I do not own Hetalia in any way, shape, or form.
This is an AU story where none of the countries are personified, please don't beat me.
Atonement
Summary: Thinking back on it, Arthur wished he could have redone many things in his life. Not because he made any serious mistakes; just to see if things would have ended differently. If he could, he would have changed how things ended with that Amelia Jones. Maybe he could have figured out why she affected him so much.
Amelia had never planned to come back to her house.
She stared at the grand place that used to be her home, an arm resting languidly across a mailbox. The picket fence had been repainted from white to blond. That was one of the only differences that stuck out, strangely enough. She knew something else had changed, but couldn't establish what exactly. "Do you know who lives here," Amelia had asked a passerby.
The older couple had been walking with a golden retriever. They shared a glance before returning to the scantily clothed woman. "A family of four, I think," one said, "and a live-in grandpa. Are you alright, Miss?"
Amelia met their faces and looked them over. "I used to live there."
What she had expected to see was very different than what she saw. In her mind's eye she had pictured the house to be worn and ghastly, with paint chipping and her swing set tobbled over. Perhaps she wanted it to be that way, to bring her some sort of alien comfort. Seeing it all happy and spruced up? She wasn't sure what to feel anymore.
Three weeks had passed since Amelia had left her apartment. She chained-smoked and boozed her way through her days, unsatisfied with the idea of living. Looking chewed up by the very teeth of Satan, she found a way into Canada, searching for a familiar face. She had gotten back into the habit of wearing that bomber jacket again for an unknown reason. Now she never took it off.
When she showed up at Madeline's apartment the first thought that went through the sibling's head was liquor. She smelled of whiskey and greasy McDonalds. Amelia had long ago given up whiskey in favor of beer as she thought it tasted better and gave her a gentler hangover. Her nose was red and her eyes were puffy, like she was going through the worst winter cold. She forced a small smile and adjusted the jacket resting on her shoulders.
Then, when Madeline didn't fall for it, that fake smile fell.
They stood there for a silent moment simply taking the other in. Madeline's nails dug into the wooden doorframe and Amelia spread her feet apart to keep more stable. The world spun, and Amelia had to focus on keeping herself grounded to it. When she couldn't handle it anymore, the pigtailed sister flung her arms around her shoulders and kissed both cheeks. Amelia had to squash the anxiety that boiled from the sudden embrace, and allowed herself to sob for the first time in months.
"He's so awful Maddie!" She howled, allowing herself to be led in by the quieter twin. "I wish he…I wish I could just…" Amelia shook her fists in the air and punched a pillow beside her. "I haven't been able to do anything. I can't eat, I can't sleep, I don't get happy. I can't feel…anything!
Being the good sister that she prided herself to be, Madeline listened. She made her pancakes every morning and let her nightgown get ruined by salty tears every evening. Because in the end blood was stronger than any broken promise, no matter how grave.
In the end, it was through her sister that Amelia finally agreed to go to therapy. Why Madeline had insisted her go for the next few months, Amelia did not know. All she knew about the matter was that Madeline was paying in full, and all she was required to do was show up and fill in a journal.
The therapist was far too uptight for Amelia's liking. She smelled of sanitizer and French perfume, wore a tight turtleneck and brown maxi skirt. Amelia didn't mind being alone with other women in general, but she was unbearable. She nodded too much and talked too little, writing things down on a pad of paper with an expensive pen whenever she felt liked it.
Amelia had asked to see it, once. The lady's smile was patronizing when she said, "Oh, it's just some doctor things. I'm checking your progress and making notes for myself, nothing you'd be interested in." She felt insulted by this for a moment, before she remembered who she was talking to. A fifty-three year old woman whose husband had left for a twenty year old.
Rough.
The 'Doctor' (as Amelia refused to actually believe they gave degrees to women like her) had asked her about her childhood a lot. She asked her about her teenage years and her parents, which was painful. She even asked her about her nonexistent sex life. Amelia had laughed when she heard that question, which made the doctor very upset and write down more things.
Madeline and Dr. Whatever talked together after every session, making the 'elder' sit in the kid's waiting room. The rules were simple enough; no swearing, no smoking, and no eavesdropping. Amelia could not bring herself to stop lighting cigarettes and hold back curses any longer. Sometimes for the last five minutes of therapy she would just say every colorful metaphor that would pop into her head. Oddly enough, Doctor would allow this and occasionally encouraged it.
It had been an oddly silent afternoon. Amelia's arms were crossed and she stared down at the floor, wondering how much this was costing Madeline. It seemed like a rip off if all they were doing was eating pretzels. "And I guess you could say that it was pretty easy. I didn't like doing the things I did, but they were necessary, you know? I guess you don't. You probably think I'm some big mean villain exploiter or something. That's what you're writing down, huh. Big, fat, mean, exploiter of people."
"I'm not writing anything at all like that," she said indifferently, filling out the remainder of her sheet, "I think this may be a breakthrough. You've never admitted your mistakes before. I'm proud of you."
Amelia couldn't bring any false joy out from her stomach. Not like she used to. She shifted on the couch where she lay and picked at a pretzel rod. Therapist couches must have some hidden power to keep her from snapping back. It's the only reasonable explanation why she hasn't already left this place. "That's not even close to a mistake I've made."
Tap tap scratch tap. "Do you want to talk about it?"
"Nope."
She leaned forward in her leather chair, lowering her voice. "You know we can't keep doing this Amelia. Why don't you stop fighting what you feel and open up to me? This is a safe place. I'm bound by contract not to tell anyone what's going on in here. Whatever it is that you're feeling, just say it."
Amelia checked her phone and read the time. It wasn't even halfway over yet. "I'm not feeling anything, Dr. I don't feel bad, and I don't feel happy. I feel perfectly at sedated. I honestly don't understand what you want from me."
Dr. Whatever chuckled and turned the classical music that had been playing down. The blonde thanked Jesus for this, and almost felt a smile appear on her face. "You were happier when you were destructive, weren't you?"
"I guess,"
"You're not eating your pretzel. I can bring some cupcakes for you if you would prefer," she offered, carefully eyeing the change in her posture. She held back the urge to write it down.
"No, I think pretzel's are fine. I'm just…not hungry you know?"
"That's new." She said with laugh. Amelia looked up from the floor and pouted. She opened her mouth to say something vile before closing it. "And you're not putting up a fight, this is also new." Tap tap scratch tap.
Amelia looked at the pretzel and took a tentative bite. "Yeah,"
"Why aren't you angry with me?" The brunette asked bluntly. She held onto her pen tighter, ready for the assault that was sure to come from the unstable blonde.
She turned her head from the pretzel rod to the therapist. Her face was completely blank, a stark contrast from only mere months ago. "Because I don't need to be," she answered.
With an uninspired face, she suddenly stood up and walked to her computer. "I can't help you if you aren't willing to get along with me." She typed what was written down on her pad of paper into the screen. "You could always try,"
"Oh I'm trying. I'm Mrs. Tryhard. Did you know I was almost head cheerleader in High School? That's being a tryhard right there." Amelia said.
"Prove it to me."
Amelia didn't twitch. "Get angry with me Amelia." She dared. Amelia eyed the framed degrees on the walls suspiciously. There had to be hidden cameras hidden around her somewhere. There was no real way she was serious right now. "Talk about that gentleman, Kirkland, for me."
As if a switch had been flipped, her whole demeanor changed. Her eyes flashed behind their glassy lens, her eyebrows crossed, and her mouth was suddenly set in a hard frown. "Why does everyone expect me to be angry!? Is it a crime for me to be perfectly neutral all of a sudden? Get angry! That's what you want, fine! I can get angry! I can get so angry that I can throw this chair at you! Last time I did that I was almost arrested. You want that? Maybe you want me to lose my fucking mind, huh. People love to see me go insane; they must get a kick out of it or something. You want me to bash you're fucking pencil into your knee? BECAUSE I CAN! But no, that'd be bad. Amelia Jones isn't bad, just misunderstood. She needs to change. She needs to stay the same. She needs to be emotional. She needs to be a good little girl like she once was. Do you guys want me to get better or to revert back to the person I once was? Because I can't do both. I just can't, and I won't!"
Her face was still like an untouched lake. "We're not asking you to-"
"Oh shut up, you totally are." Amelia fished through her purse for a cigarette and a lighter. God she needed something. "You want me to tell you my whole life's story? How my dear old daddy would exploit me and my mom would go along with it? Or-or how almost every relationship I had was because they wanted something from me. It's not that exciting. I made mistakes, huge mistakes. Monumental mistakes. I could write a book about all the mistakes I made, it could be on the best sellers list. But that's not what you want. You want me to feel. Have Amelia Jones feel something. The last time I felt something I was HURT!" She found her half empty pack and threw it on the table beside her.
"What did you do to get hurt?"
Amelia laughed. An actual, deep from the belly laugh. She clutched her sides and had to gasp for breath kind of insane laugh. She sat up because she was choking on pretzel dust, unfortunately. "I can tell you. I'll tell you the whole story right now. We can make it into a block buster, call it THE FALL or something dramatic like. A story about a kid and her addiction to anything that would benefit her, and how her whole world fell apart. How she got almost everything she wanted. How she was a complete bitch to everyone, and yet they still couldn't get enough of her. How she built a safety wall around her, a fortress even, using…using"
"Sex?" She tried, hands sporadically moving around on the keyboard.
Amelia closed her eyes in unseen ecstasy. She tilted her head back and arched her back, shivering. "Oh God yes, using her sex to do practically everything. When things were bad, she figured out how to fix them. She got laid so fucking much back then. SO MUCH SEX. I mean, I'm sorry, but sex is great. Being married and all that shit is just fine and dandy. I wanted to get married once. But sex with benefits under the stars? That's the motherfucking stuff right there. The less people expected out of you, the better. You could get a lot of stuff just by being cute. Trust me, I would know. Putting out sealed the deal, though. But our story couldn't all be about the sex, Amelia was a classy lady (or so she liked to think), she tricked people into doing favors for her. And once she had them under her thumb, she'd feel amazing! Our heroine would be doing great the first half of the book. On top of the world," she removed her pig lighter from the bag. She flipped it on, spurting two flames from the nostrils.
The therapist didn't move to stop her from lighting the cigarette. "But then some a-hole has to ruin everything for her, is that right Amelia? He has to…bring her down from her high?"
She took several drags from her cigarette before she answered. "…Sort of."
"You're not a mean person, Amelia." The therapist said. Amelia didn't look up from her spot on the floor, sticking the cigarette in the side of her mouth for easy access.
"That's a lie and you know it," a puff of smoke escaped.
She was suddenly beside Amelia. Her hand came to rest over Amelia's, a reassuring smile ghosting her lips. She squeezed gently. "You're not. You've been through so much that it's only natural for the brain to come up with a defense, a new wall of some sorts. Your head is trying to protect you by shutting out anything you can feel, since you've been hurt with your other emotions you've stopped 'feeling' them and I believe it's been doing this for a long time now. If you can tell someone-someone you don't have any connection to-about what happened freely, you could go back to how things were before. Understand?"
There was a span of silence between the two. "I had…so much back then. It didn't all come from my body, of course. Some of it came from…in here," she pressed a hand to her chest, "I don't know how I came to do the things I was doing toward the end. It all started off so well, you know? Maybe things got out of hand somewhere along the road, but I wouldn't be able to tell you where."
"And what about that one man you talked about three sessions ago? Kirkland. Did he have any part in the state you're in?"
Amelia frowned. "I hate him. I hate him so much. He was the whole reason that my empire, that my world came crashing down."
She offers a cigarette to her therapist, who refuses it adamantly. Funny, Amelia had thought she had quit smoking a couple years ago. It wasn't until later, when she was crying alone in an empty house, had she found a few spares from her teenage years. It seemed natural to pick them up and try them again. Maybe it wasn't as funny as she thought it was. "Tell me how."
Amelia grinned sadly. "That would be Chapter One, my friend."
I have no idea what I'm doing *cue the meme*
So if someone wants to possibly help me out, please PM me :) I am needing the helps if you want me to continue!
Honestly, I'm not really sure if I should continue this.. I'm not very happy with it, but it would mean the world to me if you voiced your opinion on the matter. Tell me what you liked about it, tell me what you didn't mmk?
Ta-ta and thanks for reading!
~Ladies and Gents