Kisse Misse (for SheAlwaysDies)
For @shealwaysdies!
----
Like many things in life, relationships are built on trust. Some of that trust is contained within trusting the other to be intimate. Some of that trust is contained within trusting the other to know what the boundaries are.
The first time Anna and Elsa kissed was when Anna was born. Elsa and her father had been waiting outside, after the nursemaids had shooed them out and demanded Iduna’s privacy. The moments stretched on, each lapsing into the other like waves. Without a clock to ground them, they made waiting seem like an unending moment.
This was one of the few times her dad seemed nervous. Did he always clench his fists and push them into his thighs like that? It looked painful. And his face was so downcast that the shadow on it almost hid the fact that his face had lost color. Wait a moment. Was he scared?
“Papa?” Elsa extended a hand and tentatively touched his arm.
Agdarr turned to look at her. He had bags under his eyes and his lips were drawn in a thin line. Nevertheless, he tried to draw the line into a smile.
“Elsa. Can you wait for your little sister? ”
She shook her head vigorously, “No way!”
“That’s good. She sure could use a great big sister like you.”
Agdarr put his hand on Elsa’s shoulder before going back to a more relaxed version of his original position. He still looked concerned, but a little less so. After that, the only sound was the swishing of Elsa’s legs as she kicked them a little, and their breathing.
Castles were made to hold silence, and this silence was the sort that echoed, permeated the head, and gave a sense of a great weight on the ears. It rang with its own sounds, and the blank walls made for a visual emptiness.
So still and silent had it gone, that when the door did open, Elsa very nearly jumped out of her skin. At the very least, she was sure, her heart had nearly gone out her throat. On the floor where they sat outside the room, was now a patterned frost that melted almost as soon as it appeared. One of the nursemaids appeared and beckoned to her father, silently. He nodded and entered, though not before he gave Elsa’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze.
Without someone else there, the oppressive nothingness increased tenfold. Now she was more than bored. She was beyond ennui. She was words that did not exist in her vocabulary. This was absolutely dreadful.
Elsa sat up and cast the little snow dolls to play with. A horse, a dog, a girl- wait no, two girls. After all, now she had a sister. But what would her sister look like? Setting aside a small lump, she decided to play and adventure. When the nursemaid came out to tell her that she might come inside in order to meet her new sibling, Elsa had already been lost to the land of make-believe adventure.
The maid pursed her lips and tsked. ‘Where on earth had that girl gotten that snow from?’ Regardless, she got Elsa’s attention and brought her inside.
The first thing that Elsa did not expect was for her mother to look so tired and sweaty. Did moms always look like that? Her mom always looked perfect and never scraped her knees or got out of breath. Concerned, Elsa tried to climb onto the bed with her to make sure that she was okay.
“No, Elsa. Let your mother rest.” Agdarr’s hand blocked her passage, and while she was slightly upset, the second thing she did not expect appeared.
She had no idea that babies were so… squishy. And red. Were cheeks always supposed to be that flushed? And why did her sister look like a potato with a face? She didn’t even have hair! Did she look like this when she was born? All red, and wrinkly, and puffy?
It was kinda crazy, seeing those tiny hands. Elsa’s hands were small too- after all, she was already three- but those were even smaller! They were clenched up and occasionally grasped uselessly. Elsa gasped. She had never seen eyes that blue before. They were so pale and had a sort of wondrous expression, as if trying to grasp everything new.
She leaned a little closer, though not directly onto the bed. Extending a hand, she touched her sister’s cheek. Never had she ever felt something so soft and a little fuzzy at that. This is what a sister was? Did all little girls start like that? She didn’t know. What she did know was that she liked her sister. That’s right, this was her sister and nobody else’s!
Elsa wanted to show her sister how much she cared. Show her that now that they were sisters, they would be the bestest sisters ever. But she didn’t know how. Maybe a kiss like what mom and dad always gave her? Yeah. Yeah, that would be awesome!
Leaning over, she tried to imitate her mom and gave her sister a big, fat, wet smooch on the forehead. Her parents looked at each other with slightly exhausted but heartwarmed expressions. Anna shivered because she didn’t understand what cold even was, only that she didn’t like it.
Anna cried, and Elsa covered her ears.
The first kisses were much the same. Little Elsa leaning over littler Anna and not meaning anything more than simple, childish affection. Their parents thought this was adorable, though Anna didn’t particularly care for it.
When they were somewhat older, kisses came with ‘eww’s and wiping off their cheeks. Being little girls, they hardly could appreciate the affection, more focused on the wetness that usually came with it. No matter what their mother said, kissing was gross.
In the future, both would come to miss this simpler time. Gross though it may be, at least they got to be together. Like all siblings, they fought, they played. Like siblings of similar age, they were close. Playmates rather than a great chasm between them in maturity and interest.
But they knew not then what they would come to know.
It should have been a normal night. But then, accidents would not be nearly so shocking if they always happened. It was shocking and there was always the post-accident regret. That wish that things could have gone differently, gone normally. In that instant, the two were ripped apart indefinitely.
If there was anything Anna missed, it was the casual affection, the fact that Elsa would even speak to her. Rare was the time when Elsa said more than, “Go away Anna”.
She didn’t know why Elsa didn’t want to even be in her presence anymore, and it hurt terribly. It was the sort of pain that brusquely grabbed the heart and squeezed. It scratched at the inside of her chest and made her feel a light-headed vertigo. She could think of no other reason that Elsa hated her than herself. She must have done something, but what?
Whatever it was, she did her best to make it up. Drawings, songs, stories, any way to try and get Elsa to forgive her or at least say something. Even being told to go away seemed better than the silent, looming door. Anna hated that door with a passion. It was the barrier that held the answer to her life-long mystery. Maybe somehow, someway, she’d get that door to open.
For Elsa, the pain came from keeping her mouth shut. To keep her responses silent and not speak to her sister. The words burbled up from her throat and sprang to ready lips who would then stay paralyzed, all of the thoughts thrown away into silence. Her mind screamed to just answer, to show that she cared, but she could not.
She had to keep Anna safe.
She just had to! Her powers were so uncontrollable and she almost killed her sister once. Who’s to say the next time, they would be as lucky? Even if it hurt her, and especially Anna, they had to stay separate. She’d rather a living sister than a dead one.
Her heart almost broke every time Anna came by with some attempt to rekindle their relationship. And though Anna didn’t know it, she saved every drawing, memorized every song, and listened intently to every story. She felt it was her greatest vice, being able to receive without giving.
So broken was their relationship that they were unable to join, even in grief. Their parents left and soon left them to pick up the pieces. The kingdom, the castle, their relationship. It was all shattered and nobody was there to help them. This set of events led to the disaster that struck moments after Elsa’s coronation.
Though the disaster was great, the reward was even more worth it. Finally, they were reunited, after the long silence and near-death experiences. The Great Freeze began with the accident and ended with The Great Thaw, which thawed both Arendelle and their relationship.
All the while, they would not have an affectionate kiss until Anna gave a platonic one to Kristoff as a reward. But they did hug, so very much, touch starved that they were. It was hard not for them to apply so much affection when they weren’t allowed to share any for years.
It was slow, but their relationship mended. Baby steps. A touch on the forearm here, a brush on the hand there. Neither of them had much an idea of what a sisterly relationship looked like, not anymore, but they did their best.
They worked to foster trust where the accident had broken it. At first, they were joined at the hip. Anna was afraid of losing Elsa, and Elsa feeling too guilty to go. They then tired of that, realizing they also needed their alone time. Little things, like trusting that one would do something or that the other would not also came.
They both had to heal and work to heal from all of the incidents. Anna worked through her fears of separation. Of doing something wrong and just getting shut out. She knew they weren’t healthy, but fears are scary. Elsa did the same, mainly through the guilt of it all. She felt that it was her fault, but over time and discussion, she worked to mostly be able to understand the feelings and get through them. As opposed to concealing and not feeling, she became a little more open with her emotions.
Anna panicked when she realized she felt attraction to Elsa. First of all, she was a woman, and second, they were sisters! There were so many levels of not right! At first, she brushed it off as usual sibling feelings. However, when she looked at how siblings acted in books and in town, they seemed different. But… maybe that was just them being close. The cold made cheeks red, right? And they lived in the north. It was always cold.
It never struck her that Elsa might be the same way. If indeed, it was the cold, then how could the seeming embodiment go pink? She wore ice as clothing- it just didn’t affect her. It was hard trying to figure out what Elsa was okay with, and what made her shy away. But she did her best.
The next kiss, like many of the kisses in their lives, signified a new stage in their life. From infants, to young children, to young adults, each of these were marked by a kiss or multiple. Now, they would mature into their fully-realized selves.
This kiss was on Elsa’s birthday.
After needing to retire early due to Elsa’s illness, Anna tried to tend to her. She resisted all the guilty pleas to go out and celebrate, and merely tried to help. Relationships were built on trust, and Elsa needed Anna right now. Besides, it was hard to celebrate when her own sister almost fell from a clock tower in a misguided attempt to atone.
Trying to come up with some way to help Elsa feel better, Anna attempted the classic closed-eyes forehead kiss. This went about as well as expected, and instead of kissing her forehead, she got a lipful of nose and lip. Jerking back, she looked at Elsa, who instead of looking alarmed just had a dopey smile.
“Hey Anna that was great.” Oh- yeah. It was! I mean, it was?”
“Mhmm… you know I love you.”
Anna was about as red as a beet, and simply assumed this to be a product of the fever.
“Yes, well I love you too. Go to sleep okay? I got you.”
“Mmm… yeah okay.” Elsa mumbled and pressed herself into the sheets.
The next morning, when Elsa’s fever had broken, Anna assumed that it was all a dream. She was subsequently shocked when not only did Elsa drape her arms around her shoulders- which gave her skin a delightfully buzz- but then planted a delicate kiss on her neck.
