Ludwig Beilschmidt pressed his palm against his eyes and slowly brought it down his face as he sighed heavily. He picked up the phone and stared at the dial pad. Whose bright idea was it to have a drinking contest? The first one to lose had to do what the other two said and SOMEHOW, Ludwig was the one to lose. The other two contestants were his older brother Gilbert and his best friend Feliciano Vargas.

He absolutely did not expect to lose AT ALL. But that contest was intense. Ludwig was sure that Feliciano would be the first to lose but surprisingly, the guy could hold his liquor pretty well. It was all Gilbert's fault. If he didn't… Ludwig shuddered as he suppressed the reason why he lost to Gilbert who ran to the washroom soon after Ludwig had been defeated. He vowed never to speak of his humiliation again.

Since Gilbert was out of commission, Feliciano told Ludwig what he had to do: He had to call the girl he had a crush on,  ______________,  and ask to spend the day doing whatever she wants, no questions asked. Ludwig truly did like _____________ but has yet to gather his courage to ask her to be with him. _______________ was a cheerful girl who was hard working and quite an athlete but Ludwig didn't know much about her as much as he would like to. But the issue was actually talking to her alone.

This was absurd! He was the toughest, strongest and smartest student at Hetalia Academy yet he couldn't say two words clearly to a girl let alone ______________ if it had nothing to do with work. For once, thank God for alcohol. He had enough to force his courage out but not enough to be a complete jackass.

He turned to Feliciano who gave him a thumbs up and a huge grin.

"I can't do this, Feliciano. I'd much rather let you make a mess of my kitchen."

"Nonsense!" Feliciano grinned. "You're big and strong and a nice guy! How could ____________ turn you down? You want flash cards?"

"Er… No. I can do this." He shakily took his phone in his hand. "It-it's not so hard." He began pushing the numbers based on the first five letters of ___________'s first name and last name. That was how students were identified at the academy. He pressed 'Talk' and got a dial tone. "It's ringing! It's ringing!" Ludwig said excitedly. "This isn't so hard!"

"City Morgue. Bring out your dead." A man on the other end answered. Ludwig yelped and slammed the phone on the cradle while turning bright red.

"Vee? What's wrong?"

"Wrong number. I must've been off by one number." Ludwig said nervously. He just called the city morgue. And they used that cheezy line from that British show. The only thing that could be worse if he blew the conversation with _________________.

"Oh! I forgot to give you this!" Feliciano handed a small black book and flipped to ____________. Ludwig was WAY off dialing her number. He picked up the phone again and dialed the number that was next to her name. After a couple of seconds the line picked up.

"Hello?" ______________ sounded like she was out of breath.

"Good Evening, ______________. It's Ludwig."

"Oh, Ludwig. This is a surprise. What's up?" She asked.

"Well… I was wondering if you were free tomorrow because I would like to spend the day with you."

"I only have to do one thing tomorrow but other than that, I'm free." Ludwig turned to Feliciano on what to do next and he motioned Ludwig to continue.

"Mind if I join you for that one task?"

"If you want to. But I plan on getting up really early. And I mean REALLY early. As in 5:30 AM." Ludwig's mind automatically thought that she trains in the morning which was good because he finally had a common interest between ______________ and himself.

"Oh, so it's a morning run? I do those all the time. I can do that." Ludwig said while he was shaking.

"Well… Sort of." ______________ said slowly. "I wanted to go to the central park around 6 so-"

"Central park, 6 AM, got it. See you tomorrow." Ludwig said quickly. "I… I did it." A shaky smile slowly grew on his face. "I actually talked to her and I'm going out with her."

"Good for you, Ludwig!" Feliciano smiled. "Now go to bed so you don't feel sick in the morning."

The next morning, Ludwig somehow managed to completely avoid a hangover and got up at 5:30. He was going to gather his courage, swallow his pride and go for a run with ______________ then spend the rest of the day with her. And he wasn't going to even think about backing down, no matter how much his mind was begging him to turn back.

Before Ludwig could leave, he was stopped by his brother who was holding leashes in his hand.

"You walk the dogs. Now. That is my demand for last night." Gilbert growled. He looked like hell with dark eyes and a tired looking expression which means that he was going through a horrible hangover.

"Can't it wait until later?"

"West. Me. Headache. You. Going. Out." Gilbert grunted as Aster, Blackie and Berlitz came bolting into the main foyer, extremely eager for their walk. "They won't stop bugging me until someone takes them for a walk and I need to go back to sleep."

"Oh, alright." Ludwig sighed as he put the leashes on his dogs and headed to the park. The dogs were well trained and walked at the same speed as Ludwig, although they were pulling him forward and bringing tension on their leashes a bit.

When he arrived, he found ______________ in a (favourite colour) sweatshirt, shorts, dirty white running shoes and a baseball cap. There was a wagon behind her that had a blanket covered most of it. And whatever it was in the wagon, it was large.

Ludwig cleared his throat and went up to _________________. "Good morning, _______________." He got three words out clearly. So far, so good.

"Hi Ludwig!" She smiled at him. "I didn't know you had dogs. They're adorable!" Dogs, yes, talk about dogs. That was one of Ludwig's specialties and one of the things he couldn't mess up on. All three of them were eager to meet ________________.

"Y-yes, I hope you don't mind that I brought them along."

"Not at all. What kind of dogs are they?" _____________ slowly extended her hand to pet the three dogs.

"Aster is a Hovawart, Blackie is a German Shepard and Berlitz is a Doberman."

"They really are adorable." ______________ smiled at Ludwig. "I used to have a German Shepard named Heidi when I was little. I remember my mom telling me that when we went to get her, I was still a baby back then, she was the only puppy that approached me when I was crying in my carrier and she put her head in my lap  and I instantly stopped crying. She's been like a second mother to me since we got her." _____________ was talking so quickly that Ludwig had a bit of a hard time processing her information at first then his mind flipped to 'Feliciano translation' and then he understood her.

'Do all women talk like Feliciano? Maybe they would be easier to talk to if that was the case.' Ludwig thought.

"That's… quite an intelligent dog. Um… What is in your wagon?"

"Balloons." _____________ chimed as she started to walk and Ludwig followed her. Perhaps she had to sell some balloons, Ludwig thought, but where would she sell them at this time of day? "And it cost me like 50 bucks for them." Ludwig was shocked to hear this. A package of balloons cost no more than a few dollars but by the size of what the bulge under the blanket was, she could've had at least a hundred.

"Is that so?" Ludwig followed her through the park until they were at the base at the bottom of the hill. There was a good running track on the other side and Ludwig thought that she was going to leave her wagon nearby and run some laps. It seemed reasonable but what was she going to do with those balloons?

Ludwig followed ______________ up the hill until she came to a stop at the top. They could clearly see the track around the park's lake and between them and the track was a vast empty field, save for several pigeons that were hanging around in the field.

"This is gonna be so cool! And with those birds there, it's gonna be even better!" ____________ said excitedly.

"What exactly do you plan to do, _______________?" Ludwig asked slowly. ______________ calmed down and turned her head back to him. Whatever it was, he prayed it wasn't something foolish and possibly humiliating.

"Oh, I'm just going to release these balloons in a few minutes. Y-you still want to join me? You can just watch if you want." For what? Ludwig still couldn't understand why she wanted to do this pointless activity.

Ludwig could swear that he saw an apparition of Feliciano standing behind ________________ and looked like he was scolding Ludwig.

"You promised the ENTIRE day, whatever she wants, no matter what!" Feliciano's voice echoed in his mind. Ludwig was a man of his word and he did say that he would do this with ______________. Who knows? It might be something that could be good for them.

"I don't mind. I welcome any new experience." He said politely. "If you need me to help, I would oblige."

"Thanks. You don't need to be so formal Ludwig." ______________ smiled. "Although…" Her gaze was directed at his dogs. "May I use your dogs to help? I was thinking of tying the balloons loosely around their collars and we could run down the hill then BAM! They would fly away!" ______________ spread her arms out as she said 'BAM' along with a huge grin on her face.

Ludwig laughed a little bit to himself. That was another reason why he liked ______________, she wasn't afraid to be her (eccentric) self in front of others but kept his expression solemn to avoid laughing because he thought he might hurt her feelings if he laughed out loud.

"I have no problem with that. They won't mind as long as they could have a good run."

"Alright, let's hurry! It's almost time!" They quickly got the balloons out of the wagon and slid about thirty three strings in each of Ludwig's dog's collars. The dogs sat patiently as their leashes were taken off and they were eagerly awaiting the order to run from Ludwig who in turn was looking at ______________, waiting for her to say when.

"Wait for it…" _____________ stared up ahead where the sky was a bright pink and blue hue and the sun was beginning to rise. Once the bright sphere touched the horizon, ______________ said 'now' and she grabbed Ludwig's hand as they ran down the hill. Ludwig managed to order his dogs to follow as he was being dragged by ______________ halfway down the hill. Ludwig did think it was a little strange that she would hold his hand like this, like she was guiding a child but part of him didn't mind. She let go once they were near the bottom, much to Ludwig's disappointment as he wanted to keep holding her hand a little bit longer but thought she was feeling awkward about it and respected that, and started chasing the flock of birds that were hanging around until they took flight.

Ludwig watched as the birds were flying away then stared in awe at the balloons that were being released by Aster, Blackie and Berlitz who were barking in a way that made them sound very excited as the balloon strings slipped from their collars. The missing laughter was filled in with ______________'s laugh as she chased the birds then watched as the balloons took off.

"It's working!~" She laughed as she ran back to Ludwig and continued to run down the path with him. The dogs were chasing them and _______________ continued to laugh like a child as she and Ludwig ran under the balloons that were ascending and flying above them.

"________________, I don't understand what the purpose of this is. Is this some kind of training?" Ludwig asked in shock as he was hanging on to his hat with his free hand.

"Who said anything about training? This is just for fun!"

"Fun…" Ludwig murmured softly. Come to think of it, he hasn't really had time for fun and he couldn't remember the last time when he had pointless amusing events like this. There was no one else here other than the girl that he likes so who's going to know? Ludwig smiled ran a little bit faster, still hanging on to _______________'s hand and pulling her behind him. To his surprise, he found himself laughing as well as they ran after the balloons.

Ludwig wasn't paying attention to the path and he made himself trip, taking ____________ down with him down a small slope. He wasn't hurt when he fell and he was more worried about ________________ hurting herself. To his surprised, she was on top of him, unharmed, and their lips brushed against each other. Ludwig instantly turned red and hoped that _______________ didn't realize what had happened. She lifted herself up off of him, giggling a little bit and blushing lightly.

"Sorry Ludwig. I wasn't expecting that. Are you alright?" Aster, Blackie and Berlitz came down the small hill they rolled down from, licking Ludwig and _______________'s face as if they were making sure that they were alright.

"Well… It could be better… I mean… it could've been worse." Ludwig said nervously.

"You think it could've been better, huh?" ______________ leaned down and gave him a proper kiss which made Ludwig's heart beat a thousand miles per minute because he was unsure of what to do.

"H-how's that for better?" ______________ smiled nervously with her blush intensifying.

"Why did you do that?" Ludwig asked.

"Well…" She put her two index fingers together and stared at the ground. "I've liked you for a really long time. Isn't that what you're supposed to do when you like someone? To be honest with you, you're the first boy I've kissed. I love you Ludwig, and I'm really happy that you came with me today." _____________ smiled. With the sunrise's light reflecting on her, it made her prettier in Ludwig's eyes and made him feel warm inside.

He was unsure of how to respond to her confession but his body seemed to act on his own. He took her chin gently with his fingers and returned her kiss. It was slightly awkward on his part but he was pretty sure that he did it right. (At least that's what he figured after reading a whole bunch of romance novels.)

"Ja… I… love you… I'm sorry. I really do love you but I don't know how this works. I've never had experience before."

"Well then, this will be a new learning experience for the both of us, huh?" ______________ smiled again.

When Blackie barked, Ludwig turned his head and Berlitz had a red balloon in his mouth, waiting for his owner to take it.

"Oh. Looks like we had one left." Ludwig said. "By the way, _______________. What was the point of this whole venture?"

"I told you, it was just for fun.~ I think the town could use something different now and then." ______________ rested her chin in her palm as she propped her elbow on her leg. "Why don't you release the last balloon?"

"Alright." Berlitz let Ludwig take the string from his mouth and Ludwig gave ______________ one last glance as he set the balloon free.