I do not own Axis Powers Hetalia or any of its characters.

Feliciano scarcely came home these days. He was always so skipping off with that Ludwig guy, Kiku too, that he never seemed to have time for Lovino anymore. Not that he cared! If his brother wanted to waste his time with people who barely knew or cared about him, then so be it. The older Italian was through bothering with that.

So here he was, lying on his back, counting the stars all by his lonesome, with his limbs outstretched in the freshly rained-upon grass. He supposed he could visit Antonio, or one of the other countless nations, but he wasn't in that exact sort of solitary mood.

Damn that selective loneliness.

The stars were really bright that night… It reminded Lovino of the days when Feliciano and him were just kids, and almost every night they would lay out and count the stars, so very, very much like this. Every time they did that, Feliciano, that silly kid, would try to count every single star, but he'd always fall asleep somewhere around two hundred…

What the younger brother never knew was that Lovino would continue the counting as soon as he lost consciousness, until Lovino himself fell asleep, hand in hand with his brother.

On this night, all by himself, Lovino was trying to count them.

"Two hundred twenty-two…" he drawled out, pointing in the air with his right hand; that was the one always free of holding Feliciano's hand in the past.

"Two hundred fifty… Damn." He lazily dropped the held out hand, having lost count.

A warm hand from beside him grabbed the cold right hand, holding it back up to the sky whilst intertwining their fingers. "Ve~ Six. Two hundred fifty-six."

"…Gratzi, stupid."

And they smiled, hand in hand.