12th December, 2009; Edinburgh, Scotland
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Northern Ireland can't help but think there's something sinister afoot.
Scotland's initial invitation had been suspicious enough, as it was made unexpectedly in the course of a simple phone call and not after weeks of careful negotiation with England, who needed to be persuaded anew with each visit that Scotland could be trusted to prevent Northern Ireland from falling into a life of crime/keep him adequately fed and watered/refrain from losing him down the back of the sofa/whatever the fuck else it was that made him so anxious about the prospect usually.
What was even more suspicious was Scotland's purported reasoning for issuing his summons. Apparently, they needed to 'talk', which is an idea so ludicrous that it defies all understanding.
He and Scotland might exchange the odd word about football if the mood strikes them, and Scotland certainly talks at Northern Ireland frequently – mostly in an attempt to cram geology lessons into Northern Ireland's unwilling head – and orders him around with abandon, but they never have conversations. At least, not one on one.
Curiosity had driven Northern Ireland to agree to the meeting, but that evaporates the second he steps foot in Scotland's house.
His brother has clearly applied himself to making the place presentable with a diligence hitherto unwitnessed. Nothing crunches beneath Northern Ireland's feet as he walks from the front door to the living room as Scotland directs him to, he doesn't have to excavate several layers of clothes and papers from one of the armchairs before he can use it, and there's an honest to god vase of flowers sitting on the coffee table, instead of a week's worth of takeaway cartons.
It all smacks of an attempt to create a serene, soothing sort of atmosphere. The sort of atmosphere, perhaps, that a person might want to provide for their brother if they were about to break some dreadful news to him.
Northern Ireland isn't curious at all now; just mildly terrified.
It's hard to imagine, though, anything that Scotland might consider sufficiently shocking that it merited tête-à-têtes and deep cleaning.
Northern Ireland doesn't keep up with current affairs quite as diligently as he maybe should, but unless there's some media-wide conspiracy of silence in place, he's pretty confident nevertheless that Scotland's country is not on the verge of collapse, which would seem to rule out a serious illness of any kind.
Discounting imminent death, he can only think that he might have been misled about the lifelong nature of the whole nation thing, and Scotland's decided to sack it all in and retire to the Caribbean or something.
That, too, he would consider beyond the bounds of possibility even if it turned out that they could actually resign their positions, but the fact that Scotland returns from the kitchen carrying not only two tumblers but also a bottle of his best whisky – which implies that he thinks the blow he's about to deliver is so great that it needs to be drowned rather than merely softened – worries him enough to ask, "You're not moving to Barbados, are you?"
Scotland looks at him like he's sprouted another head and neither one of them are speaking any sense. "No," he says firmly.
Northern Ireland should have known that idea was nonsense, regardless of whatever his nervous flutter in his stomach might be trying to suggest to the contrary, because Scotland burns if he so much as thinks about sunshine.
"Iceland, then?"
Scotland ignores him – which Northern Ireland guesses is an answer in and of itself – and pours out two measures of whisky so generous that they're in danger of overflowing their glasses. He hands one to Northern Ireland, and then slumps onto the sofa with the second, his face scrunched into the sort of pensive expression that Northern Ireland has only ever seen him wear before when he's trying to puzzle out especially complicated budget documentation.
His blunt fingernails tick restlessly against the side of his glass for a moment, in a way that always brings a countdown to Northern Ireland's mind; not because of the rhythm – as there's none to speak of – but because it typically precedes an explosion of some kind.
When he does eventually speak, however, his voice is surprisingly calm, although the short, sharp breaths he takes between every other word sound anything but. "So," he says, almost gasping the word, "I got back together with France."
Northern Ireland hadn't even been aware that they'd split up. His brothers never tell him anything.
"Oh," he says. "Okay."
Scotland watches him warily, as though anticipating a delayed reaction more along the lines of weeping, wailing and the general rending of clothes, and Northern Ireland slowly begins to realise that that had been the announcement this rendezvous had been set up to impart.
It's not really the bombshell he'd been expecting.
"You've been with him my entire life, right?" He shrugs. "It's hardly news."
"We weren't exactly…" Scotland pauses, clearly struggling to find the right way to express himself. A new ice age could have practically come and gone before he manages to find his tongue again. "Together together, though. But we are now, so he's going to be around a lot more than he used to be, and I know you don't like him very much –"
"I like France," Northern Ireland says, puzzled as to how Scotland could have ever come to believe otherwise.
"Really?" Scotland looks equally perplexed. "I just thought… Well, you always seemed to try and avoid him whenever he came to visit me at England's."
"I thought he was avoiding me," Northern Ireland says. "England always gave me the impression it was because of the whole biting thing."
Northern Ireland had gone through a phase – by all reports, painfully protracted – of exploring the world via his teeth in the early years of the 1930s, and France's knees had apparently been a point of particular interest. As France's own interest in Northern Ireland had seemed to wane in conjunction with said phase, Northern Ireland had previously been inclined to believe England's take on the matter.
Scotland shakes his head emphatically. "Naw, he knows how weans are; it was nothing to do with that. It was more… Me, I guess. Or us. Everything was a bit fucked up back then, really, but it'll all be different now, I promise you."