WOAH GUYS IT'S BEEN OVER A YEAR SINCE I LAST PUBLISHED SOMETHING!

I am so sorry! A lot had happened during that time and I honestly lost almost all of my inspiration. I tried to write but I kept on losing that writing spirit… :/

Fortunately, I finished the big bad chunk of my summer work and I have some free time to write! I had promised myself to write some Spamano but I never got around to it until now.

On that note, here it is! Hope you enjoy!

((DISCLAIMER: I do not own Hetalia and all that jazz. And if you don't want to see smut, I suggest you turn away now so you don't get too invested in this))

He tried.

He really tried.

He wanted this date to work. To be successful. To impress her. But it all fell apart on poor Lovino.

And the restaurant was on fire.

((Four days earlier))

The office was a joke.

Hetalia had become one of the world's leading PR firms in the past few years. With business booming, you would think that the only people hired here were hard-working, ambitious people who achieved their goals with strong teamwork and uncanny reliability.

Unfortunately, this was not the case on the 2nd floor of Hetalia's building. Of course, Hetalia had plenty of hard-working PR agents…they just avoided the 2nd floor as much as possible. The 2nd floor's workers were for all of the workers who either were just stepping onto the first rung of their career ladders, were hired because they could put the proper files in their proper cabinets, or were too downright lazy to get a promotion.

Lovino Vargas had unfortunately landed himself a spot in one of the 2nd floor's bland offices. Due to his history of getting overly angry at co-workers, the company only agreed to let him work there as long as he took four weeks of anger management classes before he would be considered for a promotion. Being quite pissed off about this, Lovino refused to take those classes right away. Almost a year later, he still hadn't taken the class. And he was still in that same grey cubicle.

Over the months, Lovino really grew to hate his cubicle neighbors. Across from him was Herakles, who slept all. The. Time. One time, Lovino tripped over him because he had fallen asleep on the floor (and Lovino was carrying a VERY important stack of papers which flew everywhere after he fell. And to think Herakles still didn't wake up!). He asked around to see if he maybe had narcolepsy or something, but it turns out he was just really lazy. And everyone still seemed to like him. In fact, office girls flocked to him whenever he was awake, which caused Lovino to get irritated from all of the ruckus. And to make Lovino hate the bastard even more, he caught him having sex with one of the interns. Herakles was so nonchalant about the rant he received that Lovino figured he should just forget about it.

As if Herakles wasn't irritating enough, he had to deal with Julchen, the girl at the cubicle next to him. At first glance, she didn't seem so bad. Besides the beyond blonde white hair and shocking violet eyes behind her black-framed glasses, she looked like a diligent working girl who kept to her cubicle and hardly ever bothered Lovino.

She only looked like that.

The exact minute that the clock struck lunch break, Julchen would whip her glasses off and let out an obnoxious sigh of relief. Within seconds of that, her friends would crowd around her desk with fast food and drinks to complain about work and gossip about their weekends. Quite loudly.

It all drove Lovino absolutely crazy. So why didn't he quit? Why did he put up with the office's constant smell of paper, pen ink, room-temperature Starbucks, and cheap cologne? Why did he ignore Herakles' alarming amount of cat paraphernalia and constant sleeping on the job? Why did he deal with the vending machine that always stole dollar bills? Why did put up with Julchen and her friends' cackling laughter? Better yet, why didn't he just move to another cubicle?

Because of one person.

No, not because of Julchen, she was the cause of the throbbing headaches Lovino suffered. He was sinking into his chair, looking at the clock on his computer. Lunch break was just a mere two minutes away. He needed to calm down, put in his earplugs to help himself drown out the loud trio next door. Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath. Good, he could feel himself calming down. So far so good. At this rate, he could almost crack a smile…

"Guess who brought donuts!" He suddenly heard an enthusiastic heavy French accent say. The sound alone ruined Lovino's steps towards tranquility and he opened his eyes in frustration. He looked back at the computer clock. Seriously? It wasn't even twelve yet!

"Perfect, girl! I haven't eaten since breakfast!" Julchen said in her terribly loud voice.

Lovino put his head in his hands. This could not be serious…

Francine Bonnefoy dropped the box donuts with a smack on the desk. The rustling of the box opening was driving Lovino absolutely crazy. "We're in luck today. The cashier was hitting on me and he gave me some extra donuts," he heard her say.

"Wait, at the shop across the street?" Julchen asked.

"Oui, why?"

There was a pause, "The cashier there is a girl!"

There was another pause, then the two burst out in their shrill laughter. Lovino could feel himself turning red with anger. He was standing up to say something to those two when another pair of heels clacked their way to the next-door cubicle.

"Oi, were you two really starting break without me?!"

It was her.

The reason he still worked in that shithole of a cubicle.

Carmen Fernandez Carriedo always looked enthusiastic. Her wavy brown hair was pulled back in a stylish yet professional way, which brought out her bright green eyes. Her button-down shirt with pinstripes and black pencil skirt made her look so well put together. She was walking to Julchen's cubicle carrying a carton of three cups of coffee. The other two quickly got up to take their coffee. Lovino could hardly look away from Carmen and her glowing olive skin. When she showed up, it was like all of their loud voices turned into the most irrelevant white noise…

"Lovino, you okay there?" Julchen asked, punching through the white noise as if it was a glass wall.

"Uhh…" oh shit, Lovino had been standing there and staring at the trio the whole time. He was about to yell at Julchen and Francine for being too loud, but Carmen arriving had sidetracked him. Now, they were just staring at him. Julchen looked mildly annoyed with him, Francine looked confused, and Carmen just looked at him with those eyes. Her mood remained unaffected by Lovino's unintentional interference. However, her eyes being on him made him flustered. "I…Um….What are you talking about?! Of course I'm okay! Why would you accuse me of that?! I was getting up to tell you all to shut up some of us are trying to work here! Now if you excuse me, I need water!" He said strung together into one sentence before spinning on his heel to stomp off to the water cooler.

Lovino made it there safely, though he almost crashed into Toris, the guy from a few cubicles down who always found himself getting coffee for the scary guy on the 4th floor. Lovino's presence made the chatty group of co-workers go silent before they left the area. Lovino grimaced, knowing his personality definitely didn't make him the most likeable person in the office. Normally, it didn't bother him that much, but that certainly wasn't the case, as he was going through one of his more vulnerable moments. Leaning against the cooler, he put his face in his hands. Yet again, he had absolutely botched a chance to talk to Carmen. How was it that he could go to some bar and flirt it up along with his brother, but all of his charm flew out the window when he tried to say something smooth around her? It frustrated him to the point where it was actually feeding his headache. With a long, drawn out sigh, Lovino took a cup and started to pour water from the cooler. His eyes watched the water pour out and smack against the walls of the paper cup, watching it fill with a dreary look of defeat in his eyes when someone approached him from behind.

"You know, walking off like that doesn't make it look like you're okay,"

Lovino looked up, turning his head around. Sure enough, Carmen was standing right behind him. Her cheerful face had a hint of concern hiding in her features. Nevertheless, she looked even more beautiful up close. She had the smallest dimples; Lovino could have kicked himself for not noticing them earlier. Realizing he needed to say something, he cleared his throat. "Ahem, what do you mean? I'm fine?" Yes, he said the words "I'm fine" like a question. Yet another reason to mentally kick himself.

"Lovino, you might want to stop pouring the water," she informed him.

Lovino looked back down at the cup of water which had indeed been completely filled and was now overflowing onto the cuffs of his shirt sleeve. "Ah shit," he muttered to himself. "Just my luck…"

Carmen only laughed, a sound he never really got to hear by itself, "Don't worry it's just water! And if you're having a bad day, get what's bothering you off of your chest. When you just talk about how you feel, it's like a whole ton of weight is lifted off of your shoulders!" she cheered him on.

Lovino huffed, "It's not that big of a deal, I guess," he began. "Working here is pretty stressful. I always get so sick of looking at that fucking computer screen all day…"

"Oh, don't worry mi amigo!" Carmen responded, reassurance in her voice. "Getting over that is no problem!"

"Really? How so?"

"Well, I don't know about you," she began, pushing a stray lock of hair that had fallen out of her updo. "But I like to think about things that make me happy, like tomatoes!"

Lovino raised an eyebrow, "Tomatoes?" What the hell was so significant about tomatoes?

"Si, I own my own my own tomato garden back home," she said, her smile brightening. "I think about it whenever I feel the workload pulling me into a slump, so I always stay positive!"

"Really? Well I guess I never thought of anything like that." Lovino mused. Was he really having a conversation with his dream girl?

"It helped me so much! The boss said he liked my attitude so much that he gave me a promotion! It's so cool, only I'll have to move away from you and the chicas, but…" she started to mutter the last few words so he couldn't pick up what she was saying.

"What was that?" he asked, intrigued.

"Oh, nothing!" she said, shaking off the subject.

"No no no, what is it? Tell me," Lovino prodded. Carmen got silent. Goddamnit, had he gone too far and ruined all of his progress?

After a really awkward pause, Carmen looked up at the clock, "Looks like break is almost over. Guess I left the other two alone for a bit too long." She was about to leave. Lovino had really done it. He blew his one perfect chance to get to know Carmen. His charms had failed to show themselves yet again. If there was only a way that he could fix all of this. She was about to leave before—

"Well if you won't tell me now, then I suppose we could talk about it over dinner," he suddenly said. Right after the words slipped from his mouth, he froze. He just asked her out on impulse!

Oh god, Carmen looked like she was caught off guard! "…Que?" she asked.

"Umm…" Lovino stammered, knowing he messed up. "I-I didn't mean it like that! I meant to say, um—"

"Sure,"

"….What?" Lovino couldn't believe his ears.

"A date? Yeah, that sounds so fun! I'd love to go!" She actually looked excited. "Wow! How about on Friday?"

"Friday is perfect," Lovino said, his voice still shaky from surprise. "I'll pick you up at seven then?"

"Seven is perfect!" Carmen said. "Where should we go?"

"Where should we go? Well I know this one place, I don't know if you—"

"Great! Can't wait for it!" she interrupted, saving him from babbling on. "We have to get back to work though," Carmen began to leave again, waving. "But I can't wait until Friday now! See you then!"

After Carmen left, Lovino stood in shock. He finally asked Carmen out! He rushed to the bathroom to splash to check and see if this was all real. After taking a splash of cold water to his face and looking in the mirror, Lovino finally cracked a smile. He had his charms all along after all!

Walking back to his cubicle, Lovino had a newfound positive attitude, one that definitely puzzled his cubicle neighbors who often got to experience the worst of Lovino's grumpiness. He sat at his computer and got right to work. He didn't even make a single complaint about Julchen, who was still eating her donuts and texting after break, or Herakles, who had actually let a stray kitten into the office during break and had half of the office's female interns crowding around his cubicle to see it. Behind his façade of working, Lovino was already planning how he would make the date as perfect as possible; he was going to get the perfect food at the perfect restaurant with the perfect scenery and make sure it was the most perfect night that either of them had ever experienced in their lives.

He just wanted her to remember their date.

And sure enough, she would.

And that's it for the first chapter! I have a feeling that I will have sooo much fun writing this! Hopefully you'll enjoy reading it too! ^^

Feel free to comment/critique. I'm pretty sure there are some mistakes hidden in there somewhere because I have been writing this in the dead of night and there are probably things in this that I could write a bit better lol

Until next chapter~~!