Lover
"Just what is it that you think you'll find?" He asked her in arrant indifference, more for the sake of asking than for the need of any actual reply. If she noticed, she didn't show it.
"Keep the light steady," she uttered absently, a drop of sweat trickling down her forehead and catching on her brow as she tightened the final nut on the telescope. He inched the flashlight closer, his attentions suddenly arrested by the provocative luminescence of her face and the soft breeze that fluttered strands of her hair over her eyes.
"I don't know," she answered, her response so delayed that he'd already forgotten the question. "Maybe nothing, possibly everything."
~X~
She used to count the stars, lying supine on the flat roof that extended beyond her bedroom window. It was forbidden to her, and she had endured more than a few scoldings for stealing off onto the rooftop, but she was undaunted; determined to find her answers in the infinite night sky. The child always began her count from Polaris, making her way along the handle of the little dipper, then down to the saucepan of its more prominent twin, tracing a path from one asterism to the next.
Kristoff had taught her all about the stars as they lay side by side on that rooftop, spinning tales about the sparkling clusters that Anna would never find in any constellation book. Within those stories he planted seedlings of magic and destiny, and from them sprouted a longing for love. The kind of love that drove people to hell and back, and condemned star-crossed lovers to the eternity of the night sky, their passions burning on that dark canvass like a whispered secret.
And Elsa had gleamed much like those stars.
The first time they met, Anna hid behind her brother's muscled back, clutching his shirt as she peered shyly at the girl with the silvery blonde hair and the shimmering azure eyes. Her studded earrings and silver bracelets glittered in the sunlight, and it appeared as if a soft white glow sheened off her fair skin.
She was Kristoff's classmate back then, long before words like girlfriend and wife had painted them into little corners. And Anna was the guarded little sister who only knew to impose herself on the generosity of her doting brother.
"You have such pretty hair," the older pretty girl told her, a honey sweet smile on her lips. "Braids really suit you."
Anna pulled harder on Kristoff's shirt, her small timid hands hidden inside the long sleeves of her sweater. A blush spread feverishly over her cheeks.
Kristoff laughed and gently pried her out from hiding.
"It's okay, Princess. She doesn't bite."
But Anna did bite.
Anna was only seven, but she could already see the look in her brother's eyes; basking in the reverie of the pretty girl's stardust.
" Y-you're ugly!" The child sputtered loudly at the girl, once again bolting to the safety of her brother's broad back.
Anna glared at her, her crinkled brows turning white, but the child's jealousy perished under the guilt ignited by the resilient smile that never left the girl's lovely face. She wondered if anyone could truly be so kind.
The Elsa that she came to know over the years was still personified by that warm, subdued smile. A smile that for all intents, portrayed a pleasing and affable girl, as radiant as a dying star.
"Want a beer?" Hans asked, tossing the flashlight onto the ground as Anna rose and dusted grass off her knees. She handed him the nut wretch, practically slapping it in the palm of his hand.
"My brother's gonna kick your ass if you keep stealing his beers," she warned with a disapproving frown. But then added, "I'll grab us a couple," before she disappeared back into the house.
She hadn't expected the sound of hushed voices or the rustle of fabric when she traipsed her way through the kitchen, pausing mid-step with two sweaty, cold beers in her hands as the voices echoed off the walls of the darkened hallway. A small light flicked on, and two shadows inched their way through the long entryway, refracting as they emerging into the open area of the adjacent living room.
Anna froze.
"We really shouldn't do this here," Elsa gasped, barely managing to speak between Kristoff's unending assault of kisses. His large callused hands enveloped her hips and pulled them firmly against his own, his mouth devouring hers like a starved orphan, unable to satiate his greed.
"Oh, come on, babe," Kristoff whined and silenced her before she could protest further, dipping his tongue deeper into her mouth even as he tugged at the buttons on her blouse, slowly popping one after the other. "Just for a little bit."
Anna watched them from her blackened corner of the kitchen, the stillness of her eyes like the tranquil sea, but the hues of her irises were droplets of petulant oceans, darkening and unforgiving. She was keenly aware of the cold beers in her hands, numbing her fingers and dripping tiny puddles onto the polished wood floors. Every muscle in her body stiffened in her petrified repose. Still, she wouldn't move.
"Your sister could be home any minute now," Elsa breathlessly replied, thinly masking the ire teeming from her voice. She pushed him away, brusquely shedding his embrace, but as she turned away, he captured her from behind, his arms harnessed over her chest like a straight jacket.
"She's probably out with Hans," Kristoff persisted, his lips tracing her neckline, and a hand teased its way across her taut stomach, his fingers slipping under the lacy fabric of his wife's brassiere. She flinched.
"What's taking you so long with those beers?" Hans obnoxiously projected into the house, loudly pushing the backdoor wide open and flicking on the kitchen light.
"Why are you just standing there?" He was quick to notice the condensation dripping down the beer bottles, and the deer-in-headlights look on Anna's face, but it was clear from his perplexed eyes, that he had not seen Kristoff and Elsa.
Anna didn't turn around right away. The moment the lights flooded the kitchen, her eyes had connected with Elsa's. And for a fleeting moment, she glimpsed the girl who had cried endlessly on the night of her engagement, and whose tears had shimmered like silver droplets as her sobs swelled through the church halls outside her bridal room.
She had never hated her more as she had then.
"Oh, Jeez!" Kristoff cried out and he and Elsa quickly scrambled to compose themselves. Elsa moved behind him, stealing one more look at Anna, and concealing her reddening face as she clasped her buttons. Anna had not been blind to Hans' unabashed stare at her brother's wife, a stare he'd held a few seconds too long, and she was certain Kristoff had also noticed. His eyes had hardened as he sized him up.
It was only after Hans excused himself and hurried back outside that Anna realized he'd liberated the beers from her hands.
"Those better not be my beers!" Kristoff shouted after Hans as he swipe his cap from the kitchen counter and ran after him. Then it was just Anna and Elsa, and the awkward silence while Elsa finished clasping the buttons on her shirt.
~X~
"Can you get a good look at the north star with your new telescope?" Elsa had her arms folded over her chest, and her eyes searching the night sky for Polaris. Anna looked up from the eyepiece, regarding her sister-in-law with wonder. The moonlight sheened off her silvery blonde hair, suffusing her lovely face in a warm, effulgent glow.
"It's too far," she replied, trying not to stare. "But I can see the rings of Saturn with it."
"Really?" Elsa sounded like an eager child. The energetic timbre of her voice sent a tiny tremor down Anna's spine, and she was overcome by a nauseating, fluttery tingle.
"I can show it to you if you like."
Elsa looked uncertain. Even at her most inoffensive, Anna always seemed to teeter on the cusp of provocation, set off by the most innocuous of things.
"Do I just look through it?"
Anna moved aside. "Go ahead. Just don't touch it." She didn't mean to stare so long into her eyes, or take notice of the supple curves of her hips and her long ivory legs. She tore her gaze away, anger silently beginning to swell in her chest.
Elsa rounded the large telescope and leaned her head forward, peering through the eyepiece. There was a warmth that was not there before, diffusing from the softness in her eyes; a warmth that rarely materialized in the presence of her husband. The smile that tinged her lips and kindled her eyes were like a betrayal. Whispering the secret that Anna had always known.
The woman that stood before her, the girl with the shimmering blonde hair, and the azure eyes, swimming in waves of sorrow beneath the radiance of that smile, was not in love with Anna's brother. Kristoff could never see it. He'd stopped counting the stars a long time ago, too busy with girls and football for anything else to matter. But Anna could see it, and she hated her for it.
Her hatred was much like a curse prescribed by the stars; authored by a cruel and whimsical universe intent on dramatic irony. Anna, who sought her answers in the celestial sky, who longed for the magic of stardust, and the promise of love, was only just beginning to understand that Polaris was not a glittering distant star, but a girl; a tragic and lonely, stupid girl who did not know the first thing about love.
"I can see why you like the stars so much," Elsa uttered, a yearning weighing down her words. "Up this close, they are beyond compare."
And she was.
Author's Note: I'm thinking another two chapters for this rather backward story.