"I can't believe we're leaving tomorrow already. The week went so fast," Anna wondered aloud.
She was laying on the grass, listening the sounds of nature and Elsa's steady breathing. Elsa's left cheek was almost pressed against Anna's left cheek, as they enjoyed the beautiful day of the late summer. Fall was coming fast, and the leaves were already starting to yellow. Both of the girls wished that the moment would never end, that they could just stay in their own little world, in middle of the countryside, free from the worries of the weekdays.
"Elsa, Anna, the food is ready!" Kristoff yelled from the grill, where he was helping Bulda with the dinner.
Bulda had immediately shooed Elsa out of the kitchen when she had tried to take part in cooking. And when Anna had offered her help, Kristoff had just asked her to accompany his sister instead. At first they had felt bad about letting Kristoff, Bulda, and even Olaf, who was removing the calyxes from strawberries on the patio, do all the work. But after laying on that grass for a while, all their problems just vanished away, there was nothing but the two of them.
Reluctantly Anna got up from the ground, and dusted the knees of her overalls from loose pieces of grass. Then she helped Elsa on her feet, and gave her the crutches she needed to walk. Elsa's knees buckled and she would have fallen back to the ground, had Anna not been there to keep her up.
"Are you alright?" Anna asked worriedly.
"Yes, of course. I just felt a little light headed from getting up so fast," Elsa assured and balanced herself with her crutches.
Anna just nodded and they started walking towards the outdoor dining area. Anna didn't say anything more, but she kept stealing glances to make sure that Elsa was looking okay. Elsa seemed to be just fine, no wobbling or looking dizzy, so Anna felt in ease again. It probably really was just passing light headiness from getting up too fast. Not completely unfamiliar feeling for Anna herself. Maybe Kristoff had just rubbed his overprotectiveness of Elsa onto her.
"Sit down girls, everything is ready!" Kristoff announced proudly. He was wearing a black apron, his green flannel shirt had its sleeves rolled up to the elbow, and he was holding a plate full of steaming hot burgers. Frankly, Anna had never been as attracted to him as she was right then and there.
"Alright," Bulda exclaimed and slapped her meaty hands together, after everyone had sat down to the table. "This is like our Last Supper, would you like to pray, Anna?" she asked and looked straight to the girl.
Anna felt intimated and uncomfortable. "Umm," was all she was able to utter. She tried to look Kristoff and Elsa for help.
"Mother—," Kristoff started, but Bulda didn't let him finish.
"Oh, silly me. I forgot completely to ask you if you even are religious," Bulda chuckled. The statement itself wasn't shaped as question, but Anna understood that it was one. Yet again she felt insecure and unsure about herself. She tried to find clues from her companions' faces to help her know what to answer. Bulda saw that: "Oh, no need to be afraid my dear. There's no wrong answers, we don't discriminate here. My husband was a man of God, I myself try to follow my Lord's way as often as I just remember to." Then she turned to Elsa and added: "Our Elsa here, on the other hand, is—what did you call yourself again, honey?" Bulda frowned as she was trying to think out the word.
"I'm an atheist, mom," Elsa mumbled, her head low.
"Yes, an atheist. Elsa's so bashful about religious subjects, don't mind her, there's nothing to be ashamed of what you believe in or what you don't," Bulda assured her.
Feeling a little more confident, but not less awkward, Anna answered the original question: "I'm not really sure about my religion. I mean, I believe that there's something greater, looking out for us, but I don't necessarily believe in bible. I do belong to a church, though, as does my mother, but I didn't have that religious upbringing. We didn't really go to services outside of Christmas or pray before dinner."
"Oh, that's okay. I think most of the youngsters here nowadays are like that, you'll fit in just right. Don't you have similar faith, Kristoff?" Bulda asked with a smile. Anna felt in ease to be met with such a positive response. You never knew when someone would blew of if you didn't believe in the exact same thing. Religion had never really been a topic in their dinner table, back at home. Actually, nothing that could have caused disagreement, had been allowed to be talked about.
"Yes mom. Something like that," Kristoff said, but looked at Anna with a warm smile. Anna mirrored it.
The little awkward but good spirited conversation ended abruptly when Elsa reached her left hand towards the back of her neck for scratching a terrible itch she had. Her sleeves were rolled halfway to her elbow and the motion made them drop all the way. The sight made Bulda cry out: "Jesus Christ, where did that came from?"
All the heads turned to see what the wuss was about. Even Elsa seemed examine her arm with confusion. What she saw, was a huge purple bruise covering her whole elbow and more. How hadn't she noticed it earlier? "Must've came from that hit on the drawer, yesterday," Elsa wondered aloud.
"A hit against a drawer shouldn't cause that big of a bruise, Elsa," Pabbie said with a serious tone. "When will you have the kidney and liver control tests?"
Elsa frowned in concentration. She opened her mouth to answer, but Kristoff beat her in it: "In two days. Should we call to her doctor and reschedule it sooner? Should we have the tests taken here, today?" His tone was almost borderline hysterical.
"No, no, I don't think there's such a rush. Two days will be soon enough," Pabbie said, thoughtful. "What symptoms you have, and how long?" he then asked Elsa, his voice was strict. Anna had a feeling that this wasn't the first time Elsa had delayed telling her family about her health problems.
"Just itching, and I've felt a little more tired and weak than usually. It has only been for couple of days and I just thought it might be the changing scenery and dry skin," Elsa tried to shrug it off, but her voice had a nervous waver in it. Whether it was from being the center of attention, or from the possibility of being ill, Anna didn't know.
"Couple of days! Why haven't you said anything?" Kristoff all but screamed.
"Kristoff, calm down. Elsa will be alright," Pabbie assured. Then he turned to Elsa. "You just go to those tests, dear. I think your medication needs to be doubled up, it doesn't slow the process down enough anymore. You know you ought to tell someone if you have any symptoms, no matter how insignificant they feel to you. Your ego should never come in the way of your health," Pabbie lectured her.
Elsa hung her head low and mumbled: "I know, Pabbie. I'll say something sooner the next time."
"Let's hope there won't next time," he said, tight-lipped. Unfortunately, as a doctor, he knew that there most likely would be.
"Okay! So tell me girls, are you excited to start the school in a week," Bulda changed the grim topic. Everyone felt a little relieved. Though, talking about school wasn't exactly Elsa's favorite thing to do. She liked school, well at least the school work, she just had some troubles with attending the school. It wasn't unknown that Elsa only ever went to the classes that had mandatory attendance. Though, this year she had promised to herself to try to do better.
Elsa couldn't sleep. The itching had grew to be almost intolerable. Also, her legs had that uncomfortable feeling that forced her to fidget them. Moving helped, but if she stopped, the feeling came back. Over all, Elsa felt restless and anxious. Laying felt insufferable, she felt need to get up and walk, to do anything but stay still. She knew that the severity of her uncomfortableness was caused by the knowledge that she was ill again.
Elsa knew that it was her kidney, this wasn't the first time. Her liver didn't function exactly properly, but it hadn't gotten worse after her sepsis had first caused the failure. Her kidney, on the other hand, was getting progressively worse. The medication slowed it down and the doctors had even be hopeful that it could stop the progress altogether, but Elsa didn't share that faith.
Somedays she even wished her kidney would just stop working. Nothing was worse than living with a ticking time bomb, never being sure if she would be fine tomorrow. If the kidney stopped working, she would either get a new one, or die. She didn't know anymore which option she would prefer.
Elsa wasn't afraid of death, but dying itself terrified her. It wasn't her fault that survival was the strongest instinct that a human had. And a human she was, no matter how dehumanizing some of her experience in life had been, how she was treated as property to be sold in favor of her owner. Elsa still had her human nature, she had learned to adapt and survive. It didn't matter that she didn't know was all the pain and suffering worth it in the end, her instincts were stronger than her mind.
So often people told her to stop bowing to others and stand for herself, to start living for herself. It was easy for them to say. How could she unlearn the very thing that had kept her alive for so long, had made her survival possible? Some of the men she had met would have bashed her head against the wall to paint it red before she had time to blink, if she had stood for herself. Often she wondered, if she had just learned to submit earlier in her life, if she hadn't cried as a baby, if she hadn't complained as a toddler, would her father liked her more. And sometimes, Elsa couldn't help but think, did her own actions even matter. Had she already committed a crime too heinous to be forgiven, before she couldn't even remember? Was her mother's death her fault?
During the week, the thought had looped in her brain like a broken record. She couldn't shake the knowledge off that her father had possibly liked her at some point of her life. If it was true, she must have done something to make him dislike her. If her father had indeed loved her mother, would it be too farfetched to assume that maybe Elsa had something to do with her early demise? Had she spent her whole life wishing for someone she herself had murdered, to come back to save her from her misery? That was just twisted, she was a monster.
"Pst, Elsa. I know you're awake," Anna whispered in the dim room. Elsa turned to look at her. Instead of laying on her mattress, Anna was standing next to the window. How did she get up without Elsa noticing? "The sky is awake, so I am awake," Anna said with awe in her voice.
Elsa sat up and frowned. "Really? It's not really even a fall yet," she wondered aloud. Northern lights usually came a little later in fall.
Elsa patted to the window and peered out. There indeed were some thin green lines on the sky. Nothing special for a girl who had grew up in North, barely visible. But Anna seemed awestruck. Who was she to ruin her happiness?
"Is something troubling you?" Anna then asked and searched Elsa's eyes.
"It's just this itching, it won't go away," Elsa admitted the half-truth.
"Could I show you the way my mother always helped me to sleep?" Anna asked, feeling a little nervous. Her request was a little strange, she was well aware, but for some reason she really wanted to share that with Elsa. "It could help you to fall asleep too. It's so late and we have really early morning tomorrow."
Elsa, too, felt conflicted. She had never really had a special mother-daughter sleeping-thing. If her mother had done something to help her sleep, she had been too young to remember. Then she had been too old and skittish to form that kind of special bond with Bulda. But she was curious to know how Anna had experienced mother's love that her own childhood had lacked, so she nodded.
Anna grinned ear to ear, and Elsa immediately knew she had made the right choice. "Okay, we have to lay on the bed. C'mon, skootch in."
Elsa and Anna snuggled together. It wasn't the first time, but this kind of intimacy was so new for Elsa, she felt a little overwhelmed. However, soon all the anxiousness started to melt away, as Anna started to sing. Her voice was soft and quiet, but Elsa heard her just fine. The lyrics of the lullaby were about some river with memories.
Anna then started stroking the bridge of Elsa's nose with her pinky. Elsa had never experienced that level of calmness before, at least not that she could remember to. It felt like all the nervousness rapidly escaped her cells and left her feeling content and in peace. It was strange how a song she had never heard before, could feel like it was made for her to listen. And how the act she had never experienced before, the stroking of the bridge of her nose, made her feel like a little child, safe in her mother's arms.
The sleep claimed her much faster than she would have cared to admit. Soon the peaceful, dreamless slumber found its way and made Elsa its willing participant. Not that Anna lasted long after. She fell asleep with the next line of the song still hanging in her mouth. They slept like logs till the morning, in each other's arms.
A/N A little shorter chapter again. This has more insight into Elsa and Anna's minds. Some of the stuff I reveal, will be important further in the story, some are here just for you to know more about the way they think. Not spoiling which is which, though. I hope you ejoyed the chapter,see you in the next one!