Saudade | CountryHumans RusAme

Saudade/'Til The End of Forever

At the beginning I told you that there's still a story to tell, a story marked and bound complete once we know peace so well we're able to define it blind.

We hoped that one day we'd be history and we've done it, I am sure of it, we've made an irrevocable imprint on a world once sullied. It starts with three boys and it grows into a flame and it scorches all we see and it leaves char and ash where they used to see glory. And the intercontinental venture simmers down into something simple, loosening the entanglement, until our shoes are back where we've begun and then, there, remains one last knot to tie up.

★

AMERICA
It was still difficult to move with the pace he was practically itching to, and so he was inevitably confined to walking with a (debatable) grace across the pavement of Allied Way and into the waiting car. He heaved one deep exhale as Canada smiled from the seat to his side, motioning to the window with a cock of his head.

America turned. His brother's words had seen no darkness of a lie, white or not: Neo Orbis had changed in his absence, a recovered dimension made now for only the goodness of what they were meant to be. The underlying sense of apprehension had faded, ripped from its hinges and replaced with replenished greenery, no hint of smoke ─ and then, beneath it all, threading through the systems: the melancholic ticking of a timer. Neo was set to close in now less than a year, and students across all fields were wrapping up their studies, making amends, and preparing for a life in the real world.

He inhaled, trying to quell the thundering of his heart, and looked back to Canada. "Have you any idea?" he asked. "What you're going to do after we split?"

Canada laughed warmly as the car puttered onwards. "I'm going to pick up counseling, somehow, somewhere. Ukraine and I are planning to go to Toronto."

"That's amazing," America said, and he felt the smile spread across his face. "That's ─ I'm jealous. You'll do great out there, and you've got Ukraine with you."

"I'll come visit!" Canada chirped, confident. "Provided you and Russia even go to the United States and not back to Moscow."

There was a pause. America's voice was surprisingly steady when it left his mouth. "You really think so?" he asked, distractedly, and his brother sighed.

Canada placed a hand on his shoulder. "America," he muttered. "Just you see for yourself."

The two lapsed into a comfortable silence after that as the pace of his heartbeat quickened again. Global High was in the distance now, and after a minute, he could see blurs of students he recognized and didn't, sprawled across the heavy morning sunlight before the bell shrilled for first period.

America tugged at his backpack strap, hanging loosely off his shoulder and shoved into the car's backseat so it was practically tangled with Canada's. It was a familiar sensation, this routine, although he hadn't known it the same way he had known it when he had memorized it by rote. Time did truly do nothing but pass, in almost ephemeral years, for the last true school day of his had been even before China had held out a hand in alliance.

Canada's eyes were sparkling, more excited for his brother's reunions than said brother himself. He stepped out, and then held out a hand, reaching into the car's interior: "Come," he offered, and America ─ sense of time slowing to a crawl ─ felt the sole of his shoe scratch schoolyard asphalt.