A/N For sonofon, who is just so perpetually awesome she made me write Hetalia!angst. I'm awaiting my crack~
This story has lots of pairings. Seriously. Spain/North Italy, Spain/Japan, China/Japan, Spain/Hungary, Hungary/Austria/Prussia, Spain/France, Spain/South Italy, but I'd probably say the strongest pairing in here is Greece/Spain, so… You've been warned. XD
I apologize for any timeline disturbances and wrongs because I didn't care to make this historically correct. Sorry for this fail?
Disclaimer: Let's be reasonable now, shall we?
A single, perfect tomato sails in an arc over the crowd and smashes onto the windshield of a parked car.
He was once as pure as that tomato, too.
It's the time of La Tomatina again, and Antonio watches from the comfort of his high-rise apartment complex down at all the chaos in the streets. His eyes flit around and settle briefly on a small child resting on his father's shoulders, cradling many tomatoes in his arms. Antonio counts seven of them.
He remembers nostalgically the first person he'd ever brought to the festival, many many years ago. It was supposed to have just been a casual get-together that was meant to cheer up the little Italian but somewhere along the way it had changed.
When Feliciano had decided to take off his shirt and wrestle Antonio to the squishy red ground, somehow Antonio's hands had found themselves in Feliciano's hair and Feliciano's mouth was firmly set on Antonio's. Nobody noticed the two as they had crawled their way underneath a tomato cart and stripped themselves down to just bare skin, eyes both glazed over at something that wasn't supposed to be happening.
When he returned the boy to his house after that, smelling of sex and tomatoes, Antonio had kissed him on the cheek and smiled.
He did not invite him next year.
He's pretty sure Feliciano doesn't remember a thing.
A few years later, the Spaniard had experienced a lot of firsts. Although Heracles wasn't the first to be brought to La Tomatina, he was definitely the first one that Antonio planned on fucking during it. They had skipped the throwing tomatoes part entirely and just went to wade in a tomato-scented bath together in the Greek's hotel room. From then on it had been a mess of love-making, tangled limbs and husky whispers. It had been slow and almost silent, but at the same time agonizing and crazy.
Heracles had been the first to top him. And it was okay because it was Heracles, someone Antonio had loved for so long. They had gone at it in several different positions at different times in the day, and the very last time they fucked Heracles had kissed Antonio's forehead in a manner that couldn't not be described as lovingly.
Heracles had also been the first and very last person to leave Antonio. When he had woken up and reached up to pull the curtains away, all traces of the Greek's being there was gone except the faint smell of him on Antonio's skin.
He still misses him.
If anything, Antonio was a bitter lover. Cruel he was not, because he genuinely cared for everyone he bedded, but he always held some part of him back and remembered every expanse of skin and every moan elicited in his head, stored away in the very back.
And perhaps that was the reason for inviting his friend Vash to La Tomatina the year after he had patched up his pride from Heracles' swift departure.
Vash was supposed to have been a substitute for something Antonio never really had, but the Spaniard's head wouldn't let him indulge in it. The blushes on the Swiss' face as he moaned out Antonio's name on the large bed was as red as the tomato tarts Antonio set out as desserts by the bed and nothing could ever had extracted the same feeling as the one Antonio had had that night with Heracles, but he couldn't do much about it.
He didn't even know why he had picked Vash of all people, when not even his hair colour matched the one that he really ached for, but he was stone-cold drunk and he didn't really care anymore. He was just so tired of being alone.
Antonio, why do you do this?
Do what?
Lock yourself up like this. You don't let anyone near your heart while you distract them with pretty words and fake kisses.
Shut up, Vash. Clearly, you're drunk.
I'm not the one with the damn wine bottle. Ah hell, you know what? This is hopeless. You're never going to let me open you up.
I invited you to have sex with me, not be my psychiatrist.
Fuck you, asshole.
By the time he met Japan, he was already slowly starting to rot on the inside. Vash wouldn't speak to him and Heracles had heard of what happened. He was slowly diminishing from his once glorified days of power, and someone who was looking to be a promising development appeared one day in the corner of Antonio's eye, and slowly but surely Antonio began to be fascinated with the man.
He was quiet and serious, but he was too stiff to be as cute as he sometimes looked. He was easily flustered and one day Antonio had caught him actually smiling.
At La Tomatina, he had fed spaghetti to the man under the candlelight and as the shadows cast a spell on them both, Antonio knew that he had to see those eyes dance with passion and pure excitement. Before he could say another word, Antonio had taken him to the bedroom and proceeded to make slow, romantic love to him.
They had collapsed against each other at the same time, huffing and puffing but still raw and hungry. Antonio was just about to fall asleep in the Japanese man's arms when he had heard the tiniest of whispers against his neck, a soft choking sound that he hadn't heard before. It was a whisper of a sob, full of choked remorse and bitter feelings locked up inside.
Yao.
And even though they were alike in that aspect of love, Antonio's wounds were suddenly all ripped open again and he left immediately, not even looking back to say goodbye to the sleeping, crying man who was weeping over someone that he'd betrayed. They both cried that night.
Elizabeta had shown up on her own accord at the famous tomato festival, long after Antonio had learned to keep everything inside and pushed all his thoughts away from his mind by sleeping and eating all day. They had bumped into each other accidentally, both their eyes wide with recognition. Looking back, he doesn't know if that was what her plan was all along, but after an hour of piling tomatoes at the other residents of town; she invited herself once again onto his property and helped herself to his wine in his kitchen.
He was at a loss of what to do when she attacked him, kissing him fiercely and pushing him towards his bedroom hungrily, eyes closed shut lest her tears fall from them. It had all happened so quickly that he wasn't able to perceive how disgusted she felt at herself until after they lay on is bed, panting and quiet.
She had cried in his arms that night, telling him all about how she loved Roderich so much but he was sometimes too busy for her and now that Gilbert was always trying to break into their relationship to take either her or Roderich for himself (she couldn't tell who the silver-haired devil wanted more), she wasn't sleeping at night and all she wanted was to go back to the good old days. Antonio had stopped her from drinking more wine but she managed to find more anyways and she drank as she spilled out everything to him, telling him that she was probably better off with him, a relationship that was so easy and not complicated and just pure, unadulterated sex instead of killing herself with trying to love one man more than another.
Later that same night, after her eyes were swollen and her voice dry, she confessed the real truth.
I don't really love you, Antonio. I don't want this kind of life.
I know.
I guess I should be heading back home now. It's dark out, and I don't know what time it is, but I don't want to worry Roderich or Gilbert. I've been a silly little girl, haven't I? I'm sorry, Antonio.
I don't mind. And if they're really worried, then you can say it was my fault. I won't tell, Elizabeta.
Thank you Antonio, but I think I'll be telling the truth now.
Francis was a beautiful man, and Antonio came to realize the extent of this on one particular festival date.
For the first time in a long time, it was raining on La Tomatina and Antonio was selling towels and other assorted garments in a stall beside the massive chaos that was only getting messier with the rain. Then he saw Francis off in the distance, wandering around, seemingly looking for something. His hair and clothes clung to his body, soaked, and he was relatively un-tomatoed for someone who looked like a blind target. He looked up at the rain coming down and Antonio swore it had been just like one of those romantic chick-flick movies.
From across the crowds, their eyes locked briefly and Francis loosened his jacket collar. Antonio motioned for him to come closer.
They had rough, wild sex behind the stall not minutes later, demanding and pushing each other for more and more until they were both exhausted and ready to go to sleep right there on the tomato-splattered concrete, the rain still pouring down on their naked bodies. Somewhere along the way they put their clothes back on and dived into the tomato-vat together, soaking themselves in tomato juice.
After that, the blonde disappeared out of sight and Antonio went back to his apartment. They didn't see each other again, but Antonio couldn't help comparing himself to a large crate of rotten tomatoes that nobody wanted to throw. He kicked the crate aside and left. It was what he did best.
All these whirlwinds of romances and passion flows up inside Antonio as he stares down at the crowds again, feeling so far away from the people only twelve floors away from him. He doesn't remember half of all the chaos he has spent on the nights of La Tomatina, but the same bitter feeling of regret climbs up at him as it does every year, and he sighs slowly, drawing the curtains together.
"…Antonio?" Arms encircle his waist and he looks down to see two sleepy eyes. "What were you looking at?"
"Nothing important." Antonio smiles lightly and hugs the man back. "But now, now I'm looking at something real good."
Romano just blushes and turns away sharply, muttering curses. "…Get back to bed."
"Immediately." Antonio smiles again and leads him back to the bed, kissing him once more before leaving to go to the washroom. Romano falls asleep shortly after, still naked, the sheets tangled around his legs.
When he wakes up later that day, Romano finds himself covered by the white sheets and a small, rotten tomato lies on the pillow beside him.