"Anna, will you go to the winter dance with me?" Hans asked Anna as he handed her a rose.

"Hans! How sweet!" She held the rose up to her nose and closed her eyes to inhale the sweet perfume. "Of course I will!" she said flirtatiously.

"Ohhhhh! That's so sweet!" cooed Rapunzel.

Anna stood to give him a hug and he kissed her a little more than she would have liked in the middle of the cafeteria. After Hans left she closed her eyes again and inhaled the intoxicating scent of the red flower, swept away by the romance.

"You're so lucky, Anna! You have the nicest and sweetest boyfriend in the whole school."

Anna stopped in her tracks and moved the rose from her face to examine it. A few of its petals had already wilted and one of them was even falling off. Not that she didn't appreciate Hans' gesture, or how wonderful he was, but Rapunzel was right. She was incredibly lucky, and she suddenly realized that she didn't deserve it.

Kristoff turned his head quickly when she looked in the direction of his usual lunch table. He must have seen Hans give her the rose, and she was more than a little embarrassed for Kristoff to witness such an extravagant gesture. She felt her cheeks burn while the rest of her body grew cold and numb. Her ears throbbed and everything in front of her got distorted. She had a weird feeling like she was floating in water, so she sat down quickly and set the rose down on the table. She didn't smell it again.

Anna couldn't figure out why it bothered her so much that Kristoff had seen her get lost in the luxury of Hans' affections. She tried to push down the anxious guilt her belly was so familiar with, but it was too much. She felt herself slipping into and out of the pool. Feeling overwhelmed by shame and unable to control her sensations, she left the cafeteria quickly, claiming she forgot to finish her algebra homework. She "accidentally" left the rose on the table for Rapunzel to enjoy.

Anna could feel Kristoff's eyes follow her as she left the cafeteria. He'd been in Corona for a couple of months, and there was hardly a time when Anna looked at him that he didn't quickly turn his head. Instead of looking away, like he always did, he sat up straighter and met her eyes with confusion and concern.

Anna's thoughts wandered as she drew hearts in her notebook. She was glad Kristoff found friends like Sven and Eugene. They both lived in the housing project that Oaken lived in, a group of eight apartment buildings with low income housing. Maybe he felt a little more comfortable there since a lot of the refugees lived in those buildings. Remembering how hostile the Arendellians at the refugee camp acted towards him, though, she knew that probably wasn't true. Even though the Arendellians didn't commit genocide against the Northuldrans, they didn't do anything to stop it. Even before the genocide they acted out their prejudice in other ways, though. Northuldrans were overrepresented in the prisons, there were bars against employment, and it was difficult for them to get an Arendellian education for those that wanted it, not least because the schools in the Northern Mountains set up by King Erik weren't even remotely adequate.

Kristoff had gone to a school like that, most likely. He probably learned some Arendellian, though not enough to be fluent. But he spoke better than Anna first thought. His accent was so thick, and he didn't have a good grasp on grammar, but he could understand almost everything. And he could speak well enough to get his thoughts across, even though it was hard to understand him sometimes. Kristoff still faced a lot of prejudice, especially at school, where his teachers didn't understand that he probably hadn't ever used a computer before or learned basic world history. He had only learned what his parents and village elders had taught him, and they probably had no use for algebra or Coronan literature, and she was sure the Arendellian educators didn't offer much in the way of useful or even accurate information. And he still barely spoke Coronan. He didn't know a single word when he arrived two months ago, and even though he could easily carry on conversations with his friends, Anna sensed he was still much more comfortable with Arendellian. Not to mention how much school he missed while trying to escape genocide, fighting for his own survival every second of the day. None of his teachers would have survived if they suddenly got lost in the woods like that.

It must be hard for Kristoff being the only Northuldran, especially since he most likely lost all of his family while he escaped. Anna could only imagine the survivor's guilt he must be feeling to have gotten out of there alive while they got left behind, made worse by wondering if he did enough to help them. That thought made Anna incredibly sad.

She should have been ecstatic because of Hans' extremely romantic invitation, and grateful that someone like him loved her. But she also felt ashamed for having something that so many other people wanted. Almost every girl that didn't already have a boyfriend (except Rapunzel) had a big-time crush on Hans. She felt even more ashamed, though, because she couldn't stop thinking about Kristoff when she should have been feeling grateful for Hans. But the deepest, most powerful shame came from knowing how hard Kristoff's life had been compared to hers. She barely knew him, but she knew him enough to know that he deserved a better life than the one he'd been dealt.

Anna sank deeper into her thoughts, the stabbing memories of things she knew didn't happen, but couldn't explain made her shudder with shame. She was plagued by confused thoughts and memories, and found herself constantly searching for answers, begging her brain to figure it out so she could finally have some peace, even though the knowing might be worse than the wondering. She was so young, but some things she remembered as clearly as though they happened yesterday, and she relived them over and over. She was relieved when the bell rang, pulling her out of her thoughts, and she quickly closed the big box of horrible thoughts and memories of what happened before they left Arendelle that somehow opened on its own and stuffed it into the carefully organized closet where she kept all the things she didn't want to think about until the time was right.

The memories contained in Anna's closet were nothing compared to what Kristoff had just gone through, though, and Anna felt guilt on top of shame, for allowing herself to feel her own pain when Kristoff deserved to feel that pain so much more than her. Putting the box with her childhood memories back in the closet temporarily helped to assuage her guilt, at least enough for her to focus in class, and hide the pain she didn't deserve to feel like she usually did. She could hide the memories in the boxes, but she couldn't put the shame in any of the boxes, no matter how hard she tried. The only thing that made the shame feel better was the guilt, but then the shame came back. She was so good at concealing her shame and guilt that no one else knew her true feelings. She didn't want anyone to know, but she also felt extremely lonely from hiding so much of herself.

She was wondering how that one box fell off the shelf and opened on its own when she bumped into Kristoff in the hallway. She quickly slammed the door to the closet and tried to be friendly. She wanted Kristoff to know that at least someone in Corona cared that he was doing well.

"Oh, excuse me," he said in Northuldran. Then he paused and pursed his lips to switch gears to ask how she was doing in Arendellian.

Anna winced a little that she couldn't talk to him in Northuldran because she knew how happy that would make him. But she promised her father that she'd never speak Northuldran. Not to mention, it had been so long, and she was so young when she last spoke it, that she didn't even know if she still could.

"I'm fine! Thanks for asking! How are you?"

Kristoff seemed taken aback by her enthusiasm, but he smiled, and Anna forgot all about her closet. This was the real Kristoff, she thought, and seeing him step into the sunlight made her day.

"So, I think I'm gonna ask Rapunzel to the dance," Eugene announced.

"Are you sure about that, buddy?" asked Sven in a patronizing tone.

"Maybe you should actually talk to her first. She probably thinks you're creepy because of how much you stare at her."

Sven laughed and Kristoff felt like he belonged. His Coronan had improved significantly over the past couple of months, and now he could easily participate in light and easy conversations with his friends.

"I do not!" said Eugene.

"You do!" laughed Sven.

"Fine. How do you ask out women where you're from, Christopher?"

"Do you want to share my reindeer pelt? It's warm in here!"

"No, that can't be true. Is that true?"

Kristoff winked at Sven when he asked Eugene, "Would I lie to you?"

"So did that ever work?"

"Oh yeah, I had many women."

"Ok, now I know you're full of it!"

"You got me!" Kristoff smiled but quickly closed his mouth, remembering his missing teeth.

"But did you have a girlfriend back home?"

There were girls he liked, but Northuldrans didn't really date the way Coronans did. Plus he'd been on his own since he was about 14, and since then all he thought about was survival. Even if there was a girl brought to him by Ahtohallan traipsing around the forest, which there wasn't, he would have been preoccupied with his own safety.

"No."

"What about here? Anyone catch your eye?" asked Eugene, eternally obnoxious.

Kristoff was silent. He didn't want to answer that question because he didn't want to be teased about it. He glanced at Sven, but he didn't say anything either, even though he knew how Kristoff felt about Anna. Kristoff actually spent a lot of time staring at Anna, but Eugene didn't notice because his own eyes were always focused on Rapunzel.

"No," he finally mustered, as he quickly picked up his tray and left. On his way out, he looked in her direction and their eyes met, just briefly. At least Anna knew who he was.

Eugene approached Rapunzel's table at lunch the next day. Kristoff and Sven watched with interest, expecting Rapunzel to slap him in the face, but she didn't. Kristoff and Sven were a little astonished when she smiled and motioned for Eugene to sit down next to her.

Kristoff's eyes kept darting from Rapunzel to Anna. He wondered what Anna would think about someone from the projects asking out a girl from a wealthy family. Anna's eyes were filled with wonder and excitement, and Kristoff smiled at seeing these new emotions on her. She held her hands together, hoping Rapunzel would accept. And then as soon as Eugene walked away the cousins started talking about it, and Anna gave Rapunzel a big hug. Kristoff was again surprised by Anna, who was genuinely happy for her cousin, even more excited than she was when Hans gave her that rose. When Hans gave her the rose, though, her excitement only lasted a few minutes, but now, her excitement lasted the entire lunch period.

Kristoff couldn't get the picture of her with that rose against her lips out of his mind. It wasn't the flower he would have chosen for her, but he liked seeing her happy and content from being cherished, even if it didn't last long. He could see Ahtohallan's love reflected from every pore, as though her skin was made from it, and that's how she'd appeared in his dreams since that day. No matter how little he liked her boyfriend, at least he was nice to her and treated her how she deserved to be treated.

Eugene returned to the table triumphant. "Well, guys, looks like we're going to the winter formal dance!"

"By 'we' you mean you and Rapunzel?"

"Well, yes, but also we three. She asked if you two bozos were coming, too."

"So you said 'yes'? Without asking?" Sven asked. They didn't have anything like it in the Northern Mountains, and Kristoff felt very uncomfortable about it. He didn't know what to do or say, what kind of rituals might be involved.

Eugene knew that Sven was asking for Kristoff's sake. "Don't worry, Christopher! It's a time-honored Coronan tradition. It's about time you learned about your new home."

"What do you think I've been doing this whole time?" he asked. They were joking around, but the thought of Corona being home made his stomach sour a little.

"So, we have to get suits. The girls all get dressed up fancy."

Kristoff's gaze wandered back to Anna and he wondered what she would look like dressed fancy. She wasn't plain looking at all - he thought she was one of the most beautiful people he'd ever seen - but he found it odd that she never did anything to try to make herself look prettier like all the other girls in school did. The answer most likely lived in the half of herself she kept hidden. It still bothered Kristoff that there was so much mystery about her, but every time he doubted her Ahtohallan whispered in his ear to be patient.

Kristoff looked away quickly when Anna saw him.

"Maybe Oaken has one."

Sven shot Kristoff a worried look, which Kristoff tried to ignore. His feelings might be irrelevant, but it didn't hurt to look at her and talk to her. Who would that hurt?

Once her cousin and aunt settled on a pink taffeta dress with puffy sleeves, which looked somewhere between princess and flower girl, they turned their attention to Anna, who picked a long sleeve floor length gown in emerald green velvet. It looked amazing on her, but Aunt Arianna and Rapunzel said it was too plain and made her look like she was 60.

Aunt Arianna picked out an off the shoulder dress with a black velvet bodice embroidered with purple, green, and gold flowers, with a short and fluffy light green chiffon skirt. It was gorgeous, and Anna thought it made her look like an Arendellian ballerina.

"Not that it should be a factor in getting the dress, but Hans is going to love it!" said Rapunzel, and Anna knew she was right.

As beautiful as the dress was, and as much as Hans would love it, Anna would have rather worn the green one, especially once she saw the price tag. Aunt Arianna insisted, though, so she went with the ballerina dress. She felt so guilty for her aunt to buy her such a beautiful and expensive dress, but she did her best to be enthusiastic about it since her aunt was so excited. She loved spoiling Anna and her brother Alex. An "aunt's prerogative" she always said.

Hans loved the dress, as Rapunzel predicted, and told her over and over how good it looked on her. She did her best to accept his compliments, but each time he mentioned it her feelings of shame for wearing the dress grew, and then she felt ashamed for being so ungrateful of her aunt, who thought she deserved the dress when she didn't, and her boyfriend, who made her feel ashamed for putting too much effort into how she looked. She got a new box for the dress and shoved it in the closet so she could move through the night and have a good time with Hans.

Rapunzel was having a good time with Eugene, and they hadn't left the dance floor the whole night. They danced so much that she had to take off her heels and Eugene had to remove his jacket and roll up his sleeves. Rapunzel's long hair was combed over to one side while the other side was adorned with a beautiful flower comb she made herself. Rapunzel wasn't even worried about losing her extensions while her hair twisted and changed directions as it floated in the air. They looked like they belonged on the cover of a book about fairy tales.

Anna, on the other hand, spent most of the evening on the bleachers batting away Hans' roaming hands as he drank cup after cup of spiked punch and talked football with his friends. On top of that, he hadn't once asked her to dance.

Finally, Anna went to the restroom just to get a break from the monotony of the evening that lacked any of the romance and whimsy Hans' rose had promised. His behavior reinforced her feelings of shame, because he gave her the evening he thought she deserved.

Kristoff stunned her as she headed back to Hans, and she paused. His hair was combed back and out of his face, and he was wearing a suit. He looked like himself, but also different. Anna liked seeing him this way because he didn't look like he had one foot in the forest. It looked like he was embracing his new life instead of dwelling on his pain. And he smiled like he did that day Hans asked her to the dance. It was the same smile that made her forget about her closet.

"Oh, Anna. Hi. Would you like to dance," he asked her in Coronan with his hand outstretched. She was taken aback by his confidence.

Her first instinct was to say 'no', that she couldn't because of Hans. But Hans was completely drunk and kept talking about her dress. She peered around Kristoff to see what Hans was doing and decided that he probably wouldn't even notice. He hadn't noticed the five times she had been in the restroom so far.

"Is it ok? I was told you dance with many people."

"Yes," she said. Of course he was right, and she didn't know why she was so worried about Hans being upset. Besides, it probably took a lot for Kristoff to ask, and she was a little shocked that he did. And it was the first time he didn't start a conversation in Northuldran, and she felt like he understood.

"That's a beautiful dress," he said in Arendellian.

Anna sighed deeply. "Oh, thanks." She was extremely disappointed that Kristoff of all people would compliment her on the dress. Not to mention she hated the word "beautiful''. She cringed every time she heard it, especially in Arendellian.

"You don't like it?"

"No, I mean, of course I do. I love it. But… I don't know how to explain, it's a little weird."

"You can say it." She didn't feel right dumping her issues on him, but nobody had ever made her feel like it was ok before. Her feelings were so dark that neither Rapunzel nor Hans, not even her Aunt Arianna, would want to hear about them. Alex was too young to understand, and she couldn't talk to her father about it because she'd be ripping at old wounds. Kristoff was the only person she knew who could take her darkness because his feelings were probably even darker, and he genuinely wanted to listen. Anna believed him. She couldn't explain it, but she felt like she could tell him anything and he wouldn't judge her.

"It's just a little too much. I don't feel that comfortable being this fancy, I guess."

"It's just a dress," he said with a dashingly crooked smile which cut Anna's shame in half.

"I know, you're right. It's stupid. Forget I said it."

"Not stupid," he said as he raised his arm to twirl her around. She opened her mouth in awe and eagerly returned to his hold.

He leaned in to whisper, "Oaken taught me," and winked.

Anna didn't know what to say. She hadn't ever talked to Kristoff like this before, and he was so different than she thought he'd be. He hadn't been as gruff since he moved in with Oaken, he'd been nice, but not like this. He was so charming, and it had been years since she felt as comfortable as she did with his arms circling her. Then he spoke in Northuldran and she couldn't quite understand. She caught the word 'beautiful', though, and her heart skipped a beat. She was caught off guard by how much she liked it in Northuldran but hated it in Arendellian and barely tolerated it in Coronan.

"I don't really speak Northuldran. I only know a very small amount."

"I'm surprised that you know any at all. How did you learn?"

"So… um, how are your classes going?" The only reason she even spoke to him in Northuldran at all was because she knew hearing the words in Arendellian would have hurt more than help and he wouldn't have understood Coronan. She shouldn't have done that, though, because now he had questions.

He stopped dancing but didn't remove his hands from her lower back. Sincere concern twisted his face.

"Anna? You can say it. You don't have to hide." Her pulse quickened with nervousness while the anxiety in her stomach quietened. She could have kissed him for offering her the comfort no one else ever had, but it was too much for her.

She had just opened up to him more than she'd ever opened up to anyone before, but she couldn't talk to him about this. She was sure he could handle it, and she knew how badly he wanted to know, but if she pulled that box out, the boxes on top of it might fall and open all at once, and she wasn't ready to take the risk. The light reflected by his smile made the contents of the dress box disappear, but he wouldn't be able to do that for all of her other boxes.

She looked down to the side, but she didn't remove her arms around his neck, not quite ready to give up the comfort being so close to him gave her. She felt a tear coming and she didn't want him to see.

"I'm sorry, Kristoff," she said as she boldly met his eyes. She felt them shimmering, but she also wanted him to see how sorry she was that she couldn't give him the answer he wanted.

"I don't understand," he said.

"I know," she said as her nose began to run. She didn't want to move her hands, though, so she sucked it in. "It's just too hard to talk about."

"Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you."

"It's ok," she gave him a weak smile. "You didn't know." She was ashamed to ask, but she needed it to be a secret.

"Of course," he said with a furrowed brow. Anna clutched her hands a little tighter around his neck, grateful that he understood. Then he leaned in to whisper in her ear again. "Anna, you can trust me never to betray you." She couldn't believe those words, which were so resolute and solemn, came from Kristoff's lips, making her question whether he was telling the truth or manipulating her to extract information from her. Her heart told her she could trust him, though, and she hoped she was right.

Then she saw over Kristoff's shoulder that Hans was approaching quickly, and he looked upset. She instantly let go of Kristoff and backed away. They didn't do anything wrong, but Hans looked upset anyway. And then he sucker punched Kristoff.

"Hans! What are you doing?"

She crouched down to make sure Kristoff was ok.

"I'm sorry, Kristoff," she whispered in Northuldran. "Stay. Please," she pleaded.

Then Anna pushed Hans against the wall. "What the hell, Hans!?" She should have gone with her gut and not danced with Kristoff. She knew Hans was going to be upset if he noticed.

"He was all over you, Anna!"

"No he wasn't. I was as far away from him as I could be while still dancing together. And it's not like you were in any condition to dance with me. We haven't even had one dance together!"

"Come on, Anna. You know how people like him are."

" Like him? LIKE HIM? You better be very careful what you say right now," she said as she glared and jabbed her finger into his sternum.

"They don't have marriage where he's from. He needed to know you were taken."

"This is a warning, Hans. You ignored me all night and then you let your insecurity get the best of you."

"I know," he sighed. "I'm sorry, Anna."

"Your answer sucked, by the way. And since you're so ignorant, I'll explain it for you. The Northuldrans do have marriage, but it's not the same as it is here. They marry for life and they don't have divorce because they don't need it." She paused to calm herself down before she continued, "Consider this a warning. If your answer had been any worse than it was, and I mean any at all, or you had given me that answer when you were sober, I would have broken up with you for it."

Ding, ding

"I'm so sorry, Anna! I just love you so much…"

Anna looked at her phone while Hans was talking. She didn't need to hear his drunken promises anyway.

"Thank you for giving me another chance. I'm gonna make this up to you. I swear!" He moved towards Anna to give her a hug but she had already turned towards the double doors on the other side of the gym.

"Well, you're gonna have to start tomorrow," she said over her shoulder. "When I saw how drunk you got I texted my dad to pick me up. That was about an hour ago."

Ding, ding

"Looks like he's already here. I hope you get home safely."

Anna glanced so slightly at Kristoff, just to make sure he was ok. She could tell that he'd been watching her the whole time. It made her blood boil a little, along with the slight smile of gratitude and understanding that she had exposed too much of her hidden self to him.