CHAPTER ELEVEN

Indeed, their talk was not over. Elsa knew that, though she spent most of the day enjoying a renewed camaraderie with her sister. Sometimes, however, she wasn't quite sure what else to say to Anna; they didn't touch on the subject of her sexuality again, or on their mother. It was as if she desired to relearn how to be friends before she worried about digging into the deeper subjects.

But by the time they returned to their cabin, Elsa had grown increasingly anxious. She didn't want to admit it to Anna, who had clearly already been through enough, but part of the reason was that she had never slept in the same room as anyone who wasn't straight before. Even if that person was her sister, it still made her a lot less comfortable than she cared to admit.

And then, of course, there was the other matter. Their mother. Thinking about that more than she wished she was, she ended up fumbling her toiletry kit and spilling its contents all over the bathroom floor.

There was a second of silence before Anna knocked on the door, her concerned voice coming through on the other end. "Elsa? I heard a crash, are you alright?"

"Yes," she sighed as she scrabbled to pull all the items back toward herself and stuff them into the kit. "Just… clumsy!"

There was a brief shuffling from the other end. "Doesn't sound like you, but okay," Anna said hesitantly, before Elsa caught the sounds of her retreating footsteps back towards the beds.

She stared at herself in the mirror for a long moment. Her heart was a lot more conflicted than she wanted it to be, and there were two people who might be to blame. Three, if she counted their father. Anna had done all she could to explain, and she wasn't comfortable calling her dad after such a long time of not doing so. That left only one option.

Emerging into their cabin again, she glanced over at Anna and said, "I think I'll take a walk before I get ready for bed. Won't be gone long. Um… hold down the fort until I get back?"

Anna looked up from where she was playing with her braid on her bed. She tilted her head curiously but smiled. "Take bug spray, the mosquitos are bad tonight," she commented. "I'll stay up for you so I make sure you get back okay."

"Fine, fine," she commented as she reached for the can of bug spray on their shared dresser. "And you don't have to do that, but… well, see you."

"Have a good walk!" Anna called after her as the door closed behind Elsa.

Walking in circles around the cabin, she sprayed her arms and legs with the repellent as she tried to build up her courage. It didn't work. Finally, giving it up as hopeless, she left the can of spray on the railing around the cabin's wooden walkway as she passed yet again, then pulled out her phone and dialed.

The phone rang for several seconds that seemed like hours before finally, someone picked up on the other end. "Good evening, this is Idunn Tremblay." Her mother sounded slightly annoyed at being disturbed at such a late hour but she kept her tone pleasant otherwise.

Elsa frowned. Didn't she even check the contact info before she picked up? Still, that wasn't important at the moment. "Mama?"

"Elsa!" Idunn's voice instantly perked up. "Hello, my sweet girl, how are you?" There was the shuffling of papers that Elsa figured meant that she had just placed a book down. "You usually wait until Sunday to call, my love; is there something wrong?"

"There is. Well… I…" Now she felt stupid for throwing herself into this phone call unprepared, but she forced herself to take a breath and just speak. "I have some questions for you, and there's one I have to start with that… that I wish I didn't have to."

"Elsa? What's wrong?" Idunn's concern was clear. "Did something happen? What is this about?"

"Mother… I need to ask this, and I'm sorry that I do. But… do you promise not to lie to me?"

"Lying is a sin, Elsa," came her mother's automatic response, and Idunn became a touch irritated again at Elsa's attempts to beat around the bush. "What is it, Elsa? What do you need to ask me?"

Clearly, she didn't want it sugarcoated. So Elsa didn't try. "Have you been, in any way, preventing Anna from contacting me for the past five years?"

There was a tense silence on the other end for a moment before Idunn growled, "What nonsense is this, Elsa? Have you been talking to your father? Did he tell you that?" She let out a large sigh and said in a calmer — but no less stiff — way, "I thought I told you that he was a liar, Elsa, why would you listen to whatever he has to say? Or why would you talk to him in the first place? I told you that Anna dropped all contact with us."

"When?" Elsa pressed as the pit of her stomach began to sink. She didn't answer right away, so she insisted, "When did she drop all contact with us? Five years ago? Or one?"

"Come on, Elsa, you know this. Your father cut us off and Anna decided to do the same thing."

"Really? She didn't, oh, I don't know… just off the top of my head… continue to send letters? Presents I never received? Call asking for me, only to be told I was 'busy' every single time?!" By the end of it, a sharp tone had entered her voice that she had been trying to suppress.

"Don't you take that tone with me, Elsa Lillian," Idunn snapped on the other end, going on the defensive; however, Elsa could hear a nervous twist in her voice and could almost picture the look of unease on her face. "Where are these accusations coming from? What reason would I have to lie about your sister?"

"You aren't answering me." She paced back and forth, huffing and puffing in her mounting rage, but she forced herself to remain at least relatively calm. "You might not have been lying, but you have been hiding things, haven't you?"

Idunn let out a heavy sigh. "Fine. Yes, Anna did send you a few things… I just didn't want those things to hurt you so I hid them," she confessed. "She shut you out and I didn't want those petty apology gifts to give you false hope."

"Things like a picture of us when we were kids? In a wooden picture frame with snowflakes painted on it? That you told me you 'found' in the attic, when really, Anna had sent it just a few weeks before? Any of this jogging your memory, Mother?!"

"Yes, Elsa, I remember clearly." Idunn sounded on the brink of being angry herself. "Yes, she sent it. A few years earlier she bought you a necklace, too, but I kept it in the attic with the picture." Then she took a few calming breaths and started speaking in a softer, reassuring tone. "It was to spare you the pain, sweetheart, believe me. You would've taken the gifts as an act of compassion rather than the bribe for your affection they actually are, and I just didn't want you looking forward to one day seeing a sister who doesn't care about you anymore."

Elsa sat down heavily on the nearest cabin step, completely flabbergasted. Her mom was admitting to have deceived her, to have made up long and involved versions of the real events, all to put up a wall between her and her sweet-but-gay sister. It turned her stomach; she literally felt as if she might get sick then and there.

"Can you even tell when you're 'stretching the truth' anymore?" she finally breathed out, voice entirely void of emotion.

Idunn was quiet for only a moment after that. "Elsa… alright. Obviously, Edgar got ahold of you somehow." The way she said his name was poisonous. "Do you really want the truth? Why I won't let your sister talk to you? She… she's a sinner, Elsa!" There was genuine pain when she spat the word out. "She's turned her back on God and lay with a- well, nevermind what she did! If she truly loves you and me, she would change her ways, but she refuses to! If she had lived with us, maybe she could've been cured — or these unnatural feelings wouldn't have formed altogether, but your stubborn father took her from us and probably encouraged this sick behaviour! I- I can't condone that around you, Elsa! I refuse to lose two of my daughters to the Devil's temptations!"

"So you lied. To save me from my sinful, unnatural sister. You lied to me about everything. You…" Pushing the heel of her hand into her eye, she sobbed out, "I was so stupid! How didn't I see this?!"

Idunn's voice went back to soothing again. "I just wanted to protect you, Elsa," she cooed, trying to calm her daughter's tears. "You're such a good girl, one of His precious children, and you have such a bright future ahead of you! I don't want Anna ruining those chances. I'm sorry you had to find out from someone that wasn't me, sweetheart, but please know it was only because I love you so much."

In that moment, everything became clear to her. The words that had been on her lips, ready to be screamed into her phone — to inform her mother that she had reunited with Anna, that she resented her for what she had done… they all died away. What good would it do? The woman thought that being "pure of sin" before God was more important than family. Maybe, once upon a time, Elsa would have agreed. Not anymore.

So she chose her words carefully. "You shouldn't have lied to me," she whispered, keeping the focus on that instead of how much she missed those lost years. Instead of Anna's sadness and loneliness during that gap, halfway across Canada from her, and how fiercely protective she felt of her now. "Mother, I… I know you only wanted to protect me, but if you ever lie, stretch, or withhold the truth like this from me again… I don't think I'll be able to forgive you. That's a sin as much as any other sin. I might be your daughter, but I'm an adult now, and I deserve to know the truth. The actual truth, not a partially-altered version. Do you hear me?"

"Elsa…" Idunn said quietly, "I hear you and I will respect that, but… I hope you don't try to get back in contact with Anna. Let her go, Elsa. As much as I want my wayward daughter back, there is no hope for her if she isn't in a proper environment. So as long as Anna is with her father, you are not to have contact with her, do you understand me?"

The words "Yes, Mother," were on her lips, even though bile rose in her throat at the thought of saying them. But she couldn't get them out; she knew they would be a lie. This decision would have ramifications, but she would not be the same as her mother was. So she heard herself saying, "I told you, I'm an adult. I can make my own decisions. But I won't go running off to Winnipeg in the dead of night, no."

The disapproval with the lack of an affirmative was clear, "Fine. Now, it's getting late and you have a responsibility to be up tomorrow to watch the little ones. Go to bed now and we will talk again next week. I love you dearly, Elsa… have a good night."

"Goodnight, mother. I love you, too." Whatever her other feelings were, that still held true. She ended the call, gazing down at the phone in utter disbelief.

It was all true. Every single thing Anna had said. Reading between the lines of her mother's Christianity-influenced fear and her trying to "nuance" the chain of events, she could hear everything she wasn't saying that confirmed what Anna had told her. She really did lose her sister for half of a decade, missed her growing up, becoming a person in her own right. And all because she dated women, and their mother couldn't handle it.

Raising her weary legs, she began to trudge back toward the cabin. There were too many feelings in her heart, and they all bled into each other, mixed together in ways that confused her, made her vision blurry and her pulse thrum behind her temples. It was bad enough for her to have to deal with learning her mother was a liar and a manipulator without everything else on top of that. But she had resolved that for the time being.

Anna was bisexual. She had been batting that back and forth a lot in her mind over the past twenty-four hours, and she still didn't really understand it. She still liked men, but would rather date women? Why? What about them made her want to do that? Elsa looked at her fellow female counselors and just saw random people; they weren't appealing to her in the slightest. Not that she cared about men as much as they did, either, but she also felt no attraction to women. That had always been the most natural thing in the world to her.

Up until the past year or two, it had also made the issue of gay rights very easy for her to ignore; she didn't care. Canada being so accepting now was a non-issue, despite how vehemently opposed to that her mother had been. She thought those people were ridiculous for wanting to marry someone of the same sex, and that they would go to Hell as the Bible foretold, but overall she decided that if they didn't believe in the Bible, then it didn't much matter either way; they were still going to sin, with or without the law "approving" of it.

Now… there was Anna. Her sweet, vibrant, loving sister who seemed to still believe in God's plan, who sang the morning praise and worship songs with everyone, who could remember every verse she was expected to remember. Who embraced her so openly, even after half a decade of no responses from the sister who she had to believe was now cold, aloof, and indifferent.

Tears dripped down her cheeks when she thought of what must have happened five years ago. Anna, confessing to one simple kiss, and her mother being disgusted. Kicking her out of their lives — making that choice for all three of them. Poor, confused, newly-gay Anna, having no idea why she wasn't welcome anymore. Not having any idea that her sister missed her just as much, but was being walled off by a controlling parent without her knowledge.

How warm and inviting Anna's hugs had been! Five years of those, gone! Five years of talking, going to movies, texting about each other's dates, asking for advice… Elsa could have helped her with college applications. They could have had so much, done so much together!

Unbidden, the memory of flashlight tag came back to her. Anna's lips on hers, kissing her so deeply and completely… how could she have still been surprised after that? Only a lesbian could kiss another woman that well. Elsa felt real heat rushing through her body from it, and she doubted any of the straight girls could have sparked anything remotely close to that within her.

But she had to block that out. Nope, sister-kisses were way too weird to think about.

As she finally knocked on the door to the cabin, softly to see if Anna was still up after all, she resolved to devote some true, deep thought to a lot of those issues. How she felt about homosexuaity, and Anna being one specifically. One thing was for sure: her mother's insistences that they were "nothing but degenerates" was definitely a horrible myth. Maybe they did sin, but as the book of Romans said, "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." This one thing didn't make Anna any worse than the rest of humanity.

Anna was still awake but Elsa could tell it was just barely by the way her blinks lasted several seconds longer than normal and how her entire body was slumped heavily against her bed. However her state didn't stop the large smile from spreading across her sweet face as Elsa entered the room. "Elsie, welcome back! Have a good walk?" Her words were slightly slurred due to how tired she obviously was..

But all Elsa could do was stare down at her. This was so dangerous? This girl and her sinful nature were going to ruin her somehow? It just all seemed so ludicrous. Anna struggled to sit up and she yawned and stretched when she finally managed to succeed. Her back gave a soft pop, which caused a pleased moan to slip past her lips. Then she turned to peer up sleepily at Elsa and outstretched her arms in a clear indicator that she wanted a hug.

Elsa fell into said arms easily, embracing her tightly. Her fingers dug into Anna's back as she took several deep breaths, trying so hard not to cry, not to let everything get to her. Anna was with her now. She hadn't lost her forever, there was still time! Why should she care that her mother was a bigoted liar?

"Elsa?" Anna murmured into her ear and her arms around Elsa's waist tightened. She gently tugged on her older sister's shirt, trying to pull her down onto the bed so they could lie together, "Are you okay?"

She couldn't stop herself from letting out a bitter sob, even though what she whispered was, "Yeah."

Anna frowned at the obvious lie but she didn't comment. She simply snuggled into her, laying a few kisses on her temple and murmuring "love you"s into her hairline. All of the tiredness seemed to have drained from Anna in the wake of her sister's distress, leaving her more attentive as she unbraided and started combing her fingers through Elsa's long hair in a soothing gesture.

"Love you, too," she replied, voice high and tight. Then her emotions were spilling over the top of the dam she had tried to build, defying her attempts to conceal them. Everything was too much to keep her from weeping into Anna's shoulder.

So Anna just continued to hold her, stroking her hair with one hand while the other rubbed circles into her quivering back. Occasionally, she would whisper something into Elsa's ear; a compliment or a reassurance that was usually followed by a kiss to Elsa's cheek. It was so soothing, so affectionate, that it almost burned her to hear and feel it all. To hold that up against what her mother seemed to think of anyone like Anna. She and the church couldn't be more wrong.

To Be Continued...