Diana

Matthew and Marcy were exchanging amused smiles at Alfred's sulking as we pulled up to the restaurant, La Chaumiere. The nations had given us a moment to quickly pull on something half decent from the closet full of new clothes they had provided. I was surprised by the accuracy of the sizes, though less impressed with the half-rack of floral skirts I would never wear.

As we were leaving, Canada had managed to swipe the keys to Al's ridiculously large black jeep.

"Oh, buck up, Al," Arthur comforted from the passenger seat, "We couldn't very well go to some shoddy burger joint."

"But why'd you let France pick?"

"Better than letting Arthur 'imself pick." Francis teased. He chuckled, raising his arms in defense as England swatted him.

We climbed out of the car and France handed his son his keys back. Alfred looked up and read the sign, "La Shaw-me-air?"

"Ah! My 'eart!"

"Yeash, Al," Matthew said, wrinkling his nose, "Even I felt that."

Marcy snorted then immediately covered her mouth in embarrassment. That seemed to lighten the mood. Even I chuckled.

In all honesty, I had been hoping for a more casual evening, considering the hectic day. But as we stepped through the glass doors of the restaurant, a small part of me realized that we'd have a completely new lifestyle now. For all I knew, this WAS casual for the countries. And despite their near-constant squabbling up to this point, they had all seemed to settle down and put on a bit more of a sophisticated attitude as they entered the restaurant.

Well, almost.

"Hello, welcome to La Chaumiere," the lovely blonde hostess said perfectly.

"You could take some lessons from her," Matthew whispered, poking his brother.

"Don't make me beat you up in a nice restaurant," he replied.

Francis smiled charmingly, "Table for six, please."

The waitress smiled apologetically, "I'm sorry, but unless you've made a reservation, it'll be a two hour wait until a table that large is ready.

England stepped forward to tell the girl to clear a table when Matthew grabbed his arm, pointing at France.

"Ah, apologies, 'ow could I be so thoughtless," he gave her a low bow, "I am Francis Bonnefoy, a delegate of France. I've been 'ere for the past few weeks on business matters and I am so terribly 'omesick."

The waitress put a hand to her cheek, a near inaudible whimper escaped her. "I'm sure you miss your family," she said, her voice a little more lilting than before.

He gave her a sad smile, "Unfortunately, no family waits for me there, unless you count the beautiful stars that shimmer over the countryside or the little café I so love to visit. It is very similar to this place. Perhaps, that is why I'm so drawn to it."

"Dang," I said under my breath with a smile.

Arthur scoffed.

"You know what?" her voice was filled with emotion as she spoke, "I believe we have a table you can use, Mr. Bonnefoy." She turned to her left and led us further into the restaurant.

"It wasn't very nice of you to lie to that poor girl," England scolded once the love struck waitress had left.

France looked incredibly hurt, "Why, Arthur, I would never lie to a beautiful young woman. I am Francis, a delegate of France, I've no family back 'ome, and I love the stars and cafés!"

England rolled his eyes in response and stared down at his menu.

"Do they serve burgers?" Alfred asked absent mindedly as he flipped through a menu of his own.

I flagged down the waitress and said entirely too sweetly, "Could we get a children's menu, please?" She nodded and left, returning shortly with a black and white paper menu and a pack of four crayons. "Thank you," I said, taking it and handing it across the table to Alfred with a pleasant smile.

"Thank you, Diana," he replied haughtily. He opened the crayons, grabbed the red, and circled the word hamburger, then flipped it over. He drew an "x" into the middle blank in a tic-tac-toe grid. "Marcy," he said with a bright smile, "best two outta three?"

Without hesitating, Marcy picked up a blue crayon. "You're on!"

I pinched the bridge of my nose.

The night wore on, delicious food (plus one hamburger) was eaten, and conversation somehow turned to embarrassing childhood stories.

"One time, I took my little Matthieu to the stables to see the horses," Francis mused. "And he spent the entire time trying to mimic their snort."

Matt blushed, "Papa."

"What? It's true."

"Aww," I laughed, "That's adorable."

Canada's blush increased.

"Mhm, I remember that," Arthur added, "He wanted to learn how to speak horse, if memory serves. But you couldn't do that one part. Spent the rest of the weekend attempting to figure it out."

"Let's not forget Alfred's attempts," France chuckled, "He thought he'd done it by just going "puh" very quickly."

"He was so proud of himself!" Arthur laughed, "That reminds me of the time Matthew had told him he was hungry, so Al decided to try and climb to the top of the fridge and toss cookies down to him. He fell off the counter and nearly broke his neck!"

At this point, I was trying extremely hard to keep my laughter to a decent decibel.

"Ah, or what about 'ow Amérique used to wet the bed and then blame it on mon petit Matthieu."

"Hey!" Alfred perked up at this, interrupting whatever he and Marcy had been talking about. "I did not wet the bed! Heroes never wet the bed."

France wagged a finger at him, "Lies. Canada 'imself told me of 'ow he took up for you because you were embarrassed."

Alfred looked genuinely hurt. "Bro," he said, "How could you? We pinkie promised."

Matt looked upset, but a glimmer of unbridled joy shone in his eyes. "I'm sorry, Alfie."

America's anger melted back to his normal ridiculous smile, "Aw, Mattie, you know I can't stay mad at you." He reached over my food to fist bump Mattie.

I cleared my throat.

"Dude, you alright?" Alfred asked with a smirk. "Sounds like you're catching somethin'."

"No," I replied pleasantly, "I'm just allergic to childishness."

Arthur snorted, then coughed into his hand to cover it up.

"Oh no!" Marcy suddenly spoke up, looking at me with a pouty face to rival France's. "I'm so sorry, Dia! I didn't know."

Alfred lost it. Boisterous laughter rang through the quiet restaurant, turning heads. Arthur and Francis practically tackled Alfred, trying to get him to quiet down.

I immediately covered my face with my hand, trying desperately to not to do the same.

"Excuse me," I said, standing and heading for the bathroom. I needed a moment to calm down. I stepped into the hall leading to the bathroom… and bumped into someone.

"Oh, excuse—" I cut off as recognition hit me. Particularly the short auburn hair. "Agent Peter?" I asked, carefully.

The tall secret service agent looked at me with terribly unconvincing surprise. "Diana! What a coincidence." He smiled.

I stared at him indignantly.

"Imagine meeting you here! How are you doing?"

I kept staring.

An awkward silence built.

"Are you going to keep this up?"

"Yeah, no..." Pete sighed.

"So, how are we doing?" I asked irritably, crossing my arms and shifting my weight to one hip.

Pete looked at me carefully for a second. "You're both doing fine." He glanced towards the dining room at the sound of Alfred's laughter. "And nothing's blown up yet, so that's a bonus…"

The corners of my mouth twitched upward. "He's really that bad?"

"You have no idea."

I chuckled. "Yes, well, the night's still young."

Peter nodded absently, still looking in the direction of the nations.

A burning suspicion poked up its ugly little head.

"Oh, and by the way, I know what you're doing." My voice was cold.

Peter looked at me, interested but unconcerned.

I glared at him. "You're using us as bait."

Peter's mouth twitched upward. "What are you talking about?" He asked in an amused tone.

I scowled. "We're not watching anyone," I growled. "We're a flame and they're moths. No need to watch each moth; you only have to watch the flame." My eyes narrowed. "So how about you cut the crap about us 'working with you,' and call and call this scheme what it is."

The agent smiled. "How about I put it this way: you're being paid an absurd amount of money to let these idiots drag you around wherever they want. If I were you," His smile fell, "I'd shut up and take the deal."

I fell silent.

He turned to walk away, then hesitated. "Oh, and just a fair warning," Peter gave me a furtive look. "I'd keep a close watch on Marcy and Alfred. It doesn't usually end well when he takes a liking to someone so fast."

I simply glared at him.

I watched him disappear from sight, then let out the breath I realized I was holding.

No suspicion any more. Just anger.

Marcy

Alfred sat beside me when we climbed back into his car. We were in the middle of a very heated discussion on who exactly won our game of tic-tac-toe, and if being the first to cheat mattered.

Dia, probably tired of our bickering, asked loudly, "Francis, could you drop us off at my old place?"

"Waddaya mean?" Alfred interrupted, "What's wrong with the new place?"

Dia rolled her eyes, "We can't stay there, all of our stuff's at the old place."

"Well there's a lot of new stuff at the new place for y'all."

"I'd like to sleep in my bed, if you don't mind."

"Right, and make Marcy sleep on the couch another night when she could be in a bed of her own!"

"I'll have you know my couch is awesome and really comfy and Marcy told me she liked sleeping on it!"

They both suddenly turned to me.

"Uhh, I'm Switzerland."

"What?" America asked.

Right, personified nations. There was probably a Switzerland.

"Oh, er, I mean I'm staying out of this. I don't really care where we stay tonight."

Dia crossed her arms and raised her chin defiantly. "Fine, then we go to the old place."

Alfred opened his mouth to protest, but was cut off by Arthur. "America, perhaps it would be better if they stayed at their own place tonight. That way they could do a bit of packing tonight and be ready to get moved in tomorrow."

Alfred slumped back in his seat. "Fine. Do whatever, see if I care."

I took out my phone to check the time, 7:4-.

My phone was snatched away. I looked up at Alfred, who with one hand held a finger to his lips and with the other turned my phone's volume all the way down. He handed it back and pulled out his own, typing furiously. Mine vibrated, one new message. I gave him a final odd look before opening it up:

Diana's such a buzzkill.

I glared at him and typed back:

That's rude! She's very stressed and going through stuff. She has a job to keep up and all of a sudden she's thrown into all this secret service stuff! That'd be hard for anyone. She's just trying to be responsible and you're making it really hard on her! :P D:

Jeeze, sorry. I didn't realize.

I sighed; maybe I flew off the handle a bit early. I sent back:

It's fine. She really is normally so fun and awesome, just right now she's really wound up.

What if we unwound her?

What on earth could you possibly be thinking?

Big party, all the nations. Minus Russia (don't ask)

If I weren't trying very hard to be quiet and covert I would've squealed. As it was, I let out a small gasp. Reply:

YES PLS! WHEN? WHERE? WHO? AHHHH!

FRIDAY, TWO DAYS FROM NOW, 8PM! New place, duh. Everyone 'cept the Ruskie (again, don't ask)

I'm in! Invite literally everyone, I wanna meet them all. (Cept Russia, for whatever reason I'm not allowed to ask)

I was positively glowing with happiness. This was going to be so amazing! I started imagining what everyone would look and act like.

No, I told myself, don't make up unrealistic ideas of what other countries are like. That'll end badly.

I noticed the car had stopped.

Thanks for the ride," Dia said, letting her seat down so I could climb out.

Shall we walk you in?" France asked.

"No!" We both answered at the same time; Dia probably because the apartment was a mess, and me because maybe I wasn't entirely over his flirting and the weird feeling it gave me. We waved as they drove off, then walked into the front lobby.

A few hours of speed-cleaning and packing followed, and while I was getting more and more excited, Dia was looking increasingly exhausted. She was washing and organizing her paint brushes from her small corner of an art studio when I spoke up.

"Hey, Dia? Maybe you should sleep."

She glanced at me and gave me a weak smile. "I look that awful, huh?"

"No, that's not—"

"I'll get ready for bed after I finish cleaning my studio." She started stacking various canvases—some blank and some half-finished—against the wall. "Heaven forbid France see any of this," she mumbled under her breath.

We took turns in the bathroom, and I sat down on her surprisingly comfortable, worn couch. I pulled out my leather notebook and began trying to get down everything I'd learned about the nations today, even though I knew it'd be impossible.

Hey Marcy?"

I glanced over at Dia, who was standing in the doorway of her room. There was a large black sketchbook under her arm, which probably meant she'd be staying up a bit longer to draw. She looked at me with concern.

"You… really did want to sleep here, right? I mean, I didn't make you, right?"

Of course not," I said with a smile, "I said I didn't care because I didn't care. I really don't mind sleeping on the couch for another night or two." Just to prove my words true, I sank back into the couch and pulled my blanket up to my nose.

Even though I couldn't see it, I knew Dia was smiling. "Alright then," she said gently. "Goodnight."

"Night!"

Her door closed, and I turned over in the old but loved blanket, looking forward to tomorrow.

Xxxxx

Again, sorry. – Diana

mon petit – my little