Okay, so the genderbent characters are going to be Prussia, Italy, Germany, England, Russia, and China. The pairings will be prucan, obviously, spamano, gerita, either fruk or usuk (idk which yet), and some very slight, nearly irrelevant rochu.

As a note, Prussia's name is Julchen, pronounced "Yule-hen", so her nickname, Jules, is pronounced "Yules"

Without further ado, I present

Chapter 1: How to Acquire a Matchmaker

Matthew Williams-Jones had a problem.

He came to this realization during English, when one of his classmates snickered and told him that "If you keep staring at her like that, soccio, then you'll burn a hole through her pretty head." And Matthew realized, after getting over the initial embarrassment that comes with being caught staring, that Julchen Beilschmidt was extremely pretty, and that he really, really liked her. And that was an issue because-

"Birdie! Stop daydreaming; the bell rang and I'm so hungry, it's crazy."

Because, even if they weren't best friends, Julchen was one of the few people who noticed him and didn't mistake him for his brother. And he ate lunch with her and a few of her friends everyday. Merde.

~0.0~

Lunch had been going well. He had, like always, listened to her ramble, the current topic was how "West unawesomely took my fireworks, she said that I wasn't 'responsible', hmph! Can you believe that?" He had sat at the seat directly to Julchen's left, and had smiled politely at each of Julchen's other friends as they arrived, although none of them noticed, like always. Yes, everything had been going swimmingly, until Julchen decided to buy everyone drinks.

"Okay, so I need like five Cokes, a Sprite, an orange soda, and… Birdie? What do you want?"

And Matthew, who had once again been contemplating the matter of his crush, had mumbled, "A tall glass of you would be nice…" and then, the second it had left his mouth, had realized what he said and turned bright pink.

"W-was?" Julchen's mouth dropped and her eyes widened and oh, god, Matthew had ruined everything.

"I-I said that water would be fine!" Matthew insisted, still flustered, "I just want water…"

"Oh, ha, I must need to clean out my ears or something…" Julchen schooled her face to her default, much practiced (and Matthew knew it was practiced, he had seen her practicing) "awesomely happy" expression. "Uh, yeah, I'll just go get those. Ha, ha…"

And as soon as she was gone, the whispering started and Matthew, never one for conflict, always one to get over embarrassed, fled. "Oh, uh, tell Jules that I… that I'll be back, okay?"

Even though he wasn't sure that they had heard him, Matthew sped out of the cafeteria and into the men's bathroom.

"...Sono etero, sono etero, sono etero…" Where he found the infamous Lovino Vargas splashing water on his face and repeating a phrase to himself.

Lovino was known throughout school for his snark and foul language, his impeccable fashion sense (it was said that he imported all of his clothes from Italy, and that he refused to wear anything not designer), and his prowess at getting people together—despite the fact that he was single.

Matthew cleared his throat and shrunk back slightly when Lovino startled. "Ah, sorry, I'll just leave, I didn't mean to-"

"Shut the hell up, kid," Lovino snapped, his trademark scowl reforming, "Do you speak Italian?"

"Um, no."

"Good. Don't repeat any of the shit you heard me say. Ever. Or I will end you."

"Ah," Matthew started to awkwardly laugh, but tampered it off with a cough when Lovino's face continued to look serious. Those rumors that he had not-completely-legal connections couldn't be true, right? "Right. Sorry, I'll go…"

"Wait," Lovino's scowl took on a less irritated look, "People don't just run into fucking bathrooms because they're okay. What the hell is wrong, bastard?"

Choosing not to comment on how Lovino was hiding in the bathroom too, Matthew decided to answer at least semi-truthfully. "Um, well, there's this girl-"

"Of fucking course there is," Lovino snorted, "Look, kid-"

"Matthew."

Lovino looked surprised at being interrupted, but just raised a brow and continued, "Fine then, Matteo, I'm going to help you."

"Oh, no, you don't have to do that..."

"I know," Lovino began walking out and Matthew had no choice but to follow (well, he did technically have a choice, but the look that Lovino sent him made him fear for his life again, so it was an easy decision), "That's what makes me so fucking nice."

Before Matthew could protest anymore, they were already to the entrance of the cafeteria. "Now, which bella is it?"

"It's Ju-"

"Birdie!" Julchen crashed into Matthew's side, and Matthew was sure that he would've been tackled if she wasn't holding a ridiculous amount of water bottles. "I didn't know what kind of water you wanted, so I just got one of like almost everything. I can give the extras to West and Ali, and I can probably convince a bunch of other people to take them too."

Matthew took three bottles of water, not wanting to have to saddle Monika with too many, and smiled back. "Thanks, Jules, this is perfect."

With an answering "Awesome!", Julchen scrambled off to redistribute her extensive wares.

"Dio Mio, per favore, tell me it's not her."

Matthew turned to Lovino, who was groaning into his hands, "Why? What's wrong with Jules?" And if he was a bit defensive, then, well, he did have a crush on her.

"Nothing wrong with her, per say," Lovino waved away Matthew's concern, "Well, aside from her being arrogant and a potato-"

"Potato? What-"

"-but it's more that she's friends with- never mind. She's fine. Whatever. I can do this." Lovino nodded, more to himself than to Matthew and walked into the sea of tables. Matthew stood there and watched, until Lovino turned back and growled, "Are you coming or not, bastard?"

Looking back, Matthew still couldn't decide whether or not it was a bad thing that he followed that day.

Ha. Ha. Ha. *sobs because I have so many projects*

I have 3 of these chapters done, and I estimate 6 chapters total, so I'll post one a week, every Saturday~ It'll be rad

There's not any extensive translations, except for the "Sono etero" thing, but that has to do with a plot point so. Not going to translate that for you.

Hope you liked it! Fav or follow or review or whatever~