I do not own Hetalia, okay? I know it has been a while since I updated this fic, but I do plan to have this story go to the end. Anyway, enough of this A/N, on with the fic!

June 1st, 1919

(From the diary of Ivan Braginsky.)

I had missed that boy so much. Yesterday was exhausting. Lucille had Fredka and I at Nikolai's party yesterday. Natalya thinks she held it to cheer me up and get me outside of the house. It helped I would say that. Personally, I hardly want to leave except for work. It is just too much of a hassle for me to get out of bed, get dressed, get into the chair and get out. I know Katyusha, Fredka and even Matthew help. Matthew keeps spending more and more time here. Katyusha keeps telling me that it's to be there in case I ever want to talk to a fellow veteran about what happened. That speaking with him would be good for me. I have yet to really do so. I have written a few letters to keep them happy. I slowly try to get myself dressed more, into the bathroom more and handle much of what I need to myself. It's not like I am weak, I am very strong, that's why I was put on the ambulance corps. An injured body is very heavy because it is hard for the person to move on their own ability. I somewhat have that ability, it's everything below my waist that cannot move on its own.

I had planned to sleep in a little bit. It was the weekend and well, the party was long last night. Lucille's friends would not stop wanting to talk to me about what I had seen, what it was like in the Bonnefoy home while I recovered before I headed back, so on and so forth. Fredka stayed with me to help me home and the late hour is something he told me Natalya had gotten mad at him for until when they brought over the family to visit and to teach Nikolai how to shoot. According to Fredka, he would not let the matter go and wanted to try it out as soon as he could. But when I had told Natalya he was late because the people at the party would not let me go until a late hour, she forgave him and apologized for how she acted before.

When Nikolai was begging me to show him how to shoot his new bb gun, it really sunk in what Lucille said about by me wallowing in self-pity, I was being a burden more than my physical limitations were. Nikolai doesn't care. He wanted to learn how to shoot. I am his hero. Fredka finds it funny as he hoped his son would look up to him. I think he's jealous too, but this is as best as I can get. I know he said this is practice for when Lucille and I get together, as if that could happen in more ways than one.

However, that was the biggest smile I had seen on Nikolai's face in a long time. And he is not a bad shot either. Hit the soup cans most of the time. He is only 4 years old and bb guns are not the most accurate of weapons. Sure, I was the one kind of guiding him along as a kind of bench to steady him, but he listened to me and took my direction. And it was that that helped to sink in Lucille's words. They don't care. They love me so much to help me, to not cast me aside and keep me as a member of the family. We stick together. However, I will not lie that I wish for two things, one that I could confess how I feel about Fredka to him, so he'll stop joking about me and Lucille. I know it is without malice, but it is annoying. And two, that I could walk again. Somewhat. Even if the best I can do is with a cane, it improves so much. You do not know how much of a treasure walking is until you cannot do it.

So how was that? Good? Bad? Short? Long? Let me know in a review. This story is intended to stand independent of both The Longing of the Heart and The Healing of the Heart which this story will have a difference from both naturally. Now if this will be as long as those, that I do not know yet and I won't update as fast as some of the others I have. But anyway, remember to read (well you just did) and to review. Ciao for now,

Otherrealmwriter

Aka

Realm