((A/N)): I hope you guys are liking this okay? I don't know? Are you? Who knows..

Actual sex in the next chapter (probably).

[Warnings]: Vulgar language.

Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia or anything written by Nathaniel Hawthorne.

" 'The fuck are you doing?"

Aldred looked up at her from the coins balancing on his palm. "I'm gettin' enough quarters to go play that game over there," he explained, nodding over toward a few consoles.

Natalya let her eyes wander around the arcade as she sipped idly at her soda, sitting next to him at a table. Immediately she spotted the game and rolled her eyes. "What do you do in that? Shoot zombies in the face?"

His eyebrows furrowed as he looked up from his coins, some of them pesos, and followed her gaze to the console with an external shotgun attached to it before snorting. "What?! Nah… I don't like that kinda shit. Gore…" He stuck his tongue out and grabbed up the coins he'd counted out. "Imma go play this Pac-Man game. Damn, Flaca."

Natalya's nose wrinkled at the name as she watched him with a scowl, blowing bubbles in her soda as he shoved the quarters into the machine and exclaimed when they clinked into place. She huffed and rolled her eyes, letting them wander about while the 'waca waca' noises and irritated, but exhilarated curses came from his direction.

Off a little ways, were two little girls arguing in two different languages about who got to play the next game. The shorter girl snapped in Spanish while the paler one countered in English. It was interesting to watch but only held the Belorussian woman's attention for a few moments before she lazily listened to a man shouting at his daughter.

The guy had a disgusting beer gut covered by a slimy 'white' tank top and kept rubbing at the stubble around his neck and jaw. Natalya's lip curled in disgust before she looked over at the annoyed, barely legal girl with heavy eyeliner and some kind of ratty arms bands on. The man continued yelling until the girl flipped him off. He scoffed at that, grabbing her wrist and leaning down to shove his tongue down her throat.

Natalya's eyebrows flew up and the soda in her straw dropped down into the paper cup as her lips parted in shock when the teenager kissed him back with vigor that was not appropriate for an arcade. Or ever. So… Not father and daughter. At least she hoped not. And no one was fuckin' stopping them from this full blown makeout session in the goddamn arcade. Wasn't this supposed to be a kid's place?

But then again…

"Fuck you!" Aldred's voice came from the Pac-Man machine and mercifully stole her attention from her disgusting surroundings. "Fuckin' piece of shit!" He kicked the console, smacking it on the side as the high scores on the screen flickered and glitched a bit.

She sighed with a shake of her head as Aldred muttered about how it was rigged or something. The woman stood, carrying her soda with her as she walked up behind him. "Did you win the game?" she asked in a tired, accented voice.

He shot a glare at her over his shoulder after smacking the machine good and hard again. "You never win this game; you just get better each time."

"Hmm.. Like you and sex?" Natalya asked with a light smirk, leaning up against the Pac-Man game to keep him from beating on it some more.

Aldred scowled at her, his ruddy brown eyes narrowed before he cracked a smile. "Exactly," he murmured, reaching out and grabbing her waist.

Natalya flinched at the rough touch, stumbling forward into him as he dragged her closer. Though neither of them weighed very much, she was still lighter and frailer by far. He pressed her against himself, running a hand up her spine as she looked up at him with her hands at his chest to push him away if need be.

"Damn, querida.." he mumbled, his lips already nearing her ear even as her nose wrinkled unhappily. His thumbs rubbed gentle, calming circles into the skin of her hips, but wouldn't let go. He knew Natalya didn't like to be touched like this, so why was he-?

His lips connected with the skin just under her ear making her gasp silently, mostly due to shock. That, finally, made her push him away and forced that ever present scowl onto her face once more. The one that always made him snicker in such a condescending way.

"Weren't you pissed at that stupid game three seconds ago?" Natalya snarled, backing away and gripping her soda tightly as his eyes followed her movements keenly.

"Maybe…" He shrugged, that jagged and quick glint of lust disappearing from his eyes as he smirked lazily at her and ran a hand through his dark hair. "But then I saw ya and… I wasn't pissed anymore." His slight smirk softened into a gentle smile that only she was permitted to see. "You always do that t' me…"

Her grip on the soda cup loosened until the lid was no longer in danger of popping off. Aldred was such a… But then he said things like this. Things that made her remember why she was still hung around him. Why she let him crash in her shitty little apartment. Why she shared a bed with him on odd occasions which were becoming more frequent than not. Sighing, Natalya stepped forward, her eyes closing as she pressed her lips to his in a gentle kiss.

The softness of the kiss was taken away as he snickered against her lips, mumbling 'Hell yeah' before pressing his tongue into her mouth a little forcefully. Making only a weak sound of protest for half a second, she kissed him back in a way that fanned the dimming fire inside her chest. There was no protest as she felt her back being pressed against the arcade game and wandering hands stray down to grip at her hips and below.

Finally pulling away due to breathlessness, Natalya opened her eyes and let a smile flicker onto her lips. Aldred opened his eyes as well and for just a moment, a split second that cast a shadow of doubt on every harsh or demeaning word he'd ever said to her, there was something sparkling in them that was neither lust nor just mild interest. But then it was gone, hidden back away behind locked doors, and his lips pursed.

"Come on," he grumbled, pulling away from her and taking her soda before sucking down a big gulp of it. "We should get back to your place before I run out of quarters again and we're thrown out of here."

Natalya quickly caught the cup he shoved back into her hands and frowned as she followed him quickly. "We wouldn't really be thrown out, would we?"

Aldred scoffed. "What would stop them? You could try to flash your breasts at them but…" His eyes wandered down to her chest and he shook his head. "There's not much to show anyway."

Her face flushed, but she ignored it, ducking through the door he'd flung open.

X~X~X

Sitting cross legged on the floor, Natalya let out a quick breath of air, the sound more like a hiss than a sigh, and snapped the book in her lap shut angrily.

"What's wrong?" Aldred immediately asked in a disinterested tone, lying on his stomach on the floor with his legs kicked up in the air and not looking up from the piece of paper he seemed to be entirely too focused on. "Did the vampire in your book finally reveal himself?" His voice was dripping with sarcasm, but still she didn't hear it.

"Nyet," she huffed, frowning down at the novel as if it had personally offended her. "There is no vampire in here, at least I don't think. I haven't gotten far enough to know." Her eyes moved up to him and her eyebrows furrowed as she caught him staring at her.

Aldred looked away hastily, back down to the paper as he smudged a bit of the charcoal he was working with into the white page.

Sighing and not bothering to crane her neck in attempts at a glance of whatever he was sketching, she closed her eyes and hunched over, rubbing her temple for a moment before his voice wafted through the air once more.

"Why haven't you gotten far in the book?"

Her eyes opened and she looked up at him in deep confusion. She understood the question perfectly, that was not the issue; she just didn't understand why he was asking her.

"O-Oh…" Her gaze moved back down to the novel, the title in English and reading 'The Scarlet Letter'. "It's… quite dense, I believe. And, I've… well.." She winced. "I'm not all that good at… y'know."

Aldred scoffed, setting down his charcoal and sneering up at her. "At what? Reading?!"

The Belorussian was quick to look away, tucking her knees up to her chest and feeling the book pressed in between them. "In English!" She defended hastily, not looking up from the disgusting carpet. "I can read in Russian and Belorussian and I can speak Polish fluently. I was nearly fluent in Lithuanian, but then my friend was killed so I-I—!" After Toris had been discovered dead, his throat slit and his body tossed in the streets like garbage, she'd lost all interest in learning Lithuanian.

As he listened to her rattle away reasons, Aldred's eyes widened steadily until she finally cut herself off. Leaving his unfinished drawing where it was on the floor, he scooted closer to her, trying to draw her attention silently. But Natalya proved stubborn, as she did over and over again, and he was forced to speak.

"Nat?"

Nothing.

"Natalya…?"

A twitch, but those violet eyes did not flick up to meet his gaze. Aldred sighed, reaching out and placing a finger under her chin before tilting it up. Her lip was pouted, but her jaw was hard. And yet, Natalya did not protest, merely staring back at him.

"I-I…" Aldred's voice faltered, as did his breath, when he was sucked into that marvelous violet wonderland. He cleared his throat, pulling his hand away and averting his gaze before his face could flush. "I didn't mean t' strike a nerve."

Natalya blinked at him, not understanding yet again. That look he'd given her had been the same she'd seen in the arcade: something other than his usual sneer or disinterest. And… Was he, Aldred Jones, actually half-assed apologizing to her?

"… Oh." Her eyes didn't turn down or away like his had. "No. It's fine. Toris pissed off the wrong people," she muttered with a shrug of her shoulders, trying to pass it off, and letting her knees fall from her chest as her legs stretched out loosely.

After a moment of silence, Aldred scooped up the book that had fallen back in her lap. "Come on, show me where you are," he commanded, his voice sounding a bit strained. The book was open in his hands and he held it expectantly.

Sighing, Natalya forcefully pried the book from his hands and flipped back a few pages. "Here. It's talking about this door and something about a virgin. They must be main characters."

Aldred shook his head, muttering under his breath, "You really are at the beginning." But then he took it back from her, peering down at the words. His eyebrows furrowed just as hers had as he struggled through the dense language of Hawthorne. "You couldn't have picked an easier book to learn how to read, Nat?" he asked with a sigh.

"This was all I had," she responded, looking over his shoulder to examine the text. "I found it in the alley."

His eyes shifted from the book for a moment as he stared up at her in shock. "The alley? What were you doing in the alley?"

Natalya shrugged. "I needed to score some."

"So you went there without me? Do you know what could have happened?"

"I could have gotten some smack…? 'Cuz that's what happened."

Aldred gritted his teeth. "Any number of things. You could have been jumped. You could have been ripped off. You could have gotten some fuckin' weird shit cut with God knows what and ODed!"

"And you think I care?" Natalya asked with a roll of her eyes.

"You fuckin' should! 'Cuz I do!"

She did not speak, only glaring at him as he looked down at the novelette again. There was a tense silence along with that ever present feeling or déjà vu. They'd argued about this before, but the memories were shrouded in shadow.

"The door is not a character."

The statement broke the silence. Aldred cleared his throat after reading the paragraphs a few times over, his voice a little brusque from their tiff, "That's just where these dudes are. They're waitin' outside this prison for this bitch, and she's got a baby so I don't think she's the virgin you were talking about."

Natalya rolled her eyes, pulling the novelette from his hands and brushing off the dirt that she'd not managed to get off yet. "Not her! I was talking about…" Her lips pouted as she let her eyes wander, finding a phrase which she then pointed to triumphantly. "Here! 'The… f-founders of a.. new…" She swallowed as her eyebrows knit together. "…c-c…"

"Colony," Aldred supplied after a moment, only to earn a glare from her. "What? I was just helping!"

Natalya huffed and shook her head. "Whatever… I just… Here!" She pointed at the text for him to read instead.

Aldred sighed, but nodded, "Yeah sure… 'The founders of a new colony, whatever Utopia of human virtue and happiness they might originally project, have invariably recognized it among their earliest practical necessities to allot a portion of the virgin soil as a cemetery, and another portion as the site of a prison.'" He looked over at her, confused. "Virgin?"

"A virgin soil. That means a virgin, da?"

He gave her a small smile, only a half condescending this time, as he shook his head. "Nah," Aldred muttered as his odd twang. "Virgin means somethin's…" he trailed off for a moment, his eyes losing focus before he winced and returned to their world. "Pure." He looked over at her. "It means something that's pure."

Natalya's lips curled in confusion. "Pure? Like that crazy good smack that—?"

"No!" Aldred cut her off quickly. "Well… No. Not pure like that, but…" He licked his lips and shifted uncomfortably. "A virgin is… someone who's never had sex, yes?"

She nodded. That was agreed upon.

"But someone who is virgin, not someone who is a virgin, is…" He bit his lip, scratching the back of his head. "My mama used to tell me that it was a person that didn't know nothin' 'bout the real world. Someone that never had t' work with their hands. Someone who's heart's never been broken. Someone that..." His hand fell from his hair. "… Who's never been through anything."

A small laugh came from her. "Guess that's neither of us." What else could she do but smile? "We've both been through enough… More than enough. But it's good to go through some of it together though, da?" Had it not been for him, she could have overdosed months ago and had to not been for her, he would have frozen in the streets.

"Yeah…" Aldred glanced up at her quickly, his lips parted and his eyes burning as that rare look intensified. Without the dilution of lust or worry, the emotion was much easier to place. Caring, compassion, and… Natalya's eyes widened. No…

The man opened his mouth, a few unintelligible noises coming from him as he looked at her desperately. He needed to say something; he needed to say it. But after a moment of silence, he snapped his mouth shut and scrambled up from the floor before running from the apartment with a slam of the door against the wall, leaving everything behind.

Natalya's eyes followed him with an almost disappointed glaze to them and she sighed. He'd be back. Maybe in the middle of the night, maybe in a couple days, but he'd be back. He always came back.

Letting her eyes wander around her now pretty much empty apartment, she took in the place that she lived. Cold, barren, grimy, revolting. It never looked this way with Al around, but as soon as he disappeared, it came crashing down on her. How could she live like this? Why did she put up with it all? What had happened to—?

Oh. But something was different.

Her eyes fell on the sheet of paper lying so innocently on her floor, surrounded by pilfered charcoal and bits of tissue used to aid shading. The tissues were barely used by the looks of it and Natalya knew that his fingers must be near black from the drawing materiel.

She wasn't sure how much Aldred drew, having only witnessed it a few times herself, but the way he formed his lines, with a creased brow, made it look as if he was well practiced. Then again, he wasn't with her every second of the day. Who knew what he used his time for? She assumed that he hooked up with other girls like her, but had no way of knowing.

Maybe… He was someone other than who he appeared.

Natalya crawled across the floor, her eyes locked on the paper as the obscured sketch slowly became clear. Darks lines, lighter smudges, soft edges. A face bloomed from nothing; down turned with a furrowed brow and pouted lips. Eyes that were focused— though confused.

Tucking her knees under her, she gazed down at the sketch in awe. There was no doubt in her mind as to who the girl on the page was. Not with that long hair, secured with a ribbon, those large eyes with feather lashes, and that angled chin.

The charcoal lines of her face were not harsh, placed there with precision and care. This drawing was not another scrawling, tedious practice; it had been made with care.

Natalya's eyes flicked up to the door, which was slightly ajar, and she wondered if she could will him to return to her. Not in a day or so, but now. Come back… Come back now. If only he would walk through the door and tell her exactly what he'd been about to say. Because if Aldred didn't appear in the next ten seconds, she didn't think she would ever know what it had been. If he didn't, she would never know how he really felt.

He didn't.

((A/N)): The book she's reading is 'The Scarlet Letter' by Nathaniel Hawthorne.