Dedication: To a lovely friend I met on tumblr; I would have probably never even finished the first chapter if it hadn't been for her wonderful words of encouragement and entertaining RP scenarios. No names needed, she knows who she is! Thank you so much for everything. (:
Circean Reality
Chapter One: Fettuccine
Romano was not having a good week. That bastard England had tried infiltrating Italy again; his Northern brother had the balls to call Germany, of all people, to help him eat his dinner like Romano wasn't fucking there; the mafia was being more pigheaded than usual; and Spain ignored him in favor of one of his novela finales.
Needless to say, Romano could not wait for Sunday, the one day he was allowed to stay at home. So imagine his surprise when he wakes up in what was certainly not the bedroom he used in his Sicilian mansion. He's groggy at first, not noticing how his Queen sized mattress turned into a twin or how his twin is right in front of him when Veneciano should be sleeping in Sausage Land next to that stupid German.
Seeing his mirror image does not scare Romano, but his brother's clothes sure do. What was Veneciano wearing? Was he trying to embarrass his Southern counterpart from ever showing his face outside? Veneciano's attire consisted of a solid navy blue t-shirt and overalls with rips that were definitely not made by the manufacturer. The other male was half straddling Romano, ve-ing with his normal dopey look. Romano dreads looking at his shoes and instead looks up to question Veneciano's presence.
Before Romano is able to mouth his thoughts he is startled by a man that looks just like the Great Roman Empire barging right into his room, but that's impossible because that man is dead so it must be a ghost and just why is the Great Roman Empire's ghost wearing an apron in his Sicilian mansion?
Romano gawks as his brother looks back to the ghost, completely unfazed that there's a freaking ghost and holy shit, has the ghost been talking to him this whole time?
"-so hurry up if you don't want to be late!" finished up the ghost, waving a spatula menacingly in Romano's direction for a couple of seconds before smiling and turning to vacate the room.
"I'm so excited! Do you think I'll make lots of friends Lovi?" Veneciano turns back to Romano, directing the question at him, but 'Lovi' was definitely not Romano's name, so there was no way he was going to answer his ditz of a brother.
After a minute of silence Veneciano-with-no-fashion-sense opens his eyes a bit, just enough to see their honey brown shade, and tilts his head a smidgen to the left. Romano is getting irked at the close proximity and decides to humor his brother.
"Fucker, that's not my name." Or not.
"E…eh? What do you mean that that isn't your name? Of course it is! You've been Lovino Vargas since birth!" Romano looks at his brother, wondering what is wrong with him.
"No, I'm Romano South Italy. I knew you were a ditz Veneciano, but how do you forget your own twin's name?" Veneciano starts to look worried at this point.
"Ve, brother, my name isn't Veneciano, it's Feliciano!" Before Romano can deny that, 'Feliciano' continued, "And we're not twins, you're my older brother! Do you have a fever?"
Instead of gracing his 'younger brother' with a response, Romano pushes Veneciano off of his bed and marches out of the room with the goal to confront the creepy ghost of the Roman Empire.
"Lovi, where are you going? We have to get ready soon or we'll be late!" whines the body on the floor.
"I want to know what's going on and you're just fucking confusing me!" Romano needs answers and no ghost or confused brother was going to stop an Italian personification on a mission.
Veneciano laughs quietly and offers his advice, "Ve, grandpa is downstairs in the kitchen!"
Pretty worthless advice if Romano doesn't even know where he is. The Italian goes through three doors that lead to a different room, a closet, and a medium sized bathroom before he decides to murder someone if he does not find the stairs soon.
To Veneciano's luck Romano finds his staircase when he rounds the corner. The Southern part of the country awkwardly goes down the steps one at a time because holy shit, were those stairs made for toddlers? Romano has to go down the stairs sideways just to make sure his feet don't fly off the small, cramped path.
Veneciano runs right after him, having absolutely no trouble going down what his 'big brother' deems the obstacle course from hell. The smiling male grabs hold of Romano's hand when they reach the last step, navigating past what Romano considered a peasant dining area to look like.
"What are you doing? Let me go! You think I'm too stupid to find my way around?" Veneciano giggles at his words as if Romano had just told the worlds' funniest joke; Completely ignoring his vulgar language and crude attempts to shove the shorter male out of his personal bubble.
When they reach the kitchen Romano is not sure whether to piss his pants in fear or laughter, it is not every day one can stare at the Great Roman Empire's ghost scrambling eggs in nothing but khaki shorts and a cooking apron. The man, ghost, thing turns to acknowledge the incoming males with a smile.
"So nice of you to join us in the world of the living, Lovino!" When Romano 'tched' at the name that was most definitely not his, the ghost takes the time to get a good look at him and says, "You're still in your jammies boy; go get dressed before you're late on your first day! Don't want them thinking I raised a troublemaker... I'll never be able to woo those single ladies if they think I'm a barbarian!"
Romano glares at what he believed to be a smart, conquering ghost of a man but is now sure to be only a hollow chunk of space. His opinion is only reinforced when the man continues to ignore the eggs that were slowly burning on the stove in favor of rambling on about something Romano had no idea about. The ghost finally notices his eggs burning when Feliciano points out that, "Ve, grandpa, I think the eggs are going to explode, there's smoke!" in his slightly amused voice.
One panic-filled scramble later finds Romano telling the two males that he really had to go because dammit, does no one understand that I'm the Southern fucking part of the great Italian Republic? Veneciano and the ghost take the news like any other normal human being.
They laugh.
It is only after a couple more times with Romano insisting that he really needs to get to his Sicilian mansion that he is informed by Veneciano, of all people, that they are in American and Lovino has never even been outside of the state, much less have the possibility of owning a mansion in a country whose language he can't even differentiate from Spanish.
Romano is flipping a shit at the news and demands to awaken from this nightmare. The ghost chuckles nervously at his grandson; This is enough to elicit Romano's attention and a new bout of shouting begins with Romano blaming 'Mr. Ghost' for his predicament.
"Mr. Ghost? What are you talking about Lovino? I'm your grandpa! I knew you wanted me dead, but sheesh!"
Romano now wants to know why he should refer to the ghost as Romulus when he is obviously a ghost and giving him a name would only incite the devil's rage. Being the personification that surrounds Vatican City has not come without side effects on Romano's judgment.
"Oh boy; what to do..." Romulus taps his fingers in an uneven beat on the dining room table. Eyes steadily glaze in thought as he stares at the china cabinet that takes up a part of the wall. Romano, irritated with his predicament by now, folds his arms in front of his chest and scowls; The man, teen, appears what can only be described as 'a volcano about ready to erupt any moment now'. Veneciano, or apparently Feliciano, became unusually quiet and looks worriedly between his two family members.
The quietness in the room is unnerving and none of the Vargas males can handle keeping still; It becomes a mess as before the minute is over all three men produce some type of noise. Romano slams his hands on the hard oak table, huffing and mouth ready to shout every expletive he knows at the defenseless males; Feliciano stands up rapidly, almost falling as he has a leg tangled with the bottom of his chair; and Romulus' fists one of his hands while placing it onto the palm of the other, yelling out an 'A-hah!' at the top of his voice.
-fettuccine-
In the end Romano is asked by the ghost to just go to school for the day and that they would resolve the country personification delusion when he and his brother came back. To say that Romano is beyond pissed to have his problem brushed off as a bout of teenage insanity is an understatement.
Standing awkwardly around the kitchen island for another ten minutes rewards Romulus with an explanation as to why Lovino, his lovable and caring grandson, has suddenly turned into a foul mouthed delinquent by the name of Romano.
His revelation?
It is obvious that Romano's 'fantasy world' is just a product of the poor teen hitting his head on something really, really hard. Something like marble stone hard.
"That's it Lovino! You just hit your precious little head on a conveniently placed marble statue some time in your past sixteen years of living-" Romano wants to not only correct the man for using the wrong name when addressing him again, but also the incorrect age that he is dubbed with; Ghost man must be tripping if he thinks the Italian to be anything younger than a thousand years, but the solid plasma man's rapid speech certainly rivaled Great Roman's inability to shut up, causing Romano's intervention to fail completely. "All we have to do is hit you twice as hard and you'll be good as new!"
Romano thinks that it sounds logical enough. Who is he kidding? Being a country personification is a preposterous idea and he's actually a human being that only imagined his whole life as a territory and country when he damaged his skull one day; all he has to do to go back to his normal living routine is to risk a little permanent brain damage, no big. Sounds about righ-
"There's no way in hell I am doing that! Are you crazy, Mr. Ghost? I'm a country, dammit!" Romano wraps his hands around the ghost's neck, attempts to throw the imbecile across the china cabinets' glass to give him a fucking concussion and see how well and dandy he likes the idea, but Feli-Veneciano karate chops Romano right on the folds of his arms, effectively saving his older brother from a life in prison.
Romulus decides to have Romano and Feliciano go with the excuse of 'temporary amnesia', temporary because it can be fixed the moment Romano concedes with theconcussion route. The 'amnesia' line is to only be used if Romano comes upon someone or something his current 'condition' does not recognize, or has killed off. Romano finds that it would be a bloody brilliant plan if it hadn't been thought up by such an idiot.
After all is settled, the Vargas family begins to execute their fool proof plan. Romulus goes back to the kitchen to finish up making breakfast while Feliciano navigates Lovino back up the deathtrap towards his room to help Lovino change into school appropriate clothing, all the while informing Romano that Lovino's favorite color is green, not red; his favorite animal and best friend is a turtle named Nacho that they keep in a small tank by the television, 'Nacho loves watching those Animal Planet specials, ve, he can't help himself with Mean Girls either!'; and his birthday is on March 17, convincing Romano that he really is sixteen years old in this 'reality' and that Feliciano's birthday just passed recently, on June 2nd to be exact, and he is finally fourteen.
Romano decides that he can just bluff his way through the day as most of what Feliciano is now telling him is extremely irrelevant, so the teen zones out as he attempts to put on a pair of faded jeans without his inner designer puking all over the carpeted floor, and really Feliciano, who wants to know Lovino's dress size?
Even though it is obvious that Feliciano is being ignored, the teen continues on with his extra rambling. From the bits he does listen to, Romano learns that he is to start his 'junior' year of high school and Feliciano is entering as a 'freshman' and well shit, Romano has never had to attend school in his life; The only smart he falls under is good looks, but Romano just asked Feliciano and nope, being handsome is not a class.
Romano is not amused.
-fettuccine-
When Feliciano and Lovino arrive at school they are well over an hour late and the hallways are deserted. Not even a guard is in sight to pass the boys through security; Romano feels no need to wait and walks right under the metal detector, setting it off, while Feliciano screams his head off at the possibility of getting suspended for 'breaking in' to their own school.
The two walk to the office with Feliciano leading, a note in his hand from Romulus explaining his oldest grandson's incapability of responding to his own name and how the boy is going through a rebellious phase just like all other normal human teens and so many other ridiculous excuses and side comments that it would shame any child in existence. It is the second version of the note, as the first was handed to Romano by a gullible Romulus. Romano shredded the first note and threw it at the ghost while cursing the Great Roman's grave out loud.
The principal is standing by the intercom microphone behind the front desk, eyes glued to a sheet of paper while mumbling gibberish under his breath. He turns to notice the two when Feliciano shouts a quick 'hello there!' and Romano is given a clear view of the man. He is short, shorter than even Romano by quite a bit, with a chubby figure and such very dark brown hair that his green eyes seem to pop out. He looks to be in his early fifties with very apparent laugh lines covering his face. Overall, the principal looks like a swell and handsome fellow, but he is glaring at the two the moment he notices that they are students, obviously displeased at having a disruption in his building of higher education on the first day, but his eyes soften with pity as he skims the note that Feliciano hands to him. The man then turns to walk into a side office, Romano finds this to be the perfect opportunity to get the fuck out, but Feliciano knows his brother enough to anticipate a hasty retreat that he snatches the other male's arm with his before Romano could showcase firsthand what Italians do best.
It is only a minute before the principal comes back with a thin stack of papers. He hands the bottom two to the students and Romano notices that it is a crudely made schedule, nothing like the itineraries the German Nation prepared for when the world conference was hosted in his country, and sneers at involuntarily giving the bastard a praise.
The principal, Romano had yet to learn his name, then takes a smaller, yellow piece of paper from the top of the stack and proceeds to write the date and time, asking Feliciano how to spell 'Fettuccine' and apologizing for not knowing how to spell his name. Feliciano laughs at this and just takes the paper, not correctly the older male's mistake. He turns to his brother and squeezes his hand in reassurance before turning to the door and saying his farewell.
Now it is only Romano, the principal, and the super awkward atmosphere that is so thick in the room that the Italian swears he can feel himself choking on it. Romano is imagining a thousand and one ways to escape from the room when a clearing of the throat startles him, the principal mumbles a quick 'well then' and leans a bit on the desk to write on a blank regular sized piece of paper with what Romano can only describe as 'doctor chicken scratch' from his angle on the opposite side of the room.
After what feels like a terribly long time, the principal turns to give Romano the paper he had written on and a yellow slip similar to the one he had handed Feliciano earlier with the words 'Hall Pass' slapped on in bold font. Romano takes the papers and grumbles a half-assed 'thanks' as he walks out of the room.
Before the principal is able to resume his previous activity of reviewing the morning announcements, Romano marches right back in to the office with a red face and demands that the poor man lead him to his first class. The principal gives a hearty laugh and walks towards Romano, asking him for the stack he had handed to the boy just moments ago.
It turns out the principal thought up the possibility of Romano forgetting his own school's layout and kindly included a map. Romano leaves the room in a silent fit of anger.
As Roma-Lovino is burning a hole in the school map with his eyes, he can't help but think back to the piece of paper that held his schedule. He glances at the first thing on the list and immediately feels his insides warm up in relief. His crazy human self has World History first period.
Even with the promise of something he was knowledgeable in, Romano cannot help the feeling of dread pooling in his stomach the farther he walks down the hall.
This was going to be worse than the time he partied too hard that he accidentally let Mussolini come to power back in 1922; Romano can just feel it.
Don't worry, more of the cast will be introduced next chapter. (:
Please leave feedback so that I will be able to improve in future chapters!