AN: I apologize for the long wait. I have never written so much for single chapters before, and sometimes writing is like trying to pull teeth or move water with a basket. From now on, I hope to be able to update at least every week- if not, then every fortnight (2 weeks). I will not let this story go under my radar, so no worries! It will be finished!


"Hey! Wake up, Mr. Brit!"

Arthur was jolted awake by a firm prodding to his shoulder. He blinked and looked up at the grinning face of Gilbert. Arthur's eyes narrowed. This was not how he wanted to wake up.

"I'm awake. Happy? Now get away," Arthur said grumpily. Gilbert laughed.

"Not a morning person, huh?"

Arthur sat himself up, stretching. "Not in the slightest," he answered as he reluctantly got out of bed.

Gilbert was still in his pajamas, but it looked like he had been awake for quite a while. Arthur didn't question him, though. He just stared as Gilbert picked up the remote control and switched the television on. Arthur scowled in annoyance.

"You are watching television this early? Shouldn't you be getting ready for school?"

Gilbert shrugged. "I always watch in the morning. It helps me get ready for my day. It's like a zen thing, you see."

"I don't see at all. I assume you are going to watch your… monster truck programs?"

Gilbert laughed again. "No, silly. Those aren't on in the morning. What do you want to watch, huh? Doctor Who? Top Gear?"

"I am fond of neither of those shows," Arthur responded.

"What? I thought every Brit liked Dr. Who."

"Is that supposed to offend me?" asked Arthur.

Gilbert frowned. "No. Why don't you like it?"

Arthur shrugged. "I watched a few episodes a while back… and I have to say that it was not something I was very into. It was… strange."

"What programs do you like, then?" Gilbert asked, flipping through the channels before finally settling on a news station.

"'The Bouquet residence, the lady of the house speaking.'"

"What?" Gilbert was confused at what Arthur decided to provide for an answer.

"You don't know what that's from?" Arthur asked. "I wouldn't expect it. It was a show from the nineties."

"Oh, so you like old stuff."

Arthur sighed. "It's 'Keeping Up Appearances'. It's a charming show about a middle-class woman who wants to climb the social ladder, so she pretends to be more affluent than she really is."

"I've never heard of it."

"Like I said, I wouldn't expect you to have. It is simply a lovely show, though." Arthur smiled before getting his uniform and going to the bathroom to wash up and get ready for school.

He was fixing his hair when Gilbert's voice loudly permeated the door of the bathroom.

"HEY ARTHUR, GUESS WHAT? SOME OF THE MILK IN CANADA COMES IN BAGS! BAGS!"

Arthur flinched at the volume of Gilbert's voice.

"Keep it down, will you?" he asked through the door.

"Isn't it funny?" Gilbert yelled back.

Arthur sighed. "As funny as it can be," he mumbled, Gilbert still guffawing outside the door.

Arthur exited the bathroom. "I'm going to breakfast. Have fun with your Canadian milk bags." He grabbed his key and left the room.


Arthur stood in the breakfast line, moving forward as the kind-looking lunch lady doled out portions for breakfast. Arthur got a simple bowl of oatmeal and stood near the side of the cafeteria, eyes roving from table to table in order to find a person he at least recognized- he did not feel too keen on sitting alone.

Arthur felt a rush of relief as he saw Matthew sitting alone at the end of long table, eating pancakes while reading. Arthur slowly went to him. As he approached, Matthew looked up and smiled.

"Hey, Arthur. You can sit here, if you would like," he said in greeting. Arthur nodded and sat down across from him as Matthew closed his book and began adding more maple syrup to his pancakes.

"You like syrup, I wager?" Arthur asked, astounded that the quiet boy seemed to have such an insatiable sweet tooth.

Matthew shrugged unabashedly. "It's really the only type of sweet I like, apart from those maple candies I used to get from my Nan. Maybe I should have been born Canadian. One year, I was able to go to Canada and see how the maple is extracted from the trees, and how it was made. I got to try fresh maple syrup, and it was amazing."

Arthur chuckled a little as he tried his oatmeal. It was tasteless, but not disgusting, so he ate another bite.

"I love coming here for breakfast, because they spend a lot of time making the pancakes good. It's worth getting up early for."

Arthur was confused. "You make it seem like you don't live here."

"I don't. Well… I don't live in the dorms, at least. You are required to live in the dorms if you aren't staying with family. I've lived here in good ol' Lindsborg, Kansas my entire life, and I just received my driver's license, so I drive to school and live with the rest of my family."

"Oh, okay. My family lives in Fort Davis."

"Army brat, are you? Cool. That's about, what, sixty minutes away from here? Quite a drive, if your parents want to visit you."

"I agree, but it's fine," Arthur replied as he ate more of his oatmeal.

"When's your birthday?" asked Matthew suddenly. Arthur blinked.

"Why do you ask?"

"If you are going to be here for a while, I'd like to at least extend a cordial, giving attitude. I figure the moves must be stressful, so this is my way of giving back to your addition to the community. I asked Gilbert for his yesterday, too, so don't think I'm being a stalker or anything."

"Oh, you don't need to do that," Arthur responded, surprised that Matthew would want to do that for him so soon after meeting him. "But, if you must know, my birthday is the 23rd of April. But no gifts, you hear?"

Matthew grinned devilishly. "No promises can be made, my good man. No promises at all."

Arthur smiled. "I never pegged you as the obstinate type, to be honest."

"Hey, I was stubborn in cooking class yesterday, wasn't I? I am actually the most stubborn of them all. My parents always say I should be a lawyer because I can argue without losing my temper."

Arthur nodded slowly. "I can see that. So, if you are going to be so stubborn about all of this, then at least tell me this: when's your birthday? You are going out of your way to extend a cordial attitude; I should like to reciprocate that."

Matthew shrugged. "Fair enough. You'll have to wait a while though. My birthday is July 4."

"The Fourth of July? It must be sad, being born on a holiday."

"It's not as bad as born born on Christmas, though," Matthew pointed out, finishing the last of his pancakes. "It's actually not that bad at all. When we were young, my parents told my brother and I that all of the fireworks were to celebrate us because we were 'bound to change the world'."

Arthur tilted his head a little. Something in his brain clicked into place.

"You have a brother?" Arthur asked.

Matthew's expression quickly became more guarded, and he began to fidget. Arthur felt bad- he wasn't exactly sure what he had done wrong.

"Uhm, yeah, I have a brother," Matthew finally responded, more timidly than before. "A twin brother, actually."

"Oh!" Arthur exclaimed, trying to lighten the mood. "That must be fun. I… I have two older brothers and two younger brothers."

Matthew seemed grateful for the opening Arthur gave him, and his eyes widened in surprise.

"So many! A family of boys, huh? What are they like? Are they taking the move well?"

Arthur smiled, glad to have gotten out of the ditch he nearly dug himself into.

"My oldest brother is at university back in England. My second oldest brother paid his way into a Catholic school near here. He was able to get a lot of scholarships because his grades are excellent. He was able to get all of the necessary funds and measures himself, because he would have been going here, otherwise."

"Why did he have to go alone?" Matthew asked.

"My parents aren't Catholic and we weren't raised Catholic. My father isn't keen Catholics so my brother's kind of the outcast of the family. My mum's real nice to him, though, and she doesn't care what religion he practices, which is a good thing. She helped him with the admissions process for his school, so he wasn't completely alone."

Matthew looked contemplative. "That must be hard for him. But I think people care less about religion here, so he should be fine."

Arthur nodded in agreement. "He was really excited when he heard that we were moving to America. More excited than I was, at least. My youngest brother Peter was really looking forward to it as well; he's probably the only one in our family who loves to move."

"How old is Peter?"

"He is eleven. He's in junior high right now."

"So you are the middle child, then. Is it true that the middle child gets ignored the most?"

"I'm not sure about that. I don't think my parents pay any less attention to me than my other brothers. I think my second oldest brother takes the cake for that one, at least. My family does have a war effort, though."

Matthew looked shocked. "A… war effort? What do you mean?"

"It's called 'The Kirkland Coalition To Keep Arthur Away From The Stove At All Times.'"

Matthew laughed nervously. "Oh… ha ha, I thought you were being serious."

Arthur put on a face of seriousness. "Oh, I am being serious. My mother and little brothers get really into it. They have scheduled meetings to think up 'war strategies' and make posters, things like that. It's like I'm some war-mongering juggernaut who wants nothing more than to blow up the kitchen."

"If only they knew you were in a cooking class… in a public institution, no less," joked Matthew, standing up to throw away his garbage. "Anyway, I should probably get to class. It was really nice talking with you, Arthur."

Arthur nodded as he stood too. "Likewise. I shall see you later."

Matthew grinned and turned away, leaving the cafeteria.

Arthur threw away his trash, getting ready to go to his first class as well. Something caught his eye and he froze, seeing Alfred at a table very near to the one he and Matthew were just sitting at.

Now that Arthur looked at Alfred, he really saw the similarities between him and Matthew. Alfred was sitting with two girls, respectfully staring at the one who was speaking as he absently pushed around his breakfast cereal with his spoon. The speaking girl had very short, almost-platinum blonde hair, and the girl beside her had longer, darker hair with a striped bow in it. The longer-haired girl's face was almost without expression, as if was caught in a perpetual state of blankness. The other girl seemed more charismatic, and she talked while passionately moving her hands.

Arthur did not even realize he was staring until he received a shove from another student who was pushing by, almost toppling him over. Arthur frowned in irritation and quickly left the cafeteria, more curious now than ever before.


Arthur went to his first class and the lady, Ms. Moran, guided him to his seat. To his slight chagrin, Gilbert hadn't changed his schedule for the day, so Arthur was expecting to see him all day, and he was assigned to sit next to him. Ms. Moran sat down across from them and went over the syllabus because she did not get a chance to do so the day before, when Arthur had visited her.

After the introductions, Gilbert started to talk to the girl sitting at the table with them. Arthur barely caught her name: Elizaveta Hedevary.

Arthur was just absently staring around the room, trying to see how many of the people he knew, when he saw Alfred walk into the classroom, followed by the short-haired girl who he was talking with at breakfast. Arthur quickly looked away, not wanting to seem creepy or overly curious, though he felt he was probably a combination of both. The bell signaling the start of class began, and Ms. Moran told the class to bring the tables together and group up immediately to start discussing a novel Arthur hadn't read yet.

Arthur didn't say much because he hadn't read the book yet. However, he at least said something, especially when the conversation strayed away from being strictly in the book.

On the other hand, throughout the entire class, Alfred did not say a single word.


"Is there something conspiring against me?" Arthur quietly asked Gilbert as he saw Alfred near their lockers in gym class. Alfred was already dressed out, and he seemed busy writing something down on a piece of paper, oblivious to everything around him.

Gilbert snickered. "What? A little flustered that you are seeing your little crush all around now?"

Arthur smacked him on the arm. "It's not a crush, you git. I'm just curious."

"About what?"

"About why he never seems to talk to anyone. Even if he's with someone who seems like his friend, he doesn't talk to them. You said he never talked in piano class, he clearly wanted to say something in English class but never said it, and he never asked anything in Biology yesterday. Something's up."

Gilbert scoffed, "You're just paranoid. And it's a little creepy, how we are two days in and you are already going all detective on me. You wouldn't happen to like Sherlock Holmes, would you?"

"Sherlock Holmes? Sure, the novels were brilliant. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle- I take pride in sharing my name with a literary genius."

"You're weird. I've only seen the movies. I did know they were books first, though, so don't peg me as a lost cause yet, 'kay?"

Arthur chuckled. "Fine."

He changed into his gym clothes and left the locker room with Gilbert. Apparently, according to Mr. Lancroft, the gym teacher, it was lap-running day, and Arthur dreaded it. He hoped that his first day of gym class could at least be kickball or something, at least. He wasn't the most athletic of people, in all honesty.

How do you grade people on running, anyway? He thought to himself as the buzzer went off and he began running. Arthur ran about a quarter of a lap behind Alfred, recognizing the longer-haired girl running beside the silent boy from breakfast. He turned to Gilbert, who was enjoying a leisurely jog.

"Do you know who that girl by Alfred is?"

Gilbert looked and frowned. "No idea. You are being creepy again. Or are you bisexual? Do you have a crush on her too?"

If they had not been running in front of Mr. Lancroft, Arthur probably would have done something horrendously violent to the snickering Gilbert. He made a mental note to whack Gilbert aside the head later.


"This has…. to… to be illegal…" Arthur panted as he waited in line for the water fountain. Mr. Lancroft had had them running for a full hour, and had given the class the last twenty minutes to cool off and socialize.

Gilbert laughed as best he could while trying to drink water at the same time.

"When you collapse from asphyxiation from water, know that I hold no pity for you," Arthur managed to say between breaths.

After Arthur had gotten his breath back, accompanied by copious amounts of water, he ventured over to the corner where the long-haired girl and Alfred sat.

"Ah, hello," he said awkwardly as they both looked at him. The girl's expression (or lack thereof) was the same as it had been at breakfast, and her blue striped bow was slightly askew. Alfred smiled slightly in greeting- at least, Arthur thought he did; it was gone before he could tell for sure.

"Hello," said the girl in response. Her voice wasn't cold, which was something Arthur did not expect. If it were not for her blank expression, she probably would have seemed very friendly.

"My name is Arthur Kirkland," he said, still awkward, but more relaxed. Most of his discomfort stemmed from the fact that Alfred was staring at him in a very unguarded and intense way.

"Natalia Ivanovna Braginski."

"That's, ah, a mouthful," Arthur replied.

"I know. Where are you from? You have a different accent than others."

Arthur sat down, hoping that his intention to converse would not put either of them off. "I am from England."

"England? I am from Russia. What is it like in England?"

Arthur shrugged. "It's very different from here. Rainy, I guess. In all the time I have been here, I haven't seen a single drop of rain, and I am unaccustomed to it, that's for sure."

"The summers in Russia are beautiful," Natalia said. "The winters are brutal. But it's a little like that here, too. Not as bad, but not completely unfamiliar."

Arthur nodded, interested in what she was saying. However, out of the corner of his eye, he could see and sense Alfred's discomfort. He thought back to his conversation with Matthew at breakfast. If Alfred and Matthew were related… then that would probably mean that he had lived in this town his entire life too. It could explain why he would be uncomfortable.

Natalia noticed this and smiled to Alfred. "We should go over that history homework," she said. "Did you have History yesterday?" she asked, turning to Arthur.

"I have that class next, right before lunch."

"Ah. Well, if you ever want to study, they say it's better to study in a group," she responded, taking out a textbook. Arthur smiled.

"I would like that."


After a very hectic lunch consisting of Gilbert daring Antonio to drink cold milk as fast as he could and Francis bragging about all of the girlfriends he'd had, Gilbert and Arthur walked into their next classroom. Arthur looked around. There were several tables capable of holding two to three people each, and Arthur knew immediately that he would probably be stuck with Gilbert, unless one of Gilbert's new acquaintances was also in the class. Arthur sat down at the table in the middle of the room, taking out a book to read while the class filtered in. Gilbert sat down next to him and grinned.

"Looks like we are tablemates too, huh?" He stretched his arms out in front of him and yawned.

"Unfortunately."

"What? Why?" Gilbert looked dejected as he frowned dramatically at Arthur.

"What a difficult question…," Arthur sighed but smirked slightly to let Gilbert know he was just giving him a hard time. Gilbert snickered and turned his attention to the teacher who strode into the classroom, holding a bottle of soda and yawning.

"Hello," the teacher said slowly, taking an authoritative position at the front of the classroom, resting his forearms on a wooden lectern and looking out at his class. "The only reason I'm doing this mundane introduction again- you've all heard the spiel, of course- is because we have a few new people in this class, whether you moved or are transferring, and we all know that you hooligans need a review of the rules, so I killed some more trees and I'm gonna kill some more time. We have quite a large class, so you will all have to bear with the crowd. Anywho, my name is Mr. Walter. I teach this psychology class, but I also teach American Government, so perhaps some of you will have me next year, if you are juniors."

Mr. Walter took a drink of soda before handing out a single sheet of paper which was the syllabus.

"This syllabus," he said as he handed it out, "basically says 'mind your own damn business and you'll be golden'."

Arthur frowned. Is a teacher allowed to use that type of language? Gilbert thought it was great, if his chuckling was anything to go by. Gilbert stole Arthur's pencil and wrote 'Mind your own damn business and you'll be golden' at the top of his syllabus with a grin. Arthur frowned disapprovingly and snatched his pencil back.

"Please, don't do that again."

"No talking!" Mr. Walter called out loudly as he made his way to the front of the room again. Gilbert snickered.

"Now. Rules. Do what it says on the paper, and only worry about yourself. Take notes, do your assignments, and this class should go smoothly for you," Mr. Walter said as he swirled his bottle of soda idly. Another student made a remark and Mr. Walter started conversing with them, laughing, really laid-back.

Arthur sat there awkwardly, not sure what to do while Mr. Walter talked with other students. A few more moments of random conversation occurred, until Mr. Walter called the class to attention, going to the front of the room again. He picked up a blue foam ball and observed it quietly as the class waited for him to say something.

"Class, I have to tell something to you that you may not have known."

He waited for a few moments for the suspense factor. Arthur could not deny that he was curious as to what he was going to tell them.

Mr. Walter smiled slightly. "I have a lot of balls."

The class started laughing- they had heard this before, and it was still as awkward this time as was the first- and Arthur just stared at Mr. Walter like he had something coming out of his ears. Gilbert snickered in his strange way.

Mr. Walter held up a hand to silence the class. "And I am not afraid to throw my balls at people. Over the years, I have become very good at throwing my balls." He gestured over to the far left wall, where there was a girl Arthur vaguely remembered as being called Elizaveta sitting next to an Asian-looking boy with a ponytail. "I bet I can throw it over there, bounce it off the back wall, and it'll hit the back of your head," Mr. Walter gloated. Elizaveta smiled and laughed.

Arthur was positive that this teacher was possibly the strangest teacher he had ever met.

Class started rather unceremoniously after that. Mr. Walter launched into a long introduction to the course; most of it was ranting, and Arthur absently wondered if Mr. Walter had ADD. He looked next to him. Gilbert looked like he was ready to pass out. Arthur smirked.

Serves him right for staying up so late last night.

Arthur was trying to keep a hold on Mr. Walter's rapid-fire train of thought when a piece of paper was shoved towards him. He looked down at it and recognized Gilbert's messy handwriting.

Do you have any idea what this dude is saying?

Arthur sighed. He didn't want to be passing notes, but it seemed like Mr. Walter was off on another tangent and chatting about the most recent American football game with another student, so he conceded. He picked up his pencil and wrote his response.

Not really.

He passed it back to Gilbert, making sure that Mr. Walter still was not saying anything of substantive importance. The paper was soon passed back to him.

He's a weirdo. But he's funny, so I guess I can live with it.

Arthur smiled slightly, and he proceeded to continue his quietest (and probably most enjoyable) conversation with Gilbert until class ended.


"Block scheduling is stupid," complained Gilbert. He was watching a news program half-heartedly while Arthur finished up his Biology homework. "Why do they do it?"

"I'm not sure," Arthur answered, penciling in an answer to a question about viruses.

"Why have four eighty-minute long classes a day, alternating the classes you have each day, instead of having eight, like, fifty-minute classes or something like that? We don't need study hall; nobody studies in study hall anyway."

"Mmhm," grunted Arthur, focused on his homework.

"The only upside is that I can put off that stupid essay for English class until tomorrow night because it won't be due tomorrow."

"Procrastination is never the answer," muttered Arthur, giving Gilbert a sideways glance.

"Meh, I'll think about it tomorrow." Gilbert flopped backwards on his bed.

Arthur couldn't help but chuckle. He put away his biology and opened his cooking book.

"Dude, we had homework for cooking?" Gilbert asked in a panicked tone.

"Yeah, weren't you listening to the teacher?" Arthur chided.

"No! I was too busy laughing about Feliciano's comment, y'know, about your weird sweet soup."

Arthur sighed. He didn't want to be reminded of the near heart-attack that was cooking class the previous day.

Gilbert groaned. "I thought I got it all done!"

"It's just notes," Arthur assured him. He completely blocked out whatever Gilbert said in return, though, because he found a piece of notebook paper lodged where the notes section was supposed to start. He couldn't read it- it looked like it was written all over in some strange language. Arthur recognized it, but he couldn't put a name to it.

"Hey, Gilbert, what language is this?" Arthur stood and showed Gilbert the paper with the strange characters all over it.

"That's… well, it's Cyrillic writing. Common to a lot of Slavic countries, countries that used to be in the Soviet Union, places like that. It's probably Russian or something."

"Russian?" Arthur turned the paper over and looked at it. "I'm going to figure out what this says. I feel in an exploring mood today. Is the library open?"

"It should be. Whatever you want, Mr. Holmes. No cheaty-cheaty, though. Oh, and if you forget your key, I'm not letting you back in once you lock yourself out."

"Quality roommate, you are," retorted Arthur jokingly as he grabbed his key and left the room.

The journey to the library was an uneventful one, and he quickly made his way into the building. There was a lady manning the front desk, and Arthur walked up to her.

"Is there a foreign-language section?" Arthur asked her. The lady smiled and nodded.

"It's over there."

"Thank you, ma'am," he replied. He found a Russian-English dictionary, and turned to the pronunciation guide at the front for Cyrillic lettering.

It took him a good five minutes, but he had finally got the sounds of the name down. The name sounded familiar….

Who is Ivan Braginski?


"Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labour. For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow: but woe to him that is alone when he falleth; for he hath not another to help him up."

~Ecclesiastes 4:9-10


AN: Lindsborg, KS is a real place. I've been there before, and it is probably the cutest town I have ever seen in my life (not that I have seen much of anything in my life- I am like Matthew; I've lived in one place my entire life). Still. I also completely and unsubtly based Mr. Walter off of my own psych and government teacher. He is such an enigmatic and strange person... I figured I'd share him with the world as best I could (I could never completely emulate what goes on in his head, but I can try).