Chapter Text
CAST OF CHARACTERS (in order of appearance):
AMERICA — Alfred
CANADA — Matthew
ENGLAND — Arthur Kirkland
FRANCE — Francis Bonnefoi
SPAIN — Antonio Fernández Carriedo
ROMANO — Lovino Vargas
The blue-eyed child looked like a cherub, picture-perfect, with soft golden locks. His smile was big, like sunshine.
But Al wasn't smiling. His heart was pounding and his hands were balled into tiny fists as pearly tears rolled down his rosy apple-cheeks. The man they called Serge had taken his twin brother and was hurting him. Al could hear Matt's cries, ripped from the back of his throat, and Serge, inebriated beyond coherency, yelling at him to be quiet. Al could see the ugly bruises Serge inflicted as he hit Matt, discolouring Matt's pale skin like fingerprints of ink. Al squirmed like a fish out of water, begging Serge: "Stop it, you're hurting Mattie! Pwease stop it!" But Serge only snapped at him to stay silent and not fuss. Al wanted to argue and defend himself and Matt, but he was petrified of Serge's wrath. He had felt it too often before. So instead, he bit his quivering lip and clenched his fists and sat down on the bed where Serge ordered him to stay, and he watched the horrible scene. Feeling alone, afraid, and helpless, he watched as Serge beat his brother, knowing that he was next.
Much later, the twins were sleeping together in the upturned crate that served as a bed, crammed with an old straw-stuffed pillow. They pretended to be asleep, hugging each other, if not for security then for comfort, but neither of them felt safe. They hadn't felt safe since Mama had gone, leaving them alone in this frightening place with Serge.
"You belong to me now," he told them every night. "Me and no one else. I'm all you've got, so you'd best obey me; you'd best behave. You don't want to make me angry, do you? No. I'm your father. I'll do whatever the fuck I want with you, because I'm your father. Alfred, Matthew," he said, grinning viciously down at them, "you're all mine."
The brothers could only agree and obey. They were just four-years-old, after all: too young to recognize Serge for what he was. Instead, he was the only thing standing between them and helplessness. He fed them, and clothed them, and housed them, and protected them from everything but himself. They didn't know anyone else, and no one else knew that they even existed, just like no one had known about Mama.
"You're my secret," he told them, "and a secret must be kept."
At four-years-old, Al and Matt were already apt secret-keepers. They didn't tell anyone about how frightened they were now that Mama was gone, or how sad and confused they were by her sudden disappearance. Lying awake at night and listening to Serge's loud, drunken snores, they told each other that she would return on the morrow to get them and take them away. Neither of them understood the concept of abandonment, but they understood the feeling of it better than most children. It was as familiar to them as an old imaginary friend. Just because they couldn't see it or name it didn't mean it wasn't there. For weeks they spied through the tiny attic window, staring across the fields to the gleaming jewel-blue sea far below.
When a ship finally did arrive in the port, however, it wasn't carrying Mama.
A crew of uniformed men came ashore, wielding long bayonets. The redcoats fought Serge's nasty, ugly men. And then they set the house ablaze.