Romania was more confused now more than ever. He had driven to Bulgaria's home before, more often than he can count, yet now he can't seem to find the place.
He had driven down the same street on the outskirts of Sofia twice and still had not been able to recognise the house.
He had assumed he got the wrong street the first time and proceeded to give himself a tour of suburbia before narrowing down his lists of options to the same street he had driven to in the first place.
He gazed around at the neighborhood and it reminded him just a bit of the area he had once lived in some 40 years ago. One of the larger, more expensive looking houses even resembled his own; that is until it was demolished and the so called 'People's house' was built.
Fuck.
Romania found himself at the end of the Road. Again. How in god's name did he manage to completely miss Bulgaria's home a second time.
It should be obvious. What with the man's insane attention to the detail and upkeep of his home. He should have been already blinded the glean off the freshly painted walls. Romania just didn't get it; sure you want a house to look good on the inside but who give a shit about the rest. Sure, on the inside Romania kept a well tidied, almost sterile level of cleanliness, but nothing compared to how Bulgaria presented his home. Or at least this was how Romania thought in his usual childlike dis contempt.
He drove back around the block being very careful to get the right street and drove to the part of the road he thought the house would be in. This time he parked the car and walked across the street paying attention to every house number.
After passing 6 or 7 houses a though occurred to Romania; he had no idea what the number of Bulgaria's house was.
'Damn it, He told me enough times!' he thought.
Regardless he pressed on, observing every house to make sure it wasn't the right one.
Then a home, if you could call it that in it's current state, presented itself horribly with it's dilapidated walls and ashes cluttering the garden. It must have been ravaged by fire and vandalism; probably an abandoned place found by squatters. Romania thought it was a shame for such a thing to happen in such a nice neighborhood. Even the gates of the home were damaged; shekels of green, ivory and crimson paint here and there amongst rust and discouraged metal.
He slowly let his hand glide over the intricate metal work as he turned to walk on when a chill ran down his spine. Something told him in his gut not to leave and to take another look at the house.
So he did and nearly face palmed when it hit him.
That was something Romanian hated about that guy, the way he was such a perfectionist. Even a silly little front gate has to be designed and painted just right. The tall red flowers twining at the top. The assenting white blooming just below. Then sheer idea of Nikolai disregarding the appearance in favor of this paint chipped mess scared him a little. What had happened to this once attractive dwelling? Better still, What had become of Nikolai himself?
Delicately moving with the twisted spiral effect of the entrance door, He let his knuckles slide sideways over the pattern to the handle.
He tried to open the door but it was locked. An additional padlock blocked his attempt at kicking the door open. He scolded himself for not being strong enough to break it. Especially since Hungary would have done it in a spilt second.
All hope was not lost however, for as I mentioned before dear reader, what Romania lost in strength he made up for in agility.
He took a few steps back so that he was half way across the street and sprinted straight for the gate, building up speed quickly. With a giant leap he had brought himself over the gate.
A sudden urge of showmanship overcame him and he grabbed the top of the gate with one arm and span himself into a midair. His slender body curled as he preformed a somersault before stretching back out and landing perfectly on both feet. As soon as he was down, he jumped straight up again lifting both hands in the air.
"Perfect ten," he called triumphantly and pointlessly since there was no body around to see it.
Romania looked up at Bulgaria's home, or what was left of it.
How the hell could something like this have happened? It must have been an explosion of some kind. Every single window was smashed and blackened with soot. The first floor didn't look stable and Romania feared, that if he went inside to investigate, would collapse on top of him. Still it was worth going inside just to see if there was any way to contact Bulgaria. Well that was the excuse Romania used to go inside, in truth he just wanted to be nosy.
Romania just passed the doorway when he heard the sound of an old woman saying screaming in Bulgarian. He walked out to see a neighbour leaning out of their first floor window shouting at him. He guessed that she was saying something along the lines of 'This is private property. Get out or I'll call the police'
He decided to play the dumb foreigner act, one he plays so well I may add, and proceed into the house.
Romania searched the house hoping to go inside and maybe find a clipboard or something official looking to stop that old woman's suspicions. He didn't want to go and try to talk to anyone who might not speak English. He spoke several languages but Bulgarian strangely was one he struggled with, even more annoying that Bulgaria picked up some basic Romanian quite quickly. Well, He was still much more fluent in English, and that's the language they spoke it, so he felt better about it.
"I said get out right now or I am calling the police" called the neighbour again. Romania toyed between calming her down or just quickly having a snoop round and rushing off. He choose the former.
"Ah! So you speak English then?" asked Romania who was quite surprised. He looked up to the elderly neighbour. She looked like one of those stereotypical sour old women; a bit over weight, face filled with wrinkles, head scarf covering her grey hair.
"Yes I speak English. What are you doing here not speaking Bulgarian?" She asked with an expression which could make Russia take a step back. Romania swallowed his pride and his urge to treat this woman with the same tone she used on him. Instead he turned on his charm and elegance.
"I am very sorry, m'lady," Romania smiled although not with his eyes, "I was visiting a friend. A friend of mine who speaks English. A friend of mine who lives on this premise..."
"Well it's very clear he's not here," she spat. Romania shivered at the thought of making a nice reply to someone so rude, shivers that ran up his spine. Yet this could be someone who would know a thing or two about her neighbour since she wouldn't have stopped him otherwise. Unless she was just being a busybody. Or maybe she is both. Probably both.
"oh, I can see. I was just frightened for his safety. Well, if you happen to know of his whereabouts, would you do me the honour of..."
"Who wants to know?"
"I beg your pardon?" Romania felt like either this woman's English was not so good, or she was being as rude and unhelpful as possible. She seemed to get rather worked up by Romania asking her to repeat herself.
"Who are you?"
"My name is..." Romania froze for a millisecond. He wasn't too keen on her knowing his real name since she might try to stir trouble for him. Yet giving a fake name won't do much for him if this woman is actually a friend of Bulgaria's.
"Constantin Popescu," he spoke with pride and grandeur.
"Romanian?" she asked with a sly glance at him.
"Yes, yes I am." Romania felt like perhaps he was saved. That she knew of a Romanian who visits occasionally, or is a friend. "I actually work with Nikolai..."
"I should have known you were Romanian," Costel didn't quite know how to take that. Lucky for him she continued talking. "Breaking into people's houses. It's just typical."
Romania could hear something snap inside his mind. The ignorance of that woman. The rudeness. He wanted to throttle her. Yet he knew he couldn't.
Not because it would be immoral. Or Inconvenient. Or a waste of time. Or because that woman was on the first floor and despite Romania's climbing skills, wouldn't be able to reach a window so high. She had big burly arms and about 20 pounds weight advantage that would mean she could snap Costel like a twig if things got physical.
"I'm calling the police. So you better leave now before they come," the woman closed her window and walked off.
Costel took a deep breath allowing a little oxygen to reach his brain.
He was here to see Bulgaria. His friend. Who's house was burnt to a crisp. Now wasn't the time to start arguments with next door neighbours. Not wanting to cause even more distress to his friend, Romanian decided to leave. Besides, it was obvious that all there was here was ash and items of little use to him.
The only issue was that he found that the gate was a little too high to get over without a run up. Although the gate between here and the neihbouring property was very low, he could leave via her door.
He made a run for the gate between the two houses and jumped over without any trouble. Now all he needed to do was just walk to her door, open it and leave as soon as possible.
Suddenly a high pitched whistle ran through his ears.
"Vykki!" Called the elderly woman at the sleeping dog which Costel only just noticed to be on the other side of the property.
The large Doberman got up with a shot. He jumped around a bit until he saw Romania. Without a second thought he sprinted across the garden in Costel's direction.
Romania froze at the sight of this; yet the creature continued onwards. He lunged at him causing Romania to fall backwards under the weight on the dog.
"No, no get off me," Romania cried, "oh God get him off!" Romania was squirming and trying to get himself free but it was not use. "Please, not the face. Ahh!" Romania's arms flailed around in an attempt to stop the attack but it was not use. Costel was just not strong enough to push him away. The dog had him pinned and trying to move futile.
The dog didn't budge. He just continued licking Romania's face with such intensity that slobber was pouring into his ears and hair. Costel couldn't control his laughter as the mutt started tickling him.
"Please," the Romanian continued to giggle, "please stop that you silly mutt" he managed to to get out in between fits of laughter. His words were lost on the dog though. He needed to assert dominance and control in order to free himself, near impossible with just how sweet and soft the dog was.
"Come now boy, that's enough," Romania eventually said, firmly. The dog stopped giving him a bath with his tongue and just stared down. This caused Romania to giggle even more looking up at its bewildered expression. "Now, get off me so I can go." Constantin tried his best to speak in an authoritative tone.
The dog stepped aside. The calmed down, albeit slightly wet, Romanian stood up brushing dirt off his clothes. Calls were aimed at the dog from above from his confused and agitated owner. Costel thought he should explain.
"Sorry, Dogs just love me. I usually don't get such an enthusiastic reaction but it's pretty much the same all the time," and with that Romania proceeded to pet the dog round the ears before walking out her door and into the street.
He decided to make a quick get a way since technically he did break into two people's properties.
He got into his car quickly just encase some police actually did show and drove off. Despite everything Romania soon found himself once again bored so he decided to try his luck with another friend. He called Serbia.
Omg, do you know what this is? It's an update! Yea, an actual update with dates uped and everthing...
T.T Forgive me for the friken epicly late update! I admit I was going to cancel the story but i got those nice reviews and a little voice inside my head really wants this finished so here :D
This chapter sucks, I know :'( Not much I can do but rewrite it but I think that will take just too long so i edited it... then the friken went crazy and lost my edit before i saved it so it's a halfed arsed edit . anyway, lashings of awesome to everyone out there who got to reading this! You are all truly awesome!
I'm also going to go back and edit the previous chapters to typos (if I haven't already done so) PLEASE don't be afraid to correct me or give constrictive criticism! This is un beta'd so you know the drill ;) "Pardon my English... I'm English :P"
(Thank you SO much for the reviews! They gave me the enthusiasm to edit this chapter -whichIWroteMonthsAgo- and start writing the next I will reply to them all... sometime ^^"
Guest(since i have no where else to reply): Thank. You. So. Much. (don't worry... I'll glare at him back :D ) I will, I realy do love that you took your time to review ^^ Made my day! Thank you so much!)