she makes a silent promise. This is it, she thinks. This is their teddy bear.