Genre : Drama, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Friendship
Rating : T for Possible mild swearing or suggestive themes
Disclaimer : This fanfiction is set in a generalized universe. It is based off of the characters and my interpretations of them, so both anime and manga have been referenced. There might be unintentional spoilers. You have been warned. Also, both country and character names used.
Characters : Canada, and others mentioned. There are no defined pairings. However, if you wish to see something as a pairing, then be my guest.
Ownership : I highly doubt Hetalia is mine. Yep. It isn't mine.

Chapter One Summary : A Certain country starts to realise that he is coming down with something. S'probably not that serious, eh? Well good thing he has his brother to distract him for the moment...

- Chapter 1 - Ice Cream is Not for Breakfast -

A certain blond-haired country rolled over in his bed as he found the world of dreams melting out of his grasp. A shudder and a sigh were the first sounds to pass his lips as a cold chill swept through his room. One violet eye peeked open, squinting hazily into the dim light of the early morn; it was then soon followed by the other one and the nation heaved a heavy yawn as he sat up in his bed and stretched.

This single movement was instantly recognized as a bad idea. So in a dire attempt to regain the bubble of heat he had been cocooned in for the past several hours, Canada snatched up the blankets and wrapped them about himself tightly once more.

Once that was accomplished; dimly, and tiredly, Canada fumbled at his nightstand, feeling for his glasses. After fitting them neatly on his nose, the nation glanced across the room to the red glow of his digital clock.

4:30am.

Matthew moaned and he flopped back onto his bed with a noise of frustration. The last time he had gotten up and checked the time, it said it was 2 in the morning, and the time before that, 1 in the morning. And this, along with all those other times, Matthew had assumed it was a decent time to be getting up; Not such an unholy hour in the morning. With another contained shiver, Canada glowered at nothing in particular, focusing on his pale dappled ceiling with a heavy note of distaste for the early morning hours.

As he berated himself for the next few seconds, a wet feeling slid across his cheek, then another, and another, a soft but rough feeling that continued on, soon distracting him from his thoughts. Canada turned with a shift of comforters, and faced the fuzzy white intruder.

"... Good morning Kuma," Canada said, his voice heavy with sleep, frustrations all forgotton, and he reached a hand to rub behind white soft ears. "Did I wake you?" He asked, as the bear pulled back and stopped licking his cheek.

"... Who?" The bear replied tilting his head to the side and he licked at Matthew's hand.

Matthew just could not be annoyed and he let loose a soft chuckle, sitting up and placing the bear in his lap. "Canada. Ca-Na-Da. Matthew, remember? I am the guy who feeds you," he awnsered stroking a soft white cheek.

"I know that," the bear said softly. "But who are you?"

Canada laughed softly and rubbed between Kumajirou's ears. "Canada. Do you think you can remember it today?"

"... Mmn... no."

Matthew let out a soft snuff of air from his nose and he continued to rub behind the bear's ears in a way that made the small being close his eyes in bliss. "You didn't answer my question." Matthew pointed out. "Did I wake you up?"

"No. I was already awake."

"Oh? Why are you up so early?" Canada asked, moving his stroking down the bear's back.

"You woke me up."

Canada stopped his movements and sighed. "I just asked if I woke you up, and you said no. Now you say I woke you up?"

"Yes. You woke me up before. I am still awake. You did not wake me up just now."

Canada blinked and he looked down at the ball of white fur. Had he woken up Kumajirou at one of the other times...? "Oh... I didn't realise. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you up," he apologized automatically.

The bear shrugged seeming to be indifferent and he just, sat there and looked up at his owner with a quizzical glance.

"Are you hungry?" Canada asked, "I can make you something to eat." Matthew knew he most likely wasn't going to go back to sleep, and he was far too awake now anyway. Best make use of the time.

"Yes please." His head tilted, "...Who are you?"

Canada sighed and he levered out of the bed, ending his conversation with the poor confused bear, who just let out another 'who' when he answered his question for the final time.

Matthew shivered again, not enjoying the feeling of the cold air against his skin. It was grating and uncomfortable, and it made the hairs on his body stand on end in a prickle. Fitting his feet into his soft and warm slippers, he hoisted his bear into his arms and in front of himself. It was not even supposed to be that cold that day, and he was already shivery? Wasn't he supposed to be the great white north? Able to live in some of the worst climates in the world? Didn't he have one of the coldest recorded temperatures in all of north America? Didn't he? A little chill shouldn't effect him at all.

He slowly trudged to the kitchen, catching sight of the thermometer on the wall that recorded the outside temperature. 3 degrees Celsius. Not that cold at all, especially at that time of morning; and that time of year, even. Plus, his house was heated, and it wasn't like his bedroom or kitchen, or any other room for that matter, was directly exposed to the elements.

Canada deposited his pet bear onto the counter, and began to work on fixing him breakfast first. Which that morning consisted of : One tin of sockeye salmon, a few tablespoons of maple syrup, and a few heaping teaspoons of ketchup, topped off with half a can of white tuna. Matthew himself thought it was rather disgusting, but the bear seemed to adore this food like no other. As long as the bear ate, and ate happily, who was he to question?

Canada mashed it all together, and set it on the table for the bear to gobble up. He wrinkled his nose lightly, as he did every morning, on the enthusiasm of which the bear ate the fishy glorp. Well... At least it had maple syrup.

While Kumajirou ate his questionable breakfast, Matthew began to rummage through the cupboards, trying to locate something that he felt like eating. When he had first woken up, he thought he felt the growl of hunger teasing his stomach, but now he was sure that it was just a twist of discomfort. Everything was looking particularly unappetizing. Even the thought of pancakes, bacon and maple syrup seemed... a little too much for the die-hard maple fan.

He sighed, and sat at the table. "S'too early to eat," he mumbled, and he snatched yesterday's newspaper off of the table.

As the morning dragged on, and Matthew fixed his hungry bear another serving of the disgusting fish goo, he was starting to come to the conclusion that maybe he was coming down with something. He hadn't yet managed to brake himself out of the dopey grog that filled just the back of his eyes, nor the slight heaviness that weighed down at his wrists and ankles. He also felt ever so slightly queasy, and he was sure there was a slight tingle at the back of his throat when he swallowed. Not to mention, he was currently bundled up on the couch, reading a newspaper, still shivering against the cold.

Groaning lightly, the nation heaved himself off of the cushions, glancing outside as the sun began to peek out of the horizon, and migrated to the bathroom. "Am I coming down with something?" Matthew questioned aloud, putting the back of his hand to his forehead.

Knowing that was a fruitless effort, and some shuffling, he retrieved the thermometer from the medicine cabinet. Right after that, he exited the bathroom with it dangling from his mouth, and moved them to fetch at least something to eat. Kumajirou decided then to follow him around the kitchen, his owner now raising intrigue.

When Matthew had just pressed down the lever for toast, he heard a beep from the device that was jammed under his tongue. He took it out, shook it, and squinted at the number.

Kumajirou's head tilted. "What?" came the solitary word.

"... 38.3 degrees," Canada said with a sigh. However, he was unsurprised by these results.

"Fever," came a one-worded response.

"Yeah, I'll say so. A low-grade one though. I don't feel that terrible," he admitted, putting down the thermometer and filling up the teapot with boiling water. "I'll take something for it, and it'll go away in time for the meeting."

After those results, Kumajirou continued to watch him for a moment as he moved through the kitchen, as if he was deciding something for himself. He gauged his owner's movements to be sure that he was indeed alright, and after a moment of doing so, he shrugged, and wandered off to go curl back into his bed and snooze. Obviously he saw it as a non-threatening issue. Sleep was more important.

Canada was then left to complete his morning by himself. It was about 8:00am now, and he wasn't particularly happy that he had already been up for two and a half hours, when it should have only been an hour at the most. Of course, that, mounted with the fact that he now was confirmed to have a low-grade fever. Oh well… Life could never be perfect, eh?

Fully clothed, in a comfortable red hoodie with deep red sleeves, he flopped onto the couch and put his feet on the table, emitting a groan with his hand on his head. Did he have to go to the meeting? Couldn't he stay home and be done with the bickering and the ranting, the loud ideas and the randomness. Sure, they were all very nice people, and very nice to be around, but he didn't feel he had the gusto that day to deal with it all.

As he mulled over not going, contemplating if anyone would even notice his absence. It wasn't like they talked to him half the time; or at all really. He'd be lucky if someone direcly addressed him. So if he went, or didn't, they probably wouldn't have noticed, unless they had a plan to talk to him in the first place.

That thought was mushed out of his head by feeling altogether guilty that he even thought about not going to the important meeting that they held. What if it was important? Even if he had a slight cold, what if he missed it on a day where he'd be needed? That wouldn't be good at all, and it certainly didn't settle well in his Canadian hea-

The phone suddenly rang.

He blinked, his thoughts cutting short. The phone hardly ever rang. Unless it was his boss or something, and that wasn't particularly often either.

So, with a stretch, Canada lifted the phone off the hook, and greeted in a much more tired voice than he meant to, "Good morning, Matthew Williams here."

"Oi! Matty! S'me, your heroic brother, Alfred!" came a bubbly and always exuberant voice. There was a pause, "Did I just wake you up, bro? You sound tired."

"Good morning Alfred, and no, I've been up for a while now. What do I have the honour of receiving your phone call for this morning?"

"I was wondering if I could borrow a ride to our meeting today, Matt," Canada's elder brother quickly replied, getting straight down to business.

"Eh? Why do you want me to give you a ride there, is there something wrong with your car?"

"Nope!" Alfred cheerfully replied. He continued on to explain his reasoning before his brother could question it, "Because you know, I want to put in a good image, huh? The whole cutting down on emissions thing, I want to be a good role model for the whole world!"

"... By getting a ride in my car?"

"Yep! I figured, you're a nice guy, and you'd let me, and I also figured that car pooling lessens the emissions, ya know."

Canada blinked. Huh. That actually was sound reasoning, he was impressed. Matthew felt a smirk tweak the corner of his mouth and he smiled. "Sure, I'd be glad to give you a ride to the meeting this morning. But can you also do me a favour Alfred?"

"What would that be?"

"Can you drive me to the next meeting? It'd still be carpooling, and it'd be nice not to drive for once."

There was a pause as America mulled that idea over. "Sure! Why not! Sounds like a deal. I'll pick you up tomorrow morning at...?"

"8:30. Speaking of which," Canada said, glancing at the clock, "I better go now to pick you up. I'll see you soon."

"Okie dokie bro!" and the line went dead.

Canada smiled to himself, suddenly feeling pretty important to be remembered by his brother, and forgot entirely about his tired and sickly feeling. With a cheer brought back to his mood, he quickly took some light medication to curb the edge off the fever (and hopefully be rid of it entirely) and moved to get his shoes and coat on.

While he did so, he called upstairs, hand on the rail, "Kuma! I'm going to leave you home today! I left out some food for you, and you know how to open the fridge anyway so make sure you have some lunch and supper, okay?"

He got a call back. "Who?"

That confirmed that the bear had heard him, and was only asking who was the owner of the instructions.

"Canada! Now be good!"

"Okay!"

And with that, Canada quickly left to pick up his elder brother.

It wasn't hard to get to his place, they did live extremely close to one another, so the time and distance wasn't much of a sacrifice at all to the drive. Surprisingly, when he got there, America was already outside, waiting for him at the curb of his own driveway. He gave a wave when Matthew pulled in front of the driveway.

But when Canada stopped the car to let America get in the passengers, the elder country strode up and opened the driver's door.

"Get out Matthew," he stated with a cheerful lilt to his voice, expression matching.

"... Huh?" Canada said, his eyebrow raising.

America continued to look at him cheerfully, thumbing for Canada to get out of the car.

It took a few seconds more of this before Canada unbuckled and he got out of the vehicle. America went past him and plopped down in the drivers and he pointed to the passengers. "Well... what are you waiting for? Get in!"

Canada, thoroughly confused, only complied on the basis that America would probably drive off if he didn't get in the car right away. The moment he was buckled and fastened into his seat, and the car's engine started, did he dare question what was going through his brother's head.

"Um... why are you driving...?"

" 'cause you let me, duh."

"... Because you told me to get out. Why did you want to drive?" Canada reworded.

"Oh!" Alfred replied with a smile. "That's what you mean. I wanted to go pick up some breakfast, and I realised you probably didn't know how to get there. And being the awesome brother that I am, I thought that maybe I could drive us to work this morning. It's like killing two birds with one stone!"

Canada looked at his brother, and snuffed an amused air out of his nose and rest his head back on the seat. "Excellent thinking," he mused.

"Want something?" Alfred asked as they approached whatever destination was in store.

"... Well I don't want a hamburger for breakfast, if that's what you're asking."

"Pfft. No. I had that yesterday. Geeze Matt, get with the times. We're going to a coffee shop that just opened near us, actually. It has coffee, tea, donuts, sandwiches, soups, a whole whack load of delicious breakfast goodness."

"Actually, I'm not feeling particularly good tod-"

"Oh! You like hot chocolate, right? They have this really good hot chocolate, and I'm sure you can dump some of your maple syrup in there. They have so many combinations. They even have this small ice-cream section. So good. I had this cookie dough ice-cream that was to die for. I think they had this maple flavoured one too. Sorta dubious about trying that. Maybe I'll get you to try that as an experiment."

Experiment... What was he talking about? "Alfred, I said, no thank you, I'm not feeling one-hundred perce-"

"I think I'll get a coffee, black... mmn... a breakfast sandwich. What about you?"

Canada took a breath, looked at his brother and opened his mouth to speak, daring him to interrupt him just one more time. "I do not think I will have anything, thank you for the offer, Alfred." He finally managed to get out, stiffly, but politely.

His brother then produced a pout that no full grown country should ever have the right to produce; especially a country of his calibre. "Aww, Matty," his brother moaned childishly, as he parked the car, "You know it's rude to refuse. And I don't offer that often at all."

Matthew sighed. "I know, I probably should just agree to a hot chocolate or something. But I'm not fe-"

"Then it's settled!" Alfred exclaimed and he then yanked Canada out of the car with him and to the coffee shop before Matthew could utter a single word more.

Why did he even bother sometimes?

Canada found himself in a short line-up with his brother, and again, before he could even object to anything, he found a hot chocolate that smelled vaguely of maple shoved in his hands, along with a large breakfast sandwich and a donut. He immediately moved to object, "Alfred I don't need this mu-"

"Oooh! Should we get ice-cream too...?"

"Alfred." Matthew scolded, "Ice-cream is not for breakfast," he sternly stated, adjusting the food in his arms.

"Aw... You're no fun. You're always such a spoil sport. Did you inherit that from England or something?" he pouted.

He was met with a stern look. This was something he wasn't going to budge on.

"Okay..." the American nation sighed disappointedly.

After a few more moments of the other country deciding on something that wasn't ice-cream, America then slapped down a few bills on the counter, gathered his change and walked out the door with his own breakfast. Which consisted of a large coffee, two breakfast sandwiches, and a box of donut holes.

Canada followed, having failed in his mission to not get anything, and just plopped down in the passenger's seat with a sigh. Looking at the food in his lap, the queasy feeling in his stomach started to return. He already had tea and toast for breakfast.

Alfred sat down too, but didn't buckle up his seatbelt or start the car. He began to unwrap one of the sandwiches and he shoved a large bite into his mouth, chewing thoughtfully on the deliciousness that was invading his mouth.

Canada wasn't surprised that America would want to eat first, so he just popped open the lid of his hot chocolate and sniffed it. Liquid would be fine for now. He was feeling the shivers come on again, and something that could heat him from the inside out would be nice. He paused. Wait a minute... Wow, it really did smell like it was maple-infused. With that, he decided to take a tentative sip. At the very least it would be warm...

"Oh... now that's nice," Canada commented with a blissful sigh. "It's not too sweet at all. And mmm, it's real maple flavour. Not artificial syrup flavour. Real maple. Thanks."

America swallowed his third bite and smiled at his brother toothily. "Told ya it was awesome." He wiped his face on his sleeve. "And you're welcome."

"You did indeed," Canada laughed and he took another drink from it, feeling the warmth bubble down and temporarily quelling the aching queasiness that hung at the base of his stomach.

Due to his brother's request (nagging), he ate about half of the sandwich, but didn't touch the donut. He told America that he'd finish that up during the break, then probably have a late lunch. Honestly, the queesy feeling was still there, and while he hadn't upset it yet, he wasn't about to chance it by eating too much. America, on the other hand, cleared all of his breakfast off, and seemed disappointed that there wasn't any more left, but surprisingly, he didn't ask Canada for his leftovers. Instead, he started the car.

"Let's get that tomorrow too, okay?"

"Sure." Canada smiled, feeling noticed and important, and he leaned back in the chair. With a yawn, he fitted his half-full cup of maple-chocolate into the cup holder, and leaned back into the soft seat of his car.

He was vaguely aware, a few minutes later, of America commenting on why his car wasn't red and white like his flag, and why it was such a boring colour like black. Matthew didn't really care... Canada shrugged softly in reply and he felt himself dropping off...

The next thing he was barely aware of was a hand on his shoulder shaking him softly. "Oi..." Came a word fading in and out. "Oi..."

"Mm..mmn...?" Canada hummed, shifting slightly.

"... Hey... Oi... wake up..." The shaking got a tiny bit harder, but it was still gentle. "...Don't make me honk the horn... I'll do it..."

Canada then heaved a yawn, sucking in air as he stretched and he finally opened his eyes and looked at his brother. "Mmn... yeah?"

America was looking at him with a tilted expression, and a slightly confused look. "When did you get up this morning? You like, fell asleep almost instantly in the car, we're already here you know."

"Huh...?" He blinked and looked around. Woah! They were! And it was an hour and a half drive! How did he manage that? "Woah... I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be rude and just sleep like that. I woke up a little too early this morning and I couldn't get back to sleep I guess..." He rubbed the back of his head. "Sorry."

America's expression morphed into a lop-sided grin and he then mussed Canada's hair. "Ah, think nothing of it. T'wasn't rude. I was just curious, s'all. Come on, lets get going before we're late, or before you fall asleep again."

Canada nodded, and he climbed out of the car, stretching.

America had already met up with England as they walked in and Matthew fell back into a pool of obsurity as America walked in and didn't look back. It didn't pain the Canadian in the slightest. He was used to it, and so he wasn't surprised when it inevitably happened. At the very least, Alfred had paid attention to him long enough to give him a surprisingly nice morning.

When he pushed open the double-doors of the large building, Canada felt a weight tug at his wrists and ankles again, and a shiver ran back up his spine. Whatever it was that he had, was still there nagging at the corner.

Canada paused, and shook it off.

Surely he'd be just fine.

That was his last thought as he moved to the large conference room to take his seat among the other great nations.

Author's Notes : Hey! This is my first Hetalia Fanfiction. Sorry that the chapter has such a slow beginning, but this is just setting up a story (not too long of one, I hope) that will delve into more facets when it concerns Canada's complex situation and character.

Also, for those who don't know:
Matthew = Canada,
and Alfred = America.

I know that probably 90 percent of you already know that because you are all very smart people. But I know that I didn't know that when I first got into the fandom, and it helped me when it was put down. So there you go! :3

I also apologize for any mistakes. I don't know 100% of the facts of Hetalia, and this is more about the CHARACTER side of things, rather than the COUNTRY side of things.

Chapter Two Preview: With Breakfast now settled into Canada's stomach... and the feeling that he might indeed be coming down with something... How will this situation be delt with? Especially when he's concidered invisible?

Thanks for reading! Please read and review!