Ludwig had long ago learned the valuable art of being able to focus on multiple things. After all, when you were dating someone like Feli while simultaneously having a sister like Gillian, it was practically a prerequisite. He had to keep one eye on Feli at all times to make sure that she didn't trip and skin her knee or tear her dress or get hit on by Francis, while he also had to make sure that Gill didn't blow something up, or spike the punch, or get hit on by any unsuitable guys. Unsuitable by Ludwig's definition. Which would apply to about ninety-eight percent of the guys here.

At the moment, however, he was having trouble with his multitasking.

Mainly because he was having a panic-attack.

Ludwig knew that he was not very good at this whole "romance" thing. He was probably the only student in the school to have gone up to the librarians in the school library and ask them for self-help books on dating. But…when you were dating someone as…exuberant with her affection as Feliciana, how else was he supposed to know how to react to her?

Right now Feliciana was sitting beside him at the table, engaged in a conversation with Toris, the Lithuanian student in her home economics class, not even paying him any attention. Which would have given him the perfect opportunity to calm himself down and glare at all of the men flocking around his older sister.

However, instead he was staring at Feli out of the corner of his eye and completely failing at keeping himself from hyperventilating.

He'd checked out every book on dating from the library and visited a few hundred websites for advice on going on a formal date before he'd come to this. They hadn't helped…at all. As he was still twitching and sweating like crazy. Which made absolutely no sense, since he was usually perfectly fine around Feliciana.

Maybe it was because she was all dressed up tonight and looked absolutely stunning? Or because he was surrounded by hearts and lace and pink frillyness?

Whatever it was, he couldn't concentrate on both her and his sister at the same time. Which was really a pain, since he could see that Antonio and Francis hadn't arrived yet, either. Which meant that Gill was completely alone and easy prey for all of the unsuitable men who were taking this rare opportunity to get close to her.

He should probably give her more credit…

Then again, this was Gill that he was talking about.

"Ve~ Ludwig? Are you hot?"

"Eh?" He jumped out of his thoughts and stared into Feli's slightly concerned expression. Her eyes had been outlined in purple eyeliner, which only drew his attention to their deep dark colouring. Shit. Why did she have to look so pretty right now? It wasn't helping him think at all. "Uh, uh, no…No, I'm fine." He hurriedly pushed his chair back and rose from the table. "Would you like me to get you a drink?"

She tilted her head slightly to the side, obviously not entirely believing him, but then she grinned and nodded. "All right, and get yourself a drink too, Ludwig. You look hot. And you keep fanning yourself with your place card."

He hadn't even noticed that he was holding a place card. Ludwig flushed and set the little piece of cardboard on the table, darting around the tables and gyrating bodies on the dance floor toward the drinks' table. Once he was there, he paused and just stood for a moment, breathing heavily.

Okay, calm down, Ludwig. Just remember what those books and websites had said.

...Damn it. He couldn't remember anything. All he could think about was how she looked when she looked up at him and how it made his heart absolutely race and…

His thoughts were interrupted by an overly familiar female voice complaining from a few feet away. "We're leaving…"

And an also familiar voice that sounded as if the owner was currently riding on a wave of euphoria. "Lovi~ we just got here."

"Everything's fucking pink. And covered in hearts…"

Ludwig groaned and dropped his head into his palms. Somebody up there hated him. Either that or just really liked to watch him suffer.

And then the voice was within an arm's length and sounded as if the owner was attempting to kill him just with the amount of hatred in her voice. "Potato bastard."

He sighed and turned from the table, grabbing two of the drinks so he'd have something to keep his hands occupied. If he didn't, he might just end up attempting to either kill himself…or Lovina. Both of which would be rather negative actions to take.

"Hello, Lovina. I wasn't aware that you were coming to this." He really should have guessed, though. She would do anything to make his life miserable.

The incredibly irritated Italian girl was standing in front of him now, her hands resting on her hips as she glared at him. Antonio was standing behind her, offering him a grin that plainly stated 'sorry about this, but I'm not doing anything to get her angry at me'. Which meant he had to face the scarily overprotective older sister of his girlfriend all alone.

"I have to make sure that you keep your filthy hands off of Feli," she replied, her eyes narrowing as she spat the words at him.

When had he ever touched Feliciana? He couldn't understand why Lovi hated him so much. He'd never done anything to either of them… Still, he knew better than to attempt to defend himself. It just made her more angry. Instead, he searched the crowd for something to distract her. "Um, I promised Feliciana that I'd get her a drink, so I should probably…"

And then Lovina grabbed the glasses right out of his hands and turned to hand them off to Antonio, who accepted them with a slightly confused expression. "Probably spiked them with some date rape drug. I'll get her a drink." She immediately marched over to the table of drinks and eyed them as if attempting through sight alone to make sure that he hadn't done anything to them.

Ludwig sighed and shook his head slightly, glancing toward the Spaniard who was now sipping at one of the drinks, obviously not worrying about date rape drugs. "I don't know what you see in her, Antonio."

Antonio just grinned and shrugged, following her with his eyes as he held the glass to his lips. "She's just trying to take care of her sister. You do the same thing with Gill."

Still. He knew these guys. He heard what they said to each other about Gill when they didn't realize that he was around. He had a very good reason to be worried about her. He, on the other hand, had never done anything the least bit inappropriate with Feli. They'd never even kissed anywhere than on the cheeks…

"Here, potato bastard." And the psychotic overprotective older sister reappeared with a new pair of drinks and flashed him a suspicious look. "And I'll be watching you until you get back to the table, so don't even think about trying to slip her something."

He sighed, deciding that it wasn't even worth saying anything else. She wouldn't listen anyway. "Fine, Lovi. Have a nice time." Please please please leave him alone… If there is a God, keep the psycho sister away from him.

Lovina glared at Ludwig as he walked back to the table where her sister was seated. She scowled as she noticed how Feli practically attacked him with a hug the moment he sat down, hanging off of his arm and accepting the drink without even checking it for signs of drugs. She was going to have to give the girl a stern talking to later.

"These taste all right to me," Antonio suddenly commented, slipping one of the drinks into her line of sight. "It'd be a shame to let them go to waste."

She glared at the glass and then turned to face away from him. "As if I'd take anything that you offered me. Even if he didn't spike it, I'm sure that you would."

Antonio shrugged and set the glasses back down on the table, also knowing that it wasn't worth attempting to defend himself. Instead, he suddenly reached out and grabbed her hands, tugging her toward the dance floor. "Come on, let's dance."

"Hey! What do you think you're doing bast—" Her protests were ignored as she was suddenly spun out into the middle of the bodies, the sharp movement forcing her to grab onto his arms to keep from falling flat on her face. Whose idea had it been to wear heels?

Antonio also didn't give her much of a chance to figure out what exactly was happening, as he had an arm around her waist, the other holding her hand as he spun her around in something that definitely wasn't what everyone else was doing.

"You—you know how to dance, bastard?"

He grinned and nodded, his emerald eyes entrancing. She knew she should probably be protesting more, but he kept moving and spinning her around, making it too difficult to figure out how to react. "You're so lovely tonight, Lovi. I can't say it enough."

She flushed slightly at the compliment and opened her mouth to retort when she suddenly felt a tap on her shoulder.

"Lovina Vargas!"

She jumped slightly at the sudden exclamation and turned. Or attempted to turn. Antonio's grip on her waist suddenly tightened and she found herself crushed against his chest, so she couldn't really move very far. Just enough to see that she'd been called by that Turkish kid, Sadiq, in her math class. Probably the only person in this school who was even more annoying in his attempts at getting her to date him than Antonio. Since he'd actually attempted to kiss her against her will the last time she'd said no.

"You look absolutely stunning," he immediately exclaimed, completely ignoring Antonio's presence. "But I thought that you weren't coming to the dance. Isn't that what you told me when I asked you out?"

"Lovina can go to whatever event she wants to," Antonio interrupted, his grip on her waist tightening.

Sadiq continued to ignore him, his attention completely on Lovina. "Well, since you're here, would you give me the honour of a dance with the most beautiful woman in this room?"

She started to open her mouth again, ready to tell him to go fuck himself, when she was interrupted again. What the hell was with these guys not letting her talk? It was really annoying.

"Sorry, but Lovi's with me tonight."

She probably would have been more irritated if it weren't for the fact that out of the options of staying with Antonio and going with Sadiq, she'd definitely prefer staying with Antonio. Not that she liked Antonio, really, but at least he didn't try to stick his hand up under her skirt and make out with her when she'd plainly said 'no, and if you don't leave me alone, I'll chop your balls off and feed them to you through a straw'.

"Unless she wants to go with you."

Lovina snorted at the statement. "Fuck off, asshole."

Antonio continued without even reacting to her language. "So if you'd be kind enough to leave us be?"

Sadiq looked as if he were about to argue, but then seemed to think the better of it as he received matching glares from both. He, better than anyone, was well-aware that Antonio could be rather brutal when it came to Lovina. He'd learned that when they were still kids having swordfights with sticks out in the middle of the street. Antonio had always had a soft spot for the girl, even back then, so when she'd come up to them and demand to play, he'd always given in. A bunch of the other boys had been rather irritated by this, as there was nothing more uncool than being forced to play with a girl, so a few of them had decided to try to scare her into leaving them alone by abandoning her in the woods during what she thought was a war game.

They'd expected her to eventually find her own way out, but she didn't come home that night. Which had led to her grandfather calling basically every family in the neighborhood to ask if they knew where she was. All of the boys had lied, at that point absolutely terrified that they'd get in trouble for leaving her alone. The police had gotten involved, they'd sent out search parties… It was almost a full two days before they finally found her stuck at the bottom of a ravine, her leg broken from falling down the embankment.

She refused to tell her family or the police or any other adults why she'd been in the woods at that time, but somehow Antonio had coaxed it out of her. And he'd then gone to their clubhouse one morning while they were all still asleep and tore the place to pieces, waiting there for them to arrive while sitting calmly with the ax on his lap.

In most cases, Sadiq definitely wouldn't be giving up this early, but that was still a very potent memory. And Antonio was starting to flash him a look that was overly similar to the one he'd held while sitting there with his ax surrounded by rubble.

"All right, all right. You two lovebirds have your fun. I can tell when I'm not wanted."

He beat a hasty retreat, glancing toward the table where her sister was sitting with Ludwig. Maybe he could go after the other twin?

There was silence between them for a few moments, and then Antonio suddenly remarked, "You know, Lovi, that I don't approve of foul language in most cases."

Which reminded her that she was still leaning against his chest. She hurriedly broke away and turned to face him. "Yeah…so? I'll use whatever language I—"

"However," he continued, still glaring in the direction that Sadiq had run off. "I will accept it in circumstances involving guys like that."

She rolled her eyes. She was definitely detecting some jealousy in his voice…which was actually almost endearing… "That guy's an asshole. Like I'd ever accept a dance with him."

Antonio's gaze immediately returned to her, where it immediately softened. "Really? Then, will you accept one with me?"

"You haven't really given me much of a choice, have you?"

Antonio shrugged slightly, his usual grin crossing over his lips. "I am now? Is that any better?"

She sighed and glanced back toward the table where Ludwig was now eyeing Sadiq with a murderous glare as the bastard hit on her sister. That could be a rather entertaining fight. "All right, but just because I know that you aren't going to let up on me until I agree. And just one dance…"

His hand slipped back around her waist and pulled her closer, a happy smile crossing over his expression as he leaned closer so she could feel his hot breath against her ear as he whispered. "That's all I could ever ask for."

A/N: … "Somebody up there hated him"… Me: *whistles innocently* Aww, poor Doitsu. *pats Germany on the head* I don't hate you, Doitsu. I'm always meanest to the characters I like the most. Just feel happy that you're not one of my original creations. Those poor darlings get put through absolute hell…

And it's not done yet ;D Haha, I think it'll be 3, maybe 4 chapters. I'm hoping to get it done before I leave for London, but since that's on Thursday and my computer will probably be packed away on Wednesday night, I'm not sure if it'll actually happen… If not, then just be assured that I'll work on it as soon as possible… If in London, preferably after I get over the jet lag.