"Do you want anything special for Christmas?"

Kristoff and Anna were sitting in the castle library by the fire in a rare moment of privacy, and on Anna's part, stillness. She had her stockinged legs in his lap, her head back and her eyes closed as he massaged her feet. Probably for this reason it took her a few moments to answer him, and when she did her voice was throaty in a way he would never admit turned him on.

"I don't really need anything. I mean, chocolate is great—but really I don't want to do big gift exchanges. Having you and Elsa in my life is just plenty."

She opened her eyes to grin up at him from where she'd slouched in her own chair and, as always, he smiled right back at her with what he was sure were embarrassingly gooey eyes.

He continued rubbing her feet as they fell back into a comfortable silence, thinking about where he would be able to get chocolates.

She broke his revere a few minutes later by reminding him about the Christmas Eve event Elsa was hosting for the townspeople the next day.

"It's not going to be a full blown ball or anything," she was saying "Elsa is going to do another ice rink and there are going to be drinks and Christmas cookies and music in the hall. You wouldn't even have to dance..."

He looked up from her feet to see her leveling him with a vaguely pleading look.

"I don't ever dance." He pointed out. "I stand at the side of the room in a stuffy collar while you dance and wiggle your eyebrows at me across the room."

She smirked at this, wiggling her eyebrows right then and there as if to prove some point.

"Well this you can come to. And you don't even have to stand across the room from me." She said.

He agreed to do it then, because she was smiling at him in the low light and looking warm and inviting and kissable and the sooner he agreed the sooner he could join her in her chair. So he did.

And surprise surprise, he did end up standing across the courtyard from her the majority of the following day's festivities. And not even because he didn't dance—now it was just because she was swarmed by about a million people all wanting to talk to her and touch her hair and give her presents.

In the last half hour no less than forty people had given her flowers, ornaments, chocolates, cookies and other little gifts. Elsa who was receiving guests a few feet behind her sister had an equally large pile of offerings on the nearest table.

Kristoff's plan of getting her sweets was seeming less and less original by the minute.

He fought his way over to her as the party started to wind down, and was rewarded by her blindingly bright smile and her warm weight as she leaned back against his chest.

"Want to walk me up to my room?" She asked coyly, one sassy eyebrow cocked.

"I'd love to" he responded hooking her arm through his own and leading her through the courtyard and up into the castle.

Once inside the gates she wiggled out of her cloak and mittens and handed them off. She gave a mighty sort of shiver before slamming into Kristoff's chest and burying her face in his sweater. He let out a loud laugh and let his arms come up around her to squeeze her tight.

"You should have told me you were cold," he admonished.

She didn't respond, merely curling her hands into the space between their bodies.

"Thanks for coming."

Kristoff made sort of a grunt indicating that she was welcome while he marveled at the fact that his mere presence across the courtyard had been a nice thing for her. Never in his life had he mattered so much and in such a way to anyone. Certainly the trolls had loved him as their own family, but his experiences with people had never produced any such results. He gave Anna an extra squeeze. Maybe one of these days he would man up and tell her that she had the same sort of effect on him.

At the door to her room he kissed her soft and slow, lingering to press a few kisses to her cheek, forehead and hair before pulling away.

"Merry Christmas Princess" he said softly.

She curled her fists in to her chest and made two happy little jumps before exclaiming:

"My first Christmas with people! How exciting!" She laughed joyfully while his heart clenched a little bit.

"You know," she added more seriously "you could sleep in here tonight if you wanted..."

Honestly she would be the death of him.

"Oh Anna—I want to, you know that—but it would be so improper. Elsa would freeze me into a human-sized ice cube and you wouldn't have a boyfriend, just an eternally cold drink."

"Oh but!" (She did a weird sort of body spasm here, as if she were trying to shake his perfectly good logic away). "It would only be like horizontal hugging! We hug standing up and sitting down already," she added in a deadpan.

Kristoff sighed at this, deciding not to delve into the levels of intimacy that sleeping together would uncover. Not that he didn't want those levels of intimacy. Not that he didn't lie in his own bed sometimes and ache for her.

"Someday." He said finally.

She gave a deflated little sigh before leaning up on her toes and ghosting one last kiss over his lips, wishing him goodnight, and turning away and into the room. His chest felt warm where her hands had rested over his heart long after the door closed.

Despite the lateness of the hour, the market was still buzzing with activity as last minute shoppers went about getting stocking stuffers and gifts. Kristoff wandered up and down the aisles of produce and goods hoping that something would catch his eye—something that screamed Anna.

As it happened, something DID catch his eye, and despite knowing it was out of his price range by a mile, he sidled over to look at it.

It was a brooch—the kind that you might attach to a cloak or scarf. It was silver and white, glinting in the lantern light of the night, and shaped vaguely like a snowman. It really was perfect.

"Can I help you, young man?"

Kristoff started in surprise as he realized that he had been leaning over the counter with his palms flat and his eyebrows raised to look at the jewel.

"Oh sorry, I was just looking at that snowman brooch," said Kristoff, chuffing awkwardly at the back of his head as he backed up to a more respectful distance.

The man behind the counter was old enough to be Kristoff's grandfather. He had a balding grey head of hair and spectacles that made his eyes appear very large. There was a certain kindness about him, too, and Kristoff felt at ease with him in a way that didn't usually happen with people.

"Shopping for a special lady friend?" asked the man as he brought the brooch out of its case and placed it in Kristoff's broad hand for closer inspection. It really was stunningly beautiful, he felt sure that Anna would love it.

"Yes," Kristoff replied. "A very special lady friend. (It felt odd to call Anna this, true as it was). I have to be honest with you though, I don't think I can afford it."

The older man adjusted his spectacles and took the brooch back, peering at it closely, and Kristoff believed for a moment that he was about to offer to take the price down. Instead the man looked up at him and said "Perhaps not."

He put the brooch back below its protective glass and looked back up at Kristoff.

"Maybe you will come back another year and buy it for her?"

Kristoff gave a short nod, feeling downhearted and started to turn away when the older man spoke.

"What is it you want her to know? What are you trying to tell her with your Christmas gift?"

Kristoff gave a somewhat helpless shrug. All of this talking and feeling and thinking about other people was not his forte.

"I guess I just want her to know that I care about her. I want her to have something that I picked out because I knew it would make her happy."

The man behind the counter fixed him with a kind smile and thumbed his spectacles at the bridge of his nose.

"Perhaps the gift she would most like to receive is free." Said the man. And then without further ado he shooed Kristoff away with a wave of his hand. "Goodnight."

Kristoff was left sputtering slightly as he processed this development. Certainly he needed to get her something. But then, of course, it hit him. The thing she had said to him just last night, that having him in her life was making her happy enough. He could prove to her that being in her life was just the thing he wanted most, and her presence in his was the best thing that had ever happened to him. He knew just how he would convey the message, too.

The castle was very quiet at this hour. Even the candle in Elsa's room that usually burned late was out (and Kristoff had checked, running into Elsa would not make his mission any easier). He slipped into his own room and changed into his sleeping clothing before taking a deep breath and re-entering the hall to walk quietly to Anna's room.

Standing outside the familiar door his courage started to fail him. His hand was half raised in a knock, his forehead resting against the door, his heart in his throat. No one had ever told him how hard it would be to tell a girl you loved her.

If he knocked, would she even hear it? Would she answer her door in the middle of the night? Would she scream? Would it wake the castle staff? Would she fling open the door as the whole household descended on him shirtless in his loose sleep pants outside of the princess' door and—

—And he turned the knob and slipped inside before his imagination could get any more ridiculous. He was her boyfriend. He was allowed to slip into her room unannounced in the wee hours of the morning. Right?

The room was very dark and quiet, the only light being provided by the moon shining over the balcony and the bed where Anna's prone form lay.

He didn't give himself time to start panicking again. He crossed the room quickly (practically running, though he'd never admit it) and slipped into the bed right next to her.

To her eternal credit she did not scream. Her eyes shot open, and she did a bizarre panicked wiggle that would have cracked him up if he hadn't been so focused on stopping her from screaming.

"It's Kristoff!" he whisper-yelled.

There was a beat in which she blinked many times in quick succession and pulled the covers towards her in a weird protective bunch. Her hair was ridiculous. Then she seemed to realize that it was him, or she recognized his voice. Whatever it was, the change was almost instantaneous.

"Kristoff!" she breathed, and she heaved herself across the bed at him, tangling her arms around his neck and laughing breathlessly into his chest. Her momentum almost carried them both to the ground but he managed to stop that flailing mess from happening by leaning back against her with a laugh of his own.

"What are you DOING here!?" she whispered happily, pulling back far enough to look at him."

He had planned a speech for this. There were some eloquent phrases he was going to say, and some lovely words about how much he had enjoyed getting to know her over the last six months. His heart was beating so fast he was practically a hummingbird; her beautiful eyes were shining up out of the darkness at him. He opened his mouth once, twice, and said nothing.

Finally he leaned down and kissed her hard.

"I love you. More than anything. Merry Christmas."

Anna did knock him out of the bed then. Already teetering on the edge, her onslaught of kisses and not-so-quiet exclamations tipped the balance, and the pair slid to the floor in a flurry of blankets and pillows.

Between gasps of laughter and kisses she managed to string together some words and sentences that mostly started and ended with "Kristoff!" and "Oh Kristoff!" Elsa was almost certainly going to burst in.

She told him she loved him too, about sixty times, and he managed to get them both back into the bed and wrapped up in her covers. She was pillowed cozily against his body, head resting on his out thrown arm, legs wrapped around his when they had finally settled down a little bit. And she was right, horizontal hugging was infinitely better than their other versions.

He was sliding into a very warm and satisfied sleep when she tilted her head up towards him and whispered that it was the best Christmas she had ever had. He opened one eye and grinned down at her.

"Just think-it's only 3 in the morning. So much Christmas yet to be had".

She leaned up and kissed him, smiling against his mouth. She tasted like chocolate.