14. the faint cracks in their conscience

No new messages.

"Hey, Artie, put your phone away and let's go eat already," said Gilbert, bursting through the dorm door. His hair was slightly damp, like he'd just taken a shower. Actually he had taken a shower.

Arthur glanced one more time at the screen of his mobile and sighed. "All right," he conceded, and got up to follow his dorm-mate to the cafeteria.

"So what's got you down? You haven't really been yourself since New Year's," said the German, pulling his hat farther down around his ears. They walked quickly across the still-frosty ground and Arthur was glad for his own hat to protect his ears from the biting wind.

"Nothing, I'm fine," he replied absentmindedly. He settled vaguely on the fact that he'd really been neglecting his guitar a bit and those strings were honestly about to go…

Gilbert studied him carefully all through the dinner queue and it was when they'd sat down with Mathias and Francis that he finally said "Bella."

"No," said Arthur a bit too quickly, but the others didn't seem to buy it. Well, Mathias and Gilbert anyway, Francis was fiddling with a camera, his own plate of food untouched.

"We're not stupid, lad," said Mathias. "You two used to talk a lot, and now you don't even make eye contact."

"Something happen?" asked Gilbert, reaching a fork across the table to scoop up some of Francis's potatoes. The French boy didn't seem to notice.

Arthur set his jaw. He wasn't exactly keen to tell either Mathias or Gilbert what had happened in that cold night of New Year's, mostly because he didn't want to see their reactions. And the fact that the same reason why Bella wasn't talking to him was sitting less than a metre from him.

"Nothing happened," he said shortly, standing up. "You know, you can have my potatoes, Gil, I'm not particularly hungry."

Out of the corner of his eye he could see his bandmates exchange looks. He ignored them, and set off towards the dorms. Not Eckland, but a dorm all the same. A place where no one would be obnoxious and nosy and awful… As he neared the dorm, he was starting to regret leaving his dinner with Gilbert, although surely his own destination would have food, considering the inhabitant of the room…

He reached the Cooper Residence Hall and climbed several flights of the stairs before arriving at a door and knocking smartly on it. (*)

The door opened, and Alfred grinned around the heavy door. "Hey!" he said. "Didn't expect you to show up."

Arthur couldn't help but return the smile. "Yeah, I wasn't really in the mood for cafeteria food. Did you get take-away?"

"Take-away?" Alfred scrunched up his nose. "You mean like takeout?"

"Whatever. I'm starving and I need food." Arthur crossed his arms. "Come on, let me in."

"All right, calm yo tits." Alfred opened the door wider to let the Brit in. "I got Chinese; you like fried rice?"

"I do," said Arthur, sitting down on the couch. "Have you got any sauce?"

"Like soy sauce?" Alfred tossed him several packets. "Here you go."

Arthur caught them, and then reached for a carton. Alfred was already stuffing himself with dumplings and spicy General Tso's chicken. They ate for a bit, and it wasn't until Arthur had finished his food that he noticed Alfred studying him closely.

"What?" demanded Arthur.

Alfred squinted slightly, like he was trying to focus on some interesting detail. Arthur immediately felt self-conscious.

"What is it?" he demanded again.

The American swallowed another mouthful of spicy noodles and said, "Are you okay?"

"Why does everyone keep asking me that?" grumbled Arthur half to himself.

"Well, no offense, man," said Alfred, "but you're a bit easy to read."

"What?"

"Are you always so surprised at everything I tell you?" asked Alfred, slightly bemused.

"Shut up," said Arthur.

"Don't want to talk about it?" Alfred shrugged, leaned back, and turned on the TV.

"No, not really—" Arthur hesitated, but then the words tumbled out of his mouth without his thinking about it.

"On New Year's they took us downtown into London to see the fireworks off the Big Ben. And you know you're supposed to kiss someone right at midnight, right? Well, I don't really… I don't really know how it happened but—Francis came up, bloody frog, and well"—Arthur swallowed hard—"he kissed me at midnight. And then Bella saw. And I don't really know why but she's really, really mad at me and won't text me back and won't return my calls and won't talk to me at all."

He stopped to breathe a bit (he'd sort of started hyperventilating… rather embarrassing) while he carefully watched Alfred for any reaction to the story.

But Alfred simply nodded his head wisely and looked at Arthur quite intently. "Don't you think," he said slowly, "that she's sort of overreacting a little bit? I mean, you weren't really going out properly in the first place, so why would she be so upset?"

Arthur sighed with relief, glad to hear his own concerns expressed in someone else's voice. "I don't know why she's acting like this either," he confessed, "but I don't want to lose her."

"Ohhhhhh I see how it is," teased Alfred with a knowing grin. He flipped the channel to a re-run of Doctor Who and leaned forward. "Oh, I love this show!"

"Shut up." Arthur made a face. "It's not like that; we're only friends."

"Okay. But don't lie to me, I saw you two holding hands last term." Alfred let out a monstrous burp. "It was awfully cute."

"It wasn't like that!"

"Okay, okay, calm yo tits." Alfred grinned at his friend. "But seriously. Have you considered talking to her face-to-face? Chicks like that kind of thing, and with that face, she wouldn't be mad at you anymore. Couldn't."

"Bollocks," cursed Arthur. "I'd rather not."

"All right," said the American, shrugging. "Have it your way."

They watched a few more minutes of Doctor Who while Arthur sulked.

"Oh, fuck this," he burst out finally. "I'm going."

Alfred grinned. "Good boy. I knew you were gonna cave."

Arthur, already standing at the door, froze and looked back. "What is wrong with you?"

Alfred raised his hands in a "don't blame me" gesture. The Brit groaned and left Alfred there, waving and laughing at his Doctor Who.

He headed towards Bella's dorm. It was actually in the same building, quite convenient when they used to walk down together to lunch like they did so often before the holidays. That's how he seemed to define everything now: before the holidays and after. Not that it really did anything except make him more worried. He hardly ever saw her anymore anyway, because she always managed to time everything well enough to ensure their never meeting in the lobby or stairwell alone.

And that was, well, a good idea. Very good, now that as Arthur stepped on the landing. Just when Bella was coming out of her dorm.

Arthur couldn't see her face, she was looking down at her phone, maybe deleting his texts or answering someone else's, he didn't know. Her blond hair had fallen forward, her shoulders were hunched up, and somehow she looked really beautiful, very soft and beautiful. He was struck by an urge to reach out and touch her face, to take her face in his hands and tell her how bloody sorry he was, because even now the remorse writhed in his chest—why did any of it happen, why didn't none of it happen…

"Oh. Arthur."

He'd been so dumbfounded that he hadn't realised that she'd noticed him. He raised his eyes to her face and saw its composed calm, the stoic mask that hid suppressed anger, anger that was leaking out of her green eyes and flooding the space in between them. It was suffocating. Suffocating him so that he couldn't think; there was just the anger and that was everything—

"What are you doing here?"

Arthur's vision seemed to sway a little bit. He didn't know why, but he blinked a few times before speaking.

"I think you know the answer to that."

She crossed her arms and cocked her head. Her hair swished around her face. It was curly today, rather than wavy. Arthur ground his teeth and strained himself to focus on the words coming out of her mouth—"As a matter of fact, I really don't. There isn't any reason for me to be talking to you right now."

"Yes, there is," said Arthur a little forcefully.

Something in her face hardened and she began to walk towards the stairs. "Good-bye, Arthur," she nearly spat out.

"No, no," Arthur chased after her and grabbed her wrist, mostly of exasperation. "Bella—"

"Don't!" she shrieked, and she threw his hand off. "Don't—bloody—touch me!"

"How else am I supposed to get your attention?" said Arthur angrily. 'You don't return my calls, you don't text me, you avoid me in the halls—what am I supposed to do?"

"Get over it!" said Bella, trying to match his tone, but ultimately failing; her voice wavered. "Just accept that you don't give a fuck about my feelings and go away!"

The floor tilted and he almost barked out a laugh; what she'd said was so wrong and untrue that it didn't—it just didn't work. It was so against his nature that he wanted to scream immediately that it wasn't and tell her off but he couldn't risk that.

"I do give a fuck, Bella," he said, struggling to keep his voice even. "I do give a fuck because I care, I'm trying to care, but you won't—you won't let me!"

"Ohhhh," said Bella in a mocking voice. "Is it my fault now? Is that what you're saying?"

"I didn't do anything!" Arthur said desperately. "It was the bloody frog who kissed me anyway; I had nothing to do with it!"

"Yeah," she snorted, the word like a knife in Arthur's side, "but you kissed him back."

"No, I didn't!"

"Yes, you did!" she insisted. "Like it or not you have feelings for—for Francis!"

"No, I don't!" he yelled back. But the words, even then, coming out of his mouth, felt not heavy but wrong all the same. She smiled in satisfaction, without warmth.

"You see then?" she said without humour. "You shouldn't lie to yourself. It's true."

Arthur swallowed. "Then disregarding that… can't we at least be—you know, friends?" he asked rather sadly; the answer was already burrowing a hole in his stomach, but he had to hear it, just to make sure.

Bella shook her head. "You've got to be kidding me."

She walked away, her footsteps echoing hollowly on the metal steps.

.

It was during another long, soporific lecture over the air raids and the Blitz that Arthur's phone vibrated with a text. The timing was uncanny. Arthur had been nodding off while next to him Gilbert doodled horrible pictures of strange (yet vaguely familiar) robots with arms that looked like a plunger and a whisk and single eyes on a metal stalk protruding straight out from the robots' fronts. He'd been watching Gil draw speech bubbles labelled "EXTERMINATE" over them for the last five minutes. Last few minutes? Time seemed to move far slowly than it did normally when you were using up energy trying to keep your eyes open. And the robots were definitely more interesting than the strategies the British used to counter Nazi Germany in the Second World War; they (the robots, not the British) were running around chasing an eyebrow-less man with a bowtie and funny hair…

But he couldn't exactly ignore the buzzing in his pocket (in his butt pocket, to be exact). Lucky that day it was abnormally hot—but English weather was always abnormal—and the air conditioning was a loud rickety thing. Perfect cover, thought Arthur, and he slid down slightly in his seat to see what message he'd received. Maybe it was from Bella.

Jager van Vliet: WHAT DID YOU DO TO BELLS

Arthur's heart sank. He started to type back a biting reply when he looked up into the suddenly glowering face of—okay, he could never pronounce, let alone spell his history teacher's name, since it was long and complicated and Indian but he really, really disliked her all the same. Everyone in her class did.

"Detention, Mr. Kirkland!" she trilled, with a slight trace of an Indian accent. "Saturday night, six o'clock. My office."

The verdict hit Arthur like a rock. He had a show that night and Ms.—whatever her name was—was fairly known for keeping her students for an unbearably long time. There was no way he was going to make it. Even now Gilbert was giving him a "You've got to be fucking kidding me" look.

"But—" Arthur heard the word slip out of his mouth without his brain having any input.

"No buts, Mr. Kirkland!" she said, raising an eyebrow. "You know, the consequences of having your phone in lessons. And this"—she wiggled his mobile—"you can have back at the end of the period."

She turned and marched back to the front.

Gilbert scribbled something on a scrap of paper and shoved it off his desk, towards Arthur. Arthur picked it up squinted. Gilbert's handwriting was awful.

Good job. Now what.

Arthur bit his lip. The situation was quite delicate, since the place they were playing at was a pub they hadn't played at before. If they broke their contract now, then they'd be robbed of the opportunity to ever play there again. He couldn't let Gilbert play guitar even if it was necessary for some of the songs, since Gil only knew a handful of chords, none of which were used in the songs. He could always ask Jager to cover for him but seeing how the Dutchman was angry at him for what happened with Bella, he doubted Jager would be willing to do anything for him. Antonio, yes, was very good with classical guitar but that was rather hard to translate to electric, it really was, the textures were so different. Unless if Antonio was a quick learner? Or maybe he'd already tried electric, you never knew, honestly. Arthur chewed nervously on the tip of his pen. Maybe he could just have Elizaveta set up her keyboard or something? …

The bell rang, and everyone jumped up to rush to the dining hall for lunch. Arthur retrieved his phone and caught up to Gilbert.

"I think I've got it," he panted. "So if Tony can do it, I think he's good enough at acoustic to play electric…"

"Sure," said Gilbert, and Arthur, relieved, let go of Gilbert's shoulder. "Where are you going?"

"Library," yelled the Brit over his shoulder. "I've got to figure out those trig identities before the quiz today!"

"No, Artie—wait!"

"What?"

And Gilbert said breathlessly, "Francis wants to talk to you."

Arthur froze. He was instantly knocked over by a group of twelfth-years trying to get a good place in the queue. "What?"

"Francis wants to—"

"No I got that part!" snapped Arthur. "But—why?"

Gilbert gave him a look that Arthur thought was supposed to mean something but made no sense to Arthur.

"What?" repeated Arthur.

Gilbert put his palm to his face. "Blimey, I didn't think you were this bloody thick!"

"What?"

"Stop saying that so much!"

"Then explain it to me!"

The German stared at him for once incredulous second and then muttered something like "useless git." Arthur frowned.

"I'm sorry, what was that?"

Gilbert looked at him. "The poor bloke fancies you!"

And shaking his head, Gilbert turned into the crowd of students, disappearing and leaving Arthur feeling like he'd been hit very hard over the head with a frying pan.

.

Arthur managed to put the bit of information out of his head for several weeks. He managed to keep The Frog (as he now called it) out of his head in the moments where no one spoke and his thoughts ran freely into places forbidden by his conscience. There was no use in trying to act like The Frog wasn't there, not without his friends being the same as Arthur's, and Gilbert, of course, flashing Arthur extremely annoying looks that, as always, seemed to mean something. Those he ignored as much as possible.

It wasn't easy. He still had to deal with Francis in art class, where the assignments were getting more and more time-consuming, forcing Arthur to spend more hours in the art rooms working on whatever project had been set to them. And time in the art room meant time talking to Francis. And while things in between them (or on Arthur's part anyway) were fairly civil, Arthur couldn't escape the nagging sensation that Francis "wanted to talk to him."

That bothered him more than anything. He found himself wondering at night what exactly Francis would want to say. To be honest, Arthur had never seen a particularly wordy side to The Frog. (There was a side where the French boy would give a coy look and smile mysteriously. That infuriated him to no end, but it wasn't as if Arthur would ever admit it to anyone.) But he wasn't exactly like Alfred or Gilbert either, both of whom often kept up a continuous upbeat chatter about nothing. Francis wasn't quiet, though. He just—when he talked, he was mysterious. That was really the only word to describe him that Arthur could think of. He didn't even know that much about Francis at all, even if The Frog lived in the next room. Perhaps it was the fact that Arthur never bothered to go in there. But since there was no reason to, why bother?

January turned into February, and the weather somehow began to grow colder than before (that was the awful bit about English weather) and a lot of students in their year had taken to staying indoors, especially since GCSE exams loomed over them in the passing weeks. Their teachers were assigning harder coursework and tests than ever. And then of course, there was the madness called Valentine's Day.

Arthur had, honestly, never really cared for Valentine's Day. Last year's had been uneventful, save for him having to sleep in Tino and Berwald's room so he wouldn't have to watch Gilbert and Elizaveta snog. It wasn't like he got any sleep that night, either.

Plus, this year he had the problem of Bella looking in the other direction whenever she walked by him on campus. And it wasn't just her, either; other people were giving him dirty looks. Lizzie, for one. That was the most prominent one because she was with Gilbert and he was Gilbert's roommate of all things so it was constantly in his face. All the time.

"They'll get tired of it soon," said Mathias cheerfully one day at band practice. "I mean, how much other gossip about you are they going to get?"

"Hm… none, I suppose," said Arthur absently. He "I mean, it's not like anyone else will fancy me."

"True," snorted Mathias, adjusting his hi-hats.

Gilbert set his jaw and put down his guitar. "Be right back; I gotta take a slash."

He left.

Arthur watched him leave, and then said "What's with him?"

The drummer spun his drumstick thoughtfully. "Well, I reckon he's just worried for his friend. And he's insanely loyal. Like a puppy. An albino puppy."

"I sort of noticed that," said Arthur, thinking back to the first night Gilbert had invited Tony and Francis to study in their dorm.

Mathias was quiet another moment. "You know, I reckon Gilbert would actually get along well with that yank if he wasn't so loyal…" he said, half to himself.

"What?"

The Dane made a panicked face, then slapped his palm to his mouth. "Dammit, I said too much."

"Sorry?"

"No, nothing. Never mind."

Arthur tried to forget what Mathias said, but couldn't. On Valentine's day, he did.

The day had been nondescript. It was a Saturday. He'd studied, he'd played chord progressions mindlessly while watching TV (G, D, E minor, C, D seventh), he'd wrote some fragments of song, he'd painted and ate scones and napped. Then Dylan talked him into a round of Call of Duty, and it turned into a suite-wide sort of thing.

Then, when Gilbert had left to go off-campus with Elizaveta and Arthur had retreated into his room to study for his biology exam (it wasn't really working, he kept playing guitar instead. A major, E major, F-sharp major, D major), he heard a soft knocking on the door.

"Coming," called Arthur, spinning around in his chair and putting his guitar flat on its back on the bed, then opened the door.

Francis.

"Can I have a word?" he asked, surprising Arthur because Christ, how was he so polite? It made him even worse to hate. There was already a sort of cold unsteadiness inside him, shaking of something he couldn't have known what it was, not then…

"Yeah, sure," he said numbly and they sat down.

The words that came out of Francis's mouth felt as shaky as Arthur was, uncertain and earnest and kind and bloody terrified. Arthur swallowed to clear his head, and then heard very clearly "I do… like you. That way."

It didn't feel like he felt like anything. He was floating between emotions, conscious that maybe he was supposed to feel something… elation? Flattery? Disgust? No, no… no, how exactly was he supposed to feel? He swallowed again, but his mouth was dry; there was nothing to swallow except sawdust. Maybe that was what disappointment tasted like? No—but why would he feel disappointed? Francis did like him, just like Gilbert said! And his heart sped up and he felt dizzy, still floating and wondering how to feel.

"A—Arthur?"

He forced himself to look at Francis again, blue eyes and dark blond hair and earnest face. "No, this…" Arthur felt the words come out of his mouth. "No, Germany was so long ago." And as soon as he said it he could see the green trees and sunshine and taste the wurst and hear the laughter but that was all so, so long ago, painfully so, hazy and distant and nothing but dreams.

"This isn't about Germany," said Francis. Arthur had nothing to say, his throat had nothing to say, and he didn't know what to say.

Francis looked on, dark blue eyes flickering with a hint of knowing, a hint of emotion or something that Arthur didn't honestly understand, but there was nothing that he could say, truly, without feeling right with himself, except…

"I can't."

Francis blinked twice, quickly, and then slowly.

"I don't think," said Arthur carefully, "that I can… do this. I just…" His voice wavered. "I can't. It's just—I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I don't—I don't feel the same way."

He paused slightly, to look at Francis, who had no expression on his face.

"I'm—" Arthur took in a deep breath. "I'm going to have to ask you to hide your feelings. I'm—God, I'm sorry—"

Francis put a hand on Arthur's shoulder. "No, I'm sorry," he said quietly. "I'm sorry."

Arthur opened his mouth to say something but Francis had already stood up and left.

The door in the next room closed gently.

.

The Frog spent Easter in France with his mother that year. And he carefully avoided Arthur's gaze for the next few months after that, after that somehow quietly earthshaking day. In contrast Gilbert shot glares at him for a week, then quickly returned to normal. Alfred was somehow even more understanding than ever about the whole thing, despite Arthur feeling guilty about telling him about it (he wasn't sure why; he didn't have much of a reason to feel that way at all) and became an even more valuable friend to Arthur.

In any case, he forgot about it anyway, once GCSEs arrived. There was a generally greater amount of chaos than really any other week or in any of the other years except for the one taking A-levels. But there were more people in GCSE year, and more stupid people in GCSE year. The resounding majority of the eleventh years spent their time cramming for fear of failure, and they'd taken to extreme eating and sleeping schedules ("Not any more extreme than they had been already," remarked Arthur drily). The video-game tournaments often held within their suite every week or so had been abandoned in favour of frantically scouring the textbooks for every last detail and scrap of information that might show up on the exam. Everyone went to bed at the earliest of an hour with a single digit, and much time in class was spent reviewing. Arthur's head might have exploded if not for his guitar, though sometimes he wrote stupid songs as pneumonic devices that Gilbert hummed under his breath while diligently studying from his barely-used literature textbook.

Some idiots started a contest of sorts onto who could study better, making bets on who would score better on the exams, of which Arthur and Gilbert would make fun of for about five seconds, then go back to studying. But it was hard to concentrate while their bandmate tried to prove that an A was better than A*.

"Clearly he's taken something to make him go mental," muttered Gilbert darkly as he studied a diagram of the Krebs cycle.

"Or we all just need more sleep," said Arthur, yawning.

The Saturday morning before exam week, Arthur had it.

"Ughhhh asfhwsjfsihg owe fslhg uof s!" he groaned in frustration, and kicked his mathematics book off his bed.

Gilbert looked up. "That was like a mix of cats being run over by lawnmowers and a cow being castrated by a butter knife."

"Lovely description," said Arthur drily.

"Thank you."

"But I've HAD IT," said Arthur.

Gil stared as Arthur stood up.

"FUCK THIS!" he bellowed at his dormmate. "I've had two weeks straight without making any real fucking legitimate music."

Arthur pointed at Gilbert.

"Get your clothes on. We're going to Jager's."

the German looked bewildered. "But I thought Jager hated you?"

"He's over the whole thing; Bella's just being a self-righteous bitch. Hurry up!"

Gilbert shook his head and put on a t-shirt and pants over his boxers. "Why are we going, now?"

The Brit looked at him dead in the eye. "Bring your bass. We're making a demo."
.

author's note.

Wow I update really slowly ;A; again, thank you everyone for being so patient and supportive and lovely; I really owe it to you all that this story even exists (heart) I'm sorry that the writing's just slowly declining… ahhhh Also I get the feeling that Bella (because she's English in this story, everyone is) would be from Oxford. I just hear an Oxford accent in my head when she's talking that is alll…..

* I should clarify some things about their dorms. The dorms aren't set up in the traditional hall style that you would imagine, but rather, they're suite-like apartment dorms. The dorm will have a sort of small common room, with a bathroom and several bedrooms, two to a room. And since it's a private school, let's go ahead and throw in a mini-kitchen in there too. The building has two of these apartment-like dorms per floor, one boys' dorm and a girls' dorm. The doors are locked and can only be opened by a pass/id card sort of thing that is issued to all students at the start of the term (hence keeping the boys out of the girls' dorms and vice versa). Of course, the people inside can let people in if they want, etc. It's not generally allowed, but most people break this rule and most teachers honestly don't enforce it, as long as they're all the same sex. Of course not everyone let in the dorms is of the same sex haha :) But anyway, hopefully this gives you a better idea of the dorms and stuff like that! :D

* and lastly, I do realise that I am dragging this story out a ridiculous amount but you know that's part of it ok so I hope you understand