This is based on a old 1981 song called Under Your Thumb by British band Godley and Cream. I had trouble naming the story but a friend came up with Premonition.
Enjoy!
I do not own Hetalia or the song!
Warning : Scenes of suicide.
Premonition
England, like any other country, had its good and bad points and Alfred F. Jones had decided that one of the bad points was the rain.
Alfred worked for an IT company back in America and he had been sent to work in their British office but there had been as many rainy days as dry since he had arrived. Right now, he was stranded at a closed railway station, in heavy rain, at night, having had to work over and missed the last train home. He had nowhere to stay for the night and there was no one around who might give him a ride home.
The rain began to come down harder and it was getting cold. Alfred was sheltering under a over-hang but he was still getting damp and when lightning flashed across the sky, followed by rolling thunder, Alfred knew he had to find better shelter.
He looked around and saw a train with carriages on a siding. He made his way to the last carriage and, after a few tries, managed to get in. He went into the seating area and sat down in the first seat he came to. He stretched out across the double seat, braced his back against the window and settled down for the night.
He was just dozing off when he heard someone stepping on to the train. Had he been found out or was someone else seeking shelter from the storm? A shadow moved down the aisle, occasionally lit up by flashes of lightning. Alfred got the impression of a slight man of just about average height as he came toward him. The man sat down in the seat opposite Alfred and said nothing.
The silence stretched until Alfred could not stand it any more.
"Hi," he greeted, just to make a sound. "Sheltering from the storm?"
The man did not answer. A flash of lightning illuminated his face and Alfred caught a glance of over-bright emerald eyes, capped with more than average-size eyebrows. There was also a glimpse of messy, wheat-coloured hair and an expression of desolation on an otherwise attractive face. Then the man lowered his head on to one of his hands as if he could not hold it up any more.
"You okay, dude?" Alfred asked. This guy did not look too good, a pity for someone so cute.
The man did not answer but gave a sniff, like someone close to crying but trying desperately not to. Then he looked up and over at the seat across the aisle then quickly turned and stared out of the window.
"Hey, dude," Alfred called out, waving his hand in front of the man's face. "Can you hear me?" Alfred could not decide if the man was deaf or just plain rude. The man suddenly shot out of his seat and walked out of the seating area, Alfred on his heels.
The man went to the carriage exit and opened it. Alfred watched him as he stood there for a moment, as if contemplating something, his hair whipping around his head as if by a high wind then he took a deep breath and leapt out of the door.
Alfred looked out of the door and peered out into the storm. The man was nowhere to be seen and the storm seemed to calm. Alfred shut the door and went back to his seat, thinking about the odd encounter.
Whatever that was, it had woken him up and he did not feel like sleeping now. So he picked up a discarded local newspaper from the floor and pulled out a pocket torch. Flicking it on, he used it to illuminate the front page and began to read.
The front page story was about a man who had thrown himself from a speeding train. No form of identification, not even a train ticket. No one knew who the man was.
But Alfred recognised the picture, a police rendering, of the man they wanted to identify. A man he had just seen jump out of the carriage into the dark.
Fear making him clutch the newspaper, Alfred bolted from the train.
Three months later ….
Arthur Kirkland had reached his lowest ebb. His entire life had just crashed and burned around him. He had no family because they had thrown him out when he came out as gay. It was difficult for him to make friends because he was cold and aloof with people he did not know so he had no one to talk to or take him in now that his relationship had just come to a horrible end.
He had found out his lover, Francis, had been cheating on him. When Arthur confronted Francis about it, Francis did not even try to deny it, instead blaming Arthur's irascible personality for his straying. To make matters worse, Arthur lived in Francis's house and worked for him.
So now he was without a home, a job or a lover. The final straw was finding that his pocket had been picked and his wallet stolen, containing his money, credit cards and all form of identification. Everything was gone.
He wandered aimlessly and found himself by the railway station. Despite having no money to buy a ticket, he climbed on to the next train to arrive. He walked down the aisle and sat down in a seat closest to the end of the carriage.
He sat in the seat then, in a fit of weariness, he lowered his head on to his hand. His eyes were burning with tears that were threatening to fall and he sniffed as he tried to hold them back. Was he so unlovable? Was this how his life was going to be like?
Suddenly he felt a pair of eyes on him and he looked up at the seat across the aisle. A young, cute man with sky-blue eyes and sun-kissed hair with a lock that gave the two-fingered salute to gravity stared back at him. He had a shocked expression on his face, like he had seen a ghost. Arthur immediately turned his face away and looked out of the window. Why had that man been looking at him like that? Could he see what a emotional loser Arthur was?
He could not take this any more. Why suffer?
Arthur bolted out of his seat and left the seating area, going to the exit. He opened the door and the countryside whipped past at high speed. The wind buffeted his hair as he contemplated what he was about to do. Just one jump and his pain would end.
It would all be over.
Arthur took a deep breath and moved forward.
Suddenly he was seized from behind as a pair of strong arms wrapped around him and pulled him back against a broad chest.
"Please, don't!" a voice breathed in his ear.
When Alfred boarded the train home, the last thing he expected to see was the ghost he saw three months ago walk into his carriage and sit down in the seat across the aisle from him.
Oh God! It's the same carriage!
Was he seeing the ghost again, this time in the daylight? Alfred sat frozen in his seat, staring at the man. He could see the man was close to tears which was why his eyes were bright. Just like before.
The man dropped his head on to his hand and after a moment he sniffed. Just like before.
It was happening again!
The man's head came up as if he could feel that he was being stared at. He looked round at Alfred who felt like a deer in the headlights. There was the same look of desolation on the man's face as before and he quickly looked away out the window. Alfred knew what was coming next.
The man shot out of his seat and headed out of the seating area.
Alfred did not know why he followed the ghost, after all he was phasmophobic. The idea of ghosts terrified him but he found himself following the spirit, knowing what he was about to do.
The man went to the exit and opened the door and the wind caused their hair to fly everywhere and the man stood there for a while, looking at the countryside speeding past then took a deep breath and moved forward.
Alfred did not why he did it. He did not know what he could do to help someone who was already dead but he wrapped his arms around the man and pulled him back.
Alfred's eyes widen as he pulled the man back into his chest. He was warm and solid and Alfred could feel the man's heart beat under his hand.
He was alive!
Alfred could not believe it. He had seen this man as a ghost but he was as alive as Alfred was. And he wanted to keep him that way.
"Please," Alfred breathed. "Don't!"
Arthur turned and saw the blonde man who had been staring at him. The man shut the door and turned back to him.
Arthur stared at the man. Why did he care what happened to tragic, unloved Arthur? And for that matter ….?
"How did you know what I was going to do?" he asked, staring at the blonde man who was looking at him as if trying to work something out.
"That's a long story," the man replied. "By the way, I'm Alfred F. Jones."
"Arthur Kirkland," Arthur said. And then he shook his head to clear it. "Why did you stop me anyway?"
"I didn't want to watch you die again!"
"Huh?"
When the conductor came, Alfred paid for Arthur's ticket and the two of them sat out of the way and talked.
"Why did you want to die?" Alfred asked. Arthur found himself blurting out his life story to a complete stranger, something he would never do in usual circumstances but then. He had just tried to commit suicide.
"That Francis is a dick," Alfred commented when Arthur had finished. "Not worth killing yourself over."
"I realise that now," Arthur admitted. "Thanks to you, I got to realise that. But why do you care so much?"
"It's complicated," Alfred replied.
"You said something about not wanting to watch me die again," Arthur pressed. Alfred looked down at his lap.
"It happen three months ago," he replied and went on to tell the story of what had happened that night. Arthur listened but he found it hard to believe that Alfred had had some kind of premonition about his death but let Alfred finish his story.
"When I saw you this time," Alfred came to the end of the story. "I thought I was seeing a ghost again but when I saw you about to jump, I had to stop you. I didn't think I'd be able to but I had to try."
"But I was nothing to you," Arthur said.
"You're a person," Alfred replied. "A human being." Arthur smiled at the fact that a complete stranger would care whether he lived or died when people in his life, family, boyfriend, did not seem to care less.
"This is a little difficult to believe, you understand," Arthur commented.
"Come home with me," Alfred replied. "I still have the newspaper."
When they reached Alfred's flat, he offered Arthur a beer and dug out the three month old newspaper. Arthur went pale when he saw the police rending of him, appealing for information about his identity. When he read the story, he had to sit down.
"Alfred," he gasped. "Look at that!" And he pointed to the top of the paper. Alfred looked and realised he had never looked at the date.
Arthur moved in with Alfred and eventually they moved to America and lived a long and happy life together. When people asked them how they met they would say in an enigmatic way ….
"We met on the train."
They kept the newspaper as a reminder of their unusual meeting.
Alfred saved Arthur on the 30th of January.
The paper was dated next day.
I have an explanation for what happened. See if you can guess what it is! The carriage I described is an older type. You can't open the door on a modern British carriage while the train is travelling and the doors are in the center of the carriage and not separated from the seating area.
That aside, I hope you enjoyed!
Hasta la Pasta!