Hikaru

My parents left the very next day which was very sudden since I thought they'd hang out a while longer but I was relieved. I didn't have to be watched by my mother or spoiled rotten by my father. Ryuto was relieved, too, but his reasons were different from mine. However, I had an entirely different thing to worry about now…

I ran the doorbell nervously as I clutched a bag full of white modeling clay. I could feel my fingers slipping and even though the day was cool, my skin was heating fast. Other the other side of the door, I heard someone walking towards the door and a male voice shouting, "I got it!" The door opened and Gilbert stood before me with a huge grin on his face, but he frowned once he saw me.

"Oh," I thought you were someone else," he said.

"What is that supposed to mean?" I asked.

He grinned. "Nothing. Come on in. Ludwig's upstairs. You can wait for him up there."

I nodded and took off my shoes as I stepped inside the Beilschmidt house. That's right. I was at Ludwig's house… I was going to meet his parents…and work on our history project that was due in two weeks. And I was going to meet his parents!

Ugh, why am I so nervous? I thought. I mean, he already met mine and my father seemed to like him. So what would I be nervous of?

"Who's that, Gilbert?" asked a voice. A woman appeared around the corner wearing an apron with a man following her. I easily recognized a few of Ludwig's traits on the couple: he had his mother's blonde hair and blue eyes and his father's rough features and giant frame.

"This is Hikaru, Mutti. She's Ludwig's girlfriend," Gilbert said, smirking.

"Oh, yes," his mother said, smiling. "Ludwig's talked about you for a while, or rather Gilbert's been talking about Ludwig and you. I'm their mother and this is their father."

I bowed my head. "It's a pleasure to meet you," I said.

"You can go upstairs to find Ludwig. He should be in his room," his father said.

I bowed again. "Thank you," I said.

As they left the room, I heard his mother saying, "Honey, isn't she adorable? No wonder he likes her." I blushed and ran up the stairs as Gilbert yelled that Ludwig's room was the last door on the left. When I got to the door, I saw that it was cracked open so I slipped inside. His room, I noticed, was very neat and organized with papers stacked neatly and books organized alphabetically by authors. He had a German flag on one wall and pictures of the guys framed on the others. Oddly, there was a white flag pinned below the German one with the words "I surrender" written on it with his named signed in Feliciano's handwriting. On his desk, I spotted "The Book Thief" and picked it up, setting the bag of supplies down with a thump.

Just as I flipped it open, I heard his voice saying, "I thought I told you to stay out of my room, Gil—"

I spun around and saw him pulling a shirt over his head as he entered his room. He stopped with his shirt dangling around his neck, staring at me. I felt myself blush and I shut my eyes. "I'm so sorry!" I apologized. "I didn't mean to intrude! The door was open and I thought you were in—" Unexpectedly, I felt myself being pulled into his chest as his arms wrapped around me. I sighed, feeling warm inside his arms while smelling the scent of soap on him.

"It's okay," Ludwig said. "I thought you were Gilbert."

I looked up and into his eyes, feeling myself harder. He leaned and kissed me softly on the lips. I hugged him tighter, burying my face into his chest.

"We should get started on our project," he said.

"Okay…" I pulled away and picked up the bag I brought. "I got some modeling claying…will it be enough?"

"Yeah, it should be. Oh, and Feliciano and Kiku can't come over to help us today. Feliciano's with his family and Kiku has a lot of chores to do at home so we'll need to work on this harder to finish it."

I nodded and helped set up a board with a blue print of the Ancient Roman Empire. For our project, Feliciano, Ludwig, Kiku, and I—or just Ludwig and I, at the moment—were building a diorama of the city of Rome itself. It seemed hard at first but once we researched all we needed to know, we were set to go. We could've finished it a week ago but I had my recital and Ludwig didn't want me stressing over it so he picked up my part of the job and did most of both of our parts. I was really grateful to him for that. And Ludwig, the serious and aggressive guy that he is, got half of the city of Rome built in the past week.

"What are you smiling about?" Ludwig asked as we worked.

I looked up to see him watching me with his glasses on and smiled. "Nothing," I said.

He touched my cheek with his fingers and I leaned over to kiss him. When our lips were about to touch, a door downstairs slammed loudly and we heard shouts of "Mutti!" and "Vati!" came from loud voice.

"My brothers," Ludwig murmured as he stood up.

"Brothers?" I whispered. I followed him out of his room and downstairs to see older lookalikes of Ludwig and Gilbert standing around and hugging his parents while chatting loudly.

"Ludwig, there you are!" shouted one of the lookalikes who had short, messy blonde hair. He embraced Ludwig as the other lookalikes surrounded him. Even though Ludwig was six feet exactly, he looked shorter among the others but still gigantic.

"Oh, and who might this be?" another said as he looked at me standing off to the side uncomfortably. He looked more like Gilbert than Ludwig.

"Brothers, this is Hikaru," Ludwig said, taking my hand. "She's my…uh…"

"His girlfriend," Gilbert interjected brashly and Ludwig blushed violently while I squeezed his hand tightly.

"What!" one shouted. "Ludwig has a girlfriend! And she's cute, too!"

Ludwig's brothers gathered around the two of us. I did my best not to hide into Ludwig's side but they were so gigantic I couldn't help it.

"Don't scare her," Ludwig's mother chided. "Hikaru, sweetie, this is Armon, Klaus, Voss, Werner, and Siegfried. They are Ludwig's and Gilbert's older brothers."

I bowed my head. "Nice to meet you," I said.

"Let's sit down," Ludwig's father said. "We can talk while your mother gets drinks."

I followed Ludwig into the living room and sat down next to him, suddenly wishing I had jeans to wear instead of a skirt.

"So do you two go to school together?" asked the one with short messy hair, Armon.

"Yes, Armon," Ludwig said apparently getting annoyed.

"How did you two meet?" asked the one who reminded me of Gilbert, Klaus.

"History," I said.

"Mein gott, you're lucky, Ludwig," said Werner as he pinched my cheeks but Ludwig hit his brother's hand and glared at him.

"I know," said Voss, who had a large scar across his face. "It took me a while to get a girlfriend."

Gilbert laughed. "That's because chicks don't go for scars. They go for the awesome me!"

Werner, who had long blonde hair like his mother whacked Gilbert's head. "Oh, yeah? And how's that Elizabeta girl you've known since you were little? Are you two dating yet?" he asked.

"Of…of course we are!" Gilbert shouted, turning red.

"I thought she was dating Roderich," I said.

"They don't need to know that!" he yelled at me. His face was flushed with embarrassment as his older brothers were snickering.

"Hey, don't yell at Hikaru like that!" Ludwig shouted and all the brothers suddenly started shouting at each other and rough housing.

"Um, Ludwig—" I began, trying to get his attention as he and one of his brothers were wrestling.

"Hikaru, sweetie, can you help me in the kitchen?" Mrs. Beilschmidt called.

I stopped and nodded. "Yes, Mrs. Beilschmidt," I called back, slipping out of the mess.

"There's no need to call me 'Mrs. Beilschmidt,' Hikaru," she told me, smiling as we passed out drinks once the brothers were done rough housing. "You can call me 'mutti" and you can call Ludwig's father 'vati'."

"Mutti?"

"It means 'mother' in German while 'vati' means 'father'," Ludwig said as I handed him a drink. He pulled me into his side and I rested my head on his chest.

"So when are you two gonna get married?" asked Armon, as if it were a casual question.

I stared at him. "I'm only…I can't…"

"Armon," Ludwig growled, growing red.

"As much as I would like to have grandkids," Mrs. Beilschmidt said, "Ludwig and Hikaru are too young for marriage. Why don't you get married, Armon?"

"I'm too busy," Armon said. "Besides, Ludwig and Hikaru have a better chance at that. And if they have kids, they'll be German and Japanese. It'll be adorable!"

As I blushed at the thought of marrying and having kids, Ludwig took my hand and pulled me up.

"We have a project to finish," Ludwig said, glaring at his brothers. "If you'll excuse us, we need to finish working on it."

"Don't do anything improper to her!" Gilbert shouted as Ludwig pulled me upstairs to his room.

"I'm sorry about my brothers. They're always…"

I reached up and put my arms around his neck and kissed him. "It's okay," I said, smiling. "Your family is really nice."

Ludwig kissed me back. He opened his mouth to say something but stopped. "We should get started on the project," he said instead and pulled away from me.

I nodded and sat down next to him and started modeling the clay into tiny Roman houses. Two or three hours later, we were done and his mother called us down for dinner. I took a seat next to Ludwig and his mother at the dinner table. As Ludwig's father served everyone at the table, the chatter grew lively with conversations between the Beilschmidt family and me and the occasional dirty joke made by one of the elder brothers. By the time dinner was done, Armon, Klaus, and Werner were drunk from the beer they kept drinking at the table. Unfortunately, I was barfed on by Armon who was absolutely the drunkest of the brothers.

"Oh, sweetie," Mrs. Beilschmidt said, leading me upstairs to the bathroom. "Let's get you washed up." She pushed me into the bathroom and handed me a towel. "I'll find something for you to wear while you shower, okay? When you're done, go into Ludwig's room and I'll have something for you there."

I nodded and closer the door. Once I peeled off the soiled clothes, I took a shower and when I was feeling refreshed, I wrapped the towel around me and ran into Ludwig's room. On the bed, I found a shirt that looked like it belonged to Ludwig and a pair of shorts that seemed like it would fall off me. I quickly put them on right before Ludwig knocked and came inside.

When he looked at me, Ludwig's face turned a vibrant red. He glanced away as he said, "Mutti called your aunt and she said that you can stay here tonight. Mutti doesn't want you to get sick walking home."

"Okay," I said.

"And she's washing your clothes so they'll be clean for tomorrow. You can take my bed tonight. I'll, uh, be sleeping on the floor."

I nodded, holding my borrowed shirt down as I took a seat on the bed. Hesitantly, Ludwig sat down next to me and I leaned against him. He kissed my forehead and I reached up and pulled his lips to mine. Eventually, I had my arms wrapped around his neck and his arms were around my waist, holding me close to him. After a couple minutes of kissing, I pulled away and stared into his blue eyes.

"Thank you," I whispered, "and goodnight."

Ludwig stood up without saying a word and grabbed a spare pillow and a blanket from his closet and set it on the ground. I watched as he spread out the blanket on the floor.

I felt bad for taking his bed so, impulsively, I said, "You can sleep up here with me. I won't take up a lot of space." As soon as I said it, my conscience started scolding me, saying that it was an improper thing to do and my ancestors would be ashamed of me but the surprised look on his face shut it up.

Unexpectedly, Ludwig tossed the blanket and pillow on the bed and climbed on the other side. Then, he kissed me on both cheeks and said, "Goodnight." He then reached over me and turned off the lamp on his nightstand. I covered myself with one of the blankets and for a while, I blushed in the darkness until I fell asleep.

A Note from your Author:

Sorry about the wait. I've been so busy in the past few days that I couldn't write anything but I've somehow found the time to *laughs* So in this chapter, it's a little love scene between Hikaru and Ludwig/Germany as they work on their project. Also, we get to meet Ludwig/Germany's and Gilbert/Prussia's older brothers, too. I did a little research and found out that he had older brothers other than Gilbert/Prussia. Warning, they were not given human names by their creator so I sort of named them after German names I found on the Internet. Armon is Bavaria, Klaus is Brandenburg, Voss is Hesse, Werner is Holstein, and Siegfried is Saxony. We also get to meet Ludwig/Germany's parents who are unnamed in the chapter but remain "Mr. and Mrs. Beilschmidt". I was going to include Germania, who is the Beilschmidt's ancestor but I decided not to. And also, I got the idea for the chapter because I watched Pride and Prejudice and it was the part where Jane Bennet goes to William Bingley's mansion and she gets sick from the rain so she stays there until she gets better. But instead of having Hikaru get sick, she gets puked on by Armon/Bavaria *laughs* And thus she gets to stay with Ludwig/Germany for the night. Oh, how I love writing these scenes... Thank you and enjoy!