Antonio's POV:

It was dark.

The only thing I could make out was the shallow cracks ran against the concrete wall, and the wooden dining chair that I was sitting on. The room reeked of mold.

Where was I?

I breathed in the musty air that filled the room. I could hear some water dropping from a leak in the ceiling. The sound vibrated through my ears.

I was stuck here, wasn't I?

My eyes adjusted to the lack of light, and I made out the outline of a door on the other side of the room.

Why should I leave? I am here for a reason, after all.

It's actually not that bad here, I guess.

I heard a sudden creak coming from the other side of the room. Light slowly bled into the space, and I saw a silhouette of someone standing in front of the light.

Who is it?

The shadow stepped forward. His golden eyes glistened as bright as the light behind him, and his caramel brown hair was delicately tucked behind his ears. He leant out a hand to me.

"Let's go back, shall we?" His voice was quiet, and he was giving me a soft smile.

I was then met with the cream white ceiling of my bedroom, and the sun's rays caressing my body.

So, it was a dream. Or.. was it?

After my daily morning routine, consisting of dragging myself into the bathroom to smash a cold wet towel on my face, I proceeded to start my daily house cleanup. My living room smelled of windex and lemon furniture polish from my work.

I had Tomás Luis de Victoria, one of my favorite renaissance composers, playing from my laptop as I mopped the kitchen floor. Every once in a while, the music would stop due to one of my cats sitting on the keyboard and accidentally pausing the music player.

Cleaning the house came automatically to me. I was like a cleaning robot that had just gotten a fresh oil change. I swiftly made a fresh pot of coffee afterwards, and took a lounge on my sofa.

Hey Ferb, what can we do today?

I didn't have a brother named Ferb, and I wasn't named Phineas, but I did have an idea for today's plans.

I hopped over to the kitchen, almost spilling my coffee in the process. I swung open all of my cabinets and pulled out all of the junk food I could handle, then I placed it on the counter.

Two bags of chips, a package of popcorn bags, a bag of assorted candies, and a tub of chocolate ice cream.

Good enough. I stuffed the goodies inside a plastic trash bag.

Icebreakers over junk food. I was BRILLIANT.

I pranced out of my front door with my trash bag in hand. I was still wearing my pajamas, but it was only 10 am, it didn't matter anyway.

I silently thanked whoever was up there for Lovino only living next door. I would of hurt my back if I had to lug this bag around for 20 minutes!

I approached his front door, and then I rang the doorbell and knocked twice. Just for safe measures.

I heard a muffled sound of what I could translate as "I'm coming!" and I waited for about a minute or two before Lovino stepped out.

He looked dressed down compared to his outfit yesterday. He was wearing an oversized gray shirt and red sweatpants. He was staring at me in utter disbelief that I actually had the nerve to knock on his door at 10 am. I was surprised myself too, trust me. Not my fault I'm an early bird.

"What are you doing?"

"Visiting you. I got ice cream." He let out an exasperated sigh.

"Come in. It better be fucking chocolate."

"Eeyup!" I set down my bag and flopped onto his couch. "I feel like I visit you more than the cats do."

"So far, you're in 1st place." Lovino rummaged through my bag, and pulled out the ice cream. "Dibs!"

"I'm the one who brought it! You can't call dibs!"

"Fuck you." He threw the tub at me as he went to the kitchen to grab two spoons. The cold emitting from the treat froze my hands. Isn't there such thing as warm ice cream?

I tried brainstorming some things we could do together. Sure I had the icebreaker, but that lasted only about 10 minutes. We could watch a movie? Nah, too cheesy.

I then had the perfect idea. I kept the thought in a safe place, so I could mention it when it was time.

Lovino then walked in, with the spoons in his hand.

"Oh, you got two spoons!" Lovino looked away, embarrassed probably.

"A man keeps to his word." He sat on the couch next to me. "Why the hell did you come here at 10 am with a giant bag of junk food, anyway? Special occasion?"

"Nah. Just wanted to get to know each other, you know? Let's call this a moving in party! Well, yesterday could have counted, but that was more of a family reunion more than anything else." Lovino nodded in agreement.

"I'm still shocked that dude is actually related to Ludwig. Although they do look alike, if I think about it."

"Yeah." I decided that I could start with a light icebreaker first. You can obviously tell that I research this stuff. I could make friends with the entire town, if I could!

"Hey, Lovi?" He looked over.

"Hmmm?"

"Wanna play Truth or Dare?" Lovino pushed me off of the couch.

"That game is for little girls, idiota. I'm not 12."

"Awww, but it would be fun! I won't ask anything gross of you, I promise." Lovino boringly stared at me.

"Fine."

"YAY! I'll go first!" I jumped back onto the couch and pulled out my imaginary microphone for added suspense. "TRUTH, OR DARE?"

"Truth."

"HE HAS CHOSEN!"

"You're a dork."

"Alright, I know. Let me think." I pondered about what I could ask Lovino. I didn't want to get too personal, but I didn't want anything silly either. I decided to say the first thing that came to mind.

"If you were a girl, what would you look like, and what would you do. YOU MAY ANSWER!" I held up the invisible microphone to his face, and he searched his thoughts for an answer.

"Well, I would have longer hair, obviously. Also I would still have this curly thingy. I really don't know what it is. Also, I would wear comfy clothes all the time, and then I would go shopping with Feli, since I would probably like shopping. He loves shopping, I swear he is a girl on the inside. Also I would buy bras, since I don't have any. Saggy boobs are gross." Lovino gave a disgusted face, then look towards me. "Truth or Dare, bastard."

I was pretty surprised that he had talked so much for one question, but I didn't mind. It was quite entertaining. "I guess i'll start with Truth too."

Alright. It didn't take long for him to figure out his question. "How do you think you are most likely to die?"

This one was easy. "Suffocation by cat hair." Lovino chucked at my response.

"I'm not surprised."

"Hmm, alrighty then!" I clasped my hands together like a stereotypical video game character. "Truth or Dare?"

"Why not? Dare." Lovino smirked at me, seeing if I would take advantage of his choice.

Oh yes, and I had the perfect idea.

"Massage my feet." Lovino gave me a horrified stare.

"..No."

"What's wrong with a foot massage? My feet ache!" Lovino facepalmed.

"I got no choice now." he pointed to the bathroom. "There's lotion in there."

I jumped off of the couch and busted into the small bathroom. It was clean, with a glass cabinet hanging up on the wall with an assortment of items lining the shelves.

I then spotted a mango scented lotion, basking in it's glory from the other products.

I FREAKIN' LOVE MANGOES.

I grabbed the bottle, and exited the room as I threw the bottle to Lovino. It fell in his hands almost perfectly.

"Alright. Sit down and give me one of your feet." I did as he told, and he put my foot on his lap. At first he didn't do anything but stare at my foot, but eventually he put a big blob of lotion on my foot and started to massage.

His hands were cold on my feet (maybe it was the lotion?) but as he rubbed his thumb over the side of my foot, my entire body melted.

Hoooly catnip, this guy was good. I wouldn't have been surprised if he had worked in massage therapy, because he knew exactly where to place his fingers. It was delicate, but yet it was able to release all of my tension in my body, and it let me relax.

He slowly moved up to my ankle, making sure not to miss a square inch of my foot. After going a little ways up my leg, he then repeated the process on my other foot.

Lovino had his eyes focused on my foot the entire time, with a light blush painted on his face. His face was relaxed, and it looked like he was about to fall asleep any minute. It was a fresh new change, seeing him like this. Usually he was tensed up, but he let that anger out on my foot, and he was released from all of the anger inside of him.

I liked this Lovino. He should give me foot massages more often!

He then suddenly stopped applying pressure onto my calf, and he looked up at me with a sly smirk on his face.

"How was it?"

"Mmmmmph." I was so relaxed, I couldn't reply.

"I'll take that as a good." Lovino crawled up onto the couch beside me, and laid back against the cushions. "Hey, Antonio?"

"..Yeah?"

"Why are you hanging out with me?"

"Because I want to be friends with you!"

"Bullshit. You just want free massages off of me."

"I'll make it up to you, I promise! That's what friends do!"

"Yeah. But, why me? I'm just a pissy immature adult with a good taste in food." I groaned at his response, and decided I was just going to talk.

"I don't know either. I never open up to people. I only have 2 friends that are humans. You're just special I guess." Lovino didn't reply to me, and we both sat in a empty silence for a while.

In all honestly, I had absolutely no clue myself why I wanted to hang out with Lovino. Every time I hung out with him, a spark would go off inside of me, and I was able to show my true self. I didn't have to act formal or "normal" for him, I could be myself. He didn't judge me for my awkward personality, or my cat hoarding problem. He didn't say anything, and that made me happy.

"OH MY FUCKING JESUS PLEASE HELP ME WHAT THE FUCK!"

The loud swearing almost sent me flying off the couch. What an amazing wake up call.

"Toni, you bASTARD! WAKE UP AND HELP ME!"

Lovino's in trouble?

I must go.

I sprinted full speed at Lovino's cries for help, stopping at a mysterious door. I swung it open to find a concrete staircase leading down into the basement. Lovino's swears got louder as I ran down the stairs. When I first spotted Lovi, I wasn't exactly sure if I were to cry or laugh.

Garcia was wrapped around Lovino's ankle, and it looked like she was winning.

I've NEVER seen Garcia wrap around a human's leg before. She just does that to tables. Is Lovino secretly a table? Is his identity a fraud?

"Toni, could you help me out here? I got a issue her-hOLY SHIT I DO NOT APPRECIATE YOU BITING ME THANK YOU!"

I bent down to the flailing figure that was currently making its way across the room. It's pretty hard to get Garcia off, but I found one way that sends her running.

"Garcia." I said in my 'stern teacher' voice. Both Lovino and the cat looked up at me. "If you don't get off now, I'm taking away your table privileges for the night."

Like magic, Garcia slowly unwrapped her body around Lovi's calf, and walked up the stairs. Lovino sat blankly staring at me, wondering how the hell did I manage to do that.

"Shit.." Lovino grasped at his leg. "She got me hard." I started to panic a little, due to the knowledge of Garcia's grasp. I looked over to him worriedly, and he pointed back upstairs. "First aid kit, in there." After retrieving the supplies, he rolled up his pant leg, and his injuries were let free. I gritted my teeth.

"Well, you don't need stitches, but it's deep." I opened the chest and pulled out the necessities. Let's just say, I have a pretty good knowledge of cleaning wounds since I own cats.

"Well, this is obviously going to sting, but I'm just warning you." Lovino shrugged, and actually looked down at his wounds as he was cleaning them up. He didn't even move a flinch as I wiped down the wounds.

"You're not even moving a muscle! Look at you, tough guy." Lovino frowned in response.

"I got in a lot of fights as a kid. You get used to the stinging." I looked up at the motionless figure as questions popped in my mind. I didn't know why Lovino had gotten in a lot of fights, but a part of me was telling him to ask more. But what happens if he was part of the mafia or something? Probably not. I'm overthinking this. Stop it Toni.

I decided to just ask about it anyway.

"Why did you get in fights?" Lovino scowled.

"I piss people off easily. And if they ask for a fight, I give one." Lovino ran his hand through his hair. "It stopped after I got out of high school, of course, but it was hard to keep in my anger during college. That's why I turn to art. I get to let out all of my emotions on a piece of paper, or whatever I'm using. It's great."

"Yeah. It is." I closed the first aid kit. "Can you walk?"

"Probably" Lovino used the washing machine as support, and slowly stood up. "Hurts like hell though. I'm not sure how I can get up the stairs."

"Hmm…" I went deep into my minds thoughts for a solution. "I could carry you up. Hopefully. Do you weigh a lot?" Lovino's face went bright red at my remark.

"Fuck no!"

"You don't have another choice, do you?" Lovino looked like he was about to explode with embarrassment. I know that being carried by someone is "girly" but we're the only ones here. Not to mention that he's injured. It's a good excuse.

"Well pick me up then, bastard!" Lovino complained as I bent down to his flailing figure. Making sure not to hurt him, I slipped my hands underneath his body and slowly lifted him off of the floor. Lovino made a tiny squeak as I did this, but then he proceeded to tense up underneath my arms.

"Relax, I won't drop you." I reassured him. He tried relaxing a big, but ended up clinging onto my shirt. He was almost like one of my cats, but bigger. Also he could talk. I wish my cats could talk.

I brought Lovino to his room, where I sat him onto his bed, and we sat in silence for what felt like hours. I couldn't really do anything with him due to his injuries, so I laid on the bed with him.

"Today was fun." Lovino looked at me with disbelief.

"Probably because you're not the one that's getting attacked by cats." I laughed at his response.

"Perhaps so. It doesn't matter though, because I got to make memories with you." Lovino had his face buried into one of his pillows. I wasn't exactly sure, but I think I could make out him saying something.

"I'm glad."