"'Being sixteen forever sounded good until you really thought about it. Then it didn't seem like such a great prospect.'" Lovino finally quoted.
He sounded… nervous.
Sounded as though he were begging for even a drop of courage.
He closed the book and stared at the ceiling of their poorly-made treehouse. The two of them were littered with patches of sunlight.
Alfred was quiet.
Alfred was scared.
Hadn't they just been smiling? Hadn't they just been laughing?
Lovino set the book on the floor. Left City of Fallen Angels behind.
His last words?
"I'm only human, Alfred."
And then he was gone.
Seven Years Earlier
"Hi! My name's Alfred!"
…
"... W-what's yours?"
…
"Well… how old are you? I'm thirteen!"
The boy eyed him up and down. As if he wasn't just caught red-handed on hoping to steal a book. He bit on the inside of his cheek.
Well, I know who's lying, his expression said.
Alfred laughed but it came out as a nervous little sound. The boy seemed to grin knowing he'd made him uneasy. He stood up and made to leave.
"Lovino," he said, parting the hanging branches of the willow tree they had been under. The green and purple leaflets were crushed in his small hands. His gaze, though bright, was muddy and mysterious.
The color of olives and Alfred was captivated.
"... Is that your name?"
They ignored the bloody scrape on Lovino's knee.
Lovino… really didn't know how to speak.
He was ten.
He knew his name. His age. Yes. No. Random words he couldn't piece together.
Alfred made it his duty to teach him, as crazy as it was in the back of his head. He brought a book with him to the willow tree at the top of the hill. When they finished one book, Alfred would bring another. Lovino seemed more eager to learn when he had a glass bottle of lemonade to sip from, so Alfred brought that too.
The first full sentence he heard from him was, "You have very blue eyes, but your glasses make you look stupid."
They'd laughed. Drank lemonade. It was summer. They caught fireflies.
He got Lovino to fall in love with books then, because at some point, Lovino stopped reading them to learn.
He read them to enjoy.
To get lost.
Alfred hated pulling him away from a fictional world he seemed to love so much. He'd pull up the anchor, inhaling cold air and his aching hands holding the chain. Lovino would be balanced on the metal, dripping wet in dark clothes with his eyes just as dark.
And revealing.
And dangerous.
There was a day when Lovino read aloud to him.
His voice was low and warm. It really made Alfred think of fresh hot chocolate. The marshmallows had just melted.
And they fell asleep.
Lovino was gone for a year.
Two Years Later
Lovino's family?
Basically dead, he told Alfred.
Alfred's family?
An absolute bore, he told Lovino.
Alfred was at the willow tree.
Reading.
Sipping lemonade.
There was a ladybug on the toe of his beat-up sneaker. He flipped a page to his book.
An acorn flew at him. He yelped.
Lovino was laughing, until he slipped from his spot on the low-hanging branch. Alfred saw the fear in his wide eyes. He forgot the stinging bruise on his leg. But Lovino landed, stumbling and falling over. He laughed again, though startled and nervous.
Alfred didn't even think to ask if he was okay.
His slingshot broke on impact. The acorns scattered around them.
"Hey dumbass," Lovino muttered. Breathless. Smiling. Relieved. "let's build a treehouse."
"Where'd you get that idea from?"
Lovino stole Alfred's bottle of lemonade.
"I snuck into the district, watched the movie they were showing in the square."
Lovino didn't live in the district like Alfred. Sometimes, he wondered why. Sometimes, he thought of asking. Somehow, he knew it would end badly.
"What movie?"
"Now And Then."
"Oh, that's a great one. Okay. Let's build a treehouse."
Lovino went missing for six months.
It wasn't pretty when they saw each other again.
They built the floor of their treehouse.
They stole all of the wood and other supplies that they needed.
Two walls.
Half of a third.
The roof.
All in two years.
Six Months Later
They moved in some of their belongings.
Books. Lemonade. Snacks. Worn blankets. A lone sock or three.
It was peaceful.
Alfred could see how relaxed Lovino seemed to become.
"I can't find any good ones, what the hell!" Alfred hissed, his voice still cut up with slips of laughter.
Lovino was the same. He was flipping through a book of his own. But his smile was smaller and his laughter far softer, Alfred noticed.
…
Alfred felt the atmosphere dampen. Drained the laughter from his lips.
Lovino flipped a page, scanned its contents.
"'Being sixteen forever sounded good until you really thought about it. Then it didn't seem like such a great prospect.'" Lovino finally quoted.
He sounded… nervous.
Sounded as though he were begging for even a drop of courage.
He closed the book and stared at the ceiling of their poorly-made treehouse. The two of them were littered with patches of sunlight.
Alfred was quiet.
Alfred was scared.
Hadn't they just been smiling? Hadn't they just been laughing?
Lovino set the book on the floor. Left City of Fallen Angels behind.
His last words?
"I'm only human, Alfred."
And then he was gone.
Alfred returned to the willow tree on top of the hill.
Returned to their treehouse.
Uninhabited.
So he stopped, and it felt like he'd left Lovino in the past. He felt terrible.
Alfred got a house away from his parents.
He tried writing a book.
Alfred was physically stuck on age twenty-two for the rest of his immortal life.
Lovino would be nineteen.
Dead? Alfred didn't know. He… almost didn't want to know.
Two Years Later
Alfred
didn't expect to find
Lovino
at his door.
Anyone but Lovino.
Lovino looked incredibly small on the large bed, tucked underneath the blanket. Small and exhausted and injured.
Alfred ran his fingers through Lovino's unruly hair. It calmed him. Protected him from monsters that no one but Lovino could see.
"Lovi, what happened?" he asked softly. "What happened that you showed up at my house covered in wounds?"
They were ignited in warm candle light. Lovino sat up, and Alfred saw the golden tears trailing down his cheeks. He sat up too, and hurried to wipe them away with his thumbs, wary of the deep scratch that was there. Alfred pulled him close.
"What happened?" he whispered.
…
"W-when I was… eleven…" Lovino stressed in a hoarse murmur. "Grandpa, mama, papa- they died-!"
That was why he had been gone for a year.
"My brother died when I was- thirteen…" His voice cracked. He choked and hiccuped. The mug holding the hot chocolate broke.
Six months.
"And when you were stuck at nineteen for a while back then, I was just… I was so scared. I had to tell you and get out. And tonight, they found me at the treehouse, because they knew. Set it on fire. Smoked me out and I ran. Do you understand? If I didn't die then, and if I'm not dying now, then I'll die soon. If it's not soon, then it'll be later."
"Don't say-!"
"I'll die no matter what, Alfred! You can't! We can't stay here, we can't run away. Nothing can save me… Nothing can save something so imperfect."
"Lovi… y-you're not something, you're someone. A someone who's perfect to me… and I… I love you."
Lovino glared. He frowned. He clenched fistfuls of Alfred's shirt and was quiet for a long time. But then he leaned in and placed his lips on Alfred's. Cautious. Warm. Trusting. Believing.
They fell apart
at the seams
and were
lost in each other.
He heard Lovino's heart beating. It was gentle and fluttering. Slow and sleepy. Twinkling.
Lovino was alive, and it was a noise Alfred lived without.
"If you go down," Alfred promised. "then I'm going down with you."
Alfred discovered that he was charged with several crimes when he came downstairs to a wrecked, empty livingroom.
He had fraternized with a human.
He had fallen in love with a human.
He had housed a human.
He had refused to turn in a human.
Alfred's punishment? Bearing witness to Lovino's execution.
The cold air ripped his skin open. Melted the muscle away and stole his bones.
Early winter forced the unneeded air from his lungs.
Alfred tucked himself deeper into his dark coat, lowering his face into the raised collar. Burying his hands into his pockets, he tried to ignore the fact that he stood upon gray stone that was stained with the dried, faded blood of humans that were long gone.
Hadn't the humans and immortals been at peace? For centuries? What happened that one half of the balance had to be annihilated?
...
His parents had never allowed him to go to an execution, and they had mostly happened back when Lovino and him were still children, even before they were… born. They had literally died out when humans were thought to have been wiped out in this district.
Alfred couldn't believe he'd never found out. Though, he supposed that he didn't care about it back then because that was when he honestly thought that Lovino was something like him. Something that couldn't die. But then Lovino told him and he left without goodbye… and Alfred denied and ignored the walls falling around him. Pulling him away from a world he loved so much.
It's starting! the crowd cried.
It's been such a long time... the crowd recalled.
The last human? Finally? the crowd wondered.
All but Alfred.
He could barely make out the jumbled words amongst the dizzying static. Lovino was suddenly there, and Alfred felt the numbing tears rolling down his face. The loveable words, those little bastards, were clawing at his boots, hissing and smirking because Alfred knew those had been words he had read aloud to Lovino once upon a time ago.
Suddenly, he was aware of the stains he stood upon, and he felt very heavy.
The officials snaked out into the open like spilled ink. More words. A gun.
He has faulty parts, they said.
His heart is beating, they said.
He's human, they said.
He has to die, they said.
I love him, said two voices that went unheard.
There was a gunshot
and Lovino was gone
and that was when
Alfred's world
fell apart.
A/N - This was an idea that I got way back in May, omg. But yeah, decided to throw some Romerica and take a slight break from Spamano. And to be honest, I sort of feel like this isn't my best? Oh well.
I hope you've enjoyed this and please review! ^^