hiding under a pile of blankets and nibbling on crackers.

rings the doorbell, wondering if he's home.

winces and rolls out from under his protective covering and stumbles to the door opens it. "Who is it?"

"Pryvitannie brat, I'm returning your whip." holds it out to him. "How are you today?"

shakes his head as he takes the whip. "Drank to much."

*too

nods. "Ah, would you like me to make you something to help with the headache?"

nods weakly. "Da, that would be nice."

steps into the house and walks to his kitchen. already has a bottle of gatorade and puts that on the counter. Opens the fridge looking_

for orange juice.

follows her, bumping into some furniture on the way there.

"Brat you should sit before you hurt yourself." mixes the gatorade with some orange juice into a large glass, then puts a tiny amount of_

vodka in and stirs it up. "Drink this, you will feel better." sets the glass in front of him.

pulls out a chair and collapses into it. He eyes the oddly colored mixture set in front of him, but at this point it seems like nothing_

could make it worse, so he drinks up.

"Drinking some water would help too." sits down with a smaller glass of orange juice and sips.

doesn't respond. He's too busy trying to figure out what he just drank. It was... interesting to say the least.

"The Gatorade has electrolytes, and the orange juice has vitamin C, you need both. There's also some hair of the dog in there."

stares at her. "I hope that was a joke, sestra." He don't think he could handle it if it wasn't.

*doesn't

"Not a real dog brat, it's an American expression ... a tiny bit of vodka."

looks down at the glass. "Ah," he said simply. He knew he was supposed to be trying to quit drinking, but she had said it was only a bit,_

and he wouldn't be drinking anymore for a long while so he took another drink of the mixture.

"Give that a few minutes, you should start to feel better. Have you had much sleep?"

shrugs. "I took a really long nap after passing out, but I wasn't able to sleep through the night..."

"Maybe after the drink I just gave you starts to work, you will be able to sleep some more." looks at her brother's haggard face.

nods tiredly and finishes the drink. A nap sounded wonderful right now.

"Dziakuj for letting me use your whip. It made my costume perfect."

her a weak smile. "You're welcome. Did you have a good time?"

gets the hint of a very faint smile on her face and blushes. "Yes, I had a very good time."

staaaaaaaares at her very hard.

looks at his stare. "Shto?"

decides to be blunt about his suspicions. "You slept with him." It was not a question.

... "Uhm ... " It wasn't a question, so she didn't quite know how to answer. "Is your head feeling better?"

that obvious deflection was obvious. "Sestra..."

"Brat ... I really like him, and he likes me too."

sighs, obviously not happy with this. "But I do not like him..."

shakes her head. "That is between you and him. I will still like him."

grunts, head still hurting to much for this. "If he hurts you, I will hunt him down."

shakes her head. "Alfred won't hurt me."

snorts in contempt, but says nothing. He's not in the mood for fighting.

sighs, "I don't understand you at all."

sips his concotion. "I could say the same."

"You don't understand you either?"

clarifies, "The same thing to you."

"What's hard to understand? Aren't you happy I'm not chasing you everywhere now? I've wasted enough time doing that."

sighs. "Da, I am. But to choose to chase after him now..."

"I'm not chasing him. He enjoys my company."

|"Apparently so." .___.

"Is that so bad? That someone likes me back?" frowns at him. "Am I really that unlovable?"

|"Nyet, that is not true. I am just saying, if he's fucking you, he obviously enjoys your company quite a bit."

blushes from her brother's harsh words. "You make it sound so dirty."

shrugs and finishes of his drink.

*off

"I enjoyed my time with him, I hope we get to spend more time together."

gets up from the table and puts his cup in the sink. "I am sure you do."

"You won't interfere?" wonders if there's room to hope for such a thing, can't even hold an election without her brother interfering.

doesn't think there is much hope of that. "I can't promise anything," he replies, trying to sound at least a little bit diplomatic about it.

"He won't hurt my feelings. He likes me brat, he really does."

sighs and gives her an emotionless glance. "People... especially people like him, will always find ways to surprise you."

"What do you mean, 'people like him'? You make him sound like he's an alien."

frowns. "He is different. He's a selfish, greedy, capitalist."

"Brat, you've become something of a capitalist yourself lately." glances up at him.

snorts, trying to control his anger. "Because I have had no choice. He ruined me, sestra. He threw me to the ground and spit in my face. And

now you are dating him. Can you understand my frustration, or are you just that dense?"

"You would be communist again if you could?" has no room to talk, her country is still run as if the Soviet Union never ended.

shrugged. "If that's what was best for my people, da."