Names used: Belarus (Nataliya), Bulgaria (Simeon), Czech (Anna), E. Germany (Gilbert), Estonia (Edouard), Hungary (Erzsébet), Latvia (Raivis), Lithuanian (Toris), Poland (Feliks), Romania (Mihai), Russia (Ivan), Slovakia (Jakub), Ukraine (Irina)
Author's note: Opening inspired by tumblr/ducere's Russia in uniform and it took on a life of its own from there. I just enjoy writing the eastern European nations; their relationships and histories fascinate me to no end and I always want to write more vignettes of them. Special thanks to tumblr/wifeofbath for always being a great sounding board for any and all EE questions and ideas.
It was astounding how quickly their world could change, based on his mood.
"Smile please, ya idiot," Erzsébet begs, completely exacerbated at this point.
"Don't want to," Ivan mumbles and so she snaps the photograph with him frowning before putting the camera away and waiting for the Soviet to walk back to her. "You cold?"
"Always," the Hungarian sighs as they start to walk through Moscow once more. No one approaches them, not with Ivan in his military uniform that Erzsébet thought both very smart and absolutely despicable. "Where did you send Toris off to?"
"Don't know what you're talking about," but the Russian gives himself a way with a twitch at the corner of his mouth that Erzsébet doesn't miss. No one doubted how much Ivan enjoyed having women at his house beyond his sisters, but Erzsébet was become tired of being the strongest object of his attention.
"Oh really? Hmm."
In silence, the snow drifting past them, they carry on to the restaurant Irina had been longing for them to go to while they were in the capital. Outside its doors Feliks, Mihai, Simeon, and Anna stand; Ivan demands a kiss from the Czech woman before going inside, Erzsébet hanging back and grateful to have been forgotten by the Russian for the time being.
"Want a puff?" Mihai demands in a rough voice; when they were out on « family outings », as Irina liked to refer to them to cheer everyone up, the Hungarian and Romanian did their best to not quarrel. He even holds out his hand with the lit cigarette between his fingers, knowing full well how much the woman hates smoking. Anna under his arm looks so smug though so Erzsébet takes the offered cigarette, sucking long and hard in an attempt to win some warmth off it. Roderich would be ashamed of her if he could see her right now, but she kills that thought before it goes anywhere.
"How's his mood?" Simeon whispers, Feliks nodding as he puts out his own cigarette he'd burnt through.
"It is what it is," and Erzsébet hands Mihai back his cigarette, turning to the Bulgarian. "So long as the food comes fast enough and the talk is pleasing to him, I think Ivan will leave us all be." She means that tonight might be calm in the house, no beatings, no threatenings, no yelling.
"I'll believe it when I see it," the Pole mutters under his breath and everyone nods in agreement before heading in to find Ivan already sitting with his sisters and the other Soviet nations in the back. Slipping between Toris and Gilbert Erzsébet lets the conversation go as it may around her, keeping her head down and being sure to never smile too widely or laugh too loudly. The Lithuanian's hand on her thigh helps.
As she slips through the quiet corridor, everyone else having gone to bed, Erzsébet finds Mihai (of course) standing at his door with a look of sure satisfaction on his face. "Care to have me tell your fortune?" he whispers in Hungarian she made him learn long, long ago.
She rolls her eyes. "Your little fuck-buddy gone?"
"Can yours wait?"
Slipping through the open door Erzsébet climbs across the mattress. They all snuck around at night, everyone knew it. What else could they do? They were so starved for love, for happiness, that it was almost all they could do to stay sane and keep going every morning. Everyone understood, everyone knew the rules, and everyone shared. At the moment Erzsébet was working her way through Toris who was kind to her and blushed while he told her how beautiful she was; he made her feel like a young bride again. Before him had been the Ukrainian, before her the Slovakian, and before him Gilbert.
"Where are your cards?" Erzsébet asks quietly, unamused as Mihai lays out beside her. "And garlic?"
"Don't fucking lecture me."
"Pleasant as always."
"Just wanted to sit with you," and she has to use all her energy to not whip her head around and stare at the man. "That a crime?"
"Ivan seems to think so."
"Hey, crazy? Be careful with him ok?"
"All those great observational skills," Erzsébet murmurs as she rises, heading for the door, "and you still think I'm an idiot." Mihai's self-assured laughter follows her out into the hall.
Heading back to her room where Gilbert would most likely be waiting (the rooms never quite warm enough to spend the night alone), Erzsébet smiling to herself in sublime happiness, a hand suddenly grabs her elbow, yanking her down the staircase. "Ivan!" she shouts in a quiet voice, not wanting to wake the others when he was like this. The smell of vodka that normally surrounded him at such a late hour isn't present but the Hungarian still keeps her guard up, being dragged to before the fireplace where she's shoved to the ground.
"Sit on the couch," the Russian orders, still in his uniform from the day.
"Why didn't you fucking throw me there then?" Erzsébet gets in, moving to sit on the old thing. Ivan doesn't respond, just pours himself a tumbler full of vodka, downs it, then sighs as he stares at the fireplace before him. Something is different.
Something is wrong.
"Vanya my love?" Erzsébet dares, knowing when he was in the right mood he loved more than anything else when she spoke to him affectionately; in the wrong mood Ivan could fly off the handles at such intimate words.
The man sighs again, turning and stripping off his jacket as he approaches the couch where he throws the heavy garment. Ivan collapses between Erzsébet's legs, leaning his head back against her stomach and thighs. Instinctively the Hungarian starts running her fingers through his hair, scratching his scalp with her nails; he loves when she scratches him, he'd admitted, his chest after sex, his arms in a fight, his scalp at the end of the day. And they don't dare speak another word as the cold night carries on.
Erzsébet doesn't know how long they sat like that before she fell asleep; all she knows is the next morning she's in her bed, Gilbert beneath the sheets beside her.
"Ah fuck," she mutters, checking and finding that she's been changed to her pajamas: one of Ivan's old shirts and her panties.
"What?" the German beside her yawns.
"What do you remember from last night?"
"You taking forever to get back to bed, and how amazing it is to be tied up by a woman."
"Thought you were banging Irina, not Nataliya."
"I am."
"Forget I even asked." She's sure to give Gilbert a hard smack to the side of his face as she gets out of bed.
Raivis beside her as they wait outside the house was definitely giving Erzsébet exercise in rolling her eyes.
"I'm not a child!" he says very annoyed, stamping his foot on the ground as if the physical exclamation point.
"You're fifteen and a part-time alcoholic, of course I worry about you Raivis."
"You all only have a few years on me," the Latvian reasons as they watch the men finish carrying out the rest of the luggage. With so many people going to and from cities it was always an event, even if there was little each could call their own. "Why should I be treated differently?"
"Why should any of us?" Erzsébet muses aloud, watching Ivan easily take Nataliya's trunk from Toris and put it over his shoulder, the other already burdened with Erzsébet's things. It was incredible to see the strength the man had, especially when it wasn't being used to beat the shit out of someone.
"Hey Erzsi!" Jakub calls from inside. "You've two photos left on your roll you know." The Slovak emerges with her camera in his hand, a gift from Ivan many years earlier in an attempt to pacify the Hungarian in some way. "Do you want to use them up before we go?" By this point most of the nations are outside the house on the outskirts of Moscow, snow still falling from the sky.
"Yeah," Erzsébet sighs, taking the camera and walking slowly around Toris and Feliks to Ivan. "My love?" she whispers and his back tenses at that, Irina smiling beside him as Nataliya storms off. "May we take a group photo before we leave? We are all here and I have two photographs left on this roll of film."
The Russian pushes his lips together to form a straight line, looking down from where he towered over Erzsébet, before snapping his fingers for one of the drivers to come take the camera. "Come on," and Ivan grabs Erzsébet's elbow to drag her to the group that scrambles to line up, ensuring that the Hungarian was standing right before him.
Once the picture is taken (they've become better at posing for such group photos, as if the images might be seen by others who would remember the great nations they once were and not the pitiable things they've become) everyone separates for the cars they'd be driven to the train in but Erzsébet hangs back, Ivan's hand on her hip indicating he had plans for that last photograph. The driver with the camera comes forward, the Hungarian daring to reach an arm up to pull Ivan's head down. The Russian smirks against her cheek as he kisses the skin before the roll is finished and so everyone gets in to head off.
At the station those who had been chosen for this "family outing" stand in one large circle: Erzsébet as Hungary, hand in hand with Gilbert as East Germany; Jakub and Anna as Czechoslovakia, Mihai as Romanian with an arm around Anna; Simeon as Bulgaria beside Ivan as Russia and Irina as Ukraine; little Raivis as Latvia beside Nataliya as Belarus, holding hands with Toris as Lithuania; Feliks as Poland fixing his scarf beside Edouard as Estonia, who gives Erzsébet a nervous look. Across the circle her eyes meet Ivan's cool gaze and she sighs, for Edouard's benefit,
"Don't look so frightened. We'll get through this, together."