WARNING: Hellooo to all you beautiful, wonderful, amazing people! Firstly, let me apologize for how disgustingly long it took me to get this chapter out, I am A Piece Of Shit, but it's okay!

I won't bore you and talk a lot before this chapter, just wanted to warn you that there will be semi/graphic descriptions of lots and lots of fire, as well as various injuries from the fire, and a kind of mental breakdown. If that's not for you than boop your cute butt right on outta here!

With love-

AJ

Chapter 5

"I am a mystery to myself." - Angelina Grimke

I saw the smoke before we even turned onto my road. The bus bumped heavily against the gravel, and I remember how big and black the cloud was, more than I had ever seen before.

"My dad must be burning our compost pile." I told my friend, Ariel. "Mom's gonna be mad." I grinned at her, my cheeks scrunching up in mischief.

And then I heard the first scream.

My head whipped around to stare at the tiny first graders in the front of the bus, all shoving over to the left, pressing their little faces against the glass.

"Wassat? That house is burnin'!"

"Who lives there?"

"It's Anna. Anna's house!"

I felt my heart drop to my feet.

No, no, no, no.

I tried to shove my way in front of the bus, my arms stabbing through the crush of children in winter coats, all pressing back and forth, trying to see the chaos. I shoved through everyone, nearly toppling over when I made it to the door. The bus driver grabbed at my jacket, gripped the hood, and I let it slide free from my body, tumbling through the partially open bus door to the snow.

"Mom!" I screamed, shooting up from the ground and sprinting toward my house. I could hear the house burning, the loud crackling sizzles sounding like music as it consumed and grew.

Smoke billowed from every window, positively pouring from any possible open crack. The heat was searing, I smelled burning hair and gasoline. My eyes teared up and my breath felt heavy and dirty. I tried relentlessly to tug my feet through the snow on the ground, but it pushed and shoved against my legs, trying to keep me back. The cold of it was confusing, my brain not understanding the difference in temperature.

"Dad! Someone, someone do something! Help me-"

A strong arm whipped around my waist, crushing me to a familiar body. I smelled lavender and peaches.

"Mom!" I wrapped my arms around her in desperation, tears positively pouring down my face. I didn't understand, I couldn't breathe. I didn't know how it was possible for my mother to feel cold to me. "Mom, where's dad? We have to-"

"Gone, Anna."

I gawked, ripping my arms from around her and backing up a full step. Her voice scared me, she sounded like a corpse. Like she didn't recognize me. Her hair was burnt and blackened, the skin around her neck and arms searing to a tight pinkish red. Her clothes were charred, and her make-up smeared, like she had been crying.

"M-Mom?"

"Gone, gone, gone, gon-"

And then she was tackled to the ground with the force of a bull, a massive police officer pinning her arms behind her back.

I lunged at him, my little fists flying in a rage, before one of the others caught me around the waist and yanked me away.

Away from the smoke, away from my home, away from my parents.

"Mom!" I screamed, flailing as hard as I could, fighting with all the desperation that an eleven year old can contain, my body withering in protest. And my mother stared at me with her dead eyes and cold body, her sooty face and blackened hands, and cried.

"The Kolai, Anna!" She shrieked and rolled on the ground, her motions so violent she almost shook from from the officers grip, while his partner pulled me steadily farther and farther from the scene. She sounded rabid, I saw spit fly from her mouth as she twitched and screamed, her eyes wide and bulging."The Kolai! You are an Arendelle! Remember!"

"Mom!" I shrieked and fought harder, my left wrist nearly snapping in the officers grip with the frenzy of my panic. I couldn't breathe, I could barely see through the smoke. The crackling pop of my home burning to cinders sung in my ears, in my blood. "Let me go!"

"Let me GO!"

"Anna! Anna, wake up!"

My eyes snapped open, the still present darkness making me feel blind with it's intensity. I shook, all the muscles in my body tense and trembling. I was sweating, my breathing erratic.

Above me, a blue eyes darted around in worry, barely illuminated by a lamp in the far corner, crossing every feature of my face three times before returning to meet my gaze. "You okay?"

I tired to calm my breathing from the desperate gasps that wanted to return. Elsa held onto my shoulder lightly and helped me sit up on the bed. "I'm fine. Just- a nightmare, I guess."

"Anna, you talk in your sleep. I've told you this a hundred times. I know what you were dreaming about."

I just glared at her.

"How long has it been since you've seen her?"

"Over a year, now. Why?"

"Don't you think you should-"

"No. I don't." I thought about the last time I had been to the institute. The white washed walls, the sterile, burning smell of everything, my mother's dark room with her drawn curtains and dead flowers. The way that she never looked at me, like I was painful to her."That place is depressing."

She's depressing.

It was quiet for a moment. I studied the room around us.

Elsa had moved us from the Wolf's apartment not even twenty minutes after I agreed to go. She and Kristoff had their things packed and out the door before I was even done getting dressed. We didn't take the car Kristoff had driven me in the first time, instead opting for an old, beat up van that was parked around the back of the building, and I assumed was a maintenance van when I first saw it.

"She's not pretty." Elsa had mumbled, but her eyes gazed at the ugly gray blob of a vehicle with affection. "The building manager almost didn't let us park her here. We had to convince him it was for work reasons."

The van actually only had two seats, meaning that I, to the great amusement of the twins, had the sit in the cavernous back half, and try to balance myself around any turn or curve we met. I was ridiculously unsuccessful, and about half way through the ride Elsa got tired of laughing at me, and offered to switch seats.

We drove for a very long time, until we were completely out of the actual city, and right on the edge of the massive Nothing that spans on as far as the eye can see.

We pulled up at an old, low navy building that jutted from the ground as if it had grown their all on it's own. There were no windows, and no apparent door, either. The building sat at the very edge of a small tree line and was surrounded by barbed wire and lots of tall grass. If anything, it looked abandoned, and incredibly out of place.

"Um..."

"Home sweet home." Elsa grinned at me, and grabbed my bag from where it sat on the ground, tossing it over her shoulder and walking toward the building.

I blushed. "Els, I can carry that!"

Elsa had shown me a secret door that was partially hidden against the walls, that you could only see if you knew what to look for. She had slid it open with a small remote from her pocket, and I was met by a cold, sterile smell.

The inside of the building had been nothing like I expected. It looked kind of like a laboratory from the movies where scientists make things blow up. There were large florescent lights that swung from chains all along the ceiling; their buzz an ever-present sound throughout every corner of the room. Which is the next thing, it was just one large room. There was a sectioned off area for the bathroom, but other than that, it was like a massive white box. There was a pathetically small back corner that was, apparently, supposed to be the kitchen area. Two mattresses rested on the floor, pressed against the far wall, and spaced evenly apart. Other than that, there was not a single disruption to the sterile white of the room. It made me feel examined, like a germ under a microscope, and I immediately decided that I hated it here. I didn't think I had ever seen a place so bare of any life.

It took next to no time to get settled in. We didn't have much to unpack, and Elsa and Kristoff continuously reminded me that we would not be staying her long. Each time they mentioned it a physical pain prickled in the center of my chest. Never seeing my apartment, or Olaf, or my boss, or the bookstore again made it almost impossible to breathe. But I understood what had to happen, and I would stick by my word. There was no other option, it was leave or die.

There was moment of awkwardness that was so overwhelming I wanted to throw my head against the wall, when Kristoff pointed out that there were only two bed, with way too much mischief in his tone. Elsa's face was slightly pink, but nothing close to mine, when she shrugged it off, and said that she and Kristoff would be sleeping in shifts to keep watch anyway, so it wouldn't be a problem.

He had glared at her, she shot back a look I didn't quite understand.

Which is how I found myself, finally having caught my breath back, with Elsa still leaning over me, on an uncomfortable bed in the middle of the night, while Kristoff snored contentedly a few feet away.

She still stared at me, all cute and concerned, and I sighed.

"Els, there's-" I hesitated, biting at my bottom lip. I wasn't sure if I wanted an answer to my question. "There really can't be any way that I'm- that I could be an Arendelle. R-right?"

Elsa blinked in shock and scooted a few inches closer to me, not helping with the whole thinking thing. There was a certain calm intimacy to talking to a person at night, in heavy whispers, that kept a constant stream of nerves gliding over my skin, the palms of my hands, the tips of my fingers. I wished to touch something, my hands twitched with the intent to do so. I shivered under the cold air against my bare shoulder blades, the tank top providing no protection.

"No, it's impossible. Why do you ask?"

I looked away, at the polished white floor. Elsa huffed in frustration. She always used to tell me that it upset her when I didn't look at her when I had something to say, that she liked being able to see the expression on my face. I hadn't really understood it, still really don't, but I liked to make her happy. I darted my eyes back to her own and was rewarded with a small grin. "I think I remember something."

Elsa's grin dropped quickly. "What do you mean?"

"I- I think it had something to do with my mom. I don't know, it's probably just in my head because we were talking about it earlier. I had a dream about the fire, but that's not strange, I dream about it a lot." Elsa's eyebrows drew up in concern, and she laid a heavy hand against my knee where the blanket covered it. I really was going to have to have a talk with her about touching me so much if she didn't want me to jump her without warning. This new, overly affectionate Elsa was incredibly difficult to get used to, and I wasn't prepared to have to exercise so much self control. "This time was different though. I made it to my house. Usually it cuts off before the part where I get all the way there and mom grabs me. I never dream that far into it without waking up..."

There was a part of me, growing and insistent, that absolutely did not want to tell Elsa what I had dreamed about. I didn't understand it. I hate lying, I suck at it, I hardly ever have the urge to do it, and here I was at the cusp of finding out something major and my entire brain rebelled against revealing it. An instinct nagged at the tail end of my thoughts, whispering that something bad would happen, that I needed to keep my mouth shut for the sake of everyone.

I looked at Elsa, and the way her eyes were softened in the near-dark glow, the way her fingers lingered against my knee. I thought about her frantic, untameable panic at the mention of the Rayalti, and the Kolai, and them being after me for any reason. Elsa had taken comfort in the fact there was no actual heat behind any of their accusations. It had calmed her to believe that there was no way I could ever be an Arendelle, or related to any kind of spirit in any way, and that she could write the Kolai's hunt off as being wild and absolutely ridiculous. The more she could rationally distance me from the situation, the easier she slept.

There was a small part of me that thought Elsa might actually consider trying to reason with them, if it came down to it.

Which, according to both Elsa and Kristoff, would not work at all. The Kolai was a kill first, ask questions later, kind of organization. The twins couldn't so much as walk in the room without being shot at.

But Elsa, in her desperation to stop this, was willing to try.

"And it was just freaking me out." I smiled at her, and calmed a little when I saw some of the tension in her shoulders release. I promptly convinced myself that it had just been a strange interpretation of my fears, that my memory was just warped due to stress and fear. That had to be it, it was just me and my brain being overly dramatic. "Once I got that far into the dream it kind of morphed and I guess my brain started thinking about the Kolai and the Arendelle's and just fed into my nightmare. I was just worried about it before I was actually awake. It's no big deal."

Elsa still looked concerned, but nothing like she had when I had first mentioned Arendelle. Her hand started tracing up and down my leg, I guess in an attempt to be soothing, but actually doing the exact opposite. It was over the blanket, but even the impression of her cool touch gliding over my skin prickled goosebumps up and down my arms.

"Anna, I'm..." She hesitated, her hand pausing about midway down my calf. It rested there, shooting heat up and down the limb in shocks. If Elsa knew what she was doing there was no indication of it. "I want you to know how sorry I am for all of this. I- we never meant to pull you into this life, we tried so hard to keep you separated from it, and it didn't even do any good in the end. They're still after you. And it's my fault. I exposed you to this."

She looked up to meet my eyes, the darkness softening every single line of her face. "I never wanted you to have to be scared."

"Els, it's okay." She shook her head, but I glared and grabbed her hand, her fingers tangling with mine on impulse. "It is. I promise. None of this is your's of Kris's fault, this is something different. They want me for something else, it doesn't concern you."

I smiled when she slowly pulled my hand closer to her body and played with my fingers, tracing lines and patterns across the skin like she does. She didn't look up at me, her eyes staring intensely at my hand in her grip, the contrast in our skin tones. Mine darker and freckly and splotchy, resting between Elsa's flawless, porcelain fingers. It was really kind of pretty, actually.

"You're a much better person than me." She murmured, still staring down. "If there was anything good that came of this, it's that I get to be around you again."

I felt my breath nearly hitch in the center of my chest. Elsa had started running her fingers across the lines in my palm. Which is ridiculously innocent and should not be erotic or arousing at all, but I absolutely could not help myself.

She leaned forward, shrinking the small space between our bodies until her forehead rested against my shoulder, her weariness a heavy thing. I could feel her exhales against the exposed skin the tank top left open.

I squirmed.

Jesus Christ, get it together, Hart. She's not even trying to do anything, you have to calm yourself down, you horny little weirdo.

"Um, Elsa-"

She abruptly turned her head inward, so that her mouth was irresistibly close to my neck. I nearly groaned, having to choke down the sound with a weak cough. Every single time she exhaled it washed across my skin in warm waves that made it impossible to repress constant shivers. She had to be able to feel me shaking, but she never commented.

I needed to move. Like, now.

"I missed you so much." I could hear the clench in her jaw, the tension in her grip on something that I did not understand. The level of frustration in her tone was alarming, even more than it normally would be because I didn't know why. Everything about it made my nerve endings incredibly sensitive, my skin feel wiggly and tingly. My hands twitched where they sat in my lap.

"I-I missed you too, Elsa."

She backed away slowly, as if afraid of scaring me. She stopped, about six inches away from my face, and stared.

I tried to think of something to say. I felt like there should've been millions of things to talk about, but all I could do was watch her face, and try to figure out why the fuck she was looking at me like that.

And then she sighed. I felt the warmth of it, we were so close.

I was, once again, distracted by the blue of her eyes, the strange icy color hypnotic. Elsa always made it difficult to look away from her, but right now, I felt like I wouldn't do it for anything.

"I'm going to fix this." She said, her voice strong and certain. She sounded like she was telling her age or her name, like it was an irrefutable fact. "I am."

I nodded. She continued to stare at me.

"You're going to be okay." She whispered, and ran a hand down the length of her hair, slipping through the tresses, having not yet formed it's morning rat nest.

I leaned heavily into her hand, barely resisting the urge to turn and kiss her palm, which I'm nearly positive would've been bad.

"This is confusing, there is a lot going on. We're all tired and stressed, and you shouldn't be here. You should be safe, at home and away from all of this-"

"But then I wouldn't have you guys back."

Elsa's face tinted pink slightly and she cleared her throat. "Well- yea, I mean- yea. But that's not the point-"

"I get it, Els." I gave her a small, sad smile. "It's fine."

She opened her mouth, like she wanted to say more, and then apparently thought better of it. She stood from the bed with reluctance, her hand leaving a cold spot where it had been in my hair. I stared at her. Some irrational part of my brain wanted to ask her to just sleep with me.

I was so tired.

And I didn't want her company in that way. I really just wanted to sleep; I wanted to feel Elsa beside me, protecting me, just making everything in my head stop slamming into each other for just a few hours so I could rest.

Over the years I had been prescribed countless medications to try and help me sleep at night, but it's impossible. I never feel safe enough, or relaxed enough, or whatever. I hardly ever fall asleep before the wee hours of the morning, after exhaustion completely takes me over.

Unless Elsa's around. Or her things, or her smell.

As if she read my mind, Elsa quickly slipped off the dark blue flannel that was draped over her shoulders, and laid over me, on top of the blanket. "I know how you like to have a million blankets at night, and it's cold in here anyway, so..."

She trailed off and scratched at the back of her head, looking away at the blank wall.

I smiled. "You won't get cold?"

I eyed the thin tank top she wore with concern. She just shrugged in a casual way. "Doesn't bother me. Ice powers, remember?"

I giggled a little and snuggled down into the blankets Elsa's cool scent washing over them and making my eyelids droop.

She stared at me, an undefinable expression on her face, and then leaned down to brush her fingers across my forehead. She swept my bangs back, revealing my right eyebrow that never saw the light of day. Her fingers left a warm, tingly path against my skin, and she seemed incredibly reluctant to remove them at all.

"Go to sleep, princess." She whispered. "We can talk more in the morning."

I nodded dazedly and yawned turning on my side and listening to her footsteps as she walked to the opposite end of the room, to stand by the door. As soon as she was far enough away I snatched the flannel from the top of the blankets and pulled it underneath, pressing it against my chest.

"'Night Elsa." I whispered, and closed my eyes.

/

I awoke, once again, to the smell of good food, and the feeling of not having any idea of where I was. Right before I followed my old pattern, and went back to sleep, there was a small tug on my braid.

"Get up, Red." Kristoff dropped my braid and ripped the covers down to one corner of the bed.

"You asshole!" I yelled at him, nearly hissing when the cold air touched my skin. I shot up from the bed, ready to smack the shit out of him.

He cackled, running across the room to the sad little kitchen.

"Children." I heard Elsa murmur wearily from behind me. I whipped around to find her laying in almost the exact spot I had just been in, her nose buried deeply into the pillow I had been cuddling with. "Behave."

It seemed as if she had collapsed there, still in her jeans and boots. There were dark circles under her eyes, and she pulled the pillow tightly to her chest, curling her entire body around it before sighing in contentment. Her fingers loosened their death grip slightly and her breathing evened out.

She was asleep. In the few seconds that I had been watching her.

"Jesus Christ." I muttered and tried angrily to untangle my hair. "You're dead, Kris."

"You won't be such a pissy little kid when you check out what Elsa made for us." Kristoff grinned at me, his cheeks scrunching in elation. "French toast."

"No goddamn way."

"Get your skinny ass over here before I eat all of it."

I threw myself across the room, grabbing three pieces from the plate before Kristoff could pile them onto his, already enormously stacked, serving. I then punched him as hard as I could in the upper arm.

"Ow!" He yelped and clutched at the area. "What the hell was that for?!"

"Only dicks rip covers off of people. That is a well known fact. If I didn't punch you for it, the levels of justice in the world would be unbalanced."

I took a massive bite and grinned at him, before humming in nostalgic delight. I had forgotten what Elsa's french toast tasted like.

"She still makes it." Kristoff smiled. "Every few mornings, when she wakes up early, always a little too much."

I was completely overwhelmed with a happy buzz in my gut, the same feeling I always get when little moments prove to me that I was missed, that the suffering wasn't one sided. "I missed this."

"She missed you." Kristoff gestured to the bed where Elsa was passed out. "More than you know."

I blushed and looked away, trying to find someway to ask him a question, even though I wasn't fully sure what the question was yet. There was absolutely no way I was bringing up any part of the encounter from last night. I didn't even understand what had happened, and a lot of it seems hazy with sleep, because I'm positive that there is no way in hell some of that could've happened.

I darted a quick glance over to the bed where Elsa was, unable to completely suppress my smile. She was just so annoyingly confusing. I never knew what to do around her.

"Syrup?" He offered, and I quickly moved on to other thoughts.

Kristoff and I spent a lot of the morning just dicking around. There wasn't a large amount of entertaining things to occupy our time. The twins thought that it was dangerous to go outside, which meant that was out, and spending hours on end in a large white box is boring.

I don't deal well with boring.

Kristoff and I tried to be relatively quiet, for Elsa's sake, but it was hard. We spent at least two hours throwing food at each other to see if we could catch it in our mouths. Kristoff won, but only by a little bit. We then rooted through the kitchen, strictly for a lack of anything better to do. It ended up with me chasing Kristoff with one of those spinny, egg beater things, threatening to cut his hair for him. We talked for a little while about the Rayalti, the Kolai, some more things about spirits in general. I tried to come up with questions that I hadn't asked before; Kristoff did his best to answer me. At one point we started making rubber band balls with a massive jar full of them, but the only thing that came from it was an impressive rubber band war that left a large welt on my neck and two on Kristoff's back. After that we laid in the floor and talked about how we couldn't even talk, because we were so bored. It was only one in the afternoon, and I was ready to blow my brains out to break the tedium.

I found myself almost wishing someone would attack us, or something, just for anything to happen.

I immediately regretted it when Elsa woke up about a half hour later with news of her departure.

"What?!" I slammed my hands on my hips, standing in front of the door. Elsa rolled her eyes at me. "What do you mean you're leaving?"

"I have to go into the city for a while." She huffed, shouldering her bag. "I need to gather some info, check on a few things, get some food."

"The last time you came back you were... wounded."

Elsa looked indignant, and glared at me. "I made it back, didn't I? It was fine."

"Elsa-"

"Anna, she has to go." Kristoff put a hand on my shoulder. "She'll be fine. We have to have supplies."

"But-"

"I'll be on my guard this time." Elsa grinned. "And in disguise. "

She pulled a blue baseball cap from nowhere and placed it on her head, grinning at me as she pulled the hood up of her sweatshirt.

She looked so goddamn cute and it was doing nothing but pissing me off.

Her eyes softened slightly, seeing I was not at all convinced. She grabbed at the end of my fingers, lightly swinging our hands. "It'll be fine, really. I promise."

And with a burst of cold air she was out the door, before I could blink.

"That's bullshit, she shouldn't go alon-"

"She's the most capable." Kristoff shook his head. "Also, she'd freeze the whole city before she'd let you go back with her, and we're not going to leave you alone here. This is the way it has to be."

I was annoyed, rightfully so, but I soon accepted that there really wasn't anything I could do about it. Also, hearing what Elsa had been capable of with a major head injury was a pretty big comfort; I knew that she could take care of herself, if need be.

She returned much, much later that evening with six grocery bags and a Monopoly board game box. I tried to stifle the intense relief I felt when she walked back through the door, but there was no smothering the cheek splitting grin across my face.

Kristoff grabbed Monopoly and stared at it warily. "I feel like this might cause more problems than anything else."

"Only when I beat your ass all across the board." I grinned and grabbed some of the grocery bags from Elsa, taking them to the kitchen and digging out each treasure with reverence.

There was a small trip in my heartbeat when I looked through the food that Elsa had gathered. My favorites were all there.

It was so incredibly stupid and sentimental that she remembered the kind of soup and cookies that I liked, and it somehow made me feel a bit like crying.

My pause in searching was prolonged enough that Elsa shot a glance at me. "That is the stuff you like, right?" She sounded worried.

I cleared my throat. "Yea, no. You got it, this is all great." I grinned widely at her.

"Thanks."

Her cheeks pinked slightly. "You're welcome."

The next couple of hours were spent in a vicious Monopoly game that (surprise surprise) Elsa won easily.

It was late when we finally retired for sleep. Kristoff took his post at the door, mumbling that he wished Elsa had picked up some energy drinks on her outing. I nestled myself deeply into the blankets of the left mattress, the pillow nest around me as comforting as ever. Elsa had never taken her flannel back, and it was still hidden under the covers. I immediately latched onto it. I rolled onto my side, staring at the bed where Elsa had settled.

Her eyes were closed, and she had pulled a pillow into her chest, like she had this morning, clutching it far too tightly to look relaxed enough for sleep.

Just watching her I was out within minutes.

We quickly developed a rhythm in The Box (the name Kristoff and I had given the safe house). Elsa and Kristoff switched off each night, staying up and watching the door. They adamantly refused to let me stay up, saying that it was safer for them to do it anyway. Elsa would venture into town nearly every evening, not really explaining what she was doing, and often coming back with more games to entertain Kristoff and I.

It was four days later when Elsa returned with nothing but a bunch of pictures and an incredibly grim look.

"We're lucky we left when we did." Was all she said, before placing her phone down in front of Kristoff and I, filled with pictures of the twin's apartment.

It had been ransacked.

Stacks of paper were strewn everywhere, mud drug onto the carpets in footprints, broken vases and lamps, open drawers with contents spilling out. The pictures had been ripped down from the walls. Each swipe brought another picture of somewhere in the apartment, completely destroyed. When they started gravitating closer to the twin's bedrooms a fierce wave of nausea hit me.

They were in their house, in their rooms, because of you.

"Someone dug through our shit." Kristoff growled.

Elsa just nodded.

I felt my breath hitch in fear. Each new image made me sick to my stomach. I had never been more grateful for Elsa's paranoia, it had quite literally saved our lives this time. It was right at that moment that I thought occurred to me, and had me shooting up from the couch in a frenzy, as if ready to sprint away.

"Whoa, whoa, hey," Elsa grabbed my shoulders, trying to get my eyes to focus on her. "Anna, it's okay-"

"Elsa, has anyone been inside my apartment?"

It was as if some switch in her brain flipped. She clenched her jaw and looked away, her hands falling to her sides and balling into fists. "Yes."

A single thought broke through the front of my skull and had my stomach plummeting. "Oh my god, Olaf."

I could feel my heart rate quickening, my pulse pounding loudly in my veins, the urge to rush back to the city nearly irresistible. "Olaf- he's my friend- my neighbor, did they- do they know him? They couldn't- There are pictures of us together-"

"He's fine." Elsa murmured. I snapped my eyes to her.

She looked angry, pissed actually. Her hands shook in tightly closed fists, blurring with the speed of her trembling.

"I checked. Him and the cat are fine. Kristoff told me they were... important to you."

I couldn't exactly identify it, but something about Elsa's tone absolutely set me teeth on edge. There was a sneer hiding underneath her forced neutral expression; I felt like I was being accused of something. "Of course they are important to me, Olaf is my friend."

Elsa's lip curled slightly. "Well, then I'm sure you're overjoyed at the news of his well being." She turned her gaze to mine, cold and distant. "All of your stuff is fine, and still there. It's not much of a surprise, we knew they had your apartment number. I just know someone was inside."

"How?"

Elsa's cheeks lit up. "It- it didn't, um, smell like you."

"It didn't..." I hesitated, confused. "Smell like me?"

Elsa huffed and turned on her heel, stalking to the other end of the room for her shift, even though her's didn't start for another two hours.

"What's her problem?" I demanded of Kristoff.

He paused, as if he were thinking, and then just shook his head.

For a few days, things were tense between Elsa and I. And not the kind of tension I was used to between us. This had anger and embarrassment and something else written all over it. Elsa didn't even want to look at me; which was weird. What made me the angriest was that I didn't even really understand what I had done to piss her off so badly, and Kristoff wasn't explaining anything. I could feel my patience running thin, being trapped in The Box only adding to my frustration.

It wasn't until three days later that I got a few answers.

It was around four in the morning when I heard a lot of shuffling on the floor in between the beds. I rubbed furiously at my eyes, trying to get them to focus in the near dark. The fuzzy image suddenly cleared, and I was met with a disgruntled Elsa, rolling around on the floor, covered by a thin sheet.

"What the fuck? Elsa!" I whisper/shouted.

She shot up like a bullet, nearly on her feet before I could blink. But her stance was wobbly, and the droop of her shoulders was concerning.

"Els." I stood up out of bed and walked slowly toward her. I gripped at her fingers; they were like ice. When her eyes tried to focus on me I saw he bags and the redness and dark circles. "Oh, sweetheart."

"Anna." She shook her head and squeezed her eyes shut, looking absolutely pitiful. "I'm sorry, I wasn't going to sleep, but I got so tired, and I thought that an hour wouldn't hurt. I couldn't wake Kris up it's not his turn yet, and he's just as tired as me. I was going to just sleep on the floor, so I wouldn't wake either of you, but I guess I started dreaming, I didn't-"

"Elsa, get in the bed."

Her face absolutely bloomed with color, and after a second mine followed suit.

"I-I mean, you should get in the bed. To sleep. Is what I mean." I cleared my throat. "I can stay up; I'm not tired at all."

"Absolutely not." She growled, even while her eyelids drooped. I led her slowly toward the edge of the mattress. I don't think she even noticed. When I sank down on it, with only a tad bit of clumsiness, she followed. As soon as she made contact with the sheets something in her seemed to crack, her neck hardly strong enough to hold her head up.

"Lay down, Els."

She shifted, making herself comfortable in the cocoon I had been buried in moments ago. Her hand was still gripping mine lightly, her fingers brushing periodically across the back of my knuckles.

"That's it. I'm gonna go keep watch now, okay?"

I tired to stand up, but the grip on my hand grew in strength that I hadn't thought possible, yanking back into my sitting position.

"Stay."

It was purred, in a voice of absolute contentment, and a blush shot across my face like firecrackers, leaving me way too warm.

"Um, Els, I really should keep watch, and-"

"Please." She whined and opened her bloodshot eyes, staring directly into mine. She looked more coherent than any time since I had woken up. "If you don't sleep I'm not going to."

Her hand insistently brushed at the back of mine, fingers idly playing with my own.

"A-Are you sure?"

Elsa seemed to take this as confirmation, and yanked me forward, pulling the covers over us in one swift motion.

I was hot. Incredibly so, my face absolutely burning.

No part of Elsa and I were touching except for our hands, but I could feel her body next to mine, the energy buzzing through the empty space between us making me twitchy.

"Um, Els-"

"Shhh." She held a finger against my lips, her eyes closed and a smile splitting her face. "I wanna apologize."

If I hadn't been so uncomfortable and turned on, I would've laughed at how she was acting.

"For what?"

"Cause I'm all stupid and jealous, you know?" She didn't open her eyes.

"Jealous?"

"Of that boy." Even in her sleepy state, Elsa pulled off a fantastic sneer. "Opal."

"Olaf." I giggled.

"Whatever." She muttered, further annoyed by the familiarity in my voice. "He gets to be normal with you. Gets to live a normal life with him and his stupid cat instead of this bullshit we bring in."

Elsa opened her eyes finally, her speech becoming slightly clearer. "Are you dating him?"

Just like with Kristoff, I laughed in surprise, just quieter. "You're jealous of Olaf?"

There were a lot of ways I could've expected her to react. This was not one of them.

Her eyes narrowed, her lips tugged into a smirk. She abruptly tightened her grip on my hand, yanking it toward her body, pulling me closer. I felt my breathe hitch as she leaned in, her smirk growing wider. She stopped mere inches from my face, her hands now idly running patterns across the skin of my palms and wrists.

And just like that I could not breathe.

I could count every freckle on her face, every eyelash. There were forests growing in the irises of her eyes, dark and unknown and terrifying. The heat building in the pit of my stomach was urgent and aching. I despised every centimeter of space between us, and at the same time, was eternally grateful it was there.

There was a repeating mantra in my head, screaming at me to not move a muscle. Elsa grinned, and I fucking knew she could see my discomfort. She leaned up on her elbow and over slightly, blanketing me with her hair as she pressed her mouth insanely close to my ear.

"Are you?"

"W-What?" My voice was shaking in a concerning way, but I couldn't hear it over the blood rushing through my ears. I felt a fire ignite under my skin, brushing every pore in the most frustrating way possible.

I just wanted to goddamn touch her.

"Are you," She paused slightly, and I could hear the grin in her voice. There was something different about the way she sounded, too. It was lower, huskier, and absolutely dripping in possessiveness. "Dating him?"

I had to stifle a groan at the sound of it.

Just fucking control yourself, for Christ's sake.

"I-I don't- no- we're friends, I don't- no."

And she abruptly pulled back, detaching every part of her body from me except her damn fingertips, still idly tracing over the skin of my forearms. She grinned an incredibly broad, cheek splitting smile. "Good."

Her hands dropped and she turned to her other side, so that I was facing her back. I felt like I was inside of an oven, producing enough heat to set the blanket on fire.

What the fuck just happened?!

My breathing was nearly in pants, my blood pounding through me so hard that it was starting to give me a headache. I squirmed uncomfortably.

It's not fair to get someone ridiculously aroused so easily; I don't understand who decided that Elsa should get to be all of the amazing things she is, along with being the single most seductive person I had ever met in my life.

I stared at her back for a long time, twitching with the urge to run my fingers through her hair, down her spine, over her hips-

I sucked in a sharp breath and rolled over to my other side, squeezing my eyelids together and curling into a ball.

I didn't sleep for hours.

/

When I woke up that morning I felt a few different things.

1.) I hot weight pressed very pleasantly against my back.

2.) A long, smooth leg hooked around my own, possessively.

3.) A heavy arm lazily crossed over my ribs.

4.) Blonde hair resting across the side of my neck.

And last but not least.

5.) A smug grin directed right at my face from a few feet away, and a sense of ridiculous satisfaction permeating the air.

"Sooooo..."

"Not one word, Kris." I mumbled without opening my eyes. If I pretended I wasn't awake I could enjoy this a lot longer. I snuggled backward into Elsa's body a bit, and I swear I felt her grip around me tighten slightly. "No one goddamn word."

Author's Note:

Oh my god I am so so sorry about how long this one took, I completely lost track of everything the first week of college, and then I came home for the weekend and I was going to get it done here, but I hadn't seen my friends and their broke asses had somehow gotten liquor and so I don't even actually remember what happened. But you guys do not care to know that, and it is also a shitty excuse so, my bad.

This chapter was

So. Goddamn. Hard. To. Write.

Not only did hardly anything important happen, but I also botched the elsanna "take it slow" thing. I've never experienced anything like it before, and (obviously) I completely failed at trying to keep a relatively slow pace with Anna and Elsa's relationship, even though they're nowhere close to dating yet, I just enjoy the tension. I can't help it, every time I write this I want them to be fucking on the sly so bad and it's ridiculous. I'm really sorry if that fucks up the story for you guys, I want it to be good, but I literally do not know how to write Anna and Elsa not together.

Anyway, I am sure this is fraught with errors and stupidity, and I need y'all to call me out on it. Tell me what's wrong, what I can fix. I know I ask that a lot, but it's 'cause I really need the help to make it better.

Also, you people that are reviewing and following and favoriting, I fucking love y'all. Like seriously. Tell me your names, we'll go get married right now, I swear, on me.

Anyway, y'all are sooooooo awesome and I love you, and I hope you liked this chapter. I'll try to get the next one out before we all die of old age.

Much love XOXO