Chapter Text
‘All passengers for the 14.20 flight to. Oslo. Please make your way to Gates 8 and 9. That’s all passengers for Oslo to Gates 8 and 9. Please make sure you have all your belongings before departing-”
“That’s my flight,” Norway says, hoisting his bag onto his shoulder and holding out his hand to shake- which India does. “Despite everything, I’ve enjoyed it. Call me if you need anything, or if you don’t . Whatever works.” He’s smiling.
India smiles back, “Of course. Have a safe trip.”
Norway nods and turns to Pakistan. “I’ll call you when I land.”
She grins. “Looking forward to it.” India fights the urge to roll his eyes. There really is no accounting for taste.
Norway then turns to England, expression noticeably more cool. “I suppose I’ll see you soon.”
“Yep. That does tend to be how trade negotiations work,” England's voice is light and formal, and his expression, whilst technically friendly, doesn’t actually reveal anything. “Have a safe trip.”
“Call me if you need more clean up.”
England's smile strains. “I’ll keep that in mind.” They shake hands.
While Norway says goodbye to Bengal, Pakistan pats his arm. “Can I talk to you for a minute?” Her voice is tense, and he can see the strain around her eyes. Consider it for a second.
“Sure.”
She nods and pulls him over to the side.
They settle on standing a short distance away- close enough to see the others, and for their voices to carry if needed- but far enough that quiet speech would be drowned out by the waves of the crowd. She hands him a folded piece of paper.
“It’s my number,” she says, face tense. “To my personal phone, not my work one. Chuck it in the bin if you want, but.” She takes a deep breath. “You’re my brother, and you always will be. I don’t. I don’t hate you for everything that’s happened-'' she glances to the side at England and Bangladesh. He wonders which one of them she’s thinking of- possibly both. She mutters the next thing almost under her breath. “I don’t think I’ve told you that recently.”
Not since independence, goes unsaid.
India runs his fingers over the paper, unfolding it. “I’m not going to budge on Kashmir you know-”
“This isn’t about our governments.”
He meets her eyes for the first time; she’s biting her nails, and blinking away tears. She continues, “I don’t… I’m just… As bad as you can be- and as much as I can be too I suppose.. I still think of you as my brother. Despite everything. I hope..” She chokes, looking away. India also has to keep swallowing and swiping his eyes. He doesn’t know how to respond. His chest is tense, his heart hurting- part of him wants to yell- to scream and rage; another wants to collapse towards and hug her because yes- she is his twin - oldest and best ally; and most of all he wants to just walk away-
So he does.
“Stay here a second,” he says, turning on his heel fast enough that he almost doesn’t see her shoulders drop in defeat. He marches over to the shops- mostly to get lost in the crowds. Everything is overwhelming, and his brain works overtime- can he trust her? Should he? She had left him , and maybe she’d had her own reasons but it had ripped a wound in him deeper than any argument they had ever had. He runs his hand over his side. It had scarred him.
And yet... his treacherous little inner voice said... maybe.
He crosses the aisle to the phone shop and buys a cheap, twenty pound brick of a phone with a new five pound sim card. It’s not a promise, but an offering- to himself mostly.
He’s walking back to the group when the tannoy bings back on and a smooth English voice says:
“All passengers for the 14.40 flight to. Islamabad. Please make your way to Gate 5 and prepare for boarding. All passengers to the 14.40 flight to Islamabad please make your way to Gate 5-”
He’s out of time. By the time he’s made his way back to them Pakistan is already saying goodbye.
“Ra’ani!” his voice is perhaps a touch louder than he meant it, and she looks startled. But before she can react, he grabs her hand in both of his and presses a small piece of paper into her palm.
When she lets go, she reads it, and her eyes widen.
“Don’t leave it too long,’ he says in a language older than any mortal ears.
Her hand closes tightly around the phone number. “I wasn’t planning on it,” she says in the same tongue. Then in English. “I’ll see you around,” she nods at Norway. “You too.”
And then she’s gone. Pulling her peacock blue suitcase behind her.
Norway too- his car no longer needed to ferry everyone's luggage, he gives them a wave and heads back towards the entrance, ice-blonde hair quickly swallowed up by the Heathrow crowd.
And then, there were two.
The silence sits thick and heavy as a blanket.
After a while, England coughs.
“Do you want a drink? A bottle of water maybe?”
“I’m fine thanks,” India says- maybe a touch too quickly.
“Oh. Ok.”
The silence settles back, all the more awkward for its absence. India shuffles from foot to foot, fidgeting with the pull out switch of his suitcase handle. England appears to just - stare into space, with the rigidity that India knows is an attempt to avoid any visible reaction whatsoever.
Eventually, the tannoy announces his flight and India quickly snaps his suitcases handle out in relief, sharply striding out.
Only to be stopped by an outstretched hand.
He stares at it for a second, then at the man it’s attached to.
Perhaps he stares at it a little too long, as the hand droops-
He shakes it before it can be withdrawn.
“Thankyou.” England's voice sounds dry and choked around the word.
India just nods.
And that’s that. He walks away, wrangles his way through the crowd, security, flashes his passport and ticket for first class and- that’s it. He settles into his seat and flexes his hand.
Somehow, he’d expected it to be more momentous. Enraging, or painful maybe, some sort of great overbearing feeling to cap it off. But, in the end…the dry, scared skin and bird-like bones against his hand had been just a handshake. Firm maybe, and distantly familiar. But still just a handshake.
He’s jolted out of his revere by the flight attendants announcing the expected arrival time to Delhi.
He sighs. It is what it is, he supposes.
And what it is, is over.
The hissing of the kettle brings him back to himself.
He breathes again, so his hands don’t shake, then pours. The rhythm of making chai is calming at least- modern time saving devices aside. Crush the spices, boil them with the tea, add milk and let it simmer but not too much…
Pour.
He breathes deep- in, out- again as he finally pours himself a cup from the pot. 2AM cooking wasn’t typically what he would have chosen to do but-
Well. The article had said it was best to do something calming before trying to go back to bed, if you’d had a nightmare.
He takes his mug and settles into the window seat of his apartment, looking out over the pulsing city of his heart. Delhi never stopped, not really, but it did ebb and flow, the brief moments when the day shops were packing up and the evening places were just hitting their stride- and again now when they closed up leaving just the all nighters in a sort of hazy lull before the early morning commute of cleaners and nurses and other such essentials come in, ready to right the world for the day workers…
It has a rhythm to it, and he shuts his eyes to feel it closely. Just for a second.
He jolts as he feels himself relax a little too much- catching his tea and hissing a little as some spills on his fingers. They’re not burnt but it does hurt, and he blows on his tea before taking a sip. Such a silly thing. But good too. It’s been a long time since he could feel the whole intoxicating weight of his long history, rather than just the sharp cut of the last two hundred years.
He looks down and scrolls through his phone, taking another sip of chai. It’s probably too early to message anyone really - wouldn’t want to disturb their sleep. Apart from-
A brain wave hits him and he returns to his room just to grab the burner phone from the bedside before curling back up on the window seat. He doesn’t check it every day, or even every second day, so he’s not surprised to find some missed messages.
He types his replies back and sends- he doesn’t much care about waking Pakistan. Besides, as he’s learnt over the last four months, she has even worse sleep than him.
He takes another sip, and looks back over the night. Isn’t it odd , he can’t help but think- his mind's eye imposing the starlight of a thousand years ago over the constellation of yellow street lights outside his window. That the past can bite so hard now, even when I’ve tried so hard to just put it to bed.
That morning, he receives a package. A package from London.
He turns the box over in his hands- it’s of around a medium size, not so much as to be awkward but certainly needing both hands to manage it- wrapped and secured tightly with brown tape and paper. He brings it in- confused, and dumps it on the table with a solid-sounding thud.
As he cuts it open (the person- the nation, he suspects- who had taped it had been profoundly thorough) a small letter falls out. More a note really. It’s about the size of a business card.
On one side it reads:
Thankyou
And on the other
I’m so sorry
India tears into the package then with a fervour he didn’t know he had- and freezes when he reveals what's inside. A wooden box with iron straps, deceptively plain.
He opens it with shaking hands, eyes burning.
It's his stuff. Glittering mirror-work ….. And satin turbans, battered old loafers and his favourite mug with a chip in it, letters he’d thought he’d lost and books he hadn’t had the time or patience to find in his final angry sweep of that prison of a house before he’d finally left for good. And at the very bottom, wrapped ever-so carefully in a Kashmiri scarf, was his broach, its fat, audacious diamond set in gold shaped like flower petals. He weighs it in his hand, its weight both familiar and alien, reacquainting himself with its curves and pattern. He laughs a little, in this modern era it looks so very old- it is so very old, a memento from a Prince long dead who wished his immortal lover to have a token from him that would last as long as the lover did. It’s been cleaned, obviously- and that one part of the setting that had been bent since the 1600s has been pushed back into a secure position.
He wipes his eyes and sniffs. Arthur probably couldn’t even remember that it wasn’t himself that damaged it in one of his overwhelming rages. After all, the man had damaged so much else.
India straightens up, sniffs again, and makes a decision.
It takes around two months to find a therapist- and at least another month to vet them for suitability. India has a few sessions with them pretending to be human- you know, before he drops the bombshell.
(He can admit to himself that that, at least, it was funny to see the look on their face as they realised they were seeing their nation oh God their actual immortal nation for therapy as he pats them on the back while they choke. In hindsight, he perhaps shouldn’t have told them while they were taking a sip of water.)
It’s another six months before they’re at another meeting. And again, it’s a break, and again, India stands at the edge, observing other nations mill about- building bonds, re-affirming friendships, and quarrelling.
“Do you think they're going to start up again?” Bangladesh says, tiredly.
India hmms .His head was still throbbing. Whatever … had put in the punch bowl of last nights SA-SEA karaoke was fucking lethal . Absolutely industrial booze.
Bangladesh shoots him a wry glance, smirking. “You’ve only got yourself to blame for that, you know.”
Bangladesh had partied just as long and hard as he had last night- but, naturally, without the alcohol.
He groans again, letting his head flop back against the wall. “I’m hoping they got it all out of their system yesterday, I don’t think I can take anymore,” he says, refusing to dignity that comment with an answer.
His little sister snorts.
After a while without her her little comments and snide remarks, he opens his eyes and checks on her.
She’s staring into space, quiet- eyes on a faraway place he can’t see.
“Hey, you alright,” he murmurs.
“Hmm?” She blinks rapidly, looking at him for a second before turning back to the room. “Yeah, why?”
“You just went somewhere for a second there.” He feels himself frown. “Are the memories still causing problems?”
“No.” She shakes her head. “I mean I still get flashes- but they’re fragments really, emotions, brief sensations, an image or too mostly. They’ve settled down like Norway said they would.”
India bites his lip, trying to think what else would be bothering her. Then a thought occurs. “She didn’t approach you last night, did she? She knows that she’s not meant to.”
“Hmm, no, she actually went home early- I’m not surprised you don’t remember.” For a second a small smirk graces his little sister's face, before vanishing again. “But I was thinking about her.”
India lets the quiet settle, it’s a strange thing to experience, around his little sister.
Eventually Bangladesh starts up again. “Do you think I was right- to cut her out agai-”
“Yes,” India interrupts, “ ‘Course you are, just because I’m ready to reconnect with her doesn’t mean you have to. Besides, what she did to you was much worse than what happened between us.”
Because it was one thing to suffer through the mutual violence and slaughter of partition, never truly knowing what they had each done. It was quite another to execute a genocide against a younger sibling, in some…twisted attempt to reaffirm control? Spite? Bind rage?
India- won’t pretend he’s an angel, but he also won’t pretend to know why Pakistan did what she did.
Bangladesh nods. But still she bites her lip. “You’re twins though, won’t it make things difficult if I-”
At that moment, the general hubbub is interrupted by a sharp, familiar yell, and a wheedling smarmy reply and a pompous laugh. India’s head whips around to see England and France- hands twisted in each other's hair and collars.
Fuck’s sake-
Before he can even think, he marches across the hall- knowing that all the irritation of a hangover is pouring off him- and snaps.
“Ay! Stop it! Both of you!”
And shockingly- they do. Or England does anyway, shooting India a very- something, something he doesn’t recognise- look before huffing and shoving France away harshly and turning his face away.
France, for his part, looks shocked. Between glancing at India then back at his …whatever they were (rival? Playmate? Stepbrother? Soul mate? Even with all that time, India had never fully understood the nature of that bond, other than that it seemed deeply toxic). France looked back at England then back at India, his smug attitude seeping away into a sort of…watchful thoughtfulness.
It makes India’s skin crawl, personally.
“Look.” He sighs. Reigning in his frustration and gesturing with his hand, and- ignoring the anxiety, and France for the most part- says, “It’s the last day, half of us are hungover. If you have to fight- do it outside?”
England meets his eyes for a second.
“Please?”
And shock of shocks- England grabs France by the collar- cutting off whatever the man’s half open mouth was going to say- and drags him bodily out of the room.
India only relaxes once the doors slam shut behind them. The head rush of it makes him dizzy.
He stumbles back to Bangladesh,
“Look,” he says slumping against the wall again. His legs feel like jelly. “You need to do what’s right by you. If you’re never ready to be around her again, that’s fine. You're my little sister Nazia, and you’re just as precious to me as she ever could be.”
And his little sister looks at him, with a small cautious smile. In her eyes he sees something a little like relief, and maybe, just a little bit, like admiration.
It’s 2024, November, in Oslo, Norway.
It's a cold, grey day, the sun barely up- this far north sunlight is a scarce luxury and only getting scarcer as the year presses on. The streets are nice, clean- people too reserved for India’s liking- and honestly even layers of his warmest clothes aren’t really keeping the north wind out.
He shivers.
Unbidden, his mind lingers on the memory of Bangladesh seeing him off at the airport. Warm Kolkata sun on her face and a concerned furrow on her brow.
‘You don’t have to do this’, she had said.
‘I know’. He mutters it to himself - party as a reminder- but partly almost an enchantment. He had requested this, and if he wished, he could drop it too.
He’s jarred out of this haze by a wave of a hand- he looks at the man he’s here to meet, and the wave falters- in a way that is obviously nerves. If you know what to look for.
“Hello, England,” he says, as the man approaches. He looks somewhat worn, honestly, warmth leached from his skin, and on the thin side. His eyes are still sharp though.
“Arthur, please.” Ahh, and his voice is still good, he’d forgotten that.
There’s a look of uncertainty flicks across Arthur's face, a name that must be on the tip of his tongue.
“Vihaan,” India says, putting England out of his misery. He glances at the cafe he’d picked out for the two of them. “Shall we go in?”
England nods and briefly moves to usher India in first before freezing and walking first. India can’t help but feel a little relieved.
The place is nice- very wooden and small, different from a London mini-cafe, a heaving Dehli teahouse, or even the stylish but bland chains found all over the world. Neutral ground.
They order without fuss- England offers to pay for his drink, but he declines. No point shifting the balance of this anyway at all.
They settle down at a window corner seat- Arthur, as is his want, sitting with his back to the wall. Able to see everything in the cafe from the position. This suits Vihaan just fine, honestly, he’s never been much bothered by people moving behind him- and besides if it all goes wrong, it makes it easy for him to just get up and leave.
He muses on what it might mean, really, that England puts himself in corners that he would inevitably have to fight his way out of, if things were to go south.
“It’s not your job to pick apart the thoughts of others, you need to spend more time focusing on knowing your own needs.’ The voice of his therapist rings in his head and he subtly takes a deep breath. He’s sitting in a position that he himself finds comfortable. Lets it out. Anticipating England's neurosis- especially anticipating the inner meanings of such- is no longer necessary.
Though, he thinks to himself, what does it mean if you want to understand someone else regardless?
He suspects his therapist would give him a firm, yet gentle look, and talk to him about boundaries.
England - Arthur, they’re among humans at present - clears his throat. “Vihaan, this is a surprise, what did you want to talk about?”
“Do you remember a few years ago, when Pan tried to break through the veil?”
Arthurs eye’s sharpen - and for a moment he seems to stare like he can peel back Vihaan’s skin to read the thoughts beneath, but then he takes a deep breath and his eyes dart away to the shop counter.
“You mean when half the world was turned into children?” His voice is deceptively light.
“Yes,” he keeps his own voice light, not mocking, but appropriately calm and non-judgemental. “I’ve been thinking about it, these past few years. On and off, mind. It was enlightening.”
“What do you want, India?”
The sharpness of the voice snaps him back to the conversation, not having noticed that he’d drifted off to look at the drizzle beginning outside the window. That stare is back on Arthur's face, assessing, fierce, but with a tension on his lips that speaks to resignation.
Vihaan, lets the moment linger. There’s no need, he realises, to react to Arthurs wild moods, his paranoia. Not least because ... .it was nothing to do with him. Not really.
(The image of a child screaming himself red-faced about how he needed to be the biggest, toughest, most viscous ever ever ever as he holds back tears flickers across his mind. A slow realisation, maybe, and a therapy expedited one, definitely. But nonetheless.)
After Arthur’s wild eyes flick away again, Vihaan speaks. “I don’t want anything, Arthur. Except to talk about it.”
Arthur’s eyes snap back to him and- there’s this vulnerability to them, fear maybe. Vihaan feels his heart ache and remembers his therapist talking to him about countertransference - the urge to meet what the other is asking for, even when they don’t say it.
He feels it acutely, he knows now, and knowing that, he can choose to act on it. He chooses not to act on it, just now.
“Ok,” Arthur says, then breathes, not obviously deep but plainly controlled, before speaking again. “I suppose you’re owed that much. At least that much, rather.”
Vihaan hmms, again non-judgmentally. He certainly is owed much, a great deal more than England has ever given but-
(a chest full of his belongings, an unsigned apology, a disengagement from an argument at his request that has been repeated a few times now.)
-he is not owed Arthur's story really.
He rests his chin on his hand. “How much do you remember?”
Arthur's face barely changes. “Bits and pieces, it isn’t coherent per say but-” he breathes again. Closes his eyes for a second. “I’ll try to answer what I can, it’s feelings and fragments really, but I’ll do my best. I know you saved my life, by the way. I know that.”
He nods, he’s not trying to hold that over Arthurs head, but he understands why Arthur might think that. “Yes, Bangladesh said that too. I-” he turns to face the window again, and the steady downpour it’s become. “I suppose I’m not so much asking questions about it, I guess, just talking. It was a very strange time, and I’m not going to lie, part of that was how- how much of a realisation it was to see you young-”
“Sorry about that,” there’s a waver in Arthur’s voice that’s well concealed- completely concealed on his face when Vihaan glances at it, before turning back to the rain. “I gather I was rather difficult.”
“No, you were young and hurt, there’s a difference.” Vihaan says, keeping his eyes on the rain. Let the man have his reaction to that in private- let himself not have to deal with it. Survival instinct keeps him too closely tuned to this man's emotional shifts, even many decades later. “No I meant more that it was a shock, really, to realise that you were a soldier so young, not just ‘on a battlefield’ - goodness knows all of us see that too young, but a soldier. It made me think about…” and he pauses, because this is the thought that feels so vulnerable, that feels like a dangle over a cliff before a free fall. “...about how it feels to come home from war, as an adult, how long it takes to leave the battlefield in your mind. And-” he looks now at England because he does need to know the reaction to this, “-how much harder it must be, for a child to do that, and for a man to do that, if all they know is the battlefield.”
“Don’t make excuses for me.” Arthur's voice betrays his stony face. The crack in it. “Just. Don’t. I made my choices I was strong enough to do that I-”
“I’m not denying that,” Vihaan says quickly. “But - I think, I think you're trying now. To be better. And I wonder- I wonder if you even know. What that life looks like. Outside the battlefield.”
Arthur turns away, suddenly blinking rapidly, a red flush of distress rising on his cheeks and his hands curling into fists- before he immediately hides them in his lap. “I- I won’t. What do you want, Vihaan? I already- I’m not good, not safe around other people, I know that. I can’t-” there’s a heavy breath, “but I won’t give up either. I won’t. I can’t die and I have kids so…I won’t stop trying. If that’s what you're worried about. I…” and here, Arthur's voice dips to a whisper. “I don’t want people to be afraid of me anymore.”
A weight, somewhere around his heart, lifts, making him feel almost giddy. Even though that hadn’t even been the thing he wanted out of the conversation. “I know that.” his voice is perhaps softer than he intended but- well. Arthur looks up at the tone. “You wouldn’t have sent that chest if you didn’t want to change, and I don’t -” he can feel his face twist into something odd.
“I’m full of so many religions, you know- Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, Jainism, Sihks, Jews, Christians- they’re all a part of me, and, in a way I a part of them, but-” he thinks about how to phrase this to the much younger nation, one who, he suspects, does not even realise how constrained he’s made his own cage. Or had his cage made for him. Whichever. “- I’ve never really agreed with Christianity’s focus on damnation and eternal sin, personally, especially as it’s applied by you Westerners.”
England looks at him, his face openly tired and weary. The haggard lines make him look older than he is, but all Vihaan can see is a stroppy 20- something wearing his fathers suit in an attempt to look imposing. It’s amazing, how much that change of perspective robs the man of his lingering menace.
“You literally believe in Karma, Ind- Vihaan, unless that’s changed also in the last 70 years-”
A flash of annoyance roils in his heart, how many times - !
“I believe consequences can last beyond one lifetime,” he snaps, interrupting the younger man. He has to quell the rush of habitual fear at Arthur’s sullen expression- stroppy child, stroppy child, you are free and powerful and he’s in the midst of torching his life to the ground- India breathes. In. Out.
Nothing explodes. India remains in control. He can just leave the conversation at any time. He is fine. “I believe consequences can last for more than one lifetime,” he repeats, calmer this time. “Especially for people like us,” he ignores the flicker of- something- something vulnerable- across Arthur's face. He has to get this off his chest, he needs to say this, for himself. Maybe for Arthur too. “I don’t think evil is a stain you never wash out- or never grow past. It’s not- it won’t ever change what you did but. You’re not tainted Arthur-”
He breathes in raggedly. “You- you destroyed our relationship, with your behaviour. You burned our relationship to ashes with your abuse of me and your people’s exploitation of mine. It is ashes. That violence can never be undone. The time can never be rewound.”
Arthur stares, grey faced but head on. Their eyes are locked together. India couldn’t look away if he wanted to.
“But, you're not a thing , England. You’re not an object or an animal. You’re not a poison. If you- if you want to change, if you want to become a better person. I’m willing to help.”
Arthur looks away and rubs his face, his hands are shaking. And when he turns back there’s something - so, so young hiding in his eyes that it makes Vihaan’s heart hurt.
“Don’t misunderstand me,” he says firmly, sharply, “ You will be associated with me, maybe a friend one day, but nothing more. I won’t be tolerating any nonsense this time around either- you mistreat me, you demand I do things against my own needs, you- ever - raise a hand to me in thought or in action, and I will cut off all contact, you understand? I will not tolerate a repeat of the last two hundred years.”
Arthur nods, shakily.
“Your number will be in a separate phone from my personal one, you understand. I don’t always check it, so expect slow responses.”
Arthur nods again.
Vihaan feels his shoulders relax, and his heart slow a little. “I don’t think you’re a monster England, but I do think- I think you’ve never learned how to come back from the battlefield. I’m willing to help, in that respect, to be a friend who knows how to do that. You burned our previous relationship to ashes…but ashes can make good fertiliser, you know?”
And Arthur nods once, then again, then slumps into a ball, both hands covering his face as he breathes, whole body shivering.
Vihaan. Lets him think.
Eventually. Arthur raises his face again- blotchy but dry and stares off into the middle distance.
“You're a much better person than me,” he croaks.
“I’ve had more practice, '' Vihaan says, straightforwardly.
“....you know I would have said yes- to- to your offer to keep my younger self. If I hadn’t died.”
“I…” Vihaan takes a moment to process that. The offer had been a combination of pain and fear and pity and hope- a chance to hold a momentary revelation in his hand and keep it. Keep the proof. It hurts his heart to think the man would have taken it, even as it doesn’t surprise him. How much easier to just erase and start over. What a beautiful, awful lie. “...I’m glad you didn’t.”
Arthur snorts, meeting Vihaan’s eyes again. Something looser in his face. “Like I said, you’re a better person than me.”
The moment hangs quieter and lighter than before. India- Vihaan- has said all he wishes to say. The ball is in Arthur's court now.
“I- I have to ask first-” Arthur says, slowly, “Are we- is this- this is between…us, yes? As people?”
“Yes.” Vihaan hurts a little that Arthur has to ask this- but he supposes it makes a certain sense that Arthur doesn’t know to separate who they are from what they are. “Between us, not our governments.”
Arthurs mouth opens and closes repeatedly- a hint of fear in his eyes. Vihaan can tell the question that must be on his tongue.
“If our governments come into conflict-” likely, given the absolute wankstains England appeared to insist on electing. “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it- but mostly, we’ll manage by just being us, let them do as they will, we don’t have to be drawn in. Either way, I promise that I won’t -'' punish isn’t the right word really, not between adults, “-I won’t lash out or cut you off without telling you why first.”
Arthur nods a pained kind of hope twisting into his eyes. Breathes again. Pulls himself together. “Ok. Ok as in yes, I mean. If. If your willing to let me try-”
Vihaan- India- nods.
Arthur tucks himself back behind his armour and straightens up, grabbing a napkin and scribbling on it. “Here’s my number - I. it’s my personal phone, contact me any time - I’ll save the number you want to use. I- thankyou. I’m sorry. I- fuck the time, I need- am I ok to go? I need to meet Canada before his flight and-”
“That’s fine, I’ll text you.”
Vihaan glances at the younger man and smiles, something light, and - he supposes- familiar? Something feels almost fond- hopeful, perhaps?- in his chest. England nods, and escapes, yelping at the rain and leaving his tea untouched on the table.
Vihaan settles. Looks out at the deluge washing the streets clean in the cold, it’s probably more sleet than rain- sharp and boney with ice- as opposed to the beautiful warming rain back home. So many different meanings to the same weather. So many different ways a story can flow.
Finally, he knows his own is flowing again.