Disclaimer: I don't own Axis Powers Hetalia or any of its characters.
Acting is all about honesty. If you can fake that, you've got it made.
~ George Burns
Chapter 6 - The Morning After
When Matthew woke up the next morning, she remained there, lying on her bed, staring up at the darkened ceiling, trying to remember if last night really did happen.
Coming to New York city.
Meeting Monsieur Bonnefoy.
Being hired into Le Château du Marianne.
Meeting Adelio, Heracles, Bella, Elizabeta, Roderich and Katyusha.
Serving Mr Kirkland.
Being threatened by Mr Braginski.
Forced to pretend to be a girl while pretending to be a boy.
Performing in front of a live audience.
She could still feel the sticky remains of sweat on her palms and scraping against her forehead. Last night truly did happen.
After returning the dress to Feliks (" I have like totally more dresses for you to try on. Come by later tomorrow, okay?"), she somehow managed to stagger up the stairs, found her way back into her room, crawl up the ladder into the top part of the bunk bed she was sharing with Cuba and promptly collapsed with her work clothes still on.
So here she was, still a little disoriented and yawning. The bed was much more comfortable than the lumpy couches and hard floors she was normally used to. And if she could, Matthew would have fallen right back down and laid there all morning. But her stomach made her priorities straight and Matthew unfortunately had to get up.
A loud grunting snore startled her from below. Peering down from the wooden side rails, she could see that Adelio was sprawled across his bed, tousled with his blankets, still clothed, just like she had done. He looked so peaceful that Matthew would hate to disturb him. Quietly, she climbed down the ladder, extra careful not to make a single sound, before she tiptoed towards the refrigerator.
To her dismay, there was no food to be found there, not even a carton of milk. They must have eaten it all yesterday morning without them realizing it. And in the excitement of having a new roommate and the bustling activities of last night, Adelio must have forgotten to buy more. With a dejected sigh, Matthew supposed she would have to go to the kitchen to scavenge for food, seeing how she didn't earn any money yet and didn't carry any of it with her. If she was lucky, perhaps Master Wang might take pity on her and give her something.
Taking off the black vest and quickly changing into a casual, more comfortable shirt, she made sure the darkness of the room covered her well, even as she adjusted the band of cloth around her chest, tightening it just to be safe. Adelio mumbled something in his sleep as she cracked open the door, and rolled over to the other side of his bed, continuing to snore, blissfully unaware as his roommate slipped out of the room.
It was still rather early in the morning, to Matthew's surprise. Pale pillars of sunlight seeped in, flickering behind the floating clouds, not strong enough to break completely through them.
As she walked down the stairs, as soon as she reached the first landing, she glanced cautiously at the hallway leading into the first floor. Adelio's earlier warnings still remained in her mind. And the moment she heard the creak of a floorboard and a murmur of a voice, Matthew bolted down the rest of the stairs, not looking back.
The kitchen was dark and oddly quiet when she reached there. The dishes were stacked neatly off the side and some scattering remained on the counters. The heavy scent of food still remained and it only made Matthew's mouth water more. But it would be rude to raid the kitchen for food without permission, so she dejectedly headed back to the dining room, hoping to find Master Wang.
She quickly scanned the room in hopes to see Master Wang and was disappointed when he wasn't here either. To her surprise, there was someone else sitting in the dining hall, reading the newspaper and a half-eaten sandwich in front of him.
The man glanced up when she entered, evidently surprised to see someone so early like himself. He nearly stood up in his stunned haste. " Jones? What are you doing here?"
With a patient sigh, she quickly explained. " I'm not Mr Jones."
He studied her for a moment, pursing his lips in scrutiny, before finally sitting back down. " Wait a minute. Aren't you the last one to perform last night? The one who replaced Elizabeta?" he asked suddenly, leaning forward towards her in interested curiosity.
The embarrassment of last night sharply resonated in her. " Yes," she mumbled, ducking her head, hoping vainly that the image of her wearing that particular revealing dress would fade away soon.
" They're calling you all sorts of names, you know," the man smirked, proving her fears right. " The 'Lady in Red', from what I heard."
Her jaw went slack. " W-w-what? T-that's impossible," Matthew spluttered, turning red. " Why would anyone call me that?"
Amused, he shrugged, rolling his shoulders back at ease. He leaned back on his chair, its back legs dangling listlessly above the floor. " You put up one heck of a performance last night. That's good enough for some people," he pointed out.
She didn't expect that last night's performance would have such an aftermath like that. In fact, it unnerved her a bit. The fact that most of the people there knew she was a "guy" pretending to be a girl seemed to make things worse.
" By the way, just asking, but are you a girl or a guy?"
Flushing, Matthew's head snapped up towards him. " I - I'm a boy!" she spluttered, curbing her voice in indignation.
But he seemed to accept it. He even threw out his hands to ward off her (supposed) outrage. " Relax! I didn't mean any offense," he grinned. " I was just checking. I wouldn't want to give you the wrong impression that I swing that way."
Heat still creeping up her neck, she managed to control her very real apprehension before casually shrugging. " Don't worry. You're not the first person to mistaken me for a girl," she easily drawled.
His grin widened. " Trust me when I say that when I first saw you performing last night, I could have swore to my father's grave that you were a girl. A very nice-looking young girl that I would have loved to ask out for a few drinks if I didn't know any better." He chuckled at her embarrassed expression, enjoying the fact he was needling her to no end. " So how did a kid like you got dragged into doing it?"
Despite his teasings, Matthew liked his casual, relaxed attitude. " Monsieur Bonnefoy brought me to Mister Feliks who got me ready for the performance."
" Ahh, Feliks. Our one and only self-proclaimed costume designer." The man's lips were crooked to a side, not entirely in amusement and leaning more towards annoyance. " Not quite what you expect from a guy."
" No," she admitted, remembering how he was admiring himself from the mirror and placing pink girlish barrettes in his blond hair when she and Monsieur Bonnefoy entered unexpectedly into his room. " But I think he's nice," she added as an afterthought.
" Nice?" He snorted in disbelief. " Wait until you catch him in one of his moods that he likes to do for the fun of it. A few months back, I got roped into it and if I could have killed him, I would have, if Bonnefoy didn't stop me." His face glowered as if he had tasted something sour in his mouth and Matthew knew better than to ask the details of what happened those few months ago.
" I haven't introduced myself yet," she quickly said, hoping to take his mind off of whatever ill memories he had revoked. " My name is Matthew Williams."
His frown disappeared for the time being as he turned his focus back on her. " Lars," he returned.
Lars. She recognized the name as the one who Bella had briefly mentioned as the one who often bickered with her. She could see that his laidback approach might have caused an issue with some people and perhaps Belgium was one of those people.
" I heard you were an actor?" he asked her. " Just got hired yesterday?" He whistled appreciatively. " Must be good to convince Bonnefoy to keep you."
" That's what everyone else has been saying," Matthew mused out loud. Thinking back now, both Cuba and Belgium had mentioned the fact to her, how Monsieur Bonnefoy wasn't hiring anyone for the longest time and how they wondered how he was so effortlessly swayed to hire her when he couldn't afford to.
" Don't see a problem with that. You probably heard some of the rumours already, even if you've only been here for a day." He rolled his eyes when she shook her head, blinking in confusion. " No? And I thought Feliks was scatterbrained enough," he muttered to himself. " Anyways, I'm sure even someone like you know that we are in a depression, right?" he added with a slight, threatening growl.
When Matthew quickly nodded to not curb his irritation again, Lars continued with a dry, bitter quirk to his mouth. " Money has been running low these days and even we are being stretched to our limits. You can tell by how many customers we get. Look at last night. Twenty-something people showed up all night and for a place like ours, that's not good to pay off the bills. Bonnefoy can't afford to hire anyone else because he can't. Less customers means less food at the dinner table. All our cheques keep getting lower and lower and there's nothing we can do about it."
She understood what Lars meant. For the last few years, since the Depression began, work and pay had been hard to come by. Even when she came to the city, there wasn't much hope to finding a job. Fortunately for her, Monsieur Bonnefoy proved her wrong.
But that doesn't explain why he hired me even he had every reason not to, she thought to herself, puzzled.
" I - I'm sorry," she stammered out loud to him. " I didn't know that Le Château was in such a predicament."
Now, Lars looked amused. " What are you apologizing for? It's not like you caused the Depression. Even if you did, you probably weren't even born during that time."
" I'm not that young," she pouted. " I turned sixteen last year."
" And I'm your grandmother," he snorted. " Either way, you're younger than me."
" How old are you then?" Matthew challenged, almost impulsively.
He winked. " Not telling." Sticking out his tongue like a child, he stood up and pushed his half-finished sandwich towards her, to her surprise. " Take it. Your stomach was growling for the last ten minutes while we were talking," he teased, grinning at her reddening face. " Besides, I gotta go meet up with Bonnefoy."
Glowing with gratitude, she accepted it, eyes shining in delight. How Bella and Lars never got along was beyond her. " Thank you very much."
He smiled, taking note the rare and beautiful color of amethyst behind her glasses. They glittered like gemstones. " You can thank me by staying out of trouble like a good little boy, Mattie," he smirked, before he left with a friendly wave, leaving her a bit dumbfounded and surprised.
Her brother was the only one who ever called her Mattie.
~.~.~.~
" The Twelfth Night," Sadiq announced as soon as he strolled the room, opening the door with a bang, purposely ignoring Heracles' scowls. " I already discussed with Bonnefoy and he consented to it."
" That originated from Korea!" Yong Soo, a loud and cheerful boy, piped up.
And everyone simply ignored him. " You decided the play without speaking to the rest of us?" Heracles acidly said. " But I suppose someone with a small brain like yours can't comprehend something like that," he added with a sneer.
" What did you say?"
Elizabeta instantly stepped in between them before either of them could get into another fight. " I agree with Monsieur Bonnefoy. I think it's a lovely idea," she loudly said. " We haven't done Twelfth Night before."
" I still like have some of the costumes from the last Shakespearean play we did," Feliks (who was also heavily involved in the costumes for the troupe) added excitedly. " I'll just totally fix them up for this play."
Nodding in agreement, the brown-haired boy Toris who Matthew had seen earlier before also spoke up. " And since Matthew joined us, we should have just enough actors to do it." He smiled gratefully at her, causing her to smile back at him. They had spoke briefly before Sadiq had entered and almost immediately, they got along quite nicely.
" I will be Orsino," both Heracles and Sadiq immediately proclaimed, before irritably glaring at each other.
" One of you could be Malvolio," Toris quickly suggested. " He has just as much as an important role as Orsino or Viola."
" Speaking of that, who will be Viola?"
Feliks then clapped a hand to Matthew's shoulder. " I think Matthew has already proven he looks convincingly like a girl, as well as a boy. He would fit the role perfectly."
Alarm shuddered through her. The thought of returning so soon back on stage, despite yesterday night being a success, made her feel frightfully anxious and nerve-racked. " I - I don't know," she stammered. " I - I never acted on stage before ..."
" But you performed so well last night," Yong Soo exclaimed. " It's in the headlines already. The mysterious Lady in Red, who charmed everyone last night," he recited, as if reading from the newspaper. He paused, peering inquisitively at her. " Can I touch your breasts?"
" No!" Matthew yelled out, instinctively cover up her chest, her face bright pink from the mortification.
" Don't worry. Yong Soo was just teasing," Toris explained, as Feliks laughed.
" It's not like you're a girl or something," he chuckled in amusement, making her turn even redder.
If only he knew ...
The desperation on her face must have convinced Elizabeta to step in to help her out. " Why don't we give Matthew an easier part first?" she proposed. " He said that he doesn't have a lot of experience so we could prepare him by building up his experience first. Why don't we give him the role of Antonio? He has a few yet important scenes and it's a small enough role to help get Matthew started."
A murmur of consent rustled through the room and Matthew could have hugged Elizabeta in gratitude for saving her from Yong Soo, who was still staring intently at her, and from having such a major role for her first time. " Then who will be Viola?" Toris asked. " And we have to decide who Olivia will be, since Miss Elizabeta is the only female actress."
There was a slight pause. " It won't hurt if we dress you up as a girl, would it?" Feliks happily chirped.
Immediately, Toris turned an interesting shade of crimson, like Matthew had done before. Except he really was a boy and not a girl. " W-w-what? I - I'm not going through with that again!" he spluttered irritably.
" Come on. You're just exaggerating. Last time was totally fun. We got a lot of customers that day too." The blond grinned deftly as Toris flushed. " Don't get so heckled about it. You won't be the only one. After all, we got Matthew and Shen here to dress up too. Which would be like totally awesome if you ask me."
The said young Chinese boy by the window said nothing and no expression betrayed his thoughts. Perhaps the only thing that indicated his annoyance was a slight furrow of his bushy eyebrows. Matthew on the other hand snapped her head towards him in disbelief, eyes widening, feeling miffed that she was so easily offered up to the wolves, so to speak.
" I - I thought I was playing Antonio," she choked out. Which was a boy's name the last time she had heard.
" It's not completely decided yet," Elizabeta vaguely said in her direction, pondering to herself about the roles. " We have yet to decide the two main roles and we still have Olivia's role to decide." She tapped her chin thoughtfully. " How about if I play Olivia and Toris plays Viola? It would benefit everyone as a whole," she quickly said in answer to Toris's splutters. " I agree with Feliks that we did accumulate a lot of customers when we had Toris and a few others wore dresses - "
" See? At least somebody agrees with me for once."
" - and Toris hasn't gotten a chance to be in a main role before. I think this would be a great opportunity for him." A great opportunity to see him paired up with other guys, she mentally added. She twittered happily to herself, eyes closed in bliss, much to the confusion of her fellow actors.
Not realizing Elizabeta's thoughts, Toris wasn't sure whether he should be pleased or embarrassed. " A-are you sure that I should take this role?" he asked, glancing around at the others for confirmation. " Not that I mind or anything. Only if everyone else is okay with it ..."
" I totally have confidence in you," Feliks brightly said, wrapping an arm around his shoulders.
" Toris would be an excellent choice," Sadiq nodded in approval. Despite throwing a dirty glare at him for stealing the line he wanted to say first, Heracles agreed also.
" Korea approves!"
" So looks like you get to be Viola," Elizabeta cheerfully said, clapping a hand to Toris's shoulder.
Blushing slightly, he tried to conceal his happiness and failed miserably. " I'll do my best."
" Now that Viola and Olivia's roles are settled, we still have the other roles to deal with."
" As I said, I'll be Orsino," Heracles and Sadiq declared once again, only to snarl at each other.
" What do you say?"
" Bring it on, bastard!"
Shen cleared his throat, speaking for the first time since the discussion began, calmly interrupting. " I nominate Matthew to play Sebastian," he said, so quiet that they could barely hear his voice. " I think the role would fit him more than Antonio."
Elizabeta gazed thoughtfully at Matthew, as if her eyes alone could imagine what she would look like as Sebastian. " Yes. I think that would work much better," Elizabeta murmured, the gears in her brain clicking and whirring away.
" But I wanted to dress Matthew up too!"
" You can do that another time, you know ..."
Sebastian does get to spend some lovely moments with Antonio after all, Elizabeta thought deviously. The smile on her face widened mischieviously. " It works out nicely. Just look at the two of them. Toris and Matthew do look alike, don't you think?" She grabbed their arms, forcing them to stand side by side. Her face glowed with delight. " They look like brothers," she gushed. And another very nice pair, if I do say so myself.
" They do look rather similar," Heracles remarked, glancing at Matthew. His emotionless gaze suggested that he knew something that he shouldn't have and it made Matthew feel slightly uncomfortable. She shifted, hunching her shoulders, trying to avoid his stare.
" Nice! They really pulled off the brother and sister look, just like that," Feliks grinned, snapping his fingers excitedly.
" So it's agreed then? I'm Viola. Elizabeta is Olivia. Matthew is Sebastian." After the collective nods and murmurs, Toris continued. " Now that those roles are taken care of and what's left is - "
Angry voices erupted from outside, cutting Toris off. They all looked at each other in confusion before hurrying to the door to find out what was causing the commotion.
" You cannot delay anymore, Bonnefoy. We have stretched our patience to the limit - "
" We are doing all that we can to settle the expenses." Monsieur Bonnefoy's calm voice floated gracefully throughout the hallways of La Château. Though even as he spoke, the thick tension remained heavy and pressed urgently down on all of them. " If you would be so kind as to give us a few more days - "
" Enough of your excuses!" the man growled. " Bonnefoy, you have delayed the payment for months now. We have been more than generous with your dilly-daddling. If you don't pay now, we will be forced to cut all your resources!"
By now, everyone was peeking out from doors, frozen where they stood, watching the scene with tense curiosity. " Not again," Sadiq muttered.
" What's going on?" Matthew whispered to Toris. " Who is that man?"
" A debt collector," he whispered back, eyes darting nervously at the man. " He wants the money for the rent. Monsieur has been pushing him away for weeks now and he keeps coming back, almost everyday now." His mouth was pressed into a worried crease. " But I've never seen him look this angry."
" - water. Electricity. Heat. Everything. All your customers would be driven away," the debt collector was angrily rambling. His face was bloated and spitting at Monsieur Bonnefoy, as he jabbed a finger at him. Despite his small statue, the magnitude of his words were able to strike fear and dread into any listening ear. " And all your lackeys would be left without a job and they'll only have to blame you for it." His lips turned to a derisive sneer. " After all, no decent employer would even think to hire a house full of - "
The burning glint in Monsieur Bonnefoy's eyes was rather terrifying to behold and a mere glance of it was enough to silence the fuming debt collector. " I advise you, monsieur, to not speak of things you do not understand," he spoke quietly, his voice only betraying a slight tremor to hide his rage. " Particularly if it concerns my employees." He indicated curtly towards the door, his gaze cold and hard. " This meeting is over. Au revior."
" We aren't done here," the man spluttered, fists clenched at his sides. " I'll be coming back and the next time that I do, it will be too late for you to - "
" You heard him," Lars growled, looming over him. And behind him, Cuba cracked his knucles menacingly and Vash had already brought out his gun. " We have no further business with you. So I suggest that you leave."
Face red with indignation, he gathered up his things. " Fine. If that's what you people want," he snarled. " This place will be closed down for good because your obstinate foolishness. You brought this on yourselves. Don't blame me when you all starve on the streets like the rats that you are."
" Here's the door, sir." Lars spat out of the last word particularly, opening the door and mockingly ushering the debt collector towards it. " I think you know how to use it."
Growling a mutter of curses, the debt collector roughly shouldered past Lars and with a final glare, left Le Château.
There was a brief pause before everyone returned back to their activities, scuttling away and whispering anxiously to themselves. " It'll be all right," Monsieur Bonnefoy quietly assured Elizabeta, who approached him, eyes wide with concern. He smiled at her in a half-hearted way. " We'll find some way to pay off the rent. We'll be fine. We always are."
And yet, it didn't relieve any of their fears.
~.~.~.~
Author's Notes:
Au revoir (French) - Goodbye
Holland and Canada have very good relations, Canada having freed Netherlands during World War II from Germany. In eternal gratitude, every year, Netherlands sends thousands of tulips (their national flower) to Ottawa, Canada's capital city. Also, Netherlands had some colonies in North America and fought against France to occupy the now present Maritimes Provinces, until the British annexed it. It just adds to the ship tease and the mystery of Matthew's brother. ^_^
Like the pair above, Canada and Lithuania's relations are generally pretty good also. Canada was also the first nation to recognize the Baltic countries' independence.
I chose "Shen" for Hong Kong's human name, mostly because I found it "Shen" meant spirit or deep thought. Since Hong Kong doesn't speak much, I assumed he has a lot of time to think about things. ^_^