Chapter twenty
The first step
Anna was handling car trips better these days. Though she didn't consciously register it, her shoulders no longer instinctively tensed while she was in the car, nor did a sense of dread hang over her when they were on the interstate. Sometimes, a simple return to the norm was progress enough.
A chill wind battered the car as they drove up to the skating rink. Anna opened the passenger door and got a full blast of it, which promptly blew the door shut again. "Whoo, that's nippy," she said. "Maybe we should've gone for some ice skating instead, eh Elsa?" She looked over at Elsa.
For a second, she received no reply at all. Ella was staring straight ahead, white knuckles still gripping the wheel and breathing in a carefully controlled manner. She registered Anna's words eventually and glanced over at her. "Haha, yeah," she said, her tone the vocal equivalent of a high tension wire, and then looked forward again.
"Hey, hey, take it easy," Anna said gently. She reached over and squeezed Elsa's hand. Elsa seemed to respond well to this, so she stroked her hand with her thumb, gradually loosening her grip on the wheel. "This is a big moment for you, I know," she said.
Elsa chuckled. "You could say that, yeah. First real date ever."
With your sister, least we forget. You're dating your fucking-
"Don't think of it like that," Anna said, perhaps sensing the beginnings of a spiral. "You've been on two dates before, remember. The relationship didn't work out, but they still count. And you've hung out with me before. Now you're just…doing both at once, is all."
"Gee, you make it sound so simple," Elsa said.
"Simple is good," Anna said. "We're here to skate, not have an existential crisis."
"Well, you know how I like to multitask," Elsa said. She was, at least, smiling now.
Anna laughed. "Come on, you dork, let's go," she said, opening the door again and hopping out of the car. Elsa considered quibbling further, but she knew it wouldn't achieve anything. Besides, she wasn't feeling nearly as stressed as she had been a moment prior, so Anna must've said something right.
Like she said, it's a hangout with Anna, just with a little extra modifier on the top. A hangout plus, you could say.
That still didn't sound great, but it was better than nothing. After a deep breath to steady herself, she opened the door and got out.
"Well, hey there, stranger, good to see you again!" Anna said as they met up at the front of the car. "Did you make it here okay? How was traffic?"
Elsa had a moment of confusion, but then caught on to the bit. "It was terrible," she said. "Just like that joke."
"Aw, dang it," Anna said good-naturedly. "Well, the date's only just started. I'll get you eventually."
She extended her hand for Elsa to take. Then, remembering what they had discussed before arriving, she jerked it back, then waved it at the door, awkwardly attempting to pass the whole thing off as an elaborate gesture. "Uh, shall we go, then?"
Elsa nodded reassuringly. "Yes, let's shall," she said. The two stepped up to the building, and entered the double doors.
It was busier than either of them had expected for a weekday. Most of the people there were teenagers, either staggering around the rink or leaning against the wall. There were also a fair number of kids sliding around, much more willing to faceplant and get right back up than their parents standing nearby, decidedly wearing normal shoes.
Anna scanned the place quickly, while Elsa performed a more thorough examination. Both arrived at the same conclusion. "See, told you," Anna said. "Nobody here who'd recognize us." She extended her hand once again.
Elsa reached for it, but hesitated. "That we can see," she said. "Someone we know might be in the bathroom and come out later."
"Our luck ain't that bad, honey," Anna said. "Come on, there's nobody even in our age group here, it'll be fine."
"…You're right," Elsa said. At last, she took Anna's hand. The endorphin rush came to her once again, and her first few steps into the rink were light and bubbly. It didn't take long for her nerves to get to her once again, though, and her eyes began to dart around the room.
Anna felt her tense up again. "There's still something bothering you," she said, patient yet confident.
"Yeah, but it's…it's stupid, really stupid," Elsa said, waving her hand dismissively.
"It probably is," Anna said. "But you're still gonna tell me, or else you'll have two things bothering you."
Elsa sighed, her shoulders sagging in defeat already. "I've gotta figure out a way to fend you off one of these days."
"I'm sure you will," Anna said, a touch smugly. "For now, though, out with it."
Elsa inhaled. "I mean…we still look like sisters, don't we?" she said quietly. She gestured back and forth between her face and Anna's. "It wouldn't be hard for someone to figure it out." Her eyes darted around the room again, suggesting that by 'someone', she meant 'anyone', and it wasn't far from there to 'everyone'.
Anna folded her arms. "All right," she said. "If we walk up to the counter and Columbo's waiting behind it, I'll admit you have a point. Until then, just trust me: nobody cares. Not really." She swept her hand around the room. "Everyone here has their own shit to deal with. Nobody's on the prowl for a pair of incestuous sisters."
"You say that now," Elsa said. "But what if someone starts staring at us?"
"Then we stare right back at them," Anna said immediately. "Make it weird, make 'em regret it."
Elsa burst out laughing. This, of course, did draw the attention of a few other people, but they swiftly turned back to their own business and resumed not caring about the two of them.
Anna beamed. "See?" she said. She took Elsa's hand again, this time intertwining their fingers together. "I told you I'd get you eventually."
They walked to the counter without fear.
Dear everyone else in this rink: I apologize for any passing judgment I might have made about your skating ability before I put these things on.
This thought played on loop in Elsa's head as she stood with her back flattened against the far wall, clutching the rail for dear life. Her feet were at 90 degree angles to each other, and any time one foot began to slide forward, she'd thrust it back until it smacked into her other foot. To her left, Anna was gearing up for another attempt to actually get somewhere. She pushed off the wall, slid for a few feet, then tried to take a step forward, bending her back knee 90 degrees like in the movies. This lasted for mere milliseconds, however, as she quickly lost her balance, began flailing her arms and legs, and crashed to the ground.
Elsa winced. Despite this being the fifth time this had happened, the smack Anna made as she hit the floor still sounded really painful. She slowly made her way over to her fallen sister, taking small, mincing footsteps. The first time, she'd rushed to Anna's side, and had ended up sprawled right next to her for her troubles. This time, at least, she made it without issue. "You good?" she asked.
Anna threw her head up, tossing her hair further into disarray. "Don't I look good?" she asked. She began the laborious process of awkwardly getting to her feet once more.
"You know, they say there's no education in the second kick of a mule," Elsa said. She'd learned by now not to extend a hand to try and help her up, as that would double the number of wheels in play and had been the cause of her own second faceplant.
"Ha," Anna said, getting to her hands and knees. "Well, whoever they are, clearly they've never met me." She finally got to her feet and made her way back to the wall, T-posing for balance. "How are your ankles?"
"Ailing," Elsa replied. She hurried to the wall as well, only suffering one minor heart attack as her feet slid an inch in a direction she wasn't planning on before getting three points of contact on the railing once more.
"There must be something to this we're just not getting, right?" Anna asked.
"Better," Elsa said. "We're not getting better."
"Well…that, yeah," Anna said. She gestured around the room. "Nobody else here is falling over this much, right?"
"Maybe they got it out of their system before we got here," Elsa said. "Everyone probably falls down a bunch of times at first, then they get better and stay on their feet."
Anna raised an eyebrow. "Simple as that, huh?" she asked sardonically. "They just build up an immunity to hitting the floor until eventually it pushes their faces away, like a magnet?"
"You know what I mean," Elsa said.
She looked around the room again, trying to see what everyone else was doing that they weren't. While it was true that most other people weren't hitting the floor as often as them, nobody seemed to be performing exceptionally. A few of the teen couples were tottering around the rink, but not with any specific technique worth emulating. Still, there had to be someone here who knew what they were doing, and after a while, her eyes fell upon a likely candidate.
He looked to be in his late sixties, his salt-and-pepper hair contrasting with his dark skin. He was currently lacing up his his bright red skates, which practically shone compared to the orange-brown rentals everyone else was wearing. It didn't seem unreasonable to surmise that he was the only person in the whole building – besides the employees – who had seen the inside of a skate rink before today.
Elsa didn't want to stare, but as she resumed looking around the room, she saw that she wasn't the only one who had taken notice of the new arrival. Once he had finished lacing up his shoes and stood at full height, he revealed himself to be well over six feet tall, even without the extra height the wheels provided. He passed through the crowded seating area, skating more capably across the cheap carpet than either of them had on the hardwood floor. Then he reached the rink, and within seconds, all eyes were upon him.
While others slid or stumbled, he glided effortlessly. Within seconds, he had reached a speed that terrified the two girls, yet all it took was a modest lean for him to turn the full 180 degrees and begin heading back in the other direction. As he passed the girls by, Elsa swore she felt an air current follow in his wake. Even the people who had been doing pretty well had come to a stop, staring agog at him. In mere moments, he had made everyone else on the rink look like children on an icy lake.
If the man noticed the attention of the crowd, he certainly didn't acknowledge it. His face bordered on expressionless, and he weaved around and through the other skaters as if they were traffic cones. Sometimes he mixed it up by swapping his feet or going one legged for a spell, but his sheer speed and precision were more than enough. He wasn't here to show off, he was here for himself alone.
Elsa moved to nudge Anna, but Anna nudged her first. "Look at his feet," she said. Elsa tamped down her own wonder to analyze his technique.
It wasn't even anything fancy, that was the kicker. In a vacuum, he'd appear to just be walking, albeit very slowly. He'd take a step, then glide along with the momentum he'd generated for a good few seconds. Then he took another step, then glided again. Step, glide, step, glide.
"Could it really be that simple?" Elsa mused.
"For us? Definitely not," Anna said. "But it's worth a shot. You try it first."
"Gee, thanks," Elsa said. She looked down at her feet. Just standing still, they had already begin to slide in different directions. Getting started from an immobile position seemed herculean enough. Yes, the journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step, but so does the journey of five feet and eight inches, from the wall to the floor.
Well, Anna's already fallen over way more than me, and her face doesn't look that much flatter than when we began. So I've still got some margin of error to chew through.
"Okay, here goes," Elsa said. She positioned her hands behind her back, then pushed off from the rail. With a little wobble, she was now rolling in a straight line orthogonal to the wall. Then, as her momentum began to wane, she lifted her foot and swung it forward. Her center of gravity shifted, and she awaited the inevitable next steps of tipping forward and falling on her face. Instead, her foot touched down safely, and her speed picked up again. It was pointed slightly outward, so her legs began to diverge, but she reacted quickly enough and lifted her other foot up, repeating the process with greater consideration towards the angle this time.
It wasn't until her third full step that her brain began to process her victory. The threat of collapse was still present, but so far she was doing a fantastic job. Already she'd covered half the depth of the rink. Literally all she'd required was the tiniest bit of guidance to go from entirely stationary to this.
The next wave of panic came as she approached the far wall, threatening the circuit of other skaters as they circled the rink. Here, though, Lady Luck deigned to smile upon her, and the crowd seemed to thin just as she made it to the other side. With both hands outstretched, she grabbed the rail, then more or less collapsed forward for the final three feet. She took a moment to catch her breath. Her breathing slowed, but her heart rate stayed high, elevated by what felt like gallons of adrenaline coursing through her.
I did it. I really did it!
It seemed silly, to be this excited about surmounting an obstacle that held absolutely no bearing on any aspect of her life outside of this rink. Yet somehow, this microvictory was swelling her with pride, as if the distance she'd covered could be measured in dozens of miles rather than feet. Though the obstacle was meaningless and arbitrary, the victory felt like anything but.
She turned around slowly and gazed back across the rink. Anna was applauding wildly, a broad grin on her face. Though the sound was drowned out by the music, the sight still warmed Elsa to the core. She raised her arms in victory, only to quickly jerk them back down to the rail as she began to slip. Anna giggled, another sound Elsa cursed her inadequate ears for missing. She raised one arm this time and beckoned Anna to follow her.
Anna obliged, launching herself from the wall. Her face was an open book, conveying her own version of the journey Elsa had gone through not a minute ago as plainly as if thought bubbles had erupted from her skull. From the initial panic of 'shit, I should've gone over this a couple more times', to the focus of 'no turning back now, just gotta do it', to the rhythm of 'left foot, right foot', to the shock of 'oh my god, I really thought I'd have fallen over by now', to the elation of 'I've almost made it!' Elsa raised her arms to catch her, then lowered them quickly when it became clear that Anna wouldn't be landing anywhere near her.
Anna didn't pay nearly as much attention to the other skaters as Elsa had, but they certainly had enough time to see her coming and steer clear. Anna's path veered to the left significantly, terminating maybe five feet away from Elsa's own landing site. Yet land she did, grabbing the rail and nearly faceplanting against the wall this time. Elsa closed the distance, using what she'd learned in smaller motions to better control her movement. Once she was within arm's length, she clapped Anna on the back. "You did it!" she said jubilantly.
Anna turned to face her, cheeks flushed. "We did it," she corrected.
Elsa took her hand, partially for stability and partially for the other reason. "We sure did," she said. "Want to try going the way we're supposed to this time?"
Anna looked up at the slowly revolving crowd, a great many of whom had also been emboldened by witnessing the old man at work. "Think so, yeah," she said. She tentatively began to go with the flow, one hand on the rail at all times.
Elsa followed along behind her. "I can't believe we're actually doing it," she said. "Seriously, that was great."
Anna nodded. "I'd take a bow, but I don't think I'd be able to get back up from it."
Elsa laughed. "Don't be silly," she said, patting her on the shoulder. "You always get back up."
A couple hours later, the two girls stumbled out of the rink, reacquainting themselves with the intricacies of friction-based movement. They were tired, sweaty, and more than a little bruised, but proud. It was even chiller than when they had arrived, thanks to the setting sun, but that was almost welcome now.
"Well, that was a good time," Elsa said. "Great idea, Anna."
"Thanks," Anna said. "You were really tearing it up there by the end, I can't believe how good you did."
"Well, it must've been the power of love that animated me," Elsa said. "Or maybe just the power of good pizza."
"Yeah, that was really good pizza," Anna said. "Like, better than most restaurants, I wanna say?"
Elsa shrugged. "Any pizza will taste better when it's been seasoned with the sweat and tears of a hard day's work."
Anna laughed. "That'd just be yours, then. Mine was the sweat of an hour's play."
"You still put in the work," Elsa said. "You certainly sweated out the sweat."
Anna sniffed her armpit. "Whoo, you ain't kidding," she said.
Elsa smelled herself. "I'm not smelling great right now either," she admitted. "Do you want the first shower?"
"We can both shower at the same time, remember?" Anna pointed out.
"Oh yeah," Elsa said. "I call the master bathroom."
They made it to the car. Elsa got in the driver's side, and Anna skipped to the passenger side. "Wow, still full of energy, I see," Elsa remarked.
"Yeah, guess so," Anna said.
Now that they were in the car, Elsa felt a bit bolder. She looked over at Anna, who sensed the change in her mood.
"Thank you for this, Anna. It was a good date. A great one, even," she said.
Anna smiled. "Glad to hear it, Elsa," she said. "I'm glad you got a good one under your belt."
Elsa smiled for a moment, then her face turned serious. "I want you to think about this before you answer," she said. "Do you think we should keep going with this?"
Anna thought for a while. "Yes," she said eventually. "Nothing we've done has felt wrong so far. In fact, if this is our first date, I…don't think I've ever had a better one."
"All right," Elsa said. "But remember, if you ever start to-"
"I know, I know," Anna said. "Got the eject button right in my hand, whenever I need it."
"That's right," Elsa said. "You're probably going to get sick of hearing me say it, but it's still true. I want what's best for you, Anna. Don't ever forget that."
"I won't," Anna said. Then she leaned over and kissed her. "And I love you, Elsa. Don't you ever forget that."
A goofy grin sprouted on Elsa's face. "I won't," she said. "But say it again, anyway."