They called me the ice queen.

Not because of anything to do with real ice, though. They were talking about meth. More specifically, the meth that I sold. The meth that everyone and their mother wanted. The meth that turned the whole of Eagle Valley upside down, and turned me into an overnight success.

The meth that would land me on death row.

-----

“Elsa?”

“Present” came a voice from the third row of desks in the room.

Oh, I should’ve mentioned, my real name is Elsa.

The girl twisted her pen between the thumb and middle finger of her right hand before realizing that the pen’s tip was beginning to dig into the veneer of her desk and laid the pen flat, letting out a sigh.

Even when it seems like it is, the first day of school is never easy.

The room sat silent save for the drone of roll call and the occasional grunt or sniffle of another student. The whole school reeked of anxiety for what the coming year might hold.

Though I know it’s the same every year, this year felt so… different.

“Alright class, I believe that’s everyone. Did I miss anyone?”

Nothing.

“Good, good.” He walked to the center of the class. “In that case, I welcome you all to your first year of Calculus!”

Elsa cringed slightly at the realization that she was actually in calculus.

What possessed me to want to take this class?

“My name is Dr. Agdarson,” god, a doctorate for a teacher?, ”and I am here to see to it that when you all leave this room on our last day together, each and every one of you has a firm understanding of this course. Now, while calculus isn’t easy, it is possible, and I am certain that if you put in the required effort…”

His voice trailed off as Elsa slumped down in her seat.

Another year, another set of speeches. God, can this please take up the whole period?

Elsa shifted to the right of her seat and rested her head on her arms, still looking straight ahead.

Let’s see how strict this guy really is.

The teacher motioned Elsa to lift her head up, not missing a beat in his speech.

Very.

A few heads glanced back at Elsa as she sat back upright. The teacher snapped his fingers twice and all eyes were once again facing forward.

Yup, I’m fucked.

A sudden wave of realization came over Elsa once more, bringing about a short onslaught of panic within her. She really was in calculus, and, by the looks of it, she would really have to work for a good grade in this class.

It was right when she was finally coming to terms with this that the teacher’s voice caught her attention.

“Now, would you all please get out a piece of paper?”

A lump formed within her throat, and again Elsa was in a state of panic.

God dammit, I’m not ready for this!

She wanted to run, but she instead reached down to her side, unzipped her backpack, and removed a blank piece of paper.

“Now, we will be starting our notes with what may be the keystone for all of calculus: the derivative. Now, this will most likely be review for all of you, but I would really appreciate it if you took notes because…”

Again his voice trailed off.

You may have a doctorate, but you’re still just a high school teacher, and it sure shows by the way you’re starting us off with review of something we all have known for-

“Elsa! What makes the derivative so important to calculus?”

Her eyes widened and once more she panicked.

“Um…” She cleared her throat. “It’s the rate of change in a function,” she said. “As far as I know…” she added, doubting herself.

“Correct!”

Whew.

“But why does that make it so important?”

Fuck, I don’t know!

The panic within her had grown to an absurd level for the occasion. Her eyes were completely focused on the teacher, everything else a blur, and she had actually completely disregarded trying to answer the question at this point. Her only focus was on figuring a way out of saying anything. Nevertheless, she started: “I- I’m-”

“Well, it makes it so we can solve a problem where variables change.” Elsa’s eyes turned towards her rescuer. “Like, instead of everything remaining the same, we can deal with everything changing.” He took a quick glance at Elsa, and for a brief moment they made eye contact. Though he said nothing, Elsa knew the message he was sending her- “You’re welcome.” She wanted to mouth a response, but the other’s gaze had already turned back to the teacher.

“That’s absolutely correct, Olaf!” came the teacher’s voice.

-----

“Elsa!”

Elsa heard the calling of her name, but she gave it no mind.

“ELSA!” The second calling was much louder.

Well shit, I can’t pretend I didn’t hear that.

She turned around and saw the boy from earlier jogging towards her, pushing aside other students in the hallway to get to her.

Oh God, what does he want?

He held out his left hand, something contained within its grip.”You left your pen,” he said.

Figures.

“Oh, t-thanks.” Elsa gave him a small smile and took the pen. They stood facing each other for a short while before Elsa realized Olaf was looking deep into her eyes. The realization somewhat startled her.

“Oh, and, uh, thanks for… helping me out earlier in class,” she said, mostly as a means of breaking the awkward silence between the two.

“No problem, Elsa,” he said. The use of her name sent a chill down Elsa’s spine. “Hey, if you ever need any help in that class I could lend you a hand,” he suggested.

Was that a joke? Wait, no, I think he’s being serious...

A student walking in the hallway bumped into Elsa from behind, causing her to stumble forwards. Olaf reached out with the intent to catch her, but she righted herself before he could get to her so he instead stuffed his hands into the pockets of his jeans and looked away for a moment. The two were now mere inches apart.

“Hey, I’ll uh.. see you later, alright?” he said.

“Yeah, sure,” Elsa replied.

“Alright,” Olaf said, giving her a nod while taking a step back before turning around and walking away at a considerably fast pace. Elsa stood in the same spot and watched him

-----

“It’s F minor!”

“No, it’s A Flat major.”

“Those are the same!”

“Anna, the notes of the scales are the same, but the feelings the two convey are completely different. Look.”

Elsa struck a chord on the piano the two sisters were seated behind.

“What chord is that?” she said.

“It’s an A flat major,” Anna said, crossing her arms over her chest in a pout.

Elsa added a note to the chord she was playing. “And what chord is that?”

“An F minor seventh.”

“Do they sound the same to you?”

Anna began to open her mouth in protest but decided against doing so when Elsa looked at her, clearly expecting an answer out of the younger girl. The vibrations of the strings within the small piano grew soft.

“No…”

“Now, would you say that the major chord sounds happy and the minor chord sounds sad?” Elsa asked.

“I guess?” Anna replied, confused as to where her sister was going with this conversation.

“Alright, and would you say that this song is happy or sad?”

Anna now realized her sister’s intentions and sassily replied: “Well, it starts off sad so it’s-”

“But it turns into a happy song, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah, but…” Elsa looked back up at her sister. Anna realized she was fighting a battle she couldn’t win. Her sister was right.

“But what?” Elsa asked.

“Nothing.”

“So, do you agree that this song is in A Flat major?”

Anna did agree, but she didn’t want to admit it. “I don’t really see why it matters, Elsa! They’re the same damn scales either way!”

Elsa stood up from the piano bench.

“It matters because it’s part of learning theory, Anna,” she said.

“Well maybe-” Anna stopped when she noticed that Elsa was walking away. The younger girl sat and watched as her sister climbed the stairs to the upper floor of their small home.

Anna looked back down at the keyboard of the piano. After a short while she struck an F minor seventh chord, the same one Elsa had struck just seconds earlier.

The door to her sister’s room creaked open and closed with a dull click.

A single tear trailed down Anna’s left cheek as the sound of the piano grew dim. After the last string of the piano ceased to vibrate, Anna lifted her hand from the keys, pulled the wooden cover shut, and laid her head atop her arms on top of it, sobbing gently.

 

2: Nightmare

“I had a nightmare last night.”

Elsa’s fork clinked against her bowl as her eyes met her sister’s from across the dining room table. “What was it about?” she asked.

“Well… I don’t think you’ll really understand it,” Anna replied. In reality, however, she knew her sister would understand it perfectly. She just didn’t want to talk about it.

“Doesn’t matter,” Elsa said through a mouthful of oatmeal, her hand covering her mouth as she spoke.

“Fine. It was really cold, and I didn’t really know why but I was going towards some old house, and I went inside and went up the stairs and at the top there was this room that I recognized for some reason so I went inside and there was this mirror on the wall.” She paused for a moment to catch her breath. “I went over to it and I looked in it, but it wasn’t me that I saw…” She stopped speaking even though it was clear that part of her story was missing.

“What a pleasant nightmare,” Elsa teased. She lifted another spoonful of oatmeal to her mouth. “You know, with nightmares like that I don’t know how you ev-”

“It was our mother,” Anna said. Elsa stopped chewing immediately.

“Oh…”

The younger girl rested her elbows on the table and lowered her head onto her hands, covering her eyes.

Way to go, it’s not even seven o’ clock yet and you’ve made your sister sad.

“Anna... I didn’t mean to...” Elsa began. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

Her words had a certain sting to Anna’s ears. She looked up and retorted “You’re a bit late for that. Maybe try giving me the time of day for once if you don’t want to upset me.”

“Anna…”

“I mean, for the first time in forever you decide to help me with piano yesterday, but then you just leave because… because of what? I don’t even know! And now you’re making fun of my nightmare!” Anna said. As soon as the last word left her lips, her eyes widened in realization of what she had said.

Elsa sat silently, well prepared for whatever her sister had left to say to her.

She’s right.

When the younger girl failed to say anything more, Elsa rose from her seat and carried her bowl to the kitchen and set it in the sink. She walked back into the dining room and continued past the table before stopping.

No, I can’t just leave her like this.

She turned around and took her seat again. Her sister appeared genuinely surprised that she did so. Neither spoke.

Neither needed to.

The two looked at each other for a few seconds, both analyzing the other’s expression.

Anna was the one who finally broke the silence between the two. “I have to get ready for school,” she said. She stood up and walked out of the room, leaving her bowl in its place on the table. For once it was Anna who left Elsa alone.

So this is what it feels like… God I’m an idiot.

Elsa rose from her seat again and carried her sister’s bowl to the kitchen and set it in the sink next to her own bowl. She paused.

Even our bowls are closer than us.

After a short while Elsa walked back out of the kitchen and made her way towards her room. She walked slowly and silently up the stairs, trying to hear if her sister could be coming out of her room. She didn’t want another awkward encounter between the two. Once she reached the top of the stairs, she walked quickly and quietly to her own room and closed the door. Immediately she realized just how bad of a relationship the two had. She was actually afraid of accidentally having to see her sister.

That realization sent a wave of regret and self-hatred over the girl. She repeated those last few words in her head, hoping to dull the pain they brought through repetition.

Afraid of seeing her… Afraid of… seeing her… Afraid…

Each time the words stung the same.

A shuffling in the adjacent room caught Elsa’s attention. Her first thought was to go see what her sister was doing. Her second was of more regret.

It’s too late to help her, you idiot. Just stay in your room and think of how bad of an older sister you’ve been until she leaves.

That is exactly what she did. Anna’s footsteps and the closing of the front door were Elsa’s signal to begin readying for school herself. She didn’t take long, dressing in only jeans and a t-shirt. She grabbed her backpack and her keys and walked out the front door. She hurried around the sharp bend in the path leading to the driveway when her sister’s frail voice caught her attention.

“Elsa… I’m sorry.”

The words couldn’t have hurt more. Elsa stopped and turned around, but she didn’t look at her sister.

“I never should have blown up at you like that.” Anna began. “I know you’re trying to be a good sister, but I just…” She stopped herself, hoping to prevent any further damage. After she had thought through what she was going to say, she started again. “I’m really lonely, Elsa. And afraid… I guess it’s our parents… I’m- I’m just not over it.”

Elsa drew a breath with the intent to speak but decided against doing so. Whatever she had to say could only cause more harm. After a short while, however, the older girl said the only thing she figured couldn’t hurt her sister any more.

“I’m sorry, too.”

Neither girl spoke again for fear of treading too roughly on the other’s fragile emotions, but both stood ready for those emotions to be shattered by the other.

Both felt they deserved it.

After a few seconds Elsa turned around to walk to her car. The thought of driving to school with only her regrets stopped her, however. She turned to face her sister, who was staring at her feet.

“Hey, uh…” Elsa began. Anna’s eyes shot up to meet her sister’s. The older girl swallowed. “How ‘bout I, uh, give you a ride to school?”

Anna pondered the question for a second before agreeing.

The three minute drive was completely silent but it was still better than going alone for both girls.

When they arrived Anna left with only a half-hearted “thanks.” Elsa remained in the car for a while longer. When she finally decided to head to class she made it only halfway to the front gate of the school before Olaf called out to her.

“Elsa!” he said. “Wait up!”

Elsa turned around and waited for the boy to catch up to her. “Hey Olaf,” she said.

“Hey,” he said. Elsa turned back around and began walking with him. The two remained silent for a short while. “Did you get the student contract thing for calc signed by your parents yet?” Olaf asked.

“No…” Elsa replied.

“Why not?”

Why the fuck do you care?

Elsa pondered the question for a short while before saying “I don’t know.”

“You hesitated,” Olaf replied.

“N- No I didn’t…” Elsa said shyly.

“Sure,” Olaf said playfully. “You’re gonna have to work real hard on that forgetfulness if you hope to survive this year, that’s for sure. Luckily for you we’re on block schedule here so you get an extra day to get it signed.”

“Yeah…”

Elsa hardly noticed that they had reached the front gate.

“Hey, I’m off to my English class,” Olaf said. “See you later.”

Elsa watched for a few seconds as the young boy strode off towards the office before the first bell prompted her to walk through the gate of the school towards her first class of the day.

-----
 

Elsa’s first two new classes were more or less void of anything memorable. AP Norwegian literature and AP Chemistry, although being AP classes, so far seemed like nothing to worry about.

It was her third and final new class, TA for the sophomore PE class, that brought Elsa another well-known wave of panic, not because of the class itself, but because of who was in it.

Anna.

As soon as she entered the gym to meet the teacher she caught sight of her sister’s red hair.

Great. Just what I needed.

Elsa tried her best to avoid catching the eye of her sister, but failed. Anna noticed Elsa out of the corner of her eye and looked towards her, surprised to see her. Elsa thought about looking away but she knew it was already too late for that. Instead she too looked in Anna’s direction.

“Alright everybody, welcome to sophomore PE!” the teacher exclaimed while still walking down the stairs leading into the gym.

Anna quickly turned to attention, but Elsa continued gazing in her sister’s direction. After a short while Anna glanced back towards Elsa to see that she was still staring at her. Anna mouthed “what?” while throwing her arms up a bit in a questioning gesture.

The teacher took notice, and he was not pleased.

“Ahem, miss,” he said. Anna’s eyes grew wide as did Elsa’s. “Do you have something to share with the class?”

“Oh, uh… no…” she said in a feeble voice.

“Then who were you talking to?”

At this point all eyes were on Anna.

“My… My sister,” she said.

“And who might that be?” the teacher asked.

Do you really fucking care, asshole? No, you just want to make my sister feel bad, don’t you?

Anna failed to respond. The teacher raised his eyebrows in a gesture that was both questioning and annoyed. After a short while Elsa spoke.

“I am...” she said.

The teacher turned to his right to face her. All eyes were now on Elsa.

“Oh, and what might be so important to your sister that she needs to disrupt my class to speak to you about it?” he asked.

“N- nothing,” Elsa replied.

“It has to be something, I’m sure.”

“No, really, it’s nothing,” Elsa said. Her defense was weak at best and both she and the teacher knew it. All she could do at this point was wait for him to drop the subject. He didn’t. The girl cracked under the pressure of his stare after only a few seconds.

“I… I was staring at her because I was surprised she was in the same class as me… I didn’t… I didn’t know…” she reluctantly confessed.

The teacher gave a loud and obnoxious laugh. “What? You’re not used to seeing her or something?” he said.

His lack of knowledge regarding the relationship the two sisters shared hit Elsa particularly hard.

“We… We had a bit of an argument this morning…” Anna said in defense of her sister from amidst the group of students around her.

At first it seemed as though the girl had nothing more to say, but she continued nonetheless, now addressing her sister. “Elsa, it was my fault. It was all my fault. I’m an idiot to think that I’m the only one that’s lonely and afraid and all that...”

Anna, just stop. These people don’t need to know about… Oh God, please don’t bring up our parents.

Every eye and ear in the room was now on Anna, desperate to get every detail of what she had to say. The girl didn’t care, however. She continued pouring her heart out to her sister. “And I can’t put all of this on you. I know you’re only trying to help, and I never should have complained about how you don’t spend that much time with me because it’s my fault, too.”

Just don’t bring up our parents, Anna.

“I need to take more of the blame for this than I do. I can’t put this on you, and furthermore I can’t put this on our parents.”

Elsa’s eyes widened.

Oh God, oh God… Anna that’s enough! Can’t the teacher stop this or something?

“Just because they’re gone now doesn’t mean they’re at fault for the way I’ve treated you, and I’m sorry, Elsa. I’m truly sorry.”

The room was now completely silent. All eyes now turned towards Elsa, who was blushing furiously.

“Anna, I…” she said feebly. “I forgive you.”

Anna smiled slightly, her eyes glistening. The silence was painful.

The teacher cleared his throat. “Well, um…” he began. His voice showed deep remorse for the unnecessary drama he had caused. “Let’s all just keep our personal lives to ourselves from now on, alright?” he said. The room remained absolutely silent.  After a few seconds he continued his speech. Elsa now focused on the teacher, trying to block out the embarrassment that her sister’s apology had brought. A short while later, however, she looked back towards her sister.

She was staring at her.

The older girl locked eyes with her sister until tears began to well up in her eyes, at which point she turned her attention back to the teacher.

 

3: So Close, So Far

God, I can’t take waiting much longer. How did I make it through three years of having a seventh class?

Elsa shifted her weight around in a failed attempt at getting comfortable against the fender of her car. She glanced at her watch.

2:15. 45 minutes left.

She dropped her arm to her side.

After a minute or so she reached into her pocket and withdrew her earbuds. The cord had worked itself into a tight coil and the girl spent the next minute untangling it. She looked at her watch again.

2:18.

She sighed.

I hope Anna doesn’t expect me to do this every day for her just because I’m doing it today because I seriously can’t stand this.

A feeling of guilt came over Elsa.

I’m supposed to do this though…

With that thought the blonde removed her phone from her pocket and plugged in her earbuds. She pushed the silicone tips of the tiny speakers into her ears and began playing music.

-----

“Elsa?”

A pause.

“Elsa!”

Still no response.

At this point the inattentive girl’s sister tapped the former on the shoulder to get her attention. The blonde jumped. She ripped her left earbud out angrily and looked up for someone to direct her displeasure towards but instead found Anna. Her harsh eyes gave way to softer ones.

“Oh, hey.”

“Hey…"

The two eyed each other like awkward freshmen at homecoming, Elsa’s music now replaced with the sounds of bus engines and distant conversations among other students. An environment so loud had never felt so silent.

“Who are you waiting for?” Anna finally asked.

Elsa didn’t want to answer but she did so anyway. “You,” she said.

“Huh. Alrighty then,” Anna said. She pulled the strap of her backpack back over her shoulder and walked around to the passenger side of the car.

Elsa pushed herself off the fender of the car. Immediately she realized just how uncomfortable she had become after leaning there for the past hour and a half. She rubbed the crease the fender left in her backside a bit.

Why didn’t I just wait in the car? I’m such an idiot…

“Hey, uh,” Anna started, “mind unlocking it?”

“Yea, sure,” Elsa replied. “Let me find my keys.”

The girl searched her pockets but found nothing. She moved on to her backpack. “Hey, I’m thinking we should go get school supplies,” she said while searching. “Second day, ya know.”

“Yeah, and then we gotta get someone to sign our papers and stuff,” Anna replied dryly.

“Yeah,” Elsa said, now researching her pockets. She stopped speaking for a short while, her attention now shifted to finding her keys. She went back to her backpack.

The silence once again became unbearable for both girls.

“God, where are my damn keys?” Elsa said, temporarily breaking it. Only her own rustling papers answered her.

After a third search Elsa gave up. She stood up and cupped her hands against the glass of the car’s driver side window and peered inside. The keys were in the ignition. She groaned.

“Locked your keys in the car?” Anna asked.

“Yea…”

Elsa looked to the top of the window. It was rolled up completely. Elsa began looking around for other ways to get in and eventually worked her way around to Anna who was now looking in at the keys herself.

“Ugh… We’re so close…” she said.

“Yeah, but we’re also so far away at the same time,” Elsa replied.

Anna glanced up at her sister. “Not helping,” she said oddly playfully before returning to peering in at the keys.

Elsa leaned against the rear door of the car and removed her phone from her pocket. Anna pulled away from the window and leaned next to Elsa.

“Whatcha doing?” she asked.

“Looking for a locksmith to call,” Elsa replied.

“Huh.”

Elsa remained focused on finding a locksmith, her fingers darting left and right across the screen of her phone. After a short while she lifted her phone to her ear.

“Hi, I’m looking for someone to come unlock my car for me. I locked my keys inside,” she said. “I’m at Eagle Valley High School, in the front lot.”

The world went silent to Anna as her sister listened to the person on the other end of her call.

“Alright, thanks,” Elsa said before lowering her phone. “They’ll be here in about fifteen minutes,” she said.

Anna didn’t speak. Neither did Elsa.

All the buses had left. The two were completely alone in the parking lot.

The older girl shoved her phone back into her pocket. She let her eyes wander as she leaned against the side of her car. A pair of birds caught her attention and she watched them for a few minutes. They stayed in roughly the same area for the entire time, flying around each other in rough circles.

Elsa checked her watch.

3:20. I called the guy at 3:15. Only ten more minutes.

The ten minutes passed, still no locksmith.

Still neither girl spoke.

In truth both girls had a lot to talk about. They just didn’t want to talk about the events of their PE class, and they both decided that the best way to avoid doing so was to refrain from speaking altogether.

Elsa looked skyward once more and found the two birds in the same place they had been previously, tracing out the same rough circles as before.

Must be mating season or something.

She kept her gaze towards the birds. After a while she looked back down at her watch.

3:35. Where the hell is this guy?

She looked back up at the birds, still following the same pattern as before. She continued watching them for nearly twenty minutes, completely transfixed by their movements. It was her sister that brought her out of her trance.

“Hey, uh, Elsa… How much longer do you think it’s gonna be?” she asked.

Elsa looked to her sister. “Oh, uh, I don’t know,” she said. Immediately she turned her attention back to the birds.

Another half an hour passed, and then an hour. At this point Anna was watching the birds as well.

A car passed by. Then a motorcycle.

“They never touch,” Anna said. “Not even a little bit.”

Elsa glanced over to her sister. She didn’t know that the younger girl was also watching the birds. “Huh?” she said.

“The birds. They haven’t touched this entire time,” Anna replied.

“Yeah,” Elsa said. “They haven’t.”

-----

After almost two hours the birds flew down below the trees, out of view of the two sisters. Immediately they both realized just how long they had been watching them. The shadows on the ground had grown long, the sky boasting a faint red tinge as the day drew near to sunset.

Elsa stood upright. She looked at her watch.

6:40?! Holy shit it’s getting late.

“You know, I don’t think this locksmith is gonna show up,” Anna said.

“Yeah, me neither,” Elsa said.

She waited about three minutes before she walked over to the nearest patch of dirt. She grabbed a small rock and walked back to her car.

“I’m sick of waiting,” she said. She drew her arm back and smashed the rock against the passenger side rear window of the car. She pulled her hand away, revealing a chipped but intact piece of glass.

“Elsa, what the hell?!” Anna said, startled.

 

“I told you, I’m sick of waiting,” Elsa said. She drew her arm back again and hit the window with even more force, sending cracks outward throughout the glass. She even chipped the rock.

“Elsa just stop, we can walk home from here or something, you don’t need to-”

The window shattered, sending glass flying into the backseat of the car. Elsa reached inside and unlocked the front passenger door by hand.

“Get in,” she said, walking around to the other side of the car.

Anna just stared in amazement.

“Well?” Elsa said.

“Yeah, hang on,” Anna replied sheepishly. She pulled the handle of the passenger door and brushed a few pieces of glass off her seat before sitting down. She reached over and unlocked the driver’s side door for her sister.

Elsa got in, sat down, and started the car. She backed out of her parking space and began driving towards the exit of the parking lot. As she made her way onto the street another car entered the driveway to the school. Neither girl caught more than a glimpse of the vehicle but they both noticed one thing about it.

On the side was a small sign, with the words “Eagle Valley Locksmith” written across it.

“God fucking dammit,” Elsa said. She looked over at her sister and let out a sigh. Anna said nothing, giving only a painful smile for sympathy.

They made it home in half the time it usually took.

As soon as the engine was off, Elsa got out of the car. She closed her door, grabbed her things out of the backseat, and stormed into the house. Anna followed a few seconds after, in a notably calmer manner.

Just as the door latched shut, a pair of doves descended over the neighborhood, landing on the power lines just in front of the two girls’ home.

 

4: Twenty Pound

A piece of shattered glass sent the light of the early morning sun into Elsa’s eyes. The girl reached a hand up to block the light before moving out of the beam’s path and picking up the transparent crystal with her free hand. She transferred it from her right into her left, which grasped a few other small fragments of glass. The girl looked around a bit more before pushing herself out of the backseat of the car and walking up to the front to drop her handful of shattered glass into a blue plastic bucket.

“How much more do you figure is left on your side?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” said her sister, who was helping the blonde clear the car of broken glass. “I’d say another handful or two.”

The older girl sighed.

I suppose this is the part where I say I’m sorry for being an airhead or something, right?

She stood still for a while, staring off into empty space.

God, if I would’ve just waited another two minutes the damn locksmith would’ve been there and I wouldn’t have a broken window right now… But why the hell did that guy take so damn long to show up? Did he have like twenty other-

“Gah, dammit!” Anna exclaimed.

Elsa shot her gaze downward towards her sister. She was sucking on the pad of her left index finger, her entire left hand supported at the wrist by her right.

Elsa ran around the car, accidentally knocking over the bucket they had been putting the pieces of glass in. “You alright?” she asked.

“Yea, I’m fine.. It’s just- this stupid piece of glass cut me,” Anna said. She pulled her finger away from her mouth to look at the cut. Her finger was flushed white save for a small bubble of blood almost in the center. A faint circle surrounded it, highlighting the girl’s fingerprints a bright shade of red.

Elsa kneeled down behind her sister and rested her hand on the redhead’s shoulder, partly to balance herself and partly to let her sister know she was there. The older girl caught a glimpse of her sister’s finger and quickly became transfixed by the small cut. Something about it interested her intensely.

I’ve never seen Anna bleed before…

The redhead put her finger back to her lips and began sucking the blood from the cut once more.

Wait, what the hell kind of a thought was that?

Elsa’s eyes widened at her own strange thought. She shook her head a bit, as if to shake the thought out of her head.

“Hey, uh, I’m gonna get you a band-aid or something,” she said.

“Oh, uh, alright,” Anna replied.

Elsa walked off towards the house. She had hoped that her thoughts would venture away from whatever sadistic place they were in but they only went deeper.

Anna… All of what she is, it’s in her blood… Take that away and she dies…

Elsa opened the medicine cabinet and began looking through the boxes of bandages for one that would suit her sister’s injury.

I guess that’s all it would take to kill someone, isn’t it? Just drain them out… They die.

She closed the cabinet door and walked back out to of the house to meet her sister. She was still sucking on her finger, picking up more glass with her free hand.

“Got your band-aid,” Elsa said.

Anna sat up and looked towards her sister. “Oh, thanks,” she said. She reached for the bandage but Elsa pulled her hand away.

“Let me,” she insisted.

“Uh, alright,” Anna said, confused.

Elsa took her sisters left hand in her own. Instead of applying a bandage to the cut, however, she squeezed the cut like a pimple with her right thumb and index finger. She wiped away the blood with her index finger and rubbed it with her thumb. It had a very watery texture to it at first but as it spread over Elsa’s skin it began more gelatinous, rolling into thin grey tubes. She then rolled the tubes in the other direction, forming them into balls.

“Uhhh…”

“Oh, sorry,” Elsa said. She dropped the grey balls of blood onto the concrete of the driveway. She peeled back the wrapper of the bandage and applied it to her sister’s cut.

“There ya go! All better.”

“Yea… Thanks.”

Elsa stood to walk back to the house, but stopped to pick up the bucket she had knocked over earlier. When she noticed that all its contents had spilled out over the driveway, she set the bucket back down.

“Damn, I’m gonna get the broom, alright?” the blonde said.

“Ok.”

Elsa walked around to the back of the house and returned shortly afterward with a broom and dustpan. The glass was swept up and in the bucket within a few seconds. After she poured the last of it into the bucket, she stared in at the glass.

“What the heck are you doing?” Anna asked, mildly irritated by her sister’s strange actions.

Elsa looked over her shoulder towards her sister. “Oh, uh, nothing,” she said before returning her gaze to the bucket of shattered glass. She reached into the bucket and pulled out a particularly shiny piece of glass.

“You gonna dump that or…?”

“Oh, yea just gimme a second,” the blonde said, staring at the glass intently.

“Pssh, alright,” Anna said. She started to walk towards the house when her sister jabbed the piece of glass into her left index finger.

“Hey! What the hell?” Anna yelled.

Elsa pulled away the glass and dropped it in the bucket. A small bubble of blood began forming on her finger. She squeezed the cut, wiped away the blood, and rubbed it between her fingers as she had done with her sister’s blood, rolling it into a small grey ball. She rolled it between her fingers, somewhat proud of her work.

“What the hell was that, Elsa?!” Anna asked, both concerned and frightened.

Elsa turned to face her sister. The younger girl had her arms out to her sides, palms upward in a questioning gesture. Her facial expression was one of both surprise and concern. Elsa glanced to her sister’s cut index finger- freshly bandaged.

“Huh? Oh… I don’t know,” the blonde said. Without saying anything else she started walking towards the house.

“Wh- What?” Anna asked. “Where the hell are you going?”

“To get more band-aids.”  

-----
 

The bell rang.

Dammit, I’m late.

The girl ran through the empty halls as fast as she could, hoping that maybe if she got to class soon enough the teacher would cut her a break. With Dr. Agdarson it was a far stretch, but even Elsa had a bit of optimism.

1210, 1212, I need 1218… There.

She burst in the door and immediately all eyes were on her.

“Elsa? Care to explain to the class why you’re late on only the third day of class?”

Care to explain why you’re a nosy prick?

“Uhh, I lost track of the time.”

“Oh! What a great reason,” Dr. Agdarson said sarcastically. He clearly wasn’t buying the girl’s excuse, but it really didn’t matter what she had said. He wasn’t the type to let people slide on tardies. “Take your seat, Elsa,” he said.

The girl walked back to her seat and sat quietly. Most of the class was still looking at her.

After a while, Dr. Agdarson spoke to the class again. “Alright, how about you all take out your signed course syllabuses for me to collect?”

Fuck, here we go.

The person sitting behind Elsa passed her a small stack of signed syllabuses, and Elsa passed it along to the person in front of her without adding her own syllabus to the pile.

Dr. Agdarson began collecting the stacks from the front of each row, starting on the right side. Elsa sat two rows from the far left. As he picked up the piles of paper he checked to make sure everyone turned theirs in. A lump grew in Elsa’s throat.

Great, it’s the third day of school and I’m already gonna miss an assignment- on top of being tardy.

After a short while the teacher reached Elsa’s row.

“Why don’t you have your class syllabus signed, Elsa?”

Better think of something quick.

“I uh… I don’t know.”

Great.

The teacher stood still, a look of irritation and disappointment on his face. The rest of the class sat quietly.

“Ya know, I think your parents should hear about this. This and the tardy. I’d like to call them,” he said.

Yeah, me too, asshole.

“What’s their number?”

“Uh…” the girl began. “They’re... not really available right now.”

“Not available, hm?” the teacher said, even more irritated. “You sure about that?”

“Yea, I’m pretty sure.”

Only the gentle ticking of the clock answered her. The teacher walked back behind his desk and sat down. Gradually silence’s grip over the room lifted and the room filled with conversation. Almost everyone was talking with someone.

Everyone except Elsa. The girl was too concerned with whatever it was the teacher was doing behind his desk. He seemed to be writing something, but she couldn’t tell what it was.

Then it hit her.

He’s writing a referral.

Wait, a referral? For not getting my syllabus signed? Well I guess I was tardy, too, but still...

She had thought that knowing what the teacher was doing would calm her but in reality it did quite the opposite. Elsa had never gotten a referral. Not in high school, not in middle school, and not in elementary school.

So my first referral ever is gonna be about me not getting something signed? What a load of crap. What the hell are they gonna make me do?

That thought worried her even more. What were they going to make her do?

I’m gonna have to tell them.

The girl’s heart and mind raced, desperate to find a solution to an impossible problem.

When they find out that Anna and I are alone, they’re gonna... Oh my God... This can’t be happening…

-----
 

5.43 grams.

The weight of a single sheet of paper.

Or, in Elsa’s case, the weight of the world.

1216… 1214…

It took the girl only a few seconds to get to class, but leaving it, at least in this way, took an eternity. Even though the door to the office was getting closer it felt like it was growing farther away.

1204… 1202…

Directly in front of her was the door to the office. To the right was the door to the outside world.

I could run.

The girl looked upwards for any security cameras, finding none.

Screw it.

She turned to her right and kept walking, towards the door. Each step felt like a thousand.

One... two... three...

At her eighth step she stopped. No matter how bad she wanted to run away from this, she knew she couldn’t, so she turned around, walked back to the office, and walked through the door.

 

5: Signed in White Ink

“Anna?”

The redhead turned to see who had called to her and her eyes instantly lit up.

“Elsa!” The young girl said. “What are you doing here?” she asked.

The blonde made her way over to where her sister was seated. Anna sat in a burgundy-colored chair across from the assistant principal’s office. There were two more identical chairs to her right. To her left was a bookshelf. Elsa sat down next to her sister.

“I don’t know,” she said. “They gave me a referral for not getting my syllabus signed.”

That and my tardiness.

“What?” Anna asked, puzzled.

“Yeah, I don’t know,” Elsa said. She slapped the referral against the back of her hand.

“That’s such B.S…” her sister replied, shaking her head.

“I have it right here if you don’t believe me.”

“Ha, yeah, I’m good.”

Anna shuffled in her seat a bit. Elsa sat still.

“So, uh…” the older girl began, “why are you here?”

“Same reason,” Anna said.

Wait a minute, I’m missing something here.

Elsa turned to face her sister. “Wait, then why were you surprised that I got sent down here for that?”

“You fly under the radar,” Anna said. She gave her sister a half-hearted smile.

The vice principal’s office door opened and a tall, skinny boy walked out. The door closed without any sign of the vice principal himself, though. As he walked past the front desk the receptionist waved to him and said “bye-bye, Tuck.”

Elsa didn’t know how to respond. Anna was right, but the redhead herself also flew under the radar, at least as far as Elsa knew.

Only the sounds of the receptionist typing on her keyboard and a ticking clock could be heard. The room smelled of paper and printer ink.

Eventually the vice principal’s office door opened, and Anna was called in.

The lack of her sister’s presence made the room feel cooler to Elsa. She began to look around the room. To the right was a stack of workbooks. Behind them was a shelf that supported what appeared to be an Easter basket with a teddy bear inside it. Why it was there was a mystery.

When Elsa’s thoughts returned to the situation at hand, her nerves also returned. Her sister was currently being interrogated by the assistant principal, and Elsa had no control over what Anna would say.

If she says one wrong word, our lives are ruined.

Elsa turned that thought over in her head, not sure what to do. It’s not like she could just burst in the room and tell her sister not to bring up their parents.

Or could I?

It was a stretch. She contemplated for a bit. Finally Elsa stood and walked to the receptionist. The older woman didn’t notice her for a while.

“Hi,” the woman said.

“Hi… Um, I was wondering if, since Anna and I are sisters and we’re here for the same reason, if I could go in and talk with Mr. Henderson with her?” Elsa asked.

It sounded like a good plan beforehand, but after she said it Elsa realized how bad it really was. The receptionist was giving her a strange look.

“I’ll ask him,” the older woman said. She stood from her chair and walked around the desk and to the vice principal’s office. She knocked on the door.

After a while Mr. Henderson appeared. He and the receptionist spoke quietly, so that neither Elsa nor Anna could hear them.

Shit, he’s probably gonna turn me away.

With both the receptionist and vice principal still speaking, Elsa walked over to where the two were standing and tried to force her way into the office as if she was completely oblivious to the fact that she hadn’t been invited in yet.

“Thanks, Mrs. White,” she said as she pushed her way past Mr. Henderson.

“Um, miss,” he said. “What are you doing?” He was trying to block Elsa from entering the room.

“Well Anna and I are here for the same reason so I figured we’d talk together,” Elsa said, giving a fake look of confusion, as if she had thought what she was doing was normal procedure.

Please buy it…

The assistant principal glanced to Mrs. White for any sign of disapproval from the woman. She offered none so he simply sighed and gestured Elsa into the room, lowering the arm that was preventing her from entering.

The office was much smaller than it seemed on the outside. Anna was seated in one of two chairs, the same as those outside of the room. She had been watching everything- the conversation between Mr. Henderson and Mrs. White, Elsa trying to barge in, Mr. Henderson denying her, and now Elsa’s entry into the room. Now Elsa finally caught a glimpse of her sister. The redhead’s eyes cried out to her for help.

Since Anna was seated away from the door, Elsa took the seat closer to the door, to the right of Mr. Henderson’s desk.

The office door closed and the room fell completely silent, as if it were soundproofed.

Mr. Henderson began speaking before he even came into view of either girl. “So, Elsa, since you’re so eager to come barging in here and talk with me, what do you have to say for yourself?” he said. He was now seated behind his desk, his chin resting on his hands, clenched together in one large fist shape.

Elsa’s heart dropped.

Shit, I didn’t think this through.

“I, uh… I don’t know, I just thought that since Anna and I are sisters and we’re here for the same reason that it might help if I were here with her.”

“Then help,” Mr. Henderson said.

Can’t you fucking tell that I don’t know how to help yet?

A clock ticked. This one was louder and deeper than the clock in the main office.

“Uh… Maybe if you could just get me up to speed…”

Mr. Henderson rolled his seat forward and straightened his posture. “Well, I’ve been trying to get some kind of answer as to why your parents can’t sign your syllabus out of your sister here since the very beginning.” He spoke much louder than he did before.

Great.

“I, uh… I don’t have much to add…” Elsa said.

“You’re kidding, right?” Mr. Henderson began. “You have nothing?”

Elsa drew in a sharp breath, but simply let it back out. Whatever she had to say couldn’t help. At least, it couldn’t help her sister or she.

Mr. Henderson pointed out Elsa’s abandoned attempt at a rebuttal. “See? You do have something! You’re just not saying it!” he said. He was practically yelling now. “What is it?!”

“I… uh…” Elsa said.

“Alright,” the vice principal said. He reached into one of the filing cabinets within his desk. He pulled out a sheet of paper and sat it on his desk. “On this here paper is a list of disciplinary actions.” He placed his index finger on “warning.” “I’m gonna start moving across this list and I’m not gonna stop until you speak up. Whatever I land on is what you both get.”

His finger began moving, first from “warning” to “lunch detention,” then to “alternative to suspension,” and so on.

Anna frantically looked between the paper and her sister, unsure of what to do. She stuttered out a few whimpers of protest. The man’s finger was now at “suspension - 3 days.” Eventually Anna’s eyes and mouth stopped moving, but Mr. Henderson’s finger did not.

Suspension - 5 days... Involuntary transfer… Expulsion.

The vice principal looked up, perplexed. Clearly this was a technique he had used before, and one that had never failed him.

Mr. Henderson stood up from his chair and began pacing back and forth, infuriated. “Why won’t you two talk? What the hell is the deal with your parents? Are they dead, for God’s sake?!”

No words could have stung more.

“Actually… Yes...” Anna said, her voice frail and weak.

Oh boy…

Immediately Mr. Henderson stopped pacing. He looked over to the two girls and met their glassy eyes with his own. He was utterly speechless. Slowly he sat back down behind his desk.

The clock ticked.

“You- You can go back to class,” he said. His voice was now as weak as Anna’s. He crossed his arms across his desk and shook his head into them.

The two girls left the room without a word.

After he was sure they were completely gone, Mr. Henderson exited his office and walked over to Mrs. White’s desk. He tapped his fingers on the desk to get her attention.

“What d’ya need?” she asked.

“I… I’m gonna need to talk with someone in the foster care system.”

 

6: Scenes From a Memory

“Elsa, Mr. Henderson would like to see you.”

Elsa’s head shot up to catch her AP Norwegian teacher walking to where she sat, a small slip of paper in hand.

“It says immediately so I suppose you should go now.”

That can’t be a good thing.

The blonde grabbed the paper, packed her things and walked out of class, fearing the worst.

Down the hall, to the right, down the stairs, to the left, and into the office. She’d gone that same way almost every day, save for the entrance to the office. It wasn’t a particularly long journey, but, given the circumstances, today it felt like it went on for an eternity.

When she entered the office it was completely empty aside from staff. Mrs. White waved Elsa into Mr. Henderson’s room without the girl even having to approach her. It seemed as though everyone there was expecting her.

Upon entering Mr. Henderson’s office, Elsa noticed that another figure sat in the seat she had occupied the previous day. Something about him was off, but Elsa couldn’t put her finger on it.

After a second or two the man looked over his shoulder. His mouth curled into a slight grin when he caught sight of Elsa.

“Oh, hello!” he said. The man stood to offer Elsa a seat.

“Hi,” Elsa said shyly, hardly acknowledging the man’s presence. She took her seat farthest from the door, where her sister had sat the day before.

The other man took his seat as well. “Alright then,” he said. “Let’s begin, shall we?” Clearly whatever he planned to “begin” was not something anyone was looking forward to.

Mr. Henderson cleared his throat and Elsa turned her attention to him. “Elsa, given the circumstances you and your sister are living in,” he began, “I had no choice but to contact child protective services.”

How wonderful.

Mr. Henderson sped up his speech briefly. “Now, that may sound bad, but, in reality, it’s quite good for you two.”

Elsa rolled her eyes.

“Now, what’s going to happen right now is Dr. Westergard here is going to take you and your sister to his office for regression therapy. Then, you’ll both come back here to discuss what we’re going to do about your living situation.”

For the first time, Elsa felt the need to butt in. “Wait,” she said, “regression therapy? Why do we need that?”

Mr. Henderson opened his mouth to speak but was cut off by Dr. Westergard. “I know you’ve both been through a lot,” he said. His voice was incredibly soothing and calm. “...And I believe that regression therapy is the best way to help you.”

Elsa let out a sigh. “Whatever,” she said.

Dr. Westergard hesitated, but then stood and opened the door, gesturing Elsa to exit the room with him. The girl obliged.

I’m probably gonna regret this.

As soon as Elsa was past the door, Dr. Westergard stepped ahead of Elsa, leading her out of the office. As she made her way to the front door of the school, she counted her steps.

One... two... three…

She looked to her left to see her reflection in the large window that enclosed the office.

Eight… Nine…

As she drew closer to the door, a feeling of loss grew within her.

Twelve… Thirteen…

Even though she hated going to school every day, leaving under these circumstance made her wish she could stay for eternity.

By her twentieth step, Elsa was outside the door. As the door closed behind her, she realized something:

I might not come back after today.

-----

The sliding door of Dr. Westergard’s minivan opened, sending a bright light into the back seat. As the two sisters exited the minivan, both girls brought a hand up to their forehead, shielding their eyes. Elsa was outside first, so she took some time to look around. While her sight was still not fully adjusted to the bright light, she could make out a small, white building in front of her, surrounded by trees. It looked exactly how she thought a psychiatrist’s office would look.

Once Anna was out of the minivan, Dr. Westergard took some time to talk about his office and how he became a doctor. Nearly all of what was said flew right past Elsa’s ears. All she could think about was what would become of her relationship with her sister after this whole thing was through. She had already done research on the protocol for orphans in their teenage years, and had found that one possibility was that her sister would likely go to a foster home while she would become an “emancipated minor.” Then, when Anna turned 16, she too would become an emancipated minor, and they could live together again.

That was the best case scenario.

In reality both girls’ lives would likely be ruined by the foster system. They would be sent from city to city, constantly transferring schools, and they would almost certainly be separated.

As if we ever spend any time together anyways.

These thoughts kept Elsa in a Glass Prison for the entire day. She walked through the halls of Dr. Westergard’s office only partly there. She went through the monotony of introducing herself to the secretary, finding her way to Dr. Westergard’s room, and then waiting outside the door for Anna, who had gone first, to finish her session with the doctor as only half a person. Her thoughts kept revolving around her parents’ death, her future, and Anna’s future, and somehow it always managed to make her feel at fault.

For everything.

-----

The door opened with a click followed by a low whoosh of air escaping the small room in which Dr. Westergard conducted his business. Anna exited first, her entire form blank and absent of emotion. Then came Dr. Westergard.

“Alright, Elsa,” he said. “Your turn.”

Elsa stood without a word and Anna sat down in the chair beside Elsa’s, closest to the door. The older girl entered the office and was immediately hit with a rush of cold air. Dr. Westergard offered Elsa a seat in an incredibly plush chair before sitting down himself in a much less comfortable chair. He cleared his throat, and for a moment he had Elsa’s full attention.

“What’s up with the huge chair?” the girl asked.

“Well,” Dr. Westergard replied, “you’ll dream more easy in a chair that really fits you.” His face lit up in a slightly reassuring grin. Regardless of how badly Elsa wished she had never had to meet him, she couldn’t deny that Dr. Westergard was quite charming.

“I don’t think any of this is necessary, honestly,” Elsa said. She knew it was hopeless to try and get out of doing therapy now, but it was still worth trying.

“Well I do,” the man replied. “After all, it did help your parents quite a bit.”

Elsa felt a rush of adrenaline hit her at the notion of her parents. “Wait,” she said, “you were my parents’ therapist?”

Dr. Westergard looked slightly surprised. “They didn’t tell you?” he asked.

“No…”

They never told me anything.

“Oh… Well, yes, I was their therapist,” he said hesitantly. “They were going through a bit of a, um, rough relationship, in the last few months of their lives.”

Elsa sat straight upright in her chair. Dr. Westergard now had her completely attention. “Well? Talk!” she commanded.

“No. I’m here to listen to you, not the other way around,” Dr. Westergard replied. “If I may ease your-”

“No, you may not,” Elsa said. “I’ll do your stupid therapy crap but first I want you to tell me about what happened to my parents.”

“I don’t think you want to hear it.”

“I don’t care.”

Dr. Westergard paused. “Fine,” he said. “Your mother was in a bit of a ‘love triangle’ with another man. She was never very cooperative during our therapy sessions, and your father became filled with rage. It got worse and worse, until… one night…” he paused again. “He took her to a park for a… a date, and… and he killed her, before taking his own life.”

The room fell dead silent. Only the ticking of a clock and the whir of the air conditioner filled Elsa’s ears.

“I… I was told… that they died in a, a car crash,” Elsa said. Her voice was frail and weak.

“Well…” the man started, “I suppose that whoever told you that was just trying to protect you.”

Both Elsa and Dr. Westergard paused. Then, the doctor pushed his chair over to a cabinet on the wall. He opened it and removed a folded up piece of notebook paper.

“I, uh… I don’t know if this will help anything, but, I have your dad’s suicide letter.”

Elsa reached out and took the paper from him. It was stiff and stained with what appeared to be either coffee or alcohol. She unfolded it and read it aloud.

“I feel there’s only one thing left to do…” she began. “I’d sooner take my life away than live with… losing you.”

She tried to fake a laugh to lighten the mood, adding “at least he made it rhyme,” but it was only a matter of seconds before her attempted humour gave way to her true emotion. An onslaught of horrific wailing and tears pelted the girl, her only thought: “why?”

-----

The regression therapy session was rescheduled.

Elsa and Anna now both sat in the back of Dr. Westergard’s minivan, on their way back to the school. No one dared speak.

The card Dr. Westergard had given Elsa had a handwritten date and time across the back. The girl sat staring blankly at the words written across the paper. Then she reached into her pocket for the suicide letter she had been given. She didn’t know why, but part of her felt like if she saw it One Last Time she might finally come to terms with the reality of her parents’ death.

It didn’t help even slightly. Elsa’s eyes again welled into tears, but she held them back. When she finally regained her composure she forced herself to read it in its entirety.

The exercise was nothing short of self torture.

She folded the paper and shoved it back into her pocket, pulling back out the business card Dr. Westergard had given her on accident. As she put the card back into her pocket something caught her eye.

The letter “u” looked identical on both papers.

So did the letter “g.”

So did every letter.

It was then that Elsa realized the truth behind her parents’ death.

My father didn’t kill my mother. This man did, and now he’s using my dad as a scapegoat.

Elsa’s thoughts raced. She knew it was a stretch but she would’ve sooner believed that than that her father had committed a murder-suicide. All at once, she thought about screaming, crying, punching Dr. Westergard, punching herself…

She did none of these.

Tears welled up in Elsa’s eyes as the minivan came to a stop at a red light. After the vehicle had completely stopped, Elsa’s eyes erupted once more into another onslaught of emotion, this time one more of rage than of sadness.

Anna tried to comfort Elsa, but it was no use. Still crying intensely, the blonde unbuckled her seatbelt, opened the sliding door of the minivan and stumbled out onto the curb.

“Hey!” Dr. Westergard yelled. He too unbuckled his seatbelt and flung his door open, hitting the car next to him. Anna also got out.

Elsa ran. She couldn’t see where she was going, but she didn’t care. She was at least certain that she was getting away from the man that had killed her parents.

Dr. Westergard and Anna pursued the blonde along the sidewalk. A few other people watched from their cars. “ELSA!” Anna yelled out.

Elsa kept running with no intent of stopping. Her tears made it nearly impossible to see, however, and she came crashing into a pole.

As she noticed Dr. Westergard and Anna approaching her Elsa began to sob even more violently. She tried desperately to crawl away from them but they caught up to her within seconds. As the pair tried to calm her down, she began screaming at the top of her lungs.

“YOU KILLED THEM!”

“Elsa! Calm down!”

“YOU FUCKING KILLED THEM!!” she exclaimed, still sobbing intensely.

“Elsa!” her sister yelled.

“NO!!! STOP FUCKING LYING TO ME!”

“Please calm down, Elsa.”

“NO!!! YOU’RE A MURDERER! YOU’RE A MURDERER, HANS WESTERGARD!!”

 

7: Basal, Reflective, Psych

Dr. Westergard’s turn signal blinked monotonously as the trio sat and waited for a clearing in traffic in front of the driveway of Eagle Valley High School. The engine of the vehicle whirred gently. Dr. Westergard himself tried his hardest to put the events of the day as far back in his mind as possible. Anna stared absently out the side window at an empty lot on the corner just across the street from the school.

As she sat she reminisced on her freshman year, walking across that lot every day after school to be picked up by her parents. Every day she would trudge uphill through the weeds that covered the lot. She could’ve just walked around it, but it was far faster to just walk straight through. Then, she would open the door of her parent’s car, hop in the back seat, and wait for her sister. Elsa always showed up second. While she waited, Anna’s parents would interrogate her on the happenings of the day at school. It was almost always the same thing every day: “How was your day?”, “Good.”; “Did you learn anything?”, “Yea.” Then, she’d look out the window to see Elsa running like mad to get to the car; like she was scared her parents would take off without her. Then she’d hop in the front seat, apologize for being late, say hello to Anna, and then they’d take off, headed home. As a family.

Oh what she’d pay to return to those times.

All the while, Elsa sat in the back seat of the car, still sobbing. At every sharp intake of breath and every violent release the two sitting in the front seats cringed. Both were certain they had never seen an emotional release so pure and intense.

A break in traffic came, and Dr. Westergard accelerated the minivan over the skirt of the driveway and into the school’s parking lot. The man pulled the vehicle into the nearest parking space and exited immediately. Anna followed suit, and Dr. Westergard opened the door for Elsa. Immediately he fled behind the door, afraid the girl might lash out at him. He and Anna both acted as if they were dealing with a skittish animal.

Eventually Elsa stumbled out of the vehicle, face contorted and reddened from her crying. If she wasn’t already so drained of life she probably would’ve tried to run again, but instead she slowly made her way towards the front door of the school. Anna and Dr. Westergard followed the sad girl.

Her sobs followed the blonde all the way to the door of the school. She opened the door and fell through the threshold, barely catching herself from falling. A teacher’s assistant glimpsed over to the door from the intersection of two hallways a few metres away. He stood and stared, confused and worried, before continuing on down the hallway.

As Elsa walked the distance from the door to the office she counted her steps once more.

One… Two… Three…

The girl realized that she was indeed back at her school; she was back where she knew there would be a routine, where everything would be predictable, where at the very least her peers and teachers, desperate for a better grade or higher pay, would be willing to prostitute their condolences for her.

Ten… Eleven…

She realized that even if she and Anna were to be separated due to the foster care system that it would only last a few years at most.

Fourteen… Fifteen....

She realized that regardless of how corrupted and hopeless she was, her sister still had a tiny bit of joy and innocence left.

Something worth protecting.

Eighteen… Nineteen…

By now her crying had diminished to a gentle whimper.

That’s it. My life might be all but ruined, but Anna still has the chance to change. I need to make sure she doesn’t end up like me.

She entered the office.

Nearly everyone stared directly at her. Even those in other rooms were staring in at Elsa through the glass. Her eyes were red, her hair messy, and her shirt drenched in tears and cold sweat. The girl heard someone whisper “my God, what happened to her?” under their breath.

What did happen to me?

Dr. Westergard placed his hand on Elsa’s shoulder. “Let’s go back to Mr. Henderson’s office, Elsa,” he said.

Elsa looked back to see that her sister was sort of hiding behind Dr. Westergard. Only her eyes were visible above the man’s left shoulder. They shone of sympathy as well as fear.

She’s… scared of me.

Elsa locked eyes with her sister until her lips began to flutter with the onset of another tormentual release of emotion. She forced herself to face forward and walk to Mr. Henderson’s office.

As soon as she reached for the door, however, a small whimper escaped her, followed by more tears. She collapsed into the door, forcing it open.

“Jesus!” Mr. Henderson exclaimed. “What the hell did you do to her?” he asked accusingly.

“N- Nothing!” Dr. Westergard replied in his own defense.

Elsa made no attempt to stand or move out of the doorway.

“Then how do you explain this?!” Mr. Henderson shot back, directing the psychiatrist’s attention to the crying figure that lay between the two.

“I- I don’t know! I told her that I was her parents’ psychiatrist and I gave her her father’s suicide letter so she might be able to cope better or something and then on the way here she just got out of the car and ran and when I caught up to her she was screaming that I murdered her parents!”

Everyone in the room aside from Anna and Dr. Westergard were completely stunned. For a few seconds the only sound in the room was of Elsa’s crying.

“Brilliant fucking work, Hans,” Mr. Henderson finally said. Everyone in the office was now even more speechless due to the assistant principal’s use of profanity, especially directly in front of students.

“Bu- But I-” Dr. Westergard began.

“Get out of my goddamn office.” Mr. Henderson snarled.

Hans drew in a breath to voice his defense but ultimately just looked around the room, saw that no one was in his favour, and let out his breath in a sigh before turning around and leaving. He slammed the office door on his way out.

Meanwhile, Elsa’s tears had dwindled due to Mr. Henderson’s display of proctectiveness over her.

He was the closest thing to a father she had had in months.

The girl’s feelings of emptiness and hopelessness remained intact, however. The way that Anna had looked at her- the sheer pain she saw in her eyes- destroyed any glimmer of false hope the elder sibling had conjured during her walk to the office. The little bit of joy Elsa thought Anna still had left was clearly long gone.

Thanks to me.

Mr. Henderson kneeled down to talk to the blonde. “Elsa,” he said softly. “Can you get up and take a seat?”

The girl didn’t respond verbally. She simply pushed herself up before falling back into the seat closest to her. Anna walked behind her and took her seat to the left of Elsa. She pushed her chair away slightly, closer to the wall than to her sister.

I must be a monster.

The door closed behind Mr. Henderson as he took his seat behind his large desk. He leaned over to Anna and whispered something in her ear. She whispered something back to him.

“Elsa,” Mr. Henderson said, trying to get the girl’s attention.

She didn’t respond.

“Elsa.”

Still only her faint whimpering answered him.

“Elsa,” Anna said, placing a hand on the distraught girl’s shoulder. For a second Elsa’s whimpering faltered, and both Anna and Mr. Henderson were sure she would finally make an effort to talk.

Unfortunately, the girl continued crying, now slightly harder than before. Her sister’s touch, while reassuring of her value to her sister, was also reassuring of how unworthy of her sister’s love she felt.

“Elsa,” Mr. Henderson began, “we need to talk about the living situation you and Anna are facing.”

Fucking great.

“Now, unless you can come up with any ideas I’m going to have to place this in the hands of the foster care system.”

You didn’t give me enough time to think about any fucking ideas.

“So, I’m going to give you a week to think, and then we’ll talk again,” Mr. Henderson said. He then rose from his seat and began walking out of the room.

Suddenly Elsa’s head shot up. “I know what we can do!” she yelled, her voice slurred and nearly unintelligible due to her crying. “Our parents! They were rich!”

She let out a choked up whimper when she drew in more breath. “They left a massive inheritance for us I’ll bet!”

“Alright, Elsa,” Mr. Henderson said. “We’ll talk about it next week. You’re both excused from the remainder of your classes today.” He then walked the rest of the way to the door and out.

“I’m serious!” Elsa yelled. She tried to grab Mr. Henderson’s leg to somehow force him to listen. “I’M SERIOUS!” she exclaimed.

When the door shut her head fell into her hands and she began to cry once more. Anna laid her arm across her sister’s back in a futile attempt to comfort the blonde.

A few seconds later the door flung back open.

“Elsa!” a boy’s voice exclaimed.

It was Olaf.

“Elsa, are you alright?” he asked. He already knew the answer, but he didn’t know what else to say.

When she didn’t answer him, he looked to Anna, and the redhead took the time to fill him in on the events of the day- from their parent’s death to the regression therapy to the suicide note- everything.

“My God,” he said. He then gestured for Anna to leave the room, to which the girl responded.

Once the door shut, Olaf took a seat in the chair Anna had just vacated, and began trying everything he could to get Elsa to talk.

“Elsa, um… You know, we all still love you.” he said.

Still no answer.

“Maybe you could stay at my place for a bit?”

Again, silence.

“Um… we could… go see a happy movie? You know, one of those animated Disney ones or something. OH! I know what would cheer you up! We could-”

“My parents weren’t rich,” Elsa finally said, almost inaudibly quietly. Olaf immediately dropped his previous thought.

“Wha- What do you mean?” he asked.

“I told Mr. Henderson that my parents were rich and that they probably left a huge inheritance.”

“Oh, well-”

“They didn’t… they didn’t leave us anything. The never even wrote a will because they didn’t think they needed to yet.”

Olaf had nothing to add.

“Now I have to come up with proof within a week or I’ll never see my sister again.”

“Oh, that’s not true! Even if she goes to foster care, once she gets out she’ll come right-”

“You didn’t see the look she gave me,” Elsa said. “She was scared of me.”

“I don’t think-”

“I’ve already treated her bad enough. After a year or two in the foster system she’ll… she’ll never want to come back to me, because it’ll be my fault that she ended up there. If I could’ve kept my mouth shut or if I could’ve actually come up with some money she wouldn’t have ever had to go their.”

“You’re saying all this like it already happened.” Olaf said.

“It might as well have.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Oh yeah? Why the hell not?”

“I think I can help.”

8: A Helping Hand

Help. I needed it- a normal job, some money even, or simply moral support...

I didn’t need to be a meth cook. In fact, that was probably the last thing I needed. Olaf’s offering was completely absurd. I couldn’t accept it.

But I did.

-----

“You’re insane.”

“No, really! This could work, I promise!”

“And what makes you think that?”

“I don’t know, I’ve watched all of Breaking Bad? Look, you just be Walt, and I’ll be Jesse.”

Olaf laughed. “No,” he started. “Breaking Bad is a tv show, alright? If you want to not get arrested within a week you’re gonna have to get rid of the idea that either of us are like Walter White or Jesse Pinkman here.”

Elsa pouted.

If I’m gonna be a meth cook, can’t I at least try to have some fun?

“Now, I’m not really much of a meth expert, but I know people. There’s a guy-”

“What do you mean you know people?” Elsa asked, somewhat condescendingly.

“I used to sell cocaine,” Olaf said. He stopped and giggled a bit before finishing his thought. “They called me the snowman.”

Elsa busted up laughing.

“Shut up!” Olaf said, playfully hitting the girl on the shoulder. “It was a really clever nickname, ok?”

“Yeah, sure, snowman,” Elsa said, still laughing. “What’s my nickname gonna be? Ice queen?”

Olaf’s face lit up. “That is seriously perfect!” he said before he too started to laugh.

After a while the two calmed down, but neither spoke up immediately.

“Ya know,” Olaf began, his tone now serious, “you sure have pulled a 180 from back at school, crying like that.”

“It’s been three hours.”

“Yea, I know, it’s just that… I don’t know. You seemed like you’d never be able to laugh or smile again in your life,” Olaf said, adding a half-hearted giggle to lighten the mood. He knew he was treading a bit heavy for the occasion.

“I guess it’s just the whole idea of doing something this illegal. I feel rebellious,” Elsa said. She smiled slightly after she finished, one corner of her mouth rising higher than the other in a lopsided smirk.

The duo fell silent. Somewhere in another room a clock ticked softly.

Eventually Elsa spoke up. “So… How do we proceed?” she asked, somewhat humourously.

“Well,” Olaf began, “as I was saying, I don’t know jack shit about cooking meth, so you’re gonna have to find someone to show you how it’s-”

“Wait, you can’t be serious! You expect me to just go around asking people if they can teach me how to cook meth?” Elsa asked, concerned.

“Not exactly, but… sort of.” Olaf said. Elsa rolled her eyes. “I know a few people that are in the business, I just don’t know if they’re willing to teach,” he continued.

“So why don’t you ask them yourself?” Elsa asked.

“Because…” Olaf began. He groaned when he realised he couldn’t come up with a good answer to the girl’s question. “That’s just… These guys… It wouldn’t work, alright?” he said. “Trust me, they won’t snitch or anything.”

Well that’s comforting.

Elsa sighed. “Alright, whatever,” she said, unsatisfied with the task she now faced. Finding someone to teach her to make and sell illegal drugs wasn’t exactly her forte.

“Okay, cool,” Olaf said. “I’ll get together a list of the guys I know that might be able to help.” He waited for Elsa’s response, but the girl said nothing, so he went off to fetch a piece of paper.

Suddenly, the world came crashing down on the blonde. She finally realised what she was doing. She wanted to run out of the boy’s house and never see him again, but she didn’t. She wanted to tell him she changed her mind about cooking meth, but she didn’t. She wanted to go back in time, change her past, make it so her parents never died. So Hans never became their therapist.

But she couldn’t.

“Alright,” Olaf said, walking back into the room. “Here ya go.” He handed the girl the note, a piece of printer paper sloppily torn on two sides.

There were three names on the list: John W, Alex C, and Tucker C.

“Um, do you have anything other than initials for me to work with?” Elsa asked, unsatisfied with the note.

“Nah,” Olaf said. “I don’t remember their last names, but I know that’s what they start with.”

Elsa sighed.

I’ll bet there’s more than one Alex C. at our school, Olaf.

“Why don’t you just lighten the hell up, and go find one of these guys tomorrow?” Olaf said.

“Where do I look?” Elsa asked.

“I don’t know, ask around,” Olaf replied. “Here,” he said, grabbing the paper. “Look at this, John W. Why don’t you just ask someone if they know where he hangs out after school?”

This just keeps getting better and better, doesn’t it?

“Look, alright, I’m not setting you up to get in trouble, so lighten the hell up,” Olaf said. “I mean, there’s hardly a thousand people at our school, so I don’t think you’ll end up with the wrong guy or something.”

You don’t think.

Elsa began: “Ya know, I think-”

“You do need the money, right?” Olaf said, cutting the girl off.

Elsa stared in silence at the boy. He was right.

“Yeah…” Elsa said.

“Then get on with it.”

-----

“Anna, do you know anyone named John W?”

“Hm?” Anna said through a mouthful of ramen.

“You know anyone named John W?” Elsa repeated.

“Nah,” Anna replied, her voice still muffled by the noodles. “Why do you ask?”

“Oh, uh, nothing,” Elsa said. Obviously she couldn’t tell her sister the truth.

Anna didn’t reply. Instead she continued gorging on ramen.

Thank god she isn’t being persistent.

Elsa hesitated slightly, expecting Anna to say something, but when the redhead failed to speak, Elsa went back to eating her own ramen, at a much less feverish pace than her sister.

The two didn’t speak for the rest of their dinner, which lasted only five more minutes. Anna finished first, naturally.

After discarding her paper bowl and placing her silverware in the sink, the redhead walked back into the dining room and sat back down at her seat. She sat silently for a few seconds. “Hey, Elsa,” she finally said.

“Hm?” the older sibling responded.

“I wrote something on piano,” Anna said, matter-of-factly. “Wanna hear it?”

“Sure,” Elsa said.

Anna paused for a second, as if her sister’s response had caught her by surprise. She then jumped out of her seat and ran over to the piano, hurriedly uncovering the keys and sitting on the old wooden bench. “Ready?” she asked, waiting for her sister’s response.

“Yea, go,” Elsa said, already watching her intently.

“Alright,” Anna said. She quickly placed her hands atop the keys and began her song.

The song she played was unlike anything Elsa had heard her play before- this was incredibly jazzy. It was very atonal, consisting almost entirely of chromatic passages. The chords didn’t fit together at all, and, according to traditional music theory, it should’ve sounded horrible.

It didn’t, though. The whole piece was strangely relaxing, and, despite how unharmonious the chords chosen were, it didn’t strain the blonde’s ears.

The song lasted merely thirty seconds, but Elsa was genuinely impressed. The redheaded girl beamed with pride when she caught sight of Elsa’s astonished expression.

“So,” Anna began, “do you like it?”

“Like it?” Elsa replied. “I love it!”

Anna blushed. It was rare that her sister actually showed some interest in Anna’s music.

“One thing though,” Elsa said, raising her index finger as confirmation that she had said one, “the part where you do the triplets or whatever, you’re not doing anything with your left hand.”

“Yeah, I know. I didn’t know what to do there,” Anna admitted.

“Well, here,” Elsa said, rising from her seat. She walked over to the piano. “What are you playing there?”

“Just fourths, going up chromatically,” the younger sister replied.

“Then why don’t you play fourths in your left hand?” Elsa suggested. “You could just play them as chords though instead of triplets.”

“The same notes?” Anna asked.

“Um… I don’t know,” Elsa replied. “Try it with the same notes.”

“Alright,” Anna said. She then played the passage, adding the chords with her left hand. She played it much slower, and she made more than a few mistakes this time.

“Eh…” Elsa said. “Drop it a… minor third? Yea, try that,” she said.

Anna tried to play it as requested, but it was incredibly difficult. She hardly made it through the phrase.

“Jeez,” she said, “why don’t you go easy on me?”

“You’re the one that wrote a modern jazz piece,” Elsa teased. “That sounded amazing, by the way.”

“Of course it did,” Anna said, upset at her inability to play what her sister had requested.

“Hey, don’t get upset,” Elsa said. “Just keep working at it and you’ll get it.”

“Sure I will,” Anna said sarcastically.

-----

It took the redhead over three hours, but indeed she did figure out how to play the passage to perfection, just as Elsa had predicted. The blonde girl was lying on her bed upstairs, listening to music and utilizing various apps on her phone when Anna burst through the door. The sudden scare caused Elsa to drop her phone, ripping her headphones out of her ears.

“I figured it out!” Anna exclaimed.

“Huh?” Elsa began. “You scared the shit out of me, Anna.”

“Oh, sorry,” Anna said, now realising what she had done. “Anyways, I figured out the thing on piano that you showed me! Come on!” she said, running out of Elsa’s room.

Elsa groaned as the energetic redhead ran down the stairs, but eventually she got out of bed and went down the stairs as well, finding her sister already sitting at the piano waiting for her arrival. Elsa made her way to the piano and stood to the left of Anna.

“Tell me when to start,” Anna said.

“Go ahead,” Elsa replied.

Anna played the passage without hesitation, and she played it perfectly. It only lasted a few seconds, though, so she then played the entire song for her sister. Once finished she looked directly into Elsa’s eyes, patiently await her response.

“See?” Elsa said. “I knew you could do it. Doesn’t that sound better?”

“Yeah!” Anna agreed. She then replace the lid over the keys of the piano, rose from the bench,jumped over the back of the couch directly behind her, and turned on the tv. Elsa laughed under her breath at her sister’s antics. She herself then walked around to join Anna on the couch, turning off the only illuminated light in the room.

Elsa sat a few feet away from Anna, but the redhead pulled her in close to her. At first Elsa resisted, but eventually she relaxed, allowing her head to rest against her younger sister’s shoulder.

“I love you, Elsa,” Anna said after a minute or so.

“I love you, too, Anna,” Elsa replied.

More than words could ever say.

The two girls remained in this position for the entire night, eventually falling asleep together after Anna had shut off the tv sometime around midnight.

 

9: Just a Project

Elsa gave Anna a ride to school again on Friday. As the blonde pulled into the parking lot, Anna looked out the passenger window to see a pair of white doves circling above the school. Transfixed by their perfectly circular flight path, Anna didn’t even notice when Elsa’s car had stopped.

“Anna?” Elsa asked, trying to get her sister’s attention.

The redhead failed to acknowledge her sibling, so Elsa tapped her on the shoulder.

“Huh?” Anna said, partly startled.

“We’re here…” Elsa replied, raising an eyebrow to Anna’s obliviousness.

“Oh,” Anna said. “Alright.” She unbuckled her seatbelt and got out of the car, pulling her backpack out from the foot area of the front passenger seat. “Thanks for the ride,” she added before heading off in a hurry. As she walked off, Elsa spotted her looking skyward once more. The blonde laughed quietly at her sister’s antics.

As she exited the car, Elsa looked skyward herself, finding the two porcelain white doves almost directly above her.

Are those the same ones from Tuesday?

Elsa stood and stared at the doves for a while, thinking. Just as before, the girl found herself hypnotized by their motion, unable to look away.

The bell is what finally caught Elsa’s attention.

Wonderful. Two days in a row I’m gonna be late to Calculus.

Once again she found herself sprinting to class, as if the margin of her lateness made a difference.

She burst through the door, and all eyes turned to her, but only for a second. Elsa scanned the room with her eyes. Clearly something was off.

Whatever, it doesn’t matter.

“Miss Elsa,” Dr. Agdarson said as the girl began walking to her seat. “Come here please.”

Today’s gonna go positively dandy, I can tell already.

The blonde turned around and shyly made her way to her teacher’s desk. “Yes?” she asked.

“You’re late again, Elsa,” he said bluntly. “I, uh… Just… Try to be on time next class,” he said. He motioned her to go to her seat.

Elsa simply stood there, confused.

Alright, what the fuck is up here? On Wednesday I got a referral for being tardy and now he’s just gonna let it slide?

“Look, Elsa,” Dr. Agdarson began. “I’d like to raise you high, but… you have to give me something to work with here. I know it’s the first week, but you’re getting off to a poor start. Just try to be more punctual.”

Elsa wasn’t about to press the issue, so she walked off to her desk, happy that her tardiness wouldn’t prove to be a punishable offense yet unsatisfied with Dr. Agdarson’s reasoning.

It hadn’t been five seconds since she had sat down when the boy behind Elsa tapped her on the shoulder. She turned around to face him.

“Hey, Elsa,” he said. “You alright? I heard about what happened yesterday with that doctor guy or whatever.”

So that’s what this is about.

“Yea, I… I’m fine,” Elsa said, although she clearly wasn’t. It appeared that her wailing the day before had attracted the attention of her peers. This made Elsa uneasy.

“Yeah, hey, you sure?” someone else asked. Elsa couldn’t tell if the two were genuinely concerned or if they were just looking for something to gossip about. Honestly, she didn’t know which was worse.

“I said I’m alright,” Elsa said.

Both students gave Elsa a strange look, as if they were calling her bluff. They both settled back into their seats though so Elsa dropped the matter.

Regardless, her uneasiness turned into self-loathing.

Why couldn’t I have just shut up at least for a little bit so all these people wouldn’t have found out about my waterworks show in the office? I’m such a fucking idiot sometimes…

“Alright, class,” Dr. Agdarson’s voice boomed, pulling Elsa back to reality. “Roll call.”

Elsa then drifted back into her thoughts.

What the hell am I supposed to do now that everybody knows about what happened yesterday? Do they know why I was crying? If they do, I-

“Elsa?” Dr. Agdarson called.

“Here,” Elsa replied.

...If they do, I guess I don’t have much to worry about, but if they don’t, what should I tell them? Should I say that-

“John W?”

Oh, shit, that’s that guy I’m supposed to talk to!

“Here,” came a voice from somewhere behind Elsa.

Dammit, who was that?

She didn’t catch sight of the boy, but she at least knew he sat behind her in class. That eliminated almost twenty people.

Shit, I gotta make sure I find him.

Elsa scanned the back of the room, hoping to narrow down her search even further.

“Elsa?” Dr. Agdarson said.

“Yes?” the blonde replied.

“Eyes forward,” the man said, in a somewhat gentler tone than Elsa was accustomed to. “We’re starting lesson three.”

“Alright,” Elsa said. With that, she turned back around to face the front of the classroom.

-----

“John!”

The sea of students amid the crowded hallway all but drowned out Elsa’s call.

“John!” she yelled, even louder this time.

A boy looked back, searching for who had called him.

Oh thank God.

“John!” Elsa yelled one last time. She pushed her way past a few students to get to the boy she had been calling. “John,” she said at last. “Hi, I’m Elsa.”

“Hey,” John said unenthusiastically. “What’s up?”

“I, uh… I’d rather not tell you here,” Elsa said. “How bout we go out to the field or something?”

“Uh, sure,” John said.

“Alright, cool.”

Elsa led the way- down the hall, down the stairs, to the right, straight ahead, and down the ramp.

The field was about twenty feet below the eating area and was separated from it by a fence and an array of solar panels.

“Let’s go somewhere we won’t be seen, alright?” Elsa said, still walking.

John grabbed her by the wrist. “This is fine,” he insisted. “Now, what’s up?”

Elsa paused. She hadn’t thought out how to broach the subject of her need for a meth cooking partner.

“I… I uh…” she began. “I need a partner for…”

She didn’t finish her sentence.

“What?” John asked. “For a project or something? Why the hell did you drag me way out here for, then?”

At this point Elsa realized that it was too risky to be upfront with John, at least for now.

“Yeah, a project. A chemistry project, actually,” Elsa said, unconvincingly. “Think you can help?”

“Yea, I guess,” John said. He sounded apprehensive.

“Alright, well… Do you have seventh period?” Elsa asked.

“No,” the boy replied.

“Okay, cool,” Elsa said. “Wanna meet out in front of the school and we can talk then?”

“Yeah, sure, whatever,” John said.

“Okay,” Elsa said. She then backed away from the boy a few steps before turning and walking away.

What an awkward conversation.

Meanwhile, John was confused. He didn’t know Elsa very well, but he could tell something strange was going on.

Once Elsa had made it about halfway up the ramp to the eating area, he too began walking back. He wanted to be certain he wouldn’t run into Elsa on his way back to the populated area of the school- that would only make an awkward situation worse- so, he took his time walking back up the ramp. He then went back the way he came down, but instead of going up the stairs he continued into the amphitheatre of the school, where he met up with his friends.

“Hey, John,” one of them said. “Where you been?”

“Oh, uh…” John began. “Nowhere in particular. Just talked with this chick about doing a project together.”

“Oh, yeah?” someone else butted in. “A project huh?” the boy said, making air quotes as he said “project.” Everyone laughed at his innuendo.

“Who is it?” the original boy asked.

“Some chick named Elsa,” John said.

Everyone fell silent.

“What?” John asked, confused.

“Dude, she’s bad news I heard,” someone said. “She was all crying and stuff yesterday in the office. Something about dead parents.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not dating her,” John assured them, “so it doesn’t really matter to me. Just a project.”

“Oh, yeah, sure,” one of his friends teased. “Just a project my ass.”

-----

Alright, I’m just gonna tell him straight up.

Elsa looked back at her watch. She had only been waiting for a few minutes but it felt like an eternity.

No, fuck that, that’s too risky. I’ll hint at it first.

Elsa stared across the parking lot of the school and across the street at the empty lot on the corner where her parents used to pick her up.

Where the hell is he? It’s 1:35 already and sixth period got out at 1:25!

Elsa was shivering from her nervousness. There were only two outcomes here: one good, one catastrophic.

Just then the front door to the school swung open. Elsa spun around to see John walking out. “Hey, Elsa,” he said.

Alright, screw it, I’m telling him straight up.

“Hey, John,” she replied.

“So,” John said. “ What’s up with this project?”

“Uh…” Elsa began. “Here, uh, come over here to my car. I’ve got some paperwork and stuff over there.”

Elsa led him to her car. She gestured him to sit down in the passenger seat as she herself sat down in the driver’s seat.

“Hey, what happened to your window?” John asked, pointing to the broken rear passenger window.

“Oh, nothing,” Elsa said. She threw her backpack in the backseat of the car. “So, this project... It’s for AP chem, and it’s pretty easy but I’m supposed to do it with someone else.”

‘Alright,” John said. “So, do you have a rubric or something?”

“No, not yet, but I-”

“I thought you just said you had some paperwork?” John said, confused.

“Well, no, but…” Elsa said.

“What the hell is going on here?” John said. “I mean, if you need a partner I’ll do it with you, but I don’t know why the hell it has to be me, and I don’t know why you’re being so secretive but-”

“Listen,” Elsa began, cutting the boy off. “My friend said you can teach me how to cook meth,” the blonde admitted.

“What?” the boy laughed.

“No, I’m serious,” Elsa began, “I need money so I’m looking for someone to show me how to cook meth and Olaf said-”

Elsa cut herself off.

This isn’t the guy.

John just stared at the girl.

“Alright… I, uh… I’m not the guy you’re looking for,” he finally said, reaching for the door handle.

“Hey, no, wait,” Elsa said, grabbing him by the arm. At the same time she pressed the button to lock the car’s doors.

John pulled his arm away. “What the fuck?” he said, now angry. He reached over to Elsa’s side of the car and pushed the unlock button. He then opened the door and got out. “I’m gonna tell Mr. Henderson, you crazy bitch,” he said. He slammed the door.

“No, hey, wait!” Elsa said, jumping out of the car. She ran to the back of the car to try and stop him, but he started running as well.

“You’re fucking crazy!” he yelled, running from her. Elsa started chasing him.

Once he got about halfway to the front door of the school, Elsa started to sprint. She caught up to him, jumped on him, and knocked him flat against the pavement.

“What the FUCK?!” He yelled. He kicked and squirmed while Elsa put him in a headlock.  She then stood, and walked back to her car, dragging John by his neck. She covered his mouth with her hand so he would stop screaming. Her breath was now incredibly heavy, her actions fueled by adrenaline instead of reason.

Once she got to her car, she opened the rear door, literally threw John inside, hurried into the driver’s seat, started the car, and backed out of the parking space before John could open the door to get out. She slammed the car into drive, and took off, almost jumping her car over the peak in the skirt of the driveway as she made her way into the street. Acting purely out of fear, Elsa slammed her foot against the gas pedal and drove off towards the only place she knew was safe: Olaf’s house.

After about two blocks, the girl’s senses returned to her, and she realized what had just happened. It all felt like it was a dream to her, like this couldn’t possibly be happening.

She spun her head around and looked into the back seat to find John there, mangled and bloody.

This really was happening.

Oh God, what have I done?

 

10: Release

Elsa was still a block from Olaf’s house, but she stopped the car anyways. She hurriedly opened her door, leaned out, and heaved with her stomach as though she would vomit, but nothing came out. She spent a few seconds coughing in agony, hoping with all her might that she actually would vomit, as though by doing so she could rid herself of the terrible burden now placed on her.

While Elsa was keeled over in the front seat of the car, John worked his way over to the driver’s side of the back seat of the car. He reached over the seat and grabbed Elsa’s hair he pulled backward with all his might, pulling the girl’s head backward with it. The girl let out a wail of agony as her head slammed against the headrest of her car’s seat. John then pushed her head forward again, slamming her face into the steering wheel. As Elsa tried to regain her composure, the boy climbed over the seat and hit the switch to unlock all doors before opening his own door and stumbling out of the car as quickly as possible.

Elsa looked backward to see that John had escaped. Instead of running back towards the school, however, Elsa noted that he had taken off in the direction of Olaf’s house.

It’s only one block. If I can get him to run that far I could get Olaf to help me.

Elsa jumped out of the car and followed after John. As she ran she frantically pulled her phone out of her pocket and called Olaf.

“Hello?”

Elsa was now in a full sprint after John, adrenaline in charge once again. She could hardly talk. “Olaf!” she said.

“Yeah?” he asked.

“I need you… to stop… John!” the girl stammered between breaths.

“What?”

“Just… go outside! You’ll… figure it… out!”

Elsa hung up and shoved the phone back in her pocket.

I sure hope this fucking works.

She had gained no ground on John. In fact, she had lost ground on him. He was running for his life, and Elsa knew there was no chance she could catch him. Olaf’s house was now within view.

Just as John reached the house neighboring Olaf’s, Olaf himself ran out of his own house, a baseball bat in hand.

John saw Olaf running towards him and he tried to swerve away from him. Olaf, however, opted to throw the baseball bat directly at him. He threw it like a frisbee, causing the bat to spin as it flew threw the air before finally striking John directly in the chest. The boy collapsed onto the pavement, his face literally grinding into the asphalt of the street. The bat skittered across the ground before bouncing off the curb with a solid metallic “clang.”

Olaf ran out into the street to pin John to the ground. Elsa collapsed. The scene that had just played out in front of her shook her to her core. John wasn’t guilty. He didn’t deserve this. But here he was, beaten and battered by those he had offered to help just moments prior. Given the speed at which the bat had hit him, he undoubtedly had some broken ribs, and possibly internal bleeding.

Olaf turned the boy over onto his back. His face was covered in blood and chunks of pavement. His nose appeared to be broken.

At this point Elsa did vomit, but it wasn’t the relief she had previously yearned for. It came more as a painful reminder of just what Elsa had gotten herself into.

It was too late to back out now, and ten minutes ago it wasn’t.

As the girl regained her composure once more, she stood and steadied herself before making her way to Olaf and John. As she caught sight of John’s disfigured face, she nearly vomited once more.

“I don’t know if he’s knocked out or what but he ain’t responding,” Olaf said. The ordeal had had next to no effect on him.

Elsa crouched down beside him but remained silent.

“What happened?” Olaf asked.

Elsa opened her mouth to speak, but she fell into empty tears as she began to articulate her thoughts into words. The idea of trying to defend her actions sickened her. The girl’s virtues had almost completely dissolved within a few minutes and she could hardly bear the moral consequence.

“Alright, well, let’s get him inside,” Olaf said. “Get the bat,” he added.

“Olaf, wait,” Elsa choked out.

“What?”

“Why did you do that?” Elsa said, her voice frail from crying.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I knew something was seriously wrong so I stopped him.”

“But… You didn’t even know what he did.”

“I don’t need to.”

-----

After dragging John inside, Elsa fled to the bathroom, ashamed of her own existence. She slammed the door and collapsed against the shower door. As she cowered in the bathroom, one thought haunted her: there was no way out. For the first time in her life she seriously considered suicide.

Meanwhile, Olaf busied himself with the task of restraining John. Clearly the subject of what to do with him would be one of hot debate, and John could easily escape within the time it would take if he was not restrained.

After finishing his task, Olaf sat down on a couch not too far from his captive student. As he waited for Elsa to emerge from the bathroom he began to piece things together in his mind. Even with his limited perspective, Olaf knew there was only one definitive solution to their problem: kill John. He also knew that neither he nor Elsa could bring themselves to do such a thing.

After a few minutes had passed, Elsa made her way out of the bathroom, her eyes red and her soul all but shattered. Elsa took a seat on the couch, sitting as far from Olaf as possible. She didn’t dare look back towards John. Neither Elsa nor Olaf spoke. The only sound in the room was that of a ticking clock.

It was nearly five minutes before Elsa or Olaf made a sound. At that time, Olaf built up the courage to clear his throat.

“So…” he began a while after, “what do you want to do now?”

Why don’t you be blunt about it you insensitive fucking asshole?

Elsa merely shook her head, choking back tears.

“I was thinking,” he continued, “ we should…”

He decided against continuing his thought.

The room fell silent again for another minute or so. This time it was Elsa who broke the silence.

“We have to kill him, don’t we?” she asked.

“No!” Olaf said, falsely reassuring the girl.

“Then what do we do?”

“I don’t know.”

Elsa bowed her head in shame.

“We can’t just let him go, can we?” she asked.

“No, not exactly-”

“So then we do have to kill him,” Elsa said. “Ya know, you said this wouldn’t work out like Breaking Bad but it sure seems a hell of a lot like it to me right now, I mean we have a guy held prisoner at your house and we have to kill him but neither of have the guts to do it so we just-”

“Just shut up.”

The room fell silent again.

Eventually John began to stir in his chair. Time was now ticking away.

“How about we just ask him what he’d do if we let him go?” Elsa suggested. She knew it was a hopeless cause but at this point optimism was about all she had.

“Yeah, whatever,” Olaf agreed. He too knew it was pointless but at least he would know later that he tried to find an alternative solution.

In agreement about what they would do next, Elsa and Olaf took a few minutes to collect themselves while John regained his consciousness.

As he realized where he was he began to cry.

“Please don’t hurt me!” he pleaded. “Just let me go! I won’t tell anyone!”

Well that answers that question.

Neither Elsa nor Olaf believed him, though. In any case, it didn’t matter whether or not he intended to tell anyone, his condition would require an explanation, and that explanation would almost definitely reveal the truth.

They still had to get rid of him, somehow.

“Listen,” Olaf said.

“I’m all ears,” Elsa replied.

“How about we take him out into the middle of the desert and leave him? He’ll never make it and then that way we don’t have to actually kill him. It might leave us with a clearer conscience or something.”

That might actually work.

Elsa agreed. She didn’t want to dwell any longer. Between John’s wailing and her own self-loathing, she could hardly bear the waiting. She left to fetch her car while Olaf prepared John for the trip.

“Alright, we’re gonna let you go,” he said.

John’s eyes lit up. His crying faded. “You… You are?”

Olaf felt horrible about lying like this. The joy in the poor boy’s face tugged at his soul.

“Yea, now, come on,” Olaf said. “The car will be here soon.”

Olaf then untied him from the chair, but left his hands bound behind his back, as well as his ankles.”

Elsa honked the horn of her car from outside.

Olaf gulped, then guided John to the front door of his house. He then led him to the car, putting him into the back seat before getting into the car himself.

“Alright, John,” Olaf said as he buckled his seatbelt, “I want you to give Elsa directions to where you want to go, alright?” he said.

“Uh… Ok, Yeah!” John said. The joy in his voice nearly brought both Elsa and Olaf to tears.

Elsa followed John’s directions perfectly- left, right, straight-  all the way to his house, but she did not stop. where John indicated.

“Hey,” he said, ”you went past it.”

Elsa made no attempt to slow down, stop, or turn around.

“My… My house is back there,” John insisted, the joy in his voice fading.

A single tear escaped Elsa’s right eye as she continued onward.

After a moment John began to understand. “You’re not taking me home,” he asked, or rather stated.

“Are you?”

Elsa and Olaf both remained silent, as did John, for the rest of the drive. It appeared that their prisoner had accepted his fate.

It was sunset by the time they arrived in the desert. The drive had taken over an hour. Elsa drove off the paved roads and onto the dirt, heading off farther into the barren landscape. She stopped in an area at least five miles from any house. Olaf was the one who retrieved John from the back seat. The boy didn’t resist.

Olaf guided him a few metres from the car before leaving him. He didn’t untie his bindings. Olaf’s eyes glazed over as he pulled away from John for the last time. Though he said nothing, there was no doubt about what Olaf was feeling: sorrow.

As Elsa drove off, she looked back at John in the mirror. He simply sat and watched as they drove off, his image shrinking in the mirror as Elsa drove farther away.

Neither Olaf nor Elsa spoke to one another the rest of the night.

 

11: Needed

I can’t do this...

But I need to…

But I can’t…

Emotion swirled within Elsa as she made her way home. The drive back from the desert may have been bad, but at least she had had Olaf’s company. Driving back home, alone with her thoughts, proved much worse.

How will I explain this to Mr. Henderson? How will I tell Olaf I don’t want to do this anymore?

How will I explain it to Anna?

She pulled into the driveway of her house and put the car in park before shutting off the engine. She didn’t get out right away, though. Instead she sat in the car for a while, thinking, breathing, trying to think up a good lie to tell her sister.

Maybe I could tell her that I went to the library? Oh, even better, I’ll just tell her that I was working on a project with Olaf! That sorta worked on John so it should work on-

"Elsa?” Anna asked from the other side of Elsa’s driver’s side window.

Shit.

“Oh, uh… H- hey, Anna,” the blonde said awkwardly. She unbuckled her seat belt and opened the door of the car, pushing Anna out of the way.

“Where ya been?” Anna asked.

“Oh, you know… Around...” Elsa said flatly.

Well aren’t I just a fucking genius at deception?

Anna was obviously unimpressed by Elsa’s response. “Huh,” she said. “Well, I cooked myself dinner half an hour ago and there’s still some left. It’s in the kitchen.” She then turned and headed back inside without waiting for a response from her sister.

After the front door of the house latched, Elsa finally decided to get out of her car. She shut the front door of the car behind her and turned to open the back door to get her things. She reached blindly to grab her backpack, searching for it by feeling instead of sight. The girl eventually found what she was looking for and pulled it out of the car.

The backpack she found wasn’t hers, though. It was John’s. The boy’s backpack was grey, but it had been drawn on with markers of various colours. There was a tear running along one of the seams that had been sewn back together haphazardly with black thread.

Didn’t think about what I would do with this…

Elsa simply threw the backpack back into the car. She didn’t want to confront her feelings again this soon. She then grabbed her own backpack and made her way inside.

Elsa closed the door behind her and placed her backpack next to the door. Anna had gone off to her room, leaving the living room unusually quiet. Elsa paused for a second, unsure of what she should do.

I think I’ll try some of whatever Anna made.

Elsa then made her way to the kitchen to find the leftovers: a bowl of cooked spaghetti smothered in tomato sauce, perfectly portioned for one. Anna had clearly planned to serve two, and Elsa felt a bit guilty for not returning soon enough to eat with her sister.

Elsa picked a fork out of the cutlery drawer and drew a small amount of spaghetti from the bowl to test its temperature. Finding that it was cold, Elsa put the bowl in the microwave and set the time to thirty seconds. She then walked over to the fridge and retrieved a bottle of iced tea from it. She turned around to get a cup when a spark from the microwave caught her eye.

“Oh fuck!” Elsa exclaimed as she ran over to the machine. She had left her fork in the bowl. She hastily flung the door of the microwave open and was hit with a faint smell of burning plastic. The blonde reached in and removed the fork from the bowl. The heat of the fork burned her, causing her to drop it. The utensil bounced towards the living room before sliding to a stop near the seam between linoleum and carpet on the floor.

“Great,” Elsa said before making her way to where the fork had landed. As she walked she noticed that the lid of the piano had been left open. After picking up the fork, Elsa made her way over to the piano to close the lid.

She paused to look at the music resting on the piano. It was hand-written, and Elsa had never seen it before. She assumed Anna had composed it. She studied the music for a moment before sitting down on the piano bench. She then attempted to play what Anna had wrote. Within seconds Elsa realized that her sister had put on paper the song she had shown the blonde the night before.

But Anna never writes down her music like that… Must’ve been a boring afternoon.

Although Elsa was a decent sight reader, and this wasn’t a very complex piece, she found it difficult to work through her sister’s composition. The accidentals and strange harmonies incorporated in the song proved difficult to articulate, being so unconventional. It took Elsa nearly twice the time it should’ve taken to play the song, and the girl made more than a few mistakes throughout.

I have to do better than that.

So Elsa sat there for a while longer, determined to do a better job at playing her sister’s song. The second attempt was certainly better, but only slightly, so Elsa began the song once more.

In the end Elsa sat there for nearly forty-five minutes, repeating Anna’s song over and over but even still she was unsatisfied. As she began the song for the umpteenth time she heard the stairs creak under the weight of her sister’s footsteps.

“Elsa?” the redhead began. “What’s up? Why are you playing my song?”

Elsa stop playing and turned around to face her sister. “Oh, I uh,” she said, “I don’t know. I just saw it here and I figured I’d… ya know…”

Anna wasn’t impressed with Elsa’s reason, but she dropped the subject. “So, need some help there?” she asked.

“Oh, uh, nah,” Elsa said. “I think I got it.”

“Then play it for me,” Anna replied.

“Oh, alright,” Elsa said. She began the piece with a lump in her throat, afraid she would stumble over some of the more difficult parts of the song.

Meanwhile Anna walked into the kitchen to find the microwave still open, with the bowl of spaghetti still inside. She also noticed the bottle of tea sitting atop the counter on the other side of the room. “Got carried away with the song, huh?” the younger sibling asked. She didn’t expect an answer. “Left the door open and everything,” she added before closing the door of the microwave and setting the time to forty seconds.

Ultimately Elsa made it through her sister’s song without making too many mistakes. She did strike a few wrong notes, though, and it was obvious she was disappointed in herself for doing so.

“Hey, not bad,” Anna said.

“Yeah, whatever,” Elsa replied, her tone more melancholy than before.

Anna immediately sensed something was wrong and walked over to Elsa. She sat down next to the older girl, wrapping her arm around Elsa’s back and pulling her close. “Something’s up,” she stated. “What is it?”

“I… It’s just… I keep trying to do this right and every time I mess it up a little bit,” Elsa said. Although it was a weak explanation for her sudden bout of sadness, it was true. The girl felt like she had disappointed her sister by playing her piece wrong.

“Yeah, but,” Anna began, “it’s more than that.” She relaxed her grip on Elsa. “What’s the deal? You’re not acting like… like you.”

Yeah, yeah, mom.

The microwave beeped. Elsa remained silent. Anna then stood and walked towards the kitchen to fetch her sister’s food.

Well… I  suppose she sort of is like my mom. I mean, look at her, she does all this motherly stuff and all…

Anna removed the bowl from the microwave and shut the door.

All the things I’m supposed to do for her.

Anna sat the bowl of spaghetti, along with a fork and glass of tea atop the piano. “You really ought to eat something,” she said.

“Anna, I… you don’t have to do all this for me, you know,” Elsa said.

“Yeah, well, if I don’t… who will?” Anna said playfully.

Anna’s words stung a bit to Elsa. Truthfully though, she was right. If Anna wasn’t around, she never took to doing the things she needed to do. Elsa needed her.

The blonde spun a lump of spaghetti around her fork and raised it up to her mouth. As she pulled the fork away from her lips a single noodle flopped down across her chin and down to her chest. Anna playfully grabbed the loose end of the noodle and put it in her own mouth. She puckered her lips and made an obnoxious sucking noise before biting off the end of the noodle and giggling.

Anna then spun another lump of spaghetti around the fork. She picked it up and passed it in front of Elsa’s face, saying “here comes the airplane.” She then sat the fork back in the bowl and laughed. Elsa couldn’t help but giggle herself.

Anna was treating her sister like a child. While on one hand it was inappropriate and embarrassing, on the other hand Elsa didn’t care.

At least for now she knew she had her.

 

12: Indecision

How do I start? What do I say?

It was now Saturday morning.

Should I tell her everything all at once or just piece by piece?

Saturday morning at 3 AM.

Should I just wait until Sunday?

Elsa had been lying awake in bed since 10 o’clock, running laps inside her head trying to decide a way to break the news to Anna.

Yea, that’s what I’ll do, I’ll just wait until Sunday. Give myself time to think.

For the past five hours she had thought in circles, constantly repeating the same ideas to herself, hoping that they would sound better after she heard it again.

But then what if I forget? Or what if something weird happens and I don’t get to tell her?

Her bed had become damp from her sweat, her pillow had become deformed and hot, and her bedspread had pulled out of the foot of the bed and now laid crooked across it, a corner of the blanket touching the floor below the girl.

No, I have to tell her tomorrow. I can’t just ignore it for a full day. I just… How should I tell her?

Elsa reached behind her head and pushed her pillow flat against the headboard so she could sit up more comfortably. As she pushed herself up she slammed her head into the wall behind her.

“Ow, fuck!” she yelled out. She reached up to rub where she had hit her head when she noticed she was still wearing her headphones from when she was listening to music earlier. The blonde pulled them off her head, pulling her hair into her face in the process. She spat out a few hairs that worked their way into her mouth and slicked back the rest of her hair with her hands. Then she sat silently.

The clock across the room ticked softly. Her computer hummed gently.

Then Elsa heard a shuffling in the room adjacent to hers.

Fuck, I woke Anna up.

“Elsa?” came the girl’s voice from the other room. “You okay?”

“Yea,” Elsa said, unenthused.

She heard Anna open her bedroom door, and soon enough she opened Elsa’s door and stepped into her room.

“Can’t sleep?” the redhead asked.

“No,” Elsa replied.

“Yeah, me neither.”

The two sat quietly for a few seconds. The room suddenly felt cooler from the door having been opened.

“So,” Anna asked, “what’s keeping you up?”

Well shit. Might as well tell her so I can sleep.

“Well… I’ve been thinking about how to keep us out of the foster system,” Elsa said. It was vague but it was a start. Anna walked over to Elsa’s bed and sat down beside her sister.

“You been looking up jobs?”

“N- no, not exactly. I mean, I don’t think that would get us out of this. It might get me out of it but not you.”

“So…” Anna said, “what do you got?”

“So far nothing.”

They sat silently again.

Fuck it, I’ll just tell her.

“I, uh,” Elsa began, “I actually talked with Olaf for a bit about taking up a job with him. He said it would pay well enough to keep us out of foster care.”

“Oh, that’s awesome, Elsa!” Anna said.

You wouldn’t think it’s so awesome if you knew what it was, I bet.

“What is it?"

Brilliant.

“Well, uh… I… Uh, Olaf didn’t really say much a- about it, he- he just-”

“No, I mean with you,” Anna said. “You’re not nearly as excited as you should be about something like this.”

Elsa sat up in bed. “I don’t know. Hey, let’s go down to the living room and we can turn on TV or something,” she said, trying to dodge the subject. She didn’t wait for Anna to answer. She immediately stood and headed out of the room. Anna somewhat reluctantly followed suit.

Elsa was halfway down the stairs when her sister called out to her. “Elsa, seriously, what’s going on? I can tell you’re trying to pretend like nothing’s wrong here but you’re not doing a very good job.

Elsa didn’t respond. She continued down the stairs to the living room, sat down on the couch, turned on the TV, and immediately began turning up the volume to drown out Anna’s voice.

Anna then walked up to Elsa, grabbed the remote from her and pressed mute.

“Elsa, I’m serious,” she said, “you can’t just ignore me like this. Tell me what’s wrong. Humour me.”

“God, Anna,” Elsa began, “it’s not something that I’m really that interested in talking about right now.”

“But it might be good for you or something to talk it out with me!”

“Talking about it would be just about the worst thing for me right now,” Elsa said. She grabbed back the remote and turned the volume on again.

“See, that only makes me want to know even more!” Anna said.

Elsa paused. The monotonous tone of a reporter on TV provided ambience.

“A- Anna… It’s just…” she began. She didn’t finish her thought.

Anna could tell her sister didn’t want to talk, so she reluctantly dropped the issue. She sat down heavily beside Elsa, causing the springs within the sofa to creak. “Whatever,” she muttered.

Elsa sat silently, holding the remote up as if she were planning on changing the channel, but she didn’t do anything. She just sat there, deep in thought.

“You gonna change the channel to something worth watching or what?” Anna asked, her tone now irritated.

Elsa didn’t respond.

Anna groaned and shuffled around on the couch.

“It’s just…” Elsa finally said, “I feel like this whole thing is my fault.”

Almost immediately Anna’s irritated demeanor was exchanged for a sympathetic one. “Oh Elsa, it’s not your fault,” she said. “How could any of this possibly be your fault?”

“I just…” Elsa said, “I don’t know. It just feels like I could’ve done more. Like maybe I could’ve tried to be closer with our parents I could’ve seen there was something going on and I could’ve st-”

“Elsa, our parents didn’t die because of you, ok?” Anna said, desperately trying to reassure her sister that she wasn’t responsible for all the misfortune the siblings had faced.

Elsa paused. Anna looked at her intently, trying to gauge her sister’s feelings. Eventually Elsa simply let out a sigh and slid down into the couch.

The TV was tuned to channel 53, the local news for Eagle Valley. Elsa still held the remote, but she didn’t change the channel. She appeared distant and unfocused on what was on the TV, her thoughts clearly elsewhere.

Anna leaned over her sister and grabbed the remote from her hand. Elsa’s state of disconnect remained intact. The redhead settled herself back in and changed the channel to 91, a children’s channel. A Mickey Mouse cartoon was on.

The duo sat in silence for a while, Anna focused on the cartoon and Elsa focused on nothing in particular.

Eventually the older sibling began to shuffle around on the couch in an attempt to find a more suitable position. Anna glanced over to her briefly before shifting her focus back to the cartoon.

“I didn’t know you still watched cartoons,” Elsa said.

“Well, duh,” Anna said. “Who doesn’t like cartoons?”

Elsa grinned slightly.

“I figured out your song,” Elsa said, trying to start a conversation on a topic other than her emotional state or the job Olaf had offered her.

“Yeah, I know,” Anna replied, “you played it for me already, remember?”

“Oh, that’s right.”

The pair fell silent again. Beneath the sound of the cartoon the living room clock ticked softly.

After a few minutes Elsa, suddenly energetic, sat up straight and asked “hey, wanna write something on the guitar with me?”

Anna peered over at her sister quizzically. “I- I’m not that good on guitar you know…” she said.

“Eh, it doesn’t matter,” Elsa said. “You could play piano or something.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Anna said.

“Alright, I’ll go get the guitar.”

Elsa rose and headed up the stairs. She walked to her own room and began opening the door when she remembered that the guitar wasn’t in her room, it was in her parents’.

She paused.

Eventually the blonde released her grip on the doorknob of her room, but instead of going to her parents’ room to fetch the guitar, she headed back downstairs.

“I don’t know where the hell the guitar is,” she said, still walking down the stairs.

Anna stood. “I’ll go look for it then,” she said as she started walking. She passed Elsa at the bottom of the stairs and continued up the flight to the second story of their home.

Elsa sat back down on the couch shamefully. She watched a bit of the cartoon on TV to pass the time. Mickey Mouse was chasing around a bulldog who had kidnapped Minnie.

After a minute or so Anna called out to her sister. “Elsa!” she said. “Come here!”

Crap.

Elsa reluctantly stood and returned back upstairs. She peered down the hall and saw that their parents’ room’s door was open. The blonde walked over to the entrance to the room and looked in to see her sister struggling with the guitar case.

“What’s up?” the blonde said.

Anna looked up at Elsa. “Oh, hey,” she said. “Can you give me a hand with this?”

“Y- yeah, sure,” Elsa said. She stepped into the room cautiously and made her way over to Anna, who was bent over the guitar case which now lay on the girls’ parents’ bed.

“Here, let me see,” Elsa said. she leaned in and began fidgeting with the latches on the case.

“Thanks,” Anna said.

After a while Elsa got the case open. “There you go,” she said, pulling the top of the case open. The room filled with the smell of concentrated cedar.

Anna removed the guitar from the case and strummed arbitrarily across all six strings. “Alright, cool. Come on,” she said, making her way out of the room.

Elsa shut the case and latched it. She then took it off the bed and put it in the space between the wall and a chest of drawers, where it had likely been when Anna found it. She then smoothed out the wrinkles left by the case on her parents’ bed.

Then she just stood there.

It was the first time she had been in her parents’ room in over a week. She looked around. The king size bed took up most of the room. Almost all the furniture was made of walnut. The bedspread was a rich shade of red. In one corner of the room was a bookshelf, filled with leatherbound classics.

Elsa stood there a while longer.

“Elsa!” Anna called out from downstairs. “Come on!”

The blonde slowly made her way out of her parents’ room and headed back downstairs.

“Hey, Elsa check this out,” Anna said. Elsa was still making her way down the last few steps. The redhead strummed an E chord. A few of the frets buzzed.

“Cool,” Elsa said drily. She made her way to the couch and sat down. She then took the guitar from Anna.

“Hey,” she said. “Do you think I should go for Olaf’s job?”

“Psh, I don’t know,” Anna replied. “That’s up to you, really.”

Elsa paused.

“I- I think it would help, if that’s what you mean,” Anna added.

“Yeah.”

The TV had been muted, leaving the room silent save for the ticking clock.

Elsa raised the guitar up to play, scooting back into the couch and accidentally sitting on the TV remote. The TV suddenly changed channel.

Elsa looked up to see what had happened and noticed that the TV was now back on channel 53.

She left the channel as it was, placed her hand on the fretboard of the guitar and strummed a chord before Anna interrupted her.

“Hey, isn’t that that kid you were asking me about last night?” she said. “John W or whatever? Looks like he went missing.”

Elsa’s heart dropped. She looked up to the tv screen to see that it was indeed the boy she had asked Anna about the previous night who had gone missing, the boy she had just left out to die in the desert mere hours ago.

John Westergard.

 

13: Decision

Come on, answer.

Elsa paced around her room, phone to her ear.

God fucking dammit answer the phone.

“Hello?” Olaf said in a gruff voice.

“Olaf!” Elsa said. She didn’t say anything else since she didn’t know what else she should say.

“Yes?” Olaf asked, perplexed.

“Ok, you know that guy that we-”

Elsa cut herself off. She noticed that her door was open.

“Hang on,” she said. She ran and closed the door.

“Alright, you know that guy that we took out to the-”

“Yea, yea, I know,” Olaf said, cutting her off.

“Right,” Elsa said, now realizing the potential danger of saying everything over the phone. “Well, anyway, that was Westergard’s kid.”

“Who the hell is Westergard?”

“The psychologist I went to with Anna on Thursday?”

“Oh, right,” Olaf said. He paused before realizing what Elsa meant. “Wait, you mean to tell me that we took that guy’s kid out to the desert and-”

“Yea, yea, yea,” Elsa said.

“Right,” Olaf said, mildly embarrassed.

The two went silent for a moment.

“Oh, Elsa, this is bad,” Olaf said. “This is really bad. What’re we gonna do?”

“I don’t know,” Elsa said. “I don’t really want to talk about it over the phone, though.”

“Yeah, good idea,” Olaf said. He stopped to think briefly. “How bout we meet in the parking lot for Von’s or something?”

“Yeah, that sounds good,” Elsa said. “Meet me there in fifteen or something.”

The two exchanged goodbyes and Elsa ended the call. She then dressed herself and made her way downstairs. She went into the kitchen to grab a snack for the road and found an unopened box of granola bars.

Eh, I’ll just take the whole thing. Maybe Olaf’ll want one or something.

So the girl grabbed the unopened box and made her way out to her car. She opened the door, threw the box of granola bars into the passenger’s seat, and started the car. She then reached behind the passenger seat to pull herself into position to back the car up. She turned her head to look out the rear window when she caught a glimpse of John’s backpack. She had forgotten about it since the previous night.

A feeling of guilt swept over the girl, try as she might to ignore it.

We left him out to die last night and here I am just carrying on with my life like nothing even happened… Hell, I still haven’t even told Olaf I’m out yet.

She reversed out of the driveway and went to meet Olaf.

 

“We have to go back and get him.”

“No no no no no, that’s just not an option.”

“B- but… We can’t just let him die! Or at least I can’t!”

Olaf sighed. “Elsa, you can’t let your emotions get the better of you like this,” he said.

“Jesus, Olaf, you’re acting like this isn’t even a big deal!” Elsa said, appalled. “We’re not talking about deciding what haircut to get or something, we’re talking about someone’s life here!”

At this point, Olaf, who had been leaning against Elsa’s car, turned to face the girl, who was pacing around a few metres away. “Yeah, Elsa,” he said, somewhat angrily, “we’re deciding between our lives and his life. Note how ‘lives’ is plural and ‘life’ isn’t. Two versus one, not to mention that the two in this equation just so happens to be us.”

“Oh, come on, our lives wouldn’t be over if we just brought him back here!” Elsa said, hopelessly trying to find a way to keep John alive.

“God, Elsa, what the hell do you think would happen?” Olaf asked. “The first fucking thing he’d do is tell everyone that we were the ones that beat him and took him out to the desert and left him to die! It just wouldn’t work!”

Elsa couldn’t argue with Olaf anymore. She knew he was right.

“Now,” Olaf said, calmer. “Are you still in or what?”

“I don’t know,” Elsa said. “I need time.”

“Well you don’t really have that so you might wanna make up your mind pretty quick here,” Olaf said.

“Yeah, whatever,” Elsa said. She then made her way to the driver’s side door of her car, got in, and started the car without a word.

“Hey!” Olaf said. He stood up from his position against Elsa’s car. “What are you doing?”

Shortly after the boy moved away from Her car, Elsa took off.

“Hey!” Olaf yelled after her. “Fucking great,” he said to himself as he ran to his own car. He got in, started the engine, and took off after Elsa.

 

Olaf initially didn’t know exactly where the blonde had went, but he was pretty sure she had gone off to free John. Twenty minutes later, as he pursued the blonde through the winding mountain road that served as an alternative to taking the freeway, he was certain that was exactly what she had intended to do.

It was a miracle he had seen the girl turn off onto the road they were on now, for if he hadn’t she surely would’ve gotten to John long before he did, as the freeway route Olaf had originally planned to take was nearly twenty miles longer.

Now within only a few hundred feet of Elsa, Olaf knew he had to stop Elsa from making it to John and releasing him. Doing so had so far proved to be much more difficult than he had originally anticipated. Both Olaf and Elsa were driving as fast as possible, Olaf to catch Elsa, and Elsa to get away from Olaf. They were consistently driving at 30 miles per hour or more over the speed limit and were doing so on a road almost always bordered on one side by a sheer 300 foot drop. One false move could kill them both.

Meanwhile, Elsa was determined to get to John. She wasn’t entirely sure what she was going to do with him yet, though. Even though she wanted to, she knew she couldn’t bring him back.

Instead of working through what she was going to do with the boy, though, she was currently trying to outrun Olaf. Her car wasn’t particularly sporty but she did have some experience driving go karts and she was still just out of reach of Olaf.

Suddenly, though, Olaf started gaining ground on her. As they both entered a corner he moved into the lane of oncoming traffic and pulled along side Elsa. Elsa, heart racing, looked over to Olaf to see him trying to yell something at her.

She looked back at the road to see herself aiming off a cliff. She skidded hard and turned left, straight into Olaf. Olaf’s car went up the side of the mountain on the left of the road and flipped over, almost landing on top of Elsa’s car. Elsa’s car continued to slide in the same direction as before even though she had turned the car to face the mountain. Olaf’s car also slid across the pavement, but on its roof instead of its tires. Both cars were headed off the cliff.

As Elsa’s car left the ground the girl let go of the steering wheel to wrap her arms around her face. The car flipped over and landed on its roof about twenty feet down the hill before it started to roll. Olaf’s car wedged itself against Elsa’s and slid down the mountain.

Both Olaf and Elsa thought they were going to die, but once the two cars stopped at the bottom of the hill they were both still alive and relatively uninjured save for some bad cuts and bruises.

Elsa’s car had landed on the right side, Olaf’s on the roof. Both fell out of their seats when they managed to unbuckle their seatbelts.

Olaf was the first to get out of his car. Once he got a view of where the two had ended up he determined why they were still alive: their cars had come to a stop on a landing only about forty feet down the hill. He stumbled over towards the edge of the landing to see that had they been going much faster they would’ve plummeted around four hundred feet.

Elsa got out of her car shortly after Olaf. Immediately she collapsed onto the ground and cried.

“Hey!” Olaf yelled. “You alright?”

Elsa only continued crying.

Olaf simply sighed and made his way over to the distraught girl. He sat down next to her and did his best to comfort her.

Though they had different ways of expressing their emotions, Olaf and Elsa felt the same things. They both felt guilt, sorrow, regret, and hopelessness. Both felt they were responsible for what had happened, and both had one question on their mind:

Now what?