Hello, everyone! I actually wrote this story a considerable while ago, maybe about six months ago, & because it went down well on my lj I've finally plucked up the courage to post it here after my friends encouraged me to because of the larger readership. I hope you enjoy it! The story is complete, so I'll put up the chapters periodically - probably every Friday until it's done.
Pairing:Spain/Romano (Spamano)
Rated T for language.
"An-Antonio, seriously, I need to go now, it's—"
Pools of watery sunlight had started to spill through the cracks in Lovino Vargas' curtains hours ago. They were settling, about as solid as ripples, on the bedsheets, moving with the dips and curves of Antonio's body as he pulled them up to his face with the white cloth gathered between his fingers. Lovino, halfway out of bed already, shifted the mess of papers and cups and bottles on the bedside table with blind fingers for his watch.
"Fuck," he said, but the word didn't come out quite as venomously as either had expected, "I can't believe it's two already. I needed to be at work half an—" he felt a hand on his shoulder, and he brushed it away, "—hour ago."
"I will be here when you get back, cariño."
"No, you will not. If I get home and you are still in my bed I will fucking kill you."
A student's bedroom is never known to be in the best of states, but that afternoon Lovino's floor gave 'messy' an entire new meaning. He picked up a white shirt that was too big and too clean to belong to him, and dropped it on the chest of the Spaniard in his bed. He pulled on the clothes that were closest to his feet.
"Uh, Lovi?" there was laughter in Antonio's voice as he picked up the shirt and dropped it back onto the floor.
"What?" he snapped on his way to the door.
"That coat is mine."
Lovino looked down at the khaki-green coat and realised the sleeves had swallowed his hands. He contemplated taking it off, then realised there wasn't time. Nonnowas going to murder him as it was.
"Whatever," he folded up the sleeves.
"Oh, and Lovi—"
"For fuck's sake, Antonio, what?"
"You forgot to kiss me goodbye."
Lovino stopped with the door half open and one sleeve of his boyfriend's coat folded, and turned back to where Antonio was sitting up expectantly. Soft and deceptively hard-faced, he ran his hands quickly through the man's hair and kissed him, then again, slower and gentler. He tasted the way he always did, every time – of burnt sugar and flour and fruit. There was something addictive about it— about him.
"Right," he said, "I have to go now. Seriously. And when I get home you had better not still be here, because Feli is coming back with me."
"Oh, Feliciano. He is such a sweet boy."
"He's a fucking moron. He means well, though, I suppose. And take home all your clothes with you – half your wardrobe is on my floor."
By the time Lovino had arrived at his grandfather's café, it was closer to three and every table was occupied, every chair taken, and the cacophony of voices and hissing coffee machines and clanking dishes had risen to the ceiling. He could see his brother from across the room, smiling in that soft, genuine way Lovino never managed to pull off when it was his turn to serve the customers. The girl at the table was giggling as Feliciano served her coffee to her, and he rolled his eyes at the way his silly baby brother leaned close to her, laughing when she did, flirting effortlessly the way he did with every pretty girl that came to the café. He saw Lovino as he looked up, and nearly dropped the empty tray into her lap.
"Fratello!" he shouted, his voice somehow rising above every other that battled for dominance around him. He ran to his older brother, nearly knocking a table down in the process. "Ve, where have you been? The café is full of people! Nonno is going to very mad at you; he says that you are going to need a very good reason to be so late. What isyour reason?"
Despite the brothers moving to London with their grandfather nine years ago, when Lovino was thirteen and Feliciano eleven, Feliciano had an Italian accent so thick and distinguished that the natives of the city often had to ask him to repeat what he had just said. Occasionally, he would trip over more awkward words and get his tongue in a twist, while Lovino could speak English in his sleep.
Lovino pushed past his brother, who clutched the plastic tray to his chest and looked mildly confused at the lack of an answer. Their grandfather stood at the counter, chatting to a girl half his age as he rang up the till, not even making the effort to hide the fact he was shamelessly flirting with her. She nodded and giggled as she fished for coins in her purse, and as Lovino stood next to her he saw the blush spreading across her face and up her bare arms.
"A-Ah, I'm so sorry, I'm thirty pence short. I-I'm so—"
Nonnolaughed and waved his hand dismissively. "A pretty girl like you should not need to get herself in such a flap. Do not worry," he smiled, loud and white-toothed and perfectly charming, "Lovino! Do you have any change in your pockets?"
Better this than a scalding for being late, he thought to himself as he searched the pockets of his jeans and realised they weren't his either. They had seemed slightly big around the waist. He would have to repay Antonio at some point or another, he decided, as he dropped thirty pence onto the counter. Nonno picked it up with rough, tanned fingers, dropped it into the till and winked at her. "Ciao, pretty lady."
Lovino had no idea how he had gotten away with it for ten years, and he certainly had no idea why so many girls came to the café every morning. Had it been him, he would have sued for harassment the moment he had been winked at.
"So, Lovino, you had better have a good reason. I only ask you to work here for one afternoon a week and I expect you to be on time, you know? Did you oversleep?"
"Sorry, nonno. It was— well. Yes, I— overslept. Sorry." Lovino glared at a stain on the counter and began to wonder if he had picked up Antonio's socks by accident as well.
Lovino Vargas' grandfather was, by this point, well into his fifties, yet used more hair products than both his grandsons combined. Tall and muscular with the kind of rough, sun-kissed skin that was commonplace in Italy yet near extinct in London, it was little surprise that he chatted up every girl that he served – they let him. Every movement of nonno's was deliberate and loud, every word he spoke slurred with a thick Italian accent. After twenty-two years of living with nonno, and, arguably, pushing him to his limit more than once as a child, he had never seen him angry, never heard him shout or snap. Even the bitterest words were spoken with a child's kindness.
"Would you like a hairbrush, fratello?" Feliciano pushed between the two with a tray of empty mugs, casting a quick – and vaguely amused – glance at his brother's bird's nest of hair before ducking behind the counter.
"Oh, now I understand why you were so late!" nonnoraised an eyebrow, "Sex hair!"
"What?"
"Oh, you know, your hair is always a mess after you have—"
"Or maybe I just forgot to brush it because I slept in so late," Lovino took his apron from the hook behind the counter and pulled it over his head, wondering if there was any other grandfather in the world who said things of that nature to their grandson so very blatantly.
"No, I have learned to see the difference. Don't lie to your nonno, Lovi," he laughed, loud and booming, and clapped the young man on the back hard enough to almost knock him over. Feliciano suddenly looked intrigued.
"Who is it, fratello? Do I know him? Does he go to our university? What is his name?" he began to interrogate him, before adding, "Or her," as an afterthought.
"It's no one. I slept in. Dammit, Feliciano, why must you be so fucking nosy?" Lovino grabbed a clipboard and pen and began to approach a man who had just made his way to a table, glad to get away from the barrage of questions.
"Good afternoon welcome to Café Vargasmay I take your order," he drawled, uncapping the pen between his teeth. He recognised the customer as a student at his university – an unkempt man with the thickest English accent Lovino had ever heard and fashion sense that made him want to gouge his eyes out with the corner of his clipboard – but had never spoken to him. The man – Arthur, or Anthony, something like that – was opening his laptop, looking like he would rather be anywhere other being served by a foul-tempered Italian.
"Tea, thanks."
"Is thathim?"
Feliciano peered over his brother's shoulder at the Englishman in front of them. The Englishman stared back.
"No, dammit, fratello. You honestly think that I would—"
"So it's someonethen? Can I meet him? Oh! I can meet him tonight! Ve, you should invite him to eat dinner with us!"
"It's not—"
"I can invite Ludwig! It'll be wonderful! Like a— a double date thing."
"Feliciano, there is no way in hell that that bastard is setting foot into my apartment."
Lovino and his brother, despite his brother's best efforts, did not, and never would, have the perfect sibling relationship – or anything remotely close. The one thing the brothers had found in common was their passion for cooking and so, since he was obligated to see Feliciano's stupid face at work and university every day anyway, he had arranged for them to cook and eat a traditional Italian dinner together once a week. He felt, with his brother's enthusiasm and constant, cloying displays of affection, he should make some effort – they were, after all, family.
His brother looked ready to cry. Ludwig Beilschmidt, his brother's stupid German boyfriend, was – in Lovino's eyes – Feliciano's oversized lap dog. He was like one of those infernal Chihuahua things, who stuck to their master's heel like a shadow and snapped and snarled at everyone else. This could have had something to do with the fact that Lovino couldn't remember the last time he hadn't referred to him as 'potato bastard'.
"Please, Lovi? I won't ask again. He won't come any other week," that heartbroken expression was enough to even make Lovino feel a twinge of guilt. He flapped his hand in a dismissive, 'fine' gesture. Feliciano leaped on him, slinging long, ropey arms around his neck in a display of affection that Lovino experienced on a regular basis yet would never get used to.
Arthur pretended to occupy himself with his laptop. All he had wanted was a bloody cup of tea.
Lovino spent the rest of his shift spilling milk on the counter, misreading orders in his own handwriting, fucking up the espresso machine and ignoring customers. Occasionally his phone would vibrate in his apron pocket and it would always be Antonio, bombarding him with menial texts that meant nothing; that were ended with a string of kisses and peppered with cheerful emoticons that made Lovino want to break something. He would reply occasionally and sometimes ignore them, knowing another would fly in five minutes later, and he'd probably reply to that one if it could warrant a reply that wasn't completely idiotic.
His phone buzzed again as he was trying to dab spilt sugar from the counter with a napkin.
lovi, u have never told me where u work! give me the address and i will pay u a visit xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Feliciano and nonnowere going to be ecstatic.
He could ignore the text, but maybe a visit from Antonio would break his day up a little. All he had done all day was break and spill and drop and forget things.
Antonio turned up twenty minutes after Lovino replied to his message – twice as fast as it took for Lovino to arrive to work every weekend; however he did it, Lovino needed to know.
For some reason, when he saw the Spaniard fighting with the door (clearly he had missed the sign reading 'push' that was tacked to the glass directly in front of his face), his chest felt tighter, warmer, lighter, like the little candles that flickered on the tablecloths.
"You got here fast," he said, after Antonio had finally won his tiny battle with the front door. Antonio's reply was to grab the front of his apron and kiss him in the middle of a crowded café. He heard the thickthudof his brother's tray hitting the floor and a very British cry of 'get in there, my son' from an anonymous customer.
Surely the kiss hadn't lasted that long, but when Lovino looked away every single person in the café was staring, coffee mugs poised halfway to mouths. A few were applauding. Antonio smiled at the customers, a charming smile that Lovino wanted to tear from his face and keep for himself in his apron pocket.
He turned back to Lovino and touched his hair with the tips of his fingers. "I ran the whole way," he said.
translations:
fratello - Italian for 'brother'
nonno - Italian for 'grandfather'
cariño - a Spanish pet name. I don't know the exact translation but it probably loosely translates to 'darling' or something.
ciao - you all bloody well know what this means because everyone knows what this means.
and 'get in there, my son' is something you regularly hear here being yelled by random guys if they see another random guy kissing their girlfriend... just to avoid confusion.