Moths and Candles
Apr. 27th, 2009 04:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pyrrhiccomedyTitle: Moths and Candles
Originally posted: Here, for![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jinsai.
Length: 3,500 words.
Characters/Pairings: France/America.
Premise: After the Great War, many Americans stayed in or traveled to France, searching for meaning, as part of what in America came to be called the Lost Generation, and in France was called the Generation of Fire.
Time period: 1920s
Smuttiness: 7/10
Funnyness: 0/10
Wrist slashiness: 5/10
Lolhistoryness: 4/10
Violence: 0/10
Would I like it?: God, but this story wound up being a lot harder to write than I thought it'd be. It's been kicking my ass for about a week. I have no objectivity left to judge whether or not it's any good, but there's sex, smoking, jazz, and France's borderline-sociopathic POV. Does that sound like fun?
---
Girls in bobbed hair and white muslin dresses floated like summer moths over shimmering lamplit puddles on the cobbled Parisian street. Their sweet, giddy voices bubbled up over shop signs to the third floor window. France watched them. He felt a certain vague approval; they were pretty, and didn't know where they were going, but they looked very good on their way to wherever it might be. This seemed very modern and French, to him, and so he wished them the best.
He sipped at his rum rickey, and the ice clinked against the glass. Nightfall should have heralded more of a breeze than this.
America stirred on the couch in the living room behind him. A few minutes later, the young republic padded in, half dressed and his hair in wild disarray. He cleaned his glasses on a corner of his shirt, then pushed them on and peered at France. He said with a certain amount of surprise, "You're here."
"Good morning," France replied. He took a drink.
"You're usually out by the time I wake up," he explained.
"It's such a trial, I know. I missed you, too."
America ignored him and left the room again, as France had known he would. America thought casual lies were beneath him. France told them anyway, just to watch him stiffen along the shoulders, lower his eyelids, and avoid returning the compliment so deliberately that it was actually rather offensive.
He went back to watching moth girls and men in dapper suits crisscross through his streets below.
America returned, now wearing shoes, a tie, and he was shrugging on a sports jacket. "I found a new jazz club nearby, last night. It looks expensive."
"Mm, I think I've seen it." His ice was already melting.
"I'm going to check it out."
"Enjoy yourself," France obliged.
"Thanks--I will." America raked a hand back through his hair and disappeared into the apartment. France heard the front door open and shut.
He thought about finishing his watered-down drink, or just pouring it out and fixing a new one.
The door reopened. America interrupted him again. "You should come with me," he announced.
France quirked a little smile. "Are you paying?" Not that he cared.
"Sure, I can."
He set his glass down on the windowsill and shook his hair out of his collar. "Then I'm yours."
---
France had to stretch his legs to keep up with the younger nation. America moved with an irrepressible, frenetic energy.
"When are you leaving?" he asked presently.
America shot him a glower and swerved around a clutch of moth girls in pale blue chenille. "I thought you said you missed me."
"I don't mind you being here," France temporized.
"Sure you do. I mean, I've been crashing on your couch for, what, three weeks? I'll go if you want me to."
"Don't think about it." A soft breeze threw ripples into black-and-bright puddles, and stirred France's hair around his face. He stretched his neck into it. "I was only curious."
America was silent for a few seconds, his hands shoved deep in his pockets. "It just feels so empty," he began abruptly, "Back at home. Ever since the war, you know?" France glanced at him. "Everybody's over here."
"You were isolated for too long," he reproved.
"Isolated's a strong word."
"Mmm." He didn't take it back.
"I'm always running into people over here." He scratched at his cheek, his jaw, the side of his nose. A bit of newspaper fluttered frantically, half-crushed against the damp curve, and he swerved a foot away from France in order to kick at as they went past. "Like, just in the past week, I've bumped into Germany, Belgium, E-England--" he faltered.
England was always a subject, between them, a ghost in the corner. France, taken by a compassionate humor, did America the favor of making no response.
He cleared his throat and resumed. "You just have so much going on. With everybody--just--everything is here. It must be incredible."
"It's tiring," France replied.
America frowned at him. He looked like he'd bit into something sour.
"You wouldn't understand," he added.
"I hate it when you say that."
France knew that, and smiled, and shook his head. "Don't be cross. There are things I can't understand about you, either."
"Like what?" he inquired.
France thought about answering 'the way you never get tired of anything,' but that would be too honest. Instead, he offered an airy, "How you survive on the terrible food you eat, for one thing."
America rolled his eyes.
---
France asked for a table in the corner, in the dark, and for their drinks, and some bread, and then to be left alone. Cigarette smoke rose from every hidden table and pooled in a sweet-smelling stew against the ceiling tiles. He nursed a finger bowl of champagne. America had wanted French wine, although there was always an off-chance that he was merely being polite.
It was an eight piece jazz ensemble, no singer, and the only lights in the room reflected off the gold of the saxophone and the trombone, raised a soft glow on the piano keys and the tops of the bass player's polished shoes. America only had eyes for the band, and so France took the opportunity to withdraw a silver cigarette case from inside his jacket and flip it open. He tapped two out, and offered one to America.
"What?" the other nation blinked down at it. He plucked it gingerly from between France's fingers, and France resisted for a moment, just because he could. "Oh." He accepted a light, as well, and took a deep drag. America held his cigarettes all wrong--pinched between his thumb and forefinger. "Thanks," he remembered around a mouthful of smoke.
France didn't answer, because he had his own kind of impatience with empty courtesies. They smoked in silence for a while, leaning back on the bench beside one another, looking out towards the band.
America's wine arrived, and the bread, and the waiter deposited a decanter of olive oil and a pinch bowl of sea salt, as well. France dismissed him with a flick of his eyes. America picked up his glass, swirled, took a taste--
"--Good?"
"It's kinda corky, but it's nice."
--And didn't seem to know what to do with the rest of it. France obligingly took the lead. He plucked a warm slab of bread from the basket, drizzled oil over it, then tossed in a sprinkle of salt. America copied him.
"Your jazz sounds different form ours." America's head tilted towards him to make that observation.
"Of course it does," France blew out a jet of smoke.
America smirked, a little--there was a flash of straight teeth. "Don't give me that tone--you still got it from me."
France grimaced in answer and took a too-fast swallow of his drink. It was a waste of good champagne.
"I like yours, though," he added as an afterthought. "It's got that, what, that--Moorish influence?"
"You remembered what they're called; I'm touched."
"It's not as sad."
"Although I can't imagine what a nation like you has to be sad about."
America didn't answer, and France looked at him. He realized he had hurt his feelings. Somehow, the fact that he could casually hurt America's feelings made him forget his own irritation. He slid an arm around his shoulders and nuzzled against his ear. "Don't be cross."
"You're always saying that to me."
"Well, you're always so prickly."
"No. You're just offensive." His neck tensed.
"But, so are you," France acknowledged.
America turned to him, and their noses almost bumped together. "I said I would go home if you wanted me to." He shrugged France away.
France returned his arm to where it had been and rubbed his knuckles lightly against the back of America's neck. "You don't have to be so stiff, mon petit." He buried a kiss below his ear.
America drew in a quiet breath and shied away an inch. "Stop it--somebody'll see."
"No one is looking," France murmured. He tapped out his cigarette in the ash tray.
"I-I just want to listen to the music."
"So listen." He kissed a circle around the back of the young nation's neck. America sighed and shivered, and his head dropped forward.
He relieved America of his smoldering cigarette before the drooping curl of ash could drop onto his pant leg. He stubbed it out next to his own. His fingers walked across America's shirt to his row of buttons, and he flicked one open. America sank forward another inch like a puppet with a cut string. The music washed through the room, and now and again a clink of glass or dinner plates chimed in amid the wail of the saxophone or the piano's hopeless retort, but here in their corner, they enjoyed an island of silence. France felt the dull, warm planes of America's skin with his fingertips. America sank against his shoulder.
"My dear," he murmured, into the hollow behind his ear. He had opened America's clothes to his pant waist, and he scored his nails across his stomach. The muscles under his hand trembled. "Why don't you go home?"
America's voice caught. "Make up your mind. I keep saying, I'll go if you want me to."
"I don't think of me. I don't care one way or the other." He dragged his lips down the line of his neck, and America rolled his head to the side to allow him. "I only think of you. You hate it here, don't you?"
Startled, then-- "What? No I--"
"Shh." The saxophone opened around a high, lost, weeping note, and France reached between America's legs and squeezed. A shock flew up the other nation's back and escaped out his mouth on a quiet oh. "You're miserable; it's plain enough. You say you're envious of the way I'm at the center of everything, but the truth is that you hate us all, a little."
"That's--not true--I--" France briskly unfastened America's pants and shoved his hand inside. Whatever America was going to say terminated in a whimpered "Damn it."
France curled one hand around his erection, and the other into the hair at the base of America's skull, and America flinched and bowed between his hands like an accordion, pliant and ready to be played. He smiled and spoke soft against his ear. "You do--it's all right. We're terrible people. I've been sick of all of us for ages." He dug his fingers in a little harder, and nipped at the tender flesh behind his jaw. America's breath came faster. France released a low chuckle. "You venture out of your safe isolation to join in our war, and for what? Do we even have the decency to be grateful?"
"Do you?" America's voice shook, and France doubted he had any idea what he was saying.
"Of course not." He cupped him, used light touches and brief fingernails. America's flush climbed his neck under France's lips. "Darling boy. You should have been mine. I would have taught you not to care about anyone's approval." Not even your own.
"I h-haven't been anyone's colony in--" a touch of old heat found its way into America's unsteady voice.
"I know," he hushed. "You belong to no one but yourself, I can see that. Otherwise you could never be so alone."
"Shut up," America whispered.
"I just want you to know--I understand you." France gave his cock a sharp tug, and jerked his fingers in his hair. America gripped the edge of the table.
He wet his lips and swallowed a few times before he managed to speak. "Who…who said I wanted you to?"
"You must be understood by someone." He shifted in tighter, and bit the back of America's neck.
"Stop it, Jesus, we're in public--"
"No one is looking."
"If they did--"
"They wouldn't care." France sighed, and it washed across America's flushed skin. "Finish your drink."
America set it on the table defiantly, still half-full. He braced his free hand against the edge of the bench.
France watched him for a few seconds. He was just a deep blue shadow of himself in the enclosing smoke and darkness, shuddering with his eyes clenched shut. France disentangled his hands from him, both hands, and drew the young nation into a gentle embrace. America let out a sharp, involuntary breath, then threw his arms around his neck. France froze for a moment in surprise.
"Shh," he breathed, even though America hadn't said a word. He kissed the warm shell of his ear. "Poor darling."
"I do hate you, a little." His voice was muffled against France's shoulder.
"I know. I know." France kneaded his knuckles into his back.
"You never care. It's never good enough, no matter what I do--"
It was a cruel observation, and France had saved it for years because it was true. "Everything you love recedes away from you. Doesn't it--America."
America's arms tightened around him, and France thought he whispered "shut up" again. He could feel his erection still pressed against his knee. There was a pause, while France reflected on how best to demonstrate his compassion.
He spoke into his hair. "Lean across the table."
America stiffened. His head snapped up. "What?" France kissed him beneath his left eye. America blinked and jerked his face away. "Are you insane, this is a restaurant full of people, they'll--"
"They haven't noticed us yet."
"They'll hear!"
"You'll just have to keep quiet, won't you." France pulled his glasses off delicately and set them on the bench at his side. The other nation stared. He glanced from America, to the table, and back, and raised his eyebrows.
America half-rose and found the edge of the table again. He sank over it--folded his arms beneath his head. He was almost invisible in the darkness, just a shifting outline as he breathed, too fast. France slid behind him, half-propped on the bench, and pulled America's open pants down his hips. He heard a soft intake of air, and smoothed a hand down his back in an unthinking gesture of comfort. He opened his own slacks as well, and leaned over him, past his head, so they both felt skin on skin, and took the little decanter of olive oil from the table arrangement.
He kissed America's neck before he withdrew, and nudged his bare hips against him, and smiled when the other nation's fingers knotted in the sleeves of his white sports jacket.
"You will never get what you want from us," France breathed. He poured a pool of oil into his hand, and slid his fingers into the curve of America's ass. America's spine arched, and he forced his forehead against the cushion of his arm. "But surely, you can enjoy it when we take what we want from you?"
"You're such a bastard," America whispered, and he didn't struggle when a long, elegant finger probed inside of him. "A-and you never--haah...yes...know w-when to shut up."
France paused. "You may have a point. A few points."
They both listened to the band. France also listened to the quick, uneven intervals of America's breathing as he worked his fingers into him, and when America whimpered and twisted one hand in the tablecloth, and his half-full glass of wine tipped over and spilled red all across the white linen, he heard the dull, quiet ring of that, as well. The wine soaked into America's sleeve, but France doubted he noticed. The other nation shook, bit down on his wrist, dug his heels against the floor, and rocked back rhythmically against his hand. France bent his fingers and twisted them.
"Fuck--Jesus--fucking get on with it, already--" was the ragged response.
It was not the sort of request France was inclined to refuse. He shifted, repositioned himself, and pressed into him. It was (hotslicktight Godyes thiseverything) just what he needed for an ached-for rush of mental silence. America made a paper-thin sound and ground back, impatient, twitching and nudging against him.
France leaned forward, so they could both hear each other's harsh, strained breath. He wrapped one arm around America's hips, gripped him in tight and recaptured his erection. His other arm caged over America's neck. When France bore down, America couldn't breathe--he just arched his back and made rasping, grateful sounds.
He's still such a delightful boy.
The heavy wooden table shuddered a little beneath them with every thrust. France rutted into him roughly until they both came. America finished first--because France was compassionate.
The business of sitting up and straightening clothing, and righting toppled table set pieces, was then hastily accomplished.
"I think we should probably go before they notice you came all over the tablecloth," France proposed.
"I'm getting tired of this band anyway," America agreed.
America threw down a wad of money, and France took the bottle of wine.
---
They walked through the quiet, after-midnight streets together for hours. Between them, they finished the wine, and chain smoked through a third of their combined cigarettes. The Seine captured the empty bottle, and their cigarette butts, and it still went on glittering in the moonlight.
"Why do we put up with each other?" America wondered. He kicked a bit at the cobbles, and he still smoked wrong. "I mean, I don't even like you, really."
France nodded absently. "Likewise." He blew out a long trail of smoke, and watched it pull away on the breeze. Night had finally cooled the baking city into something civilized. "Well, there's something honest between us, at least."
"I try to be honest with everybody."
"Yes, but I don't." He flicked a look at America. "And I'm likely the only one of us who ever bothers to let you know that you have no chance." Us, on France's lips, always meant the Old World, Europe, the world's most and only important social club.
"Chance at what?" America didn't sound very interested.
"Being one of us. You know we'll never take you seriously." He waved his cigarette vaguely in the air before him.
"Why would I want to be?" America tossed his spent butt into the river, and didn't meet France's eyes.
"You would be happier, you know, if you just slunk back into isolation. Trading, and doing clever things with railroads, and whatever else you got up to on your own." America snorted. France shook his head. "Truly--America, in all honesty--" and he was rather surprised that it was honesty, at least as near as he could tell; "I would hate to see you get mired down with us. All your charm is in your idealism. It won't survive us."
"I never took you for a cynic," America replied dryly.
"Such wit. ...You may be lonely, on your continent, backwards place that it is--backwards, and terribly unstylish, by the way. No neighbors really worth talking to; your brother is professionally unobjectionable, of course, but he never has anything to say…at least, that's interesting enough to still remember that he's speaking by the time he's finished. You may not even have a single real friend to your name--except Russia, I suppose, that other misfit, although...you two aren't speaking anymore, are you, since he went in for that funny system…"
"It would be awesome if you were going somewhere with this," America sighed.
"--But you're safe there," France finished. "I know all of this--all this--" and he made a graceful, expansive gesture that took in all of Europe, "Seems terribly appealing, but you'll only get burned, mon coeur. You are a well-intentioned and idiosyncratic creature, and we are all cynical and well-established. There is no place for you here."
There was silence.
"Maybe you've got it backwards," the young republic said after a while.
"Mmm?"
"Democracy keeps spreading. My kind, I mean. My ideas keep catching on. I invented half of everything interesting over the last hundred years or so. Your book shops are full of my writers--"
"Your writers are all writing in Paris," France pointed out.
"Not important," America dismissed. "You guys are reading my books, talking like me, painting like me--we went to a jazz club tonight, for God's sake."
France stared off to the side, towards the quiet sloshing of the Seine. "What are you trying to say?"
"I don't know, maybe nothing." America had a funny little smile on his face. "But you should think about it."
"If you stay here," France warned, "You will be changed."
"Yeah, I know. But so will you."
Originally posted: Here, for
jinsai.Length: 3,500 words.
Characters/Pairings: France/America.
Premise: After the Great War, many Americans stayed in or traveled to France, searching for meaning, as part of what in America came to be called the Lost Generation, and in France was called the Generation of Fire.
Time period: 1920s
Smuttiness: 7/10
Funnyness: 0/10
Wrist slashiness: 5/10
Lolhistoryness: 4/10
Violence: 0/10
Would I like it?: God, but this story wound up being a lot harder to write than I thought it'd be. It's been kicking my ass for about a week. I have no objectivity left to judge whether or not it's any good, but there's sex, smoking, jazz, and France's borderline-sociopathic POV. Does that sound like fun?
---
Girls in bobbed hair and white muslin dresses floated like summer moths over shimmering lamplit puddles on the cobbled Parisian street. Their sweet, giddy voices bubbled up over shop signs to the third floor window. France watched them. He felt a certain vague approval; they were pretty, and didn't know where they were going, but they looked very good on their way to wherever it might be. This seemed very modern and French, to him, and so he wished them the best.
He sipped at his rum rickey, and the ice clinked against the glass. Nightfall should have heralded more of a breeze than this.
America stirred on the couch in the living room behind him. A few minutes later, the young republic padded in, half dressed and his hair in wild disarray. He cleaned his glasses on a corner of his shirt, then pushed them on and peered at France. He said with a certain amount of surprise, "You're here."
"Good morning," France replied. He took a drink.
"You're usually out by the time I wake up," he explained.
"It's such a trial, I know. I missed you, too."
America ignored him and left the room again, as France had known he would. America thought casual lies were beneath him. France told them anyway, just to watch him stiffen along the shoulders, lower his eyelids, and avoid returning the compliment so deliberately that it was actually rather offensive.
He went back to watching moth girls and men in dapper suits crisscross through his streets below.
America returned, now wearing shoes, a tie, and he was shrugging on a sports jacket. "I found a new jazz club nearby, last night. It looks expensive."
"Mm, I think I've seen it." His ice was already melting.
"I'm going to check it out."
"Enjoy yourself," France obliged.
"Thanks--I will." America raked a hand back through his hair and disappeared into the apartment. France heard the front door open and shut.
He thought about finishing his watered-down drink, or just pouring it out and fixing a new one.
The door reopened. America interrupted him again. "You should come with me," he announced.
France quirked a little smile. "Are you paying?" Not that he cared.
"Sure, I can."
He set his glass down on the windowsill and shook his hair out of his collar. "Then I'm yours."
---
France had to stretch his legs to keep up with the younger nation. America moved with an irrepressible, frenetic energy.
"When are you leaving?" he asked presently.
America shot him a glower and swerved around a clutch of moth girls in pale blue chenille. "I thought you said you missed me."
"I don't mind you being here," France temporized.
"Sure you do. I mean, I've been crashing on your couch for, what, three weeks? I'll go if you want me to."
"Don't think about it." A soft breeze threw ripples into black-and-bright puddles, and stirred France's hair around his face. He stretched his neck into it. "I was only curious."
America was silent for a few seconds, his hands shoved deep in his pockets. "It just feels so empty," he began abruptly, "Back at home. Ever since the war, you know?" France glanced at him. "Everybody's over here."
"You were isolated for too long," he reproved.
"Isolated's a strong word."
"Mmm." He didn't take it back.
"I'm always running into people over here." He scratched at his cheek, his jaw, the side of his nose. A bit of newspaper fluttered frantically, half-crushed against the damp curve, and he swerved a foot away from France in order to kick at as they went past. "Like, just in the past week, I've bumped into Germany, Belgium, E-England--" he faltered.
England was always a subject, between them, a ghost in the corner. France, taken by a compassionate humor, did America the favor of making no response.
He cleared his throat and resumed. "You just have so much going on. With everybody--just--everything is here. It must be incredible."
"It's tiring," France replied.
America frowned at him. He looked like he'd bit into something sour.
"You wouldn't understand," he added.
"I hate it when you say that."
France knew that, and smiled, and shook his head. "Don't be cross. There are things I can't understand about you, either."
"Like what?" he inquired.
France thought about answering 'the way you never get tired of anything,' but that would be too honest. Instead, he offered an airy, "How you survive on the terrible food you eat, for one thing."
America rolled his eyes.
---
France asked for a table in the corner, in the dark, and for their drinks, and some bread, and then to be left alone. Cigarette smoke rose from every hidden table and pooled in a sweet-smelling stew against the ceiling tiles. He nursed a finger bowl of champagne. America had wanted French wine, although there was always an off-chance that he was merely being polite.
It was an eight piece jazz ensemble, no singer, and the only lights in the room reflected off the gold of the saxophone and the trombone, raised a soft glow on the piano keys and the tops of the bass player's polished shoes. America only had eyes for the band, and so France took the opportunity to withdraw a silver cigarette case from inside his jacket and flip it open. He tapped two out, and offered one to America.
"What?" the other nation blinked down at it. He plucked it gingerly from between France's fingers, and France resisted for a moment, just because he could. "Oh." He accepted a light, as well, and took a deep drag. America held his cigarettes all wrong--pinched between his thumb and forefinger. "Thanks," he remembered around a mouthful of smoke.
France didn't answer, because he had his own kind of impatience with empty courtesies. They smoked in silence for a while, leaning back on the bench beside one another, looking out towards the band.
America's wine arrived, and the bread, and the waiter deposited a decanter of olive oil and a pinch bowl of sea salt, as well. France dismissed him with a flick of his eyes. America picked up his glass, swirled, took a taste--
"--Good?"
"It's kinda corky, but it's nice."
--And didn't seem to know what to do with the rest of it. France obligingly took the lead. He plucked a warm slab of bread from the basket, drizzled oil over it, then tossed in a sprinkle of salt. America copied him.
"Your jazz sounds different form ours." America's head tilted towards him to make that observation.
"Of course it does," France blew out a jet of smoke.
America smirked, a little--there was a flash of straight teeth. "Don't give me that tone--you still got it from me."
France grimaced in answer and took a too-fast swallow of his drink. It was a waste of good champagne.
"I like yours, though," he added as an afterthought. "It's got that, what, that--Moorish influence?"
"You remembered what they're called; I'm touched."
"It's not as sad."
"Although I can't imagine what a nation like you has to be sad about."
America didn't answer, and France looked at him. He realized he had hurt his feelings. Somehow, the fact that he could casually hurt America's feelings made him forget his own irritation. He slid an arm around his shoulders and nuzzled against his ear. "Don't be cross."
"You're always saying that to me."
"Well, you're always so prickly."
"No. You're just offensive." His neck tensed.
"But, so are you," France acknowledged.
America turned to him, and their noses almost bumped together. "I said I would go home if you wanted me to." He shrugged France away.
France returned his arm to where it had been and rubbed his knuckles lightly against the back of America's neck. "You don't have to be so stiff, mon petit." He buried a kiss below his ear.
America drew in a quiet breath and shied away an inch. "Stop it--somebody'll see."
"No one is looking," France murmured. He tapped out his cigarette in the ash tray.
"I-I just want to listen to the music."
"So listen." He kissed a circle around the back of the young nation's neck. America sighed and shivered, and his head dropped forward.
He relieved America of his smoldering cigarette before the drooping curl of ash could drop onto his pant leg. He stubbed it out next to his own. His fingers walked across America's shirt to his row of buttons, and he flicked one open. America sank forward another inch like a puppet with a cut string. The music washed through the room, and now and again a clink of glass or dinner plates chimed in amid the wail of the saxophone or the piano's hopeless retort, but here in their corner, they enjoyed an island of silence. France felt the dull, warm planes of America's skin with his fingertips. America sank against his shoulder.
"My dear," he murmured, into the hollow behind his ear. He had opened America's clothes to his pant waist, and he scored his nails across his stomach. The muscles under his hand trembled. "Why don't you go home?"
America's voice caught. "Make up your mind. I keep saying, I'll go if you want me to."
"I don't think of me. I don't care one way or the other." He dragged his lips down the line of his neck, and America rolled his head to the side to allow him. "I only think of you. You hate it here, don't you?"
Startled, then-- "What? No I--"
"Shh." The saxophone opened around a high, lost, weeping note, and France reached between America's legs and squeezed. A shock flew up the other nation's back and escaped out his mouth on a quiet oh. "You're miserable; it's plain enough. You say you're envious of the way I'm at the center of everything, but the truth is that you hate us all, a little."
"That's--not true--I--" France briskly unfastened America's pants and shoved his hand inside. Whatever America was going to say terminated in a whimpered "Damn it."
France curled one hand around his erection, and the other into the hair at the base of America's skull, and America flinched and bowed between his hands like an accordion, pliant and ready to be played. He smiled and spoke soft against his ear. "You do--it's all right. We're terrible people. I've been sick of all of us for ages." He dug his fingers in a little harder, and nipped at the tender flesh behind his jaw. America's breath came faster. France released a low chuckle. "You venture out of your safe isolation to join in our war, and for what? Do we even have the decency to be grateful?"
"Do you?" America's voice shook, and France doubted he had any idea what he was saying.
"Of course not." He cupped him, used light touches and brief fingernails. America's flush climbed his neck under France's lips. "Darling boy. You should have been mine. I would have taught you not to care about anyone's approval." Not even your own.
"I h-haven't been anyone's colony in--" a touch of old heat found its way into America's unsteady voice.
"I know," he hushed. "You belong to no one but yourself, I can see that. Otherwise you could never be so alone."
"Shut up," America whispered.
"I just want you to know--I understand you." France gave his cock a sharp tug, and jerked his fingers in his hair. America gripped the edge of the table.
He wet his lips and swallowed a few times before he managed to speak. "Who…who said I wanted you to?"
"You must be understood by someone." He shifted in tighter, and bit the back of America's neck.
"Stop it, Jesus, we're in public--"
"No one is looking."
"If they did--"
"They wouldn't care." France sighed, and it washed across America's flushed skin. "Finish your drink."
America set it on the table defiantly, still half-full. He braced his free hand against the edge of the bench.
France watched him for a few seconds. He was just a deep blue shadow of himself in the enclosing smoke and darkness, shuddering with his eyes clenched shut. France disentangled his hands from him, both hands, and drew the young nation into a gentle embrace. America let out a sharp, involuntary breath, then threw his arms around his neck. France froze for a moment in surprise.
"Shh," he breathed, even though America hadn't said a word. He kissed the warm shell of his ear. "Poor darling."
"I do hate you, a little." His voice was muffled against France's shoulder.
"I know. I know." France kneaded his knuckles into his back.
"You never care. It's never good enough, no matter what I do--"
It was a cruel observation, and France had saved it for years because it was true. "Everything you love recedes away from you. Doesn't it--America."
America's arms tightened around him, and France thought he whispered "shut up" again. He could feel his erection still pressed against his knee. There was a pause, while France reflected on how best to demonstrate his compassion.
He spoke into his hair. "Lean across the table."
America stiffened. His head snapped up. "What?" France kissed him beneath his left eye. America blinked and jerked his face away. "Are you insane, this is a restaurant full of people, they'll--"
"They haven't noticed us yet."
"They'll hear!"
"You'll just have to keep quiet, won't you." France pulled his glasses off delicately and set them on the bench at his side. The other nation stared. He glanced from America, to the table, and back, and raised his eyebrows.
America half-rose and found the edge of the table again. He sank over it--folded his arms beneath his head. He was almost invisible in the darkness, just a shifting outline as he breathed, too fast. France slid behind him, half-propped on the bench, and pulled America's open pants down his hips. He heard a soft intake of air, and smoothed a hand down his back in an unthinking gesture of comfort. He opened his own slacks as well, and leaned over him, past his head, so they both felt skin on skin, and took the little decanter of olive oil from the table arrangement.
He kissed America's neck before he withdrew, and nudged his bare hips against him, and smiled when the other nation's fingers knotted in the sleeves of his white sports jacket.
"You will never get what you want from us," France breathed. He poured a pool of oil into his hand, and slid his fingers into the curve of America's ass. America's spine arched, and he forced his forehead against the cushion of his arm. "But surely, you can enjoy it when we take what we want from you?"
"You're such a bastard," America whispered, and he didn't struggle when a long, elegant finger probed inside of him. "A-and you never--haah...yes...know w-when to shut up."
France paused. "You may have a point. A few points."
They both listened to the band. France also listened to the quick, uneven intervals of America's breathing as he worked his fingers into him, and when America whimpered and twisted one hand in the tablecloth, and his half-full glass of wine tipped over and spilled red all across the white linen, he heard the dull, quiet ring of that, as well. The wine soaked into America's sleeve, but France doubted he noticed. The other nation shook, bit down on his wrist, dug his heels against the floor, and rocked back rhythmically against his hand. France bent his fingers and twisted them.
"Fuck--Jesus--fucking get on with it, already--" was the ragged response.
It was not the sort of request France was inclined to refuse. He shifted, repositioned himself, and pressed into him. It was (hotslicktight Godyes thiseverything) just what he needed for an ached-for rush of mental silence. America made a paper-thin sound and ground back, impatient, twitching and nudging against him.
France leaned forward, so they could both hear each other's harsh, strained breath. He wrapped one arm around America's hips, gripped him in tight and recaptured his erection. His other arm caged over America's neck. When France bore down, America couldn't breathe--he just arched his back and made rasping, grateful sounds.
He's still such a delightful boy.
The heavy wooden table shuddered a little beneath them with every thrust. France rutted into him roughly until they both came. America finished first--because France was compassionate.
The business of sitting up and straightening clothing, and righting toppled table set pieces, was then hastily accomplished.
"I think we should probably go before they notice you came all over the tablecloth," France proposed.
"I'm getting tired of this band anyway," America agreed.
America threw down a wad of money, and France took the bottle of wine.
---
They walked through the quiet, after-midnight streets together for hours. Between them, they finished the wine, and chain smoked through a third of their combined cigarettes. The Seine captured the empty bottle, and their cigarette butts, and it still went on glittering in the moonlight.
"Why do we put up with each other?" America wondered. He kicked a bit at the cobbles, and he still smoked wrong. "I mean, I don't even like you, really."
France nodded absently. "Likewise." He blew out a long trail of smoke, and watched it pull away on the breeze. Night had finally cooled the baking city into something civilized. "Well, there's something honest between us, at least."
"I try to be honest with everybody."
"Yes, but I don't." He flicked a look at America. "And I'm likely the only one of us who ever bothers to let you know that you have no chance." Us, on France's lips, always meant the Old World, Europe, the world's most and only important social club.
"Chance at what?" America didn't sound very interested.
"Being one of us. You know we'll never take you seriously." He waved his cigarette vaguely in the air before him.
"Why would I want to be?" America tossed his spent butt into the river, and didn't meet France's eyes.
"You would be happier, you know, if you just slunk back into isolation. Trading, and doing clever things with railroads, and whatever else you got up to on your own." America snorted. France shook his head. "Truly--America, in all honesty--" and he was rather surprised that it was honesty, at least as near as he could tell; "I would hate to see you get mired down with us. All your charm is in your idealism. It won't survive us."
"I never took you for a cynic," America replied dryly.
"Such wit. ...You may be lonely, on your continent, backwards place that it is--backwards, and terribly unstylish, by the way. No neighbors really worth talking to; your brother is professionally unobjectionable, of course, but he never has anything to say…at least, that's interesting enough to still remember that he's speaking by the time he's finished. You may not even have a single real friend to your name--except Russia, I suppose, that other misfit, although...you two aren't speaking anymore, are you, since he went in for that funny system…"
"It would be awesome if you were going somewhere with this," America sighed.
"--But you're safe there," France finished. "I know all of this--all this--" and he made a graceful, expansive gesture that took in all of Europe, "Seems terribly appealing, but you'll only get burned, mon coeur. You are a well-intentioned and idiosyncratic creature, and we are all cynical and well-established. There is no place for you here."
There was silence.
"Maybe you've got it backwards," the young republic said after a while.
"Mmm?"
"Democracy keeps spreading. My kind, I mean. My ideas keep catching on. I invented half of everything interesting over the last hundred years or so. Your book shops are full of my writers--"
"Your writers are all writing in Paris," France pointed out.
"Not important," America dismissed. "You guys are reading my books, talking like me, painting like me--we went to a jazz club tonight, for God's sake."
France stared off to the side, towards the quiet sloshing of the Seine. "What are you trying to say?"
"I don't know, maybe nothing." America had a funny little smile on his face. "But you should think about it."
"If you stay here," France warned, "You will be changed."
"Yeah, I know. But so will you."