Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia.

Kicking the Bucket List

one

"I'm a candle you'd extinguish when you found the sun."

— z.n, ten word story

Lovino Vargas never really saw himself as the type of person to be depressed. And it's not that he cut himself or that he wanted to die or anything… It's just that he didn't see any reason in living anymore.

Other people, they usually have this sort of reason for their existence. A beacon of light in the dark that consumed their beings, a thread of hope. No matter all the bullshit life threw in their faces, still, they pushed forward. They found the strength to carry on. And, with that, they make it through the day.

In all honesty, Lovino wasn't one of them, no.

He calls it like he sees it, and more often than not, his view on life is… cold. Bleak.

But, in his opinion, very, very real. It wasn't his fault that he didn't shy away from the truth.

Yet somehow, he felt like he was being ungrateful in a way by feeling like this. By most people's standards, he had nothing to complain about. He just graduated with honours he worked his ass off for to get, he's going to his first choice college, and his grandfather had gotten him and his brother a penthouse a five minutes' walk away from campus.

Like, what else could he possibly want?

All is good… Life is good. Right?

Wrong.

For the Italian, he felt as if he were okay, yet somehow not okay. He couldn't even begin to describe what the actual fuck he was feeling, and truth be told, all this quasi-okayishness was beginning to fuck with his head.

It was that point of life where he was wondering, 'Why the fuck do I even exist?'

…Alright.

So perhaps there was a reason for his existence. It was more like a purpose he was born to do, as opposed to some self-actualised discovery of one's source of joy.

Feliciano is Lovino's younger brother by a whopping twenty minutes.

Yes, they're twins.

And don't even fucking say that those twenty minutes couldn't possibly make a fucking difference, because it did, it does, and it always will.

So shut up, dammit.

He liked to think of them as polar opposites. Lovino was, admittedly, an asshole with a vengeance and an obsession with anything and everything by Mario Puzo (Author of The Godfather? The Last Don? Anyone?! Dio mio, this guy's a god.) and… tomatoes.

..Shut up. I know what you're thinking, dickhead, and you better keep your damn thoughts to yourself before I— Dio mio, I don't even know— throttle you, dammit!

Ahem.

…Whereas Feliciano was the happy-go-lucky idiot who was, like, a fucking art prodigy obsessed with, uh, pasta. Definitely not starving artist material, no.

Don't even try to judge Feliciano for obsessing about pasta, either. Italian food is fucking orgasmic. It automatically PWNs all those other cuisines, so your argument is invalid.

A-Anyway, getting kinda off topic here, dammit… Let it just be said that Feliciano was the better twin. The nicer, better-looking twin, who had his future laid out for him as a great artist. Hell, he even graduated as fucking valedictorian. How the fuck that happened, Lovino would never know.

What he does know is that his fratello's valedictory speech was in Italian. It was a 10-minute long speech about fucking pasta. Lovino remembers he was just sitting there, trying not to shit himself laughing because all of the faculty members were fucking moved to tears with Feliciano's speech.

No, it couldn't be about how all of them had grown up and were now, hell, 'taking flight' to different colleges and universities. About all of the bullshit the seniors went through in order to complete all of their requirements, and how the memories they've shared together would always remain with him 'til he took his last breath. No, it had to be about pasta.

Fucking pasta.

"Ve~ Pasta has always played an important role in my life. Whenever I felt like being lazy— which is often, tee-hee— my older brother Lovino would always give me the strength to carry on by threatening to stop cooking me pasta~! Even though I can cook my own pasta myself anyway, his pasta tastes out of this world! It tastes amazing, and I hope you all could try it sometime, but he complains enough while making pasta for me, so I don't think that'd be a good idea~ Thank you, Lovi! For the pasta! I love you! Please continue cooking pasta for me in college! Please!"

…At least he got a shout-out during that speech. E-Even though there was that fucking 'complaining' bit, it was the truth. No one else understood the speech anyway.

And after all he's done for Feliciano, he was kind of… happy to actually be acknowledged by his fratellino somehow. He was definitely not moved to tears for that bit, hell no— he was just— just t-tearing up from laughing so hard, d-dammit…

Anyways, being Feliciano's 'pasta-maker' was just one of the many, many roles Lovino had to take.

He was Feliciano's bodyguard for one.

Ever since he and Feliciano were in kindergarten, these rotten little brats would always try picking on the latter by bullying him.

AKA by stealing his crayons.

Bitch, nobody steals Feliciano Vargas' crayons without Paying The Ultimate Price.

If Feli's crayons were taken by some dipshit, then Lovino would come in to the rescue. He would pummel his fists into those ugly— Dio mio, so fucking ugly— fat faces and steal those crayons right back.

E-Even if doing so landed Lovino in the time-out corner.

Feliciano was fragile. He was not.

He could take it, so he did. Even as a kid, he felt like he d-deserved it anyway… he was a pretty rude little shit back then. And he often found himself that maybe, this was the price he had to pay.

For not being good enough.

Over time, it got worse. The beatings became more frequent, and he was ganged up on a lot. He always told Feliciano not to tell anyone though— especially not Nonno— because he didn't want to hear his own grandfather scolding him about how he should be more… sweet, like Feliciano. How he probably had it coming to him with how rude he was.

Even as a child, Lovino didn't want to be reminded how he was never good enough.

Like, he was fully aware ofit already. Any other reminder of the fact would be like rubbing his insecurities and shortcomings right in his face.

And he had too many of those to count.

One day, though, in middle school, one of the beatings he got was so bad, it landed him in the hospital because he had a swollen jaw, a busted lip, a black eye and a few broken ribs.

The grown-ups didn't know it was the work of a bunch of beady-eyed twelve year-olds who got their kicks out of making others feel as shitty as they actually were. Lovino said he fell off a tree he was climbing, and no one questioned him twice for it. He had a knack for being clumsy anyway.

Plus, he had a hunch they wouldn't understand, let alone try to. All they'd do is cross their arms over their chests, look at him with disappointment, and blame it on him not being good enough and how he brought it all on himself.

Once the brief wave of concern had washed away, Nonno was pissed at him for getting himself this beat up by falling off a fucking tree.

Then Feliciano told Nonno the truth. Feli, you little snitch, Lovino remembered himself thinking as Nonno abruptly stormed out of the hospital room, pulling the younger twin with him.

He assumed that it was safe to say that Nonno rained hellfire upon the school the next morning. He wasn't there to see the glorious moment for himself, but his tormentors had gotten suspended.

It was one of the best days of his life.

Albeit the absence of the bullies in school, Nonno immediately moved them out of that hellhole and to another one. A private academy in their hometown of Verona back in Italy.

Years passed. Lovino not only had the role of being Feliciano's bodyguard, he had gotten partial responsibility of Nonno's role of caretaker, too.

Ever since they moved to Verona, Nonno had become increasingly busy, often going on business trips that left an awkwardly maturing 13-year old Lovino in charge of the house and his brother.

He was the eldest, after all.

And, voluntarily or not, he had assumed the role of being the p-protector of Feliciano's… goddammit— virginity.

See, when you go through, uh, puberty, you start to feel things you think is the work of amore, but it isn't amore, it's an infatuation. And once that thing shatters the fuck out of your pre-pubescent heart, you tend to feel like it's the end of the world. Only worse.

Boo-hoo.

But as long as Lovino was around, no one would ever dare lay a hand on his fratello's heart, and thus, automatically, his fratello's virginity. I-It's not that he cared or anything, he just didn't want Feliciano to deal with all the heartache and come crying to him for Dio knows how long.

Yet still, that didn't prevent Feliciano from making friends, of course.

Slowly, ever so slowly, Feliciano began to… branch out. He started making friends— a lot of them, actually.

He began to go to parties, hang out with his friends after class, and he began to do his own thing.

He became more independent.

It was around that time that struck this hidden fear inside of Lovino, that Feliciano wouldn't need him anymore. And another fear, much, much worse…

The fear of being alone.

When it was time for them to go to high school, Nonno had taken them out of their current school and moved them back to the place where they grew up; America. It was out-of-the-blue; unexpected.

Lovino didn't know if it was a good change.

But it was the first time in a long while he felt like he was good enough, like he was wanted. Everyone wanted to hang out with the 'new kids', especially because they were hot and Italian.

He relished in the feeling, and he loved how the girls showered him with attention whenever he spoke in Italian.

But it didn't… It didn't last that long.

Feliciano began to have more and more friends. He became popular in school, while Lovino was just… derping in the shadows, like a shady and angsty motherfucker. No matter how hard he tried to be good enough, he always fell short of perfection. People preferred his fratello over him. They always did.

Always will.

It was at that time, sophomore year, when he discovered his talent in writing.

He oft immersed himself in movies and books, so whenever he was bored, he would write down little ideas and excerpts that popped in his head during class, and pore over them later when he got home from school. He had… no one to pass notes with, anyway.

But still, his mind was swimming in his thoughts. Continually, they slowly began to suffocate him.

He couldn't stop focusing on every single mistake he had ever made, breaking it down into smaller parts, and discerning what could've been if he'd said this, or if he'd done that. All that overthinking made his head spin.

One morning, though, he had this— this line in his head that bugged him all morning and he couldn't shake it off, so he decided to write it down on a piece of notebook paper.

They say 'you only gave as good as you got'

I gave my all

but it was still not enough

He blinked once, twice, hazel eyes rereading the note in his sun-kissed hands. He let the words sink in as he reflected on it.

His grip on the piece of paper tightened.

The bell went off, so he stood up, shoved the note in the bottom of his backpack, and slung it over his shoulder while walking out of the classroom.

That was the same note Lovino found himself rereading at the moment.

He was in the midst of fixing his backpack for classes tomorrow when he came across the crumpled piece of paper.

It sent his mind whirring into overdrive, when he realised something he'd been denying all along.

One day, Feliciano will inevitably grow up.

One day, he won't need Lovino anymore.

One day, he will be able to stand on his own two feet and forsake the brother that has only ever been there for him in the first place.

One day, Lovino would be forgotten, his reason, his purpose for existing diminishing along with it.

And where the fuck would that leave him? What would he do with himself now?

What of all the things he'd ever done for Feliciano?

He's built Feliciano up, only for he himself to be the one crumbling down. He'd put Feliciano before him too much, too often, he had lost sight of himself and who he was in the first place.

What do I stand for? Who am I in the first place? Dio, what do I even want?

Was he just a blank slate?

A stepping stone?

A scapegoat?

He felt conflicted.

Slowly, he set the note back down on his desk.

What'll happen to me when Feliciano doesn't need me anymore? He thought to himself.

He wasn't really good at anything— well, nothing that'd make Nonno relatively proud of him, anyway.

Maybe that was why he was all alone in the penthouse he and Feliciano shared while the latter was out with his friends for dinner before college started. They— he and Lovino— breathed the same air, yes, and they lived in the same apartment, yes, and were going to the same college… yet even then, Lovino couldn't shake away the feeling that he and Feliciano were worlds away.

As if they lived in two different realities.

Same book, yes, but not on the same page.

The Italian got up from his chair and flopped down onto the bed, a groan escaping his lips. He buried his head in the pillows for a few minutes, letting his thoughts take over, before he finally raised his head up and pulled the drawer built into his bedside table open. In it was a pad of paper, a couple of pens, a bunch of knickknacks he'd probably throw away at the end of the year.

He pulled the notepad and a pen out of the drawer before shutting it close. Lovino made himself more comfortable on the bed and rested his weight on his elbows, letting the words tauntingly dancing through his mind settle a bit so he could collect his thoughts and perceive what was to be written.

It was a bucket list. One that'd last four years— the entire duration he would be in college.

'But why four years? Aren't bucket lists for life?'

A small bitter smile crept upon the Italian's lips.

He wasn't living a life.

He was merely existing.

It was a pathetic ghost of all that he could've been capable of, all he could've achieved, but in the end, all his efforts had been in vain. By the time they graduated, Feliciano would be launched into a world full of opportunities that awaited him. He was an artist on the rise of glory and fame. It was only a matter of time before he reached that zenith.

Feliciano wouldn't need him anymore, thus rendering Lovino's existence o-obsolete.

The older twin, always forgotten, always hidden in the shadows, would no longer serve a fucking purpose.

So why not embrace the dark when it's all I've ever known?

He brought his pen to the paper's surface. He began to write.

[_] Watch a Broadway play— Chicago preferred— with front-row seats.

[_] Watch a FIFA football game.

[_] Go to the beaches in California for spring break.

[_] Write a screenplay.

[_] Try smoking weed (YOLO?)

[_] Visit Verona again.

[_] Cruise around the streets of Paris in a limousine while drinking champagne like a classy ass motherfucker.

[_] Trigger a Jäger-train.

[_] Discover inner muse at the Louvre.

[_] Try absinthe in Amsterdam (fuck yeah, YOLO)

[_] Change someone's life.

[_] …Make Nonno PROUD of me for ONCE.

The thing is, this wasn't just a bucket list, no. Because by the time he's finished all of the things on his list, Feliciano probably wouldn't need him anymore. The bucket list would give him some sort of incentive to go on with life, but when Feliciano is finally independent, he will have finally fulfilled his purpose, as well as accomplished everything he ever wanted to do.

Why bother staying alive when there's nothing to live for? I might as well just die, right?

Lovino wrote the following words at the top of the page: KICKING THE BUCKET LIST.

With that, he pulled away a fraction and inspected each and every item on the list.

What else do I want to do?

The corner of his lips twitched upwards into a smirk.

It's something he's been wanting to do for quite a while now. Going about the task would prove to be difficult and quite possibly life-threatening, but it was a risk he'd be willing to take since the outcome would be well worth the sacrifice.

[_] Trim that stupid British eyebrow bastard's eyebrows.

Satisfied with this, he set his pen down.

The list— though subject to change— for now, was complete.

Translations:

Dio mio - Oh, my God (It.)

fratello - brother (It.)

fratellino - younger brother (It.)

nonno - grandfather (It.)

amore - love (It.)

Dio - God (It.)

~jellydonut16~