three random words from random word generator: shivering, typical, talk
november 15th 2018

with him being the nation itself, people would take one look at alfred and say that he's a typical american. even though he isn't really, he does have some of the american stereotypes. he guesses it's all that matters. he likes talking, he likes stem and aliens and action movies with bombass cgi. he's even blonde and blue-eyed. pretty much your (stereo)typical blonde american man, now, isn't he?

but as much as he seems like it, he really isn't. how can he be, when he's actually a nation whose lifespan can go on for several centuries? and just like what his name suggests, the united states of america is a complicated and vast country with many races and different cultures combined. not to mention he also bears a short but bloody history of only over two hundred years. a young nation, he is, but he has seen enough wars to know what it's like. he talks and talks and talks, cheery and seemingly empty-headed, but it's simply a guise, a facade to hide all of his frustration and struggle inside.

he remembers shivering, shaking violently and unable to move after pearl harbor, remembers being at war with kiku and ludwig and feliciano and- he remembers everything. the revolutionary war, the 1812 war, the civil war, the first and second world war, the vietnam war and many more. everything. even to this day, the grotesque flashbacks come to him every night and make him jerk awake in cold sweat and yet still can't really snap out of the nightmares. those are tremendously horrifying scenes to witness and it's what all nations have to bear with: memories of wars and blood. if any human were to have the same memories as they do, they would go absolutely insane. it's so much more than mankind could ever imagine, with their lifespan so insignificant compared to their countries. they were the only ones able to recall all the goddamn details, and there's no one that the nations could share them with. not human, because they don't understand, and especially not other nations. they could be allies right at this moment, but tomorrow their guns might as well point towards each other for all they know.

it's exceptionally worse for older nations. they have been through so much more than alfred could ever know. he could hardly count how many times arthur had come to him with a bloodied and fatigued body in his childhood, the timeless emerald green so hauntingly exhausted and pained. it was a look alfred didn't think he could forget. athur told the young alfred that he was used to it. but he really doubted it, and he still does. how can anyone get used to being plagued day and night by the sight of their people dying, screaming for help and weeping hysterically over the corpses of their beloved?

arthur can't. alfred can't, no one can.

they have all wondered how their life would be if they were human before. every nation has a human name, and most of them prefer to be called by it. the act distances them, even though only temporarily, from the bloody and heavy nation identity, and lets them just be normal for a little.

in some way, they all are their people's stereotypes. arthur has fair hair and green eyes, loves literature, shakespeare and tea, he cusses like a sailor, smokes and drinks heabvily when he is stressed out. francis is flirty and romantic. ludwig is stiff and serious. and more.

at the same time, they aren't just the stereotypes, they never will be.

but they almost wish they are.