A/N: Really long Author's Note at the bottom that hopefully clarifies my long absence. Please read it.

A Thousand Reasons

Disclaimer: I don't own Hetalia Axis Powers, but I do own my overly random plotline and any OCs I throw in.

Chapter 20: Good Enough

Words are meaningless. Part of being a nation, you learn that words can be your worst enemy or greatest ally, but in the end they are all meaningless. There is no forever; your nation exists as long as your people recognize you and the memory of it do not fade. Even still a nation will not live forever and because of that…there is no such thing as love.

Lovina stared as Lovino casually conversed with Antonio while Antonia focused on drawing something that had caught her eyes. While Lovina also drew, it was more a picture from a long ago memory than anything else, not something more present.

"Cute~" Antonio said from behind her. She suppressed the instinctive flinch from someone getting too close to her. He didn't know she was a nation, or at least that she had been. He wouldn't understand her need to get away from someone who could actually cause her irreversible physical harm.

"Don't say that," she said instead. "It's not complete and isn't very good right now. It's missing something."

No matter how often she looked, she couldn't find the something that was missing. The life her paintings, drawings, and sculptures used to have had become lost to her. She couldn't see it in anything other than her children.

"What is it missing?" Antonio asked, looking closely at her painting trying to decipher what it could be. He had been around Italy and France long enough to know good art and Rosalina was talented. She was not giving herself enough credit. No matter how he searched, he could not see that anything was missing the way she said.

"Life," Lovina answered. "Emotion…this does not have any soul in it. It's worthless."

Her heart ached. She felt like this painting. Drawn and put together in color, a mimicry of life, some mockery of what it could be with so little effort and without any true emotion outside of what a person who sees it could give it. Then again, that was the master of art. Everyone will see something different, feel something different. Art resonates with people.

"It has emotion," Antonio replied with a small frown on his face.

"What do you see?" she asked. She couldn't resist. She knew it could hurt her, his words right now could make a difference to her and what happens in the future, she hated knowing she could still be swayed by a man she had never thought to see again after leaving twenty years ago.

"Longing."

It was a short answer and not the one Lovina expected, her eyes flicking between the painting and Antonio before looking back down at her hand. It felt like a betrayal all over again. She had resolved herself not to live wanting this man. She had sworn her children would be enough, that they would be all she would ever need. She didn't want to want or need anything more.

Her hand shook and her eyes blurred. "I think I am done for today," she said, "'Nia, watch your brother and come home safe. I do not mind you remaining out a little longer. I am unwell and have words to speak to your uncle."

"Yes mama," Antonia and Lovino answered. They could see a shadow on their mother's face. One they did not know and could not drive away. Their mama was hurting and yet they could do nothing but watch as she packed and got ready to go speak words with their tio who probably knew their mother far better than either of them would. Their mother would not show them certain faces and in this she was a stranger to them. They worried for what it might mean if she were to be lost to them in time because of it.

Nodding her ascent she looked at Antonio. "It was a pleasure to meet you, but I am unwell and still recovering. I must return to rest. Goodbye Antonio."

Lovina's breath shuddered as she breathed out while walking away at a sedate pace. She had said goodbye. Her breath hitched into silent sobs that grew louder as she found herself kneeling alone in front of her home. Words she had never spoken before to anyone, let alone to him. It made everything seem so final…so permanent. It hurt more than she thought.

"Lovina?" Sadiq spoke quizzically, uncertain of her state as her glassy-eyed stare focused on him.

"Sadiq," Lovina called out, her voice sounding horrible from having cried her throat raw.

"None of that, little one, none of that. I'm here," Sadiq said, one hand wrapping around her waist and pulling her to him, the other resting on top of her head running fingers through her hair. "You're okay."

The tears welled up in her eyes. "I love him…so much," she whispered. It was almost a desperate prayer.

"You always will, Rosa, you loved him far longer than you've been apart. He's important to you and special in your heart."

"It hurts…I want the pain to stop…I just want to stop feeling."

"No you don't," Sadiq said gently, using the hand that had been running through her hair to lift her chin. "The feelings you have prove you're alive, that you're living and moving forward and dealing with it as best you can. Today hurt because you were unprepared and it has been years, but tomorrow you will be stronger for it. The pain proves that everything you've felt was real, that your love is real and not just some product of your nation's attachment."

"I hate when you're logical," she sniffed.

"I know," he agreed, but really her heart wasn't in the half hearted movements she made to pull away. Loving Antonio was unbearable, because he was a stranger, because he looked at her like she was a stranger, because she knew their history and she wanted that connection again, most of all because she had two children to care for now and she knew she could never put them through anything that might hurt them for her own selfishness.

Somehow she didn't know if the reasons she was coming up with were an excuse not to see Antonio again or to give her the strength she'd need to resist falling in love all over. She could come up with a thousand reasons why it would be a bad thing…but just one reason to make it a good thing would probably maker her crumble if it were good enough.

A/N: So, I'm pretty sure all the fans of this story have given it up for abandoned. But it did win the voting in which story I should focus on exclusively and I do try to keep my word even if only to myself that I would finish every story I have posted on here. I am sincerely sorry it's taken me this long to even start typing again, but I've actually been in a bad way for a while. It wasn't just school or writers block or family issues or even the regular illnesses. I've been having some pretty bad headaches and migraines every day for months and had them regularly for years before that. They hurt and cause me a great deal of distress, sometimes to the point I can't even do something physically. Sometimes they make me wish I would just die. I won't, for a lot of reasons, the least of which is I'm not a fan of suicide, but I've also had reasons to take a break from writing. It pains me to say, but I'm weak when it comes to my family, and being a writer…it's not a job they're fans of or very supportive of so when the first novel I finished didn't do so well on Amazon they were disappointed and told me to give it up. I've published a few others, but…well its discouraging and I was so tempted to stop writing altogether. One of my friends is actually a guitarist and photographer, he's in college trying for photography and music majors while performing with his band and I'm his only support. Recently he's been mine too. None of these reasons are good enough for me to have left you guys waiting on chapters for so long, but I have a plotline and I'm well into writing more chapters so for those who haven't abandoned me…I won't abandon you. I may end up taking time off when I'm due for big school assignments and I may not update with any regularity, but I plan to aim for twice a month. Maybe it's too much to ask for but if you guys could offer me some encouragement, that writing is worth it and something I should keep doing, because it is something I love I'd be really grateful. I'm not asking you to search for my books, in fact they're due for some heavy editing soon, but just to show you're still reading this and you like it would be great.

Thank you for reading my really long Author's Note.

Anake14