Archive of Our Own

“Are we there yet?”

Looking up from her book Elsa was entertained to find her sister inexplicable upside down on her side of the cabin. It wasn’t the weirdest position she had found her in, but this one was up there. Raising her eyebrow at her Anna flopped down onto the bench again.

“Are you going to ask it again in ten minutes if I answer?”

“Hmn, maybe we’ll be there then.” Anna spoke as she stretched her arms above her. Letting them drop to her side as she was done with that.

“I somehow doubt it,” Elsa told her as she checked her watch again. The small arm had not made it even one revolution around the face yet since the last time she was asked. It was a little funny to her that her sister had talked her into this train journey across Europe, despite the fact that it had nearly a day and a half of pure train travel involved.

“Can’t you let me live in my fantasy?”

“That wouldn’t be me now,” she teased her as she closed her book. With a bit of quick math, she knew that there were at least three hours left before they would arrive at Kings Cross.

Where her sister had drawn a line on a map, she had taken on the task of figuring out how they would get from all the way up in Scottland down to southern Italy. All in all, it wasn’t too bad, three long treks and two comparably short ones. The first of the set though was a long one, just over eight hours spend in a large metal box on wheels.

“’Ugh, wanna play I spy?” Anna asked her as she resisted the urge to pull out her phone and switch between the same three apps before closing it again.

“Sure, you wanna start.” The question was more of a formality, as Anna had already jumped up and started to stare out of the window. Looking over she saw that they had traded the Midlands forests for the more open pastures that dotted the countryside here.

“Okay. So, I spy with my little eye something…” she pondered for a moment, “that is alive.”

Elsa took a moment as she looked out the same window and saw the countryside that was quickly passing by. Out there where large fields filled with a mixture of crops and grasses. She could spot a couple of white dots in the distance she guessed would be sheep. Closer by there were some brown shapes that could reasonably be Horses or even Cows. She was a little late to figure out the difference between them from this distance.

Most if not everything out there was alive, most of the plants and crops fell into that definition. Their dad had brought it up nearly a decade ago, and for two weeks the dinner table had been rather silent as he and Anna had been beefing about it. Looking back, it was kinda funny to see the grown man that was their father, getting into a disagreement with a nine-year old.

Putting that nugget to the side she made her first guess as general as she could be, “Is it green?” By the smile that started to adorn her face, she was already sure that she had missed the target by a mile.

“Nope, not at all,” Anna told her as she waited for her to make a second guess.

Thinking again, she ruled out all the plants and flora. She doubted Anna would have made it like a tree or something, but it was good to double check.

“Will it come to you if you call it?” she asked.

That got a better response,  she thought as Anna rolled her eyes before responding, “Hotter.”

“Did you pick a cow again?” she asked her outright.

“How? How do you guess it from that alone?” Anna asked her as she threw her hands in the air.

“You always pick a cow when we play this game,” Elsa told her again, “we have been playing this game for I don’t know how many years. You always pick cows if they are even remotely in view first.”

“I don’t always, ” Anna protested as she looked up as if she could look up all the times that she had picked a cow first.

“You do.”

“It’s not my fault they are cute,” Anna said.

“Never said they weren’t.”

“You wanna pick one?”

“Sure, I spy something with my little eye…” Elsa looked around and took in as much of the space they were occupying. Picking something out of the window was an obvious first choice. The second space was inside, besides them there where only a couple more things in here. Anna’s and hers backpacks, her book that she had put down next to her, the Gameboy that had died when Anna hadn’t remembered to charge the batteries at home.

“Red.”

“Is it my hair?” Anna asked quickly.

“No.”

“Is it the poles that carry the cables outside?”

“No.”

“Is it…” she lingered for a moment to look around for the first time, taking in the surroundings a bit more than giving it a glance. “the light up stop sign above the emergency break?”

“warmer, but still no,” Elsa said as she smiled. It was kinda fun to know her sister this well that she could have guessed those first couple of guesses herself. However, she knew that the red rivets that held the cushions to the seat behind her was far enough out of view that there were going to be at least a couple of moments before it would be guessed.

“Hmn, can you still see it?” Anna asked her as she looked intently at her face.

“I feel like this is getting a bit away from the way you’re supposed to play this game.”

“Just a yes or no Elsa, I’m not asking much here,” she protested.

“Yes, I can still see it,” she admitted as she stared into her sisters’ green eyes.

“This isn’t fair.”

“Dear, you are in the ballpark.” She told her, “Maybe take a moment and look around before throwing out five more guesses.”

“Where is the fun I that,” Anna responded as she got up and sat next to her to get the same point of view. From where she was sitting the rivets where plain as day, but there was a lot of stuff there that could trip her sister up.

“Is it the patch on my backpack?” Anna asked her.

“Nope, that’s a lot colder.” She told her as she relaxed into the seat.

“The sticker on the Gameboy?”

“Much colder, you’re getting away from it.”

“What if I give you a kiss for a hint?” Anna offered as she turned to bribery earlier than Elsa had expected.

“You can try,” Elsa said as she rolled her eyes. A quick peck on her cheek later she let out a chuckle, “unfortunately kisses can’t be traded for hints.”

“You’re not being fair,” Anna protested again as she nudged her shoulder.

“Look at the chairs,” Elsa said after a moment, giving into the adorable pout she could see forming on her sister’s face. Anna for her part jumped up and rushed over to inspect them.

“Is it the rivets?” she asked proudly convinced she had gotten it.

“It is!” Elsa said as she watched Anna gave herself a high five. It was rather adorable she thought. Anna dropped back into her own seat as she let out a sigh. For a moment Elsa thought that she was going to go for another round before Anna asked her.

“Are we there yet?”

🚂🚃🚃

Arriving at Kings Cross it was already getting towards the evening, when they had gotten onto the train in Inverness it had already been past noon. Now it was nearly ten o’clock, luckily the accommodation she had arranged was only a couple of stops away at Holloway Road.

The lady at the reception was more than happy to check them in and recommend a place to eat that wouldn’t be too busy at this time of night. Anna eventually picked an Italian place, despite the fact that she knew that they were going to be there in a couple of days. But Elsa didn’t mind too much when she tasted the warm slices.

“Humans really where put on this earth to eat bread and drink wine,” Anna spoke as she finished devouring her own slice.

“You’re not wrong,” Elsa conceded as she closed her eyes to savour the flavour. The warm pizza slice was amazing, her choice of just taking a margherita was proving to be a good one. Her sister had called her boring, but she didn’t mind it. The flavour spoke for herself.

Eating the food and then sipping on their wine, they quickly spend another couple hours going over everything and nothing at all. At the end they only got up when the waiter told them that they were closing in about an hour. Paying the tab, they made their way back to the hotel.

Walking into their room Anna switched on the light as Elsa entered the bathroom to freshen up. It had been a long day, she thought as she splashed her face a couple of times.

“Elsa?” Anna called out from behind the wall.

“Yeah?”

“You know there is only one bed here right?“

“What?”

“They gave us a double bed.”

“Oh,” she called back as she tried to parse the information that had been given to her. She was pretty sure that she had put in the reservation that she wanted a two-person room.

Coming out of the small bathroom she saw what Anna had called out for, instead of the two singles that she had expected there was a large double bed in the middle of the room. Anna already sitting on the front of the bed.

“I can take the couch if you want,” Elsa offered as she looked if there even was a couch to crash on. But even before she could finish looking Anna spoke up.

“It’s fine, but I’m taking the left side.”

“If you call dips I have to respect it,” Elsa told her as she stripped off her shirt and replaced it with her sleeping one. “Anyway, go get changed, I’m not sharing a bed with someone who is wearing jeans… again.”

“Fine, but only cause I love you,” Anna told her as she disappeared into the bathroom herself. Taking a moment, Elsa pulled out their charging cables and plugged one into the left side of the bed. For tomorrow they had to find a convenience store or something for new batteries though. Even if they still had nearly a full day of travel ahead of them, it would be marginally more bearable if Anna could use her Gameboy.

Looking at the right side of the bed she took a moment and mentally mapped out where the middle line would be. It didn’t seem like it would be any smaller than a normal twin matrass she found in hotels, but it was still a little different to have it just be one bed.

“You sure you wanna share?” she called back as she kicked her trousers off as she landed on her back in the bed.

“I’m too tired for this Elsa, and I’d rather just sleep than have a thirty-minute conversation about this where eventually you agree with me,” Anna called back as she finished up her nighttime routine.

The whole event that her mind had convinced her turned out to be a lot more boring in the end. Anna just fell asleep within a couple of minutes as she let the phone drop out of her hand next to her on the bed. What did manage to surprise her was the fact that her sister somehow managed to double the space she was taking up moments after she could hear her soundly asleep.

After like fifteen minutes she was only taking up about as much space as her shoulder’s width allowed her. And even then she was slowly realising that Anna was rotating slowly until she was firmly pushing her off the bed entirely. In the end she just pushed her sister back to her own side and firmly laid on her side making sure she wasn’t about to feel her sister push er off again.

The rest of the night managed to be a lot more peaceful, leading to them sleeping in for the day. They had a train later that evening, but considering it was only nine in the morning they still had plenty of time. The inhouse breakfast was nice for what it was, they filled their plates as they looked what was happening in the city that day.

In the end they just chose to hop around the city as their feet carried them. Dropping off their bags at the station for when they would leave. The couple of hours they got where quickly filled with dipping into a few museums that Elsa had wanted to see and clothing stores up in Camdem where Anna tried to convince her that buying combat boots was a great idea. When it was pointed out that they would have to carry it with them for the remainder of the journey, Elsa just let her have it. She was sure that Anna was going to ask her to put it in her bad in a couple of days but that didn’t matter now.

Now it was just waiting in line to pass the passport control at St Pancras, arriving with about an hour before the train was set to leave. It was a bit annoying that they had to wait this long but they couldn’t do anything about that with dickheads in charge. But as they took their seats they just waited for the departure.

Luckly for her this was one of the shorter trips, meaning that Anna could just get lost in her latest run of Pokémon Red. She never got why Anna was so into it, but anything that let her peacefully read her stories was a big plus.

🚂🚃🚃

“How come when we build stations they are in nice buildings, and when the Belgians do it you just have this mess?” Anna declared as they made their way through the enormous walkway that ran underneath the platforms that made up the Brussels Midi station.

“Let’s just see if we can grab a connection to the central station,” Elsa told her as she approached one of the station maps. From what she could figure out there was a metro line that ran from here to there, but it was on the other side of the building. Looking around she managed to spot one of the departure boards that where interspaced along the ceiling.

She knew her sister had a point, but for what it was worth she also knew that a capitals quality wasn’t down to the immediate area around the main railway station. Though looking at the transport map she found out that there where two other main railway stations in the city. Eventually whit the help of a lady that walked up to them asking if they needed help, they managed to grab the metro towards the European quarter.

This time they just decided to stay in for the evening and eat at the hotel’s restaurant, which turned out to be a great choice. It wasn’t the basic pleasures of a good pizza, but rather a refined dining experience. The potions where made to leave enough space for the next and the chocolate desert was heavenly. If there was one thing the Belgians got down to a tee, it was chocolate.

“I could eat a million more of those,” Anna responded as she slowly ate the last couple of bites from her own desert. It was as if she was dreading the moment her plate was empty and she would starve for the lack of delicious chocolate.

“I’m sure we could order more if you want,” Elsa added as she cleaned off the spoon that sat on her desert plate.

“No! Then it wouldn’t be special, and I will probably hate it, and I don’t want to hate it I want to love this. It’s so good.” Anna yelped out as she tried to make her inner thoughts make sense as she said them out loud. Elsa knew what she was on about, even if the words where a little bit weird.

“Then we can just look for something similar tomorrow then?”

“Yeah, let’s do that. But for now, do you think there is still something open out there?”

Elsa glanced at the window and while there where still a couple of hints of sunlight, but that was down to the summer. And even as she glanced at her watch to check the time she didn’t think that much stuff was happening at eleven. Or at least something that they’d be interested in after a full day in London.

At the end of the day, they just retired to their room and enjoyed the fact that while they had been given a double room, both beds where nearly as big as the one bed they had to share the day before. The fact that there was also a bathtub rather than just a shower made her a little giddy.

A warm bath and just relaxing with a book made the evening worth it. The thought of Anna’s original plan of just hopping on overnight trains was a faraway memory, securely put to the wayside of just staying in hotels for the couple of days they would be travelling.

“Did you know that there is a statue of a little kid pissing here?” Anna interrupted her calm aura.

“What?”

“Yeah, they even dress him up for events and special occasions.”

“Okay?” she called out hoping that her non-committal answers would give her sister enough interaction that she would be satisfied to leave her be.

“Oh, it’s apparently a part of a set of three…” Anna carried on as Elsa put her book on the towel as she slipped underneath the warm water. At least there she could just stay in peace.

🚂🚃🚃

Exploring the city gave a much more favourable view than the one Anna had projected onto it when they had just arrived. It wasn’t the cleanest city in the world, but the mixture of green spaces and old buildings it fit right into any other European city in this part of the continent.

The one thing they hadn’t anticipated was the amount of hills that made up the city, with the row and rows of high-rises it covered up the gradual slopes that made up the streets. A couple of times they even had to catch their breath when after walking uphill for ten minutes and entering an open space where all other roads still led uphill.

Following their phones for navigation, they started to doubt the prediction of time as anytime they started walking it took twice as long. lucky the amount of tourist traps gave ample opportunity to duck out of the steady climbs and into hundreds of shops that had the widest range of tad for sale. Anything you could imagine had Belgian flags on it, miniature versions of the Atomium and thousands of different beer cups and glasses.

Eventually settling on grabbing a drink to combat the summer heat, they found shade on the outdoor seating. Elsa ordering one of the cherry beers, where Anna opted for a beer that had a knight’s helmet on the logo. Both where brought out with their own glasses, her own decorated with a small glass manor set into the feet of the glass. Anna’s had a representation of the helmet set near the top of the stem of her own glass.

From where they were sitting they resorted to people watching for the afternoon. Being in a touristic metropolis gave sight to a wide range of different people, be it the droves of tourists that stick to the guide and listening to whatever they are talking about. Or the obvious day tourists that live around the area, they don’t fall for the tourist traps and just walk into their respective pubs. The last group where the people who just lived here, the lady who is just rocking her pyjama trousers to the store, the kid who carries his GameCube with him across the street.

“When does the train leave again?” Anna asked her.

“In like three hours, though the email did say we should probably get there fifteen minutes early.”

“Okay, so still plenty of time for us to get back to the hotel, grab a bite and get to the station then.” Her sister surmised the plan that had sat in the back of her own head.

“Yeah, though if we can get there a bit earlier, I’ll be forever grateful.”

“You’re forever grateful a lot these days,” Anna joked as she took another sip of her beer.

“One of us has to be, sweetie.”

All in all, the trip back to the hotel was more pleasant than their earlier walk about town had been. Elsa would have pointed out that it was starting to cool down in the evening, Anna for her part was just saying it was because it was downhill. The food was a bit more basic than the night before, but they still enjoyed their time with the wine card.

Packing their bags was a quick twenty minutes of gathering the mess they somehow had managed to make in the single evening they had been there and stealing of the soaps and towels. For the price they had paid for the room it was well withing their right.

“Did we miss anything?” Anna asked as she put her bag at the doorway. Scanning the entrance hallway for something they might have forgotten.

“Doesn’t look like it, let’s head out before we miss our tram,” Elsa told her as she put her backpack on.

From there they just rode down to the station, checked in for the Thalys as they walked onboard to the train carriage. With two seats with a table between them, they stowed their bags in the baggage area by the entrance and sat down for the shortest journey they would be taking that week.

Chatting between them, Elsa relaxed into her chair as Anna was recounting a childhood memory. They had ended up there by some convoluted way, but she was enjoying the play by play her sister was giving her when she baked waffles with her mom and accidentally burned her hand on the hot waffle iron. She hadn’t been at home that day and when she got there later that evening the only mark that remained was just some red on Anna’s hand.

“It’s strange cause even thought I remember my hand hurting in the moment, I don’t remember actually feeling it burn. Like somehow my brain has locked that memory away as it’s too traumatic to remember it.”

“Maybe, or maybe it’s just too long ago that the only memories you have of the moment are copies of copies your brain made up.”

“Is that how it works? Do memories just fade away and get replaced with fake ones?”

“I think so, or at least that’s what I read in an article a bit ago.”

“Oh, it could also be a fake memory!”

“Could be for sure,” Elsa told her as the announcement of the departure rung through the carriage. They would be arriving in Paris around ten, which would probably be a bit late if they still wanted to walk around and explore the city a bit. It was going to be one of the shorter stops on their whistlestop tour of Europe.

“What are you reading?” Anna asked her as she put her book on the table between them.

“Something about magical bureaucracy,” she admitted as she showed her the cover.

“How does that not surprise me at all,” Anna told her as she took a closer look , “Charmed Quill?”

“One of the magical items that the main character uses, it kinda acts like a dictation tool, but also it will write down sources if you ask it. It’s honestly a little deux ex machina, but it cuts so much of the fat of the boring story so I’m willing to look past that part.”

“You mean that this story,” she held up the book, “about magical boring stuff.”

“Magical bureaucracy,” Elsa interjected.

“Has so much real boring stuff the author added a tool to make it less boring?” she said with a giggle.

“Don’t mock it if you don’t like it,” Elsa told her as she took the book back.

“Hey, I know I’m not the target audience, but I’m happy you found something in your wheelhouse.”

“Thank  you, I’m happy to enjoy my sexy boring bureaucrat and her business.”

“What, they’re sexy? You didn’t mention that, is it like that fairy smut that is just horny with the cover of magic then?” Her sister asked suddenly far more interested with the potential content the story could have.

“Well, it’s not that much of the story.” She admitted, there was a bit of that in the book. But nowhere near the fairy porn that had taken over bookstores on mass. “It’s just a cute side story between Alice and Emmy that happens very much in context rather than out of nowhere.”

“Oh, well that’s still boring,” Anna said as she looked a bit more disappointed, “but also very much in your wheelhouse.”

“Yeah, I’ll let you play your pocket monster game and you let me read my boring books,” Elsa told her.

“Hey, first off its Pokémon, as you know. Second off, these games have kept me company for days and months when you were off doing boring stuff.”

“Studying for exams and the like.”

“As I said boring, so I could play a lot of the game. And I think they are very fun to play and have much repeat play value!”

For a moment they had a stare off before the conducted came by to check on their tickets. As she pulled out her phone to let the woman scan them, Anna took out her Gameboy and put in her headphones to listen to the sound as she trudged though the wilderness that made up the majority of that game’s world.

Having settled into a comfortable silence, she picked up her book as well as she skipped though it to get back to where she had left of the day before. With that they spend the next couple of hours mainly in their own world, only interrupted when Anna venture out to grab some drinks and she herself  getting up to use the bathroom near the end of the journey.

Getting off the train in La Gare du Nord, they opted to grab a taxi towards their hotel. It was a bit less fancy than they had the night before, but it would do. Getting their keycard, they entered the elevator up towards their floor. The room was, split in a way that the two people sharing it didn’t have direct view of one another as they where in bed. Elsa opted to take the bed nearer to the door as she slept a bit more deeply than her sister, who would wake up from a mouse waling on a cloud. Or that was how she had posed it years ago.

“When do we have the train tomorrow?” Anna asked her as she had chanced into her sleeping attire.

“we have a train at eleven, and then we’ll be in Torino around ten.”

“So, we really don’t have much time to explore the city?”

“Not on this trip, we have a pretty set schedule we can’t really veer away from it.”

“Ugh, this is just annoying.”

“Hey, you wanted to do this,” Elsa told her with a laugh, “We’re going to go all the way without missing trains.”

“You should have said it was dumb,” Anna still managed to complain a bit.

“I think I did that at least twenty times, but you still managed to be convincing enough for us to do it anyway.” Elsa responded as she pulled on her own night shirt. “But for now, go sleep so we at least can eat breakfast somewhere in the city before we leave again.”

“Fine, goodnight Elsa.”

“Sleep well Anna.”

🚂🚃🚃

It turned out that with an eleven o’clock departure hour, there was very little time to spend in Paris. Waking up at nearly nine and only really getting out of the hotel a quarter to ten. They where rushing to find a place to eat that they had been recommended as the time was quickly running out.

When they eventually got the address, the restaurant had closed up for a summer break leaving them hungry as they headed over to the station in hopes of grabbing a bite to eat there before getting onto their train onwards to Italy.

La Gare de Lyon was nearly as big as the station they had arrived at, so luckily they had the opportunity to eat a sandwich or two before the call for their train rung through the station hall.

As they entered they entered their own cabin, again Elsa had sprung for the additional cost that provided a bit more privacy on the eleven hours that they would be spending on the train. Settling in Anna kicked off her boots as she sat sideways on the bench, where Elsa just took a spot opposite her next to the window.

As the train sat at the platform the view was rather limited to the rest of the departing trains, and the interior structure of the station. But quickly they pulled out into the city leaving them to look at the ever-expanding landscape that filled the area with buildings as far as the eye could see.

As the train slowly got up to speed Elsa decided to dig back into her book for the time being. With nearly twelve hours ahead of them, she was going to take all the time where her sister wasn’t gonna pester her to see if she could finish this book. However, some thirty minutes later she already heard the much-repeated phrase.

“Are we there yet?”

Looking up from her book she was presented with her sister somehow crouching on top of the seat she had been laying down on just a couple of moments earlier. She had honestly thought this was going to a bit later in the journey.

“No, still eleven hours before we get there,” she said to her as she put down her book. There was a moment where she thought her sister was about to complain that they should have just flown down to Sicily rather than taking five trains through western Europe in less than a week.

“Do you ever think that we will travel more in these couple of days than many people in history would in their lifetime?”

“Not particularly, but I feel that even back in the day people travelled a whole lot, be it for pilgrimages or even just armies traversing across the countries to conquer them.”

“Are you ever going to take a question not serious?”

“Maybe, but you’ll only find out by asking more of them,” Elsa told her sister as she watched her face light up. There was a good chance that she was about to be asked a million pub quiz questions.

“What’s your favourite piece of writing?”

So, she was going with more opened questions then, she surmised as she tried to remember what her favourite was. It was a rather flexible title in her head, but for the moment she was at least partial to a shorter work.

“I think that I’m currently liking Ozymandias by Percy Shelly.”

“Related to Mary Shelly?” Anna asked her.

“Her husband,” she explained.

“That makes sense,” Anna said out loud, to Elsa she didn’t know what made sense but was happy that she was connecting dots in her head.

“What’s it about?”

“What?”

“Ozymandias, Is it a novel? Or a poem or something.”

“It’s a poem that can be ascribed many meanings. It’s about a man who hears a story about ruins that are standing in the middle of the Egyptian desert. One of which bears an inscription that tell the man that all this was built in the name of the king of kings, in this case Ozymandias, and that people should tremble before his works. Though when the man looks around all that is visible is sand and ruins. ”

“So, it’s kinda saying that even if in the moment you are the most powerful person, time will eventually grind down all your achievements anyway?”

“Kinda, it’s how I feel about it more or less. The hubris of demanding future people’s tremble before a ruined temple structure is kinda funny.”

“I can see that,” Anna said as she sat back on the seat more normally.

“Anyway, my turn now,” Elsa spoke as she thought of a question.

“The Magician’s Nephew by Clive staples Lewis,” Anna said not even waiting for her to ask a question.

“Interesting but not what I was going to ask sweetie.”

“You don’t wanna ask me to clarify?”

“Not now, maybe if we are still doing this in a couple hours we can circle back.”

“Fine, give it to me then.”

“What’s the last time you listened to a song that made you tear up?”

“That’s not fair,” Anna immediately protested.

“It’s up to you to answer it if you want,” Elsa held up her hands innocently.

“Fine, but you don’t get to make fun of me for it.”

“Anything said here won’t leave the cabin,” she promised.

“Fine, it was when I was watching a Minecraft video and they were saying goodbye to the season and I teared up when they played the song that they normally use at the start, but then had slowed it down and let it fade out at the end.”

“I mean, if that’s what does it for you,” Elsa said as Anna rolled her eyes at her.

“I wasn’t bawling my eyes out, just got a little wet.”

“That’s what she said,” Elsa instantly replied as her brain processed what her sister had said.

“Boo! Can’t let a girl have a little moment before ruining it,” Anna told her as a smile came back to her.

“Anyway, back to me then,” she stated as she bit her lip thinking deeply.

“What’s something you haven’t told mom, but told dad?”

That was something else, she didn’t have many secrets she kept from their parents. And then one that she hadn’t told her mom, but had her dad? It might be something that she done years ago.

“I think the only thing I can remember is when she made cookies, and I took one before they were cool. Dad saw me do it but never said anything about it? I don’t know if that would count, but I honestly can’t remember anything else.”

“I mean if you can’t remember anything else, I will have to let it count. But that’s really it?”

“I don’t really keep secrets from them Anna, unlike some people here I just shut up about stuff they don’t need to ask about.”

“That was one time! And I learned the lesson there, don’t speak about stuff you’re not supposed to know about.”

“Correct, a surefire way to not get barred from taking the car for what was it again?”

“Five months,” Anna grumbled.

“Indeed, anyway my turn again. Where did you lose my green shirt last summer?”

“That’s not fair, these are supposed to be fun opened questions!” Anna protested as she could see her try to get out of answering it.

“Hey, no such rules where established, just answer the question. Did you really lose it, or do you know where it is?”

“I know where I left it, if that helps.”

“And where would that be?”

“Last I saw it; it was draped over a surfboard when it leaned against some fence.”

“And it was not there when you got back to it?” Elsa probed deeper.

“No, and neither was the surfboard if you recall. Merida still gives me shit for loosing it.”

“Fair enough, I’ll have to ask her next time.”

“What would that do, I just told you that it was there when we…” Anna quickly slapped a hand in front of her mouth. “…When I.”

“Anna Agnarrdóttir don’t tell me that it was on the same night..”

“It wasn’t! I met Hans after that happened, and that only happened once so don’t even bring that up. That’s only bad memories.”

“Then who?” she asked as she was genuinely curious.

“It was one of Merida’s friends, I never got her name but in my defence she was smoking hot and more importantly available.”

“Hmnn, this isn’t going to be the end of this conversation, but I’m happy that you didn’t lie about losing it.”

“I would never lie to you!” Anna continued her protest, “Not say things on the other hand.” She added in a whisper. Elsa heard it clear as day anyway, but she wasn’t about to call her sister out on it. It was the same way that she got out of lying to other people. Shutting up was incredibly effective of a tool to not say something you’d later regret.

“Anyway, want to ask another question?” Elsa asked her.

“Sure, let’s say that we aren’t gonna ask about that kinda stuff.”

“Sure, I can live with that,” Elsa concurred.

🚂🚃🚃

Arriving in Italy they had gone over nearly any point they could have thought about, eventually just resorting to guessing numbers or colours they thought about it. Entering the hotel, they had booked, they passed out on the beds. The next train was early  the next morning so there was little room to walk around the city.

“I am not doing this again,” Elsa said as she stood in the cold morning air of Tornio.

“I’m with you,” Anna said equally unenthused.

“One more train and then we can just spend a week in the sun.”

“I thought you said that the cold didn’t bother you?” Anna asked her.

“I meant winter, if it’s summer I don’t want to deal with cold if I don’t have to.”

“Makes sense, when did they say they would pick us up?”

“In like a couple minutes,” Elsa said as she looked over towards the corner, willing a cab to turn around and get to them quicker.

A couple minutes later, they finally got into the car as they were driven towards the station. Between paying for their tab, grabbing a bite to eat onto the train and finding their seats, they moved quickly.

Now it was again an eleven-hour journey that would be spend in a mixture of silence, talking or just wandering around the train. They mostly did the latter part, doing multiple laps from the front to the end and back again, they found the restaurant that was onboard, the observation cart and most importantly the bar.

“You can say what you want, but at least they serve quality wine in trains here,” Elsa said as she took a sip from her own glass.

“Do you think we can do the fun, get drunk, black out and then we just skip towards the end of this journey?” Anna asked her.

“I don’t think that getting blackout drunk is a great end to this journey.”

“I mean, I thought so but we could give it a try.”

“Anna, no.”

“Fine, but we’re gonna need something more for the food later.“

“That’s a different moment in time, that’s different wine.”

“Love to hear that.”

The following hours where spend drinking more wine, eating surprisingly good food for a train cabin. And then they retired back to their seats to wait out the last couple of hours as they slowly sobered up. Eating more snacks, Anna eventually got back to her game. Elsa for her part continued reading her book and finished it about twenty minutes before they arrived at the final station they would see for the journey.

“Are we there yet?” Anna asked her for the last time.

“Yes, we are. We went all the way and now, I’m never doing that again.” Elsa told her sister as she stepped off the train.

“Fair,” Anna said as she followed her onwards to the resort.