Title: Be my dear (misunderstanding)
Rating: pg13
Pairing: UsUk
Warning: fluffiness, painfully unedited
Disclaimer: Hetalia belongs to Hidekaz Himaruya-senpai-sama.
Notes: for my lovely
Giulia, happy birthday cutie ♥
Summary: Alfred is a warrior. Arthur is annoying.
Alfred is a natural at sword fighting. He doesn’t have the precision his brother Matthew has, and he’s not nearly a graceful. He’s strong though, the kind of strong that makes the enemy line shiver in fear when the soldiers see him lined up, first row, ready to pounce on them.
They call him the Northern Eagle, the same animal who’s drawn on his shield and on the back of his armor. The white, royal eagle is the symbol of his birth line, a symbol that only he, as the elder son, has the right to wear during battle. So he wears it, and other soldiers have learnt to respect Alfred, or to fear him.
He’s a little proud to know that there are already legends about him, like that time he went defeated an entire squad on his own, only him and his sword and in the end he was so drenched in blood that they wouldn’t let him enter the camp because he seemed dead himself.
It wasn’t like that, really. There weren’t so many enemies to begin with, and they were young and scared and they had recognized the eagle on his shield. Also, Feliciano was on patrol duty that night, no wonder he had been mistook for a ghost, or a zombie, or whatever Feliciano had ran away screaming for as he looked for Ludwig to protect him.
Everyone loves Alfred, he’s sure of it. Despite his bad behavior, his gross manners and the fact that he eats like a pig he’s one of the best soldiers of their little base, lost between two mountains. They have a great responsibility. The passage they’re protecting is small and insidious, but if enemies managed to pass through it they’d be able to reach the Capital in a few hours of walk. There wouldn’t be even the time to rearrange the city army, they’d be slaughtered right there.
They haven’t been doing a bad job at protecting the Capital. Until now, no one has ever been able to cross the mountains and even see a glimpse of their glorious city. Alfred is proud to be a part of this, he’s ever dreamed of being a hero and protecting people. His mom used to say he was destined to do great deeds and now that he’s one of the famous heroes who’re defending the Capital against cruel warlords he’s finally satisfied with his life.
There’s only one little thing that keeps bothering him, keeping him awake and unable to sleep at night.
•
“Jones, how many times do I have to tell you not to breathe this loudly when you are in my presence? Is it that difficult? Why is your uncultured, inferior mind apparently unable to comprehend a simple concept like this, something that everyone would understand in a moment?”
He’d really like to say that, no matter how conceited it may sound, his roommate’s whining doesn’t quite affect him, but that’d be a lie. His roommate’s remarks affect him, his roommate’s presence affects him, everything about Arthur Kirkland affects him to unimaginable levels.
“I would like to be able to sleep, you know? Rest my mind. I know you don’t understand because you don’t even seem to have a brain, but normal thinking people like me…”
He dives in the pillow, willing Arthur’s voice to vanish, to drown away in the corners of his mind, but it seems impossible. Arthur has the kind of irritating voice that drills in your skull and finds your patience, no matter where you’re hiding it, and then proceeds to wear it out. It’s a supreme work, and it never fails to leave Alfred completely out of himself with rage.
He’d jump Arthur, ready to put his hands to a good use on that thin neck, but years of forced coexistence taught him that fighting with his roommate is never a good idea. Arthur is probably just bored, and a bored Arthur needs a way, any way, to express all of the uneasiness stuffed inside him.
If Alfred manages to ignore him, he’ll shut up in the end. Or maybe not, maybe he’ll continue to provoke him, but Alfred knows that deep inside, him not responding to any of Arthur’s provocations can only annoy Arthur more, and that would mean that, for once, Alfred has won.
If he just gives in, and since Arthur’s baits are being more and more outrageous as time passes that possibility is this close to becoming reality, Arthur will just beat him up into a bloody pulp with his spells and leave him there without even bothering to tell someone to collect their best warrior from the floor with a spoon.
Arthur would never spare one of his precious silver teaspoons to help Alfred getting up on his feet. That would make the point of smearing Alfred on the floor completely useless. If Alfred loses his patience, in the end only Arthur will benefit. He won’t be nervous anymore, he’ll be able to sleep, and tomorrow he’ll smirk at Arthur’s bruises and impossibility to go out in mission while he basks around with a smirk in his black cloak.
Alfred is not giving up. He resolutely gives his back to Arthur’s complaints and feigns sleep. Arthur looks like he’s not going to stop anytime soon, but at least tomorrow they can be grumpy together.
•
Arthur isn’t a warrior.
He has a dreary looking book full of spells and charms hidden under his bed and protected by a lot of curses. He never opens it in Alfred’s presence, like he’s afraid Alfred could stole magic tricks from him or something. Alfred wouldn’t be able make a feather fly, let alone read one of those complicated words in ancient languages, but he never comment anything because he prefers Arthur to think of him as a possible menace instead of an ally.
They’ve never been allies. Not even on the first day, when Alfred arrived on the camp and Ludwig Beilschmidt decided to entrust him on Arthur’s care. Alfred won’t ever forget that Arthur sent him on a suicide mission in the hope he died, just to be free of the unexpected burden. More than anything, Alfred won’t ever forget when Arthur decided to help the enemy in trying to kill him.
He survived by a sheer miracle, and the first thing he did after he managed to come back to the camp was run to their shared room. He was furious, his mind easily replying the gleeful, diabolic smirk Arthur has sent him before disappearing into sheer air and leaving him alone to fend off fifty soldiers and the demonic wolf Arthur himself had been kind enough to summon to finish him.
Arthur had been in their shared room, throwing Alfred’s possession in the garbage and singing a silly children song to himself. He didn’t even have the time to react because Alfred was on him in a moment, all blood and fury hitting him like a cannon ball. He hadn’t left him the time to take out his magic wand or his spell book, he didn’t even have the power to raise his sword but he bit him, he hit blindly under him until they were rolling on the floor like animals trying to tore at each other’s throats. Arthur wasn’t hurt, but Alfred was bigger and more used to hand-to-hand fight.
They had been punished after that. Alfred had purposefully attacked his superior and he still doesn’t know, even now, what Arthur was being punished for. They didn’t even want to listen to his story of how their official mage had tried to get rid of him. Whatever the crime was, at least they were punished in the same way, forced to stand each other, sharing rooms and being sent on mission together for the rest of their lives. And thank you very much.
A few years has passed since that disgraceful day, and even though nothing and no one in the world can get to Alfred as quickly and as forcefully as Arthur can, he has learnt to live with the other man. Or to ignore him, at least.
•
Alfred doesn’t even know how that happened. He dives into his bed, pulling the covers over his head and trying to choke on the pillow. He can’t black out the soft questions spoken outside his room, Francis, that busybody, has already interrogated, spreading the story even further. Arthur has disappeared. If Alfred is lucky he’ll never come back. Alfred wants to disappear too, and never ever come back.
Things were going so well. He had ignored Arthur all night, and the morning after they were sporting twins eye bags and the same tired expressions, and then Arthur had to go and say the stupid thing, Alfred doesn’t even remember what exactly he had said, and he was just so tired and…
“Well, at least I don’t have those hideous eyebrows. At least I’m not that pathetic that I have to hang out with Francis of all people because no one else stands me. At least I have real friends and Francis doesn’t have to pretend that he likes me because I’m too much of a pain in the ass that they had to actually force someone to live with you because no one wouldn’t do that on their own.”
He paused, to take his breath, “You’re impossible!”
Arthur stood there, not doing anything, his lips trembling. He was as white as a ghost.
Then he turned on his heels and stormed out of the room, stepping on an unaware Francis who only wanted to call them for breakfast. And now everyone knows about Alfred F. Jones, the only person in the world who was able to make Arthur Kirkland cry.
“Good job, boy,” whispered evilly Francis in his ear before gleefully running to tell the entire world about the stunning news, “you broke him. Thousands have tried, but you must have something truly special to destroy even that stone he has in place of his heart.”
Alfred turns around, tossing and pulling the covers, unable to sleep his sadness away. Arthur has never been polite towards him. He’s been rude, annoying and even cruel, but Alfred has never said such terrible things to anyone. And it’s true that Arthur has no friends. He must’ve felt really lonely.
Arthur’s book of spells lays abandoned on the floor, and something clicks in Alfred.
Arthur is out there, alone. Without his only weapon. The mage is so used to obtain everything he needs with magic that he probably has no idea how to survive alone in the forest. A forest full of wolves, boars, mountain lions and never forget the enemy camp on the other side of the river.
Arthur is more or less in the middle. Little, tiny Arthur, with his black cloak and giant eyebrows.
Alfred grabs the book and he’s out of the door and right into the forest before he can even think about it. He’s the hero, he’ll save the princess, the mage, the damsel in distress? His mind is giving him strange mental images. What counts is that he’ll save Arthur, and Francis, who probably has had the biggest unrequited crush on their camp’s official first mage for decades, can suck Alfred’s sword.
•
Alfred finds Arthur in the woods, completely unscathed and talking animatedly with thin air. It must be a very heated discussion if Arthur, usually so composed and calm, is blushing so hard it’s probably glow in the dark.
“I DON’T LIKE HIM LITTLE FAIRY, I SWEAR!”
A little pause.
“No, Mr. Unicorn, and it doesn’t even mind because he hates me. He has always hated me, since the beginning. He made it really clear.”
He sounds devastated. Alfred has the vague suspect it’s his fault.
The little chat with invisible friends must be lovely, but he decided it’s time to make his presence known, and he coughs a little.
Arthur turns towards him, looking like a deer in deer in the headlights. A deer with very bushy and cute eyebrows. His cheeks are still red, but his eyes are a little wet. His face loses all of its colours as soon as he sees Alfred standing there, on an oak’s root.
“Wha-what are you doing here?”
“Who were you talking to? There’s nobody here.”
Arthur scoffs. “With my invisible friends, of course. Oh, wait, I don’t have any friends because no one would like my giant eyebrows, right?”
He sniffs, tries to spit something out but in the end he’s forced to give his back to Alfred to hide his tears.
Alfred doesn’t know what to do. He’s never been good with crying people, maybe because he’s usually the one who makes people cry, as a little voice inside his head that sounds suspiciously like Francis’ reminds him. In the end he tries with the sincerity cards.
“Listen, uhm, I’m sorry.”
He’s watching his feet very closely, but he can still feel Arthur turning towards him.
“I didn’t mean, you know, all of those things, I just… You’re so annoying sometimes, and I just. I…”
The words die on his tongue, but he is sorry. He never meant to make Arthur cry.
“You know,” Arthur’s voice startles him, and he raises his eyes to find the mage giving him a very pointed look, “I never meant to hurt you, that day.”
Arthur reddens even more. “I just, the wolf was meant to help you, not try to kill you.”
He gulps, and this time he’s the one looking at his feet in order not to look at Alfred’s reaction.
“WHAT? But it attacked me, it tried to eat me, it…”
Arthur mumbles something, in a voice so tiny and cute Alfred doesn’t understand half a word.
Can it really be just a big misunderstanding?
“What did you say?”
He steps towards Arthur, effectively trapping him against the tree because it looks like the other boy is going to flee any minute now. It doesn’t matter, this thing must be settled down right now, and Alfred’s legs are faster than his skinny ones anyway. “What did you say, Arthur Kirkland?”
He’s so much bigger than Arthur, but that never made the mage uncomfortable. He always talks back, he’s never afraid. This time is not afraid either, just extremely awkward, as he mumbles something.
“I can’t hear you like that, Arthur.”
Alfred hopes it’s reading this right, hopes he’s not making a terrible mistake as he leans his face down, toward Arthur’s one as the mage raises his eyes. His face is now a violent shade of red, and there are tears prickling at the corner of his eyes. Lovely, thinks Alfred.
“I said that I may have pronounced the spell wrong, on that day, but I didn’t realize and I…”
“Why would I believe you? You’ve never made a mistake with your spells, and you were throwing my stuff away when I cam-”
Arthur violently stops him with a shriek. “I wasn’t throwing it away, I wanted to tidy up the room so that when you came back you’d find everything clean. You’re such a mess and I just wanted to…”
“And why, again, did you make a mistake?”
There’s a challenge in Arthur’s eyes, and Alfred really really really hopes he’s not reading the signals wrong, or this will be the most awkward moment of his life.
“Maybe you made me flustered.”
Alfred leans down and kisses him.
•
“Wow, I hoped he’d kill you. Things worked out in the best way, after all.”
Francis sounds more than a little disappointed when they both come back in one piece. Except Arthur’s backside. That probably hurts, a lot.
“Francis, Arthur told me that you told him that I told you that I hated him. Care to explain? Because, even though he was really annoying, I never said that.”
Francis pales.
“You have three seconds to run. Three, two, one…”
richard kirsch poker I've never written Hetalia, I didn't even think I would've ever written Hetalia. It's my little sister's otp, though, and I want her to be happy. Hope I didn't mess up too badly.