SUMMARY: He can't help but go through this, every time he has to visit.
Thanks to all my viewers and reviewers. After months of procrastination, I finally got myself to sit down and finish this in a bout of insomnia.
This is like the first story I've finished, so I hope this a fitting end to all of this.
Six
Here
There is a moment of disbelief, followed by an explosion of realization that strains the boundaries of his existence as they are now, before it all settles into a steady calm. A calm like a summer sea on a clear day, with the breeze wrapping round like mischievous sylphs intent on playing a game with their earth-bound counterparts.
He turns, feeling little more than a breeze himself, and looks to the shining man who has so caught his fascination (and his hea—). The figure is standing proud and tall, a defiant tilt to his face and a wide smile that threatens to devour everything in its pure, undiluted joy. Like a planet, everything seems to orbit him, like small moons. The crowd, the emotion, his thoughts…all of it revolves around him.
In this place, in this moment, that man is the world.
He thinks for a moment, and in that moment, understands just what it all means. Why he is here, what this entire week has been about…and he thinks, of course.
He is here because he is here, because, when it comes down to it...
He understands then, in some twisted backwards way that only begins to make sense now that he's fading back into…He feels melancholy, but only a bit.
He's not really real after all.
He waves at him then, as the golden boy turns around and his eyes widen just so, a bittersweet smile on his lips, and fades…
"Ar—thur!" America stands ahead of him, arms crossed and his grin as wide as ever. His luggage is tightly held in his hands (never be too loose with your effects abroad, of course), and his arms are steadily tiring from their weight. England glares at the boy then, intent on making his troubles known as is so often his want, when he is scooped up into a bear hug that he splutters and curses at while he has the breath to.
"St—stop! You idiot! I can't hold all this and deal with your man-handling!" His voice is incensed, as is his body, but somewhere within him warms at the sign of affection, as it always has, and always will. America only hugs him tighter then (little more gently), before letting him out of his hold, and stepping back with brief laughter and smirk. The scene has changed now, though their location hasn't.
It's back to conflict then, as America is never constant or as predictable in his moods as his demeanor would suggest. Sometimes, it almost tires England out, but he never allows it to.
He just—can't.
"Can't handle a little hug, old man?" England withholds the urge to snap back that, yes, he could handle it when he wasn't in a position to drop both his laptop and all his belongings because some brute doesn't understand that he's just come out of an impossibly long taxi ride that would have been shorter if someone had bothered to pick him up hours ago—but something catches his attention.
It's the flicker of a reflection that he only manages to catch because the whispers of his faerie friends quickly point it out. It glimmers against the backdrop of skyscrapers and people, formed like a person and staring at him with his eyes (and smiling?). It's him, England thinks, or it something that wishes it was. America watches him curiously, the playful tint to his expression gone as he subtly glances behind him in worry and fear. England faintly wonders if all these threats have finally have finally begun to take their toll on America, the so often the oblivious git that we was, as he begins to mutter a curse that will send the blighted spirit to whichever hell it belongs to, when he is cut short.
It waves briefly before it disappears, and that is that.
"England?" America calls quietly, whispering with urgency he tries to hide behind a Hollywood smile. "What was—is it?" England looks at him then, at his face which is almost (and how often it is that) normal if not for the small glint of nononono! in his eyes, and responds,
"Nothing. It's a false alarm." America sighs, and England thinks, as he occasionally does when its moments with just the two of them and no expectations to live up to (you mustn't be so close to him, England), that it isn't that he can't see faeries and the magical, it's that he doesn't let himself to. And that leads to thoughts about what could have happened to bring about something as sad as that.
"Great!" His companion cheers and stretches so that his striped t-shirt (what he had thought was America's) is clearly visible behind his jacket, a Union Jack so proudly emblazoned upon it that makes England blush.
"What are you wearing?" England jerks out of his hold, a tirade prepared and waiting, and glares at America who smiles sheepishly.
"I just had it lying around, ya'know?" He scratches at his head and looks deliberately at the sun, which hides his face (was that a small blush?) from England. "And I thought, 'wouldn't it be awesome to wear it today, 'cause England's visiting and all?'. And I decided to wear it. My boss saw it, and was cool with it too! He said something about it being diplomatic and stuff, especially with…everything going on." There is normal shrug to dismiss the kind of thoughtful, kind gesture that England sometimes forgets America can commit without prompting, and the moment shudders but does not break as England steps forward with an almost-there smile. America laughs in burst, and carefully looks down with a shining expression on his face and carefully asks,
"You aren't going to hit me, are you?' England ignores the baiting for what it is, because sometimes America tries so hard to be what he isn't but should be, and hugs the man who was his boy, and is now entirely something else.
"No, I'm not," he says evenly.
'Thank you,' he thinks in the safety of his own mind.
And the day proceeds as it does.
A/N: I really have no solid idea of who "he" was, but I suppose you can interpret it as you will. I'm welcome to anyone commenting on what they think everything that happened was about. It'd be cool to compare what I think happened to what anyone else does.