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Romania first noticed the exhaustion in Bulgaria centuries before he ever noticed the blood.
That was the truly terrible part of it. Anyone could become fascinated by beauty. France built entire philosophies around it. Italy romanticized it constantly. Even England, bitter and prickly as old wire, occasionally succumbed to longing disguised as irritation. Nations were vulnerable to that sort of weakness because nations were born from people, and people had always been disastrously easy to ruin with affection.
But exhaustion was different.
Exhaustion was intimate.
It revealed itself in moments no one else cared enough to observe.
The slight delay before Bulgaria answered questions during international meetings, as if every sentence required him to claw his way upward through deep water. The stiffness in his shoulders whenever conversations drifted toward him. The way his expression flattened whenever anyone joked about Eastern Europe as though centuries of invasion, occupation, poverty, and survival were merely aesthetic inconveniences.
Romania noticed all of it.
Not intentionally at first.
That was the lie he told himself, anyway.
Because eventually the noticing became deliberate. Then habitual. Then obsessive in ways Romania refused to name aloud even within the privacy of his own thoughts.
It happened slowly enough to evade suspicion. Nations measured time differently from humans. Obsessions could ferment over decades before becoming recognizable. One evening Romania would simply realize that he knew Bulgaria’s coffee order by heart despite never consciously memorizing it. Another decade would pass before he realized he could identify Bulgaria’s footsteps from halfway down a corridor. Fifty years later he would catch himself tracking Bulgaria’s movements across crowded rooms automatically, the same way predators tracked motion through forests.
None of this struck him as alarming until one winter conference in Brussels, when Bulgaria loosened the collar of his shirt absentmindedly after a twelve-hour negotiation session and Romania’s entire body reacted with such immediate violent awareness that he physically stopped hearing the conversation around him.
The room dissolved into noise.
Germany was speaking.
Someone else interrupted.
Pens scratched against paper.
But Romania heard only the pulse beneath Bulgaria’s throat.
Steady.
Slow.
Alive.
Romania stared at that pulse with the sudden horrifying clarity of a starving animal discovering blood in snow.
And that–
That was when fear finally arrived.
Not fear of Bulgaria.
Fear of himself.
Because Romania understood monsters better than anyone else in Europe.
The world had spent centuries forcing monstrousness onto him. Vampires. Castles. Teeth in the dark. Blood rituals whispered by frightened travelers who needed Eastern Europe to remain mysterious in order to feel civilized themselves.
Romania had laughed along with the myths for years because sometimes it was easier to weaponize fear than resist it.
But now the old stories pressed unpleasantly against his ribs.
Not because he truly believed himself monstrous.
Because he understood suddenly why monsters existed in the first place.
Hunger.
Loneliness sharpened into appetite.
The desire to consume something beautiful before it disappeared.
The terror of standing alone forever while centuries peeled every familiar thing away from you one layer at a time.
Romania understood that kind of hunger intimately.
And Bulgaria – God, Bulgaria practically radiated it.
That was the problem.
Bulgaria carried loneliness quietly, but not subtly. Romania saw it in the exhausted set of his posture whenever meetings ended and other nations drifted naturally toward companionship while Bulgaria remained standing alone for one second too long before leaving. He saw it in the ancient caution behind Bulgaria’s eyes whenever anyone touched him unexpectedly, as though affection itself had become something suspicious through overexposure to loss.
Romania recognized those instincts because he possessed them too.
Perhaps that was why the obsession rooted itself so deeply.
It felt less like attraction and more like recognition.
Two old wounds noticing each other across centuries.
Which would have been manageable – dangerous, but manageable if Romania had not also started imagining what Bulgaria’s blood might taste like.
That detail complicated things considerably.
Romania tried very hard to ignore it at first.
He failed spectacularly.
The fantasy arrived at inconvenient moments. During diplomatic meetings. During sleepless nights. During long train rides through winter landscapes where dead forests blurred against frozen windows like old bruises across the earth.
Sometimes Romania would remember the pale line of Bulgaria’s throat and feel his own pulse stumble hard enough to hurt.
Other times he imagined teeth against skin and nearly dropped whatever he happened to be holding.
It became unbearable quickly.
Worse, it became embarrassing.
Romania possessed a reputation. Dramatic, yes, but intentional dramaticism. Stylish dramaticism. Refined theatrical melancholy cultivated over centuries. He was not supposed to become some feverish gothic cliché internally narrating another nation’s pulse rate like a deranged Victorian vampire.
And yet.
And yet every time Bulgaria entered a room, Romania became aware of him immediately in ways that bordered on humiliating instinct.
The scent came first.
Every nation carried traces of their people, though few discussed it openly. France smelled faintly of wine cellars and old paper. Greece smelled like salt-warmed stone and olive branches left beneath harsh sunlight. Russia smelled like snowstorms and smoke and something vast enough to make human beings feel insignificant.
Bulgaria smelled like forests after midnight.
Dark earth after rainfall.
Cold mountain air.
Woodsmoke drifting through abandoned villages.
Romania noticed it constantly.
The scent lingered in conference rooms after Bulgaria left. It clung faintly to wool coats and cigarette smoke and the edges of winter evenings. Romania caught himself inhaling deeply whenever Bulgaria passed nearby and immediately hated himself afterward.
This was not normal behavior.
This was how tragedies began.
The realization should have driven him away.
Instead it pulled him closer.
Because loneliness, Romania eventually understood, was not merely an emotion for nations.
It was a physical condition.
A chronic illness.
Humans died before loneliness could fully hollow them out. Nations did not possess that luxury. Nations survived long enough for isolation to calcify inside them. Long enough for silence to become more familiar than companionship. Long enough that being understood even briefly felt almost unbearably intimate.
Romania had survived empires.
Ottomans.
Kings.
Wars.
Communism.
Revolutions.
He had survived the slow humiliation of being romanticized by outsiders who loved fictional vampires more than real suffering. He had survived centuries of Western Europe speaking to him with polite condescension sharpened carefully into diplomacy.
And through all of it Bulgaria had remained nearby.
Not close.
Never truly close.
But present.
Another old nation carrying exhaustion like a second skeleton beneath his skin.
Romania began following him before he consciously admitted that was what he was doing.
At first it happened accidentally. Their schedules aligned. They left conferences simultaneously. Romania walked in the same direction because Brussels was small and winter evenings encouraged lingering.
Then one night he found himself standing across the street from Bulgaria’s apartment building while snow drifted slowly through yellow streetlight.
And he stayed there.
For nearly an hour.
Watching Bulgaria move behind illuminated windows.
A silhouette crossing warm light.
Removing his coat.
Standing motionless in the kitchen with one hand braced against the counter as though the simple act of existing exhausted him.
Romania should have left immediately.
Instead something painful twisted beneath his ribs.
Because Bulgaria looked lonely when he thought no one could see him.
Human lonely.
The kind that settled into apartments after midnight and remained there permanently.
Romania recognized it with devastating clarity.
So he returned the next night.
And the next.
And the next.
By the seventh evening Bulgaria finally acknowledged him.
The apartment window slid open with a soft metallic scrape, releasing cigarette smoke and cold air into the sleeping street below. Bulgaria leaned one shoulder against the frame, dark hair disheveled slightly from sleep or exhaustion, expression unreadable beneath the amber glow spilling from his apartment.
“You’re bad at this,” he said calmly.
Romania’s pulse lurched hard enough to feel painful.
He attempted dignity immediately.
“I have no idea what you mean.”
“You’ve been outside my building for a week.”
The directness of the statement struck Romania speechless for half a second longer than acceptable.
Snow settled quietly along the shoulders of his coat.
Somewhere in the distance church bells marked midnight.
Bulgaria continued watching him with the endless patience of someone accustomed to enduring absurdity.
Romania should have lied better.
Instead he heard himself ask, “Why haven’t you told me to leave?”
The question emerged softer than intended.
More honest.
Bulgaria exhaled smoke slowly into the winter air. “I was curious.”
Those three words lodged themselves beneath Romania’s ribs like hooks. It didn't sound as he was angry or frightened. Really just curiosity.
Romania laughed quietly, though the sound emerged strained around the edges. “Careful. Curiosity has unfortunate historical consequences where I’m concerned.”
“You enjoy those stories too much.”
“They’re excellent stories.”
“They’re ridiculous!”
The corners of Romania’s mouth lifted automatically. Bulgaria always sounded faintly exhausted whenever indulging Romania’s dramatics, but never truly dismissive. There was affection hidden somewhere beneath the irritation. Romania had suspected it for years.
Unfortunately that realization only deepened the ache inside him.
Because affection between nations was dangerous.
Humans fell in love believing time belonged to them.
Nations knew better.
Nations buried everyone eventually.
The cigarette ember glowed briefly red in darkness as Bulgaria took another slow inhale. Romania found himself staring again—not at the cigarette, but at Bulgaria’s mouth. The shape of it. The faint hollow beneath his throat when he breathed.
Blood.
The thought arrived suddenly and violently enough to make Romania physically tense.
Warm.
Metallic.
Alive.
He imagined leaning close enough to hear Bulgaria’s pulse beneath skin.
Imagined teeth.
Imagined trust.
God.
Romania looked away sharply, disgusted with himself.
Above him Bulgaria went very still.
Then, quietly:
“You’re staring again.”
Romania nearly walked directly into traffic out of embarrassment.
After that things deteriorated rapidly.
Romania attempted avoidance for approximately four days before failing catastrophically during another conference meeting when Bulgaria sat beside him accidentally and spent two hours close enough for Romania to smell his skin beneath cigarette smoke and wool fabric.
Every movement became unbearable.
The brush of sleeves.
The sound of Bulgaria turning pages.
The pulse visible beneath pale skin whenever he loosened his collar absentmindedly.
Romania stopped processing language entirely somewhere around the forty-minute mark.
Then Bulgaria leaned close to point out an error in a document.
Romania caught the scent of him fully for the first time.
Forests after rain.
Cold stone.
Something dark and old hidden underneath.
The room tilted violently.
“You stopped listening,” Bulgaria murmured.
Romania looked at him.
Really looked at him.
At the exhaustion beneath his eyes. At the tension buried perpetually inside his shoulders. At the pulse fluttering steadily beneath vulnerable skin.
Hunger flooded through Romania so abruptly it felt almost nauseating.
Not hunger for blood.
That would have been simpler.
This hunger was worse.
He wanted closeness.
Possession.
Trust.
He wanted Bulgaria to look at him the way lonely people looked at warmth during winter.
The realization horrified him.
Unfortunately Bulgaria noticed immediately.
Bulgaria always noticed more than people assumed.
His expression shifted subtly – not fear exactly, but understanding arriving piece by piece with terrible precision.
Romania watched realization dawn in his eyes and felt humiliation crawl hot beneath his skin.
Because now Bulgaria knew.
Not everything.
But enough.
Enough to understand why Romania stared.
Enough to understand what Romania imagined whenever his gaze drifted toward Bulgaria’s throat.
Enough to understand that Romania wanted him in ways neither of them could explain properly.
The silence stretched horribly.
Then Bulgaria asked quietly:
“Are you serious?”
Romania wanted death immediately.
The meeting collapsed after that.
Italy laughed himself breathless.
France looked fascinated.
Hungary appeared moments away from physically exploding with delight.
Romania contemplated setting the entire building on fire.
Bulgaria said almost nothing.
That silence hurt worst of all.
Because afterward Bulgaria began avoiding him.
It wasn't cruelly. Never like that.
That was the tragedy of Bulgaria. Even distance felt gentle with him.
He simply withdrew.
He sat farther away during meetings. Left conversations early. Avoided eye contact whenever Romania entered rooms unexpectedly.
Romania told himself this was reasonable.
Expected.
Necessary.
But loneliness sharpened inside him viciously over the following weeks.
He slept badly.
Dreamed worse.
Sometimes he woke before dawn with phantom warmth lingering against his mouth as though he had already bitten Bulgaria somewhere inside unconsciousness.
Other nights he dreamed of blood spilling across snow while Bulgaria stared at him with quiet disappointment.
Those dreams lingered after waking.
Romania became frightened of himself in earnest then.
Because obsession changed people.
History proved that repeatedly.
Empires became monstrous through obsession. Kings murdered sons for obsession. Nations annihilated cultures because they could not bear losing ownership over things they loved.
Romania had seen what happened when hunger replaced tenderness.
And beneath all his romanticized gothic fantasies lurked one terrifying possibility:
What if he ruined Bulgaria?
Emotionally.
What if this strange fixation devoured the fragile trust between them until nothing remained except damage?
Romania tried convincing himself to leave things alone.
Then Bulgaria appeared at his apartment unannounced one snowy evening and destroyed whatever restraint remained.
Romania opened the door expecting perhaps Hungary or Greece.
Instead Bulgaria stood there beneath dim hallway lighting, snow melting slowly into dark hair, exhaustion carved visibly into the lines of his posture.
For one terrible instant Romania thought: Mine.
The possessiveness shocked him so badly he nearly stepped backward.
Bulgaria entered silently after a long moment.
The apartment filled immediately with warmth and winter air and the scent Romania had spent weeks trying unsuccessfully to forget.
Neither spoke at first.
The silence between them felt swollen with everything avoided previously.
Finally Bulgaria asked, with devastating calm:
“Are you actually going to bite me?”
Romania’s entire nervous system failed simultaneously.
Because Bulgaria did not sound frightened.
He sounded tired.
Curious.
Maybe even resigned.
That realization disturbed Romania more than fear would have.
“Why are you here?” Romania asked instead.
Bulgaria removed his gloves carefully, eyes lowered toward his hands rather than Romania’s face. “Because avoiding things doesn’t make them disappear.”
Romania laughed once beneath his breath.
“That’s ironic coming from you.”
“Yes,” Bulgaria agreed quietly. “It is.”
Then he looked up.
And Romania understood suddenly that Bulgaria looked exhausted because he had been suffering too.
Not the same way but adjacent to it.
Romania saw it now in the tension around his mouth, in the sleepless shadows beneath his eyes, in the strange vulnerability hidden beneath his usual composure.
Bulgaria had noticed the obsession.
And instead of recoiling entirely, he had internalized it.
Turned it inward.
Romania’s stomach twisted painfully.
“You should be angry with me,” he said softly.
“Probably.”
“But you aren’t.”
Bulgaria hesitated.
Then, very quietly: “No.”
That answer changed everything.
Because suddenly Romania understood this had stopped being one-sided long ago.
Not the blood obsession.
Not the hunger.
But the loneliness.
Bulgaria had been lonely too.
Lonely enough to let Romania stand outside his apartment for a week without sending him away.
Lonely enough to come here now despite understanding perfectly well what Romania wanted.
Lonely enough to offer vulnerability instead of distance.
That realization terrified Romania more than anything else had.
Because Bulgaria trusted carefully.
Painfully carefully.
And once trust existed, Romania knew he possessed the power to destroy him.
The thought should have inspired restraint.
Instead it made desire bloom hotter and darker inside him.
Bulgaria stepped closer eventually.
Close enough that Romania could hear breathing.
Close enough that warmth gathered painfully between them.
“You really wouldn’t hurt me?” Bulgaria asked quietly.
Romania answered instantly.
“Never.”
He meant it absolutely.
That was what made everything afterward unforgivable.
Outside, snow drifted silently past the windows in slow pale streaks, softening the distant glow of the city into blurred gold and gray. Romania’s apartment was warm in the way old places became warm during winter – not comfortable exactly, but enclosed, insulated from the cold world outside by old radiators and low amber lighting and heavy shadows gathered in corners. A single lamp near the living room cast warm amber light across part of the apartment while the hallway and bedroom beyond dissolved into darkness.
Bulgaria stood only a few feet away near the wall separating the living room from the narrow kitchen area, coat discarded earlier over the back of a chair. The top button of his shirt had already come undone at some point during the evening without Romania consciously noticing when. His sleeves were rolled halfway up his forearms now, exposing pale skin and tired hands roughened by centuries of existence.
Romania looked at him for one suspended moment too long.
Then, almost unconsciously, he reached out and touched Bulgaria’s wrist.
The contact was careful.
Gentle.
But deliberate enough that Bulgaria immediately understood the silent request beneath it.
Come closer.
Bulgaria hesitated only briefly before allowing Romania to guide him backward several slow steps until his shoulders brushed lightly against the wall behind him. The movement itself felt intimate long before anything else happened.
Romania’s hand remained loosely around Bulgaria’s wrist the entire time, thumb resting absently against the pulse there as though reassuring himself Bulgaria was truly here and not another obsession conjured by loneliness and sleepless nights.
Bulgaria leaned back slightly once the wall steadied him. On either side of him stood a laid table and a lamp. Warm amber light fell unevenly across his face, catching the exhaustion beneath his eyes while shadows gathered along the curve of his throat and collarbones. Romania suddenly became painfully aware of how tired Bulgaria looked this close.
Romania stepped closer instinctively.
Too close now for diplomacy.
Too close for pretending this remained harmless curiosity.
Bulgaria looked up at him silently, and Romania noticed the exact moment awareness passed through him too – the realization that Romania had cornered him gently against the wall without consciously meaning to. There was still space to move away. Romania would have let him.
But Bulgaria trusted him enough to stay.
One hand drifted backward automatically until his fingers flattened lightly against the wall beside him, grounding himself against something solid.
The gesture did something terrible to Romania internally.
Bulgaria loosened the collar of his shirt slowly, fingers brushing pale skin beneath the dim apartment light. The movement itself was small. Careless, almost. But to Romania it felt catastrophic. His attention fixed immediately on the exposed line of Bulgaria’s throat – the visible pulse there, steady beneath fragile skin, warmth alive and immediate in a way that made Romania’s thoughts unravel violently around the edges.
Pulse.
Warmth.
Trust offered willingly.
Bulgaria visibly trembled once beneath the intensity of Romania’s stare, but he still did not move away.
That trust nearly broke Romania apart.
Because he understood suddenly that Bulgaria was giving him something dangerous. Not simply permission to bite him. This was something softer and infinitely more terrible than that.
Permission to see him.
Permission to touch the loneliness both of them spent centuries hiding beneath diplomacy and sarcasm and exhaustion.
Romania approached him slowly enough that he could still stop. There was still time. Space. A thousand tiny chances to choose tenderness instead of hunger.
He rested trembling fingers against Bulgaria’s throat first.
Warm skin.
Steady pulse.
Bulgaria inhaled sharply beneath the touch but remained still despite the instinctive tension that passed visibly through him.
God.
Romania closed his eyes briefly.
Because Bulgaria was not fearless. People mistook his silence for fearlessness all the time, but Romania knew better. Bulgaria was cautious in the way wounded animals became cautious after surviving too many winters. Every vulnerable thing he offered another person had to be dragged painfully upward through years of instinct screaming at him to hide instead.
And still he stood here allowing Romania close.
Allowing this.
“There you are,” Romania thought helplessly as his thumb brushed once against Bulgaria’s pulse.
Bulgaria tilted his head back slightly without seeming to realize what the movement did to Romania internally. It exposed more of his throat unconsciously, revealed trust so instinctive and unguarded that something primal inside Romania snapped hard enough to hurt.
“Romania,” Bulgaria said softly.
He was so soft.
Romania bent his head before he could think properly again.
At first he only pressed his mouth against Bulgaria’s throat. Just warmth. Just skin. Just the unbearable intimacy of contact. Bulgaria shivered immediately beneath him, fingers tightening briefly against Romania’s sleeve, and Romania felt his own pulse turn violent in response.
He could hear Bulgaria’s heartbeat now.
Slow.
Heavy.
Alive.
Romania had spent weeks imagining this moment. Months, perhaps. Longer, if he was honest with himself. Obsessions rooted themselves quietly over centuries until eventually they wrapped around your ribs tightly enough to interfere with breathing.
But none of his imaginings prepared him for reality.
Because Bulgaria made another small sound when Romania’s teeth grazed his skin lightly.
A sound halfway between fear and relief.
That sound ruined everything.
Romania bit him.
The blood hit his tongue warm and immediate.
And suddenly Romania understood why humanity invented vampires in the first place.
It was silly to think it had ever been about blood tasting good.
They invented vampires because intimacy could become monstrous if desired badly enough.
Bulgaria’s blood carried memory. All nations’ blood did. Romania felt it flood through him instantly in fractured flashes too fast to process fully – snow-covered villages, church bells echoing through mountains, smoke after battles, silence stretched over decades until it became part of the landscape itself.
Bulgaria tasted like survival.
Like grief endured quietly.
Like someone who had suffered so continuously he no longer expected tenderness from the world.
Romania should have stopped there.
A small bite.
A brief moment.
Something intimate but survivable.
Instead Bulgaria’s hand slid upward shakily and closed around the back of Romania’s neck.
Not pushing him away.
Holding him there.
Trusting him.
The gesture shattered the last intact piece of Romania’s restraint.
Hunger flooded him instantly – not physical hunger, but something older and uglier. The terrible aching desire to be wanted completely by another lonely creature. Romania drank deeper before he consciously realized he was doing it.
Bulgaria gasped softly.
Romania heard the sound dimly through the roaring in his ears.
Warmth spread through him rapidly, almost euphoric in its intensity. Bulgaria’s blood felt alive beneath his skin, carrying centuries of endurance and sorrow and quiet loyalty. Romania became drunk on it immediately.
Not enough.
The thought appeared suddenly and horribly.
Not enough.
He tightened his grip unconsciously.
Bulgaria made another sound then.
Smaller this time.
Strained.
Romania noticed it.
That was the worst part.
He noticed everything.
The way Bulgaria’s fingers tightened abruptly against his shoulder now – not holding anymore, but gripping. The slight jerk that went through his body when Romania swallowed again. The hitch in his breathing. The way his pulse began skipping unevenly beneath Romania’s mouth.
Romania understood all of it instinctively.
And still he did not stop.
Because now Bulgaria was trying, carefully at first, to pull back, but his trust still softened every attempt to escape.
Instead the resistance emerged slowly, almost uncertainly, as though part of him still believed Romania would realize on his own that this had gone too far.
His free hand came up shakily between them, pressing weakly against Romania’s chest. Not enough force to actually move him, just pressure. A silent plea. Bulgaria turned his head slightly as though searching for air, and Romania felt the movement directly against his mouth.
He knew.
God, he knew.
Romania felt Bulgaria swallow hard beneath his teeth. Felt the tension spreading through his body now in visible waves. Bulgaria’s heartbeat had accelerated completely out of rhythm, too fast and uneven against Romania’s tongue.
Still Romania drank.
Because panic had started mixing with the hunger now.
If he stopped, this would end.
The closeness.
The trust.
The unbearable feeling of being needed by someone equally ruined.
Romania’s hand slid instinctively to the back of Bulgaria’s neck, drawing him closer in a grip that felt careful right until Bulgaria’s next attempt to pull away failed almost immediately.
The movement knocked Bulgaria harder against the wall. The lamp shook faintly beside him. Bulgaria caught himself against the furniture around him automatically, fingers slipping clumsily against polished wood of a table as his balance failed him for a second.
That was the moment everything truly broke.
Bulgaria froze beneath him for one stunned second.
Romania felt it happen.
The realization.
Not confusion anymore.
Understanding.
Romania heard Bulgaria inhale sharply through his nose as his fingers tightened harder against Romania’s chest. The pressure finally became resistance now. Genuine resistance. Bulgaria tried to twist away again, weaker this time because his body was already beginning to fail him, and Romania responded automatically by pressing closer instead.
A quiet sound escaped Bulgaria then.
Not fear exactly.
Pain.
Romania felt it vibrate directly against his mouth.
And still–
Still he drank again desperately, as though he could consume loneliness itself before it escaped him.
Because now memories bled through him too quickly to separate. Bulgaria rebuilding endlessly after wars. Bulgaria surviving occupations and humiliations and abandonment after abandonment after abandonment.
So lonely.
God, he was so lonely.
And beneath Romania’s hunger lurked an even uglier realization:
Bulgaria had come here because he thought Romania understood that loneliness.
The knowledge should have horrified him into stopping.
Instead it made the blood taste sweeter.
Mine, that terrible voice whispered again.
Mine because he chose me.
Bulgaria’s knees buckled suddenly as his body finally began giving out.
The movement shocked Romania hard enough to force clarity back into him all at once.
Reality crashed down brutally.
Bulgaria was collapsing.
Romania jerked backward instinctively, blood bright against his mouth.
Bulgaria stumbled violently against him, breathing shallow and uneven now, one hand pressed weakly against his own throat as though he no longer understood where pain ended and his body began.
You didn’t stop.
You heard him struggling.
And you didn’t stop.
The apartment became unbearably silent except for Bulgaria’s ragged breathing.
Romania reached toward him automatically. “Bulgaria–”
Bulgaria flinched.
The movement was tiny.
Instinctive.
But it hit Romania harder than any violence ever could.
Silence expanded between them like something living.
Romania felt sick suddenly.
The blood in his mouth turned nauseating.
What had he done?
Bulgaria pressed himself upright slowly against the wall, movements unsteady in ways Romania had never witnessed before. Nations healed quickly, yes, but exhaustion still existed. Shock still existed. Violation still existed.
And Bulgaria looked violated.
That realization hollowed Romania out instantly.
Enough that Bulgaria looked dazed standing there. Enough that his balance kept threatening to disappear beneath him. Enough that Romania could still see the weakness trembling visibly through his arms every time he tried to steady himself against the wall.
“Sit down,” Romania said hoarsely, stepping forward instinctively.
Bulgaria recoiled immediately.
Not far.
He probably couldn’t have moved far even if he wanted to.
But the reaction itself carved something rotten straight through Romania’s chest.
Bulgaria looked confused afterward, almost startled by his own response. His unfocused gaze flickered briefly toward Romania before drifting away again toward nothing in particular, like he could not fully hold onto one thought long enough to process it.
“I…” Bulgaria swallowed weakly.
The motion visibly hurt.
Romania watched his throat work around pain he himself had put there and felt nausea rise violently inside him.
Bulgaria blinked slowly, one hand still pressed against the wound as though trying to keep himself together physically. The room seemed to tilt subtly around him. Romania could see it in the way his posture shifted unsteadily a second too late each time he corrected his balance.
“You said…” Bulgaria began quietly.
Then stopped.
His expression tightened faintly with confusion.
Like he couldn’t quite remember what he had been trying to say.
Romania’s chest tightened painfully.
Because Bulgaria looked lost.
As though the moment Romania crossed that line, something inside Bulgaria had simply failed to keep pace with reality afterward.
Romania took another careful step closer despite himself.
“Don’t,” Bulgaria whispered immediately.
The word emerged breathless and fragile.
Romania froze.
Bulgaria closed his eyes briefly, forehead tightening faintly like he was trying to think through fog. His fingers slipped against the edge of the table again. Romania noticed belatedly that he was trembling hard enough now for the wood to shake softly beneath his grip.
Then Bulgaria laughed quietly.
The sound nearly killed Romania.
Because it wasn’t bitter or cruel.
It sounded confused.
Like Bulgaria genuinely did not understand what had happened to him.
“I thought…” Bulgaria murmured vaguely, more to himself than to Romania. “I thought you…”
He stopped again.
Romania saw him trying desperately to fit the pieces together.
The gentleness from earlier.
The way Romania had touched him.
The promises.
The hunger.
The moment it changed.
Bulgaria looked down at the blood staining his hand like he couldn’t fully comprehend where it came from.
“I don’t understand,” he admitted softly.
God.
That hurt worse than accusation ever could have.
Because Bulgaria had trusted him enough to become vulnerable and now stood here unable to even fully process the shape of the betrayal.
Romania opened his mouth immediately.
“I’m sorry.”
The words sounded pathetic the second they left him.
Bulgaria looked at him then.
Really looked at him.
And Romania realized with horror that Bulgaria’s eyes had gone glassy from shock. His focus kept slipping unfixed around the room before dragging itself slowly back toward Romania again.
“You said you wouldn’t hurt me,” Bulgaria whispered.
Like part of him genuinely could not reconcile the Romania standing in front of him now with the one he had trusted only minutes earlier.
Romania stepped toward him again without thinking.
This time Bulgaria tried to move away too quickly.
His knees gave out immediately.
Romania caught him instinctively before he could hit the floor.
The contact sent visible panic through Bulgaria’s exhausted body at once. Romania felt it immediately – the sudden rigid tension locking through him, the weak frantic attempt to pull himself free despite barely possessing the strength to stand anymore.
“No–”
“It’s okay,” Romania said desperately. “I’ve got you.”
The words felt monstrous the moment he said them.
Because Bulgaria had believed that already.
That was the problem.
Bulgaria’s breathing hitched unevenly. Romania could feel how cold his hands had become through the fabric of his sleeves. Bulgaria tried once more to push weakly against Romania’s chest before stopping abruptly, exhaustion overtaking panic faster than either of them expected.
Then something in him simply seemed to collapse.
Emotionally.
Romania felt Bulgaria’s resistance disappear all at once beneath his hands, leaving behind only trembling exhaustion and stunned disorientation. Bulgaria sagged weakly against him, head falling briefly against Romania’s shoulder as though his body no longer remembered how to remain upright alone.
Romania nearly broke apart right there.
Because Bulgaria still trusted him instinctively even now.
His body did, at least.
Even after everything.
“I don’t…” Bulgaria’s voice cracked softly against Romania’s shoulder. “I don’t know what happened.”
Romania closed his eyes.
The confession felt like a knife.
Because Romania knew exactly what happened.
He had taken loneliness and mistaken it for permission to consume.
He had taken trust and mistaken it for surrender.
And now Bulgaria stood half-dissociated in his arms trying to understand how tenderness had transformed into harm so quickly.
Romania guided him slowly down onto the floor before his legs failed completely. Bulgaria obeyed automatically, movements delayed and sluggish with shock. One hand remained clamped weakly against his throat while fingers of the other curled faintly into tablecoath's fabric like he needed to anchor himself to something real.
The amber light from the lamp fell across his face unevenly.
Romania hated how pale he looked.
Bulgaria stared downward silently for several long seconds.
Then, very quietly:
“Was I supposed to stop you?”
Romania stopped breathing.
Bulgaria still wasn’t looking at him.
His voice sounded distant now. Unsteady. Like he was speaking through exhaustion too deep to fully navigate.
“I thought…” Bulgaria swallowed painfully again. “I thought maybe that was just how you…”
He trailed off weakly.
Romania felt horror spread cold through his entire body.
Because Bulgaria was trying to blame himself for not understanding the moment Romania stopped being gentle.
“No,” Romania said immediately, too sharp, too desperate. “No, don’t do that.”
Bulgaria blinked slowly, finally looking up again.
There was no anger in his expression.
That somehow made everything infinitely worse.
Just confusion.
Hurt too large and shapeless to fully process yet.
Romania sank slowly onto his knees in front of him before he consciously realized what he was doing.
I knew, he admitted in his head.
The words scraped raw against his throat.
I knew you wanted me to stop, he couldn't say that out loud.
Bulgaria was still.
Silence stretched between them.
Snow drifted softly beyond the apartment windows.
Somewhere outside, the city continued existing normally while Bulgaria sat bleeding quietly on Romania’s floor trying to understand how trust had turned into this.
Finally Bulgaria spoke again.
“So that’s why,” he murmured faintly.
Romania frowned immediately. “Why what?”
Bulgaria looked down at his hands.
“At first…” His voice faltered slightly. “It felt warm.”
The words nearly made Romania sick.
Bulgaria touched his throat weakly again, expression distant.
“I thought you…” He swallowed. “I thought maybe you loved me.”
Romania felt something inside himself cave inward violently.
Because there it was.
Bulgaria had mistaken hunger for love because Romania himself had not understood the difference until it was already too late.
And now Bulgaria sat here trying to mourn something that had never truly existed in the first place.
***
The room still smelled like blood.
Warm metallic traces lingering beneath winter air and cigarette smoke.
Romania suddenly couldn’t stand the scent.
He stumbled toward the sink violently and scrubbed at his mouth hard enough to split skin, but the taste remained there stubbornly beneath everything else.
Forest smoke.
Loneliness.
Trust.
He gagged.
Because now that the hunger faded, he understood exactly what he had consumed.
Faith.
Bulgaria had come to him carrying centuries of careful guarded loneliness and offered it with shaking hands.
And Romania had devoured it.
After that night Bulgaria changed.
Subtly enough that most nations never noticed.
Romania noticed immediately.
Bulgaria no longer stood near him during meetings.
No longer allowed accidental touches to linger.
No longer looked at Romania directly unless diplomacy required it.
But worse than the distance was the absence of softness.
Before, Bulgaria had watched Romania with quiet understanding hidden beneath irritation. There had been warmth there occasionally, brief and rare but real.
Now there was nothing.
Not hatred.
Not grief.
Nothing.
As though Romania had reached into him and killed something permanently.
Months later, during another conference in Brussels, Romania passed Bulgaria alone in an empty hallway between meetings.
For one terrible hopeful instant Romania thought about apologizing again.
Then Bulgaria instinctively stepped back before Romania even spoke.
The motion happened automatically.
Like muscle memory.
Like fear.
Romania froze.
Bulgaria did too, realizing what he’d done only afterward.
For a moment they simply stared at one another across the cold hallway.
And Romania saw it then with devastating clarity:
Bulgaria was afraid of him now.
Deep in the animal part of him that remembered harm even though it didn't show it openly.
The realization hollowed Romania out completely.
Because Bulgaria had been fooled.
Romania had decided to make this choice.
And now he would live forever with the knowledge that someone once offered him trust so carefully, so tenderly, and he answered by teaching them fear instead.