Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia.

A/n1: Last Wednesday evening, I was watching a current affairs-program late at night. Thinking about what happened earlier that day, I think most of Europe was watching similar programs. I had seen a lot of opinion and especially a lot of cartoons already, just as I had heard many people talk about the drama that happened in Paris. I myself was trying to form a certain picture on all of that had happened as well.
Then, at the ending of the program, the satirical item LuckyTV came with a short clip. In the clip, I watched a black backgroud and heard a cartoony tune and I could see a hand, holding a gun. The gun fired, but there was only a little flag with "bang" on it that came out of it. You might think that this was just a somewhat abstract way of showing the viewers that the program maker was thinking about those people that were killed in France, but the fact that "bang" means "scared" in Dutch (and the program maker seemed very well-aware of that) gave me the shivers. It didn't help that the clip froze for a couple of seconds after the flag had come out, either.
In any case, my heart goes out to the people that died the last couple of days and the ones they leave behind. This was one dreadful week.

A/n2: I got fired this week. My chef called me this week and told me the company had to 'let go' a lot of other order pickers that worked at the great warehouse – including me.
I can't say I didn't see it coming – there wasn't much work to do after the holidays were over – but I'm pretty bummed by it nevertheless. Now I can go back to writing tons and tons of letters in the vain hope I'll get a job. And I can go back to my parents' endless speeches about how and where to find a job, and I can go back to feeling guilty and useless because I don't have an extra job. Just great.
I'm still a mailwoman, thankfully enough, but that's not enough. I'll need more work… and I hope I'll find it, because otherwise...
Oh pfffrt, I don't even want to think about 'otherwise'. Ugh.

A/n3: Just a few more chapters left, and I wonder how I'm going to wrap this story up, really. There are still some loose ends, yes, but after that, it's time to conclude this story!
I wonder how I can thank you all for reading this fic for such a long time.^^ Everything I can think of just doesn't seem to be enough, really.

~~ And Three Makes Five ~~

Chapter 83:

I've never been a material girl. My father always told me never to love anything that cannot love you back.
Imelda Marcos
(Former First Lady of the Philippines)

The very next day, I woke up after having had, say, two, three hours of sleep.

I felt like a fucking boat-wreck. I had been pretty much unable to catch some zzz's, because of all the happenings of the other day, because of my own stretched-out emotions and because of the great dinner Antonio and I were going to prepare this evening.

Yes.

We were going to have dinner with our kids.

With all of them.

Tonight.

And I thought I was going to fucking die from the stress because of it, dammit.

No, wait, it… it wasn't stress I was feeling.

I silently stared at the ceiling, my arms resting next to my sides as my mind wandered off to the other day – when Antonio and I had finally met up with Luisa.

God. She had become an adult.

I swallowed a lump and felt my fists clench themselves automatically.

Even though it had been twenty years already, I could still vividly imagine her child-version. The tiny, small Luisa, that would glare at me, and puff up her cheeks, and try out new swearing words she simply borrowed from me. The grumpy little kid that wouldn't accept hugs and kisses unless she really, really couldn't hide her eagerness for them anymore, and would reluctantly allow me and Antonio to embrace her with all the parental affection we had for her. In-between punches, kicks and hisses, of course.

But that small, bossy girl had changed into a grown woman now. She was an adult, human lady – and she wasn't ugly, either. I didn't know if she was dating anybody yet, but if you ignored the fact her sense of fashion had only gotten worse throughout the years, you couldn't help but see a very attractive, very interesting young woman. I bet she had to kick the horny bastards off her. I hope she did kick them off her, all of them.

I'd have liked to have done that for her.

My lips started to tremble a bit when I, once again, realized that I never saw my cute daughter grow up.

I never sent her off to school, I never met her friends, I never confronted her with bad grades, I never spoke a teacher, I never discovered her talents, I never joined her when she went shopping, I never flipped out even worse than she herself must have done when her first period started and I never chewed out the first boy she brought home.

And the same goes for Alejo and Matteo.

My twin sons. My hands gripped the sheets below them and I exhaled shakily.

Luisa had carried a picture of them, and after all the drama of yesterday, she had shown it to me and Antonio. Their resemblance to Antonio was disturbing, dammit – it really was like I was starting at two different versions of him, only slightly younger and less… how should I call it… dark.

Alejo looked like Antonio in his scary pirate days, and I must confess I shuddered a bit when I looked at his image. But the shuddering stopped when I noticed there wasn't any hate or lust for power shining in his hazel-colored eyes. Just… well, just a cool kindness and a certain lust for life. It made Antonio break down in tears – that sentimental bastard cried so much yesterday, but I think he cried the most upon finding out our eldest son hadn't become what he had always feared he'd become.

And Matteo! Matteo still wore a ridiculous pair of glasses, and they were still red. He looked like Antonio as well, but dorkier, sillier and friendlier – and I never thought I'd ever say that about anybody, since Antonio was, in my eyes, one of the kindest people I knew. Matteo smiled broadly on the picture and looked happy, but he seemed to be older than the other two. I don't know – there was something in his face, or his posture, that told me that he had gone through a lot of pain.

Luisa didn't say anything about it, though. She didn't want to. She said that her brothers had the right to come and tell their lifestories to me and Antonio themselves, and that's why we decided to have this dinner in the first place – to meet up with our children and… and get to know them again.

Getting to know your own kids.

Tssk. How fucking pathetic.

There it was again – that grim, hollow feeling that tried to attack me every time I remembered that I never had been the father I had wanted to be. Twenty years ago, I suddenly was a dad, a papa, Papa Lovi, but just when I had realized how much they actually meant to me – how much I loved them and cared about them – they were snatched away from me.

I now knew what it was like to have your kids taken away from you. I had forgotten about it thanks to the PPSS bastards, but I knew everything again now.

It was like falling in a bottomless pit. Because, like falling down forever, losing your kids is like never stop feeling something's horribly off.

N-no fucking parent should go through that kind of numbing, helpless pain…

I breathed in again and heard myself sob. Oh – so I did start to cry. Well great. I already felt shitty, I guess feeling just a bit more shitty wouldn't hurt too much.

But right when I was lying there, with tears sliding over my cheeks and plopping into my ears, the door opened and Antonio came walking in the bedroom. I had half-expected him to bring me breakfast again, just like yesterday, but his hands were empty. Maybe he had forgotten the tray – it wouldn't surprise me, he was kind of a scatterbrain, after all.

'Good-morning, Lovino!' he greeted me, his voice upbeat and nice as always.

'H-hi,' I croaked back – and felt like kind of a bastard when I saw my crappy greeting instantly kicked his happiness in the metaphoric balls.

'L-Lovi!' he stammered as he rushed to my side and crouched down next to the bed. 'Hey, what's wrong, sweetie? Oh, your eyes are all red and irritated! Oh, my love… how long have you been crying?'

'I'm not fucking crying, crying is for babies,' I nagged, harshly wiping my lower arm over my eyes. 'I-I'm just… I don't know, it's because I'm sick and shit.'

'No it's not.' Antonio smiled kindly at me and gently pulled away my arm. 'You shouldn't rub your eyes like that, sweetie, they'll only get more swollen if you do that. You should touch them gentler – here, like this.'

Antonio leaned in closer and placed one of his hands underneath head, supporting it as the other one softly caressed the area right underneath my eyes.

I scoffed. 'Y-you stupid ass. My eyes hurt – not the part below them!'

'Well, I don't think pushing my fingers in your eyes will make you feel any better.' Antonio chuckled and I felt I relaxed a bit more when his other hand stroke the back of my head. 'I'll get a face cloth for you – a warm one. I'll dab your face a bit and then, I'll take you downstairs with me, okay?'

'I don't want to go downstairs.' I said and folded my arms. 'I-I'm still sick, dammit.'

'You said you felt a lot better yesterday night,' Antonio remembered.

I tsssked. 'I-I only said that to get you into bed.'

'You didn't get me into bed, though.'

'Well.' I snorted. 'It's not my fault you didn't want to fuck a needy man.'

'An exhausted man,' Antonio corrected, 'and I didn't want to make love to you because we were both pretty emotional, remembering we are parents of three grown-up children and everything.'

I mumbled something immature under my breath. Antonio had looked extremely vulnerable and fragile yesterday night, and I had hoped that having sex with him would, I-I don't know, relight his fire or something – but Antonio had indeed rejected my selfless offer and instead, he had held me until I fell asleep.

Typical. I had wanted to cheer him up, and he cheered me up instead. Our relationship in short.

'We can have sex tonight, but only if you feel better.'

'H-hm?' I looked up at him, my thoughts disturbed.

Antonio laughed cheekily and bent over a bit, pressing a couple of kisses on the area just below my ear.

'You heard me,' he muttered afterwards, his voice hot and low, 'and if you didn't, you'll probably find out tonight, my love. If the stars aren't lying, that is.'

'A-ah. Okay.' I gulped instinctively. Antonio and I hadn't shared the bed – in all possible meanings – in a long time, so I felt both excited and nervous about the two of us having a romantic night together once again. But it'd be nice to feel his body again. I had missed it. All of it.

'But let's talk about that later tonight, okay?' Antonio got up from the floor. 'I'll first go dab your face now, so in the meantime, you can mentally prepare yourself for all the questions I'm going to ask you – because if you think I'm just going to let you sob and whimper here all by yourself, you think wrong, sweetie.'

I could only wordlessly glare at him as he walked off, thinking both wonderful and very mean things about him at the same time.

/0o0\

It was a strange experience, dabbing Lovino's face in the same fashion I had dabbed Luisa's face less than a day before.

Especially because once more, the striking resemblances between my husband and my daughter struck me like a… like a swat in the face with a fly-swatter. The same grumpy expressions, the same pose, the same ridiculous way he tried to make me believe that me cleaning up his face didn't matter to him at all, dammit, not at all, although I already knew that he'd instantly kiss me back if I was playful enough to try and steal one from him.

'I don't know if I'm up for this,' Lovino mumbled.

We had been talking about the kids for a few minutes – and I figured they were part of the reason why he was crying all by himself here. I frowned a bit as I watched Lovino's troubled eyes. He may not really look like it, but over the years, Lovi had become more of a… well, of a person that just keeps silent about his own emotions and feelings. Yesterday, I had cried rivers, waterfalls of tears after realizing Luisa was my daughter and Matteo and Alejo were my sons, and although Lovi had shed some tears here and there as well, he had controlled himself, waiting until he was alone.

…

I wish he wouldn't do that…

'Lovino,' I started, turning his face my way when he tried a bit too hard to my liking to keep his distance from me, '…hey, sweetie, you can tell me if something's bothering you. Please tell me, okay? Please tell me why you think you're not up for this.'

I actually knew what he meant to say with 'not up for this', but I asked anyway.

Lovino gnawed on his lower lip and resisted my asking hands for a couple of seconds, until he finally gave in and sadly looked up to me.

'I don't think I will survive losing them again, A-Antonio. I… I don't think I can… I can't live with the idea of…'

He couldn't say anything more, his words disappeared in his soft sobs and mumbled complaints.

'Oh sweetie…' I felt my eyes started to itch as well and pulled him closer. 'It's too early to think about that, Lovi… way too early.'

Lovino hugged me tightly and his voice broke when he spoke again. 'I-I know, b-but—'

'No.' I shook my head and stroke his sweaty back – he should change his PJ's later. 'We're not talking about that yet. Not now. They're still young, Lovino. They're in the prime of their lives!'

I pushed him back a bit, looking him in the eyes with a hopeful smile.

'Now. Before you continue to worry about all the things I just know you're going to worry about, let me tell you this: do you want to start mourning them already?'

Lovino gave me a shocked look, not even blinking. 'O-of course not, y-you moron!'

'Then don't do it!' I sighed and tenderly wiped his eyes, again, this time using the back of my hand. 'Don't look at or think about our kids as if they're lying in their coffin already. They're humans, yes, and one day, they will die – but can't we, until that time comes, just enjoy being their parents? Maybe… maybe even… enjoy becoming grandparents?'

'Grandparents!' That caused Lovi to choke out a strangled kind of laugh, but a laugh nevertheless. 'Y-yeah, right! You see those three dorks becoming parents any day soon? Like – can you imagine Alejo, or… or Matteo, of all people, as a father?'

I pouted. 'Hey, Allie's a good kid! And Teo, well, Teo could be a great father as well – you witnessed the way he played with his cactus as well! He loved that plant as if it was his own daughter!'

He rolled his eyes. 'In that case, what about Luisa? That fiery temper of hers is surely going to infect all of her kid's genes.'

I laughed. 'Silly Lovi!~ The first guy that's indecently touching Lulu and knocking her up in the process is going to spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair, you know that!~'

He laughed as well. 'So you're going to let him live? Aren't you the softy!'

'I've grown in the last couple of years.' I nodded proudly. 'If she gets a boyfriend in about ten years or so, who knows, maybe I'll only want to beat him up real bad then! Merely break a few ribs or something.'

'You're so mild, it scares me.' Lovino giggled, which was absolutely adorable and made me want to tickle and kiss him silly, just to hear him laugh like that again. But I had to be careful with him, he was still a bit weak, after all.

Also, I wanted to have sex tonight. So did he – I had seen that perverted glister in his eyes, ohh yessss – but I was supposed to be the wise, older man here and politely reject him if he didn't feel well enough – so it was up to me to make sure my blushing, cute and way too sexy spouse would feel good and at ease today.

So let's get busy already.

I stopped caressing his face, collected his torso, legs and everything that belonged to his comfortably-warm body in my arms and raised him up, not responding – well, not right away – when he gave a startled yelp and started nagging what the fuck I thought I was doing all of a sudden, dammit!

'Well,' I simply said as I stepped into the corridor outside of the hallway, calmly making my way to the stairs, 'I think I told you that I was going to bring you downstairs with me. Remember?'

Lovino growled in protest, but clung onto my shirt in a accepting, no, in a bordering on downright affectionate manner as I descended the stairway, one step at a time.

'B-but what help can I be,' he softly muttered, batting his eyes down. 'I'm not even a very good cook. Or assistant-cook or whatever. And I always drop or break something when I'm trying to help you out.'

I smiled and managed to gently ruffle a hand through his hair.

'You're not a help. You're much, much more than that.'

Lovi didn't really say anything in respond to that. Maybe he wasn't sure what to reply on a comment like that – something I could understand, because even I myself didn't exactly know what I had said to him, except that it sounded pretty nice in my ears and that I hoped that he shared that same opinion.

Fortunately, my hopeful thoughts were confirmed when Lovino quietly pulled himself up a bit, placed a hand to the side of my face and placed a soft, shy kiss on my cheek. It was such a tender and unexpected gesture – I even stopped walking downstairs for a second, I had to adjust my grip around him.

I heard a chuckle and I could see from the corner of my eye that Lovino smiled lovingly at me, his fingertips still touching my face ever so feathery-light.

'Don't drop me, dumbass.'

o\00/

It had been a long time since the last time my brothers and I had sat in a bus together.

Matteo and Alejo both owned either a crappy car or a badass motorcycle that reeked of gas and pollution and other stuff that has a bad effect on the environment, after all, while I didn't even own the bicycle that was at my place. Both that thing and the boring car that stood in front of my and Seb's apartment were… well, his. I only owned the flabby leg-vehicle.

…

Talking about my legs. Yes. Yes, that was the pun.

Anyway, when I had told my siblings that our parents – our real, biological ones – were expecting us for dinner this very evening, we all quickly came to the same conclusion: we should go to their place together, and, heck, why not use the bus as a way of transportation? After all, there was a very conveniently-placed bus stop close to Papa Lovi and Papa Toni's House, so… so it was a very logical and normal thing to just take the bus.

It was pretty funny, because the bus turned out to be able to pick all of us up in turns: it firstly stopped in my street, then it went and pulled over in Alejo's street, just one, two blocks from my own, and finally, the bus stopped in the street where Matteo and Mia lived. Raquel had agreed to babysit her and the both of them even came to see him off. The way Matteo pressed his face against the window to mouth 'my pretty prince and badass princess I love you both so much oh god' was both endearing as it was embarrassing, since he even wept during his touching departure.

'Dude, we're only going to visit our dads, we're not going on a lifelong trip around the goddamn world,' Alejo dryly commented as Matteo plucked his glasses off his nose and dried his eyes. 'I mean, shit. Why so dramatic?'

'I-I'm sorry, I'm so sorry…' Matteo laughed nervously and put his glasses back on. 'I-I've been like this the entire day already, y-you know? It's like… i-it's like I'm going to experience something world-changing, and I don't really know what I will feel when the life-changing thing actually happens, and I've been crying out of both happiness and anxiousness all day long…'

'Why aren't you gay yet?' Alejo asked.

'Alejo!' I glared at Alejo dismissingly. 'Just because Matteo is a wimp and the biggest, most shameless pussy since… um… well, birth, doesn't mean he can't be straight! Lots of straight men are also total weaklings, after all.'

Matteo frowned. 'I get the feeling you just offended both gay and straight men and I don't know what I should do with that feeling.'

Alejo nodded understandingly. 'That's just classic Luisa. Either ignore it or prepare yourself for a shit-storm of insults from a pregnant lady that had a bit too much chocolate this morning.'

Matteo gasped. 'You had? Luisa! You shouldn't eat too much chocolate! You what kind of stuff's in that? Bad stuff! Like caffeine! Too much of it might damage your baby!'

'I just had ONE candy bar this afternoon, dammit!' I nagged – but instantly felt guilty about it nevertheless and mentally told myself I perhaps indeed had eaten a tad too much of it, since I hadn't counted the two bars of chocolate I stuffed my face with this morning in my careful calculations.

'Well, anyway,' Alejo sighed as he stretched himself (we sat at a four-passenger-seat-area in the bus, by the way, so we could all sit together), 'now that we're all here, maybe we should ask Luisa why we couldn't bring our lovers and kid with us, to meet our fathers.'

I grunted and already made myself ready to snarl at him, but Matteo beat me to it – in a much calmer fashion.

'Allie, Luisa wants them to get used to the feeling of being parents of grown children, first. And so do I.'

Alejo gave him a mocking look, but folded his arms and allowed our brother to continue his explanation.

'How would you feel if the kids you haven't seen in years suddenly show up at your house, all grown-up? Isn't that… isn't that shocking enough already?' Matteo rubbed his hands. 'I can only imagine how torn-apart they must feel… w-we were their children, they really, really loved us, we know they did, and then we were taken from them. They never had the chance to raise us. You know how that probably feels, not being able to raise your own children?'

Alejo huffed. 'I don't know, you're the father here…'

'I'd die.' Matteo started to shiver and now rubbed his arms. 'If my daughter was taken away from me? I'd die a thousand deaths. Maybe not literally, but the man I used to be would die, right then and there.'

Alejo didn't make a sarcastic reply. He did glance at Matteo, holding his breath, as if he expected him to say more. Matteo was done, though.

'Matteo is right, Alejo.' I patted Matteo's shoulder and took in a deep breath. 'I-I want them to meet Seb too, of course… but at least let them get used to the idea of their kids being adults now. Bringing our lovers and Mia with us would be an overkill of emotions or something to them, like… like… "GAH, they're really adults" and then "GAH, they're dating already" and "GAH, two of them are parents already or dangerously close to becoming one" and I think it would be mean to give them strokes on the very first day we'll all be together as a family again.'

'Okay, okay…' Alejo sighed and ran a hand through his messy hair. 'I get it now. Okay. Thanks for explaining. I was just wondering about this.'

'That's alright,' Matteo said.

'And… and I'm also wondering about something else.' Alejo sounded a bit troubled.

'What is it?' I asked.

'Will they… still like us?' His brown-green eyes gave me a slightly scared look. 'We're… w-we're not the fluffy, bubbly kids we used to be anymore. We changed. I no longer want to run after innocent creatures with an axe. You don't chase away every single human being that wants to be close to you. And Matteo even became one of the nicest dads that I ever got to meet.'

'Well,' I softly said, smiling at him, 'if you put it like that, they'll only like us more.'

Alejo's eyes grew a bit foggier. 'You… you really think so?'

'You know you think so as well, Allie.' Matteo smiled as well, only much broader.

'So they'll love us?' Alejo was quick to rub his cheeks, but I had seen something small and watery sliding off them anyway. 'Me as well, I mean? E-even though I haven't really accomplished any—'

'Definitely.' I cut him off, leaning over to him to put a hand on his knee. 'Absolutely.'

Alejo choked up and I had to squeeze his knee really hard to avoid sobbing as well, while Matteo exhaled shakily and started polishing his misty glasses again.

We were both the happiest, whiniest and the dorkiest persons in that entire bus.

0\0o/

The bus stopped at a bus stop that was… very close to our parental house. Our parental house – did you see me use those words? I couldn't believe I could actually say things like that now!

'There it is,' Luisa said as soon as the three of us got off the bus and stood there, in the gap that separated Raquel's house from our fathers' House. It was very funny for me to see the big House Luisa was pointing at, and it was even funnier to think that all this time, whether I was fruitlessly ringing their doorbell or kissing all of Raquel's pain away in bed, I had been so close to them, like a mirage – so very close, so frustratingly close and still so insanely far away.

Maybe it actually wasn't that funny.

'I'm their florist,' I heard myself say as my brother, sister and I slowly made our way into the direction of the biggest House. 'Did I tell you that already? I… remember how I told you about those new customers of me, that wanted to have a big celebration party for their twentieth wedding anniversary? Papa Lovi and Papa Toni are… they actually hired me. It's their wedding anniversary. But I never met them since Papa Toni had asked Raquel to serve as the messenger between us. Just imagine what could have happened if I had met them face to face.'

'I wonder about that as well,' Allie said, grinning at me as if he hadn't sat and cried his eyes out in the bus a little while ago. 'I mean, knowing you, you probably would've done business with them as usual, not having a clue in the world, until months later. Then, you probably would've stopped watering your cacti one fine day and asked yourself "but wait a minute, weren't those people…?" and only then you'd have started to connect the dots.'

I made a face. 'I'd never "water" cacti.'

He rolled his eyes. 'I know, I know, Mia's kind has always been very special to you.'

I blinked, confused. 'What's got my kid to do with cacti?'

Alejo looked at me and hesitated, but ultimately, he just smiled at me, shook his head and gave me a firm smack on the back.

'Anyway, tell me more about that anniversary party. What did you and that saucy little minx Raquel prepare between the bed sheets, hmm?~'

\0o0/

I looked at the huge clock in the kitchen and felt my heart made a leap – well, it at least felt like it made a leap.

Because it… it was about five o'clock now. It shouldn't be too long before the kids would show up. Just a little bit longer, and this House would be filled with voices that had belonged here for years, but could have only been here for a few mere, measly, meager months. Fucking unfair world we live in, dammit.

Antonio had prepared most of the dinner by himself, only when he had to cut vegetables or cook rice, I had swooped in to help him out. Not much, but just a bit. All bits help, after all. That's what I believe.

We were both now sitting in the kitchen. But just a few seconds ago, we had been in the dining room, and a couple of minutes earlier than that, we had been… in the kitchen.

YES, WE WERE PACING AROUND THESE TWO ROOMS LIKE RESTLESS LIONS OR BEARS OR WHATEVER AND IT SUCKED BALLS.

I glanced over at Antonio, who was just as quiet as I was and rocked back and forth on his chair like he had to pee really, really badly. Just like me, he just couldn't keep his eyes off the clock for too long, and just like me, he looked rather neat. Nervous, yes, anxious, certainly – but neat. And neatness made everything better.

We changed ourselves half a hour ago – I don't really know why, it just seemed to be normal, especially when you knew you were going to greet very important people in about a short time – and so, there was nothing left for us to do but wait.

The two of us were very chatty, loud people – we normally blabbered about whatever the fuck floated our boat, with a volume that was ten times more obnoxious than what was necessary. But we hadn't spoken much for the last couple of hours. Indeed – hours. These had been quiet hours. Yup. Very quiet…

I fucking hated quietness.

But I had no idea what to say to Antonio.

…

Wasn't that weird?

Then, Antonio suddenly cleared his throat, and looked at me.

'You think they'll like the food?'

Relieved that I had been given the opportunity to talk, I sat up a bit more.

'It's tomato soup, paella and vanilla and chocolate ice cream, Antonio. I'd say it's a very safe thing to say they'll probably like it. You know, since they've probably been brought up with these kinds of typical Spanish foods.'

Antonio furrowed his brows worryingly. 'But soup and ice cream aren't really typical Spanish foods.'

'I'm not sure about soup, no, but the ice cream indeed isn't something typical Spanish. But it is typical Italian, and therefore it is good. Besides, they loved soup and ice cream when they were little demon children, so my guess is that the older versions like those things as well.' I sighed and scratched my wrist. I got all itchy all of a sudden, dammit.

Antonio plucked his lip. He seemed to think hard about something – probably something that unsettled him at least a bit.

I sighed, again, and awkwardly moved myself – with chair and everything – towards him a bit more.

'Okay, out with it. What's bugging you, hm?'

'You think…' Antonio's expression was changing from thoughtfully to slightly panicky, '…y-you think they'll let me hug them?'

'Of course they'll let you hug them.' I huffed, hearing how unsure I sounded. 'I mean… they never minded your hugs when they were little, so why would they mind them now?'

'You know why.'

'Well…' I frowned and looked away, 'well, maybe… maybe I just don't want to think about that.'

'Maybe they'll bolt as well,' Antonio mused. 'Good thing there isn't much traffic now.'

'Hey, don't get all gloomy and shit on me, dammit!' I smacked his upper arm, but it probably hurt my hand more than it hurt him. 'It's my job to be the skeptical sourpuss, not yours. Come on, cheer up a bit.'

'Okay.' Antonio rewarded my attempts to lift his spirits with a halfhearted, but warm smile. 'I'll… I'll try, Lovi. I hope that's good enough for you.'

'For now, that's good enough for me,' I nodded, before sneaking a peek at the clock once more. 'H-hey, by the way, Antonio… at what time would they come again? I thought they'd come around 5:15, but it's almost that time and they're still not here.'

Antonio grinned. 'They're half Spaniards and half Italians! You really think they are as punctual as West-European countries? Awwww aren't you just the cutest!~'

I growled. 'I'm not fucking cute, just how many times do I hav—'

Ding-dong!

Right at the sound of that first 'ding', Antonio and I both shot up from our chairs as if somebody had kicked us off them. Sadly enough, we sat fairy close to one another, so we instantly bumped heads and faces and what-not, causing Antonio to hysterically rub his chin in pain and causing me to hold on to my hurt nose.

'Go ged de door,' I hissed in-between curses.

'…what?' Antonio said, a bit disorientated while a red mark appeared underneath his chin.

'DE DOOR – ow, fuck, by dose – GO GED ID!' I insisted.

Antonio got all pale. 'I-I'm not opening that door alone – you're coming with me!'

'Bud by dose, wh-whad if id sdards to bleed?' I stammered.

'Then you'll bleed.' Antonio snorted and grabbed my hand. 'Come on, sweetie. You're fine and we shouldn't let them wait.'

It was useless to protest or struggle, Antonio could be insanely strong and determinedly when he put his mind to something. So while I wasn't exactly cooperating with him, I didn't keep him waiting either and tried to adjust my speed of walking to his as we stampeded through the diverse rooms and chambers and halls and why the fuck was I still amazed by this House' hugeness, until we stood in front of the door.

The door. The front door. The door had never felt so fucking big, heavy and safe before. But once we opened it – once we allowed the visitors in front of it to get in, all of that was gone. No more safeness or white lies or eve—

Ding-dong!

'What are you doing!' Antonio and I then heard a female voice from outside nag. 'Don't butcher the damn doorbell – th-they'll come! Have some patience, you creep!'

An offended gasp, followed by a slightly heavier voice. 'You heard that, Teo – she called me a creep! Oh!'

'Allie's right, Lulu,' another slightly heavier voice responded, 'they could be upstairs or something, folding… towels and stuff.'

'They're NOT folding fucking towels, they KNOW we're coming!'

'It's still very, very heartless of you to call me a creep, very heartless indeed.'

'Folding towels IS important! You know how wrinkly they can get if you don't fold them?'

'Would you PLEASE STOP about your HOLY TOWELS already?'

'It's them, isn't it?' Antonio muttered under his – now rapidly speeding-up – breath. 'It's the kids. Oh god. Th-they're here, they're really here…!'

'Ssssshhh!' I sissed at him, pressing the side of my head against the wooden door. 'I can't hear them if you yap through their bickering.'

Antonio stared at me molesting the door and raised an eyebrow.

'Are you seriously trying to eavesdrop on them, rather than just open the door?'

'I'm not eavesdropping – I'm gaining more valuable information about them!' I whispered and fiercely defended my very logical and normal actions. 'Now just shut up alrea—'

THUD THUD THUD

'OUCH, motherFUCK!' I yelled shortly after the harsh, loud bonking on the door started. 'Cut that out, dammit – my fucking EAR!'

The bonking stopped and I heard two excited and different voices started to laugh nervously.

'I TOLD you you shouldn't knock…'

'Oh take a hike, Teo, you wussy saint.'

'P-Papa Lovi?' I heard the third and most recognizable voice ask, carefully. 'Are you… i-is that you?'

Antonio and I exchanged glances, as if we needed to give each other permission to actually press this through. Maybe… maybe, in a way, we did need to give each other permission to continue. In any case, I'm not really sure what I would've done if Antonio had shaken his head right then.

But he didn't.

'Open it.' Antonio breathed out. 'We'll… we'll just open the door.'

'Together?' I asked. 'I hope you know you're needlessly making things more complicated and dramatic.'

'Just do it, Lovino.'

'F-fine, fine…'

We both grabbed the doorknob – as far as that was possible, of course – and turned it, slowly but surely opening it. I said it before, this was one big and heavy asshole-door, and it was the last obstacle that separated me and Antonio from our children.

And for some reason, that thought really hit me.

People, distance, ignorance, fear, uncertainty and memory loss had kept up apart from our own flesh and blood for years, for at least two whole, long, tiresome decades, and now that all of that was lying behind us, only this door – this fucking, goddamn door – was keeping me away from my children.

Fuck that door.

With a grunt, I yanked at the doorknob a whole lot more aggressively than Antonio probably had in mind – judging by his surprised yelp – and then it suddenly was open, and it suddenly wasn't a barricade anymore. The sun was setting behind the three figures on the doorstep, so it took me a few seconds to get used to the dark yellow glow that made the persons in front of me an abstract combination of invisible and black.

But soon, my eyes got used to the light and the black and invisible figures actually got colors, faces and expressions.

Oh, expressions.

S-so many expressions…

I wordlessly stared at the three grown-up humans in front of me, clumsily opening and closing my hands, since I didn't know what to do with them, while Antonio next to me let out a coughing sob and got teary-eyed again.

Luisa wore a very pretty pink dress and looked like she was going to a very fun party. Her hair was wild and uncontrollable as usual, and I guess that was chocolate I saw on her dress' collar, but she was the prettiest daughter I had, the prettiest, the nicest, the best, the one and only, and she was smiling.

'I… w-we're here,' she started. 'A-all of us, we're… we're all here, p-papa.'

Both Antonio and I nodded, still not saying a word as we automatically looked at the two young men standing to either side of our daughter. We had seen a picture of the boys before, but even if Luisa hadn't shared that photo with us, we had known which part of the twins was Matteo and what part was Alejo.

Matteo was crying – no, he was bawling, snot and tears streaming over his face while making that same heartstring-pulling face he also made when he was still a young kid. He looked through his glassed with eyes that were bigger than ever, looking from me to Antonio and from Antonio back to me. He wanted to say something – do something, I don't know, but he seemed to be paralyzed by his conflicting feelings.

'C-can I…'

That was Alejo – and Antonio and I immediately gave him all of our attention. He looked tough, Alejo. Like a tough, menacing, wild, quite creepy kind of guy. He looked handsome and cool, he wore the best clothing of all of them and he missed a few fingers.

Oh.

I should have known.

Maybe I did.

But no matter how rough and manly Alejo seemed to be, his expression was probably the most emotional, the most careful, the most hopeful of all of them – perhaps because Luisa had already met us yesterday, perhaps because Matteo was still trying to figure out what kind of expression to make – and our oldest son swallowed a lump that had got the size of the world.

'Can I… c-can I…' he stammered again, shaking over his entire cool-clad body as he took one little step towards us.

What is it, what do you want, I was going to ask him – but Antonio knew what he meant, like he always, whether he had wanted it or not had known what Alejo was thinking about, and he suddenly dashed forward, towards him, throwing his arms around our somewhat shorter son, pressing him against his body tightly.

'You can hug me whenever you want.' Antonio sobbed harder, especially when Alejo heartbreakingly happily gripped his shirt. 'Y-you hear that? You can hug me whenever you want, Allie, you… you… oh god, I missed you so much…!'

I felt my eyes were getting irritated again, and let out a puff of air when Matteo suddenly was hugging me and burying his face in my chest. He had cried and snottered so much, I could already feel my skin getting damp – but like fuck if I cared, dammit, like fucking hell I cared, and I wrapped my arms around his still shocking and jolting body.

'I-it's okay, it's okay, it okay, really,' I said, like an alarm clock somebody had forgotten to put off, and gently put a hand on his curly hair. 'why so many tears, hm? Come on, you act like something bad has happened…'

'Mia died,' Matteo hiccupped.

I was silent for a second and removed his glasses, cautiously rubbing his eyes.

'I know.'

Matteo looked at me with reddened, puffed-up eyes. 'I left her – and then – they trampled – she's gone – s-she… she…'

He couldn't form words anymore and pushed his face back against me, crying helplessly while I sighed, smiled and rubbed his back, looking over at Antonio.

He was now cuddling both Alejo and Luisa, who had refused at first, judging by her angry eyes and flustered face, and gave me a questioning look. Is he going to be alright, I could almost hear him ask with his eyes, now plastered on Matteo.

What a stupid thing to ask.

He was with me.

He sure as fuck was going to be alright.

Nevertheless, I still shook my head and beckoned him to come over.

He did, together with Alejo and Luisa, and just a couple of seconds later, Antonio was holding Matteo in his arms and telling him how much the both of us and Mia loved him, while I grabbed Alejo's face and huffed, rubbing his eyes dry as well.

'You little asshole, you really think we wouldn't want to fucking hug you? Some nerve you have, brat.'

Allie could only grin stupidly and nod, gleefully allowing me to cool his overheated face a little.

'S-so stupid.' Luisa gulped and folded her arms, glaring at me. 'I-it's your fault we're all such fucking bawlers, dammit. You're a stupid father.'

'You're a dumb papa!'

I smiled broadly and – perhaps – fatherly at her.

'Language, baby.'