Fic: Curls and Kernels
Title: Curls and Kernels
Fandom: Hetalia
Rating: PG-13
Characters & Pairings: England/France
Warnings: Making out
Summary: A typical Sunday for your typical antagonistic, emotionally stunted, sexually uncommunicative couple.
-
It is ten o’clock on a slightly chilly Sunday morning; breakfast has long since been finished and the plates put away, and yet France is still in the kitchen. England has seen him, standing at the polished marble-grained countertops, paring apricots in his golden-dusted fingers. He is wearing black casual trousers beneath a shirt that he had no energy to button up more than halfway (flirt), and he has tied up his hair in the way that he does when he is concentrating: loose, low, and hasty, so that a single curl has escaped and is touching his jaw like it knows a secret. His feet are bare, toes huddling in together for protection against the onslaught of the cold floor. The mound of prepared fruit beside him is growing steadily larger, soft and sumptuous like something from a still life.
England saw all this - took it all in and more - as he stomped past in his decaying tartan slippers with a heap of dirty laundry in his arms.
Now, he kneels on the stone tiles in the laundry room, poking fingers down into used socks to check the heels for wear before throwing them into the washing machine. He tries to rid his mind of the image of France and the apricots, of rich tempting flesh and skilled hands on the handle of the knife, by thinking about the patterns on their clothes. The delicate spotting on France’s expensive pyjamas; red and green check on England’s shirts. The fine diagonal stripes on France’s best tie; England’s corduroy trousers. France’s cashmere sweater; England’s argyle socks (“It’s a perfectly respectable pattern!” he huffed as France’s snigger leaked through his fingers.)
All of France’s socks are perfect. The texture calls to his fingers, silky and even, in plain block colours deliberately chosen to match his suits. None of his socks look more than six months old. There is no hint of leather-stain on them, no sign of thinning where his feet place pressure. England’s socks are stretched, shrunken, mismatched - they have worn patches at the heels and holes from which his toes look out. The one in his hands has been darned twice.
The scent of apricots has reached the laundry room, sweet and fragrant.
England throws all of the clothes into the washing machine at once.
*
It is half past ten, and there is a shining coppery basin on the table that would be large enough to stew an average-sized dog. France is piling huge mounds of halved apricot into it with yellow-glistening fingers. The point in his shirt where it begins to open, skin revealing itself from above neglected buttons, is precisely level with England’s eyes where he is sitting behind his newspaper. England is certain that France has moved his business over to the table purely to make him aware of that fact.
The scent is stronger now, filling up the cracks of the kitchen, a thick haze that elbows into England’s brain and disperses the chequered squares of his crossword, sending letters scattering and coming together again in the form of the juice and the fragrance oozing beneath France’s fingernails. France is even humming, something just as sweet as the fruit, the final touch to the perfect plot, shackling England’s attention sill more firmly to his shape and his presence.
England endeavours, with earth-rocking force of will, to concentrate on the crossword.
Except that now, France has piled the final handful of apricot-flesh into the basin and is scoring a long stem of vanilla between his palms. The scent of the spice is rising up from where it splits apart and yields to his pressure, sweet and fresh and smotheringly delicious. The smell blends with the juice and the glisten, all running together to drip down France’s wrists, almost to the point of threatening his rolled-back shirtsleeves.
“All this show just for jam,” England thinks, except perhaps it has not stayed purely in his head, as France is widening his eyes at him in that way that he always uses to express “You stupid scruffy Englishman in your out-of-date shoes”. England feels the familiar, terrible rush of heat to his cheeks before France has even had time to open his mouth, and is out of his seat before France has got so far as “You”.
“I’m going upstairs to read,” England blurts, and stomps hastily out of the room with an overwhelming impression that under the noise of his slippers slapping against the floor, France is tittering at him.
*
It is quarter to eleven, and England is lying half-upright on their bed, having wrinkled his nose in calculated affront at the mound of pillows France insists on spreading out over it which make it resemble a Turkish brothel - and also having (with dignity, England tells himself), proudly swiped over half of them onto the floor. A copy of David Copperfield is propped up on his stomach as he attempts to look at its pages rather than his toes in their threadbare fabric, poking up tauntingly over the top of the book. Through the floor below him, the mouth-watering scent of vanilla is swelling up directly into his brain, so rich he can practically feel it sitting on his tongue; it skitters through his sinuses with slippery and subtle abandon, leaking through his senses and sending the novel swirling around his head. England screws up his face in an attempt to force his own concentration, and for a moment considers putting on his reading glasses purely for the studious frame of mind they give him - but he is already reading a Dickens novel while wearing worn-out argyle socks and a sweater vest with holes in it, and does not need to feel any more elderly today.
On the other hand, his head is full of apricots and the way that France makes them appear almost sinfully enticing just by holding them in his hands, and perhaps a dash of aged respectability would do them all some good.
Just as he is reaching over to the bedside table (and fumbling around France’s three equally expensive but subtly different wristwatches, his hand lotion, his sleek alarm clock and his slim paperback tome that is just well-written enough to escape the label of pornography), there comes an enormous, splitting, cracking sound, as of a boulder impacting with an anvil.
It prematurely shatters any expectation England may have had of his own practised sophistication, as he drops the smutty novella on the carpet and swears. Before he can even gather his composure, the noise announces itself twice more in rapid succession, only barely muffled by the floor, shattering the vanilla-drenched quiet and making the room reverberate with enough sound to seem physically present.
The tranquil, Dickensian thoughts drain from England’s head, to be replaced by something dark and gruesome which Denmark taught him as a child.
He places his book aside carefully, swings his feet over the side of the bed and scoops up his slippers onto his feet, all while the noise continues at irregular intervals. As he stands up, he ensures very deliberately to step with all of his weight onto France’s dirty book (and it has landed with its pages open, too. What a shame), before pacing steadily to the bedroom door and opening it. When he first steps into the hall, the noise rapidly becomes even louder - but suddenly, as he is approaching the stairs, ceases entirely.
England stops, places both his feet firmly and evenly on the carpet, and cocks his head. He can hear something happening down in the kitchen: something moving, things being shifted about, France’s semi-hums, semi breaths that he makes while thinking.
England blinks. Frowns. Turns on the spot to return to the bedroom.
The earsplitting noise starts up again.
England stamps into the music room, plugs in all of his amps, and starts blasting the Buzzcocks as loud as his equipment will let him.
*
By half past one, England has run out of punk music and remembered about the laundry. Slippers on his feet and cushioning his footsteps, he is making his way painstakingly down the stairs, pausing before each one as if to determine its safety, trying frantically to think of a route leading to the washing machine that does not involve going through the kitchen. A slow, curling heat, laced with a narcotically sweet scent, has begun to rise and swirl throughout the house with a sensuality which he had not thought achievable by something intangible. Lingering near the bottom of the stairs, he can hear a slow simmering sound, and his treacherous tongue wets his bottom lip without his permission as he thinks of shining rounded jars topped with linen and string.
Laundry, he tells himself firmly. His insides protest.
He assumes a mask of dogged neutrality and ventures into the kitchen. Sleeves still rolled up, France is sitting quite calmly at the table with a book of what looks like poetry, reading glasses on his face and quite unabashedly giving off an air of polished, scholarly stylishness. England tries not to look at his face, his fingers; walks in with his head up and aims for the opposite door. Although France has not once looked up, England can feel tendrils of his attention following him around the room.
On the stove, the copper pan is simmering with liquid golden fruit and pale crystal bubbles. The smell makes England reel with yearning. On the surface of the mixture, bobbing among the amber-clustered ripples, are several naked apricot kernels.
England stops and stares at them, in all their defiant innocuousness. He senses France sense him stop, and even as they are both facing away from each other he feels France’s smile brush the back of his neck.
“Why don’t you hang it outside?” France says, looking at his book.
“I will,” England says, looking at the pan.
As he walks into the laundry room, he wonders whether it would be more satisfying to punch France in the face or to throw him onto the table and help his stupid shirt make up its mind over whether or not it wishes to cover his stupid chest.
*
For the rest of the afternoon, England stays in the garden and sweats amongst the flower beds.
*
By the time he eventually creeps back inside, dry clothes piled chaotically into the laundry basket just to show France’s perfect socks, the counter was bearing a line of gleaming glass jars, each filled to the brim with beautiful darkened apricot-blend, cooling and solidifying and releasing siren-scents. France has gone, but his rich, spicy cologne lingers, so that England turns his head to sniff at his own shirt collar just in case it is the culprit.
His clothes smell of raw soap and old libraries.
He sets up the ironing board whilst scowling at the cupboards.
France comes wafting in on the tails of his own perfume some time later, as England is steaming a crease into the fold of his trousers. England holds his breath and steels himself for the customary slap of palm upon backside that France never seems able to resist administering whilst England is ironing, and lets out a huff of relief when it lands precisely as anticipated. It is reassuring to have these rituals in their life.
Accordingly, he turns around and yells obscenities for five minutes while France sniggers into a bag of onions.
*
The dinner France made had been steak, seared briefly on each side, with a peppery sauce and a heap of beautifully arranged vegetables, and no apricot jam in sight.
“Are you sure this is dead?” England had asked, prodding at the red centre of the meat with a wary fork.
“I don’t know,” France had replied. “Maybe you should grind it into tiny pieces and boil it until it turns grey, just to be certain.”
Now, with the kitchen cleaned and restored to order after France’s orgiastic enjoyment of it and with as much reading done as he could stand to do in his restless mood, England sits on the side of their bed and slowly removes his socks, concentrating on his own toenails rather than the sound of France humming in the bathroom as he washes his face with something foamy and ridiculously expensive. England’s head is full of images of food: the beautiful, flawless things France can create, the glisten and the shine, the texture and the sensation. He thinks about sweet and smooth, rich and full, about the talent and the passion contained in those fingertips - and finally, a little guiltily, about the way France angles his thighs as he stands at the stove.
England leans his palms onto the mattress on either side of him and stares at his discarded socks moodily.
Staring at him in turn is France, who stands in the bathroom doorway stripped down to his trousers with his arms crossed over his chest. England can feel the pressure of his gaze upon the side of his head, and it discomfits him; hastily he begins to unbutton his shirt, purely to force France’s attention elsewhere.
The moment that France’s eyes wander further down his body, England is filled with a sense of flooding relief, one which he does not want to think too critically about.
“Sometimes I think you have more affection for food than for me,” he mutters instead, forcedly scornful.
He had expected France to laugh. France does not. Instead he simply stands there, eyebrows slowly lifting, looking again at England’s face even as he removes his shirt. England shifts uncomfortably, wondering how many items of clothing he might have to take off before France will forget about what he said.
Quite a few, it seems, judging by the steadiness of France’s gaze upon his face right now. England is beginning to seriously begrudge him his eyes.
But France does not say anything, walking over to the bed in silence and in thought, and he does not even begin to take off his trousers until he is out of England’s sight. England bites his lip, not even wanting to imagine what France might be thinking right now. If he is deliberately avoiding the opportunity to exhibit himself, it must be bad.
Even so, this has almost become a game by now, and England would hate to lose.
And so, ignoring the unspoken words between them with an aplomb borne of experience, the two of them continue to get ready for bed in silence, both pretending that England never said anything. As France sits beside the mirror to apply what England has always thought of as his concoctions, England tugs on his pyjamas and heads into the bathroom to clean his teeth. Not having his bottom pinched at any time whilst he is doing so is distinctly unsettling.
After rinsing his mouth, he heads back into the bedroom. France is already in bed, the covers pulled up almost entirely over his bare chest, checking the faces of his watches to make sure that their times match. The main light has been switched off in favour of the bedside lamp, and its pale yellow glow picks out the highlights in France’s skin; casts a mesh of gold over his face and chest. He gives not the faintest flicker of his eyes upwards.
Feeling stifled by the oppressive atmosphere, England wavers and hesitates, as if this is the first time that they will share a bed. It takes some steeling of his nerves to venture forwards, and he swallows hard against the swelling feeling in his throat of his own idiocy. France pays him no attention as he approaches, having moved on to plumping the pillows. He shakes them vigorously up and down between his hands, one after another, his hands stretching and tautening the fabric as he smoothes them back out.
“Fine,” England groans, suddenly unable to take it anymore, slumping onto the mattress and glaring uselessly at the opposite wall. “It was a stupid thing to say.”
As England watches nervously out of the side of his eye, France rolls over and sends him the kind of stomach-melting gaze that makes it feel as though nothing ever happened.
Then suddenly, without even seeming to have moved, he has his arms around England’s waist and is pressing kisses all across the backs of his shoulders.
England squawks, more out of surprise than anything else, and his hand goes reflexively back to find France’s hair and anchor itself there. “H-hey, what are you doing?”
“I’m showing you,” France says, in the midst of placing a shivery kiss right at the nape of England’s neck, “why my affection for you is different from my affection for food.”
England huffs and squirms, wriggling against the hands that France is smoothing slowly around his hips, but does not actually do anything to remove them. “I said it was stupid, all right? No need to rub it in.”
“You know very well that that’s not what I’m doing,” France murmurs, breath teasing the edge of England’s jaw. England makes a highly impatient grunt and turns around, catching his arms around France’s neck and pitching the pair of them over.
Only after some time of silence does England manage to pull away again, leaning back and taking a deep, spinning breath. France looks inquisitively up at him from where he has landed on one of the pillows, hair thrown out around his head like a dull-gilted fan.
“Honestly,” England mutters, fingers of one hand resting on France’s collarbone and pressing in just slightly, “if I didn’t know better I’d swear you did the whole thing just to get to me.”
Each of France’s hands is snugly fitted around one of England’s thighs. He blinks innocently. “How could you possibly imagine such a thing of me?” There is a pause, during which England rolls his eyes. “The shirt was deliberate, though,” France admits.
England scoffs. “I know that.”
France hums contentedly, his eyes fixed unabashedly on the display as England sits up and strips off his pyjama shirt. “I am so very lucky,” he murmurs, hands squeezing delightedly into both of England’s legs, “to have someone who understands me so well.”
-
The jam recipe I used is this one.
Did I mention yet that UST is my favourite?
I'm going to include the fandom in my fics' headers from now on, since I'll be introducing new fandoms to my LJ at some point.
Fandom: Hetalia
Rating: PG-13
Characters & Pairings: England/France
Warnings: Making out
Summary: A typical Sunday for your typical antagonistic, emotionally stunted, sexually uncommunicative couple.
-
It is ten o’clock on a slightly chilly Sunday morning; breakfast has long since been finished and the plates put away, and yet France is still in the kitchen. England has seen him, standing at the polished marble-grained countertops, paring apricots in his golden-dusted fingers. He is wearing black casual trousers beneath a shirt that he had no energy to button up more than halfway (flirt), and he has tied up his hair in the way that he does when he is concentrating: loose, low, and hasty, so that a single curl has escaped and is touching his jaw like it knows a secret. His feet are bare, toes huddling in together for protection against the onslaught of the cold floor. The mound of prepared fruit beside him is growing steadily larger, soft and sumptuous like something from a still life.
England saw all this - took it all in and more - as he stomped past in his decaying tartan slippers with a heap of dirty laundry in his arms.
Now, he kneels on the stone tiles in the laundry room, poking fingers down into used socks to check the heels for wear before throwing them into the washing machine. He tries to rid his mind of the image of France and the apricots, of rich tempting flesh and skilled hands on the handle of the knife, by thinking about the patterns on their clothes. The delicate spotting on France’s expensive pyjamas; red and green check on England’s shirts. The fine diagonal stripes on France’s best tie; England’s corduroy trousers. France’s cashmere sweater; England’s argyle socks (“It’s a perfectly respectable pattern!” he huffed as France’s snigger leaked through his fingers.)
All of France’s socks are perfect. The texture calls to his fingers, silky and even, in plain block colours deliberately chosen to match his suits. None of his socks look more than six months old. There is no hint of leather-stain on them, no sign of thinning where his feet place pressure. England’s socks are stretched, shrunken, mismatched - they have worn patches at the heels and holes from which his toes look out. The one in his hands has been darned twice.
The scent of apricots has reached the laundry room, sweet and fragrant.
England throws all of the clothes into the washing machine at once.
*
It is half past ten, and there is a shining coppery basin on the table that would be large enough to stew an average-sized dog. France is piling huge mounds of halved apricot into it with yellow-glistening fingers. The point in his shirt where it begins to open, skin revealing itself from above neglected buttons, is precisely level with England’s eyes where he is sitting behind his newspaper. England is certain that France has moved his business over to the table purely to make him aware of that fact.
The scent is stronger now, filling up the cracks of the kitchen, a thick haze that elbows into England’s brain and disperses the chequered squares of his crossword, sending letters scattering and coming together again in the form of the juice and the fragrance oozing beneath France’s fingernails. France is even humming, something just as sweet as the fruit, the final touch to the perfect plot, shackling England’s attention sill more firmly to his shape and his presence.
England endeavours, with earth-rocking force of will, to concentrate on the crossword.
Except that now, France has piled the final handful of apricot-flesh into the basin and is scoring a long stem of vanilla between his palms. The scent of the spice is rising up from where it splits apart and yields to his pressure, sweet and fresh and smotheringly delicious. The smell blends with the juice and the glisten, all running together to drip down France’s wrists, almost to the point of threatening his rolled-back shirtsleeves.
“All this show just for jam,” England thinks, except perhaps it has not stayed purely in his head, as France is widening his eyes at him in that way that he always uses to express “You stupid scruffy Englishman in your out-of-date shoes”. England feels the familiar, terrible rush of heat to his cheeks before France has even had time to open his mouth, and is out of his seat before France has got so far as “You”.
“I’m going upstairs to read,” England blurts, and stomps hastily out of the room with an overwhelming impression that under the noise of his slippers slapping against the floor, France is tittering at him.
*
It is quarter to eleven, and England is lying half-upright on their bed, having wrinkled his nose in calculated affront at the mound of pillows France insists on spreading out over it which make it resemble a Turkish brothel - and also having (with dignity, England tells himself), proudly swiped over half of them onto the floor. A copy of David Copperfield is propped up on his stomach as he attempts to look at its pages rather than his toes in their threadbare fabric, poking up tauntingly over the top of the book. Through the floor below him, the mouth-watering scent of vanilla is swelling up directly into his brain, so rich he can practically feel it sitting on his tongue; it skitters through his sinuses with slippery and subtle abandon, leaking through his senses and sending the novel swirling around his head. England screws up his face in an attempt to force his own concentration, and for a moment considers putting on his reading glasses purely for the studious frame of mind they give him - but he is already reading a Dickens novel while wearing worn-out argyle socks and a sweater vest with holes in it, and does not need to feel any more elderly today.
On the other hand, his head is full of apricots and the way that France makes them appear almost sinfully enticing just by holding them in his hands, and perhaps a dash of aged respectability would do them all some good.
Just as he is reaching over to the bedside table (and fumbling around France’s three equally expensive but subtly different wristwatches, his hand lotion, his sleek alarm clock and his slim paperback tome that is just well-written enough to escape the label of pornography), there comes an enormous, splitting, cracking sound, as of a boulder impacting with an anvil.
It prematurely shatters any expectation England may have had of his own practised sophistication, as he drops the smutty novella on the carpet and swears. Before he can even gather his composure, the noise announces itself twice more in rapid succession, only barely muffled by the floor, shattering the vanilla-drenched quiet and making the room reverberate with enough sound to seem physically present.
The tranquil, Dickensian thoughts drain from England’s head, to be replaced by something dark and gruesome which Denmark taught him as a child.
He places his book aside carefully, swings his feet over the side of the bed and scoops up his slippers onto his feet, all while the noise continues at irregular intervals. As he stands up, he ensures very deliberately to step with all of his weight onto France’s dirty book (and it has landed with its pages open, too. What a shame), before pacing steadily to the bedroom door and opening it. When he first steps into the hall, the noise rapidly becomes even louder - but suddenly, as he is approaching the stairs, ceases entirely.
England stops, places both his feet firmly and evenly on the carpet, and cocks his head. He can hear something happening down in the kitchen: something moving, things being shifted about, France’s semi-hums, semi breaths that he makes while thinking.
England blinks. Frowns. Turns on the spot to return to the bedroom.
The earsplitting noise starts up again.
England stamps into the music room, plugs in all of his amps, and starts blasting the Buzzcocks as loud as his equipment will let him.
*
By half past one, England has run out of punk music and remembered about the laundry. Slippers on his feet and cushioning his footsteps, he is making his way painstakingly down the stairs, pausing before each one as if to determine its safety, trying frantically to think of a route leading to the washing machine that does not involve going through the kitchen. A slow, curling heat, laced with a narcotically sweet scent, has begun to rise and swirl throughout the house with a sensuality which he had not thought achievable by something intangible. Lingering near the bottom of the stairs, he can hear a slow simmering sound, and his treacherous tongue wets his bottom lip without his permission as he thinks of shining rounded jars topped with linen and string.
Laundry, he tells himself firmly. His insides protest.
He assumes a mask of dogged neutrality and ventures into the kitchen. Sleeves still rolled up, France is sitting quite calmly at the table with a book of what looks like poetry, reading glasses on his face and quite unabashedly giving off an air of polished, scholarly stylishness. England tries not to look at his face, his fingers; walks in with his head up and aims for the opposite door. Although France has not once looked up, England can feel tendrils of his attention following him around the room.
On the stove, the copper pan is simmering with liquid golden fruit and pale crystal bubbles. The smell makes England reel with yearning. On the surface of the mixture, bobbing among the amber-clustered ripples, are several naked apricot kernels.
England stops and stares at them, in all their defiant innocuousness. He senses France sense him stop, and even as they are both facing away from each other he feels France’s smile brush the back of his neck.
“Why don’t you hang it outside?” France says, looking at his book.
“I will,” England says, looking at the pan.
As he walks into the laundry room, he wonders whether it would be more satisfying to punch France in the face or to throw him onto the table and help his stupid shirt make up its mind over whether or not it wishes to cover his stupid chest.
*
For the rest of the afternoon, England stays in the garden and sweats amongst the flower beds.
*
By the time he eventually creeps back inside, dry clothes piled chaotically into the laundry basket just to show France’s perfect socks, the counter was bearing a line of gleaming glass jars, each filled to the brim with beautiful darkened apricot-blend, cooling and solidifying and releasing siren-scents. France has gone, but his rich, spicy cologne lingers, so that England turns his head to sniff at his own shirt collar just in case it is the culprit.
His clothes smell of raw soap and old libraries.
He sets up the ironing board whilst scowling at the cupboards.
France comes wafting in on the tails of his own perfume some time later, as England is steaming a crease into the fold of his trousers. England holds his breath and steels himself for the customary slap of palm upon backside that France never seems able to resist administering whilst England is ironing, and lets out a huff of relief when it lands precisely as anticipated. It is reassuring to have these rituals in their life.
Accordingly, he turns around and yells obscenities for five minutes while France sniggers into a bag of onions.
*
The dinner France made had been steak, seared briefly on each side, with a peppery sauce and a heap of beautifully arranged vegetables, and no apricot jam in sight.
“Are you sure this is dead?” England had asked, prodding at the red centre of the meat with a wary fork.
“I don’t know,” France had replied. “Maybe you should grind it into tiny pieces and boil it until it turns grey, just to be certain.”
Now, with the kitchen cleaned and restored to order after France’s orgiastic enjoyment of it and with as much reading done as he could stand to do in his restless mood, England sits on the side of their bed and slowly removes his socks, concentrating on his own toenails rather than the sound of France humming in the bathroom as he washes his face with something foamy and ridiculously expensive. England’s head is full of images of food: the beautiful, flawless things France can create, the glisten and the shine, the texture and the sensation. He thinks about sweet and smooth, rich and full, about the talent and the passion contained in those fingertips - and finally, a little guiltily, about the way France angles his thighs as he stands at the stove.
England leans his palms onto the mattress on either side of him and stares at his discarded socks moodily.
Staring at him in turn is France, who stands in the bathroom doorway stripped down to his trousers with his arms crossed over his chest. England can feel the pressure of his gaze upon the side of his head, and it discomfits him; hastily he begins to unbutton his shirt, purely to force France’s attention elsewhere.
The moment that France’s eyes wander further down his body, England is filled with a sense of flooding relief, one which he does not want to think too critically about.
“Sometimes I think you have more affection for food than for me,” he mutters instead, forcedly scornful.
He had expected France to laugh. France does not. Instead he simply stands there, eyebrows slowly lifting, looking again at England’s face even as he removes his shirt. England shifts uncomfortably, wondering how many items of clothing he might have to take off before France will forget about what he said.
Quite a few, it seems, judging by the steadiness of France’s gaze upon his face right now. England is beginning to seriously begrudge him his eyes.
But France does not say anything, walking over to the bed in silence and in thought, and he does not even begin to take off his trousers until he is out of England’s sight. England bites his lip, not even wanting to imagine what France might be thinking right now. If he is deliberately avoiding the opportunity to exhibit himself, it must be bad.
Even so, this has almost become a game by now, and England would hate to lose.
And so, ignoring the unspoken words between them with an aplomb borne of experience, the two of them continue to get ready for bed in silence, both pretending that England never said anything. As France sits beside the mirror to apply what England has always thought of as his concoctions, England tugs on his pyjamas and heads into the bathroom to clean his teeth. Not having his bottom pinched at any time whilst he is doing so is distinctly unsettling.
After rinsing his mouth, he heads back into the bedroom. France is already in bed, the covers pulled up almost entirely over his bare chest, checking the faces of his watches to make sure that their times match. The main light has been switched off in favour of the bedside lamp, and its pale yellow glow picks out the highlights in France’s skin; casts a mesh of gold over his face and chest. He gives not the faintest flicker of his eyes upwards.
Feeling stifled by the oppressive atmosphere, England wavers and hesitates, as if this is the first time that they will share a bed. It takes some steeling of his nerves to venture forwards, and he swallows hard against the swelling feeling in his throat of his own idiocy. France pays him no attention as he approaches, having moved on to plumping the pillows. He shakes them vigorously up and down between his hands, one after another, his hands stretching and tautening the fabric as he smoothes them back out.
“Fine,” England groans, suddenly unable to take it anymore, slumping onto the mattress and glaring uselessly at the opposite wall. “It was a stupid thing to say.”
As England watches nervously out of the side of his eye, France rolls over and sends him the kind of stomach-melting gaze that makes it feel as though nothing ever happened.
Then suddenly, without even seeming to have moved, he has his arms around England’s waist and is pressing kisses all across the backs of his shoulders.
England squawks, more out of surprise than anything else, and his hand goes reflexively back to find France’s hair and anchor itself there. “H-hey, what are you doing?”
“I’m showing you,” France says, in the midst of placing a shivery kiss right at the nape of England’s neck, “why my affection for you is different from my affection for food.”
England huffs and squirms, wriggling against the hands that France is smoothing slowly around his hips, but does not actually do anything to remove them. “I said it was stupid, all right? No need to rub it in.”
“You know very well that that’s not what I’m doing,” France murmurs, breath teasing the edge of England’s jaw. England makes a highly impatient grunt and turns around, catching his arms around France’s neck and pitching the pair of them over.
Only after some time of silence does England manage to pull away again, leaning back and taking a deep, spinning breath. France looks inquisitively up at him from where he has landed on one of the pillows, hair thrown out around his head like a dull-gilted fan.
“Honestly,” England mutters, fingers of one hand resting on France’s collarbone and pressing in just slightly, “if I didn’t know better I’d swear you did the whole thing just to get to me.”
Each of France’s hands is snugly fitted around one of England’s thighs. He blinks innocently. “How could you possibly imagine such a thing of me?” There is a pause, during which England rolls his eyes. “The shirt was deliberate, though,” France admits.
England scoffs. “I know that.”
France hums contentedly, his eyes fixed unabashedly on the display as England sits up and strips off his pyjama shirt. “I am so very lucky,” he murmurs, hands squeezing delightedly into both of England’s legs, “to have someone who understands me so well.”
-
The jam recipe I used is this one.
Did I mention yet that UST is my favourite?
I'm going to include the fandom in my fics' headers from now on, since I'll be introducing new fandoms to my LJ at some point.