Chapter 35

A hot steaming cup of tea before the eyes, with faded eyes, a train full of thoughts are crossing her mind while listening to what they're telling her.

"Elsa? Are you listening to what I'm saying?" there's Marshall's voice on the other end of the phone, with a preoccupied and a little bit annoyed tone.

"Yes, sorry.. I was lost on my mind.. So, you're thinking this is the most suitable decision?"

"Of course.. You must be away as much as possible from the situation unless you're asked. For what concerns Anna.. I'm more than willing to help her if she allows me."

The two have spent the last half hour on the phone, discussing about the situation in front of them. Not one of the best for sure, now they have a tough nut to crack and they need to find the smartest way to fix everything without any repercussion on anyone.

"Talk with Anna and see if she's willing to talk to me, give her my contacts and I'll deal with the rest if it's the case. Stay calm, everything will be fine." And with that the call ends, both perplexed and worried. Elsa does as suggested and texts the redhead leaving Marshall's phone number and e-mail address in the hope she asks him help. In the meantime, she tries to get back to her normal working life, she doesn't want Hans to keep ruining it for the umpteenth time, directly or indirectly.

Outside of her office there's Kristoff immersed in his thoughts.

"Dr. Bijorman, to what do I owe the pleasure?" she asks him raising an eyebrow. Since she got back she avoided everyone, or at least she tried to avoid the guy in orderto not having to deal with one of his ambush. She knows the possibility of him asking her how she's doing, what happened, if she heard from Anna and the blonde doesn't have any intention of bringing up that topic since her only goal is to jump back into work trying to distract herself.

"El.. Ehm.. Dr. Winters, I came here to talk about one of our former patients who is currently in the ER." That's the main reason of his visit for sure, but it's also true he'd like to take advantage of the situation to try to understand how she is, and in particularly what happened between Anna and Hans, having saw the blonde in his cousin's room.

"Which patient and what happened?" She asks him while adjusting the collar on her white coat.

"The little Maggy Jansen. High fever for a few days, general sickness, nausea, vomit, her father brought her to the hospital after noticing her condition was getting worse." Elsa's heart tightens at hearing the name, she still remembers her, her kindness and transparency that only a child seems to have naturally, she remembers the evening spent together helping her with her algebra homework, she remembers about their little secret.

"All right.. let's check up on her and let's do all the necessary test to assure it's not a reaction to the transplant." In her professional and firm voice, it's possible to slightly detect concern.

Once they reach the ER, the woman inspects each room, each bed to find that little twelve-year-old. When she finds her, she tries to catch her breath and go to her.

"Doc.." the tired and feverish kid calls her and her father.

"Dr. Winters? Please.. help my daughter.."

"Mr. Jason don't worry. We'll take great care of your daughter. Tell me, for how long is it going on like this? Does she have any pain localized in a specific area?" she begins to ask while she puts on some gloves and stands closer to Maggy smiling at her in sign of comfort.

"I don't know.. it's been a few days, at first, she only had a fever and it didn't seem too bad. Then she started to get worse, she felt sick and nauseous, she can't stand up and she burns like hell." The man is almost in tears and trembles, he doesn't know what to do, he keeps pacing, worried about his daughter's health and terrified by the idea her condition is related to the surgery she had some time ago. "Doc.. it's not the heart, is it?"

Elsa examines the kid's chest and her scar doesn't seem to be inflamed, so she excludes that option. She keeps going on her examination feeling all the abdominal region and as soon as she reaches the lower area she feels a big inflammation and the child screams in pain. "Don't worry Mr. Jason. It's appendicitis, it's very common and luckily you brought her here before the situation got even worse. I'd like to operate as soon as possible, you'll have to sign the consent forms and naturally I'd prefer to keep her in observation to check everything is all right."

Maggy's father takes a deep breath and gets closer to his daughter, he caresses gently her forehead. "Everything's okay, monkey.. I love you." He kisses her and steps aside so that the nurses can prep her and bring her to the OR.

Ding Dong

"Mooom! Can you open the door?" Anna shouts from the bathroom. She curses people's timing. 'Every time I'm in the bathroom people come! Every damn time..'

Gerda goes to the front door and opens it. "Ah, good morning, come in! Anna will come shortly. Please, sit down and make yourself comfortable. Would you like something to drink? Coffee, tea, water?"

Marshall follows her in the dining room and sits at the table giving her a silent thank you. "A glass of water is just fine."

Shortly after, Anna joins them and smiles at the man. "Thanks for coming over, I hope I haven't stolen you from work!"

"Don't worry, I can leave my office to visit clients, or possible ones. So, ready?"

Anna straightens herself out and she looks at him straight in the eyes, her face covered by so much seriousness her mother has never seen on her before. "Yes."

The surgery doesn't take much time to end and as asked by the father the lead surgeon is Elsa, who is checking her right now and she's completing the data on her charts. Just to be safe, she's just finished to book a few more test as soon as the anesthesia wears off, to make sure there aren't any more inflammations. The blonde is protective of Maggy, maybe because she's one of the first patient that touched her deeply. 'Perhaps cause she' a child..' for sure this is one of the reasons, but she knows there's something else. Despite her usual coldness, Elsa has always adored children and when she was little she dreamed of having a sister, with whom spend time together, run in the garden, making snowmen, not feeling alone.

"Dr. Winters?" Kristoff calls her softly.

'Remember you're not alone anymore.'

"Elsa?" the blonde is startled, she turns around to face her colleague and friend. That voice inside of her is right, she needs to try and stop isolating herself, she has friends, she has people who care about her and loves her. She's not alone.

"I'm not alone.." she murmurs. Kristoff understands what she's saying and he gets closer to her landing his hand on her shoulder.

"No, you're not."

They go to her office, they sit on the couch and Elsa breaks out of her character, she starts crying and shivering. He just hugs her without a word. It's a new situation for both, he doesn't know how to deal with it but having an idea of her character he knows that the best thing to do now is to wait for her to start talking, to let off steam and to open up. After a few minutes spent between tears and sobs, the blonde regains a bit of self-control.

"I don't know what's happening to me.. I tried to forget the past, yet every time things seems to go right.. here it is again! I feel guilt so much.. I feel like shit.. I'm a shit person.." Elsa drops her face in her hands and starts to shake her head as she thinks about everything that has happened during that week and the one before. "I wanted to reach her.. I wanted to hear from her. But at the same time I didn't want to. I felt betrayed, by all of you.." Kristoff grits his teeth. It was him who talked to Anna and even though he knows Elsa is not talking about the event of the day. He feels guilty too, but now it's not about him.

"I'm afraid of him. I'm afraid he can still hurt me and he's doing it.. even if I know I'm the one letting him to do so, but I can't help feeling this way.. when Anna understood.. I was so afraid. I was afraid of losing her.." Kristoff doesn't understand, how could she lose her for something like that? It wasn't Elsa the one doing those things, on the contrary, she tried to defend the others and herself.

"I seriously thought that she would have been tired of waiting me.. I thought she would have left me. And now I find out what she's done.. what she's done for me and I fell like.. I don't know.. Weird." The guy begins to fill in the gasps. "I've never expected something like that. I've never felt protected before. It's something weird and I like it.. even if I don't like what happened."

"Sure, it would have been better another way." Kristoff decides to step in this conversation Elsa is having with herself. "But you got the confirmation, you can be sure that girl won't go anywhere." Elsa finally faces him.

"Are you talking for real?"

"I'm sure of it. Have you not seen how she looks at you? That girl is completely lost for you, she'd do anything to make you happy. I know it wasn't easy for you.. but neither for her. It was hard seeing her like that. I've known her for all my life and I've never seen her so broken, so dead.. You know how she is, she's high-spirited and it's impossible to make her stay calm, yet.. there was this radical change in her behaviour and I was really worried." The blonde is silent, she's digesting the information. "I was worried for both. Elsa, I know we've known each other for a little, but I care about you and so do a lot of other people, more than you think. I'd like you to know, to remember that there's no reason to suffer alone. There are people willing to help you whenever, if ever, you need. Whatever it is to let off some steam or to distract yourself. You're developing a big family here." At those words the doctor's eyes starts to water. "I'm sure you have noticed the hot teas in the Relax." She nods. "Do you know who made them?" she shakes her head. "Mandy."

"Mandy?" she looks at him shocked. She almost never spoke to the girl, okay maybe more with her than the other nurses, but she would have never thought she would have done something like that.

"Yes. You do know she's in paediatrics and I'm sure you haven't noticed it but after Maggy had the transplant she was getting checked by a nurse and that nurse was her."

Now she remembers, it was Mandy the nurse who was looking at her curiously after she gave the little girl the good night. "She's always believed you weren't insensitive, the ice queen as everyone says. Even she noticed your change during this week and when she asked me if something happened between you and Anna – ehy no, don't worry! I haven't told her anything, don't look at me like that! Anyway.. she sensed something happened and she wanted to do something to help you indirectly, so she made you tea, she knew your schedule, you're predictable, everyone knows that if you're free you drink tea at 5pm."

"She set up the hot water and left the tea infuser in my mug." Kristoff smiles and Elsa does the same. "I can't believe it.."

"I told you, more people than you think."

"Thanks, really and I'll go and thank Mandy too. It was very thoughtful from her." Elsa knows that's not something everyone would do, especially for someone like her and as soon as her shift ends she'll go and talk to her.

No one never will probably find out what's so special about a hot cup of coffee, or any other hot beverage, to bring people in a state of meditation, calm and deep reflection. Perhaps it's all about the curious magical and hypnotic movement of the steam coming out, or the delicate or strong scent released, or the heat surrounding the hands wrapped around the cup. Maybe it's all because of the sense of peace and calm related to that simple and normal action and habit.

Whenever you're in need of a break from everyone and everything, whenever you need to recollect your thoughts, whenever you're trying to decide something, there's always your favourite hot beverage in front of you and then there is the perfect conditions for all of it if there's also that peaceful sound of rain drops on the window.

As it's happening right now to Kai in his office, he has in front of him the mug Anna gave him at Father's Day when she was 8. Unbelievably there is no sign of the time passed, despite the intensive use. Here it is the epiphany.

"Now everything is clearer to me about those two!"

Author's Note: Hi everyone! Yes, this is not a false allarm, I'm back! I know it's been quite a while and I'm truly sorry.. but everything is better now. A lot has happened since I last wrote to you.

I had some dark times but I gratuaded from University, I found a job I really enjoy, I had various project going and everything went great, finally.
I'm still trying to organize my life, between work and everything else so I hope I'll manage to update frequently or at least I wish I don't have to make you wait too much. I'm a little behind with the translation, as you may remember I write this ff in my motherlanguage too (italian).

I assure you, this story won't be left unfinished, I care too much about it to leave it incomplete.

I hope there aren't too many mistakes, if so, please let me know and I'll correct them!

I really want to thank so much for everyone who's still here, supported me and understood.

You're the best.

I'd like you to remember that there's always light after dark. Just keep going on, never give up. You're worth it.

If you want to keep track of me, follow me on Twitter ( kryptolella) or Instagram ( christysmazz) or tumblr ( .com) (I have also a Youtube channel since I enjoy editing fanvideo, I'm having trouble with my old software so I had to change it, we'll see how it goes, some account name kryptolella).

I want to remind you that this story is also on Archive of Our Own

See you soon!

Christy