Yes, this was originally intended to be a one-shot. I changed this for two reasons: one, because I found myself unsatisfied with the... er... "resting position" of Belarus and Latvia's relationship. Two, because someone was nice enough to complain about the ending. I enjoyed that complaint. It made me feel... appreciated. :D
This will probably end up being three to four chapters long, now.
Please review! Reviews boost my self-confidence!
Oh, and one more thing:
I call Lithuania, Tolys and Hungary, Erzsebet. Because I'm an overly-perfectionistic (that is a word, isn't it?) purist. Deal with it.
Change of Heart: Chapter Two
At first, Raivis Galante excused it as a figment of his imagination, or a paranoid over-reaction, which he attributed to having lived a considerable percentage of his life with Russia. After all, it made no sense when you looked at it any other way. When it continued, Latvia told himself it was a coincidence. Belarus just happened to be there fifty-five percent of the time he turned around – and there was absolutely no reason to think that he simply didn't notice her the other twenty or so percent. However, he was eventually forced to face the disturbing truth – Natalya Arlovskaya, for whatever reason of her own, was stalking him. The only question was, why?
Unfortunately, everyone else seemed to have already worked this out.
"Don't go near him," he sometimes heard one country whisper jokingly to another, in whatever language. "That's Belarus's boyfriend. She'll kill you out of jealousy if she sees you within twenty meters."
This made Latvia as silently irritated as it did confused. Mostly because not many people hung around him to begin with – usually it was just his older brothers, Ukraine, Poland, Sealand, the Nordics and occasionally the Benelux Siblings. Having another hindrance to his social life, whether in the form of a joke or a real new fear sweeping through the world, was not very helpful.
There was also the fact that the very idea of Belarus being in love with him just made absolutely no sense. They had barely had any direct interaction with each other until a few weeks ago. (Though Estonia had once pointed out that Belarus seemed to hate him least out of the Baltic States). Before that, Belarus had been threatening him for goodness sake! With a knife! (Though at least she never broke any of his limbs, like she did to Lithuania). She hardly ever talked to him on non-political terms. (Though their governments were fairly close.) So why on earth would anyone think she was the least bit interested in him now?
Except for the fact she was stalking him.
Oh, right.
And that wasn't the worst of it. Then there was Lithuania. It seemed that whenever Latvia most needed support, he lost one of the few people he could confide in. The problem wasn't that his sibling had said anything to convey that he was angry at Latvia. The truth was, he hadn't said much to Latvia recently at all. That was the problem.
Latvia thought about this as he sat next to Sealand on an old park bench in the dappled shade of a fairly large tree, and sighed. He hoped Lithuania realised that he couldn't help it if Belarus liked him and not his brother.
Which she didn't anyway, of course.
He sighed again. All this thinking, worrying and nonsense was giving him a headache.
"You okay, Raivis?" Peter Kirkland inquired, glancing upwards in Latvia's direction from underneath his blue and white sailor hat.
"Yes, I-I'm fine," Latvia replied quickly, forcing a rather weak smile onto his face. "Why do you ask?"
Sealand, unconvinced, frowned thoughtfully. "I don't know… you seem very distracted. I mean, more than you usually do. I thought you might be having some problems with your girlfriend or – "
"FOR THE LAST TIME, BELARUS IS NOT MY GIRLFRIEND!" Latvia yelled, jumping up suddenly.
Sealand's mouth dropped open slightly, causing him to almost lose the lollipop he'd been sucking on. Latvia suddenly became re-aware of his surroundings. The violet-eyed boy blushed timidly, and quickly sat down again.
"I'm sorry," Sealand said apologetically. "It's just, everyone else was saying – "
"Yeah, I know what everyone else is saying," said Latvia weakly. "It's okay, Peter, you didn't realise."
They sat in awkward silence for a few moments, listening to the sound of the wind through the leaves and watching the occasional group of people walk past. Ordinary, everyday civilians who didn't have to worry about psychopathic Belarusians following them around everywhere. Lucky bastards.
"So, what is going on between you and Belarus?" Sealand asked suddenly.
Latvia lifted his head. "I-I'm sorry, what?"
"I said, what is going on between you and Belarus?" he young, blond-haired boy repeated with more emphasis.
"Oh," Latvia said awkwardly. "Well… I'm not sure. She just started following me around one day, and – well, you were there the day it all started, weren't you? That was the time Britain caught you pretending to be Kumajiro."
"Hah, yeah, I guess I didn't have the best polar bear costume on, did I?" Sealand laughed. "Still, it was pretty funny considering how long it took for him to actually notice."
Latvia smiled, suddenly feeling much calmer and more natural. He really needed to start spending more time with Sealand again.
"Didn't anything happen between you before that?" asked Peter. "I remember you said she started looking at you, and you were afraid she wanted to murder you for something."
"That's a little over-exaggerated," Latvia said, though he didn't want to admit the suspicion had crossed his mind during the period. "But, yes… it started a little after China and Russia started dating. Of course, I didn't know that at the time, so I ended up following Russia to see what was making him so happy… and I ran into Belarus, who was doing pretty much the same thing."
"And…?" Sealand persisted, gesturing for him to continue.
"We sort of got into a conversation," he said. "She wanted to kill China, and I tried to convince her not to, and then… she had this weird look on her face."
Sealand sucked his lollipop thoughtfully. "You were enough to convince her not to?"
"Well, a-as China's still alive, I assume so."
"She likes you," Sealand said bluntly.
"… What?"
"C'mon, Raivis, think about it," Sealand said, rolling his eyes. "She's an obsessive, murderous psychopath, and your innocent little pleas of, 'Oh, please Miss Belarus, don't kill China!' were enough to make her reconsider. She definitely likes you."
Latvia sighed. He had been doing a lot of sighing recently. "Just brilliant."
"Hey, what are you complaining about?" asked Sealand, seeming to bounce up from his sitting position. "It mightn't all be that bad."
"What do you mean, not all that bad?" Latvia said ominously, turning to the little boy in the sailor outfit with a slightly crazed expression on his face. "You said so yourself, she's an obsessive, murderous psychopath!"
"And possessive. Did I mention that?" Sealand didn't really seem to be picking up on the cause of his friend's distress.
"How is this a good thing?" Latvia demanded.
Sealand twirled the lollipop stick around in his mouth, then pulled it out and said, "Pro: she'll protect you from Russia. She's already done it once."
"Con," Latvia retorted, slumping back slightly into the bench, "she scares everyone else away."
But Sealand didn't appear to have lost his argument yet.
"Pro: she's really pretty."
"Con: she scares me."
"Pro: she's got a great collection of gothic romance novels. You like those, don't you?"
"Yes, but con: I'm too afraid to ask her if I can borrow any of them."
"Well," Sealand said logically, "maybe she wouldn't seem so scary if you got to know her."
Latvia mumbled something inaudibly and looked down at his feet.
"What?" Sealand bent down to try and meet his gaze as Latvia glanced at him.
"I'm caught between two visions of doom," Raivis explained. "My brother tried to go out with Natalya – she broke all his fingers. Russia refused to go out with her – she threatened to kill him. She's not exactly giving anyone a chance to like her."
Natalya Arlovskaya let out a sigh, and rolled over on her bed, holding the photo in her hand up to the light. The image of a short, blond-haired boy smiled awkwardly back at her on its shiny surface. Natalya grinned in satisfaction. She'd had to break into someone's house to get a hold of this picture. Moving it to the back of the pile, she studied the next, taking in every detail of his violet eyes and shy expression.
Belarus's heart gave a jolt at the sight of the following photo – next to Latvia stood a younger boy with thick eyebrows and a sailor outfit, smiling and saluting cheekily in her direction. The look of happiness on Latvia's face when he was with this boy was more genuine than she had ever seen in real life. Sitting up, she shuffled through the photos. There were many more of Latvia with him, all of them with a similar look of joy.
Belarus felt a surge of jealousy. This boy, however he was, could see what she couldn't, could make him feel what she was unable…
"Natalya! Sister, are you here?"
Belarus almost jumped – she'd been so absorbed in the photos, she hadn't noticed that someone else had entered her house.
"Irina?" she called out cautiously, turning to look at the door of her bedroom. Moments later, the Ukrainian woman opened it slightly, and peaked in.
"I came earlier, but you weren't home," she explained, giving her little sister a friendly smile.
Belarus nodded, but said nothing.
Ukraine stood still in the doorway for a few moments. When she wasn't turned away coldly, she took it as a sign of welcome and quietly (or as quietly as she could) walked over and sat next to her younger sibling.
"Just so you know," Ukraine said, glancing at the pictures out of the corner of her eye, "Lithuania said that if you wanted to look at some of his photos, you just needed to ask."
"He wasn't there when I arrived at his house," Belarus said flatly. "And besides, he gets on my nerves."
The silvery-blond haired woman smiled knowingly. Belarus had disliked Tolys since the moment they'd met, something that had only been increased by his status as Russia's "favourite." To make matters worse, Lithuania, for some unknown reason, had developed a crush on her, constantly trying to date her despite her attempts to make it clear she simply wasn't interested. Breaking a large number of his bones didn't seem to have gotten through to him.
"So, where were you earlier?" asked Irina innocently.
"Observing," Belarus replied bluntly.
"Ah." She nodded, understanding that by "observing," the expressionless female meant "stalking Latvia."
"Observing Russia," Belarus expanded.
Ukraine stared at her sister in surprise. "Ivan? But… But I thought –"
"He can't be trusted," Natalya said with a hiss, her eyes growing dark. "I need to watch him constantly, be there to remind him… to keep my eye on at least one of them… that if he lays one finger… passes one threat to Latvia…"
Ukraine tried not to whimper too loudly. Her little sister was scary. Come to think of it, her whole family was scary. Why did she have to be surrounded by so many frightening people…?
"Russia… big brother… why are you so cruel…?" Belarus whispered quietly to herself, her head bent solemnly.
Irina felt a stabbing pain in her chest that had nothing to do with the weight of her breasts. Of course. As soon as she allowed herself to hope that her family might finally be able to get along with one another, something else came up. Belarus was no longer demanding marriage of Russia, so Russia should now have no more reason to push her away, but now she hated him for inflicting pain on Latvia. And Ukraine was caught in the middle, loving both her siblings, but at the same time not wanting to be dominated by her brother. So she had pushed him away, trying to make friends with the outside world.
Was there no way to end this?
Ukraine eyed Belarus carefully for a few moments before bending forward and saying as softly as she could, "Natasha, don't you think you might be… over reacting? A bit?"
Belarus raised her deep blue eyes to meet Ukraine's light ones, where they stayed, frowning suspiciously for a few moments. Then they transformed into a glare.
"Oh. I see how it is," she said, straightening herself. "I should have known you'd take his side."
Eyes widening, Ukraine stammered, "W-what do you mean? I'm not taking sides…"
"It was the same thing when you weren't telling me about the date, wasn't it?" Belarus stood up, towering over the older woman, who shrunk back in fear. "But no matter what you do, I will succeed. Russia will never hurt Latvia again."
"Natasha, please, th-think logically," Irina begged. "Why would I ever want to see Latvia in pain?"
Belarus's eyes narrowed even further. "Get out. Now."
Ukraine jumped to her feet, and ran out of the house without looking back.
All hopes of healing her family's broken relationship and redeeming Belarus had now been proven false. Things were no better than they had been with Russia.
"Hey Liet, does my butt look big in this?" Poland asked, turning around in front of the full body-length mirror in his bedroom. He was referring to the pink miniskirt now hanging from his hips.
"Hmm? Yeah," his friend replied, not really paying attention. He had occupied himself for the last half hour by curling up in the chair next to the wall of the cross-dresser's bedroom.
"Liet, you are totally not listening to me!" the blond said in irritation, glaring at Lithuania with his hands on his hips. "What's gotten into you? Normally, you're all like, "Poland, you're so totally hot!" But now, you're just moping in the corner."
Ignoring the desire to point out that he had never once said anything of the sort, Lithuania cleared his throat and said, "I'm just worried…"
"Oh, well that's nothing new."
"… about Belarus."
"Like, why are you worried about her?" Poland asked. "She's just a bi-polar bitch with some kind of obsession disorder."
"She's not just that," Lithuania said defensively.
"You're suffering from blind love, Liet," said Poland, turning back to the mirror. "Just, like, give it up already."
"I'm worried," Lithuania continued, though he knew that the other man probably wasn't listening anymore, "because I think that if she doesn't change her ways, she'll destroy her first real chance for happiness."
He sat silently for a few seconds, waiting for some sort of response. Poland continued to admire himself in the mirror.
"And I know you don't like her, but I really care about her, and I want her to find happiness," said Lithuania. Still, no reply.
Lithuania groaned, and picked up the pillow sitting to his right. Holding it before him, and looking at it as if it was a very close and dear acquaintance of his, he said seriously, "But I don't know how I can make her understand. Someone would need to… to hit her over the head just to get her to listen to you!"
"Um, Liet, I don't know what you think you're doing, but from here it totally looks like you're having a heart-to-heart discussion-thing with my pillow." Dropping his hands, Lithuania saw Poland staring at him with an "are you really that stupid?" expression on his face.
"Oh," he said awkwardly. "I'm sorry, I didn't realise you were – "
"But you know, about the whole hitting Belarus idea, Erzsebet's pretty good at hitting people," Poland interrupted.
"Hungary?" said Lithuania blankly. "Yes, but – "
It was then that Tolys Laurinaitis had the greatest epiphany of his life.
"That's it!" he cried suddenly, jumping up. "Feliks, you're a genius!"
"I know, right!" Poland exclaimed in self-satisfaction. Then he frowned. "Wait, why am I a genius again?"
"You've just given me the answer to stopping Natalya from scaring away Raivis!" said the brown-haired man excitedly. "Come on, we're going to Hungary's place!
"… But, change into your pants first."