Hey there, readers! I be here once again, trying my hand at another story again. And, hopefully, I'll be back soon with another one. (No death this time.) Please, please enjoy! And reviews make me a happy little girl.

Quick dedication to my friend JJP, who helped me out of my writer's block.

Summery: AU One-shot: "In his strange ways, Ivan decided many things—and many people—had so much heart, and thus, so much potential. Alfred Jones was one of them." Russia/America slash. Human names used.

Warnings: Language, angst, scenejump!rape, and the appearance of a car I will never ever ever ever ever ever ever own.

Disclaimer: I OWN NOTHING...expect my story and such, legal quandries aside. Don't sue.

Ivan knew he was a strange man. A strange man with strange desires, and he had strange ways of keeping those strange desires locked up in that strange pound of flesh he knew as a heart. What a strange word, strange inflections. He remembered the first time he said it in English, remembered how strange it sounded. A brief, whipped-up wisp of air not quite at the back of the throat, warming the tongue and tickling his jaw—it was hot, it was warm. Heart was a hot word. A strange, hot word that ended too abruptly when the tip of a tongue had no give to taunt and tease anymore. A word with so much potential, Ivan decided. In his strange ways, Ivan decided many things—and many people—had so much heart, and thus, so much potential.

Alfred Jones was one of them. Ivan knew without a doubt.

When Ivan transferred to the United States some years ago for university, Alfred was all the culture-shock he needed and then some. This yellow-haired, sunflower-yellow boy was bright and cheery and watched baseball like it was mandated. He drank about three Cokes a day yet managed to lift Ivan's thick wooden bed one-armed when Ivan lost his transfer records. He picked fights and usually won.

Yet what Ivan noticed and didn't understand was his Alfred's attitude after every scuffle. He'd come back to their dorm with bruises and red knuckles, slump onto the couch with a heavy I won in the air, and stare out the window for hours on end. Occasionally, he would chance a glance at his hands. It was bad for the heart, he said, all this fighting. He didn't know why he lost his temper all the fucking time.

Americans, Ivan decided, were put on this Earth to confuse him.

He even briefly considered packing up and heading back to Moscow when he learned that, no, Alfred was not here on some football scholarship or was the result of some pity percentage factor, because Ivan was certain naïve fools weren't part of the affirmative action policies he'd heard of. In fact, Alfred F. Jones, Ivan's roommate, the boy who laughed at anything and everyone, who watched Indiana Jones and National Geographic religiously, who had an imaginary alien friend named Tony—He's real, damn it!—who snuck one too many glances at Ivan's ass, had been accepted.

What was worse, Alfred was accepted on an academic scholarship. To an Ivy League school.

For astrophysics.

More specifically, Alfred's teachers put it, he was exceptional in several nuclear fusion theories, and he'd help win quite a bit of grant money because of it. And this was the same boy who couldn't locate Russia on a map.

"Eh, it's more like a hobby, really," Alfred said when Ivan demanded an explanation. "My parents and my brother are proud and everything, but I'm not really cut out for government recruiters scoping out my brain. I've been thinking about teaching, actually." He looked up at Ivan with something warm in his eyes and beautiful in his full smile, and Ivan wasn't sure where those came from. "I love kids."

Ivan should have known. He should have known everything there was to know, everything that would plague this boy's mind as soon as those three words left his pretty, wide mouth. A mouth that smiled and laughed and cooed nonsense like Damn, Ivan, your eyes are heartbreakers when the only heart that could break was Alfred's. Ivan pulled that same mouth to his own, biting lips and carding his hands through hair that shined on cloudy days, and kissed sweet-nothing-promises that I will give you everything. But Ivan knew damn well that science screwed Alfred in the long-run, and there was nothing he could really do but push Alfred to his back and ravage him until he could taste Alfred's smiles in the air.

Alfred was a strange, hot word in Ivan's world, and he just wanted something more. And Ivan felt that somewhere in Alfred's beautiful fantasy world, a world he so desperately wanted to share, Ivan would go through Hell and Siberia, back and forth, to give Alfred that something more.

Ivan would learn the hard way.

If anything, Ivan could blame Alfred's brother.

Ivan met him once, and Matthew was not the twin he expected. Where Alfred was flamboyant, Matthew was cautious. Where Alfred had a loud, heart-lifting laugh, Matthew never strayed far above a giggle. Alfred loved summer sunshine. Matthew played hockey. He went to a Canadian college despite their parents' worries, and when Matthew called to let them know he was heading back to the States for some time off, Alfred was bouncing off the walls. He enlisted Ivan in some much needed, military-styled clean-up. Ivan wasn't allowed in the dorm unless he picked up something that might be on the floor within five seconds or Alfred would pitch a fit like a housewife on meds. Matthew liked clean rooms, Alfred said, or he wouldn't stay. And Alfred was adamant that Matthew stayed with them.

Alfred and Matthew weren't opposites. But it was close.

Especially when Matthew showed up with his daughter.

That was certainly a smack in the face. As if dating Alfred wasn't enough. And it happened to be his painful, charming boyfriend that relayed The Family Scandal after Ivan cornered him with threats and cashmere-soft bites, and God-forbid Alfred tried to hit him or Ivan would ravish him right then and there, and Alfred groaned and gave in.

Once upon a time, in the distant lands of some Canadian campus, sweet, shy little Matthew had found his nameless princess to live happily-ever-after with. But that princess had needs, and darling Matthew was as smitten as a naïve student could be, and gave in with few worries that life was anything but cotton-candy and lollipop-colored snuggles under winter-studded quilts.

A baby wasn't part of Matthew's picture.

But Matthew, like Alfred, was a very different sort of person. He took responsibility, scared shitless and strangely happy. But his parents weren't happy. Her parents weren't happy. She, especially, wasn't happy. So she played her part, played the glowing mother-to-be. She gave birth on a beautiful June morning to a beautiful baby girl. She called Matthew and told him. Then Matthew's beautiful princess disappeared, and a new drama unfolded with Matthew and Alfred's parents spearheading the war-effort. If Matthew refused to give up his daughter for adoption—and he did refuse, adamantly, with Alfred backing him up—then that left Matthew with only one option: His parents would take care of his baby as long as he was in school. But therein laid the stipulation. Matthew could only see his baby on extended holidays. No shirking his studies, no quick-drives down to the States over the weekends, no careless time-off. And only when Matthew was stable after he graduated would his parents even consider giving up their granddaughter to his full custody.

Matthew didn't like the arrangement. He was heartbroken and bitter and he didn't like being away from her. But it was for the best.

So the fact that the holidays had rolled about and Alfred was bursting from head to toe in sudden domesticity could mean only one thing: Matthew would be visiting. And he would have his daughter.

Ivan should have understood Alfred's excitement from the start.

Matthew's daughter was blonde and blue-eyed, and as appealing as babies were in Ivan's predominately muscle-and-testosterone world, she was beautiful. Little Isabelle was one-year-old and curly-haired, and she had a fondness for giggles and chirping coos. She cried little and slept late, and the boys were quick and amused to notice that she often threw her arms up in the air when Uncle Alfred brought in McDonalds and shouted "Am! Am!" in place of the more scholarly "hamburger."

"I've been duped by genetics," Matthew said half-humorously. "She looks more like Alfred's than mine."

Ivan glanced over the couch he and Matthew were sharing. Isabelle was tumbling about on a mass of blankets, playing with a stuffed-animal puppy Alfred bought for her. "Do not let him hear you say that."

Matthew rolled his eyes. "Look…I'm not afraid for her or anything, especially around Alfred."

"Hmm."

"Yeah, and I've known him longer than you, okay?" Matthew snapped, and Ivan's eyes widened a bit at the venom in his voice. "Jeez…and you're his boyfriend? God, trust him a little bit, why don't you?"

Ivan was glad Alfred was studying—or pretending to—at a friend's dorm room that day.

But his happiness was irrational and unfair, and maybe Matthew was right to berate him. True, no one would ever find a better uncle or babysitter than Alfred, but to some overprotective women this was a cause for alarm. They would see something dark and disgusting in Alfred's care, in his dreamy looks that scoped sugar-and-baby-doll futures. Men didn't act like that, they said. Not normal, especially for young college boys. Who did Alfred think he was?

Ivan saw something else. Whenever Matthew would crash and burn on the couch—studies, a child, the future; Ivan didn't envy him—Alfred was there with a tender gentleness Ivan had never seen from him before. If Ivan was Alfred's rock, than Isabelle was his anchor. Alfred would spend hour upon sleepless hour singing lullabies, telling stories Isabelle didn't understand, running a loving finger down his niece's cheek, too soft to stir but too deliberate to deny his adoration. In those few weeks Matthew was visiting, Ivan never saw Alfred at night, and Alfred was never upset.

At first, it bothered him.

Then again—Ivan was known to attract the strange ones.

"I cannot give you what you want," Ivan told him one night.

They were in bed, Alfred nuzzling Ivan's wrists. But when Alfred turned around, he was smiling. Twining his hands through Ivan's short, ashen bangs, Alfred smiled and whispered, "I have you. My own sexy, Russian boy-toy…" Alfred shimmied up Ivan's body, smirking, and pressed his lips against Ivan's neck, just under his ear. It wasn't so much a kiss as it was a connection, just a tender pressure that reminded them that, yes, they were here. "What else could I want?"

But Ivan wasn't dense, and he wiped away Alfred's tears without saying another word.

Thus it turned out to be five in the morning on some unimportant day in the near future, and Ivan had been running on coffee and Red Bull since nine the previous night—he had caved and taken Alfred's advice, but if he managed to pass, than Ivan would complain quietly. It was the American Way to study, Alfred said. Ivan wasn't very cultured, but he was polite in a foreign-charming sort of way, so he thought the least he could do was relieve Alfred of his self-induced, no-sleep nocturnal guard. Ivan's class started at eight; Alfred's didn't start until twelve. He didn't see any worth indulging a three-hour crash nap, but Alfred could use six or seven hours of shut-eye. Ivan knew he had been running on Pop-Tarts and a few cases of Pepsi since Matthew and Isabelle arrived; it was the least he could do.

Alfred had long moved into Ivan's room at night, so they set up an old crib Alfred wrangled from his parents' house in his old room. When Ivan opened the door, Alfred had his back against the shiny wooden rungs, bleary-eyed but content, a physics book in his lap.

He looked up and smiled, that same sugary-sweet twinkle in his sleepless eyes.

"'Morning, babe."

Ivan tipped his head. "What are you studying?"

"Shh…" Alfred glanced over his shoulder. Ivan held his breath. Satisfied with something, Alfred looked back up and whispered, "Dark energy theories."

All of which went in through one ear and out the other. "I thought you were working on…what was it…fusion?"

"I am. I was. I finished my paper last night, actually." Alfred beamed. "I know, right? Tired as fuck, but I got it done. And I finished my video games and my porn subscription is up today, so there was nothing better to do."

Ivan raised an eyebrow.

"Joking. Haha, lol, rofl, lmao, all that jazz. Funny."

"Indeed." Ivan crouched down beside him and pried the textbook from Alfred's nearly slack fingers. "Go and sleep."

Alfred pouted. "But Belle—"

"I will watch her. I have class early, anyway."

"But…"

"Now."

"Shh!"

Ivan lowered his voice for another forceful, if cloying, "Now…" and pushed Alfred's bangs back to press a short tender kiss against his forehead that had his quirky American boy red-faced and mockingly acerbic. Alfred rolled his eyes, smiling, and pushed Ivan's hand away.

"Fine," he said. Standing up, wobbly to the point that Ivan had to hold him steady, Alfred pensively made his way to the door. "Wake me when you leave."

"I will wake up Matvey and he will wake you for class."

Alfred glared over his shoulder. "Mattie—"

"Matvey has slept for twelve hours. You have slept three hours in four nights. Go to sleep or I will wake her."

Alfred bolted.

Ivan sighed and slumped to the ground where Alfred had been moments ago. Convincing Alfred took a lot of one's energy, and Ivan was feeling the effects in full. There was a pulse in his body, like someone was punching his chest from the inside-out. Waves of cement. Pulsating muscles. Exhaustion worthy of a shady poet. Ivan could feel the cheap dorm carpet through his sweatpants, and for a little stretch of wayward time he considered succumbing to the Sand-Man's lull, as Alfred put it. This college-boyfriend-brother-baby thing was completely out of his management zone. He had reached a point where he actually needed the so-called "required" eight hours of sleep. Quite a far cry from his four-or-five hour regiments.

Maybe he could sleep. Alfred wouldn't know. He kept baby monitors in every room, so someone would hear her, God forbid she cried.

So he fought gravity with tooth and snarl, steadied his swaying legs under vertigo, and made the mistake of peering over the top of the cradle. His scarf was more loosely wrapped than he imagined, and with a perfect set of gravity and sleep-heavy limbs the end of his scarf fell over the lip of the wooden rungs and grazed Isabelle's chin.

Ivan panicked. Isabelle's eyes fluttered open.

Ivan froze.

What was it American's said when life seemed to be moving in two different directions, but both would spear you in the circumventive end? Ah, yes; Ivan was fucked. Would she cry? Would she scream? Should he wake Alfred now, before Alfred had the incentive to cut his balls off—?

Then Ivan's palpitating heart took a quick, quivering hop. From his vantage point, his height and panic making him dizzy and his scarf dangling like a dead weight in the crib, a pair of huge, wide, unblinking baby-blue eyes stared into him. Into his shocked violet eyes and he fell under subliminal, cerulean waves that caught him in the tide, and then little Isabelle yawned. A tiny puckered mouth, scrunched up eyes under wayward curls, and under Ivan's rocking panic attack she wound her fingers into his scarf and snuggled into it, relaxed and sleepy, happy and safe, snuggled under Ivan's cool shadow.

Ivan stared. Maybe relief was lingering somewhere in his loosening grip, in his now-thrumming heartbeats, but in the end it was only an afterthought. Whatever he felt when Isabelle, darling, charming Isabelle, clung to his scarf with a look of calm contentedness, an imaginary Alfred was now whispering in his ear. A beautiful baby girl, all blonde curls and cherubic innocence. Someone's pride. Another's joy. A child that looked so much like Alfred and how could Alfred not have been dreaming? How could Ivan have missed it?

If he tried, and he did (Isabelle was quite the silent muse), Ivan could delineate every twist and knot in Alfred's optimistic, hopeless dreams. Dreams that opted for pregnancy, where Alfred, the lean, strong boy he was, would laugh under Ivan's ghosting lips, glowing like a fresh mother-to-be in a growing male body. Ivan could see himself glowing as well, but it was a more fatherly brand, the kind that came with a fresh dose of pride, of satisfaction, of watching Matthew and friends marvel at Alfred's miracle. Knowing, with all certainty, that half of that miracle and its mother would always be his. His baby and his Alfred. His very own family.

Alfred would've been picky with names, and after several fights consisting of "Russian names sound ugly, man" and "American names lack meaning", Alfred would have pouted and manly-sighed a compromise. If it was a boy, Ivan could have his Mikhail; if a girl, then Alfred could have his Samantha.

It would have been that easy, and everything after that would run through its predestined course. Alfred might have been lucky enough to have twins. Ivan would have been lucky enough to be the father he'd wanted, both for himself and for his own children, warm and sturdy, a perfect blend with the father Alfred was always meant to be: A beacon. A tall, glowing, yellow beacon of acceptance and love, the best kind of father, the kind that loved his life and everyone in it. The kind that had a strong Ivan of his own right beside him, watching over the family Alfred had dreamed and dreamed about.

It was all Alfred wanted in life. It was all Alfred needed; that special something more.

And as Ivan ran a shaky, soft-hearted finger down Isabelle's cheek—Matthew's daughter, Alfred's daughter—he lamented knowing it was the only thing Ivan could never give him.

It was so much like Alfred to believe in things that could not exist.

"I cannot give you what you want."

Ivan told him every time they sex, when Alfred would wrap his strong, strong legs around his hips and dared not let go. Alfred cried without tears.

But he had to know.

But even Ivan, a self-made man of self-sufficient emotions, could think of twenty different ways to smooth Alfred into a more rational state of mind than the one he was doomed to face.

Ivan had a particular fondness for sun-bright days and spring smells, clear and crisp enough to cleanse his body of college-toxins he knew would sink in eventually, and with school practically over for the year Ivan was becoming more and more affectionate, more coaxing without ulterior motives hiding under his scarf. It was he who would drag Alfred outside, sometimes to go people-watching in the park or car-window-shopping, whichever caught their fancy at the particular moment. And while Alfred complained sometimes, especially when he was in the middle of a "super expensive video game" or just all around spoiling little Isabelle to death, Ivan had the self-satisfying suspicion that Alfred appreciated the alone time with him. (Ivan was especially indebted to Matthew for once, when one beautiful afternoon Alfred's twin made it perfectly clear that he was Isabelle's father, and he was more than capable of watching his own daughter without Alfred breathing down his neck. Alfred had slinked off with Ivan after that.)

Ivan, being the great boyfriend he was, knew how to cheer Alfred up. That one particular day, Ivan decided to bring him to a local Chevrolet dealership, where he let Alfred roam the parking lot, staring at shiny, colorful new cars, like a small child looking up into Heaven at the pearly gates. But Alfred was most likely a damned child, considering how broke he and Ivan were most of the time; Alfred rode his bike everywhere, and Ivan's family and his part-time jobs coughed up enough money to buy a rinky-dink old truck for times of suspect virtue, mostly for the backs of movie theater parking lots with his voracious little American boy who just happened to forget his wallet back at the dorm…

But that didn't keep Alfred from falling all over a brand-new, red-jewel-colored Camaro coupe ("2012 model," Alfred so graciously informed him) glinting scarlet like the fires of foreplay Hell in the dealership lot. Ivan had no particular fondness for muscle cars, but seeing Alfred lying dramatically across the hood of a Camaro was a whole other range of hysterical and sexy in Ivan's snow-glossy book of life.

"My God, Ivan, it's freakin' gorgeous," Alfred gushed, leaning against the hood like a cheated man. "Ugh. Why? Why?"

"I hate to break it to you, darlings, but cars only talk in Transformers," a voice chirped behind them.

Ivan and Alfred turned, tuned to each other's command. Alfred brightened.

"Liz!"

Ivan frowned, eyeing the waving, approaching young woman with suspicion.

Elizaveta Héderváry had been a senior at the same university when Ivan and Alfred were freshmen, and with her sisterly-sort-of connections with the local Italian brothers, had established herself as the all-around Mother Lizzy of the freshmen boys. After graduation, she married the head of the music department, a Mr. Roderich Edelstein from Austria, and a few months back graced the campus with the crescent-moon glow of an expecting mother. She and Roderich had been excited. So had Alfred and the Italians.

Then she disappeared for a few months. A call here, a text there, mostly to Feliciano Vargas at odd intervals. Ivan never cared enough to inquire, or really cared to meet her again. Something didn't feel right. But he felt Alfred smiling beside him, so Ivan plastered on a rocky grin to reign in his temper.

"Well, hi there, Miss Liz," Alfred crooned, his Virginia-gentlemen charm seeping thick through his lips, nearly as cloying as his New York smile. Ivan's grin dropped, smoothed over in a neutral mouth-line that was anything but neutral, swooned to silence under the lilting up-down-up-down accent in Alfred's voice.

Elizaveta smiled, opening her arms for Alfred's eagle-swoop hug.

"Thanks, dear," she giggled. "So, what are you two broke bed buddies doing here? Don't tell me you actually won the lottery, or I'll have to start ripping Roddy to shreds for no good reason."

"I'll get lucky one day," Alfred chuckled. He mock sighed, letting his head lull dramatically against Ivan's rigid shoulder. "Alas. We're just walkin' around, scoping out my next relationship, if I can afford it one day." Then Alfred yipped, going red in the face when he felt a large hand lightly slap his ass. He glared half-heartedly up at Ivan, a pair of mischievous blue-violet eyes smirking down at him.

Elizaveta hid a laugh behind her palm. "Me too. But, unfortunately, nothing nearly as pretty as that Camaro. Roddy doesn't make nearly enough money for that. And he's so damn lazy I had to come here by myself to look for a car for the two of us."

Alfred perked up. "What kind of car were you thinking about? Probably a tank, especially if you're worried about the baby—shit, completely forgot. How's the baby? Girl or boy? Name? Damn, you look great, Liz. Good call having them young, I hear it's easier for women to bounce back after a pregnancy young—,"

All the while, Ivan was observing Elizaveta's face, eyes narrowed, his arms clenching at the spider-bite idea that snared his mind since he first saw her walking across the dealership lot. Her smile froze, stuck and stiff. The muscles in her cheek and temples twitched the longer Alfred persisted, blabbering on without respite, until Ivan saw Elizaveta's smile disappear completely. Ivan yanked on Alfred's arm.

"Ow!" Alfred snapped. "What the hell, man? What—uh, Liz…are you okay? The baby's okay, right?"

Then Elizaveta sighed. "I don't see why I should keep quiet about it. The Vargas boys already know, and I'm sure Gilbert had a high time bragging to his idiot friends about it…Do you two know Gilbert? Gilbert Beilschmidt?"

Alfred, confused, nodded slowly. Ivan watched him over the roll of his scarf.

"I thought so. He graduated before you two enrolled. Probably for the better." Elizaveta shuffled slightly, glancing around herself; probably feeling exposed in the bright, shining, beautiful daylight.

"Liz?" Alfred prompted, looking concerned.

"Don't cheat on each other, okay?" Elizaveta said, staring straight into Alfred's startled eyes. She did the same to Ivan, but with an added glare to prove that, yes, she would pick a fight with him if she ever heard rumors that Ivan was trying out his newfound allure on anyone else but Alfred, and then bat his ass with a frying pan back to Russia for good measure. Ivan glared back and threw a nasty, pointed look at Elizaveta's model-thin belly in response.

Stupid woman.

"What—of course we wouldn't," Alfred sputtered. "Why would you—Liz, what happened?"

"Don't be spreading this around school or I'll cut your balls off."

"Liz."

Elizaveta pressed her lips together in a brief, white-lined mask of indecision before she rubbed subconsciously at her elbow. "I had to get an abortion."

Ivan closed his eyes. Braced himself for the ebb and flow of pain and distress. He was almost as good as Matthew now, tasting Alfred's mind in the air around them.

Right now, Ivan felt Alfred's body rupture in an internal, forceful shudder, the only blip on Ivan's radar a blue-popped wrist by his hip. He reached out for Alfred's hand. Alfred yanked it away, the motion flaring with indignation. With unconscious spite. Ivan tasted a scrambled mix of animosity, salty bitterness, spiced fury. A dash of obsession that left a bad aftertaste in Ivan's mind. A small helping of malicious undertones—Ivan's favorite—thrown in at the last minute.

And underneath it all was the mound that held it together, the pinnacle, the resounding base. Pure, sullied, real, ethereal. Low-grade, high-quality misery.

Then a loud crunch started Ivan out of his reverie, Elizaveta gasping with him. Alfred had his hands over his face, peeling away his hair; a huge, mangled, fist-sized hole was shot a foot through the jewel-red Camaro's hood. Ivan saw blood on Alfred's hand.

"Alfred!" Elizaveta shouted.

"…The fuck," Alfred groaned beneath his hands. Elizaveta stilled, as did Ivan, entranced into place by the dangerous toll in Alfred's voice. A toll that chimed despair.

"A-Alfred…" Elizaveta began, steadying herself more quickly than Ivan could. "It…It wasn't growing right, Alfred. The doctors said I wouldn't be able to have anymore children if I went through with the pregnancy. And…I…it might not have been Roderich's. And I didn't want to take away his chance of having his own children."

Alfred slowly brought his hands down, glaring a stormy, lightning-bolt blue gaze at her, at her stomach. Then there were shouts behind him, angry voices about cars and disturbing the peace and—Ivan grabbed Alfred's arm and ran, because the idea of paying for a destroyed, twenty-thousand dollar car quickly dwarfed any sentimental, life-changing moments Ivan was allowed to indulge in. Elizaveta cursed at them as the pair fled down the street, back to their dorm.

As far as Ivan was concerned, she deserved it.

Matthew jumped from his place on the couch when the door flew open, a tensed, seething Alfred storming the dorm and a stoic Ivan shadowing him, a grim look on his face. Isabelle, who was playing on the floor with Matthew's shoe laces, looked up in fright at the noise.

"Alfred?" Matthew called, but Alfred just brushed passed him, slamming the door to his bedroom on the way. Matthew stared, dumbfounded, until Isabelle started crying and grabbing onto his leg.

Ivan stopped next to him, glancing down at Isabelle's huge, tear-stained, blue-as-the-sky eyes.

Matthew gaped at him. "What the hell happened?"

Ivan dug into his pocket and pulled out his wallet and the cash card his sister had gotten for him as a birthday gift. (He hadn't used it, too afraid that his sister would track his movements.) He handed it to Matthew. "Take Isabelle and find a hotel for tonight."

"W-What? But why?"

Ivan dropped into a squat, running his large hand as gently over Isabelle's curls as if he was calming Alfred, sputtering and shaking from a tantrum. And, he considered solemnly, he might as well have. Like Alfred, Isabelle shook a bit under his touch at first, tears prickling the edges of her blonde lashes. She sniffled like him. She whimpered like him. And, after a few more moments of love-drenched touch, she opened her big blue eyes, staring straight into his half-lidded gaze without fear. Abandoning Matthew's leg, Isabelle latched onto Ivan's wrist and nuzzled his palm, her forgotten tears slipping through Ivan's slack fingers. So much like Alfred.

Ivan had never liked children before. (Then again, he hadn't liked men before he met Alfred.) He planted an awkward kiss on the top of Isabelle's head, then carefully took his hand back. Ivan stood up just as Matthew leaned down to pick Isabelle up, watching Ivan's face, because he knew. In some strange, unnoticeable way, Ivan knew.

"Please take her. I will call you tomorrow."

Matthew nodded, throwing a last, sympathetic glance at Alfred's door before grabbing Isabelle's things and leaving the dorm, closing the door behind him.

Ivan didn't know what he was going to say. He had expected once he walked into Alfred's room, only moments after Matthew and Isabelle had left for the night, that his distressed boyfriend would throw something hard and strong at his head, scream for him to leave him the fuck alone, and proceed to drown himself in self-pity and science scholarships until the demons settled down for their nightly respite. In truth, Ivan had hoped that would happen. The only confrontation he prided himself on was tough-love confrontation, and Ivan learned about four days into their relationship that such tactics didn't work with Alfred F. Jones. Ivan preferred being the sponge, saving his dry insults for when Alfred was just vanilla-plain pissed, and absorbing any and all pain Alfred was willing to let him soak up.

Had this gone as Ivan had hoped, he could have just left Alfred to his thoughts and wait. Maybe eat something, do some homework. Call Matthew and tell him to use all the money he desired. Maybe call his sisters. Then wait until midnight, when Alfred would have tired himself out so much that he would have crashed, and sneak into his room, curling his body over Alfred's, knowing the two would naturally adjust themselves to the contours of each other's bodies. Let Alfred sleep his pain away under Ivan's care. That much Ivan could give.

But it never went that way. Once Ivan entered the bedroom, scoping out a pacing Alfred with wary eyes, Alfred had turned to face him, red-faced and tensed, and bombarded Ivan upon entry.

"I want to feel stressed," Alfred sputtered. "I want to wonder if I'm doing something wrong. I want someone to ask me where babies come from and then I'll have to call you and figure out what the fuck to say. But I can't have that."

Ivan didn't know what to do.

Alfred rested his head in his hands. Ivan saw blond hairs falling to the floor, ripped out by white-knuckled fingers. "I hate women sometimes. They can have everything, but all they do is bitch and moan about abortion rights, abortion rights, fucking abortion rights."

If tension was thick, then anxiety was about as thin as swimming through water at a ten-thousand feet below sea level. Ivan dared not tread, or the pressure would kill him. Alfred's misery would kill him.

"And adoption…they would never let me. I'd be passed over so fuckin' fast—Christ. You know that, don't you? They'd never let gay guys adopt. Or a single one. Or even if we were together, they'd still…"

Ivan wondered if Alfred was speaking to him. He didn't ask. He stayed, soldier-straight and stock-still, following Alfred's movements. Gauging them.

"Mother fucking Nature gives kids to the wrong people," Alfred scoffed. "I can and—God, I wish I could."

I can, I wish, Ivan repeated. Something connected. Ah…

"I wonder if Roderich or Gilbert even knew. Just…can you fucking imagine that? Can you?" Alfred stared him straight in the eye, genuine and wild. Knowing. "Gilbert could have…he could have wanted to be a father. Roderich would have forgiven her…He could have loved that kid, too. But wanna know something? No one will fucking know, ever, because she was too damn scared of her marriage than her kid's life. I would have lost my mind if Isabelle—I would have lost it if my girlfriend did something like that and didn't fucking tell me."

"Alfred."

"What?"

"Is Isabelle your daughter?"

Alfred stopped. His pulse thrummed quick as a hummingbird under the thin folds of his neck. He turned away, wiping his arm across his eyes. "I…" he began, but he cut himself off, opting for a bitter monotone. "She's Mattie's now."

Ivan dared to step closer, then rolled back on his heel. Thinking. "Now?"

"H-He…" Alfred leaned against his closet, head down, beautiful blond hair flopping over his face. Ivan wanted to reach out and smooth it back. "My parents don't know. They think Matthew…I didn't even know the girl, I promise, Ivan, I swear. We were at a party and she had short hair and I was drunk off my ass and some dick broke my glasses…I thought she was an ex of mine…Christ, I didn't even notice. A-And I didn't see her again until after Belle was born, and she just dropped her off in my dorm and ran away and I never saw her again."

Alfred choked. "God, Ivan, you don't understand how much I loved Isabelle then. Shit, I love her more. B-But I didn't know what to do…and I almost screwed up…and Belle almost…F-Fuck!" Alfred shouted suddenly. Ivan jumped.

But Alfred fought through the tears with clenched teeth. "I called Mattie down from Canada. I didn't know what to do. I was scared. My parents didn't know…just Matt. All I had back then was Belle and Matt, and I didn't know—Matt's a fuckin' saint, y'know that?"

Ivan did know that. He could see it, clear as the emotion in Alfred's eyes.

Matthew stared down at baby Isabelle, wrapped tightly in a dark pink blanket in his arms, sucking on her little thumb. Little Isabelle, Izzy, little Izzy-bell. His little niece.

He turned to Alfred, shattered and halfway drunk on the couch, loving the child in Matthew's arms more than he knew how to deal with, more than he could handle. Isabelle destroyed Alfred in the best of ways, because a week-old child could take Alfred's heart in the palm of her hand and squeeze until Alfred's life was no longer about Alfred. No longer about school grants and energy theories and government recruiters for NASA. Oh no, Matthew could see it. Matthew could feel it, as clear and bright and beautiful as if Isabelle had been his to begin with.

Being a twin cemented every decision Alfred and Matthew made together. It was inevitable. Matthew only had to gaze upon Isabelle's face, so much like Alfred's, so much like Matthew's, that he knew he had no choice.

"Al."

Alfred looked up, bleary-eyed and confused at the love, the pain, the resignation in Matthew's eyes. Alfred started crying.

"Please, Al. Let me take her."

"N-No…"

"Mom and Dad will never know. I'll tell them it was my fault. I'll tell them Isabelle is mine."

"S-She's…"

"Yours forever, bro. But you can't do it now. I can handle it. I love her too, you know."

God, did Alfred know.

"Kids will end up hating their parents one day," Alfred said, shaking. "Always. I couldn't do it. I almost…I l-love her too much, even if I could get her back. I'd rather be the Uncle Alfred she can always run to when Daddy-Dearest is being an asshole."

"Who said you will never get her back?"

"Mattie's her father now. Even if I asked…he would fight me for her, now."

"How do you know? Did you ask him?"

Alfred shook his head. "He's my brother. I know him better than he knows himself, sometimes. And vice versa. He'll never let her go. But Liz…fucking Liz…" Alfred's fist shot up and punched through the closet door, wood splintering under his knuckles. His body was tense, all veins and clenched muscles. Ivan had forgotten how strong Alfred really was.

"That bitch," Alfred growled—punching and punching—"It doesn't fucking matter to her. I tried. Jesus Christ, I tried, because I wanted to be a dad. A-And I could still be a good father, once I…I could have done it. Isabelle would have been miserable, but I could have. I would—"

Then Alfred screamed. Tore and ripped through Ivan's chilled blood like a hot poker, and Ivan was torn between running away, far, far away, and tying Alfred down, to keep him from hurting himself.

He could choose neither. So he stayed silent. Stayed motionless. Watched his beautiful, shredded boy destroy himself from the inside-out.

Alfred fell to his knees, punching, punching, mangling his closet, letting splinters bloody his hands and carpet, watching the huge, gaping hole eat its way through Alfred's hands, through Alfred's closet. He didn't like it. So he stayed where he was, talking to someone, talking to Ivan, trying to make it worse, because goddamn it, it was better than making him feel better.

"I would've gone through it," Alfred hissed, his voice lost. "I would've kept it. I would've done everything. I…I would carry that kid myself. I would have…God, Ivan…Why couldn't I?"

Ivan froze, stared. Alfred started shaking uncontrollably, thrashing at everything he saw, anything that moved, and fixed him with a wild, blue-crystal gaze that set a blank cassette in Ivan's mind, rewinding and spinning, while his heart beat under the huff huff huff of Alfred's panted crying. His panted pain.

Ivan broke with him.

"Ivan…I would do it all. No regrets."

Ivan pulled a squirming, squalling Alfred into his lap, into him, Alfred. Alfred, Alfred…what do I do? And his Alfred responded with elbows and growls, red-faced curses and white-knuckled nooses. He didn't want no goddamn hug and goddamnit leave me alone—and then a palm was pressed so tenderly, so carefully and anxiously, against his glassless eyes until Alfred felt Ivan's warm, strong skin vibrate against the tips of his lashes. His hand covered his face in what Alfred decided was quite the blessed darkness, the balminess of Ivan's fleshy blindfold keeping Alfred anchored to a man that only showed affection at night. That same man was now breathing on the floor, holding a crying heart to his chest and shielding him from whatever vicissitudes bared their poisoned fangs.

An illusion. Alfred knew it was an illusion, knew that as soon as he wrenched those hands from his face those vipers would rip through his throat. And it was sad. Alfred was known to be dense and oblivious and naïve and all those things his brother and friends said behind his back. But he also knew he wasn't stupid. Goddammit, he wasn't stupid.

But by his damning God, Alfred wished he was. Everything would be so much easier.

Ivan—his Ivan—wouldn't be falling apart with him, falling apart under Alfred's mess and emotions that he just wished would temper with his gender. His strong, stoic, sexy rock of a Russian boyfriend wouldn't be holding his head to his neck, wouldn't be wrapping his body behind his to keep Alfred steady, wouldn't be shaking. Shit, Ivan was shaking. Shaking so hard and warming up like a misplaced summer fever. Then the realization, the late-coming realization, seeped into his bones, laid them flaccid against his aching skin, where his Ivan was holding him together, was shaking with him and through him:

Ivan was with him. Even if Ivan didn't really understand, even if Ivan knew he could do absolutely nothing to help, at least he was there.

So Alfred shuddered and sighed, swallowed his squall, and slumped against Ivan's rising-falling chest. Whispered. Muttered something that cried and screamed in silence. "Okay."

Okay, yes. Okay was enough. Okay was okay. It wouldn't bring Elizaveta's baby back. It wouldn't give him Isabelle again. It wouldn't give him peace. But okay gave him Ivan…okay was okay. Okay would suck it up. No regrets.

Then Ivan grabbed Alfred's waist and pulled him forward, pressing his face into Alfred's belly and wrapping his arms around him with such deliberate ardor that a confused Alfred felt his fingers settle into damp, gray-blond bangs.

"You know I would," Ivan murmured into his belly. "If I could give it to you, I would. I would try a thousand times over until it happened."

Yes, Alfred knew, and he bit the storm back from his break and released it all in a quiet, miserable gasp into Ivan's lovingly strange mouth all night.

No regrets. Not this time.

Ivan wasn't surprised when Matthew showed up the next morning with Isabelle, smiling sadly, and said he was leaving for Canada a few weeks early. A "job interview," he said. It was last minute, he completely forgot, he wanted the money for Isabelle's college fund, parents missed her, and the act went on. Ivan thought it was quite good, and he let Matthew know by giving him a small, sincere smile.

Alfred followed Matthew everywhere, helped him pack, bathed Isabelle, pleaded for hours to try and get Matthew to change his mind. "C'mon, bro! Just a few more days…What happened to that Devils game we were supposed to go to?" Matthew had winced at that. But he said he had to leave. Their parents were expecting Isabelle back, Matthew wanted some alone time with his daughter, and suggested that he take Ivan instead.

Ivan didn't think the emphasis was necessary, but Matthew had gotten his point across. Alfred, pouting on Ivan's shoulder for the next thirty minutes until Matthew needed help getting his stuff in their parents' car, relented. In that time, Ivan gave in and wrapped his arm around Alfred's back, both of them beginning to fall back into pre-Matthew-Isabelle-mode, most of which included verbal and physical jabs, Ivan giggling evil things in Alfred's ear, Alfred finally getting fed up and wrestling a laughing Ivan to his back. All with a smile.

When Matthew walked in, plainly told them to get a room—"This is my room, asshole!"—he extended Isabelle's car-seat, Isabelle sleeping and strapped inside, to Alfred and asked him to load her up in the car while Matthew got the rest of his bags.

Ivan was quickly forgotten. Alfred hopped off the bed, grabbed Isabelle's carrier, and took his sweet time making his way out of the dorm, leaving an irritated Ivan all by his lonesome on Alfred's bed, Matthew standing in the doorway…standing in the doorway, and not leaving. Ivan raised an eyebrow, and Matthew bit his lip before taking another step inside.

Matthew sighed, deciding to lean heavily against what was left of Alfred's closet. "I'm guessing you figured it out."

Ivan nodded curtly.

"Does he know you know?"

Ivan nodded again.

Matthew looked a tad crestfallen, turning away to look at a pair of Alfred's skates in the corner. Ivan took a closer look at Matthew's face, still astonished by how identical the brothers really were, and even more astonished by how…by how…Well, Ivan truly could not say he was astonished, because how could anyone understand how one teenage boy, happy and shy and inconspicuous, just decide on the blink of an eye to raise his distraught twin's illegitimate daughter without so much as regret? Ivan couldn't even touch the subject with a ten meter pole.

But his astonishment didn't seem to matter much, if Matthew didn't bother with it.

"Ivan…" Matthew said, glancing up at him. "Whatever you've been doing, keep doing it."

Ivan tilted his head.

"Alfred," Matthew clarified, turning to leave. "He likes to punish himself. Don't let him. I'll see you around." And he left.

Ivan got up and moved to Alfred's window, peering down through the dusty panes at the minivan in the courtyard. Alfred was leaning inside the second row doors, giving Ivan a nice view of his ass, while Alfred smoothed out Isabelle's curls and touched her forehead with a gentle kiss. He might have said, and Ivan could only speculate by reading Alfred's lips, something along the lines of a choked, "Be good for Daddy. And Grandpa and Grandma." Ivan leaned his head against the window, watching on with half-lidded eyes.

Matthew arrived a few moments later, toting the rest of his bags and throwing them in the backseat. Alfred glanced over at him, gave Isabelle another kiss, and carefully closed the door. Another fleeting look at the tinted windows, and he managed to put on a smile as he and his brother man-hugged each other, patting backs, laughing, adding a touch more affection Ivan had only seen in them as one.

When they parted, their arms still clutching each other's shoulders, Matthew said something Ivan couldn't make out. Alfred's smile wavered, the fakeness gone. Matthew patted his cheek, ruffled his hair, until Alfred smiled for real and let himself rumble a little laugh that Ivan could see shake his body slightly. Matthew joined in, gave his brother another closer, shorter hug, before parting completely and heading for the driver's seat waving behind him.

Ivan watched Alfred who watched his brother and his daughter—no, Matthew's daughter—drive off. Down the courtyard, around a huge fountain couples and students liked to lounge on, and into the city streets. Stopped by a traffic light. Then disappeared around the corner. And Alfred still watched. Lanky and loose again, relaxed, probably sad to the point of depression. But as least he looked like the college boy he should have been, all lackadaisical and handsome, handsome, beautiful. Always beautiful in Ivan's eyes. Always his.

Then Alfred turned, his round, blue eyes traveling up the ivied walls of their dorm building until they connected with Ivan's. Big, sad, healing blue eyes, getting wider and wider with Alfred's star struck smile. Foregoing tears, as Ivan had expected, he raised a hand and waved up. Remembering Matthew's words, Ivan pressed one hand against the glass and used the other to beckon his cracked, fleeting little love upstairs, here, with Ivan. Forever and ever, whatever "forever" meant to Alfred.

And Alfred smiled, blushing, and bounced his way back upstairs, letting his strange heart lead him on.

A/N: This baby gave me a mean, blurry, fantastic, month-long headache. And I seem to flock to Ivan-centric writing, so...THIS MUST BE REMEDIED NEXT TIME.

Anyway, please read and review! I'm too sensitive for flames, and I consider these little stories my illegitamite children...so I like when people say things about them. HAVE A GOOD DAY!