Chapter Text
“Tomorrow’s the first day of December,” Anna said with a yawn as she turned away from blowing out the candle on the nightstand. “Can you believe it?”
He chuckled as she settled back beside him on the bed, wiggling closer until he dropped an arm over her waist. “Judging by how long I spent shoveling snow today...yes, I definitely can.”
“You know what I mean,” she murmured as she nuzzled her nose against his neck.
“‘Fraid I don’t this time.”
She shifted upwards until she could meet his eyes in the firelight. There was a softness in her expression that made his heart swell in his chest. “It’s going to be our first Christmas at home together.”
At home . A lump rose in his throat at the words; this time last year, they had both been staying at the castle, and she’d spent more time than not in bed recovering from a horrid bout of pneumonia and a broken wrist. But this year...Kristoff couldn’t help but lower one of his hands to rest over hers, letting his index finger trail over her wedding band. “Oh,” he managed to say, wishing for the millionth time he was half as articulate as she was.
He needn’t have worried, though; Anna, as usual, understood exactly what he wanted to tell her. “It’s going to be perfect,” she said before kissing him softly.
“S’always perfect,” he responded between kisses. “Everything is, I mean. With you.”
“You charmer, you,” she said with a giggle.
“I try.”
Before she could kiss him again, another wide yawn escaped her. Kristoff pulled back a little, ignoring her pouting, and wrapped his arms around her, shifting to accommodate her as she sighed and tucked herself against him once more, her face buried in the crook of his neck. “We can get a tree, right?” she asked, her voice muffled.
“Mhmm.”
“And candles?”
“Of course.”
“And stuff to make--”
“Whatever you want, baby,” he laughed, kissing the top of her head. “But only if you get some sleep.”
She yawned once more and said drowsily, “Promise?”
“Promise.”
Staying quiet enough not to wake her husband was, Anna learned quickly, far easier said than done. It was all well and good when he was the one up first; she had always been a heavy sleeper. Once she had woken to the sound of him laughing so hard he was bent double and wiping tears from his eyes and the sight of Olaf jumping up and down on the bed. “Wuzzgoinon?” she had mumbled, wiping at her eyes, as they explained through giggles that they’d spent a full ten minutes doing everything they could think of to rouse her in time for the sunrise hike she’d promised to go on.
Kristoff, on the other hand, had always been a light sleeper out of necessity; there were always animals to care for, crops to be watered, and patients his grandfather needed help caring for at all hours of the night. And Anna knew all too well that since meeting her-- well, re -meeting her, really-- it had only grown easier to rouse him no matter how late the hour or how exhausted he was. Last winter, when she’d been so terribly sick, sometimes it seemed like her nightmares had him up and at her side even before they woke her.
She bit her lip at the memory of those tense, terrifying days; she hardly remembered the worst of them, but she knew how they had worn on him and her sister, how they still worried so over her at any sign that her strength might be flagging. And, as loathe as she was to admit it, they had every reason to worry over her even now.
But today, at least, she wanted her husband’s biggest worry to be over whether he’d rather eat breakfast in bed or at the table, and so she tiptoed around their little cottage as quietly as she could, wincing each time she stepped a little too heavily or set something down a little too quickly. This was one of the rare days when neither of them had anywhere in particular to be, and it was the first real day of the Christmas season, and-- well, and she just loved him more than anything, and that by itself was reason enough to make the most of the morning.
She smiled triumphantly as she managed to light the fire in the stove on only the third attempt; Kristoff had always been able to get it on the first try, and he’d spent many painstaking hours helping her practice doing that and a dozen other such practical things by herself. It thrilled her every time he stopped to give her such a lesson, and not just because it meant he’d hover close over her shoulder and whoop for joy whenever she succeeded.
No; what she truly loved about his lessons was that it meant she had learned something real , something far more useful than Latin or needlepoint or dancing a minuet. It meant there was one more thing she could do for herself, to take care of herself-- and she knew that that was exactly why he was always so willing to stop and teach her no matter how busy he might be. She had always been treated like something fragile, something that needed taking care of, and though Kristoff was all too familiar with how true those things were, he still did everything he could to help her forget it, even for just a moment.
A snore loud enough to be heard even through the closed door escaped him, and Anna bit back a laugh. Hopefully he’d make enough noise of his own to drown out whatever racket she made trying to cook pancakes and eggs.
As the butter in the pan began to slowly melt, she busied herself with digging through the little trunk of decorations she’d snuck away from the larger supply that had been brought from the castle to the cottage on the hill where she kept her own little court of foreign dignitaries and visiting diplomats. The garlands and ribbons and ornaments she had left behind, but there were a few precious things she’d specifically asked her sister to send that she wanted to keep just to herself. She grinned as she pulled out her favorite of them all: a little wooden Advent calendar, hand-painted by a man in Arendelle who had given it to the royal family to celebrate Anna’s first Christmas nearly twenty years ago. She only had a few bits and baubles to fill it with for now, but Kristoff didn’t need to know that; he had been born with a double helping of patience to make up for her utter lack of it, and so she knew there was no risk of him stealing a peek at the days that lay ahead.
A pop from the stove startled her out of her reverie; she quickly set the calendar in the middle of the kitchen table and scurried over to see the butter was bubbling. Quickly, she ladled in some of the batter she’d made earlier, and the warm smell of cinnamon began to waft through the little house. She smiled in satisfaction at the sight of it beginning to brown at the edges, enjoying the rare moment of feeling like a proper wife, one who could actually take care of house and husband without outside help.
As she flipped the pancake over, she heard the creak of the floorboards, and a moment later felt a pair of strong arms wrap around her waist as Kristoff came up behind her. “You’re supposed to still be asleep,” she said sternly as he yawned and dropped a kiss on the top of her head. “You were snoring just two minutes ago.”
“Smelled food. Couldn’t stay in bed.”
“I was going to bring it to you so you could eat it in bed.”
“Well, now I’m up,” he said, moving to trail a line of kisses down her jaw. “How can I help?”
“By sitting in your chair and doing absolutely nothing.”
His arms tightened around her waist. “Can’t I do absolutely nothing right here?”
Anna deliberated for a moment as she slid the first pancake onto a waiting plate before sighing in acquiescence. “I suppose. If you insist.”
She did, at least, allow him to crack a few eggs for her, only because if he kept kissing her like that she was going to forget about breakfast entirely. It was sort of nice, anyway, to have him working beside her, even if she’d intended to make him rest for once; they had spent every day together since he’d come back for her, and still, a year later, she always felt as if she was making up for lost time.
As if he could sense where her thoughts had drifted, Kristoff paused in setting the table so he could lean down and kiss her cheek. “I love you, by the way,” he said, knowing that, even with the way he cherished her every second of the day, she still liked to be reminded out loud.
“Love you, too,” she said, turning to catch his lips so she could kiss him properly. “Do you think six pancakes is enough for two people?”
“What, three each? Sure, that’s plenty.”
“No, five for me and one for you,” Anna teased, going to the little cupboard to pull down a jar of the applesauce they’d jarred that summer. “I’m half-starved after all my hard work cooking.”
Kristoff snorted; they both knew full well she wouldn’t be able to finish even two, and that he’d gulp down all the rest, have two eggs on the side, and still be ready for lunch as soon as the clock struck noon. “If you insist, your majesty,” he teased, earning a tweak of his nose for his insolence.
“You sit down now,” she said, shooing him away. “Let me put the food on the table. You open the first door.”
“The first...what?”
“On the Advent calendar!” she said, pointing at it. “I don’t know if you guys have them up here, but I do this one every year.”
He studied it for a moment. “Did we do it last year?”
Anna’s fingers stumbled as she transferred a pancake to his plate, nearly dropping it. “No, I-- I don’t think so. I’m normally the one who gets it put together, and last year...well.”
Before she could turn back to the stove, his fingers closed gently around her wrist. “It doesn’t matter, baby,” he said, his eyes understanding when she managed to draw up the courage to meet them. “I’m excited to do it this year.”
“Good,” she said, managing a smile. “Go ahead and open it then-- well, actually,” she amended, handing him the glass jar of applesauce, “would you open this first?”
(Really, she probably could have done it on her own, but it was so much more satisfying to watch the muscles in his forearm flex as he popped it open with ease.)
As she sat down beside him, spooning applesauce onto her own pancakes, he found the door marked with a curling, scarlet 1 and pulled it open, his massive hands dwarfing the tiny knob. A broad grin unfurled over his features as he pulled out the wooden carving that lay within and held it carefully in the palm of his hand. “Oh, wow! Did you make this?”
“I did. Your grandfather taught me how. And look,” Anna said proudly, pointing at the little harness she’d painstakingly painted onto the miniature reindeer. “I painted it to look just like Sven’s real harness.”
Really, it was just tiny blobs of purple paint that looked nothing like the hand-woven harness Kristoff had made himself, and one of the antlers was crooked, and she’d forgotten to finish whittling one of the hooves, but he oohed and ahhed over it all the same until Anna thought her heart might burst with pride. “Do you really like it?” she asked hopefully. “I made it so that even when you’re up the mountain and he’s down here with me, it’s like he’s with you.”
“I love it,” he assured her, smiling as he set the carving down in front of the calendar. “I’ll be sure to take him with me on my next trip.”
“The other stuff in the calendar may not be as good as that,” Anna said, feeling suddenly nervous. “I wanted to make sure we’d at least get started off on the right foot, so you would like the calendar and everything, since it’s our first real Christmas together and I want it to be perfect and--”
She didn’t realize her hands had been fluttering nervously until Kristoff caught them between both of his own. “Anna.”
“Oops. Rambling.”
He chuckled and pressed a kiss to her fingertips that made her feel warm all over. “I love your rambling. And I love you. And it’s going to be a perfect Christmas, just like I promised you last night.”
“You really mean it?”
“Of course. And we can get started on it being perfect as soon as I finish eating all six of these pancakes.”