Aph Benelux Siblings - Tumblr Posts

Prompt day 4: Childhood

Sister’s revolution

“Big brother?” the boy wispered as he looked at the retreating back of his older sister. “Why is Emma leaving us. Did someone send her away?” The young boy had tears in his eyes.

Johan tried his best to blink away his own tears away, Henri had heard Emma and him fight too many times already. He did not need to see his big brother break down now, right as his other sibling was leaving him behind. His beloved baby sister had seen him, Johan, as not good enough once again.

Once she had chosen to stay with Spain and now, she chose to leave Johan.

Still, how could he tell Henri that it was his fault that their sister was leaving? That no, she was not being send away by anyone, she just did not want to near the Dutchman anymore. So she walked away from him, and as long as he had custody of their youngest sibling, she was going to walk away from Henri too.

Luxembourg would have to go without his older sister, simply because Johan had not been able to make her stay with them. How was he going to apologise for that? Say he was sorry it was just going to be the two of them for now?

His united kingdom had fallen apart. And he feared it would crumble even further.

Maybe he had never been meant to be a good older brother.

Maybe he had been meant to fail België and Luxemburg all along.

For now, he wrapped an arm around the younger boy and pulled him close to himself as he could and used the other hand to hide his face as the tears escaped from his eyes and the man did all he could to prevent the sobs escaping his mouth.

No matter how much he wanted to cry and mourn the loss, he could not. Right now, he had to be strong for his baby brother, who was crying over their sister leaving.

His family had fallen apart.

Netherlands - Johan

Belgium/België - Emma

Luxembourg/Luxemburg - Henri

Belgian Revolution (1830-1831), the succesion of the southern states of the united kingdom of the netherlands to become the independent kingdom of Belgium.

mythology/folklore

day 3: flowers

Happy

“Play something on the violin for me?” she sweetly asked her older brother. Again.

Sometimes she just missed hearing the way Johan had mastered the violin during all the years he had been playing the instrument.

“Let him be.” Her younger sibling told her. “He prefers the be a DJ these days.”

Henri sounded so proud. He has always looked up to their big brother.

Johan did have a talent for that music style as well, as did his people.

“Henri..” The woman started to say but stopped when she saw that Johan had managed to retrieve an old looking instrument, a violin, to his sister’s delight.

Knowing that his little sister liked to dance as much as she loved the way he managed the violin, he silently mouthed to his brother to dance with her.

First he thought that Henri either didn’t get the message or chose to ignore it, but then Henri took Emma’s hand and lead her toward the middle of the room.

Looking at his younger siblings as the piece ended, he started another piece. A small smile, barely visible, played on his lips while he looked at them.

It meant the world to him to see his siblings happy like this, all smiles and laughter.

Johan - Netherlands

Emma - Belgium

Henri - Luxembourg

[[ From here || @ask-thenetherlands ]]

The big day

“You look gorgeous, stunning, beautiful.” The brown haired Hungarian woman said to the blonde in front of her, admiring her friend’s beauty as she simply sat there in her wedding dress, and she took a few steps back to get an even better look at the other woman. “Everyone will be looking at you.” And she felt tears beginning to gather in her eyes.

She still couldn’t believe that her best friend was actually getting married. She could only hope that Emma would be as happy being married as Erzsébet herself had been when she had been married to her great love, Roderich.

“Well, I am the bride. Everyone should be looking at me.” The blonde answered, with tears in her own eyes.

“Don’t cry, Emma, please” The brunette begged her, while she went over and hugged her Belgian friend. “I spend nearly an hour getting your make up just right. You can’t ruin it now, I want you to look perfect for you big day.”

Belgium hugged her beloved friend back. “I don’t know why I’m so emotional and nervous.” She confessed through dry sobs.

“It’s because your big day is finally here.” Erzsebét reassured her. “Remember how much fun it was to get everything ready for it?”

She regretted answering her phone when she only heard her best friend scream her name into her ear.

“Was that really necessary?” the Hungarian complained, though she doubted her friend even listened to her as she continued to talk at such a speed that Hungary didn’t understand a word she was saying.

“So?” Emma said to her after a while. “Aren’t you happy for me?”

Her silence prompted the woman on the other end of the conversation to speak again.

“I’m happy Arthur proposed to me.” Belgium said, a little hurt at the lack of response from her best friend.

“WHAT?!”

She knew she would have regretted it more if she hadn’t answered the call.

“You’re ring looks so pretty.”

Hungary was actually impressed by the ring on Emma’s finger.

“Lux also said that. Big brother wanted to know what it’s worth.”

“It’s always about money with your brother.”

“Maybe it wasn’t really about the ring. Lux is convinced he only wants me to have the best things.”

The brunette shrugged. “I think it’s about the money, but if he wants England to only get you the best of the best, it’s also kind of sweet.”

“I’m so happy you’re here to help me choose a dress.”

Emma had her friend in a tight hug as soon as she noticed her. Looking over her friends shoulder, Erzsebét noticed Luxembourg waving at her with a smile on his face.

"Lux has great taste, but I need the opinion of a woman. Ned refused to come along.”

“Your brother isn’t coming?”

“You should have seen the look on his face when I brought the subject up. It was like he was ready to cause a major crises in his government, just so he could say he was too busy to watch me try on dress after dress.”

They friends had a small laugh about it.

“So I decided to have mercy on poor Big Brother.” Emma concluded. “I’ll make him pay for it later.”

The three of them had one of the best days ever.

“Just relax.” She told her bride-to-be best friend.

“I can’t believe Arthur, why would he want those flowers. That man has absolutely no taste.”

“You don’t actually believe that sweetie. This is just like what happened when the two of you were trying to decide on the food. And the wine.”

“You think he has good taste?”

“Oh no, I think your man has the worst taste, but that’s my opinion. Not yours.”

“Thank you, Erzsebét.”

“You also disagreed about the colours on the invitation, the location, to invite France or not..”

“Enough. And of course France is invited.”

“You’ll eventually agree on the flowers, sweetie. Just relax.”

“I remember.” She said softly with a wide smile on her face. “I also remember practicing throwing the bouquet. We both know what to do, don’t we?”

It was a lovely wedding. From the moment her brothers walked her down the aisle to the moment both of them said ‘I do’ to the moment Arthur and Emma were declared husband and wife and finally shared the first kiss of their marriage.

They looked perfectly happy.

The food turned out to be eatable and even good tasting. Everyone enjoyed the party and the opening dance by the bride and groom was lovely to watch.

There had been one other moment that no one would forget anytime soon.

“Everyone get ready.” Hungary told everyone as she moved them into position while Belgium waited with her back turned to the crowd.

“Okay Emma.” She gave the sign. As the newly married woman threw her wedding bouquet to towards the group, as they had practiced, she only had to move on more person.

And gave the Netherlands a little push. Directly into the line of fire.

Instinctively catching the flowers.

Before the man could even register what had happened, his little sister turned around and winked at him.

He was still standing there, holding the flowers when the bride walked up to them. The youngest sibling patting him on the shoulder in a light effort to comfort him.

“Should have just gone shopping for this dress with me.” She told her brother.

And to her best friend she whispered almost inaudible “Let’s see how he will explain this to his girlfriend.”

Before she left them to join her husband.

Her best friend was evil.

a @aphgenficexchange gift for @apoaeon. 

Cozy

The three siblings had spend the whole day wandering through one of her oldest cities, with Belgium showing her brothers all of her favourite places to visit.

At the end of the day, they had settled down on Emma’s comfortable couch in front of the television, eating the Vlaamse frieten they had picked up on the way home. The brothers had insisted on it.

Noticing his younger siblings had fallen asleep, Johan got up from his spot on the couch to look for a blanket or something to cover them with. After checking a few closets, the Dutchman found a quilt.

Returning with to the living room with the quilt in his arms, he threw it over his sleeping brother and sister.

When the blue eyed man was convinced that they were sufficiently tugged in and in no danger of getting could during their sleep, Johan began cleaning up. The containers of their food still on the table. It could wait till the morning, but... stel niet uit tot morgen, wat je vandaag kunt doen.

Besides, most of it would just go into the garbage bin and it would only take a moment to wash the few other things, like their glasses.

The man was glad however, that his sister’s kitchen was down the hall of her living room. Otherwise he would have worried that the sounds would wake them.

Johan was almost finished putting the freshly cleaned dishes back in the cupboards when he heard a shuffling sound behind him.

Turning around he, he found his still half asleep brother standing in the doorway.

“What are you doing, big brother?” he younger man asked as he tried, and failed, to stifle a yawn.

“Nothing, Lux. Get back under that quilt and get some sleep.” Was his response, muttered as softly and gently as he could manage.

It was probably thanks to Henri being tired that he turned around without an further questions or comments and walked back down the hall.

When the oldest of the three siblings returned to the room after finishing cleaning up, he found Emma and Henri sound asleep.

He probably should carry them to their beds. Sleeping like that wasn’t exactly great on their backs or necks.

Yet looking at them sleeping peacefully, he felt how tired he was himself. He should also go to his bed.

What he did instead was reclaim his place between them, readjusting the quilt to properly cover all three of them and before he knew it, the Dutch nation was asleep himself.

When the sunlight hitting his face awoke him the next morning, the Netherlands found himself alone on the couch.

Sitting up a little straighter, he noticed a plate with waffles and a cup of what appeared to be still hot coffee on the table in front of him.

When he looked out of the window, he saw Belgium and Luxembourg standing in his sister’s yard.

He put the quilt aside, and started on his breakfast.

He would fold the quilt before he went outside to greet them.

Johan - Netherlands

Emma - Belgium

Henri - Luxembourg

Stel niet uit tot morgen, wat je vandaag kunt doen - Dutch saying that pretty much means ‘don’t postpone’

Vlaamse frieten - a kind of fries from Belgium

When your older brother might be a lost cause and your younger brother admires him too much.

@aphgenficexchange gift for @phyripo

Hetaween 2019 Day 10 Tragic

Johan felt numb and ignored his friends’ kind gestures, like a hand on his shoulder or their gentle words. Nothing truly reached him anymore and staring over their shoulders, he saw Henri.

How did they believe he could look after him? He could only hope to find Emma one day. It was his fault he let her walk out alone, dressed as little red riding hood to meet her big bad wolf.

Embarrassment

“You’re really doing this to me. I can’t believe you’re actually doing this.” Henri grumbled at his big brother before taking a more accusing tone of voice to add “I trusted you.”

Said older brother seemed to pay no more attention to him than he did to any of Henri’s bosses as he continued to drag the younger man out of his office and away from his work. There was so much work that needed attention!

Not that he dared to look at his own bosses for help, he was so embarrassed that they saw him like this. Pulled out of his office and soon out of the building entirely while clutching a single file of paperwork to his chest. He was completely certain they had been able to listen to the brothers argue in his private office before Ned had slammed that door open and forced the smaller nation out.

“Johan,” he tried again, “I told you how much work I have left to do. I’m sorry I don’t have time to come to the party, you know I’ll really try to be there next time.” The only thing that earned him was Johan quickening his pace.

As soon as they were out of sight, the taller man turned around. “You should thank me, Lux. Emma wanted to drag you out of here herself.”

A brief silence followed. “Think about that.”

He did.

He knew what that would have meant. Childhood stories.

“Thank you.” Still clutching that one file.

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Johan = Netherlands

Emma = Belgium

Henri = Luxembourg

@hetafamilyweek for 2021

Prompts vacation + family photo. Or the one with the aph benelux siblings spending a free day together and ending up taking a bunch of pictures.

He was not about to run to his older siblings, he refused to. Henri was his own independent person. A few strange noises in some foreign hotel would not scare him. So what if the building was old. At his age, not that many buildings were older than him.

There had been that odd feeling about this recently renovated hotel that had him feeling off since the moment stepped inside of it and that feeling had only grown stronger the longer he remained there. Almost succeeding in falling asleep, the small nation was quickly awakened by a sharp and loud noise.

Sitting upright nearly immediately, the blond turned on the light but saw nothing in his room. Hearing the sound again yet seeing nothing, he threw the blanket off of himself. The only things he grabbed on his way out were his phone and his key card.

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Making his way down the hall quickly, mainly to put distance between himself and his room, he found himself in front of his sister’s door. He didn’t want to knock and wake up Emma up in the middle of the night because he heard some noises in his room, but he couldn’t wander the hall all night in his pyjamas and he certainly wasn’t going back to that room alone.

So he knocked on the door. There was no reaction and he knocked again, harder this time. Believing the sound had gone unnoticed by his sleeping sister, he was about to knock on the door again just as Emma opened the door. “What’s wrong? Why are you still awake?” she asked him, not sounding like she had been sleeping at all.

Against his better judgment, still standing out in the hall, he blurted out “I can’t stand the sounds in my room.” His sister nodded in understanding and stepped aside to let him into her room.

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Once inside he noticed some Halloween movie was playing on the television and how loud the volume was. No wonder his sister hadn’t opened the door sooner. Emma was already settled on the couch the room offered, where she had obviously been sitting before. She was eating some popcorn and held out the bowl to him, while staring straight at the screen and clearly doing her best to ignore all the small sounds that could be heard in the room.

Not knowing what else to do, he took some of the popcorn and turned the sound up just a little more.

Neither mentioned it, until they heard an unearthly noise. Emma grabbed hold of her little brother and they ran out of her room and towards their big brother’s room, a floor above theirs and on the other side of the hotel.

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The rapid and urgent sounding knocking on his door roused him from his well earned sleep. He tried to ignore it but the noise wouldn’t allow him to fall asleep again. Throwing the covers of him he walked to the door of his hotel room and threw it wide open.

Ready to throw insults at however was disturbing his sleep, he saw his brother and sister huddled together. Seeing the fear on their faces he quickly ushered them inside. “What happened?” He asked as he shut the door.

“You’re not going to like this answer.” Emma said silently while Henri looked at him with those begging, hopeful eyes.

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She was right and he didn’t like their answer. They had awoken him because they were scared of the noises. They were grown, independent nations. Their fear of some noises should have annoyed him, instead the look on their faces had worried him. There simply were a lot of noises in this building. It might have been renovated recently, but it seemed it hadn’t been the greatest renovating.

That is how the Benelux siblings had somehow ended up trying to sleep in one bed. It was a large bed, but it wasn’t easy to fit all of them on it.

So he held both of his siblings close and waited for them to fall asleep, before going back to sleep himself.

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A sudden and loud knocking that seemed to come from the room’s ceiling startled all of them awake. Their frightened looks angered him and he stormed to his door and threw it open.

No one.

Stepping out of his room he looked around the hallway but still didn’t see anyone and with the layout of this place they couldn’t have been fast enough to be out of sight already. Alright, so no one had been knocking on his door. Going back inside, he picked up the phone to make the hotel staff get whoever had the room above him stay quiet.

He would have walked up there himself, but he didn’t want to leave Emma and Henri alone. Also, the woman minding the phone had told him he would have been standing in front of the door to an empty room.

Empty room. No one staying there. Okay. He wasn’t going to share that information.

He went back to bed and waited for them to fall asleep again.

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Loud noises coming from the wall nearest to the bed woke them all up. He was about to stalk off to the room next door before remembering the was a closet next to his room. How could he forget, he had a friendly conversation with the lady from room cleaning while she had collected some things from that exact closet.

Silencing the hushed whispers of his siblings, he got out of bed and walked over to the desk and wrote down something on a piece of paper.

Opening his door, he stuck the note on the other side and shut the door again.

Once back in the bed he gathered his family in his arms and told them to go back to sleep, leaving no room for arguments.

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Next morning found Henri smiling at his brother after he showed him the sign.

Next morning found Emma sighing at him after she read what he had written down.

“Really Johan, you told whatever was making that noise it had to pay toll before getting inside your room?”

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Prompt "I thought I heard something." for @hetaween-event-2022 with the Benelux siblings.