oioioi. what's this. winter. fuck yeah. ANYWAYS so I guess this kind of... ends the obligatory chapters I felt like I had to write. But it was fun while it lasted! I really do love this pairing so burningggggly much still. hell, if I ever find anyone else writing/drawing them I'll give off my firstborn. IN THE MEAN TIME rest assured I'll be around polluting the interwebs with my Dutch and Estonian love.
10 vignettes, 200 words each, Estonia's POV. again.
if.. this does get around to being continued on. no promises that it will. But I'll probably cycle through another year but from the Netherlands' point of view. Who knows what the future holds.
I
"Romance is stupid."
I peered over from the top of my book at him, snuggling in a bit closer to his side. We're sitting side by side in bed, against the headboard, and he's flipping through a book as well. The difference is, he's looking obviously displeased with whatever the hell he's reading. I slowly begin to smile.
"Is it? "
"Fuck... I don't need to bring you flowers or chocolate all the time just to let you know I'm 'thinking of you'. And we don't need to go on long walks or have a getaway for 'just the two of us'. It's stupid."
His brow is furrowed in concentration, lips twitched downward into the slightest disapproving scowl.
"But you hold my hand everywhere we go. Isn't that romantic?"
It was true in Amsterdam, at least. It had even been slightly infuriating when he started, but I got used to having someone's hand on mine.
"So you don't wander off and get lost and end up in the red light district again."
Oh. Now that I thought back, that had happened. It was terrifying situation at the time, too.
He seemed like a hypocrite though.
II
The problem with being immortal is eventually you get tired and you believe you've already done everything. It's then that you realize and consider the only thing you haven't done is die properly.
It was that miserable mood I was in when he approached me, placing a hand on my shoulder as I stared out the window. Looking down at me, he didn't speak. I wondered if this same morbid curiosity overcame other nations, specifically him, but I didn't dare ask.
"How was the meeting?"
He still attended his own country's political dealings—although mostly only when he felt like it—as I was expected to travel back home for any of my own. The thing of it is, it left me time alone.
"Boring without you."
Of course it was. After I nodded, I sighed and leaned back, reaching up to hold onto his hand with one of my own. He wraps both of his arms around my shoulders instead, and when he leans down and sets his chin on the top of my head, I give a soft sigh.
"I missed you..."
"I'm here now."
It was true. Maybe that was enough to make everything better.
III
I remember for weeks being tormented over the decision.
To say 'I love you' or to let it go unsaid. Already spending time with him and my life with him had been the best times of my life. Even though he was quiet and stoic most of the time, I knew he felt the same kind of bond with me as I did with him... Otherwise, he would of said something and left me alone.
Every time I looked at him and I tried to have the words leave my mouth, I'd just freeze and go entirely quiet though. He'd give me a funny look and then drag me on to continue whatever we were doing, where I'd just sigh and lament my inability to express emotion through words.
When it did happen, it happened just when we were as natural as we are now. Side by side and curled into each other, his face nestled against my body as I kiss his hair, this is almost exactly like we were for the first time when I mumbled 'I love you' barely audibly but somehow he still caught it.
This time, he mumbles it first.
No sound could be sweeter.
IV
Both of our birthdays are in the winter months, and we're both very aware of this sneaking back and forth we have to do as a result. Most nations don't even bother celebrating birthdays anymore, unless they're close with their larger family, or, like us, if they have a lover where they can smile and fawn over a cake and a present with.
Strangely enough he's not that big of a fan of chocolate. Not for cakes anyways. The icing is fine, but the actual main event needs to be something else. This year, I just tried to prepare him a small little apple cake that he and I could enjoy before he headed out to go drinking with his friends.
When I hand him his present, a nice and expensive watch, he stared at it for a few minutes before I reached over to grab it and place it around his wrist. As with every year, he thanks me with a kiss and a tiny rare smile before then asking if I'd like to go drinking with him. Politely declining, I let him know that tonight is his night.
When February comes, we'll hide away together under our covers.
V
I hate to think sometimes that there are things that can pull us away from each other and we'd have no control over it. What if one day, we were taken and never be allowed to see one another again?
I've had nightmares before of us as lovers before the second world war. How we would have been torn back and forth between others and then I wake up, covered in a thin layer of sweat with a concerned lover beside me.
It's just useless paranoia, that much I know. I'm under no danger of losing him but sometimes my mind just won't stop. Things are relatively peaceful these days. Whether or not he ever thinks the same things, I'll never know unless he comes out one day and tells me. His nightmares wake me up when he mutters in Dutch and German, thrashing around to try and grab onto something for safety.
Russia doesn't care about me now a days. I don't... think he does, at least. But it's painful to think what if I'd fallen in love with another, another nation, another man, another non-communist during the Soviet era...
Too many questions and I hope they're never answered.
VI
"I wish it'd snow already."
He's watching me carefully, his chin on my sternum as he hands stroke up and down my arms. I can't stay still hardly, wriggling around in the bed with a small frown as I stare out the window. It's already been snowing in Tallinn, and my body craves that Amsterdam be covered in the same icy frost. With red-rimmed eyes, he tilts his head down and nuzzles against my bare chest, probably sparing a glance to the window as well.
"It'll come before you know it."
I look at him like a little kid enchanted, and he nods with certainty at his own words. "And if it doesn't snow before the week's out, can we go to Tallinn?" It's a long way to travel just to see some snow, and perhaps I'm being a bit silly about it, but seeing snow and being able to touch it to me is such an amazing thing. As a little nation, it always mystified me even.
Nodding again to agree, I know he's probably just doing so because he knows that it'll end up snowing probably by tomorrow.
It'd be all the comforts of home.
VII
It was such a dizzying array of reds and magenta, golden yellows, splashes of orange and long wispy stems of celadon and viridian all in front of the most breathtaking sky of azure and light blue. My jaw actually drops as I stare at the artwork, the long and curvy ash grey signature being none other than his initials.
"...I didn't know you could paint."
Tearing my gaze away from the large canvas, I look at him just as he turns. The long, thin paintbrush I assume he used to sign it with is still in his hand, another brush dipped in taupe paint sideways in his mouth. The tubes of paint around him, rolled and almost used up give their vibrant shades all over his shirt.
"...Sometimes."
The paintbrush falls from his lips and he looks down, while I make a beeline for the easel. I've never seen a prettier field of tulips, not even all around his country. He usually keeps this room of his home locked and it's the first time I've been in it so I try to take it all in. There's even the most breathtaking cityscape of Tallinn.
"...Sometimes?"
"Sometimes."
VIII
For some reason he suggested we spend Christmas with our families together. It's amusing to see how his sister gets along with my brother's Polish partner, and comical how my smallest brother is so afraid of him and trembles. His Luxembourgian sibling even makes small talk with my older brother while cooking lovely roasted poultry and accompaniments, trying to encompass everyone's own traditions.
It feels so natural to all be together, like everything a real Christmas is supposed to represent. There's even snow outside, and I can't help but smile so much. I can even see him crack a smile once in a while too.
All of it combined together is what makes me eventually excuse myself, heading outside to wander down the quiet and dark street. The further I walk the scarcer lights get, until finding a park. I take a seat on a bench with a sigh.
I can't remember feeling so much like I belonged to a family since I was a little kid.
Before I know it, there's tears running down my face. It's horrible and stupid but I've never felt so many things and it's just outright confusing.
I never really liked Christmas before anyways.
IX
There's blood steadily dripping from his nose, and he has the most sour expression. His shirt is torn at, and even his knuckles are bruised. Biting on my bottom lip I grab his arm, trying to tug him over to sit down. He looks like a mess, his hair dipping down onto his forehead and blood spotting his shirt.
"What happened?"
He jerks at my touch, obviously not calmed down yet. It takes a bit of struggling before I can convince him to sit down on the couch, and I grab a handkerchief from my pocket to press against his probably broken nose.
"Just some fucking... God dammit, they were such fucking idiots, they deserved a fucking lot more than... fuck..."
The white cloth is quickly soaking up the blood and I frown, trying to comfort him with my other hand by stroking his arm. When he closes his eyes, I feel a dull ache in my heart for him.
"...They said this country's going to shit... God... Fuck them..."
The true bane of every nation is hearing when people criticize us. It's a personal insult. I suppose he found one way to deal with it though...
X
For us, a year is about as useful as a measurement of time as a centisecond is to every day use. When something monumental happens even in a year, we'll look back on it eventually as if it was just a day. Fond and miserable memories all blur together eventually.
So when he wishes me a happy birthday, which wouldn't mean a thing without him being around... I thank him and mean it.
"It's your birthday. You shouldn't be thanking me..."
There's so many things that I wish I could say sometimes. How he slows down time for me, lets me appreciate everything around me, how I've never felt that I've had a fuller life before him.
"I want to."
Somehow I can't say any of it. My throat wants to close up. The only thing that I can hope is that he understands what I mean every time I look and smile at him, how I feel every time I touch him. I haven't even felt so sentimental until his sister told me that he must not of painted for the past century, until around the time we got together.
The little unspoken things meant the most.
