Hetalia: Axis Powers is not mine.

A/N: Hello. I just wanted to do some FrUK hurt/comfort. Sorry if I got back stories wrong...? Anyways, enjoy. :)

I'm sorry.

I'm sorry that it was always me that started it.

I'm sorry that your every move always angers me afterwards.

I'm sorry that you never seem to think that I'm worth it.

I hate the fact that I think about you so much. In certain moments I wanted you to be there, you know. Last week our peoples celebrated Remembrance Day and you weren't even there with me; what's up with that?

I sighed. With the way my mind looked back at things in the past, there would be no way I was getting the paperwork done tonight. I stared at the documents before me. There had been a ministerial meeting this afternoon. I was expected to be done with the treasuries and security reports by the day after tomorrow. Now that would be an impossible task to do. Cameron, how you abused your country. I could feel a headache coming on. I sighed again and let my mind wander.

Why couldn't it be 1945 again? You remember, don't you? The celebrations, they were loud and everyone chattered happily. All of the Allies were there and we were laughing too but then we had an argument and then I kissed you out of the blue.

The shock on everyone else's face was so funny then.

And then we, you and I, excused ourselves and just… took a walk and talked. It was so uncharacteristic of you, to just talk. I didn't even remember what we talked about. I thought we'd go book a motel room or something.

It wasn't as if we never had sex before either. There are still living testimonies to that. Canada has got your hair and your nose while America inherits your lively sky-blue eyes…

…now that's a memory I don't want to remember.

I just wonder… why didn't we ever last?

Is it my attitude? Is it your nonchalance? Or both?

But you're a right bastard. I know no motive of that… that one time with India. She was living in Britain just to receive her education. It was night, the tutors had gone home, and I left for a government matter.

But I went home and discovered you had done indecent things to her. To my pretty little India. Not only that, you implanted ideas in her mind. She was rebellious enough before, but you fueled it more.

Just like you did with America.

Did you hurt that night, France? I hope so, because I was furious. But still, you smirked your devilish smirk, as if you had won. You know what, France? You didn't win anything.

Except perhaps what was left of my heart… you shattered it to pieces.

But… do you remember 1904?

I didn't know how and when I forgave you. But I had at that time.

Do you remember 1916?

Do you, perhaps, remember 1944?

Well. I….

France, I love you. I have done for I don't know how long, and I still bloody fucking do. Do you…? No, you don't. You might have once, but you don't.

Do you remember holding America and Canada for the first time, France? I do. They were such frail-looking tiny things, but they were strong from birth.

For a while, I had worried and fussed. You had smiled and told me they were beautiful, unlike their mother. I threw a tantrum at that before realising that men don't usually like being called beautiful at all.

Yes, that was a memory I don't like to remember.

("Perhaps it's best that we don't tell them, England," you had said. "They are, after all, different colonies belonging to different empires."

I had agreed. I was a fool in love; I didn't think there would be any betrayals. But who am I kidding? It would have happened eventually anyway.)

Well, our relationship… if we could even call it one… wasn't too bad. But it wasn't exactly, well, a relationship.

I focused my gaze to the words on one of the papers again, half-heartedly reading it.

The door to my study opened with a creak. I dropped my pen in surprise and looked at the door. It was France. He looked rather disheveled, his hair was not as styled and his usual blue inner coat looks a little wet from blotches of raindrops.

Talk of the devil, huh.

"England."

He said no insults, no dramatic proclamations. Just one clipped word.

"I don't remember letting you in, frog." Meaning: what had happened?

"You always do in the end, mon ami." I grimaced inside. It was true, even when I don't want to. As it was, he knew my house too well to know where the alternate keys were placed. Perhaps he stole some at a time and got spares for them.

Perhaps he wasn't just talking about my residence.

He smiled, but it it wasn't his usual proud, sensual smirk. It was a weighed-down one. He walked towards me. "What are you doing?"

"The usual government papers," I said. "No, no, France, you don't look through other nations' papers…"

"Well, hide it where I can't see it, then."

This was unusual. He was… nervous about something, I could tell. I was usually the grumpy one. I frowned. "Is there any problem, France?"

"Well…" he seemed to consider telling me what's on his mind. "Not really."

"Tea?"

"Perhaps later."

"Scones?"

"No. You acting all worried is cute, actually. Just don't offer me your food."

The blatant insult to my cuisine did always get me riled up. "Well, just shut up about my food and tell me the damn problem, then."

He didn't answer and only placed his head on my shoulder, his gaze distant. I sighed internally. Force had never worked with France, so it was actually stupid of me to think that it would now. I settled for setting my hand around his shoulder.

We were on the couch in the living room. France had changed into one of my pyjamas. I decided that work could be tended to later, so I picked a random novel to read from the study. It turned out it was a French novel, and the kind of novel that France liked himself.

(Our position, it was as if we were any normal couple. This was a parody of one, what with our bloody past rivalry and enemy-hood.)

I glanced at him. Still the same distant look. I could be patient, yes, but only for so much time. But now, I let him think about whatever was bothering him and gave his shoulder what I hoped could pass as a comforting squeeze.

(But I would like to think that the love and care and worry was real. I was pretty much a hopeless romantic at heart, and he knew that. Plus, we got along rather well now, after the World Wars.

Our personalities and past just got in the way, sometimes.)

A moment passed in an uncomfortable silence, at least for me. Then I remembered that I brought a novel. Huh.

"England." He abruptly untangled himself from me and looked at me intently, as if coming to a decision. Okay, no using the novel, then. I stared back at him, waiting.

"I'm… sorry."

What? Of all the things he could have said, this was rather unexpected. France rarely, if ever, said sorry. And to me, of all people?

It was a little hard to process. "What are you sorry for, exactly?"

He groaned. "You just have to make this harder on me, don't you?" He took a deep breath. "I'm sorry for… everything." He paused. "I'm sorry for having my revenge when you have done nothing to me. For… making you suffer more than you needed to."

What? What? I reacted on autopilot and heard myself say, "But… I've done those things to you, too, France. Don't you think we're already even?"

"Well, cher…"

I tuned out his next words. Why did he bring that out? He didn't need to say any of it! Deep down I agreed with France's words. It could be my ego talking, but sometimes the scars lingered on your mind. I was afraid, very afraid of rejection. Far more so than France knew. (Actually, he didn't know that at all.) And he was among the first people who rejected me, and the first to betray me, perhaps. But I thought I was past that—

Ah, yes. The first to betray me before… before America, of course. But he also helped the second case.

That last thought must have brought a change to my expression, because France stopped talking. He actually looked nervous now.

Stupid France. I was ready to focus on the present and consider the possibility of some semblance of a normal relationship… and he made it all come flooding back. Stupid, stupid France.

(And weak, weak England.)

Stupid…

I knew what he was talking about. It was not about Normandy, even he was too small back then to make a difference. Of course, it was all about America. He just had to help him because I acquired Canada. Which actually was my right, too, because I was the one who had given birth to him.

To them both.

Not that it wouldn't have made a difference even if I hadn't. I had been a stupid parent, after all.

Stupid… who's stupid now? England, of course.

And who's weak now?

"England—England, I'm sorry. Don't cry, please…."

As if I could control it… what an idiot you are, I wanted to shout. As it was, I wasn't able to. I gave up on trying to talk and just let the sobs take over.

Why did it still hurt, after all this time?

Do you still remember your joyous face upon seeing the babies for the first time, France? Because I do.

I've forgiven you, France, a long time ago. But that's not the only problem.

"Ssshhhh, don't cry…"

"Why now?" I murmured.

He didn't move from his position: sometime along or after the apology talk, we had taken to a cuddling position in the sofa. I didn't complain. Neither did he. Perhaps it had come naturally. (Or he had manipulated me to it. But I still didn't complain.)

"Why what now, cher?" His tone—he knew what I was talking about, the bastard. He was just stalling time.

A rainy part of a lonely island could always use a little hope. But I was too tired to pursue the matter.

(It wore out on everyone eventually: to hope. Because it was just that, a hope, and it didn't change the outcome. It never did.)

"Never mind."

Why apologise now?

It was cold when I awoke. There was a definite lack of warm body around me. France must have been up first, possibly making breakfast.

I tried to ignore the fact and snuggled deeper into the sofa. Yes, it was unusually cold. I noticed the blankets surrounding me and wrapped myself up in them more.

It didn't ward off the cold completely, but it was something. For now. I drifted off again.

"England, wake up." There was a gentle shake to my arm. "I made soup."

I opened my eyes and lifted my head groggily. Still cold. Everything was blurry at first. I blinked. "What time is it?"

"Two in the afternoon."

I stared at him. "…what?"

"Your boss called. I told him you were sick. He seemed like he didn't believe me, but then he said, well, you deserved a day off or two."

"But I'm not…" only after saying that did I realise that I was shivering slightly. Damn, so that's why the room was so bloody cold.

"I tried to wake you up, but you looked like you needed your rest. Soup?"

"Ah, yes… thanks." I received the still-steaming bowl from him. It made my hands warm.

I ate slowly, trying not to drop the heavy bowl. The soup was delicious, of course, but I didn't feel hungry at all, and my head felt light, as if I was flying.

("What about your own boss?"

"Oh, that. Don't worry, Nicolas said I could use some vacation time.")

"You lost weight," France remarked.

"Did I?"

I was tired of this. Yes, I knew. We both knew that I knew and we both knew why. Why did he have to comment on it, anyway? Why did he insist on being such an annoying, pompous bastard most of the time?

"Yes, you did. And I'm glad you did... England." Smug face, matching a smug tone.

"Of course you would be." I didn't bother disguising the weariness in my voice. Because really, what's the point of all this anymore?

Of course you would be glad that my empire was falling apart. Of course you would bask in the fact that all my children were running away from me, escaping one by one, and succeeding.

"Well, well. So now you already accepted that you could lose, hmm, dear Angleterre?"

I woke up abruptly. A dream. Only a dream. Based on a real memory, but still a dream. I didn't immediately open my eyes. I wanted away from him, if for just a few seconds, because even my dreams were plagued by him.

Then France was enveloping me in a hug. "England? England, calm down," he soothed, rubbing circles down my back. Why? Oh. I was breathing in short pants and struggling about in the blankets. "Calm down. It's alright. It's going to be alright. Shush, shush."

It was so ironic I wanted to laugh. Tell me, France, how was it going to be alright when you were the nightmare but acted the healer?

I do love him, but sometimes, sometimes…

Sometimes it made me frustrated. Why couldn't our relationship be a normal one?

"I love you."

I blurted it out without thinking. My fever must still have been high.

I was sitting on the sofa, France on the couch across from me. It was late afternoon. I had probably gone mad, because I was using those three words as both a confession and a scolding, to him and to myself. I didn't know anyone could do that.

But I was fed up. Of his roundabout way of romance. Of my own. Of our cowardice. We had had a millennium and it apparently hadn't been enough to make this work.

France opened his mouth to speak, but I beat him to it.

"I've loved you since the earliest time I could remember meeting you. You were so pretty even back then, with your bright robes and your cheeky smirk and the twinkle in your eyes.

"You found me, you taught me things, you showed me things… even my own brothers weren't that kind, and I fell for you in no time. I was just a weak little child back then. Sometimes I pretended to dislike you, but we both knew that wasn't true.

"And then came the Normans. You were there, too. You saw me, didn't you? I ran and ran from you lot, but that king captured me.

"It hurt, France, to have you there, just standing there, indifferent, cold, uncaring…"

France visibly deflated. "I was a child, too, England," he said quietly. "I couldn't do anything."

I knew that. I just wanted to blame you. I wanted to break you just once, because I was always helpless against you. Please understand.

"Then we drifted further apart. You kept to your side of the Channel, and I mine.

"But all too soon, a war broke out." I smiled. It felt strange, the smile. As if it was bitter and empty. Or perhaps it really was. "I burned Jeanne at the stake. But still, it seemed as if fortune was not on my side."

"England—"

"No, listen." You made me remember. This was what you get: the confession of a broken England. "The wars we fought weren't for, hmm, supposedly noble causes anymore. Over time, they were just another tool for us to trip the other. To make the other fall, to have him at your feet. Don't you remember, France?"

He seemed to have given up on interrupting me. I was satisfied. But my head spun a little now. "Then suddenly it was all about the New World.

"Do you remember when we cannoned each other's ships all the way to the Americas? Fun times," I smiled in nostalgia. "We landed in different areas, but we always seemed to meet someplace, then fought, and it was our men who stopped us from clawing at each other's throat. Well, except when it was the men who were furious."

Confession… what confession, actually? What was the point of talking of all this again? My head hurt.

"We used to sneak out into the middle of nowhere and battled to our hearts' content, didn't we? And then…" I stopped. I couldn't keep going about this. Talking meant admitting; I didn't want to cry again. I swallowed.

"Well, after all the matter with the New World had calmed down… some more petty wars. Then there was Napoleon."

Well, it had been… an awful affair, too.

Sometimes my own stubbornness disappointed me. Shouldn't I give up on talking?

(I just want to say… it hurt. It still hurts. Fix it. Fix me.)

Before I knew it, his lips were upon mine. His tongue roamed, demanded access to my mouth, and I allowed it. I let him dominate the kiss and closed my eyes. It was nice, just feeling, not thinking, not remembering.

"I'm sorry," he said once we parted. "I'm sorry, cher, I truly am. Please let me make it up to you."

Stupid France. That was what I'd been waiting for him to do all along. Didn't he understand?

After all, I always said 'I love you's first. What had he expected? Rejection?

My head still spun. This time more violently.

But I smiled. "Of course."

Stupid France and weak, weak England…

(France was always the beautiful one. England was always the beast. We Englishmen were always thought of as savages. They wanted to conquer us. They wanted to convert us.)

I'm sorry, too, France. For all my anger and bitterness.

No, I'm not sorry for falling for you.

Even if I should probably know better.

Do you remember 1904? 1916? 1944?

France, finally I know why I couldn't move on from… certain events. It's not because you hurt me.

It's because I need forgiveness myself.

I was falling, again. But you caught me this time, and perhaps… perhaps… it would finally be alright.