Wednesday, October 11

"Ohmygosh are you ok?" Anna, ears boiling with embarrassment, asked the innocent woman she'd just bumped into.

Anna bit her lip before she dared to look into the woman's face. Her striking green eyes, though, not even a little hazel, caught Anna's attention, and if it weren't for her friendly gaze, Anna would have thought the woman extremely upset.

Her hair was almost the same color as Anna's except for the magenta streaks that made the red pop brighter. Anna's red was more of a strawberry blonde, though, while this woman's was all Rose DeWitt Bukater. But it was so chunky and layered and asymmetrical! She'd taken every risk Anna had never dared and made it look so effortlessly chic.

Whereas Anna had a healthy dusting of freckles along her naturally reddish cheeks, nose, and forehead, the woman's complexion was so flawless that Anna questioned whether she was a natural ginger. She was practically a magazine ad for a high-end foundation!

And then she looked at the blazer and blouse she had ruined, a silky iridescent peacock blue, framed by a cream-colored three-quarter length jacket. Anna's style was decidedly feminine, and she'd never even considered wearing a blazer to work until she noticed the woman's magenta-colored nails, short and square, punctuating slender fingers and wrists gracefully extending past the cuffs. Her shoes were magenta, tall, and strappy, and they had red bottoms. Even Anna's peep-toe sling-back kitten heels were intimidated by this woman.

"Oh, no worries!" the woman said casually. "It was an iced coffee, and I didn't like this blazer, anyway. Really, you did me a favor."

Anna gritted her teeth, not quite believing the woman could dislike anything about herself. "Can I at least buy you another iced coffee? I was just headed over to Oaken's anyway."

There was something so friendly in all her glamor, her smile glinting in the bright afternoon sun. More than making up for her faux pas, Anna just wanted to talk to her more.

Then the woman held her hand out and said, "I'm Gianna West, by the way."

Anna shyly pushed a strand behind her ear and admitted to her own boring name. "I'm Anna. Quinn. Anna Quinn."

"Anna, Gianna! No way! We rhyme!" She smirked invitingly, and Anna hesitantly gave in to her mirth.

The two were soon laughing enough to buckle over and Anna said, "Whoa, I really needed that!"

"Rough day at the office, I take it?" Gianna asked with a mix of cool confidence and warm concern.

Anna just had to fire someone that morning for the first time ever; it was, in fact, one of the worst mornings of her entire life. And she had just hoped for one kind word from Kristoff Boreman, Frozen Fractal's chief financial officer (CFO), after she escorted the man—whose wife was five months pregnant—out of the office.

"Let me know when you've made the adjustments to payroll so I can update the budget," he barked, coldly distilling the man's contribution to the company to a number on a spreadsheet before shutting her door.

Anna spent the rest of the morning in tears, hiding in her office and questioning all of her life choices. She pulled herself out of it, though, because sometimes that was what working in human resources meant. It also meant that the next day would be filled with interviews and even more hard conversations when she had to let over 100 people know they didn't get the job. Giving people bad news wasn't exactly something Anna was good at, and it certainly wasn't something she liked doing.

She smiled sheepishly at Gianna and said, "Yeah, you can say that again!"

"Bummer. Let me guess… Boss has it out for you?"

Kristoff, who was also Anna's direct supervisor, had just emailed her wanting to meet to discuss the budget (and probably how she exceeded it again). That's when she decided she had earned a large frozen snowy mocha with marshmallow sauce and extra whipped cream.

"Oh, it's a long story. I'd rather not get into it."

"You know, Anna, bosses are people, too. Just like you're having a bad day now, I'm sure they have them, too. You just gotta figure out what makes them tick, you know? And then use it to get what you want."

Elsa mentioned Kristoff had separated from his wife about a year before Anna started. It wasn't any of Anna's business, so she never asked. But it was obvious that he was hurting. She'd be more than happy to show him how good she could be at her job if he ever gave her the chance.

"What about you, Gianna? What do you do?" Anna asked, hoping it was something much more exciting than human resources.

"Actually… I'm on the market. I just graduated from Southern Isles University. I had a nasty break up and I moved to Arendelle to get away from everything and start fresh."

"Me, too! Well, not the messy breakup part. I mean, I'm from Arendelle and just moved back from North Mountain a few months ago."

"Right on. I guess that really makes us twinsies! Two rhyming redheads new to the big city! Look out, Arendelle! Woo-hoo!" she said with a fist pump.

Anna smiled at the prospect of making a friend so easily, especially someone as cool as Gianna. "I'm sorry to hear about your breakup, though. Was it really serious?"

"He was only, like, the love of my life!" she laughed facetiously. "But seriously, I gave that guy everything he ever wanted and then some. Turns out he was such a taker, though, you know?"

Anna didn't really know since she'd never even had a relationship last long enough to call someone her boyfriend. She always fell head over heels right away and put everything into the relationship, and just when she was reasonably certain they were 'the one,' they'd dump her. Eventually, she just stopped putting herself out there; the heartache and pain just weren't worth the effort.

Gianna knocked her shoulder into Anna's. "Do you have a boyfriend? You're too pretty not to."

"Me? No," she said with a blush. "I just don't really have a lot of time for that right now since I'm still adjusting to my job and everything. But, actually, I just finished my certification last week."

"Well, that settles it!"

"What?" Anna asked, her heart racing.

"Ok, this is going to sound a little crazy, but let's go out tonight! I'll find you a guy to help you get over your dry spell and you can find me a guy to get over my ex. What do you think?"

Gianna's lips curved into an irresistible smile and Anna couldn't imagine a better way to pass an evening. "Ohmygosh yes! I'm so in!"

Anna had nearly forgotten about her horrible day by the time she got back to the office. It was exciting enough to make a new friend, but Anna shivered in anticipation that she might meet 'the one,' or at least 'the one tonight.' She already knew exactly which dress she was going to buy for the occasion—it had been in her favorite store's window for the past three days—but she wouldn't even think about leaving the office before she was completely prepared for the next day's interviews.

Kristoff didn't even knock when he came into her office, briefly throwing off her good mood. "Anna, you can't just go around buying cakes like they grow on trees."

"That's not what I was doing, I-"

He pinched the bridge of his nose and whined, "You just need to be more responsible. There's a budget and you need to stick to it."

Gianna's words echoed in her brain, and Anna appraised Kristoff more closely than she ever had.

Even though the office was casual—as Anna understood, most offices in the gaming industry were—Kristoff wore an expensive, dark gray suit, maybe five years old, with a cheap black tie every day. His shoes were never scuffed or untied, and there was never a single strand out of place from his blond slicked-back hair.

His face was always so smooth and freshly shaven, and, rather than any aftershave or cologne, the unmistakable scent of Barbasol lingered every time he left her office. Though his eyes were bright brown and deep like wells, they were old and weary, and the areas around them were sunken and dark, likely from too much worry and not enough sleep. His shoulders, though, were strong and broad enough to hold up the world, so they did.

Anna tuned out the rest of what Kristoff said, focusing on how heartbreaking it was that he put so much time and effort into keeping his life in order, but he ultimately had no control over the things that really mattered. Eventually, her eyes settled on the small and barely there freckles over the bridge of his nose, which she'd never noticed before, and her lips curved ever so slightly.

As he placed two sets of index and middle fingers—nails so short he could have bitten them to the nub—at the corners of her desk and leaned over, it occurred to Anna that she was one of those things in his life that he couldn't control. She created chaos and made his life more complicated, and there wasn't anything he could do about it. She was just one more thing on top of the giant pile of things that raised his blood pressure.

Kristoff was just a person, after all, and he was hurting. And Anna wanted so badly to make it better.

"I'm sorry, Kristoff, I didn't realize I was going over the budget again," she said sincerely. She made sure his eyes caught her gaze before continuing. "Do you mind explaining how it works, because I don't think I understand? And I don't want to keep messing it up."

Anna had just opened her heart to him a little, and it was pounding, hoping that her words meant something. Either he would be the decent sort of man she thought he was, or he'd have an even bigger tantrum and make her feel so much worse than he ever had about going over the budget. The last thing she wanted was to cry in front of him, but she already felt an unwelcome dampness at the corners of her eyes.

He snapped upright, one hand to his hip while the other hand went to his chin. "First thing tomorrow morning, ok? I have to leave early to get my kids."

Anna smiled patiently, despite how much she'd gloat over this victory with Gianna later. "I have interviews starting at 9:00. Will 8:00 work?"

The corners of Kristoff's mouth lifted so slightly that Anna almost missed them, and his voice softened into something that felt a little like a tease. "Yeah. I usually get here by 7:00, so I'm pretty sure I can make it."

7:00? Even 8:00 was hard for Anna. She could easily stay up to 4:00 in the morning, but waking up early was something entirely different.

She probably wouldn't get home until very late that night, in fact, or very early in the morning. But whatever happened that night, she couldn't even be a second late for their meeting, or else Kristoff would lose all respect for her. He'd never stop yelling and she'd forever feel bad for all of his future blood pressure issues. She bit her lip because there was too much at stake to screw it up.

Feeling better about things after her breakthrough with Kristoff, having made a new friend so easily, and having purchased the very last dress available at the store—which just so happened to be her size—Anna felt ready for whatever came next.

Then she spent way too much time on her hair and make-up, but she looked perfect, she thought. Gianna was probably going to have smokey eyes sexy enough for a model, while Anna had classic and flawlessly exaggerated cat eyes, just as gorgeous if not as cool. Gianna would probably wear her hair in beachy waves that looked deceptively like bed head, but Anna's hair was plaited into an elaborate but romantic French braid that would make Daenerys proud.

She kept reminding herself that she wasn't actually going to find 'the one' that night, but 'the one tonight.' If she took some random guy home with her for a one-night stand, she wouldn't have cared about the state of her apartment. But she tidied up anyway, just in case he was 'the one.' Wasn't there always a chance that fate would give her what she wanted most in life: someone she could love with her entire being? She braced herself for an exciting adventure, and she landed on the side of a cliff.

"Oh, excuse me."

Anna was a split second away from telling Gianna to take a rain check because the chest Anna had just collided into could just as easily have been 'the one right now' as it could have been 'the one forever.' If she could have just turned her head and listened for its heartbeat…

"Anna?"

She lifted her gaze to Kristoff's wide, blinking eyes, searching for an answer. He looked confused, too, as though not sure what to say, either.

"Kristoff? Hi! Do you live here or something?" She tried to be casual about it as she quickly backed away, but he completely took her off guard.

"Yeah. It's so close-"

"-to the office," Anna helped him finish the sentence.

He rubbed the back of his neck, and Anna blushed at the way his forehead wrinkled, though his eyes seemed so relaxed, even relieved.

"I'm sorry!" Kristoff said suddenly. "You're on your way out. I don't mean to hold you up or anything."

"You're fine," Anna said with a small shrug. "I'm just meeting up with friends for drinks."

"Drinks?" he coughed, betraying his discomfort. Anna smiled slightly when she caught him fighting against checking his watch.

"Are you just getting home from work?" she asked. It was nearly 9:00 pm, and he was still wearing his suit, though his tie was loosened and the top button of his shirt was undone, revealing just a hint of light brown hairs curling to escape their jail.

He finally looked at her again, a little color in his cheeks. "No, my son had a basketball game. They lost, but he scored a few points."

Anna didn't tell him she was sure he was also good at basketball. Nor did she mention the way his voice hummed with pride at the mention of his son. "I'm sure your son was happy you were there to cheer him on. It must have been nice to see how well he played, even if the team lost."

"Yup," Kristoff said quickly, and the reality of his situation set in. He was coming home late—alone—after seeing his son. Because his son didn't live with him. Suddenly, Anna understood the toll being separated from his wife took on him: it meant he was also separated from his kids.

"Well, I'm in 6E if you ever need anything," Anna offered, which was the best she could do.

Kristoff smiled awkwardly, and pointed, "So, 8:00 am then?"

Anna raised her eyebrows and smiled. "Night, Kristoff!" she said as she walked away.

She turned her head towards him just as she got to the front door and he folded his arms. "8F."

She gave him a nod and a small wave and waited until she was a block away before letting her smile grow to its full potential and releasing a small giggle.