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Northern Waters	By : Domina_Ecca Category: +G to L > Hetalia: Axis Powers Views: 1538 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia - Axis Powers and I'm not making profit off of this story.

Chapter List
- 5
- 6
- 7
The end of the month drew near. Ludwig was healing very well, almost unbelievably well, in fact. He had claimed to be a quick healer, but Berwald was still surprised when one morning he stumbled sleepily into the kitchen and found him making coffee, the crutch resting against the dining table, unused. His improved mobility seemed to cheer him up a bit, as he was suddenly smiling and laughing more, but it also led the German into a habit of following him around during the day. Yet, he found that he didn’t mind it at all.
When Tino had been with him, he felt bad for having left him inside the house alone during most of the day while he worked, but Ludwig went so far as to even sit and watch him while he chopped firewood. He wasn’t sure why he did that, but figured that he probably couldn’t stand to sit around inside the house and do nothing. This extended contact did eventually lead to extended conversations, slowly but surely. After the first real winter storm had come and left the land blanketed in white and they no longer sat on the porch during the cold evenings since it made Ludwig’s leg ache, he had given in and told Ludwig everything he knew about Sweden. He had never traveled much, not even between towns, and even less with the way things were now, but still, Ludwig seemed to have an infinite amount of questions, and he did his best to answer them.
After a few nights of this, the topic suddenly changed. Ludwig asked about his family. He must have looked surprised but the German didn’t waver, so he told him. Berwald never had any brothers or sisters and she had never known his parents. He had lived with his grandmother nearly his entire life up until she died when he was fifteen, and then he moved to the town they were in now. That was when he met Lukas.
“But, Lukas isn’t Swedish,” Ludwig said, but it sounded like a question.
He shook his head. “Norwegian. Moved here in ’36.”
Ludwig’s eyes stared into the fire, into memory. “Yeah, he seemed, not, Swedish,”
After he spoke he appeared to realize that it wasn’t what he had meant to say, and Berwald chuckled a little. Ludwig then turned to look at him in moderate astonishment.
“What?” he asked, feeling rather self-conscious under his wide-eyed stare.
“…Nothing.” he said after a moment, but Berwald saw a strange smile on his lips.
It took a day or two, but Berwald began to notice something after that night. Although, he wasn’t sure what it was that he was noticing. It seemed like Ludwig was trying to joke with him more, occasionally actually telling jokes in order to get him to smile. Most of his smiles ended in confused expressions, but he continued with this. Unsure of what else to do, or of what Ludwig wanted him to do, he make an effort to joke back.
His first attempt was so awkward that Ludwig stared at him in utter shock for a few moments, but then threw his head back and laughed loudly. Berwald had never felt so relieved in his life. He tried to promise himself that he wouldn’t do it again, but he found that Ludwig looked unbelievably happy when he smiled, and that his laugh sounded nice, too. It wouldn’t hurt to try a few more times…
Strangely, though, Ludwig laughed at a lot of things he said. It shocked him to the point where sometimes he would simply stare in disbelief at the German while he laughed. Not many people had ever found him funny. In fact, he gathered that most people thought he was intimidating. He didn’t try to, but he was taller than most of the people he met, not that it was something that he could help. His strength, too, might have seemed daunting, but years of manual labor and jobs with various construction and lumber companies could result in nothing less. Perhaps Ludwig was able to look passed his appearance; he was a solider after all, taught to fear nothing, not even a tall Swede. The more he thought of this, the more he found he was rather touched by the fact that Ludwig could laugh at his jokes and sarcasm. He began to wonder if this meant Ludwig was beginning to consider him a friend.
Almost as if to prove his wondering, Ludwig began to tell Berwald things about his own family. He told him that he and his brother had lived with their grandparent most of their lives, too. He spoke of his grandfather with great admiration though, and Berwald smiled at the way his eyes seemed to almost shine. He listened to his story with interest, but noticed the way he paused when he began to talk about when he and his brother had been signed on to join the army. Berwald didn’t press anything. After that, he didn’t seem to want to speak of his family anymore, and although Berwald wanted to ask about his homeland he swallowed his curiosity; he had no intention of forcing him to think on painful thoughts, it wasn’t good for injured people to do that anyway.
Instead, as he fumbled for a topic to switch to, but still only really able to think of Germany, he looked at him and asked if he could read in Swedish. Ludwig seemed surprised, but nodded. Berwald swallowed and tapped his fingers together a bit, feeling awkward. He couldn’t read in German. When he told Ludwig this and asked him if he might consider teaching him a little, those pale blue eyes lit right back up. He seemed to latch on to the idea, and somehow, a few moments, a pen, and a sheet of paper later, Berwald found himself in the middle of a language lesson.
Ludwig was a very patient teacher, even though Berwald felt it took him far too long to understand what he was being taught. Part of the issue came simply from a lack of vocabulary, which Ludwig seemed happy to supply. Between their shared knowledge of German and Swedish, they were able to find the words they needed without much struggle, even if it led to awkward hand gestures and poor sketches of objects and adjectives.
They both stayed up much later than Berwald had intended in asking for the lesson, but as they staggered to bed, Ludwig told him that he had ever intention to continue it tomorrow. He said that it was important to learn to write in German, but the reason became muffled in the pillow as he lied down, almost instantly asleep. Berwald chuckled quietly to himself for several minutes before he too lost consciousness. Happy fools, was his last thought.
- 5
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- 7
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Northern Waters