Hey! So, this was inspired by the poem Human Contradiction by G.S. Go check it out, I personally think that it really fits Alfred, as well as quite a few of the other Hetalia characters. Warning: Alfred is quite O.O.C. in this. Hope you like this!
Human Contradiction
"I am the human contradiction."
- Excerpt from Human Contradiction by G.S.
Alfred walked home as cold air bristled the hairs on the back of his neck. Normally he'd wear a scarf, but in the mess of things this morning, he'd forgotten to grab his.
Mornings were normally a rush, especially when it was the morning of a meeting, but this morning was more insane then normal.
Alfred felt very, very conflicted.
Two parts of him constantly clashed in a never-ending battle; the cracking mask he wore, and who he wanted to be.
The mask always won out.
.oOo.
"I'm a paradox. I want to be happy, but I think of things that make me sad. I'm lazy, yet ambitious. I don't generally like myself, but I also love who I am. I say that I don't care, but I really do. I crave attention, but reject it when it comes my way. I'm a conflicted contradiction. If I can't figure myself out, there's no way anyone else has either."
- Unknown
Memories flickered in his mind, one after the other, as he reflected on the day's events. America had hosted the G8 meeting this time, so Alfred had had no way of opting out of this meeting.
He had to put on that confident façade, fake a smile, and pretend to be someone he wasn't. He had told so many lies, throughout the course of a single meeting. It hurt to imagine how many he had told throughout the course of his entire life.
Throughout his life, he had heard most of the insults that the other nations threw at him, and, regardless of what they might think, they actually stuck. Insults at his weight, his style, his appearance, his tastes, they were all decked at him like arrows, and they all pierced through his armor and embedded themselves into his heart.
Years of these insults had shaped who he was, and built up his ego, but had worn down his self-confidence.
How could you be confident in yourself if all you are is the clay others have shaped you to be and not who you really are?
.oOo.
"Big egos are big shields for lots of empty space."
-Diana Black
More memories swam to the surface.
If Alfred wanted to tell, he could list each and every scar on his body, and tell you why it was there. Some were obtained through war with other nations. But others formed through war with himself.
War with who he was.
War with his mask.
War with the standards that others conformed him to be.
It all was the same.
He hated this stranger that sometimes occupied his body in order to conform to society. He desperately wanted to stop this, to kill that stranger that took his life over, but he wanted to die, and be blessed with death that could never come.
He wanted escape from this.
But the labyrinth that others so carefully built around him wasn't so easy to run from.
.oOo.
"I think about dying but I don't want to die. Not even close. In fact, my problem is the complete opposite. I want to live, I want to escape. I feel trapped and bored and claustrophobic. There's so much to see and so much to do but I somehow still find myself doing nothing at all. I'm still here in this metaphorical bubble of existence and I can't write figure out what the hell I'm doing or how to get out of it."
- Matty Healy
Wherever Alfred looked, he could see evidence of sadness.
The trembling teenager clutching her crying baby to her chest like it was a lifeline, weeping at the corner of the avenue, and the homeless old man on the sidewalk, crippled and bent with years of living on the streets, begging for some food.
The young man in a military uniform, a battle scar twisting his facial features into a permanent scowl and a foot long-amputated, and the young woman sitting at his left, also in military dress, with an amputated arm, sitting together on a bench, staring at the sky with empty eyes.
The little girl with broken eyes running down the busy street, crying, trying to hide her cuts and bruises with scarves and gloves and long sleeves, running from an abusive home, and the little boy that sat in the shadows, with cuts wringing his wrists and scissoring across his limbs, not caring anymore if he lived and died.
Not one person stopped to help them, to ask if they were ok.
Alfred felt his people's pain. He felt how the teenager with the baby was a teenage mom who was thrown out of her home, how the old homeless man hadn't eaten in days, how the discharged army veterans who once fought for his country now had no place to go. He felt how the little girl was abused at her home, and how the little boy was bullied at school and cut himself to try to distract the pain.
He felt how society had sensed their weakness and turned on them, hackles raised, and deemed them outcasts.
Seeing all of this, he didn't want to show his weakness, the face behind his cracked mask.
He faked a smile, laughed a little, and raised his guard in public.
But in private, in the confines of his bedroom, all he could do was cry.
.oOo.
"I don't cry in front of people, it shows weakness, I don't want people to think I'm weak. But when I'm alone, I cry till I have no more tears to cry, I have weaknesses, and when you hit them, the pain is excruciating, remember that."
- Unknown
When he was a child, still young and innocent, Arthur had raised Alfred to be the absolute best he could be. He had pressured him to preform his best and be someone he wasn't, to be England's perfect little colony.
Only when Arthur left, did Alfred get some freedom. Eventually, Alfred declared independence from Arthur to try and get rid of the pressure, which lead to the Revolutionary War between America and Britain.
But even after he declared independence, he still felt the pressure.
The pressure to be someone he wasn't.
The pressure that all results must be beyond average.
He used to try to do the best he could on everything, even if what he was trying to achieve was humanly impossible.
High standards built up to high disappointment.
Disappointment led to frustration, and that led to failure.
Failure led to the belief that he was incompetent.
And his belief of his incompetence led to his lack of wanting to even try.
.oOo.
"It sucks, you know. When everything is doing fine, then, it all crashes again? And the worst part is, I really don't want to try and put it all back together again, but I have to."
- Unknown
Throughout his life, Alfred scarred himself.
Faint scars lined his arms, wrists, thighs, and ankles.
Multiple times did he become addicted to the cutting.
Multiple times did he promise himself to stop.
Multiple times did he try to wean himself off of it.
Multiple times did he break those promises.
Multiple times did he loose hope.
.oOo.
"The scars start to fade and the urge to bring them back becomes stronger and stronger."
- Unknown
Alfred was submerged in his thoughts. The faint prickling of the icy wind was unknown to him now, he was too far entrapped in his memories to notice things like that.
His scars were his deepest secrets.
No one knew about them, about how many he had.
He didn't want people seeing them.
He didn't want their pity.
He didn't want their sadness.
He didn't want their regret.
Some people will stab you in the back, then ask why you're bleeding.
They had poked and prodded him forward on this path, and at the end of it these wounds were the results of their words and actions. Maybe the indirect results, but still results caused by their choices.
Because of this, Alfred really didn't want people to see his scars or his fear.
And yet, there was a part of him that still wanted them to see just how scared he was.
.oOo.
"The darkest place I've ever seen was inside me, and nothing scared me more."
- Unknown
Thoughts blurred around him into a mini hurricane of emotion as he stepped on his doorstep, and stood there with his keys in hand, shaking with all of the sudden memories of words that popped into his head.
"God, he's so annoying."
"Does he really think that his ideas are good ones?"
"This dude is an idiot."
The keys trembled in his hand, jingling.
When he was little, he didn't like going to bed, not because he just wasn't tired or didn't like sleeping, but because nightmares constantly haunted his dreams.
He used to be glad when he woke up.
He used to stall his bedtime as much as possible.
But now those nightmares were preferable to everyday life.
Tears slipped down his cheeks as he slid the key in the lock, unlocked it, stumbled inside, and leaned against his door, crying.
He used to hate sleeping.
Now he slept as much as humanly possible.
Late bedtimes switched for early ones, and and early riser switched for a late one.
And as he cried, one thought recurred over and over inside his head.
"When did these two realities switch?"
.oOo.
"I didn't want to wake up. I was having a much better time asleep. And that's really sad. It was almost like a reverse nightmare, like when you wake up from a nightmare you're so relieved. I woke up into a nightmare."
- Ned Vizzini
"Sometimes you try and ignore the obvious and shield yourself from the blunt truth that some people are truly clueless to how much they hurt you."
- Unknown
"Hey... Davie... I have a question."
"I'm not particularly religious, but..."
"You live up in heaven, now, right?" So can you ask God something for me?"
"What did I do that made God so angry that he forced me to live as a nation?"
"...what did I ever do to deserve this?"
A/N: And I'm done. This is riddled with quotes. I lost track of how many long ago, but I put them because they fit. In no way, shape, or form, is this meant to encourage self-harm. This is just a story, spun by the little devil inside my mind. If you deal with depression, self-harm, or any serious problems of the sort, please, please tell someone and let them help you. You are important. You are special. You are loved. There will always be someone who cares for you, mmkay? This is meant to reflect on the affects that our actions and words can have on others, and how they shape us into the people we are today. This is meant to demonstrate how even the smallest of statements can hurt more than an avalanche of punches, and how powerful a single word can be, and how it's easy to miss what isn't directly on the surface. This is meant to exhibit how, sometimes, behaviors can draw their roots from childhood experiences that changed a person and how the tiniest of actions can be a breaking point for a person. It is not meant to "promote" or "romanticize" depression. I will repeat myself again, if you have any serious problems such as suicidal thoughts, depression, or self-harm, please tell someone and let them help you, because you are not alone. Something else I want to say: The rest of the nations do not mean to hurt Alfred. They don't realize how much their words hurts him, and they do not realize the consequences and effect of their actions. Arthur didn't mean to pressure Alfred as a colony, or mean for it to have the kind of effect on him. He had absolutely no idea that the pressure he put on Alfred would hurt him like this. Anyway, I hope you liked this and thanks for spending the time to read it. Ciao!