EDIT: July 7th, 2013.
Re-EDIT: December 12th, 2013
Itty bitty tiny small edit: October 5th, 2014
Might I suggest listening to Baby It's Cold Outside - Margaret Whiting and Johnny Mercercover before, after or while reading this. Listening to that version for three consecutive hours was my abettor for this venture. Hot chocolate in September was the muse.
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Snow leisurely drifted across the white canvas of already blanketed city scenery. Great round cotton-esque puffs that would land on hats and soak through to the scalp; or sneak their way through bands of wound scarves to gently, gracefully, painfully plop on bare skin just behind a shirt collar to melt and slid down the spine in Winter's indefatigable joke with Spring. Ha ha.
Cutting through the blur of frozen and wet and cold came warm lights shining through the sheer curtains of tired apartments as families settled down in front of their televisions with piping mugs of hot chocolate that warmed their very beings with giddy childish bliss as they listened to the telecaster and meteorologist discuss the building severity of the evening weather. An idle hint of school shut downs being presumed for eager kids, followed up by a quick relay of precautions for the parents and other solemn early morning commuters, who "might prepare for metro delays and black ice on the roads. Back to you, Tom."
From the portal of warmth and comfort and shared living encroached the luminous light through the dark, polluting the pure white mounds of snow with its florescent hum. The door was jammed to stay open and a boot clad foot slowly eased itself into the snow drift, visibly bracing as the other leg was forcibly admitted to sink in the soggy mound as well. "I-it's not that cold," was thrown back over a broad shoulder into the light. He was young, twenty-some-odd and a liar, as most twenty-somethings are, but still lacking the practiced adeptness to it that comes with age and college.
A gruff laugh resonated from in the stairwell behind him, closely followed by a second shadow casting its grey silhouette out over the white. "You're shivering," supercilious and very Italian, the voice commented in amusement as the point he had just been previously trying to argue was demonstrated before his eyes. Surprisingly, the words shared a hidden common core meaning; say, to something along the lines of moron.
Alfred stood a little straighter and stomped his boot clad feet in protesting defiance, stubbornly pulling his gloves over his hands in an attempt to warm up. It didn't help, but it also didn't make him any colder, so he told himself it was better than before. His body wasn't so easily fooled, though, so when he tried to get out a simple "am not," it came out distorted through his chattering teeth. The sharp, arrogant, I-told-you-so-bastard puff of air that came out behind him was a good prod to his ego to suck it up, and Alfred braced himself and took another tentative step forward so he was completely out of the doorway and at the full mercy of the elements. No longer protected, he was immediately hit by the onslaught of snow clinging to his glasses and cold air entering his lungs with every taken breath. Before he could start down the slick, icy steps, though, a warm body was pressed flush against his back and a pair of arms looped around the blonds' torso.
Lovino stood a couple of inches shorter than Alfred, but was older by a couple of years, making it a frustrating non-topic that wasn't to be pointed out, so wasn't aided by making an added point to, especially by blunt displays of general perspective and rare displays of physical contact outside of the apartment. Molding himself and his burning pride into Alfred's back and standing at his full height as to rest his chin on the sparsely clothed shoulder, Lovino sulked in his ear, "You are too, idiot. Now just come back inside." His point had been proven. "I'll make some of Nonna's cioccolatio caldo. Not as good as hers but, hey, you're not picky," Lovino's cioccolatio caldo, else where called really thick hot chocolate but oh my god this is so good just, was on par with his Nonna's on technicalities, but the woman added something off of the recipe to supersede every mimic out there. Alfred, however, loved both, equally. He got a different tasting experience when Lovino made it for just the two of them, usually on lips opposed to a mug, so, arguably, he liked Lovnio's more. Or so he said, anyway. "I'll make it so thick you'll need a spoon, the way you like it."
The point that he had been trying to make for the better part of two hours as the two had slowly progressed from the couch, to the tiny kitchen, through the short hall and out of Lovino's apartment, bickering the whole six flights of stairs down to the door was crumbling now that there was no more floor left to cross, and Lovino was shivering in the wind and the thought of being left alone again to adjust to living alone for the first time. His small apartment was too big for just him on a good day, but it was cold and they were tipsy from splurging on the good wine and home cooked food that had successfully gotten Lovino homesick. Nonna's cioccolatio was more of a bribe for himself, actually.
The blond huffed as he turned his face downwards just enough to see the head resting on his shoulder and the green eyes that stared back at him - and oh, god, how Alfred loved those eyes... But it was the principle of the matter that they had wasted hours debating the situation that was provoking his stubbornness from conceding so easily. "Just lend me another coat and it won't be so cold-"
"No," was the curt answer.
"Do you want me to freeze?"
"You're the idiot that wants to leave in the first place," the brunet grumbled, "Just come back in, and you won't have to worry about freezing."
There was a lengthy pause where the blond just melted into the warm contact. He didn't even want to leave; there wasn't any legitimate reason why he had to even go. Save for the tiny fact that: " My family is going to go nuts if I don't get back soon," he muttered with just a hint of resentment lacing his words.
"I'm going to go nuts if you do."
"Lovino..." The blond warned, though his resolve was quickly diminishing with the cold that was assaulting his front, while his back remained warm where Lovino was holding him.
The brunet tightened his grip and nuzzled further in the other's neck, taking a deep breath of the scent of fresh air tainted with just a hint of the smell of hamburger grease that always clung to the other man no matter what. "Mm, just a little longer," he mumbled.
"It's late now," was the sighed reply.
"You're a grown adult," came the retort to the pathetic excuse.
The blond snorted. "That doesn't mean anything. My dad has probably already called the cops to file a missing persons report."
"Francis knows you're here. He won't let him."
"My brother is going to kill you..."
"Heh, you won't let him."
"Doesn't mean he won't try and punch you," the blond remarked dryly.
A lull fell over the surrounding area. There was the faint sound of laughter coming from one of the adjacent apartments, but it was too muffled to break through the bubble that was forming around the only two people standing outside at such a late hour and in the snow that was beginning to come down in smaller clumps, but in larger quantities. The blond broke the quiet first, "Your neighbors are going to start talking-"
"-Let them talk. I don't give a damn."
"Liar. You can't just ignore it-"
"- Alfred, shut up and get the hell back in this apartment before we both freeze our asses off," Lovino snapped. Lifting his head off of Alfred's shoulder and glaring a hole in his cheek.
"I'm not making you stand out here," Alfred finally muttered dejectedly. Lovino's patience was wearing thin, Alfred knew. And if Lovino stopped trying to pester him into staying, he would actually have to leave. And actually leaving meant actually going home where Lovino was not. Alfred didn't want Lovino to stop pestering him.
Lovino sighed as he scowled at Alfred's back and the direction the conversation was starting to take. At some point Lovino had absentmindedly started pinching at the flesh on Alfred's taut stomach that was covered only by a thin, white, long-sleeved shirt under his open jacket, but was now taking his aggravation out by repetitive motion, and Alfred was starting to squirm around until he let out a choked laugh, breaking Lovino's brooding. "Yeah, you are since you refuse to come back in," he finally muttered.
Alfred continued to wiggly in Lovino's arms in an attempt to avoid him from furthering his barrage of pinches. "That's because I have to go home!" he whined.
"No you don't." Lovino stiffened his body so Alfred wouldn't get away - though the blond could have forced him off anytime he wanted, and they both knew this, and the fact that he hadn't yet just further convinced Lovino that the argument wasn't entirely lost. "Just one more drink?"
Alfred exhaled, and with it went all of the lame excuses he had been trying to come up for why he had to leave as he heard the uncharacteristic desperation in the others voice. "Fine," he sighed in resignation.
Lovino smiled and let his arms fall from around Alfred's waist to grab his hand instead, leading the way back into the apartment with a feeling of triumph.
Alfred poked at Lovino's side and stopped before he crossed back over the threshold and into the warm inviting shelter. Blue met green and in a dead-serious tone that only Alfred could get when it came to anything you consume - "Extra thick: like you said," he reminded Lovino about the promised Italian treat.
And it was the adorable look that the blond was wearing that drove Lovino absolutely crazy in more ways than one that brought a genuine smile to his normally peeved expression."Si, of course." He couldn't help but laugh as he hauled Alfred into the house fully, pulling him down for a quick kiss and shutting the door with his foot.
The street was once again met with the beautiful stillness of a freshly fallen snow. The only sounds osculating throughout the dark night being those of the creaking trees' branches from the additional weight of the frozen rain as they started swaying in the gradually increasing breeze, the faint sounds of televisions reporting the oncoming blizzard, and then the thing that disrupted it all -a glass shattering in a certain apartment followed by a slew of rapid Italian curses and a boisterous bout of laughter soon after that. But just as sudden as the noise was, it's end was just as abrupt, indicating that mouths had found something else to be occupied with. And it would remain that way until the wintry storm had passed, leaving both to forget the cold outside, because in the small apartment, it was pleasantly warm.
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Have you ever re-read something you've written and kinda wanted to delete it, Word, and all memories of it? Please, leave your name and shame in my inbox. Together, we can fight our own idiocy and prevail.