The early hours of:

1st January, 2012; Edinburgh, Scotland

-
Although Scotland's spare bed has always looked like a perfectly normal double before, upon a more thorough examination, it's clearly far too narrow to accommodate two people in anything approaching the requisite comfort required for a decent night's sleep.

Wales therefore concludes that, "I should probably just sleep on the floor."

Romano gives him a look that is one part, 'You're a fucking idiot' to nine parts, 'I can't believe I always have to do the thinking for the both of us'. He very rarely looks at Wales in any other way whenever Wales is foolish enough to try and initiate conversation with him.

"Would your family expect you to be sleeping with someone you've supposedly been dating for nearly a year?" he asks.

Wales' family seem to be under the impression that he possesses the sexual impulses of a particularly gregarious bonobo. He nods.

"Well, then we should share the bed," Romano says.

"It's not like they'll ever find out if we don't," Wales argues. "We're all very respectful of each others' personal spaces. We don't just go barging into bedrooms without first knocking and waiting for long enough that someone could get dressed if they need to, you know."

"And what about France?"

"France wouldn't d–"

Wales cuts himself off mid-word, because, on second thought, he's not entirely convinced that France wouldn't. Although he's known the other nation for something approaching half his life, he's still not really certain where his boundaries lie. He definitely has them, but sometimes they turn out to be so far distant from where Wales would prefer them to be that they're likely only visible by telescope.

As France's proprietary interest in Wales and Romano's supposed relationship has yet to decline towards more comfortable levels, it probably would be best to err on the side of caution.

"We'll share the bed," Wales says.

Even with that weighty decision made, Romano appears just as reluctant to make the first move towards the bed as Wales is. They both stare at it in silence for a while longer before Romano breaks their impasse with a sudden, rough growl of frustration, and then informs Wales, "I sleep naked."

"I promise I'll keep my eyes to myself," Wales reassures him, even though he does think it's a little unreasonable for Romano not to consider modifying that particular habit for one night, given the circumstances. "Besides, the lights will be off the whole time."

Romano growls again, gestures significantly towards the bedroom door, and then subjects Wales to a glare that is 100% pure and unadulterated, 'You're a fucking idiot'.

"Oh," Wales says, flushing once the meaning of the gesture finally sinks in. "Right. I'll just…" He hurries forward and grabs his pyjamas from his open bag. "I'll leave you to it and go and get changed myself, I suppose."
-

-
Once Wales has retreated to the bathroom, however, and the sense of embarrassment-fuelled urgency that had sent him fleeing from Romano has faded, he feels disinclined to do anything of the sort.

He instead finds himself contemplating Scotland's bath, giving serious consideration to its suitability as a more desirable place to rest his head for the night. He's slept in it before on a couple of occasions in the past when he'd been too pissed to remember how to navigate his way back to the spare bedroom after brushing his teeth.

The only thing that stops him from grabbing a few of Scotland's larger towels and jumping right in is the knowledge that no-one who had attended his brother's Hogmanay celebrations could ever believe he'd even taken a passing glance at that level of drunk at any point.

He was, in fact, almost stone cold sober, as he'd suspected going in that it would require at least one clear head for there to be any hope of peace prevailing whilst Romano and Scotland coexisted in the same room, and had thus not allowed himself more than the odd fortifying swig of whisky all night.

(As it turned out, it probably would have been better if the clear head had been Scotland, who had eventually had to be hauled out to the garage to cool off by England and Northern Ireland after Romano said something mildly disparaging about his living room décor.)

Resigned, he begins, very slowly, to undress.

Some time later, as he's carefully folding his cardigan, Wales catches sight of himself in the mirror above the sink. His skin is chalky pale and his eyes have a definite haunted cast to them. He looks, quite frankly, terrified.

"Why are you doing this to yourself?" Wales asks his reflection glumly.

His reflection, unsurprisingly, has no fresh insights to shed upon the matter, but then Wales can answer his own question well enough without outside input already, anyway.

As he is apparently:

1) otherwise undateable,
2) incapable of putting his own happiness above that of certain other people, and
3) perversely determined to prove Scotland wrong,

he is thus doomed to continue playing his part in this particular ridiculous farce until such time as the faintest chance of a reasonable alternative presents itself.

And, until that blessed day, he will just have to muddle through as best he can.
-

-
When Wales eventually returns to the bedroom, Romano is lying as close to the right hand edge of the bed as he can with the duvet pulled up high and snug around the bottom of his chin, but, disappointingly, clearly still wide awake.

He watches Wales warily as he crosses the floor, then even more warily when he reaches for the duvet himself. Wales very deliberately averts his eyes, and keeps his head turned until he's settled himself at the far left of the bed.

Romano immediately turns off the lamp on the table beside him, and then asks, "You don't move around in your sleep a lot, do you? I can't fucking stand that."

Seeing as though they've apparently committed themselves to this absurd course of action come what may, Wales thinks it's a little late to be worrying about such considerations. Nevertheless, he replies, "No. I do snore, though."

"Okay," Romano says, in such an offhand, unconcerned manner that Wales feels duty-bound to add, "Very loudly. Yr Alban and Lloegr both say that it sounds like an aeroplane taking off."

A soft rustle of fabric suggests Romano is shrugging. "So does Veneziano. I'm used to it."

Wales almost remarks that he must share a bed with his brother far more often than Wales ever does any of his – who are still bothered enough by the noise to resort to trying to smother him with a pillow more often than not when they're forced to overnight together – but ultimately decides that it's a conversational door he has no wish to open. Many other nations, as France has doggedly reminded him over the centuries, have very different attitudes to family than Wales has himself, and it's neither Wales' place to judge, nor any of his business, if Romano happens to be amongst their number.

Instead, he busies himself with wrapping the top of the duvet around his neck as tightly as Romano has his own in an effort to trap as much of his body heat close to his skin as possible – he hopes Romano won't regret his decision to go with out nightwear, but given the gelid nip of the frugally unheated air, he has serious doubts on that score – and then closes his eyes.

A moment later, the niggling feeling that he's been unforgivably impolite compels Wales to say, "Well, good night, then."

After a short pause, and sounding faintly puzzled, Romano replies, "Good night, Galles."
-

-
By rights, the quiet sounds Romano's making – soft, even breaths, and the odd creak of springs as he shifts his weight – shouldn't disturb Wales, but he finds them impossible to sleep through all the same.

They're a constant reminder that there's another presence in the bed, and that's led Wales to realise that, despite what he'd believed before, there are worse things than being alone in one.

The mattress actually feels far colder when there's warmth at the other side of it, but it's completely beyond his reach.