I don't own Frozen.
"So… you don't even know where you're from?" Anna asked.
"Retrograde amnesia of the severest form," Jane's shoulders sagged as her head fell back against the open window sill. "After I left St. Bridget's long term care in Little Rock, I went north. St. Louis first, then I landed in Chicago. I was there for… three years? Because of this—" Jane snapped again, light dancing off her fingertips like sparklers in July. "—I was able to evade the police. Not just one, but four, five, twelve steps ahead. And that's where I discovered my affinity for computers. I just had this… instinct with them. I could power them, and it made me want to know more about them. So I studied. And I… tweaked? Anything electric, anything with a computer, microchip, digital anything, I can manipulate. I'm somewhat of a coding prodigy, ahead of the technological field by a good twenty years, due to my condition."
"How did you figure it out? Aside from, like, lightning bolt throwing a la Zeus?"
"I infiltrated a substation at an energy company outside of Chicago. Power lines are filtered through substations that temper the voltage, and I sort of, connected myself to it."
Anna quirked a confused brow.
"Needless to say, I was unaffected by a shock that should have killed fifty grown men. It's where I got a bit of my daredevilry."
"But were you, like, born this way?" Anna asked.
"I don't know. If I was, I can't remember it. I just knew I couldn't let anyone find out. I'm not something to be poked and prodded."
Though she could have done with a bit of poking and prodding, looking as poorly as she did. Anna had hoped a bit of rest and the light of a new day would do Jane wonders, but it only served to emphasize the extent of the blonde's injuries. One eye was swollen shut, her perfect lower lip slashed, and a knot the size of a grapefruit protruded from the back of her skull. Anna had fashioned another ice pack from a baggie and an old rag, and propped Jane's head on it, unsure and unpracticed in abrasion treatment. It was certainly a change from the conwomanesque exploitation of every apparent weakness.
Anna redirected her gaze to the breezy front garden, the gravel drive leading back into town. She had felt too awake to rest when Jane did, circadian rhythms kicking in as the sun rose and the morning smiled. Anna had taken the nondescript sedan in the garage down the four-lane to the nearest Walmart and stocked up, food, first-aid, the works, a special trip to the five-dollar DVD bin to commence Jane's cinematic education. That is, if the woman wanted to stay.
She invited me. She wants to stay with me, right?
Well, she was going nowhere that morning if Anna had anything to say about it. Seeing her in that bright robe, light cotton and happy flowers… it was a graphic contrast to her marred exterior. Anna followed the v of the robe down discreetly as she could, blue-black discolorations diving between Jane's breasts and likely blanketing her abdomen.
Like snow cones will make up for that.
And, as she was wont to do, Anna questioned. She had to ask, had to know, just what made Jane so special. Anna could have slapped herself for not seeing it before: the skittish physicality, the inquisitive glances, the unconventional repartee. It was all testament to Jane's isolation, how an abandoned child would act if she had removed herself from the world for an age. And then, due to Anna's stubborn persistence, Jane had taken a step into that world, and look at what transpired:
It beat her down because she was different.
Okay, technically, none of this was her fault. It was Hans's, or simply a lapse in everyone's personal judgment. Biting off more than they could chew was understatement; more like taking on a job none of them could swallow without choking, gagging, and then upchucking. But Anna couldn't help but feel like that obligatory reciprocity Jane had once mentioned was indeed the pachyderm in the room. There was a link too mysterious to vocalize between the two women, and Anna thought the subject best left for another time. Another time when Jane wasn't looking so broken and exhausted on her bay window cushion, staring out over the grounds with a wistful melancholy.
"I'm an orphan too, you know," Anna tried, returning to the conversation.
"I'm sorry. There are far too many of us."
Anna's shoulders jumped and slumped in reply. "I grew up here. Well, not here here, but in New Orleans. Learned Creole French and everything, down near the railway station. Foster care for four years until my foster mom died."
"You're eighteen?"
"Almost nineteen," Anna said proudly.
"So… you were there for Katrina?"
"That's when I left," Anna said, thinking back to her childhood by the rail yard. "It was awful, and I was in the lower quarters at the time. When the water started climbing, I just ran. Threw myself on one of the cargo trains heading north and rode the storm out."
"Quite literally."
"Yes. I don't remember much, I was still so young. Seven, eight maybe? I left before it really hit, that first downpour had me spooked. I was never one for storms."
"You were too young."
"We're always too young," Anna said. "But I made an okay living on the trains. I was a good hobo and a better liar. I could cry on cue and beg for a mommy I never had when someone found me where I shouldn't be. Several crocodile tears and an ice cream cone later, I'd slip off into a crowd before anyone could call social services."
Jane waited for more.
"Ended up in San Antonio, picked up Spanish," Anna said. "I was quite the little Renaissance woman at that time. With a few languages under my belt and a motor mouth, I managed on the streets. I imagine it would have been harder if I had gone north. The winters aren't as forgiving.
"I stole my first painting in Texas," Anna said fondly. "I still have it. Now I know that it's the simplest, most unsophisticated landscape that I own. But something about the stillness drew me to it. How everything in a picture could be perfect when the real world was so… turbulent. Just a moment of forever, right there on canvas."
"That's nice. Is that why you like art so much?" Jane asked.
"Well…" Anna paused. She had never told anyone this. No one knew her, not really. Despite her babbling, her amiability, her constant presence in the social sphere, no one knew her.
I'm just as isolated as she is.
"I only stole happy scenes, at first. The Romantics, lovers lying in wild flower fields, families at the hearth, duos dancing."
"Pictures where people were… with others?" Jane asked.
Anna nodded. "They weren't quite so… so lonely. I never had that. That… constancy. Forgive me, but I was drawn to them," Anna chuckled. "I talked to them, like an idiot. Because, what were they doing right that I wasn't, you know? Even the portraits, the singulars, they at least had a relationship with the artist. They were alone, but never lonely. There was someone out there who cared enough about their muse to immortalize them on a canvas, sign their name to them, claim them. And then, because I'm a sympathetic at heart, I started looking for the lonely people. Though there are few in paintings, if you look really hard. Even subjects in anguish, are in anguish because of others. Theirs is a suffering at the hands of another, not of… abandonment. Implicit in completed works is an attentive act, by the viewer, by the artist. Take Vermeer, for instance. He does these great things with light, but on such mundane subjects. Like the woman at the window, just sitting by herself. But she's writing a letter, and that letter has to be to someone… God, I'm rambling…"
"No, I… I get it. It's not just the paintings themselves, but what they represent."
"Yeah, company."
"More like the fact that you never had it," Jane said. Blunt, but not harsh. "You are empathetic, your nature is much too caring for all this. You—" Jane's eyes trailed her form, lingering briefly over her chest, where she had shocked the life back into her. "You feel things so acutely, so keenly. How aren't you broken yet?"
Anna's head thudded against the window frame and her eyes slid shut. The entire conversation, revelation, interrogation, was dredging up the last forty-eight hours of inconstant sleep. Too deep, too much, like water-logged lungs and rejolted hearts.
"You don't… have to answer that," Jane said, rolling her hands together over her tucked knees.
Anna took a deep breath and continued.
"And so an art thief was born. More trains, and a lot of time spent in museums. I even ventured into libraries."
Jane gave her a dubious look. Well, as dubious as one could give with a blackened eye.
"I can be quiet when I have to," Anna defended. "I'd sneak into movie theaters, because, well, it's dark. And cool. And Texas was hot. So hot! I was eleven when I made it to Los Angeles. I'd done… two stints in juvie at that point? Petty theft, and a release to another foster family that I'd leave after a day or two. Hans caught me stealing a rather nice watercolor from a local artist in a Pasadena gallery at twelve. Trained me for a year or so, then turned me loose on Europe at fourteen. I pulled a few jobs with him and his brothers in Hamburg and Düsseldorf, because they needed a girl. More trustworthy, or innocent, or some bullshit like that," Anna sighed. "I added German to the list, stole a few paintings, started hording cash like a dragon. After spending so much time with Hans and his family, I knew how to fake documents. Build aliases. Set up a few offshore accounts linked back to phantom emails and disposable cell phones. After several solo jobs, I bought my first place at fifteen. This place."
"It's beautiful, A."
"Thank you. Decorated it myself."
"But where are all of your paintings?"
"I have a warehouse in New York. The weather down here is awful for the canvases. Wet air, heat upwards of a hundred degrees come the thick of summer. The oppressive kind, that weighs down on your skin. Plus, I'm not here long enough to chase the moths away."
"Well, I still like it, despite the blank walls. Or maybe because of them. It's… peaceful."
"Not a bad place, that's for sure," Anna said. "Thought about naming it Belle Reve, but that's a little too on-the-nose, don't you think?"
"Belle Reve? Beautiful… what?"
"French, for 'beautiful dream'. From Streetcar Named Desire? No?"
"I'm afraid I don't know it."
Anna brightened at her admission. "I had a feeling you wouldn't. I know not to yell 'Stellaaaaaaa!' at you if you're perched on a balcony."
Anna bounced into the kitchen and knocked a bag to the floor in her haste. Double-checking to make sure there were no eggs or glass in the bag, Anna left it on the floor and rifled through the rest, hummling as she found just the sack she was looking for. She marched back into the living room and faced a quizzical Jane, who had not left her position at the window seat.
God, even battered beyond recognition there's just something about her…
"I've got a present for you!"
"What? For me?" Jane asked.
"As promised," Anna said, hand disappearing down into the bag and pulling out a plastic case. "One forty-fifth anniversary edition of The Sound of Music, complete with commentary from Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer. Not that we have to watch the commentary, because we've got quite a pile to get through."
Anna upended the bag at the end of Jane's white feet, DVD cases spilling out and overflowing to the walnut floorboards below.
"I thought you might say 'no' to the hospital, but I know you need to rest and recoup for a while. And movies help pass the boredom… Let's see, they always have a copy of Steel Magnolias in Natchitoches, they filmed that one here. Then I picked up this combo pack of Singin' in the Rain and The Wizard of Oz because, hello, classics! Casablanca's on my Netflix queue, which is arguably the greatest movie ever made. Then, a complete one-eighty from the classics and movie musicals, I picked up all three season of Game of Thrones, 'cause I haven't gotten around to those y— what, what's wrong?"
Jane was crying. And not stoic, I-lost-your-seventy-five-million-and-I'm-mad-at-Hans crying, but ugly, snotty, forehead wrinkling weeping.
"The reviews for Game of Thrones weren't that bad," Anna said, flabbergasted. She moved to slide the mountain of DVDs back into the Walmart sack. "I'll take them back, we'll find something else to watch."
Anna was never one to watch someone suffer. That's why she tended to leave before things turned hairy. But this time, leaving was nonoptional.
She used her talents and read the woman's body position: Terse lips. Tight jaw. Crossed arms. Shiny eyes. Body language reveal: wounded animal. Frightened, apprehensive, on edge, and despairing because of it. So Anna did what came natural. She shifted on the window seat and gathered the blonde up in her arms, petting and shhing while she let her companion work out whatever it was that was zapping through her electric mind. The robe-clad woman clutched at Anna's t-shirt, sniffling and crying sloppy salt water onto her shoulder. Anna's abs tightened as Jane clutched the fabric over her stomach, hands shaking.
"Hey, c'mon," Anna whispered. "It's… whatever it is, I'm sure it's fine." She wanted to stroke her head, but feared aggravating the knot on the back of Jane's skull. Her hair was still cool from the ice compress, which had dropped from Jane's grasp and was now leaking. Staining a peach pillow burnt orange.
She let herself focus on the leaking plastic bag, unsure of how to respond to Jane.
I never know how to respond to Jane.
While Anna watched drops condensate against clear plastic, the white curtains blew into her face. She was chilled, Jane's tears coupled with the scant breeze constricting and limiting a once free-flowing warmth. Like Jane was leeching it from her body, and the wind was helping. Like she was the only thing sustaining the crying woman in her arms.
Which got her thinking…
"Shit, you must be famished!" Anna said softly. Her fingers migrated snail-like over Jane's vertebrae, Anna still fearing any pressure would send her curling into the fetal position. "I had some breakfast earlier. If you call freezer-burned Eggos breakfast. But we've got plenty now. Whatever you want. Or we can order pizza, I've got like, ten thousand in petty cash around here, might as well use it—"
Jane mumbled something into her shirt.
"Didn't quite catch that."
Jane sniffled loudly and squeezed the eye closed that wasn't already swollen shut.
"You're supposed to hate me."
"What?!" Anna sputtered, eyebrows knit together like a tea cosy.
Sweetheart, I am flirting the wrong way if you think I hate you—
"I nearly killed you, A."
"Yeah, so? You saved me, too. You didn't mean to."
"But I just told you… I'm dangerous."
"So am I."
"No, you're… you're not dangerous. Not really, you're… too good."
Anna snorted. "C'mon, you know better than that."
"No! Really, you're too good to be around me, A. You saw what I did to those men and you still… you came after me."
"Well, of course I did!"
"But why?"
Oh fuck… why? Why? Even I don't know that! It's more than infatuation, this is too deliberate. I can't know enough about you, you're entrancing, enigmatic, electric… okay, maybe not that one.
"I don't really know myself. Other than I couldn't let you leave like that. I feel like I left someone once…" Anna's memories were hazy, a significance clouded by experience and time. No cloudy problem of the past could compare to the fragmented riddle in her arms. Her focus returned to Jane. "And you took a blow for me, if I recall correctly."
The rest of her body prickled goose bumps, but the skin on her chest began to burn. Sear. Scorch. Anna would investigate later.
"We're liabilities to each other. People like us shouldn't have friends. Shouldn't be friends. Look at what Hans did to you, and you've known him for years!" Jane's tear tracks turned her face shiny and blotchy. Bruises on her cheek bones. Slashes on her skin.
Imperfection had never been gorgeous to Anna before.
"Don't worry about that. We'll fix this thing… later," Anna rubbed Jane's shoulder.
Together?
"We have a house, food, and too much time on our hands. Now…" Anna's voice dropped as she pushed Jane off of her, wiping her tears gently with the pads of her thumbs. "I have a deeply personal question to ask you…"
Jane's good eye widened in anticipation.
"Do you like bell peppers on your pizza?"
Jane's sad shell cracked and she joined Anna's giggling, the former continuing her self-medicating as the latter darted about, unpacking groceries while dialing the nearest pizza place, pepperoni and extra bell peppers, please.
"Well, that makes all the sense in the world now!" Jane said.
Anna paused the DVD. If watching a movie made Anna feel nice, watching Jane watch a movie turned her giddy. Observing the introvert as the sweeping shots of the Alps and the nunnery and the Captain's mansion trotted across the screen was an exercise in restraint; Anna so desperately wanted to supplement the experience with insider information and behind-the-scenes tidbits. But she knew that would interrupt the overall narrative, and letting Jane form her own opinions of The Sound of Music uninfluenced by Anna was one of the hallmarks of cinema. It was like she was taking Jane's viewing virginity, not that that's weird.
Or creepy.
Or inappropriate in a movie about nuns.
"Do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti. The basic scale," Anna smiled proudly.
"With nonsense syllables to replace lettered notes. What was the point of that exactly?"
"To teach the neglected children to sing! On a mountain!"
Alright, scratch that. She obviously has zero taste in movies.
"We're not even halfway through with it yet," Anna said, redirecting her attention to the blonde. She was lying prone on the couch, towel draped over the cushions, and head turned toward the television while an ice baggie rested precariously on the back of her head. Several gallon bags of ice had been placed along the length of her spine by Anna ("No, I don't mind, just lay down, the movie's starting!") to treat the largest bruises. Anna held Jane's feet in her lap so she could police the ice bags and reset them should they slip out of place.
At least that's what I told her.
There were only two substantial contusions on the front of Jane's torso, but one was the origin of her bruised/and/or/broken rib that the woman refused to have checked out by a medical professional ("I can make you an alias, photoshop you an I.D." "No thanks, A. I'm fine." "Everyone is confused about their insurance now anyway if that's what you're worried about!" "I don't like hospitals." "Okay, Jane.").
Ice Queen with electric powers and stubborn as a damn mule.
"Do you want to watch something else?" Anna asked, fearing the answer.
This can make or break our potential relationship, I fuckin' swear, what will we sing to our future children if you don't like the goat song—
"No, I like it. The songs are nice, and I'm sure the plot will pick up soon."
"Sure. You want anymore pizza?"
"The beating didn't kill me, but more pizza certainly will. I'm stuffed."
"I'd kill for something sweet… I think I want some—"
"Too bad we don't have any—"
"Chocolate," they said, synchronized.
Anna's eyes brightened and she leaned over the couch, her left cheek resting awkwardly on her knee as she peered down toward Jane.
Alright, just avoid the fact that she finished your sentence and that her ankle is sort of in your cleavage—
"You like chocolate?" Anna asked.
"I need to tell you something deeply personal," Jane said, mimicking Anna's tone from earlier. "I love chocolate. There's this one shop, in Neuchâtel, I've singlehandedly dismantled an entire display before."
"Singlehandedly?" Anna teased.
"Well, singlemouth— singletongue— there's no good way to say that."
Anna was too busy picturing Jane's tongue wrapped around a wad of nouget to hear her question.
"So do you want some?"
"Um hmmmm…"
"Well, go get it. I'm incapacitated," Jane teased.
"Wait, what?" Anna said. "Oh, chocolate!"
"Yes…" Jane continued. "Chocolate. Are you well? You forgot yourself, for a moment."
That happens when you start talking about your KISS length tongue dismantling things.
"I can pick some up from the store tomorrow," Anna said.
"Great! And can you spring for the imports? Domestic's good, but there's something about the Swiss…"
"They don't usually carry those is small town shopping centers. But there are several chocolatiers in New Orleans, one in Shreveport, too, if I remember correctly. We'll make a day trip out of it, when you're feeling up to it."
"I'd like that," Jane replied. "Can we finish the movie?"
"Yeah."
Fifteen minutes later
"How many canoes have you fallen out of attempting to recreate that scene?" Jane asked.
"For your information— two," Anna confessed.
After the movie concluded, Anna was thrilled to discover Jane approved. Goat song and all. They removed the ice bags, and Anna offered Jane an arm as the two lumbered up the stairs. It was only eight o'clock, but they were dog tired.
"A?"
"Hmm?"
"Did you say you were going to the store tomorrow?"
"Yeah, did you need something?" Anna asked, jumping excitedly at the prospect of actually helping. Any and all aid she had attempted to provide was met with shrugs and disavowals, cajoles and soft 'I got it's' that made her feel useless.
"Could you pick me up a needle and thread?" Jane requested.
"I have needle and thread. Do you plan on making some clothes out of the curtains?"
"No, I'm not quite that domestic. I just, well, it would be easier if I made you a list…"
She followed Jane into the room and fetched her pen and paper, doing her best to look skyward as Jane sat in some discombobulated version of Indian style, writing on her knee until Anna brought her a magazine to rest her paper on. As if the idea had never occurred to her. Her handwriting was a child's scrawl, imperfect and disproportionate.
"I type a lot…"
"Sure…" Anna joked. Though it occurred to her that Jane hadn't had any type of schooling. She was a genius, but the simple task of writing never made life's curriculum, pen and paper discarded for screen and keys.
The list Jane handed over belonged to a serial killer. Anna was certain of it.
Copper wire spool.
Gloves. Size child's large or adult x-small. Preferably with grip.
Pliers.
Needle and thread.
Soldering iron (or welding device, if not easily accessible).
Tablet or laptop (I'll pay you back later). I need to find out where the nearest empty field is, and you don't have a computer here.
"What the— are you going to kill me in my sleep? 'Cause I can save you the trouble and let you know I usually have a night cap you can drug me with. And you can dump me in the lake instead of burying me in a field, for fuck's sake."
"What?! No, I'm making gloves," Jane protested.
"Then why am I buying gloves?"
"They help with the…" she rubbed her fingers together and nearly set the quilt on fire. "Shit shit shit!" She pounced on the singed fabric, yelping and clutching her torso as she moved.
"Hey! Quilts are replaceable. Chill out," Anna said, smothering the spark. "And take a handful more of these," Anna directed, a clacking bottle of aspirin thrown at Jane's lap. "I'll pick up your serial killer kit tomorrow, but right now, I'm going to go and pass out. Here's hoping I remember to brush my teeth."
"You better, your breath smells worse than Kristoff and Sven."
"They are smelly aren't they? I thought it was just them being men."
"No excuse. They should shower."
Anna sniffed under her arm. "So should I. G'night Jane."
"Goodnight, A."
See you in my dreams. Hopefully nude. With tongues and chocolates. And— Fuck. When did that wall move there?
Updates are fun because writing is fun and you guys are fun. Answered questions are fun, but mysteries are as well. Know what else is fun? Reviews. Just sayin'. Upwards of 200 follows right now, and I'm blown away like Dorothy. Thanks, guys.