Work Text:
Hey. Wanna hang after the meeting?
Iceland glances at the crumpled paper, and then up at the nation sitting next to him. Hong Kong doesn’t even look up, eyes suspiciously enraptured by one Britain’s long-winded lectures on global warming. The note is written in Chinese though, and it was the Chinese nation that slipped it on top of the hefty pile of paperwork; Iceland has no doubt of the suspect, though his motive is far more elusive.
The last time they’d talked more than in passing had been America’s 2014 Halloween gettogether, and even then Hong Kong had left early with a smugly sober China, leaving Iceland to return miserably to what was left of the Nordics. Even then, they’d spoken of shallow things, like fashion trends (Iceland was clueless) and pop music (Iceland was even more clueless). Nothing that convinced Iceland that Hong Kong was interested in him for anything other than small talk. Small nations had to stick together, after all.
But then Hong Kong glances sideways towards Iceland, and the smug satisfaction on his lips has Iceland squinting in confusion.
Iceland scribbles on the paper, what for?
Hong Kong considered it, and for a while Iceland wonders if he’s being ignored. He tries to satisfy himself with the mind-numbingly boring speech Norway contributes to eco-policy – as if he knew anything, with his environmentally friendly laws and yet a 15% oil income – and taps his bitten fingernails on the table impatiently. Sometimes he looks suspiciously across to Hong Kong, who twirls his fine, straight hair round and round dextrous fingers.
Then Hong Kong replies and this time it’s in Icelandic. Are friends meant to have a reason?
Iceland replies instantly. Friends?
Hong Kong huffs silent laughter, hiding it beneath his paperwork. So Nordic prudeness isn’t just a stereotype?
It’s logic, Iceland replies, making sure Hong Kong catches his sarcasm. He thinks a while. I never understood why other nations consider people they barely know to be friends.
Before he can get Hong Kong’s undoubtedly witty reply, Germany, seated beside Hong Kong, puts a stern hand on the slim wrist and shakes his head, and the meaning is clear. ‘This is a meeting, you teenagers should learn to take it seriously’. Hong Kong is probably the only nation brave enough to roll his eyes straight into the burly German’s face, and is rewarded by a gruff sigh and a guarantee that they’ll never be seated together for another meeting for at least several decades. Even though seating is allegedly random, they all know the big nations get a say in it. How else would Italy be seated with Germany 95% of the time?
Iceland has convinced himself that he’s forgotten about the notes already – least of all cares – when Hong Kong’s reply comes. Takes time to make friends. All your friends were once strangers.
Iceland wants to point out that his only ‘friends’ are the Nordics, but instead sends a simple fine, and crosses his arms, making clear that the interaction is final.
The meeting finally drags to an end, and when it has the British sun has long ago set. London’s nightlife is undoubtedly revving, and half the nations seem eager to join it, the other half stifling yawns and eagerly awaiting their beds. Denmark has an arm around a coffee-high Norway, while Finland is practically already painting on eyeliner. Norway walks to Iceland, a little displeased that they were seated so far from each other that day. “Denmark is dragging me out. Want to come keep it PG?”
Denmark grins. “Whatcha speakin’ about? Icey wants to try out the British gay bars, right?”
“Actually, I’d rather not,” Iceland huffs, suspecting it to be a jab at only a few years ago, when half his youth population and he had drunk the long winters away into a mindless stupor. Those were dark days, but he felt the judgement a little unfair. Finland was still like that.
“Shame,” Norway hums, musical monotone resolute to his fate, but expression not excessively unhappy. “Get to the hotel safe. Text me when you’re there.”
Iceland nods, and turns heel without another word. He’s pretended to have forgotten the interaction with Hong Kong hours earlier, but isn’t surprised to be stopped in the corridor of the office building while the last few nations trickle out. “Iceland.”
“Hong Kong,” Iceland nods, suddenly shuffling uneasily in his booted feet.
“Wanna change clothes before we go out?”
“I’d rather not go clubbing or whatever,” Iceland says awkwardly.
“Me neither, really. Waste of a perfectly good city,” he says, though he turns up his nose a little, “even if it’s the idiot Britain’s.”
“Yeah,” Iceland laughs awkwardly, as if he doesn’t owe England a – statistically worded – shit-ton of money.
“So I was wondering if you’d like to go eat?”
“Yeah…”
They hop on the tube, which is blissfully efficient compared to what Iceland’s used to, and Iceland lets Hong Kong drag him off at the stop of choice. “Chinatown,” Hong Kong explains. “A lot of my people came here a while back, so the food’s really good.” Somehow, he’s found Iceland’s hand, and is dragging him slightly behind him, something that sends heat to Iceland’s cheeks (he’s shy) but he brushes off as simply Chinese pushiness. The district is alight with colour, and there are lanterns decorating the sky. Some restaurants have fires blazing outside, and in the windows are slightly dubious pig’s heads and body parts… with which Iceland feels a little acquainted. It’s bustling with people, but in the cosy, community way, and Iceland and Hong Kong slip unseen through tourists and Chinese and Brit’s looking for an exotic night out.
Turning down a side street, Hong Kong leads Iceland to a smaller restaurant that has escaped the brunt of crowd attention, and houses only the dedicated native Chinese. It looks run down on the outside, but inside is warm and cosy and a middle-ages Chinese lady greets Hong Kong in mandarin. Hong Kong charmingly returns the greeting and she smiles, giving an informal bow before leading them to a small table for two.
“What do you want?” She asks again in mandarin.
Hong Kong and Iceland confer in English, Hong Kong pointing out his favourites and Iceland cluelessly agreeing to his recommendations. When they’re done, Hong Kong gives the order, the lady nodding as she jots the food down.
“Anything else,” she asks.
“Tea, please, for two,” Hong Kong tells her.
“And water, please,” Iceland adds, savouring her startled expression at his unaccented Chinese. Teasing humans with a nation’s linguistic flexibility never gets old over the centuries.
“Yes sir!” She fumbles, shooting Iceland an apologetic glance before hurrying away with their order.
Hong Kong huffs a laugh from across the table, and Iceland blushes at the attention, the strange look in the other nation’s glinting eyes. “You sound good speaking Chinese,” he comments, “like, the whitest person possible sounding like a Shanghai native. It’s kinda hot.”
“No!” Iceland protests, but now he’s laughing too, because Hong Kong is right – someone like him shouldn’t even have the ability to speak Chinese. Hong Kong’s arm is laid easily across the table, and when Iceland lets his hand drop their fingers brush. Iceland jolts as if burned, pulling his hand back and hoping Hong Kong doesn’t notice, but Hong Kong has withdrawn his hand too, and Iceland wonders if he somehow offended the nation.
The waitress comes with a jug of water and tea, and then brings the food to their table. She asks if they want anything else, but Hong Kong shakes his head and she leaves them in peace again.
Iceland is eyeing the dishes a little suspiciously, and Hong Kong pushes one to him. “Eat, it’s good! In my place, we take a bit from each dish – whatever you like. You should try it all. Chinese food is pretty popular in the West.”
“I know, I have just never had any before,” Iceland admits. The etiquette makes him feel out of his comfort zone, and Hong Kong makes him feel judged. Hong Kong has always been someone to admire from a distance. The cool, people-savvy nation who is somehow at comfort with his eternal teenagerhood, and his place in the world. His clothes were always exquisite, and while unabashedly eccentric, he got on well with even powerful nations, speaking to them as equals. Somehow, instead of being outshone by his big brother, his culture was celebrated as unique around the world.
How could Iceland compare, with his sparse population, near inarabal land, and tendency for both economic and environmental disaster? Far from unique, he’d been Norwegian and then Danish until recent, recent memory.
Hong Kong’s glances between bites send colour to his cheeks, and makes him fumble with his chopsticks.
He feels sickeningly inferior.
“Is it good?” Hong Kong asks when they’ve cleared a few plates. He appears collected, but this thick eyebrows are furrowed in concern.
“Y-yes!” Iceland exclaims, “Very! Sorry, I – ah – I-I’m not good at talking.”
The nation opposite him cocks his head. “Really? I didn’t notice. I kind of expect Westerners to be quiet compared to me.”
“I’m quiet compared to most people,” Iceland admits, “I’m probably really boring to be around.”
Hong Kong cocks his head the other way. “Really? I don’t think so.”
Ducking his head, Iceland buries his face in a pile of boiled rice, shovelling piles of it into his mouth all the while Hong Kong shamelessly chuckles at his expense. Iceland knows his face much be burning, and at the end of the meal, the somewhat concerned waitress offers him a plate of oranges to cool off. He snatches a slice as Hong Kong pulls him into the cooling night air, briefly enjoying the sweet fruit before they are back on England’s underground and Hong Kong takes him to a quieter location by the Thames.
There are only a few lingering people out, for the night is swiftly approaching midnight. The city lights reflect on the shimmering, inky water, and while it is beautiful, Iceland can’t help but think it a cheap imitation of the night sky he could see even from his capitol. He voices his thoughts to his newfound friend. “Hong Kong is really populated, right? You’ve probably never seen a proper night sky, or how brightly the stars shine.”
In the silver light, Hong Kong’s face is whimsical as he stares out across the water. “I’ve never seen them from my place, no. I was only created when the port had become big enough for England to want it… but I got to spend time with my brother, even if I was with England most of the time, and he would take me into the mainland countryside and tell me stupid stories about the moon.” Despite his snide, his smile is peaceful, honest, and a little sad. “So I do see the stars from time to time. But I prefer the city. The lights are brighter than the sky.”
Iceland spends some time considering the words. He can’t understand where Hong Kong is coming from, being an eternal seeker of peaceful obscurity, but it makes him a little sad to think he’s been so blinkered to his own strife. The next time he speaks, he speaks hesitantly, feeling as if one wrong word could break the comfortable silence that had overcome the two. “You could see the sky from my place. I have always thought that it is never as beautiful anywhere else. Iceland is so far from anything, and I don’t have many people, so I think the stars are more my citizens than my actual citizens.”
“And the puffins, right?” Hong Kong breaks his companion’s poetry while shifting to look at him innocently. “You have a lot of puffins.”
“More sheep, actually!” Iceland snorts in retaliation.
Hong Kong hums, and suddenly the sound of the lapping water lulls the back into mutual sonder.
Every now and then, as they are looking out across the river, Iceland can feel Hong Kong’s eyes flicker to him. Iceland stares determinedly forwards, unsure as to what the other’s attentions means. A group of drunk, rowdy tourists pass, and they are speaking a strange mix of Danish and English, and when they are far away enough that their chatter is gone, Hong Kong takes Iceland’s cold hand in his burning one a little shyly, and leads him over a small fence, down some steps to where the dirty Thames water meets British ground.
“I used to come here, when I was much younger,” Hong Kong comments once they are seated.
Iceland looks at him, his pale face glowing in the moonlight. “Why?”
“In the 1800s,” Hong Kong clarifies, “Britain had lost his American colonies, and he was barely holding onto Canada, and he wasn’t really committed to Australia yet, so trading with India and China was really important to him. When he took me from China I was still really little, and I didn’t really know what was going on, only that England was much different from China and his people treated me like an animal or an amusement.
“I wanted to think that he loved me like he loved his other brothers – and I think he wanted that too – but he never could. I was always the strange monkey child that let him avoid tariffs and get my brother hooked on Opium, and I didn’t speak much, and when I did it was in Chinese, which he hated at the time. He hated any of his colonies speaking anything but his precious English.
“So when I felt I was so alone I could die, I’d come here to actually be alone, with the stinking Thames to be my only friend,” he turns to Iceland with a sigh, “I have this need to be around people, y’know? But coming here was a strange way of coping, I guess. It helped, a little.”
Iceland doesn’t know, but he nods, his face grave in contemplation. When he speaks, it’s as if he is truly the centuries-old entity that he is, “you’re actually very young, compared to me.”
Hong Kong snorts and shoves him so that Iceland falls backwards and Hong Kong falls over him. When Iceland looks up, it is he whose youthful face ripples in the blue light, and Hong Kong’s ancient in shadow. The Asian nation has a small smile on his face as he looks down at Iceland, and just as Iceland is about to protest, to push him off, Hong Kong is leaning down and kissing Iceland’s lips softly, unsurely.
Iceland closes his eyes to the brief sensation that seems to span an eternity. He doesn’t open them even when Hong Kong sits up abruptly.
He hears the splash of something throwing into the water, and as the ripples are depleting, Hong Kong says, “I’m sorry.”
Iceland pales. It was a mistake. Of course it was a mistake. Tentatively, he opens his eyes and sits up, “why?”
“I should have asked… or something,” Hong Kong says lamely, refusing to meet his eyes. Iceland feels his heart stutter at the changing shadows that dance across the other’s face, the dark, deep eyes that seem to absorb all light. He places a hand next to Hong Kong’s, on the damp, cold concrete, and their smallest fingers entwine, and then the rest of their hands follow. Iceland stares anxiously at the other nations, and finally he meets Iceland’s eyes, which shimmer with a dawning uncertainty.
Iceland wavers, unsure if the breath he takes is to say something, or specifically to be stolen away by Hong Kong’s, but then their lips meet again and his breath is stolen, and the softness of the other teen’s lips against his makes him melt. Before he knows it, his hands are gently pressing against Hong Kong’s chest, and Hong Kong has circled his lower back, pulling them together, and they deepen the kiss as the water ripples by and the clouds part to the full intensity of the moon inscribing the event into both of their memories.
When they part again they don’t stray far, foreheads touching and hair falling awkwardly into shy, dark eyes. The meet a glance and mutually look away, Iceland doubling over in giggles as Hong Kong laughs into the back of his neck.
When their laughter dies down, Iceland leans against the other nation. “That was…”
“Really nice.”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah.”
The city lights glimmer on the water. Hong Kong splutters, “oh no!”
“What is it?” Iceland asks in concern.
“My first kiss! In London! Ew!”
“Hey,” Iceland huffs. “Wait, that was really your first kiss?”
“Well, yeah, really,” Hong Kong says defensively, “who did you expect me to be kissing before? Japan?”
“Ew, no,” Iceland comments, blinking fervently. “But… but you are so much… cooler than me. I had expected you to be really popular.”
“Oh I am!” Hong Kong says shamelessly, “but no one likes me for me. No one wants to kiss someone with a shitty sob story and childhood issues. And hey,” he nudges Iceland with his shoulder, “you’re pretty cool. It’s like, in the name.”
“Please shut up.”
“But you were nicer when you were shy.”
“Sue me.”
A boat makes a languid trail through the water, and they watch as a bridge opens to let it pass, the ripples lapping at Hong Kong’s trainers and Iceland’s battered boots. Hong Kong checks his phone, breathing out a sigh that makes his fringe float in front his face. “It’s late. I should probably take you back to the hotel before your brother comes for me.”
“He’s definitely coming for you,” Iceland said drily, letting Hong Kong take his hand and pull him up. They stand in an oddly intimate moment, caught in each other’s eyes, the seeds of teenage romance already blooming in ancient hearts. Hong Kong’s smile is hastily followed by Iceland’s. On the tube home, Iceland is brave enough – or perhaps tired enough – to rest his head on the crook of Hong Kong’s shoulder, letting his breath make goosebumps on Hong Kong’s skin. The hotel is near the centre of the city, so the journey is disappointingly short, but Hong Kong escorts Iceland to his hotel room where Iceland initiates the softest, most delicate kiss so far; one that leaves their lips tingling and fingers curling for more. Iceland steps away, opening the door, even though he wishes he could ask Hong Kong to stay.
“I’ll see you at the meeting tomorrow,” he promises Hong Kong, who gulps and nods.
“Yeah,” the other teen’s voice is scratchy, and Iceland can tell his is tired.
“Góða nótt...“
“Jóutáu…”
Iceland closes the door, and the sound reverberates around the room despite being only a whisper. For a moment, he stands with his back against the wood, mind reeling from all that had happened. So unexpected… so… undeserving, he worried. But the warmth in his chest made up for his uncertainty, and as he undressed and crawled into bad, he couldn’t quite wipe the smile from his lips, nor forget the feeling of Hong Kong’s pressing against them.
He groaned.
Lovestruck teens rarely slept.