Thanks to Mondmaedchen, TheSilentLilac, StuffyJinx, fishstick1999, BubblesGoesPop, Elizaveta Hedervary – Hungary, ScandinavianTrash and teabrows for reviewing.

Disclaimer: I don't own Hetalia.

Finkraine: Commute

There she was again. She always sat in the same seat. And she always got off right before his stop, but she was always on when he first got on. At least, when going to work. At the end of the day, she got on after him, and got off after him as well.

Tino wished to speak to her. He thought she was beautiful, and her eyes were unconditionally kind. He wished to get to know her. But he was afraid. What if things didn't go well? What if she thought of him as a creep?

He sighed, bowing his head. He didn't notice when she turned to regard him as well.

…

Katyusha turned to the young man she usually saw on the train. He was a constant, and yet they had never spoken. She wanted to get to know him, but was afraid of changing the natural order of things. Not all change was good, after all.

She shook her head, standing up. The train was slowing. They had reached her stop. And as she exited, she didn't see the person staring longingly at her.

…

Something was different today. Something that made Tino's stomach drop.

She was there again, sitting next to a man and speaking comfortably with him. He couldn't understand what they were saying, but for the first time he heard her voice.

But of course she had a boyfriend. She was a beautiful woman. So why did Tino's heart ache for the woman that he didn't even know the name of?

…

"Someone's watching you," Ivan said.

Katyusha blinked, instinctively looking towards him, but he lowered his head.

"Do you know him?" Ivan asked.

"I see him here every day," Katyusha said. "Was he really watching me?"

Ivan regarded her for a moment before he sighed.

"I hope you know what you're doing," he said.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"I'm sure you'll understand eventually."

…

When Katyusha boarded the train at the end of the day, she was a little surprised that someone else was sitting in her usual place. But…

There was an open spot next to him.

She took a deep breath to steel herself, before she sat down next to him. He looked a little startled by her presence.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I hope you don't mind."

"No, not at all," he reassured. "My name's Tino."

"I'm Yekatarina, though everyone calls me Katyusha."

"Katyusha. It's nice to finally meet you."

The two of them happily chatted until Tino had to get off at his stop. And the following morning they sat together again, and so it continued.

The prompt was: 'Human AU where Finland and Ukraine have the same commute to get to their respective jobs and while both take notice of each other, neither actually approaches the other for quite some time.'

The whole commute thing, at least by train, is kind of a foreign concept here. We have the minibus taxis, but they're risky (one joke is that there are two road laws: for taxi drivers and other drivers, and there's a section regarding South African taxis on Wikipedia's page for organised crime syndicates, though it's mostly about the taxi wars). Actually, go check out the 'Taxi wars in South Africa' page to get an understanding of why it's too risky to use them. It's a lot safer to drive or carpool. I do have some experience with the metro after vacationing in Portugal, and we see it a lot on TV. Going by train is really the only way this prompt would have worked.