Not Much
by Bleedred (Toilinthefields)
Last updated: December 27th, 2011
Characters: Germany, Italy
Pairings: None
Rating: Everybody
Genre: Friendship
Warnings: Germany, Italy, German accents, Italian accents
Summary: Germany brings down a box of Christmas decorations.
Written as a request forInevitable11 for the HetaChallenge 2011 Advent Challenge
"Germany!"
The sudden call of his name and the sudden rocking of the ladder he was standing on were enough to almost give him a heart attack. He dropped the box on the edge of the attic before he grabbed onto the edges himself to re-stabilize. Germany glared down the ladder where he saw an all too familiar Italian clinging to his ladder and bouncing up and down.
"Ja, Italy, vhat is it now?" he asked, that familiar wrinkle appearing between his eyebrows. He was in the middle of taking down boxes of Christmas decorations; why did Italy have to choose now to run up and grab the ladder that was supporting him? "I zought I told you to help Prussia set up ze tree downstairs." He wasn't trying to scold him, per se... just... remind him of his assigned task in getting the house ready for the holidays.
"I just-a wanted to see what you were doing~" The smaller man released the ladder from his grasp and waved his arms around excitedly. Germany frowned and grabbed the box again, lowering it from the attic enough so that Italy could clearly see it.
"I vas taking down boxes. See?" He sighed and started to descend the steps again with his box. "You almost knocked me off of it, Italy..." No, the prospect of falling with a decent-sized box of fragile glass ornaments for the tree did not appeal to him as something he wanted to do during his day. Not only would he be injured, he'd have to go looking for every last spec of broken glass lest someone hurt themselves on it or worse... think it was some piece of dust he'd let live! Germany cringed at the thought as he set the box down on the ground between Italy and himself.
"Oh... right, but-a I wanted to see you anyway!" He smiled, seemingly completely unperturbed by his friend's mini-lecture. However once he saw the box, something changed on his face, as though he recognized the box. Without prompting, Italy leaned down and opened the box despite Germany's protests of "Vhat are you doing?"
Germany couldn't figure out what Italy was thinking as he tried to tug the box away. "I need to take zis downstairs first, Italy... You can go through it vhen ve get zere..." Italy, however, did not relinquish his conquest.
"No, wait-a one minute, Germany~" he sang as he dug through the various ornaments. Germany cringed as he watched, fearing that any second now one of the fragile valuables was going to be broken by his clumsy colleague. He wrapped his arms around himself, tapping his fingertips against his upper arms in an attempt to relieve the stress of the situation. He'd wait... but he wouldn't like it.
After an agonizing few minutes, Germany relaxed once Italy pulled out a small little wrapped up... thing. Germany couldn't quite see what it was with all of the makeshift packaging around it to keep it from breaking... whatever it was. It must have been important or... something, because just holding it even without being able to actually see it yet, Italy was beaming like Christmas had already come for him. Just Germany was about to ask about it though, Italy began unwrapping the protective packaging.
A small little ball appeared in his hands, it didn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary other than it didn't have any patterns on it. It was just a white Christmas tree ball, plain and simple with a little metal hook to hang it from a branch. It was classic and traditional. Though, it was unusual, considering now most of Germany's ornaments at least had some sort of pattern to them to make them stand out a bit more as times have changed. Despite it's blatant plainness, Italy continued to smile at it as though it were the most spectacular ornament of all.
"Remember when I gave you this-a one~?" Italy asked, looking over at Germany expectantly. At first, honestly, Germany couldn't place it. He didn't recall ever receiving such a thing from Italy, but maybe he did get one at some point. It wasn't unfeasible. He narrowed his eyes as he looked at it from a distance, hoping to jog his memory.
He was about to say that he didn't remember, but then Italy turned the ball around. Little black letters appeared on the surface. Germany leaned across the box some to read it more closely. It had their names... and the year they became allies on it. Oh.
"I'm-a glad that you kept it, Germany. Even though it is-a not most pretty one..." A very... touched look seemed to cross Italy's face as he lowered the ball some, holding it to his own cheek affectionately. "It... really does-a mean a lot to me~"
Germany leaned back some, closing the box back up and bending over it to hide the tiny smile on his face. No one needed to see him happy over something so small as that, right? Knowing his luck though, Italy wouldn't miss a beat and just notice by the slight bounce in his step as he carried the box downstairs.