#aph!seychelles

Why England had thought this book full of fantastical nonsense would be a good early Christmas gift for the bairns, many of whom struggle with all the ins and outs of the English language, is a mystery to Scotland. Scotland has had centuries to learn the English bloody language, and it still trips him up when people decide they’re going to play with words for ‘fun’. Most of the weans hate the damn book, or are generally too mystified by the language it uses to complain.

After a long pause in which no-one says anything, Hong Kong raises his hand.

“Twinkle means the light that’s shining fades in and out,” says New Zealand, still leaning on the nearby window seat so he can peer out with great interest at the slowly falling snow. The weather is the reason all the brats have been gathered indoors and need preoccupying before dinner - and preoccupying quietly, because Ireland had threatened to murder the lot of them if they disturbed her when she has a migraine, and England’s pissed off out of the country entirely to attend the accession of the new King of the Belgians in Brussels.

Hong Kong puts his hand back down again, and New South Wales explodes.

“Bats don’t shine!”

“Indoor voice,” Scotland rumbles. The lad’s right, of course, but the last thing any of them want is to call down the wrath of the Irish on their heads.

New South Wales scowls, but subsides back into his cross-legged slump on the library’s plush rug. “I hate this book,” he mutters.

Seychelles, who had been sitting silently with a furrowed brow for most of the nonsense story and clutching her giant stuffed fish for emotional support, raises her own hand. “Oncle, puis-je être excusé?”

What frozen hell has Scotland descended into that has temporarily put him in charge of enforcing the Empire’s godforsaken tongue? England better be back by bloody Christmas.

“Angelique,” he grits out. “English.”

Seychelles frowns at him. “I want to go. Please.”

Don’t they all.

Arthur Kirkland was not having a good day. To describe it as such, however, would, of course, be a gross and malignant understatement that did absolutely no justice whatsoever to just how Not Good the not good day was – but, to spare an otherwise unwieldy rant (and most certainly a headache) on the very many not good features that made the not good day not good, tact, diplomacy, and many, many hot cups of tea had been procured, presented and just generally shoved in Arthur’s direction all in the vain hopes that Arthur Kirkland, Student Body President of Hetalia High School and all-round pain-in-the-arse-when-pissed-off, would keep his very not good and therefore actually bloody awful bad day to himself. And not kill anybody. Not killing anybody would be good.

“President?” Hesitantly, the Student Council Secretary, Michelle, stuck her beribboned head around the Council Room door, seeing Arthur at the main desk there where she’d left him about an hour and a half earlier when school had finished for the day. Kirkland was still buried in a pile of paperwork, muttering unfavourable comments about said paperwork under his breath. The poor paperwork. “President, would you like another cup of tea?”

Arthur looked up at her, impressive eyebrows still drawn down in the hefty scowl he’d been directing at his work. “You make crap tea.”

…Ah. He was still in a bad mood, then. At least it matched the weather – it had been cloudy all day, occasionally spitting on to rain.

“You still drink it,” Michelle pointed out with a huff, glaring back at the president.

“I wouldn’t dare to inflict it on anyone else,” Arthur drawled, signing-off on whatever bit of paper was in front of him with a slash of his pen and setting the piece on a pile to the side of his desk. “They might take us to court for attempted murder.”

Michelle bristled, puffing up like an angry cat. Stupid British bastard. Like he was one to speak!  His efforts in Home Economics had been declared Biological Warfare. The only thing worse than Kirkland’s cooking was his temper – and his cooking was really bad; his scones had sent unsuspecting students to the nurse on more than one occasion. And yet, if the rumours were to be believed…

If the rumours were to be believed, Arthur Kirkland had been fun once. A little wild, a little weird, with a talent for telling stories, pulling pranks and playing the electric guitar. Legend had it that it’d been him and his band of merry men who had conquered the local rival school’s playing field one sunny afternoon armed with nothing more than a red coat and a play-sword he’d nicked from the drama department, abducting that school’s flag to places unknown to this day and flying high a Jolly Rodger blowing a raspberry in its place. The culprits behind the act had never been brought to ‘justice,’ and the other school would never be able to live it down.

Arthur Kirkland had been fun once, once upon a time – but that had been a long, long time ago, before Michelle had come to Hetalia High School, and she’d never seen hide nor hair of the wild part of the president’s personality people sometimes whispered about. Kirkland didn’t tell stories any more, didn’t daydream. He caught the pranksters rather than indulging in pranks, and Michelle had never seen him touch a triangle never mind a guitar. Kirkland had become responsible, and he was all the grouchier for it.

Magnanimously, Michelle changed the subject from her questionable tea-making skills, even though she felt like fetching a teapot just to chuck it at Kirkland’s head. She’d probably miss, anyway. Stupid Eyebrows Idiot had learned how to duck. “How long are you planning on staying back tonight, anyway?”

“I need to finish sorting out the game court schedule by tomorrow; both the tennis and basketball groups submitted their requests for court-time at the last minute, as per sodding usual.” Arthur sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose between forefinger and thumb and adopting the expression of one trying in vain to will away a headache already in full swing. Lord, he made seventeen years look old. “The crafts group, as well, have asked for a temporary room transfer for their club activities since their old room currently has a leak in the ceiling, and -”

“And you’re planning on getting all that done and still going home early?” Michelle scoffed, folding her arms across her chest as she took a perched seat on the edge of one of the room’s other desks. Arthur just looked at her blankly. “Dieu, I thought you were actually serious for once when you stopped me about it at lunch – thought it was a miracle. It would be the first time the stupid president had gone home at a reasonable hour instead of skulking around the Council Room and making me stay late with him, but noooo, here he still is. How am I ever supposed to get a boyfriend at this rate?! I’m going grey before my time and -”

“Lunch,” Arthur said. Interrupting Michelle mid-rant.

“Lunch,” Michelle said, and moodily kicked out with one leg to knock against the president’s desk. The idiot had the most peculiar look on his face, like the slow dawning of some horror not yet fully realised. “You stopped me, remember? Rambled on about your little brother and having to leave early when I was trying to get in line for the fish -”

The legs of Arthur’s chair screeched as he got to his feet. “I need to go.”

“-Eh?” Realising the question made her gape somewhat like a stunned fish Michelle closed her mouth from the sound the president had managed to startle out of her with his abrupt proclamation, watching with some bemusement as the boy started sweeping papers up into one large pile willy-nilly.

He was in a rush – that was obvious; usually Kirkland would be anal about putting the sheets into some kind of order, but in his haste neglected his normal care and just shoved them in the schoolbag he’d yanked up from its resting-place on the floor by his feet. And then knocked over his schoolbag, the contents all sliding out in a rush and hitting the ground.

Arthur swore rather colourfully, and immediately started gathering everything up again. Wisely holding her tongue, Michelle hopped down off her desk to help him – she could wait for a better time to ask just when it was Kirkland had learned to swear in French.

A small book had fallen the furthest away from the pile – a slim red-bound paperback, its pages yellowing at the ages from age and love. There was no title on the cover anymore, just the faint leftover glimmerings of gold where letters had been slowly rubbed away, and Michelle picked it up curiously, wondering what it was.

  Once there was a princess, young and fair, the daughter of a king of a faraway kingdom. Her mother had died when she was just a baby and the king had grieved for many years about it, but on his daughter’s tenth birthday decided to remarry again.

The princess was pleased, happy at the thought of having a mother, and greeted the lady her father had chosen to be his wife with every kindness, bringing the new queen flowers from the garden and her lovely smiles. The queen smiled in return at the child, petting her golden hair – but when the king stepped out of sight the woman turned cruel, throwing the flowers to the ground and sending the princess away with angry words.

The princess ran, hurt at such unkindness, and wept in the deepest parts of the castle gardens where no-one could find her. She stayed there many hours, crying bitter tears, and only glanced up when a beautiful white bird landed on a tree near her, the bird looking down at the unhappy princess with a curious eye.

“Why are you crying?” asked the bird.

The princess was astonished and stared at the bird in wonder, for she had never heard of a talking bird before.

“Why are you crying?” the bird asked again, and sounded so dreadfully concerned that the princess could not help but answer.

“My new mother doesn’t like me,” said the princess. “She

  Arthur snatched the book from Michelle’s hands.

Michelle only looked up at the president, dumbfounded. “…You read fairytales?”

Arthur went a funny shade of red, the colour spreading high along his cheekbones and touching the tips of his ears. He stuffed the book he’d taken from the Council’s secretary in his bag, refusing to meet Michelle’s eyes. “…It’s my little brother’s.”

“Do you read it to him?”

“I need to go,” Arthur said again, stubbornly avoiding the question and Michelle and hurriedly shoving the last of the paperwork in his bag.

The girl wasn’t to be put-off, feeling a grin touch the corner of her mouth as Kirkland just continued to get redder. “I bet you did. I bet you read it to him at bedtime when he was little and fell in love with the story yourself -”

“Goodbye, Michelle.”

“Can you recite it word-for-word? Oi, stupid president, I think that’s really cute-”

The sound of the door slamming shut was Michelle’s only answer, Arthur taking off down the corridor outside with complete disregard for the ‘no running in the halls’ rule, no doubt still wonderfully red in the face.

    *****

    Arthur took the stairs back up two at a time, the sound of his rapid footsteps horribly loud in the suddenly otherwise-silent house.

“…Peter?” There was no response from behind the door to Peter’s bedroom, not even the slightest rustle of movement. “Peter, I heard a crash. Are you alright?”

When there was still no reply Arthur laid his hand on the knob, digging out the key from where he’d dumped it in his pocket and sticking it into the lock. It would be just like Peter to have gone ahead and hurt himself somehow – Arthur would never hear the end of it from Rhys, Peter himself or their parents -, but it was just as likely to be a trick played by the youngest brat in the family, the cold shoulder used so that Arthur would apologise for what he’d said, let Peter have his way, open the door. Still, if it wasn’t a trick –

Arthur twisted the key in the lock and opened the door to his little brother’s bedroom, standing in the doorway just in case Peter was faking it and tried to dart out past him into the hallway. The room inside was dark; Arthur couldn’t see much past the square of light the open door left on the carpet.