'ᴛʜᴇ ɢʟᴏʙᴀʟ ᴊᴏᴜʀɴᴀʟ' || ʜᴇᴛᴀʟɪᴀ

14

The room fell silent.

"Wait . . . Are you trying to say that—"

"You know exactly what I'm saying."

"You?"

"And Gilbert?"

"Trust me, it didn't go that far."

"Sure?"

"Fucking— Yes, I'm sure!"

"Well damn . . ."

"I think that's sort of cute . . . ?"

"I would not call it cute, Italy . . ."

"Does he remember it was you?" Alfred asked.

"I have no idea, you'd have to ask him yourself," Arthur replied.

It was something he hadn't remembered straight away either, to be fair. It was only as America had been reading the entry aloud that the gaps had started to fill and the memories of the alcohol-fuelled Halloween Party became complete again. It was quite funny; the way he'd felt that evening was different and exhilarating, but he'd tried to block it out. After all, it was never a good idea to bring up the past once the future had begun — Gilbert and Matthew had gotten together as he'd started to remember what had happened at the end of the previous year, and he was hardly going to bring that evening up out of the blue.

Gilbert leaned back in his seat, aghast. He felt bad for not remembering, hoping that he hadn't offended England with the entry, but he was shocked at himself that it was Arthur of all people. Maybe it was a joke. Maybe he was just kidding, and someone like Feli or Toni would step forward and say 'well, actually, 'twas I!' and everyone would have a laugh and joke together! Or maybe Gilbert had seriously been way too off his face to realise who he was with, and had possibly hurt his friend in the process . . . Make that friends, actually . . .

"Prussia, are you serious?!" a young voice yelled through Gilbert's headphones. He threw them off for a moment to try and save his hearing, and then remembered who it was. He'd completely forgotten that Peter was there listening. "You and the jerk?!" he cried.

Gilbert cautiously leaned towards the microphone, sliding his headphones back on. "Apparently so—"

"THAT'S SO DISGUSTING!"

"Didn't anyone ever tell you that if you have nothing nice to say, then you don't say it?" the Prussian winced.

"No, but they did say that honesty is the best policy!"

"Fair enough . . ."

"Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go and bleach my eyes and my brain. I have some nasty images I need to get rid of before my innocence is corrupted entirely!" Peter stated, and he — to Gilbert's assumption — fled away from the computer.

He didn't know if he should laugh at Peter's reaction or not; he hadn't expected it to be so extreme and dramatic, but then he also felt bad for the kid . . . Still, he had been drunk! He had had basically no control over his actions — anyone who knew Gilbert after a good few drinks knew that all too well. So long as Matthew didn't feel jilted or anything, no one should let what went down that evening ruin anything . . . He hoped . . .

"Should, uh, I perhaps take the book now?" Feliciano asked over the awkward silence. Alfred nodded and passed it to him with little hesitation, and the Italian flicked the page over. Its unusual contents made him frown.

"Everything alright?" Ludwig asked, trying to get a glimpse of the paper.

"Mhmm . . ." Italy replied slowly, before going back to his seal smiley self. "The page just says 'from here, nations not present will have some entries sprinkled throughout. You do not have to read them. They may see them in time'. What do you think of that?"