Third Bar
Disclaimer: I don't own Hetalia or Snow Patrol.
Note: words that are being spoke in normal font are in another language.
Words that are being spoken in italicized font are in English.
Francis smiled to himself as he took in a whiff of the bakery he had just walked in, nothing beat the smell of fresh cooked bread in Paris. He'd been living in ancient city for now almost two and a half years, finishing off college at a Parisian university for theatre and now he worked for a Shakespearean stage company in England. The commute was a bit of a hassle, and sometimes he'd have to rent a hotel room on the other side of the Channel to make sure he could make it to practice on time if it started early in the morning. But he loved his job, he loved acting, especially Shakespeare, and even being an understudy was a just a dream come true to him.
Monique was now in her sophomore year of college in Rome and had met a boy named Marcello who she was now dating. According to Monique he had been the first boy she had ever trusted with the truth behind her past and he never judged her for it. Francis had yet to meet him and he was sure that his little sister had done so on purpose. He would meet him one day, Monique couldn't hide him forever.
"Can I help you, Monsieur." The lady behind the counter asked, she was in her mid-forties to early fifties and owned the bakery with her husband. They had a very good system going, she worked the counter and he baked seeing as she couldn't bake all too well and he wasn't a people person. Francis had picked up on all of this in the past two and a half years he had been coming to this bakery every day to pick up breakfast.
"I'll have the usual, Madame." He said flashing her a smile that made all women end up with a light blush on their cheeks. "How's business?"
"It's going well, thank you. How's the acting going, I'm sure that helps you pick up loads of girls." She said smiling; Francis felt his smile almost slip off of his face and destroying the façade he had worked so hard to build up around himself. Most people thought that he was the happiest man in the world, he had a great job, he was smart and handsome, he had loads of money, and the ladies loved him. But three years ago Francis lost his whole world, again, the second love of his life disappeared out of his hospital room with only a note saying goodbye. No one had heard from Arthur Kirkland since.
The lady behind the counter handed him a paper brown bag containing the coffee cake and croissant he ordered every morning and a paper cup filled with vanilla coffee. "Merci," Francis said taking the items out of her hands and handing her his plastic credit card that had a seemingly never ending supply of money on it.
Francis was glad that he had a day off from play practice, in two days he was heading to tour around Europe and so the crew and actors had been given time off to pack and relax before the trip starting in Madrid and ending in Copenhagen. Even though he was only an understudy, he too had felt the brunt of the stress actors had as well as the crew members as he helped out with them too. He sat down on a bench in one of the many parks that Paris was famous for and ate the breakfast he had just bought. Children chased each other in the grass and around the trees enjoying the last warm days of fall. Parents chatted among themselves about their children and the latest gossip of the city. Despite being surrounded by all the people, Francis felt alone, more alone then he had ever been, but he could not leave his self-imposed exile from his friends. They were all moving on with their lives and he felt himself stuck in a rut and far behind them in the road of life.
Sighing, Francis stood up, having a pity party for himself would get him nowhere and neither would thinking about Arthur. In fact he'd probably just slide back a few feet if he thought about Arthur for too long. He perused through the Parisian streets trying to find a motive for why he had stepped out for a morning jaunt in the first place. He shied away from areas like the Eiffel Tower and other tourist attractions to avoid the couples enjoying their honeymoon or a long awaited vacation.
After meandering around the city for nearly an hour Francis decided to head back to his apartment and pack for the upcoming tour. This would be his first real tour with the acting company. In the past four months since he had joined he had only done plays on stage in England and always as the understudy. This was his first time as the understudy for the main character though; he loved the character of Hamlet, the betrayal and deception of the story, the genius of it. Monique had promised to see the play when they came to Rome even though her older brother wouldn't actually most likely play the role of Hamlet when she saw it. Well it was a step in the right direction; he wouldn't be the understudy forever. He frowned as his apartment door swung open, a suitcase that definitely didn't belong to him was sitting in the foyer.
"Hello?" He asked on his guard as he walked into his apartment.
"Frannie!" Monique said hugging him as she jumped up from where she had been sitting at his kitchen table. "Where were you?"
"Getting breakfast and enjoying the city." Francis said with a smile glad to see his sister. "What are you doing here?"
"We had a long weekend, and you said you wanted to meet Marcello, so here we are." Monique stepped away from her brother to stand beside the tan man who also sat at his table. He had tan skin and light brown hair with a curl that looked like the ones Feliciano and Lovino sported, maybe it was an Italian thing, Francis thought with a shrug.
"It is nice to meet Monique's favorite brother." Marcello said standing up to shake Francis's hands.
"I better be her favorite brother." Francis playfully growled at his sister earning a giggle from her. How nice it was to hear something that for four long years he thought he would never hear again. "It is nice to meet you too, Marcello." Francis sat down at the table across from Marcello and beside his sister. "You are a very lucky guy to be dating my sister, but I must warn you Monique has many people who would wait in line to make your life miserable if you do anything to harm her at all." The tanned man paled slightly and Francis could see the warning look in his sister's eyes, but as her older brother he felt obligated to give the Italian the warning. "I gave Gilbert the same spiel when he began to take an interest in Matthew." Monique chuckled slightly at that.
"I understand why you are protective of Monique, more than most older brothers would be, but I promise I would never hurt her on purpose." Marcello said taking Monique's hand as he spoke. "I want to protect her as well." Francis could see the love and determination in the Italian's eyes that he had once seen in his own eyes for a very different person.
"Excuse me, I have to pack for my trip. You're welcome to make yourself at home." Francis said pushing his chair away from the table. "It shouldn't take me too long and then I'll show you around Paris, you'll get the special tour from a local."
He was almost done packing when his sister knocked on the door. "Are you okay?" she asked sitting down on the bed beside his black carpeted suitcase he was folding clothes into.
"Yeah." Francis said patting down the white t-shirt he had just folded and placed in the suitcase.
"There is no sign of Arthur anywhere in this house. It's as if he never existed in your life." Monique said switching to English her voice concerned and slightly upset. Her blue eyes raged with a spark she had never lost, not even when she had lived in a nightmare day and night.
"I can't think of him, when I do- I'm trying to move on Monique, I'm trying to put my life back together. He left, he left me, he left Alfred, he left everybody and for reasons that are unknown to me. Obviously he has no desire to ever contact me again." Francis said his voice monotone and his eyes flickered to the dresser where he had hidden the letter Arthur had left for him at the hospital, it was nearly torn up from being folded and unfolded so many times during the past three years since Arthur's departure from their lives. The pictures Feliciano had taken of them when they had given Arthur a grand tour of Montreal also resided in the drawer beside the letter and a picture of Jeanne, Francis's first love.
"What if he can't for whatever reason?" Monique asked and Francis found his anger rising, couldn't Monique drop the subject? It was painful and unnecessary.
"Is there a reason to all this? To your trip, to your questions?" Francis hissed, Monique took a deep breath before speaking again.
"Alfred called me, he said he you never answered his phone call. He said he thought he saw Arthur in Copenhagen, but he wasn't sure."
"Monique, I can't- I won't go off chasing fairy tales, let me move on, please." Francis walked around the room gathering the last articles that he would need to pack. He didn't want to hear about Arthur or where he could be.
"But what if Arthur is in Copenhagen? Are you just going to let him walk out of your life forever?"
"He already did that." Francis said slamming the cover to his suitcase down on top of it. He would not let himself build hope that Arthur was in reach to him.
"You're a coward, you know that."
"Not all of us have your kind of strength." Francis replied somberly, memories of Jeanne and his mother's deaths hitting him and the strength he had possessed then that had helped him get through it all. Arthur had taken a lot of Francis with him it seemed.
"You're stronger then you give yourself credit for." Monique said before she walked out of Francis's bedroom. He could hear Marcello and Monique talking to each other outside the bedroom door.
"I'm worried about him, he's lost so much in the past couple of years, he doesn't talk to his friends that often. If he keeps this up I'm afraid I'll lose him." Monique said, Francis paled at her words, he thought he that if he avoided his friends he could somehow prevent them from knowing just how much pain he was in. It wasn't a sharp pain anymore, just a dull ache in his chest where his heart had been ripped out. Francis almost laughed at himself for how much he sounded like that dreadful heroine from that vampire book series Jeanne had loved when that awful vampire she called a boyfriend left her. The werewolf would have been the better choice.
"He'll be okay," Marcello replied, "I think you worry more about him then he does for you sometimes." Francis almost snorted at that comment, there was no way Monique worried more about him then he did about her. He was the big brother it was his job to worry.
Suddenly the telephone rang making Francis jump, he reached over and grabbed the phone off of his night stand. "This is Francis Bonnefoy."
"English please," a male voice in a British accent said,
"Oh sorry, hi Dalton, what can I do for you?" Francis said, Dalton Hitts was the actor playing Hamlet in the play company, he'd only been with the acting troope for about two years now but he was extremely talented and Francis felt extremely lucky to be able work under him.
"I'm going to need you to fill in for me."
"Quoi?" Francis almost shouted,
"It won't be a problem will it? I know you know all the lines and you've practiced the character. I broke my leg walking down some stairs." It was no secret that Dalton was accident prone but breaking his leg right before the big tour, Mr. McCune would not be happy. Joseph A. McCune was the leader of the acting company Francis worked for and he was not an easy man to please.
"I understand, will you still tour with us?"
"Doc doesn't want me to, he says I need to stay on this side of the Channel till it heals."
"Kay."
"Break a leg." Francis snorted at the irony of Dalton's words and listened to the dial tone as the English man hung up before him. He was going to play the lead now, the realization hit him like a hundred kilogram sack.
"Mon Dieu!"
"What's wrong?" Monique said running into his room with Marcello on her heels.
"That was Dalton, the lead actor in Hamlet, he broke his leg. I- I'm going to play the role of Hamlet on tour." Francis said sitting on the bed trying to wrap his brain around it. Suddenly he wasn't sure if he was ready to have a lead role in a play that he would perform in front of hundreds of people. There was no way he could convince all of them that he was Hamlet and that his uncle had murdered his father or that he was in love with the fair Ophelia.
"That's wonderful; I can't wait to see you perform." Monique said clapping her hands in delight. Francis smiled knowing that at least one person would enjoy the show no matter what, and after the show she'd proudly boast that it was her brother who was playing Hamlet no matter how poorly he performed.
"Thank you," he said standing up, "I did promise you a tour of the city of love from a resident right? Well, we'd better be off if we're to see everything."
I hang my coat up in the first bar
There is no peace that I have found so far
The laughter penetrates my silence
As drunken men finds flaws in science
Their words mostly noises
Ghost with just voices
Your words in my memory
Are like music to me
I'm miles from where you are
I lay down on the cold ground
I, I pray that something picks me up
And sets me down in your warm arms.
Author's Note (The part of the story where the author comes out and writes a silly note): Well here we are at Chapter two and we get to see Francis. I first heard this song with a FrUk video while writing The Russian Sunflower and knew I had to write a chapter in My English Rose about them. Arthur isn't really in this chapter but that's beside the point. As for the Monaco/Seborgea pairing, that comes from one of Himaruya's Christmas webcomic last year where Seborgea asks Monaco out on a date. I've liked the pairing ever since. I would like to wish everyone, even if you're not American, a Happy Thanksgiving.