Hetalia Deaths

Matthew Williams (Canada)

Now, Matthew, our dear Canada, was a victim of child neglect and died of starvation, which explains why he is never noticed.
******************************************
Matthew hadn't always been such a lonely child. He found memories, tucked in the deepest recesses of his mind, of when he was happy. His favorite memory was of the first time that he went to the polar bear exhibit at the Toronto Zoo. The mama and the papa had just had a polar bear cub, and he was so unsure of his footing. He would wobble every now and then, stumbling in between his mother's legs. He remembered being in awe of such a large animal with such bright white fur. He loved their black noses and, no matter how fierce they appeared, they would always coddle their young and guide them across the exhibit, nudging them along with those same noses.

It was his favorite memory because it was his first time really seeing the world. Until that point, he was so young that Matthew's world had consisted of his little house in the Canadian countryside, the deep winter snows and his parents' faces. When his papa had taken him to the Toronto Zoo, he had been overwhelmed at the sheer size of not on the zoo itself, but the massive city around it. He had been overcome with the number and variety of strange and wonderful creatures that were all crowded into one area. He missed that feeling, being completely and wonderfully overwhelmed with awe.

Nowadays, it was rare for him to see anything aside from what was contained inside the walls of his house. Not even the blinds were open to offer him a view of a backyard or the backs and sides of the other homes around them. Mama and papa never opened them anymore. He didn't know why, but he was scared that they would beat him if he did anything on his own.

You see, their marriage, once full of happy looks and stolen kisses, had turned to sour expressions and angry screaming matches over the past couple of months. Matthew wasn't sure what had happened, adults were complicated and strange, but he understood that I was far from good. It had started out with papa sleeping in the spare guest room on the second floor, separated from Matthew's bedroom by just the bathroom. After that, it had turned into more and more disagreements, which led to papa disappearing for long stretches of time and mama always drinking an amber colored liquid that made her fall asleep. When papa would come home, he would get mad at mama for whatever she did, and they would start fighting again. Then the whole process would repeat again

As their arguments got even worse, they would start to become physical with each other, and not in the way that people were supposed to, with holding hands and arms around waists. They would hit each other. Mama would kick papa's shins, and he would grab her hair and pull it until she started screaming. Whenever these fights happened, Matthew hid himself away in his room.

That's where he was now, barricaded behind a measly wooden door, it doing absolutely nothing to block out the shouts and the feeling of seething anger emanating from the room not far down the hall. It scared Matthew, but there was nothing he could do to stop his parents from fighting. He had tried once, and he had received the angry, stinging slash of a belt across his cheek. He had not tried since. But now, it was especially tempting. Neither of his parents had come to check on him in almost two weeks, and that time span was starting to seem more and more unbearably long. Matthew was able to reach the tap in his bathroom for nice cold water, but it was the hunger that was starting to get to him.

He had a box of granola bars in his backpack, but those vanished about two days in. Matthew was very very hungry. Right now, his stomach felt as though it was twisting upon itself, gnawing at its own walls, desperate to be filled with something besides water. It had already eaten some of the cushiony bits on his legs and torso, but it still wanted more. But Matthew could not go into the kitchen, for fear of upsetting his parents. And even if he did, he was not tall enough to reach the handle of the refrigerator, nor could he even touch the countertop.

He hoped his parents would stop fighting soon.

For now, all he could do was sit, curled up against his bedroom wall, and wait. He had been waiting for so long, and he had passed the time through various means. He read the couple of books in his room, he cleaned out the space under his bed, but he spent most of his time sleeping. His slumbers were becoming longer and longer, but no matter how much he slept, his body still demanded more. He felt so tired... His eyes drooped at the thought of sleep. Maybe another couple of hours wouldn't hurt...

As Matthew began to close his eyes, a loud crash jolted him out of his reverie. It sounded very much like the slam of the heavy wooden front door. Had mama or papa left? His curiousity peaked, and he leaned his ear near the door.

"Goddamit. Fucking bitch." He heard papa yelling at the walls. It must have been mama who left.

He heard papa's angry footsteps stomp down the hall, through the guest bedroom, and into the bathroom that he shared with Matthew. Matthew tentatively approached the door, hearing the sound of running water.

He cracked open the door timidly. "Papa?" He asked quietly.

His father did not respond, instead proceeding to wash his face with cold water, not even noticing his only child.

"Papa?" He tried again. To no avail. Matthew cast his eyes downward, and softy closed the door, filled with an emotion his childish mind could not quite comprehend.

Was it his fault that papa and mama fought all of the time?The thought had been bouncing around in Matthew's head for about a week now. He always tried so hard to be well behaved and kind, so that he would make his parents proud, but maybe he hadn't been doing it right. Maybe he had only been making them angry. Matthew sat down on the floor again, curled his knees up to his chest, and buried his head between them. Then, for a reason he could not understand, he began to cry. They were soft, muffled sounds that barely reached outside of a meter radius. Soon, Matthew felt his kneecaps growing wet with salt water.

He kept on like that for some time, perhaps ten minutes, perhaps ten hours. Matthew could not tell.

He did not look at the clock.

When he felt his tears dry, his body was filled with a vast emptiness, comparable to what he felt in his stomach. His eyes were blank, and he stared at a small stain in the carpet in between the toes of his shoes. He remembered making it; he had dropped a marker one day while coloring. He had covered it up with a pair of socks in the months since.

He no longer heard papa in the bathroom. There was not running water, or angry footsteps, or the sound of angry telephone calls. The house was silent. Did papa leave me too? He asked himself. He had that same feeling as earlier, accept that he could not will his tear ducts to send any more water down his cheeks.

After about two hours, Matthew decided that his father had, in fact, left. Matthew had no idea when he would come back, or if he would come back at all. When he and mama fought, sometimes he would not come back for weeks. Would mama even come back? Matthew was not sure about that either.

He felt thirsty, and he had the desire to go and get some water from the bathroom, but the muscles in his legs refused to move, full of stiffness and too weak to support Matthew's weight. So he stayed pressed against the wall, back resting against the green and white striped wallpaper. He stayed like that for a very long time.

But eventually, he felt the overwhelming desire to sleep. It wasn't like the other urges for rest before; this one was almost desperate. He needed to close his eyes for a very long time. His body told him that, and he was willing to comply. When he was dragged into the soothing darkness, the last thing he thought was that all of this was entirely his fault.

He never woke up.
******************************************
Canada had never been very visible. He was always one to blend into a crowd, lost easily amongst the sea of people. Whenever people did see him, he was almost always mistaken for his fully visible, very noticeable brother, who had an incredibly commanding presence. No one ever really saw Canada, but he was all right with that. His brother got so much attention, that he never even once envied his solitude.