Xenoblade Main Theme, Empty, Soldiers (Piano Ver.), Family Portrait.

I got it done fast, hurrah!


Big Brothers Don't Cry

Sort of Okay In A Crisis

Feliciano punched him.

Not Lovino.

He punched Antonio so hard he must have put all his weight into it, because Lovino's ex actually hit the concrete floor in the building hallway. It stunned both of them because on Antonio's side he'd just had a set of knuckles crack against his cheek, and Lovino's mind had already shut down in an effort to keep himself standing without screaming.

Feliciano was shouting enough for all three of them:

"Who the hell are you!? What the fuck do you think you're doing? Touching him like that- are you sick?" It was English mixed with Italian, and if Lovino could translate it then maybe there were a few flecks of Spanish- not for Antonio's benefit, but just from his brother's penchant for language classes in school. "Don't you dare fucking come near him again or I-!" He could remember the last time Feliciano had screamed because it had been at Lovino telling him to leave home for Italy, but he could not remember when he'd last seen his little brother furious enough to turn violent. "I-! I'll think of something just-!"

"Stop…" Feliciano temper didn't have any staying power, Lovino could see the rage crumbling just by taking a fast, stunned look at his brother's face as Feliciano tried storming past him. He got his numb arms up first though, making his body push away from the door frame and bump hard against his brother's. "Stop…" He didn't know what kind of hug it was, his back turned against Antonio and his hands looking for a shoulder or a wrinkle in Feliciano's shirt to hold on to. Lovino was too numb already for the fear that maybe his brother would force him off, which meant it calmed some of the ringing in his ears when he felt his sibling tightly clamp his arms around him instead. He even followed Lovino's lead as he tried pushing him back into the apartment.

"It's okay, Feliciano." It was not okay, everything was so far from okay right now. Lovino just said the lie and there must have been something wrong with his voice, because it made his brother stop clinging quite so hard and cut off the furious sounds he was still spitting at Antonio.

It wasn't okay. It wasn't okay for a stranger to stand at his door and tell his brother that Lovino had lied to him, or that he'd always been lying to him. It wasn't okay for that stranger who Lovino had trusted and loved to take something like this into his own unskilled hands. It wasn't right for Antonio to take a tactic that would make some people only upset and use it on someone who, if Lovino knew his brother right, would lose a lot more than just his temper if their bond was questioned.

It wasn't okay for Antonio to take things out of his hands like this, to take control over something he wasn't even a part of. He'd been a lot of Lovino's firsts: his first real love, his first time, his first kisses and dates. He'd been late nights out dancing or sitting by just talking before the touches started again, he'd been something like freedom and relief from the stress of standing up too high and all alone.

"Are you going to tell him now?"

But then he'd done this.

"Lovino…?" He'd done this and the numbness gave way to the cold when Lovino realized Feliciano'd let go of him a little bit, stepping back through the heat he couldn't feel anymore and staring at his face. "Lovino, what's wrong? What does he want you to tell me?" His brother looked upset, and then his brother looked scared.

"Tell me what's happened- Lovino?" And it was the kind of scared look that Lovino only barely remembered seeing once, in a locked school bathroom after a hard winter's day trying to deal with what he was and who he was going to become. It wasn't the white terror of a bully coming after the smartest kid in the class, or the teary-eyes from a nightmare that sent him tapping at Lovino's door for comfort. It was wide eyes and hitched shoulders, a forced attempt at a crooked smile with teeth clenched trying to stay calm. His brother had both hands on his arms holding on stiffly, and when Lovino felt himself being shaken softly, he quickly touched his own face looking for the cause of Feliciano's fear.

And he found it.

Tears.

A man shouldn't to cry in front of the people he was supposed to protect. Lovino's grandfather had told him that over two years ago, and somewhere in his subconscious Lovino had understood that the words meant the old man had been passing the responsibility on to someone else. Maybe he'd meant it for the dying son who hadn't been able to take care of his children, but it made more sense to think that maybe he'd meant it for the grandson who didn't know how to cope with the direction his life was taking.

"Say something…"

"Feliciano, I'm gay." They weren't messing around trying to whisper to each other in Italian, they just couldn't be comfortable enough in that language to deal with such an awful subject like this. It meant Antonio didn't get to understand the exchange, and that was probably what gave Lovino the courage to finally say it. His brother's face, which he was watching so closely because he had to see his reaction, didn't change: it meant he didn't understand. "Antonio is my boyfriend."

Ex-boyfriend.

Ex-lover.

Not his current one anymore, because Lovino knew he wouldn't be able to forgive him for today. He'd forgiven so many things in their relationship already, but he'd crossed the line: he'd climbed the wall and taken shots at the people Lovino kept protected behind it.

Or at least that was what Lovino had been trying to do, because when Feliciano's hands snapped back like the touch burned, his world gave a sharp, painful contraction.

"You- what?" The next thing to go was his vision, because he was either too proud or too scared to wipe away the tears that were forming faster than he could manage. Instead Lovino just dropped his eyes to the floor. "But we're… The whole family is…" Catholic? Yes, he knew that: he knew what was waiting for him after this life.

"I haven't told anyone." Where he found the breath for speech was a mystery, because the sun was glaring off the tiles and he could almost hear his tears hissing off the floor with the heat he couldn't feel. "Please, God, don't tell-"

"But you're…?" Feliciano wouldn't say it and Lovino couldn't pick his head up and look at him. They just stood there, not touching, with the sweltering air standing between them. He watched his brother's shoes scuffle and clop over the floor, agitation written in the scattered movements. The next thing Feliciano said wasn't even directed at him, it was just frustrated grunts, words spitting off his lips. "Can't even tell him to go away-" Who? "-think this is a joke? At least turn around…!"

Lovino just wanted to hear an answer, but instead he heard footsteps before he felt a hand come down on his shoulder, the other one touching the small of his back as Antonio seemed to think his presence was wanted. If anything it just made Feliciano stop moving, and it frustrated Lovino through the storm of emotion and made him jerk away from the hold.

"Don't touch-!" They both said it at the same time, one in English and the other in Italian. It was Feliciano who shouted it while Lovino barely managed the murmur, but it got their point across.

And Antonio actually listened, which was something new all in itself. But just because he listened didn't mean he had a right to-

"I know you're both upset right now, but Lovi this-"

He had no right to break the silence, he had no right to try speaking to either of them or calling Lovino by a pet-name he barely tolerated. The only thing that kept him from lashing out and saying something about it was the way Antonio's voice got Feliciano to move.

It got him to move, but more like storm, straight across the floor and past Lovino without a word. His head snapped up in terror when his brother didn't stop going and the feet that hit the concrete floor outside started running and-

"Feliciano!" No! No, God don't leave-! Don't turn away from him!

He wanted to scream when he whipped around and there was only an empty doorway left staring at him. He wanted to shout and beg for someone who'd been too fast for him to stop. He wanted a reset, a do-over, he wanted anything that would trade his lover for his brother because a break-up was one thing- but losing his family was something else entirely.

"Lovino…?"

Lovino wanted so much in that moment with tears blinding him and his empty stomach screaming to vomit acid and self-hate, but he didn't move. He couldn't connect with what had just happened, he couldn't cope with the change that had just taken over.

"Don't ever speak to me again."

When he found the first fragments of himself again in the hurricane blowing through his brain, he used them to stab Antonio and tell him to get the fuck out of his life.

"How long were you going to wait, Lovino?" And Antonio somehow had the gall to fight with him, to argue for a 'them' that didn't exist anymore. "It had to happen eventually, and I'm still here."

"Forever." And ever, and ever, he would have faked it until he died. "I was going to wait forever, and I was going to keep my family for-fucking-ever!" Maybe he'd just put himself out of his misery now before the floodgates opened and the real horror came washing over him. He was a quitter who'd failed his way through high school and scrimped and scraped for every inch he'd earned in here in Italy, why not just throw in the towel now that there was no one left worth fighting for?

"I'm still here."

"I don't want you here." Get out, just get out and go away… "Leave me alone, I can't even look at you."

"Lovino-"

"Get out…" Get out… Get out… go away…

And please, God, someone bring his brother back…

…It turned out to be one of the longest and hardest days of his life. Just hours spent sitting alone with the heat and his angst, because there was no better word for it.

The self-pity and soul-consuming guilt.

The blame he just kept pouring and piling on himself.

By what right had he even let himself get into a relationship like that? He could have friends and he could have his own apartment, he was allowed to go out and dance or visit the beach, he was supposed to send money home for his brothers, and he had an obligation to at least succeed enough that he wasn't a failure. He had to set the bar someplace where his brothers could aim and exceed: not so low that they didn't have to work at it, but he could only push it so high on his own without help.

Coming out didn't have a place in that outline of his life.

Being out wasn't something that would help anyone, not even himself.

Fuck: all he had to do was turn on the god damned television and hear about the hate and the fighting back home.

He didn't even fit the god-damned stereotypes, so making waves would be only that: making waves. There was no appeal for him in slipping into women's clothes, and why would he want to kiss or hold another man who anyone else might mistake for a girl? He had a temper and he swore, but his interest in fashion extended only as deep as "yeah, I'd wear that".

Being out wouldn't change him.

So why the obsession with coming out at all?

It took three paralyzing hours before Feliciano came back, but he couldn't have known that at the first or second ones. He stayed out of the kitchen, refused to touch the gas or the knives: he didn't trust himself. His solution had always been to work at something and distract himself when he was upset, but there was no distraction for this. He'd hurt himself if he let himself near heat or steel.

He knew he'd do it, because his nerves hit him so hard that his own body rebelled against him. He puked pain and sour vomit in his bathroom, and then stood under an ice-cold shower until his head began to ache and his back was numb.

The sun was going down and he hadn't eaten anything all day, sitting in that square living room again with his hands covering his face, his eyes finally dry because he'd run out of energy and tears for crying.

He was numb and his apartment was silent, which was why he heard the footsteps in the corridor before the doorknob even tried to rattle and turn. He knew it was only one person, so that meant it was either Antonio back for round two, or whatever Feliciano had said to their family hadn't brought the mob to his door.

"I- I got lost…!" It was Feliciano, but if his brother hadn't said the words between rough pants, and if he hadn't sounded the way he usually did after doing something stupid, Lovino probably would have kept his head in his hands. Instead he turned slowly to look over the back of the couch at him, and he saw how his brother was absolutely drenched in sweat, panting like he'd just run a mile, and carrying something wide and large in a plastic bag.

"…What happened to your mouth?" And a fat lip. His brother had a fat lip and one side of his face was an angry red colour, too strange for sunburn.

"Oh," Feliciano just dropped whatever he'd bought on the kitchen counter, running his hands under the tap for a few moments either trying to cool them down or wash the city grime off. "Do you know the church up on the hill? The little one with the angel over the door?"

"I know of it, haven't been inside it…" Lovino went to Church with their cousins, and they liked to go to a larger one in their own neighbourhood.

"Don't go there." Why… not? "They're just not a very nice congregation."

Before he could ask what the fuck his brother had gone and gotten himself into, Lovino watched him rifle through a cupboard and pull out the only two bowls he owned. The bowls went on the counter and two spoons followed, and when he untied the knot on the plastic bag Lovino didn't know which way he was supposed to feel when Feliciano pulled out a small bottle of chocolate sauce, then pulled the lid off a quart of ice-cream.

"Don't tell me you punched a priest." The words sort of stumbled out of him, unintentional but necessary as he watched the sweet cream land in the bowls, the dessert already soft and beginning to melt in the heat. The chocolate came down in a liberal stream before his brother picked both up servings in a hurry and raced against the heat to bring the bowls over to the couch.

He gave Lovino the one that looked a little smaller, because he was a... because he just did.

"No, not a priest. I asked him questions though." Questions he didn't repeat now as he sat on the warm tiles on the side of the table next to Lovino. He was spooning the ice cream into his mouth like a greedy treat, but the older brother didn't know how to understand anything right now. "But there was a fight- a small one! Very small."

He said it like Lovino'd begun demanding information from him, because maybe that was what he should have done, but it felt easier to just try and hold his bowl in one hand and manipulate the spoon with the other. It was plain vanilla with chocolate drizzled over top, no special ingredients like fruit or cinnamon, no crushed peanuts like the kinds Lovino usually had his brothers jump on and smash once summer came around and ice-cream became a staple in their household.

But he didn't want to think about Carlino right now.

Because he couldn't handle thinking about his youngest brother right now…

They ate in silence as the sun kept sinking, the red light splashed over his walls as it kept getting darker. Ice cream wasn't much of a meal, Lovino could have made better, and it was hard to eat so much sweet on top of more sweet. Feliciano finished his first, Lovino just kept telling himself all the things he couldn't think about. When he caught sight of his brother glancing back into the kitchen and licking the dip of his spoon, he just reflexively tilted his own bowl around as an offer to share.

Without thinking, Feliciano accepted and stole a spoonful of sweet cream and chocolate.

And then they both just stopped and looked at each other in the dying light, because Lovino had no voice even when he saw the shine start to build and echo the quiet pain stressing his brother's face.

"I'm sorry…"

Feliciano hadn't clung to him that hard since their mother died. It was just easier for Lovino to stay sitting on the couch, Feliciano still on the floor, on his knees, arms wrapped up around his waist and face pressed against his chest while Lovino held his head and shoulders, kissing his hair. He moved so fast to get there that it really was just a flash, his spoon hitting the floor just as he wept his first words against Lovino's chest.

"Your boyfriend's a jerk!"

"I know, and I'm sorry about that too…"

"I mean he's a real jerk!" It wasn't light tears, it wasn't small hiccups or a whimpering voice. Feliciano pushed his face down hard because he wasn't just upset: he was screaming. "He just shoved you like that and he made you cry and I-!"

"Feliciano it's settled!"

"He said you hate me!" His brother unwrapped his arms from around him, but he just clung to his shirt where it was bunched up around Romano's sides instead. He kept his forehead pressed hard to Lovino's ribs, a damp patch telling them both where tears had stained the cloth, but he didn't tell Feliciano to shut up as his voice finally dropped… "Or… that you don't trust me… like you're just putting on an act…"

"Stop it." Stop it, stop- just stop talking. Lovino put his hands on the sides of his brother's face and made him look up at him, but since that felt awkward he just brought a foot up and made the coffee table move back with a clatter over the tiles. He pushed Feliciano back until there was room for him to sink to the floor, but that didn't make his brother let go of him. "He didn't know what he was saying, and what he said was wrong. I trusted you to look after Carlino while I was here in Italy, right?"

"Yes, but-"

"I gave you my car when I left."

"But none of that-"

"I've been working my ass off trying to get money together for your books and shit, do you really think I'd just hand that over if I didn't trust you?" Feliciano didn't raise an argument that time, he just stared at Lovino's chest, sobs still kicking at him and tears trailing weakly from his eyes, highlighting the flush and bruising on his skin.

"I do trust you, Feliciano, but damn it even you had to run off to a church for a few hours…" And get the shit kicked out of him, because Lovino touched the welt around his mouth and watched his brother flinch from the pain. "So what would Nonno say? How would Nonna react?"

Feliciano was quiet as he considered the questions, because for Lovino they were important. His brother had become violent, and he'd raised his voice, and then he'd run off and picked a fight with total strangers. That was how Feliciano had reacted to hearing this, this thing that Antonio had insisted was small but which obviously caused something to short-circuit in his brother's understanding of the world.

He watched Feliciano fight for his own set of answers, and then he watched his face get dark- mouth thinning and brows drawing down over cloudy and exhausted eyes. And he felt Feliciano let go of him with one hand and make a fist.

POW!

"OW! What the fuck!?" And punch him in the gut! What the hell was that for? "You stupid shit, that hurt!"

"If you ever keep a huge secret like this from me again, Lovino-!"

"This is how you fucking have a heart-to-heart! What kind of fucking poet are you?"

Lovino got back by taking a hand-full of his auburn hair and twisting it until his brother yelled, a glancing punch nicking him in the jaw before they ended up tumbling over on the tile floor, feet kicking and insults hissing. They jostled the table and broke one of his fucking bowls, and with shards of ceramic making the environment too dangerous to roll around on and get hurt, Lovino broke the hold around his neck and turned it into a chance to heft his brother onto the couch, twisting one of his arms around until with a sharp yelp, Feliciano surrendered.

"Enough! Enough! You win! That hurts!"

"You scream like those girls you like so much!"

There was food in the fridge and ice in the freezer, but with the sticky mess on his floor and his brother's need to go wash the sweat off his body, Lovino only took out enough ice to cool their bruises before they both agreed that he didn't deserve to have to cook for them after today.

"At least let me clean up the ice cream before we go."

"Leave it, I'm hungry damn it." Hungry, and eager to get out of the tiny space where he'd spent the whole day thinking things he didn't want to remember. "There's a burger joint a few blocks from here, if you're interested."

"If they have French fries then please…" French fries and milk-shakes. "And chocolate sundaes?" Of course.

"But you're paying, you stupid shit." Him and his fancy scholarship money. "And not a word about all of this to anyone, understand?"

"I understand."

"Do you promise?"

"I promise: I won't say anything."

"Then I trust you." And he did.

He trusted him.


Because it didn't come across as clearly as I wanted it to: Feliciano was arguably more upset about Antonio's behaviour than the fact that his beloved older brother was gay.

In Antonio's defence though, if he'd had a stronger relationship with Lovino he probably could have gotten away with a stunt like that. You know, one built off mutual trust and respect where he could stand up and say "I fucked up big in your eyes yes, but only once and ultimately with the best intentions!" Bad 'tonio.

Bad Sunny for never writing good 'tonio.