It is one of the sad realities of life that agreeing to do something and actually doing it are two extremely different things. The only thing which links them is the subject matter, and when the initial euphoria had worn off; they were allowed to have a radio station, Gilbert revised the previous conversation.
He promptly made to rush out of the café in a fit of panic.
Several spilled chairs later, when Elizaveta and Arthur had tried to restrain him forcibly, and the former had resorted to whacking him on the shins with a conveniently placed ice cream scoop, he reviewed the proceedings once more.
"Fuck," he mumbled into the table. The drinks they'd ordered while waiting had left sticky, ring shaped marks on the surface, and coupled with the odour of detergent that permeated the table-top, it was enough to make him feel vaguely queasy. "Fuck."
"Oh calm down," Arthur sniffed, expression neutral. "You'd think you'd just been told you impregnated a girl and she was expecting you to raise it."
"I doubt Gilbert would even get that far," Elizaveta returned, helping herself to the albino's abandoned ice cream. She mumbled past the spoon. "Although he's not a hopeless case. There's a certain…charm to him, if you go for self-pitying, moronic, obnoxious types." The last part of the sentence was muttered quietly, but it was still loud enough to cause the subject of the conversation to spring back to life with a scowl.
"I am not moronic!" he snapped, before snatching back his ice cream and eyeing the woeful contents with a look of sheer incredulity. "Oh shit, how much of this did you even eat? You're going to get fat, you know. Isn't that a thing that girls obsess over – mmph!"
Any further jibing was promptly stemmed by the napkin that the brunette shoved into his mouth. She smiled beatifically as she rose from her seat. Gilbert had taken the outside, and when she edged past him in order to leave, she took special care to step on both his feet.
Hard.
"It was lovely to meet you Arthur," she took the Englishman's proffered hand, managing to make herself heard over Gilbert's incoherent spluttering. "I hope this wasn't an inconvenience. Why don't we meet up again after school on Monday to discuss exactly how to go about things?"
The blonde's gaze flitted between her retreating back and the sputtering German next to him, expression gleeful.
"I think I've fallen in love." He declared as Gilbert finally managed to propel the offending tissue away from him. The ensuing silence that fell over them was punctuated by hacking coughs as the latter attempted to expel the scraps of paper left in his mouth, but in between them, the distinct disgruntled "get in line," was more than audible.
Operation: Get Roderich Edelstein the Freeloader out of My House began on a rainy Monday afternoon, when the three congregated in Arthur's dormitory, armed with pencils, pens, and a copious amount of paper that spent more time forming aeroplanes than being written on.
"The plan is this," Gilbert declared, whacking the blackboard that had been liberated from the school council with a conductor's baton misappropriated from the very Austrian who was the unwitting subject of their conversation. "Arthur, you circle him from around here, Elizaveta, play the role of the femme fatale. Lure him towards you, down the stairs with you feminine guiles, as dubitable as they may be. Then I, with my awesomeness, will launch an aerial assault on him, leaping from the chandelier with a large sack. Having bundled him into this, we shall drag him to the radio station, making sure not to avoid any pot holes. Am I awesome, or am I awesome?"
A paper plane whizzed in a loop towards him, embedding itself in his white tufts of hair.
There was a noticeable stretch of silence before Arthur broke it, struggling to hide the way his lips twitched upwards in amusement.
"Awesomely a failure, you mean. Beilschmidt, I hate to break it to you, but this isn't exactly an espionage film set in the second world war. And where did you get that Prussian uniform?"
Gilbert cast a downward glance at his dark blue attire, before waving a flippant hand.
"Drama department. I told the Finnish kid I was staging a re-enactment at the local theatre," He coughed loudly, tapping the board impatiently. "Now can we get back down to business?"
"It would help," Arthur returned, folding his arms casually, "If we knew exactly why you're so eager to get him out. Also, why does he live with you? The two of you can't stand each other. I mean, the last time I saw you, it was that catastrophic Hallow - " The shrill ringtone of a mobile phone interjected before he could elaborate, and his hand dived for his back pocket. Whoever the caller was, they were deeply unwelcome. His face seemed to shutter over for a moment as he checked the ID, holding a hand up. "Do you think you could hold it for a moment? I need to take this."
"Certainly not! Did Julius Caesar allow his troops to take a dip in the Rubicon before they crossed it? Did Bismarck ever allow – oh go ahead," he groaned as the sound of his phone started echoing in the room to the tune of a jaunty marching song. "I'd better answer this as well."
"I'll go into the hallway," Arthur offered quickly, already sliding past the doorframe. "Please don't crease my duvet." The only response he got was a sharp, short nod as the other flipped open his phone.
"Hello, Beilschmidt speaking."
In order to assert the reason why Gilbert was so determined, the topic of the Beilschmidt-Edelstein feud must be broached.
It was almost as infamous as the Adnan-Karpusi debacle of two years ago, in which blood, sweat and tears were shed, lost and secreted in gutters (and no-one ever talked about the sewer incident, ever).
Many linked the starting point to the moment, when to the shock of all present, Roderich Edelstein, student head of the music department arrived outside of one of the girls' classrooms and promptly began serenading Elizaveta Hedervary on the violin. He was promptly collared by a prefect and reported to one of the residing heads, and unfortunately, Principal Hassan did not look at it with quite the same romantic penchant that her students seemed to have. He was sent off with a warning, but little else and school legend had it that when Gilbert Beilschmidt, of devil eyed and white haired fame heard, all hell broke loose.
Literally.
Gilbert bombarded the other with all manner of assaults, including liberal use of water and stink bombs, desecrated his homework, when he could get his hands on it, deliberately managed to set school council meetings an hour early so the other arrived late. How he achieved the last, no-one knew, seeing as the council should not even have taken notice of such a miscreant as him. Francis Bonnefoy did seem significantly Arthur Kirkland-free for the next week however, and there was the frightfully handy coincidence that the blonde had to deal with an extra surge in complaints regarding the elder Beilschmidt's behaviour.
Roderich, in turn deeply connected with the heritage of Austria's musicians, composed a sonata lasting half an hour entitled 'The Hooligan Swine,' and unfailingly performed a movement from it each lunch time, before selling it to the school body.
A week later, he was going out with Elizaveta, and their on-off relationship had captured (and was still capturing) the eyes and ears of the majority of the school population.
Another version was that the whole fight occurred much later, after the first breakup .
Gilbert had tolerated Roderich so far; he trusted the Austrian pretty boy about as far as he could throw him with two broken arms, but he was decent to Elizaveta, even if he did prefer her to be more feminine than she previously had been. He made her happy, although he was uptight and couldn't take a decent practical joke and they existed in an uneasy equilibrium, the three of them.
It was enough equilibrium for Gilbert to merely clench his fist when Roderich, evicted from his dormitory for absurd noises at all times of the night, moved into the Beilschmidt household at the behest of Ludwig.
What he did not tolerate however, was the fact that Edelstein was merely content to freeload. He wasn't poor, that much was clear from the cut of his casual clothing and his abundance of suits and purple velvet coats. Frugality, Gilbert could admire; he was sparing with his own money and blanched at anything that was overly expensive. What he didn't admire was that this particular frugality mirrored Vash Zwingli's, and he was rather keen on their front garden not becoming a rather active shooting range, thank you very much.
His dislike soon manifested itself when this parsimonious nature also seemed to extend to never paying rent. Knowing Gilbert, it was only a matter of time before he vocalised it, and it was from there that things turned decidedly frosty.
It was one thing to assure someone of the potential success of an endeavour, but it was quite another to actually try and go through with it – a dark cloud was already looming over Elizaveta as she prised open the door, the hinges creaking as she pulled it.
An avalanche of paper promptly spilled out, spilling around her feet as she made her way into the room.
"If it's Gilbert," an irritated voice resounded from what looked like a landslide of music, "Go away, please, you uncultured ruffian," Sheets drifted like snow in the air, thick and furious as the sound of frantic scribbling could be heard, and it was in the middle of the maelstrom that she found her paramour, otherwise known to others as Roderich Edelstein.
He was a year older than her, well groomed and enviably elegant, from his straight posture to his manner of dress – his clothes were always sharp and clean – something which could not be said for certain other teenagers in her acquaintance, and he never went out without a cursory glance at the large mirror that was in the hall of the house.
Despite his lavish surroundings, and frequently fresh changes of clothing, all of which looked as if it had come out of a high fashion catalogue, he lived like a pauper, frugally and economically, to the extent that several pairs of underwear looked more as if they had been made out of patches than any recognisable material.
Today however, he looked pressurised instead of calm, and there were noticeable bags underneath his eyes, even more marked by the purple of his irises. A tower of crumpled paper balls had accumulated next to him as he dashed out yet more notes, muttering curses under his breath as he once again shredded another sheet. When she gave no reply, amazed at the sheer amount of music, he looked up, and the flinty glint in his eyes diminished slightly, expression melting into a smile. "Hello, my love."
"Have you eaten recently?" she returned, folding her arms obstinately. "I swear last time I could feel your ribs poking into my side like another pair of fingers."
"I had a meal," he nodded, as if agreeing with an invisible audience. "Ludwig brought it up for me."
"How much of it did you eat?"
"Enough." He turned to his papers yet again, capped his fountain pen with a sigh.
"Trouble?"
"This new piece is extremely difficult to write. It's for the university nearby, you know, the one with that music program I want to join for young adults. They asked me to display my skills in one five minute piece which I have to perform at some point. The problem is, I have the ideas, they just…don't fit the time quota. Tell me," he drummed his fingers thoughtfully on the table, as if copying an imperceptible beat. "Does three time or four time sound better?" She laughed in response, folding her hands behind her back as she stepped forward, picking her way through the debris in a bird-like fashion. She stopped just short of him, leaning forward to press a kiss to his cheek. He accepted it graciously, before turning to catch her on the lips.
"How long have you got for it?" she asked, when they'd both managed to catch their breath. "I think a waltz would be good. Maybe you can submit it for our dancing classes."
"Are you still paired with Beilschmidt?" he grumbled, scanning his notes once more. There was a pause before he hummed the melody, foot resuming the beat. "I've been thinking about moving you know. I mean, the rest of the house is friendly, but that ruffian strikes a balance."
"I don't think you need to worry, Roderich," she replied blithely, her smile amused. "I don't think he likes you either. You know, though, there's a spot in the radio station which looks like it needs a regular musician to keep it filled." He shot her a wry, semi-bemused glance.
"If I didn't know any better, Liza," he started, drawing out each word in a lilting tone. "I'd think you were encouraging me. Moving takes a lot of time, you know."
"You never unpacked half your stuff. Besides," she balanced on his chair, drawing whorls into the soft material of the arm. "Think of all the equipment."
"I do hope that's not an innuendo."
"Will you think about it? I've heard you barely have to pay anything."
"I barely have to pay anything here."
"There'd be no sense of obligation though, would there?" she tilted her head, and his eyes strayed to the patch of neck that was bared, the hint of a chain glinting around it. Her expression was mild as she watched him through half lidded eyes, soaking in the light that came from the large double windows. "Think about it, no having to sort through shared laundry. No slamming Gilbert's doors open when his games become too loud." Roderich sniffed at that, sliding a little down his seat.
"I do not slam doors. I close them firmly and decisively. Anyway, the weather's lovely today," If she noticed his switch between topics, she didn't comment, nodding in agreement. "We haven't spent much time together recently," He rose, extending hi s arm. "Would you like to accompany me on a stroll, Lady Hedervary?" She grinned in response, tucking hers into the crook of his elbow.
"It would be my pleasure."
Of course, luck being rather whimsical, it turned out that the front hall of the house did have a chandelier. A rather nice one in fact, dripping with glass ornaments and alight with a multitude of light bulbs.
It also had one self-propelling white haired German, complete with hemp sack and a large grudge against certain composers.
Sorry for the late update! Well, I hope the AusHun was convincing (I feel like I should be writing HunAus, because Hungary seems to be the most, er, authoritative, in the relationship?) I'm not used to writing it, but I have a feeling that their relationship wouldn't be as stormy most of the time as a PrusHun. Then again PrusHun could also be fluffy and...well.
I had some questions asking about whether or not there would be any pairings. I'm not sure I'm going to put ones in that haven't already been established in the Radio Hetalia (general name for things related to the stor(ies) ) pre-story just yet, but there'll be hints as it continues. So yes, I'm sorry if you don't ship AusHun, but it's going to stick around for the duration of this story, but it won't feature as a large issue.