A/N: Well, this is my first sort-of-snapped Canada fic, and also the first one I've tried with America. Since he's my brother and we live in the same house, I see a lot of his different sides, so I apologize if he's terribly out of character.

"Eh, Alfred...?"

Alfred F. Jones looked up from his comic book to see his twin brother, Matthew, standing awkwardly in the doorway to the room they shared. Matthew's hands were hidden in his hoodie pocket to disguise their nervous twisting, his large violet eyes darting around and refusing to meet his brother's blue ones. "C-Can I talk to you?"

"Yeah, sure," Alfred shrugged, folding over the corner of his page and sitting up halfway on the American flag comforter of his bed. Matthew watched him nervously for a moment before carefully shutting and locking the door, shakily padding over to sit across from him.

Matthew had always been rather cautious for a middle-school boy who was going on fourteen, but this was outright absurd. For God's sake, they were brothers! There was no need for him to be so scared.

"Well, what's wrong?" the self-proclaimed hero asked confusedly. A sudden flash of protective anger flitted across his face. "Did someone beat you up again?"

Matthew eyed the locked door nervously, as though someone was going to burst through it at any minute and drag him away. Finally, he braced himself and managed to jerkily force the words out.

"Remember three months ago, when the neighbor's cat scratched me?"

Alfred nodded bemusedly, cocking a confused eyebrow. "What, did it get infected or something?"

Instead of answering, Mattie bit his lip. When he finally continued, it was in the same strained, unnatural tone as before. "And remember how last week, I said I ran into a desk?"

Again, Alfred nodded, though he was growing to be a little fed-up with all this mystery. Why couldn't Mattie just get to the point, already?

"I-I didn't." Matthew forced the words from his own mouth, a huge war tearing his mind apart from the inside out.

"What?" Alfred demanded confusedly. Something was wrong here; even he could figure that out.

Mattie took a deep, shaky breath and shoved it all out, word by jerky word. "I-I've been fighting depression since last year, a-and I started cutting myself in September."

Alfred's breathing stopped dead.

Little Mattie?

Depressed?

Cutting himself?

Why the fuck hadn't he said anything sooner?

It was like a virtual semi truck had just slammed Alfred dead-on in the face. God, he felt like such an idiot. Suddenly it all added up.

The long sleeves, Mattie's increasing need to be alone, his gradual transition from normal colors to mostly black and the bottled-up silence. Matthew always seemed to fight against himself when he was on the verge of revealing something—anything—that seemed even vaguely personal. Mood swings had kept Alfred, Dad and Papa on their toes, and sometimes Alfred would hear his brother get out of bed in the middle of the night to go run the bathroom faucet; the next morning there would be a pinkish stain left in the sink. Alfred had even found makeup under Mattie's bed a few weeks ago. It all pointed directly to depression.

"Oh, my God," Alfred whispered, finally remembering to breathe again. Matthew was watching edgily, obviously scared of what his reaction would be when it really sank in, but Alfred's brain seemed to have jammed. All he could get through his head was how much emotional agony his brother must have been through in the past twelve months. And how he could've helped, but he'd been so wrapped up in his own problems that he hadn't even thought to throw a second glance Mattie's way. God, he must seem so shallow and self-centered in Matthew's eyes—and maybe he was.

While Alfred was trying to process all this, he also saw how heartbreakingly scared Matthew looked, and he did the only thing that felt natural; Alfred leaned forward and pulled his brother into a tight hug.

"Oh, my God..." he murmured again, suddenly aware of how little Mattie was quivering. Still struggling to accept this, he began rocking gently back and forth as Matthew very gradually started to relax, seeing that he wasn't about to be yelled at or told on.

"I'm getting help from the school counselor on Monday," Mattie whispered, voice shaking. "Don't tell Dad or Papa."

"You have my word as a hero," Alfred replied quietly, still in partial, deadened shock.

Mattie.

Depressed.

Cutting himself.

He didn't know what to do but wanted desperately to do something to help his brother. It was like someone telling him the sky was orange or that fish flew; his entire reality had been crushed in the blink of an eye. Alfred had always promised to look after Mattie and take care of him, but now he suddenly felt as though he'd failed.

They sat together in silence for a while, neither sure of what to say to the other. Suddenly Alfred's stomach felt like an uncomfortable hole, and his heart was beating hard against the lump in his throat. He was shaking a little.

Finally Matthew broke away from his grasp, scooting back to move into his crosslegged position across from his brother.

"S-some news, eh?" he asked with a hint of a smile.

Alfred only nodded, still unable to speak. But finally, his mouth spilled one of the many questions that were all jammed up inside his mind.

"Do you have scars?" Alfred blurted before he could stop himself. "From it?"

Matthew looked down at his hands, now twisting a little in his lap. "Yes," he murmured, almost too quietly to hear. "A lot of them."

He hesitated a moment before pulling up one of his long hoodie sleeves, revealing a mesh of healed-over slash marks in his smooth, pale skin. Some were mere scratches that could indeed have been done by one of their neighbor's many cats, but Alfred realized with a lurch that other ones could have left blood running down Mattie's arms and been the reason for the pinkish stain in the sink. Two relatively fresh scratches stood out red from the rest, but one more so than the other.

Matthew trailed soft fingertips over the bright red cut, which was dangerously close to the vein in his wrist. "Th-this one is from last night. I was trying to decide whether to say anything to you about it..."

Alfred couldn't speak. He just hugged Mattie again, resisting the tears that threatened to slip down his cheeks.

"Thanks for telling me, Mattie," he finally whispered.

Today my little brother

Told me that he cuts

That the scratches on his arms

Weren't from the cat, or running into a desk

I thought he was just clumsy

I can't believe that I didn't know

I should have seen the signs

Now I feel guilty

Self-centered and wrapped in my own problems

I thought he was fine

But now that I look back, everything was so obvious

I'm such a hypocrite

For calling others arrogant

I'm such a drama king

For thinking that my petty issues mattered

I thought he could talk to me

But everything wasn't fine, and I know that now

He needed love from me

But I wouldn't stop being 'heroic'

He needed someone to talk to

But I just wouldn't shut up

I'll try to be what he needs from this day on

But I know I'll just let him down

Like everyone else

I wish he would have told me sooner

So I wouldn't have buried myself, just out of reach

I wish I was a better brother

I wonder what I look like to him

So trivial, so shallow

So spoiled and weak

Thought I knew what pain was

But pain doesn't matter

Compared to agony