Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia.

A/n1: When I was taking Creative Writing classes a few years ago, the teacher constantly told us we shouldn't ramble in stories, because it would be distracting from the plot. Also, less is more.
So for the final, most critical story, my fellow students and I were allowed to only write three pages. That was it. Three puny pages.
I ENDED UP WRITING FIFTEEN FUCKING PAGES
I EVEN USED LETTERTYPE SIZE 10
THAT'S LIKE CRAZY SMALL
AND YET
I
UM
FIFTEEN PAGES.
My teacher wasn't pleased. He actually got mad at me as well – fifteen pages, what in the world was I thinking!
But to his dismay, he actually really enjoyed the story I wrote, so I still got one of the highest scores of all. I became the first student of the teacher to get away with writing fifteen pages instead of three! Huzzah!
Know why I told you this? Well, many of my readers seemed to be disappointed when I announced I was going to stop rambling. So I needed to remind myself that it's okay to ramble, as long as the reader thinks it's not annoying.
Also, I wanted to brag. Sorry for that. ^^;;;
Anyway, thank you for your continued support! That's what I wanted to say.

A/n2: Sorry for the awful cliffhangers, by the way. It's my evilness. It does that. So please accept this lighter, fluffier chapter as a peace offering!

~~ And Three Makes Five ~~

Chapter 40:

We are no longer children – we are already dead.
Constantin Brâncusi
(Romanian sculptor)

We didn't stay.

Hell, we didn't even say goodbye. Or 'sorry for leaving anyway'. Or whatever.

We just turned our backs on him, so that the manager couldn't see our shocked faces, so that we couldn't see each other's shocked faces, and waited until the bus pulled over in front of us.

Then we got in, and not a single word about the Turkish manager's slip off the tongue was exchanged between us afterwards.

We were a lot quieter than before.

\0o0/

Well, eventually, Antonio, the kids and I got back home. The ride back had been nice and comfortable. That's about it.

We said goodbye to the other nations and kids, we wished them a happy two months (what else were we supposed to say) and we got inside our wonderful, fantastic, cool House. My god, how much I had missed it. I had even missed the flattened gate, for crying out loud.

We really should repair that gate, by the way.

So Antonio and I unpacked our bags, let the kids play outside and by the time we were finally sitting on the couch that evening, we concluded we already felt like we had never even left this House in the first place. Everything just felt that normal and safe again – it was such a wonderful feeling, I could float around in it forever.

One of the nicest things of finally being home again, was the fact that we finally had some privacy – and so, as soon as the kids were sleeping, Antonio and I retreated ourselves back into our bedroom and had hot, heated, you-name-it-we-play-it sex.

All was fine again, I caught myself thinking when Antonio was holding me in his arms and kissed my neck while his big, comforting body pressed down on me.

We were living our lives here again, we enjoyed living with the kids, we had sex, and we were at least partly aware of fucking everything.

Fucking everything.

Everything was back the way it was before. And yet it wasn't back the way it was before at all. It would never go back the way it was before, for shit's sake.

Dammit.

Dammit, dammit, dammit.

Goddammit.

'Antonio,' I croaked out, gently patting his back.

We had just finished. We were both breathing very heavily. We were sweaty and nasty and anxious and I just needed to say it.

Antonio stopped pressing down lazy kisses on my – still quite feverish – skin and looked at me wearily.

'Y-yes, Lovi?'

'I think,' I started, and instantly felt like I had rough, thick wool of some sorts in my mouth instead of my tongue, 'I think we should face the facts.'

'Shouldn't you say "face the music"?' Antonio said, as if he made a joke – but he wasn't laughing. Neither of us was.

I was smiling, though, and looked him in the eyes.

'Are you ready to become human?'

Antonio's eyes widened in panic and for a second I thought he was going to run away, so I tightened his lovely body between my thighs just a bit firmer.

'Ouch, Lovi,' Antonio muttered, since I was busy pulverizing his hips. Still, he calmed down . He calmed down enough for me to feel that I could relax my legs now.

I snorted and pushed some hair out of his face. Like Alejo, Antonio needed to get a haircut as well, dammit. His hair was slowly turning into a curly mop. Bleh.

'Now why the fuck are you acting so damn scared, you wimp? You should be happy.'

'Happy?' He spoke hard – hard and cynical.

'Yes, happy!' I said, just as hard but not cynical at all.

He grunted. 'Why!'

'Oh, I don't know – maybe because we'll finally be fucking free from being a shitty personification? We'll become humans, Antonio! Mortals! Die-able things!'

Antonio made a grumpy sound, let go of me and rolled off me, next to me, sighing as he stared at the ceiling.

'You sound like you're pretty sure about what's going to happen, Lovino.'

'Well you sound like you have no clue what's going to happen.' I rolled on my side to look at him. 'Even after everything that manager and Femke have said. Idiot.'

Antonio frowned and thought. He always looked so damn brooding and attractive whenever he attempted to frown and think at the same time, it almost made me want to read one of those goth novels.

'Sweetie, that resort manager never explained what he meant with "final months". Maybe he actually meant "final vacation months" or something like that. Because we're supposed to go back to work, eventually – whatever that's supposed to be,' Antonio finally said.

I immediately shook my head. 'I'm telling you, Antonio – they're releasing us. After the following few months, they'll reveal that the kids are going to replace us. We'll be mortal, they'll be immortal and that's that.'

'But they're just children!' Antonio sighed. 'I don't want my kids to wander around the earth like we did when we were their age. Who'll take care of them until they've reached the right human age?'

'We are. We're the biological parents, after all. And we have experience. We'll need to teach them everything we know about being who we are/were, so that they can have what it takes to become America's Next… I mean, a nation's personification,' I reasoned.

He snorted. 'Oh yeah, and you think we know all of that?'

'Well, we are personifications.'

'Oh, right.'

'Yeah.'

'I never received instructions on how to be a nation's personification, though.'

'You didn't? I did.'

'You did?'

'Sure. Written in pink ink.'

'Pink ink, eh?'

'Yup.'

'…'

'…'

'You're lying.'

'Wow – you think?' I smacked his head – gently, yet grumpily.

Antonio laughed and let me smack him more, smack him just as much and gentle and grumpily as I wanted, until he caught my arm and gave it a tug, pulling me closer to him. I yelped and wanted to hit him some more, partly because I was playing, partly because I was feeling like I would fucking bawl my eyes out of I didn't.

'You're scared,' he said – no, whispered. 'You're trying to cheer me up, you're trying to be as positive as you can, but you're scared, Lovino. You can't fool me.'

I pursed my lips together and wanted to punch his face, dammit, like Luisa would punch my face if I said something that sounded so awfully right and yet so awfully wrong at the same time, but Antonio still held my arm, so I couldn't punch him.

'I get it.' Antonio smiled and I felt he sneaked a hand behind my head. It starting stroking the back of it and it was nice.

What do you get, I wanted to ask – but I could only glare at him.

'I'm sorry. You need someone to cheer you up as well. You can't do all the cheering-up. I get that now. I'm so sorry.'

'We'll die.' I gripped his shoulders and bit my quivering lower lip. 'I don't know what's that going to be like. What should I expect?'

Antonio thought about it, his eyes looking up.

'It'll take a while before we will die, though. We're in our twenties now, so… we're going to live for at least several decades.'

'Decades, you say…'

'Oh, you don't know what a decade is? A decade is a period of ten ye—'

'I fucking KNOW what a decade is.' I groaned. 'Don't explain it to me.'

'But I like explaining things to you! I want to explain things to you!' Antonio hugged me and even rolled back and forth with me in his arms, making me feel like I was being squashed by a tanned Furby.

'Then explain – you're strangling me by the way – then explain something nice to me, dammit,' I managed to stammer, hugging him back and trying to get him to lose his tight grip around me as well.

What – I can totally do that, dammit! I can hug and make people lose their grips around me! At the same time! Yeah!

'Very well,' Antonio suddenly said as he indeed loosened his arms, 'in that case, let me explain to you what will happen to us after we've gotten fired as personifications.'

'I said nice things.'

'This is a nice thing.'

'Oh really.' I huffed.

'First of all, we'll need to find a job.'

'…as in… work?'

'That thing humans do in order to be able to pay their taxes and stuff, yes.'

'We're going to get taxes?'

'Sweetie, our kids will probably get the House, if they get older. So we'll have to get out when the moment's there and find a place of our own. So yeah, until that happens, we'll need to find a job so that we can save money for our own place.'

'Ah.' I smiled, just a bit. 'What kind of house would you like for us?'

'A farm.'

'Hm, I should have known. That's so you.'

Antonio smiled and stroke my hair. 'Would you like such a place to call home as well?'

'Sure, I like farms.' And I like the promise of watching a sweating, half naked Antonio working on his land during the Summer, I thought – but I didn't say it out loud. He'd get a big head and walk around half naked all the time, and that would be too bad. It's way more entertaining to gaze longingly at him while he doesn't have a clue, after all.

'I'll be a farmer. I'll be harvesting fruits and vegetables every year and work really hard to be able to have a reasonable income. It'll be tough.' Antonio still sounded like he actually couldn't wait for that to happen, though. 'Maybe I can also find a job in town, you know. Just in case. That way, you can go to college.'

I chuckled. 'You… you want me to go to college?'

'Of course! You're the smartest of the two of us! You're book dumb, I give you that…'

'Hey!' I huffed.

Antonio grinned. '…but you're still very bright and intelligent and you should study something you really like.'

It sounded like fun, I had to admit that. And yet, I felt troubled.

'But I'll be… I guess I'll be in my late thirties or early forties when I'll be able to do such a thing…'

'Of course not – you can start whenever you want, my love. You can start tomorrow, if you want to! I don't mind and I'm sure the kids won't mind that, either.'

I sighed, but smiled anyway. 'Alright, I'll think about it.'

'Okay.' Antonio seemed satisfied with that answer. 'What would you want to study, by the way?'

'That would be art or architecture,' I muttered.

'You could even try and become a teacher that teaches art or architecture!'

I felt my eyes lit up, as if I had just made an amazing discovery. 'That… that sounds pretty awesome, actually…'

'But you shouldn't go live in the big city, if you're going to college. I… that would make me sad. Of course, if you really want to, then who would I be to stop yo—'

I started laughing and covered his mouth with my hand. 'Shut the hell up, you dork – as if I'd ever go that far away from you. Even if I have to cross an entire country to reach my future university, I'd rather get up extremely early in the morning than move to the city.'

Antonio grinned against my hand. 'Y-you'd rwheally dwo twhat?'

'Wow, that's a stupid question. I'm going to punish you for asking such a stupid question.' I removed my hand and replaced it with my lips, my oh my, how original, and I kissed him firmly.

Antonio was surprised and for a moment, he just kind of froze as I kissed and bit and licked his lips, grabbing his fine ass and rubbing his lower body against my exposed crotch. I snickered like I had just conquered a damn country as I heard him gasp and felt his moist dick steadily swell up.

'Lovi,' he mumbled as he finally started touching me in all the right places and ferociously kissed me back, '…hmnnn… I fail… to see how this is a punishment…'

'Y-you – ah – you fail to see that?' I muttered while he tried to push up one of my legs.

'Yes…'

'…heh.'

All of a sudden, I sat upright, hop, like that, head-butting him in the process, and Antonio fell backwards.

Firstly, Antonio lay there, blushing, and he was all like "o-oh, so you want to top, well okay then, my body's ready~" but as he watched me get out of bed, his blushing abruptly stopped.

I heard him sit up. I even heard him pout.

'Loviiiii! What are you doing? I thought we were going to have some more fun…'

'And I thought I felt like taking a nice, long shower,' I said, stretching my back just to fucking pester him.

'B-but Lovi…'

'Punishment!' I spun around until I faced him and planted my hands on my hips. 'That'll teach you to think I'd move away from my family for something as unimportant as school and knowledge and a decent education!'

'So you're punishing me by… leaving me in this state.' Antonio seemed a bit mad. I liked that.

'No, I'm punishing you by taking a shower and leaving you in that state, like a total bastard,' I cockily corrected him.

Antonio saw my flustered face – yes, it was flustered, again, it does that, I don't know why it just keeps on doing that whenever Antonio and/or sex are involved – and he smirked.

'You realize we're going to have sex anyway, don't you?'

'I don't know what you're talking about, you sex fiend. I'm going to shower and that's final.'

I walked into the bathroom. I stood there in the middle of the chilly, cold room for a second or two, before huffily peeping around the corner of the entrance, to where Antonio still was sitting.

'I'm not locking the door, by the way. Just so you know.'

The last thing I saw before casually closing the door was Antonio's grinning, excited face. It made me grin and feel excited as well, dammit.

Oh this was going to be good.

\0o0/

It really seemed like it was going to be good, yes. I was convinced it was going to be wonderful.

Especially when I was showering for, like, five damn seconds and I heard him coming – no, storming into the bathroom, already too horny to at least give me a moment to get the running water warm and nice, dammit.

And I was like "I don't remember inviting you into the bathroom", and he was like "well I remember huff huff" and then he stepped inside the bathtub as well, fucking hard (FYI, I'm talking about his erection here, it wasn't like he stomped around the tub like a confused elephant), and I wanted to nag at him for being too, I don't know, assertive, but then he wrapped his arms around me and pulled himself against me and we both got wet and everything I wanted to say kind of flew from my mind.

And you know, everything up to this point was nice. He was kissing me now, and touching me, and asking me what would be the most comfortable position for us to do this, since we didn't have shower sex all that often, and I really enjoyed all that was happening underneath the nice, finally warmed-up water.

But then I thought of something to do – I seriously don't remember anymore because of reasons I'm about to explain – and I slipped.

I slipped, fell backwards and bumped the back of my head against the side of the tub, and goddammit, that hurt!

Antonio had witnessed everything and gasped, asking if I was alright. I said I was, dammit, but I sure as fuck was going to get a massive bump, but that was alright, he should just pull me back up and continue where we stopped, because I was still very much aroused. And he was okay with that and attempted to pull me up…

…but then he fucking slipped as well, falling right on top of me, making me smash that same painful spot in the back of my head again.

So I passed the fuck out.

…

Yeah.

\0o0/

When I finally came back into this world, after having really strange dreams about me going on a trip around the world in a bathtub, together with a Spanish elephant that kept asking me if I was alright, I firstly noticed it was morning already. The second thing I noticed was… that Antonio had gotten a lot smaller and younger while I was gone.

I mean, he totally looked like a kid now. A cute kid, sure, a cute kid with big, green eyes that actually weren't really green, but more like hazel.

Also, he was blowing bubbles into my face. Big, colorful bubbles.

…

…

Oh, it was Matteo. Right, I knew that.

I groaned and tried to sit up a bit more. '…crap, what the hell... Matteo, what are you doing here, dammit…'

The kid blinked once, twice, and then his whole face seemed to open up as he smiled broadly and accidentally splashed the remains of his bubble soap all over the bed.

'Papa Lovi! You'reh awaaaaaake!'

'You're loud,' I mumbled, sinking back into the pillows.

'He's awake?' I heard his twin brother ask. 'Alright! I'll go tell Papa Toni and Freaky Beard!'

I turned my head to the side, just in time to see Alejo sprint out of the bedroom. Apparently, he had been sitting on the chair next to my bed for quite some time.

'W-what's going on,' I muttered, frowning. Then I winced – I suddenly felt a rough, headache-causing pain throbbing through the back of my head.

'Ouch – fuck, fuck, this hurts,' I hissed.

'Papa, you shouldn't use bad words.' Luisa – who had been sitting next to Matteo all this time, or so it appeared – crawled further up and frowned at me. 'And you're a stupid turd. That's what you are, dammit.'

I blankly stared at her and wondered why the hell all of the kids had been watching over me instead of some fucking adults. I mean, the last time I left Antonio in the care of the twins, they almost fucking saw his leg off. I was lucky to still have my head!

'See?' Matteo in the meantime told Luisa, proudly waving his bubble ring around like it was a sword or, more fitting since it was Matteo we were talking about, a wand, 'I told ya I'd wake him up with mah bubblies. Ehehehehe!~'

Luisa snorted and looked down at the sheets. 'You spilled it on the sheets, dummy. That's why he woke up – because papa thought he peed himself.'

'No,' I growled, 'I woke up because I woke up, dammit. And I hope that your sister is lying about you spilling your bubble soap all over the sheets, young man, because Papa Lovi is feeling pretty damn horrible today.'

'Uhhh,' Matteo stammered, and instantly started rubbing pillows over the wet spots.

MY PILLOWS. MY BEAUTIFUL, SILKEN PILLOWS. MY WONDERFUL, DELIGHTFUL, EXPENSIVE PILLOWS.

God, I wish I could get up and snap at Matteo for acting like such a fucking moron, but, just in time, I remembered I was a dad, and that he was only trying to help, and that lashing out at my son wouldn't relieve my painful head at all – nope, it would probably only get worse. You know, because of feeling guilty for yelling at Matteo and all.

So in the end, I decided to keep calm and readjusted my position in bed a bit better – away from the wet spot, and again attempting to sit up a bit.

Luisa immediately got up and grabbed one of the pillows that Matteo hadn't ruined yet, weirdly wobbling over the bed linen in my direction. Then she harshly commanded me to bend forward a bit, dammit, so she could tuck – no, smash, kick, hurl that pillow behind my back.

'Oh,' I said, flabbergasted. 'Okay.'

'Hmpf!' Luisa's response was, after she had safely installed that pillow, and blushed heavily as she wobbled back to her original spot.

'Thank you,' I told her, as soon as she sat down again, and smiled when I saw her face heat up even more.

'Papa…' Matteo's tiny, sobbing voice suddenly caught my attention, '….uwuuuuh… I think I bwwoke the pilloows…'

I looked and yes, my pillows indeed were no longer creamy white or baby blue of soft pink – what the fuck was up with my gayish taste in pillows, by the way – but they all looked gray, wet and actually kind of creepy now.

I shuddered. Fucking nasty!

'Aw, Teo – it's okay. Papa's just… no no, don't cry! It's okay! It's… just throw them off the bed! Throw them off, I don't want them anymore.'

'You're not angwy?' Matteo blubbered, astonished but relieved.

'No, silly, I'm not.'

'Ah,' he said and dried his tears and snotty nose with the same pillows by suddenly burying his face into it.

Then he starting a whole new conversation with me, while that pillow still covered his entire face. Of course, I only heard muffled sounds and words that sounded like "papa" or "Lovi" every now and then, so I didn't really know what to do.

'Now why don't you go groom Mia,' I helplessly said. 'Or show her those fine pillows!'

Matteo abruptly let the pillow fall down – a long string of snot still connecting his teary face to the pillow.

'I can has pillowz?'

'Another LOL-cat reference, huh.'

'…whuh?'

'Yes, Teo.' I rolled my eyes, but chuckled. 'You can have the pillows. Say hi to Mia from me, alright?'

'Ya!' Matteo shrieked, and collected as much wasted pillows as he could, before he let himself fall of the bed – 'I dun't feel paaaain, mah pillooows pwotekt meh!' – and staggered out of the room, like an ant that was carrying too much food. Or something.

Then only Luisa was left, and even though I really appreciated her help, just as much as I appreciated the help of the boys (whatever their exact help was), I actually wanted her to go as well, so I could think and rest a little.

But before I could answer her accusing glare – apparently I had done something wrong again, I should keep tags on that – the door opened… but I saw nobody coming in.

Of course I instantly wanted to complain about annoying ghosts haunting the doors, could a wounded man never get his rest in this place, etcetera etcetera… but Alejo's excited voice quickly put an end to my aspiration to nag even more than I had already done ever since waking up.

'Look, look look look, Papa Lovi's awake, Papa Toni! You see it too, Freaky Beard?'

'Freaky Beard?' I huffily commented.

'Lovino!' Antonio hastily followed Alejo inside the bedroom and stared at me like I had just survived a super-dangerous operation of some sorts. 'You're awake! God, I'm so happy, I thought you were slipping into a coma when you didn't wake up after all this time…'

I blushed, since I was me and Antonio was Antonio.

'O-oh, I'm feeling okay enough. You didn't have to be that worried about me…' I stammered, averting my eyes.

However, Antonio's quickly distracted brain wasn't paying attention to what I said – no, it was paying attention to somebody that had yet to enter the bedroom.

'You were right, Guillermo, he did wake up. Sorry that I doubted you!'

'Guillermo?' I repeated. 'Who the fuck is Guillermo, dammit?'

Alejo's face popped up next to me all of a sudden, as the small boy tried to pull himself up the bed.

'Guillermo is Freaky Beard!' he not-helpfully explained to me as I lifted him up.

'And who in the goddamn world is Freaky Beard?'

'I'm Freaky Beard. And I'm Guillermo. Apparently, I have many names. You should smack some sense into your son's questionable behavior, like my parents did – like I did.'

I looked up. I recognized that voice, somewhat, but I didn't really remember that well anymore. It was an old and cranky and hateful voice, a voice I rather didn't want to hear at all, and then the person to which the voice belonged all of a sudden was standing next to my bed as well.

And I swear to god, I couldn't even fucking yelp or groan when I finally realized who he was.

'But you,' he lowly told me with a snort and a colorless glare, 'must call me Dr. Delgado. You disgusting homosexual brat.'