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Vilnius, 1994
Lithuania tensed under his heap of blankets as a loud, crashing noise echoed through his apartment, coming from the direction of the door. He remained still and waited, not daring to move or breathe.
Maybe it had actually come from outside, he tried to convince himself and forced his thoughts to stay calm. Maybe a stray cat. Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe-
No. Russia didn’t know his address. At least, he shouldn’t, but who knew what ways he had to find him? Sometimes, in cold nights like these when he couldn’t sleep, Lithuania thought that Ivan would be able to find him anywhere, even if he moved to a tiny cabin somewhere in the deepest, darkest woods.
He strained to listen, then startled when he heard a bang, followed by footsteps. Inside of his home.
Panic welled up inside of him, and for a moment, it seemed nearly impossible to breathe. He didn’t dare move, frozen to the spot. It took a few moments for the initial wave of terror to pass, leaving him slightly trembling. Only then did Lithuania dare to take a long, deep breath in an attempt to calm himself.
The way he saw it, there were only three options: Fight, call the police or stay here and hope the intruder (intruders?, he wondered, because how many were there) wouldn’t come into his bedroom. The telephone was in the living room – he had the chance to make it if he was completely silent.
Before he could change his mind again, he quickly slipped out of his blankets, wincing at the loss of comfortable, cozy warmth. Doing his best to ignore the fearful prickling of his spine, Lithuania looked around his room for anything to defend himself with – just in case, he told himself. It was hard to make out shapes in the dim moonlight falling through the gap between his curtains, and he located the baseball bat America had gifted him the previous Christmas more by memory than by sight.
He gave it a quizzical glance and lifted it, then decided it would have to do, hopefully. He wasn’t looking for a fight – who knew what kind of weapons the intruder carried? – but at least it gave him the illusion of safety, and that alone was enough to calm his racing thoughts so that he could find the courage to venture out into the hallway.
As quietly as possible, Lithuania opened his bedroom door, checked the corridor and slipped outside. The old wooden floor was uncomfortably cold underneath his feet, but he didn’t dare put on his slippers in case he would make a noise. He just hoped it wouldn’t creak.
Slowly, carefully, he made his way in the direction of the living room. The entire apartment was silent now, although that didn’t calm Lithuania’s nerves in the slightest. If Ivan was truly here, he wouldn’t make much noise, instead he would try to catch Tolys off-guard, when he was sleeping…
Lithuania almost breathed a sigh of relief when he saw light coming out from underneath the kitchen door. That meant the intruder was in the kitchen, and whatever they were doing in there, at least it gave Tolys access to the telephone in the living room. Just around the corner, and then…
Tolys startled so much that he dropped the baseball bat when he turned to the living room. The door stood open widely, the lamps were lit, and someone was sitting on his couch. And that someone was none other than Prussia.
He stared back at Lithuania, the hand holding a potato chip freezing half-way to his mouth. The crumpled bag was in his lap – they belonged to Tolys, he realized dimly, Prussia must have stolen them out of the cupboard – and he looked almost as surprised as Lithuania felt.
“What are you doing here?” Lithuania heard himself ask, his heart beating frantically in his chest. Apparently, the information that the intruder wasn’t dangerous (anymore, his brain added), hadn’t reached his body yet.
Prussia blinked, then looked down at the chips bag and up again at Tolys. “Eating?” He held out the bag, then slowly pulled it back when Tolys didn’t move.
“How the hell did you get in here?” Lithuania asked, too bewildered to be angry.
Gilbert shrugged and crunched down on another chip. “Door was open,” he answered between chews.
“No, it wasn’t. I always lock my door.”
Now Prussia looked almost apologetic. Almost.
“Alright, fine. I broke in,” he admitted. When he saw Lithuania’s glare, he shrugged again. “Hey, it’s not my fault your lock’s shit. Really, you should rethink your security standards, all it took was Germany’s credit card and some force. Well, a lot of force, after the card broke.”
Tolys blinked at him, then mechanically walked over to his door. This could only be a nightmare. This had to be a nightmare. The door stood slightly ajar, although Gilbert really had done his best to close it again, but one look told Lithuania that the lock was completely and utterly broken. How exactly Prussia had managed to do that was a mystery to him.
He closed his eyes and focused on breathing in and out rhythmically. What had he done to deserve this? Why couldn’t they all just leave him in peace for once? He groaned, feeling a headache set in. He’d have to call a locksmith first thing tomorrow. Today? What time was it even? Would the new lock be expensive? He hoped not, he hadn’t yet received his paycheck and what if no locksmith was available would he have to live without a lock and-
“Tolys?” Lithuania startled and lost his train of thought (thankfully), then gave himself a shake and turned around. Gilbert stood in the entrance to the living room and cast him a curious look.
“I’m coming, I’m coming.”
He sighed and followed Prussia back, then flopped down into his armchair with a groan.
“Everything okay with you?” Prussia had the gall to ask while he made himself comfortable on Lithuania’s couch once more, looking rather unbothered from where he sat opposite of Tolys.
“Yes, don’t worry-“ Lithuania began, then broke off abruptly. “No, you know what, it isn’t! What the hell are you doing here? In my apartment at 4:30 in the morning? And what in the world possessed you to break in? I have a doorbell for this reason!”
Now Prussia looked a tiny bit uncomfortable, as if he hadn’t expected Lithuania’s anger. Tolys snorted. Typical.
Prussia didn’t immediately reply, giving Tolys the chance to properly take him in. He didn’t look that great, Lithuania realized, worse than he’d had the last time they’d seen each other a few years ago. He was skinny and pale, with dark bags under his eyes, a bruise on his right cheek and a split lip. Despite the cold, he didn’t wear a jacket, only a transparent crop top and baggy jeans, all black. Had the idiot really been walking around the city in the middle of January in only a top without a jacket?
“Don’t you have a jacket?” Tolys asked.
Gilbert shrugged. “Lost it.”
“Where?”
“Somewhere outside, I guess,” Gilbert replied evasively.
Tolys sighed, then pointed to the blanket at the other side of the couch. “Why don’t you take that?” He offered. Prussia cast it a glance, then shook his head.
Idiot, Lithuania thought. Why can’t you just accept it when someone’s being nice to you?
“Well?” Lithuania pressed instead of expressing his thoughts and crossed his arms in front of his chest. “You still haven’t told me why you’re here.”
Prussia mirrored his stance and cast him a challenging glance, although it looked less fierce than usual. He mostly just looked exhausted.
“Why? Can’t I visit a friend?”
Lithuania raised his eyebrows. “You haven’t visited me since I’ve moved here. How did you even find out where I live?” The thought sent a spark of fear through his nervous system. If Prussia had been able to find out, then Russia would surely be able to find him, too.
“Poland told me,” Gilbert replied matter-of-factly. “Relax,” he added when he saw the spooked look on Lithuania’s face. “He won’t tell Russia, if that’s your concern.”
Tolys breathed a sigh of relief, although he didn’t quite know how to feel about Gilbert’s skill at reading his mind.
“Anyway, I was at the club,” Prussia continued airily. “And I thought, hey, why not visit you and bless you with my presence?”
Club. That explained his outfit. Tolys pointed to his cheek. “And that?”
Prussia shrugged and forced a cheeky grin to appear on his face that even Lithuania could tell wasn’t genuine. “That? Little altercation, that’s all. Doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things. Just a nasty run-in with some drunk loser, don’t sweat it.”
He talked fast, and something about it sounded like he’d rehearsed it. Tolys raised his eyebrows again.
“Are you high?”
Prussia blinked, then waved his hand in a non-committal way. “Not really anymore.” Then he began looking around Lithuania’s living room in an embarrassingly obvious attempt to change the topic.
“Nice place you got here.”
Tolys hummed in agreement as he watched Prussia’s gaze catch on the many little details that made the place comfortable – the plants, the soft carpet, the many blankets on the couch that Prussia had left untouched. Granted, the apartment was a bit too small, but he’d put in a lot of work to make it into a home, and he was glad that it had paid off.
“Now all I need is a functional lock,” Lithuania remarked drily.
When Prussia didn’t answer, he rolled his eyes. “And why are you in Vilnius?” Tolys pressed, not willing to let his unwanted guest off the hook that easily. This entire visit still made no sense.
“Huh?” Prussia asked and blinked.
“Can’t you go clubbing at home?” Lithuania wasn’t well-versed in the party scene, but he knew there were lots of clubs in Berlin.
Gilbert grinned again, still not looking genuine in the slightest. “Boring,” Gilbert replied with too-much cheerfulness. “I go there every night, I needed a change of scenery.”
“And then you came here out of all places?” Something about that didn’t add up.
Gilbert shot him a glare, his patience clearly beginning to wear thin. “What is this, an interrogation? Do I need your permission to enter your country, or what?” He replied testily. “I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but we don’t live under Ivan’s roof anymore, I can go wherever the fuck I please now.”
Lithuania grit his teeth in frustration. The mention of Ivan’s name stung, and Gilbert knew that. He’d forgotten that Prussia always had to make things difficult.
“I’m not telling you where you can or cannot go,” he replied, struggling to contain his irritation. “But don’t you think you owe me a proper fucking explanation as to why you broke into my apartment in the middle of the night? You’re right, you can go wherever the hell you want, but why did you have to come here out of all places?”
Lithuania took a deep breath and tried not to regret his harsh words. Prussia had averted his gaze now and stared at the floor.
“Look, I wasn’t-“ Tolys began, then trailed off.
He didn’t even know what he wanted to say. It wasn’t like he hated Prussia’s company per se – he’d had four decades to get used to him, a lot of things that had bothered him about Gilbert in the past didn’t annoy him as much nowadays. He’d gotten used to his loudness, his hyperactivity and his questionable talent at escalating pretty much every situation by being clinically unable to shut up when necessary.
And now that the shock was beginning to wear off, he wasn’t even that mad about the lock anymore. A little, yes, but mostly he was irritated by Gilbert’s lack of honesty. Because it was one thing to come barging into Lithuania’s home, which was already bad enough, but it was an entirely different thing to so obviously lie about it.
Lithuania sighed. “Can you at least be honest with me? I’m just-“ The words kind of worried about you got stuck somewhere in Lithuania’s throat, and he wasn’t sure if he was glad that his tone conveyed the feeling equally well.
Prussia still averted his gaze. Lithuania watched his fingers play around with the zipper of the pillow in front of him, pulling it open and then closing it again over and over. Finally, after what felt like hours, he lifted his gaze from the pillow to look at Lithuania.
“I was in Moscow,” he finally admitted.
“Why were you in- Oh.” It took a few moments for the words to sink into Lithuania’s consciousness. “You visited him.” The sentence came out in a rather accusing tone, and Tolys swallowed.
Prussia wasn’t this stupid, right? He had to possess at least some amount of self-preservation instinct. He hadn’t just willingly gone back into the lion’s den, or had he?
Gilbert’s fingers froze. Then he pushed the pillow away with a sharp motion. “Don’t say it in that tone!” He shot back angrily, his glare immediately confirming Lithuania’s suspicions.
“You went to see him,” Lithuania repeated. “Willingly, I assume.”
Prussia rolled his eyes. “And what if I did? I’m a grown-up, I can make my own decisions, God, you’re sounding just like Lutz right now.”
“I’m not saying you can’t.”
“But you disapprove.”
Lithuania threw his head back in exasperation. “Of course I disapprove, what the hell did you think? I thought you’d be intelligent enough to know better than to run after him.”
Prussia snorted. “I’m not running after anybody.”
Tolys raised his eyebrows haughtily. “Oh, so he invited you over? Then why are you here now?”
Gilbert grit his teeth, his face red, and Lithuania knew instantly he’d hit the right spot. “That’s none of your business.” Then his expression relaxed as he lifted the corners of his mouth into a smug smile. “Admit it, you’re jealous. Sad that you’re not his number one anymore?”
Lithuania shook his head. “Jealous? No, thank you, you can keep Ivan and his many neuroses, issues, and violent outbursts. If anything I’d pity you if you really were his ‘number one’. Which I doubt, otherwise he wouldn’t let you out of his sights anymore. And he definitely wouldn’t let you go clubbing, especially not looking like that.” He gesticulated towards Gilbert’s see-through top.
Prussia crossed his arms again and stubbornly looked to the side.
Tolys sighed. “Is that also where you got those bruises from?”
“It was an accident,” Gilbert replied after moments of tense silence. When he heard Tolys snort disbelievingly, he added, “No, really, this time it was. He was so drunk, he couldn’t have actually aimed if he’d wanted to. He just didn’t like my attempts at maneuvering him to the bathroom, that’s all. He was blindly hitting around himself, I don’t think he meant to hurt me.”
Lithuania continued staring at him in disbelief and faint disapproval. Whatever helps you sleep at night, he thought bitterly. Maybe it was also his plan to make it seem like an accident so you can’t get reasonably mad at him. No, almost a century of living with Russia had taught Tolys to put absolutely nothing past him and to never, ever underestimate him, and he had to forcibly remind himself that Gilbert had less direct experience with him. It wasn’t fair to take his paranoia out on Prussia.
He let out a sigh. “And then you decided to come here?” That part still made little sense to Lithuania. Why hadn’t he simply gone home?
“Is that so unlikely?” Prussia shot back. “You’re acting like I’m a total stranger.”
“I just don’t understand it, that’s all. I mean, you could’ve gone home. You could have gone anywhere.”
“Well, maybe I didn’t want to go home,” he challenged.
Lithuania raised his eyebrows. “And why not?”
Gilbert looked to the side. “Maybe me and Ludwig had a bit of a fight,” he finally admitted.
“Because you wanted to see Ivan?” Tolys guessed.
Gilbert turned his gaze back towards him. Tolys could see him bite his bottom lip as he seemed to consider how much he was willing to tell Lithuania. Then he took a deep breath, his chest rising and falling in the process.
“I wanted to meet Vanya,” he began, sounding rather reluctant, then cast Lithuania a sharp glance. “Because we do that sometimes when he’s in Berlin,” he clarified defensively before Tolys could even say something. “And I thought, hey, why not visit him, been a while since I’ve been to Moscow and all. But Ludwig wasn’t all that pleased about it.”
He shrugged. “I don’t know what his problem is. Maybe he was just pissed he had to pay for the plane tickets, what do I know? Anyway, I told him he’s not my boss and I can go where I want and flew over to Moscow. But Ivan was really drunk and it was boring, so I left again.”
Lithuania raised his eyebrows. “More drunk than usual?”
“I’ve never seen anyone this drunk in my lifetime. He couldn’t even stand anymore without help.”
For a moment Tolys didn’t know what to say. He wasn’t necessarily surprised. He’d always known that Ivan wouldn’t take losing Tolys well, but he’d expected this unwellness to show itself in crazy attempts at getting Lithuania back, not really drunk stupor. Then again, maybe this was only the first stage and the real danger would soon follow. Lithuania made the mental note not to let his guard down just yet.
“He’s living in an apartment now, one of those old, ugly ones that look like they’re falling apart. And he was just sitting in his armchair like he hadn’t moved in years. We’re talking, like, unwashed and all that.”
Prussia hesitated. “I thought maybe he’d be happy to see me – he seemed happy the last time we, uh, hung out, right? But he didn’t even recognize me. He just- He didn’t even know who the fuck I was!”
He broke off for a moment and took a breath to collect himself. “He just kept asking about you,” he continued, lifting his head to glare at Lithuania as if Ivan’s obsession with him was his fault somehow. “’Tolya, is that you, are you back?’ And when I told him it was me, do you think he was happy? No, obviously not, because that asshole had the gall to be disappointed. ‘Oh, Prussia, it’s you.’ That was all he said, and then he kept asking about you again, where you are, what you’re doing, when you’re coming back. Just constant whining and self-pity.”
Lithuania swallowed. “You didn’t tell him anything about me, did you?”
“Of course not, how stupid do you think I am?” Prussia replied brusquely. “I tried to get him to take a bath, I thought maybe it would help him sober up. Then he started yelling and hitting around himself and telling me to leave, so I did.”
He shrugged, but his nonchalant tone didn’t mask his disappointment.
You stupid boy, Lithuania thought, to his surprise feeling bad for Gilbert. Did you really think you had a chance?
“And then I went drinking, and then- I don’t know, I just felt like seeing you. Don’t ask me why, I don’t know either, I was high and it seemed fun.”
“And then you came to Vilnius, lost your courage and went partying instead?”
“Well, kind of. Not the courage thing, I have plenty of courage, thank you very much. But I wasn’t sure if it was a good idea, and I was coming down hard, and another hit seemed like a better idea. And then night turned into day and day into night, you know how it is.”
“But you found your way to my place somehow.”
Prussia shrugged again, but a smug little smile started to play around his lips, this time genuine. “Well, obviously.”
Lithuania sighed. “And how long are you planning on staying?”
“I don’t know, as long as you’ll have me? I don’t feel like going back home just yet. I think it’ll do Ludwig good to miss me a bit, he’s been getting a bit too clingy lately. I’ll even repair the lock, okay? First thing tomorrow, promise.”
“I don’t know,” Lithuania replied evasively. “I think I’d better call a professional locksmith-“
“No way,” Prussia interrupted. “Why would you do that when you have me?”
“Have you ever repaired a lock?”
Prussia shrugged. “Can’t be that difficult.”
Lithuania sighed and took another long look at his guest, then gave up his resistance. A bit of company would do him good. Besides, Prussia seemed determined to stay – he would most likely simply break in again if Lithuania threw him out.
“Alright,” Lithuania conceded. “You can stay for a bit.”
He pretended not to see how Prussia’s gaze lit up. And he also pretended that he didn’t feel the warmth that crawled through his body at that. Instead, he gave himself a shake.
“You can sleep on the couch. Bathroom is down the hallway to the left.”
Prussia lifted his eyebrows in mock offense. “You won’t let me sleep in your bed? Really? Are you practicing abstinence now or what?”
Tolys rolled his eyes. “Don’t push your luck. I don’t even know why I’m letting you stay.”
Prussia grinned. “It’s because you love my presence so much.”
Tolys opened his mouth, but to his dismay found that he couldn’t argue with Gilbert’s assessment.
“Whatever, go take a shower and I’ll prepare the couch for you.”
Gilbert winked at him and did a mock salute. “Of course, sir. Anything else?”
Lithuania sighed, then shook his head. He had a few very stressful days ahead, that much was clear. But as his eyes followed Prussia’s form as he made his way to the bathroom, he also found that he couldn’t really complain.
Maybe it was going to be okay for once.