[He doesn't want to move. He doesn't want to crawl out from underneath the safety of his bed into a too-large, crowded room in a too-large, crowded building in a too-large, crowded city filled with people he can't understand in multiple ways and who look at him like he's a danger when all he's done is help. He doesn't want to address people that bang heavily against his door with no regard for those that just want to be left alone in the peace of silence!! Even if...it's a familiar voice calling his name...
It takes a while, but Lalli drags himself out and reluctantly gets to his feet. Forcing his arms to comply, he opens up the door to stare into the face of panic. Please be quiet, lovable idiot...]
( The look of panic immediately melts...Emil is simple. Lalli is still there, and that's the most important thing. He puts a hand on Lalli's shoulder and sighs, absolutely relieved. Still, why can't he feel him in his mind??? )
Thank goodness. I thought you'd disappeared somewhere. ( Emil looks at Lalli intently, trying to yet again try and push his way through with telepathy but not feeling he has the capacity. Lalli also looks forlorn -- more so than usual -- which might mean he can't telepathically send messages either. It's important to him, after all, so it could explain the melancholy? )
Can you feel that? Hear it at all? ( He's still trying to send something, anything through to no avail. It doesn't really upset him, if he's lost his telepathy, but it certainly is inconvenient and saddening for Lalli's sake. )
[He fights the urge to smack away Emil's hand, even if every part of him is screaming to push away. It only gets worse as he goes on... Did Emil not notice, or was he just that insistent on being a blathering idiot? Lalli shouldn't be surprised, really, since it had never stopped him from talking all the time before, but now... Now it felt like a jab to his heart mocking him with every word and expectant lilt to his tone. He must be asking him something.
He's certain it isn't the answer Emil's looking for, and he knows it will mean nothing to him, but it's the only answer he's got now.]
( The look on Emil's face falls from relief to deflated disappointment almost immediately. He knows that melodic gibberish -- or, more correct, he doesn't know that gibberish outside of a handful of words. None of what Lalli said is at all parsable, outside of his name.
Okay. Okay. Don't freak out, this is...workable. )
I...don't know what you said...but that's alright! It's just like old times, okay? ( Whether or not he's fully settled into that idea isn't exactly legible due to his look of panic. That hand Lalli is so concerned about is withdrawn to point between the two of them, then he sort of circles his fingers around backwards. That gets punctuated with a hesitant thumbs up.
[A thumbs up... A thumbs up?! How delusional could one idiot possibly get? Suppressing a growl, Lalli steps away from the door to emphatically give Emil two thumbs down...then kick the door shut. This is bad, stupid!!! He's real mad about it!
Anyway, he's gonna go crawl under his bed again like a shitty gremlin, please drag him out.]
( Oh my fucking god...well, that happened. Emil sits there, stunned for a moment, before he tries the door and is relieved when it's not locked. Hello, any of Lalli's roommates -- hey, Ruby -- excuse him while he makes his way to Lalli's room.
He opens the door carefully, not even knocking. At first he blinks at Lalli not being visible, but he knows him better than that. He surveys the room and its emptiness before crouching down to look under the bed.
Hi, fair gremlin. )
Will you get out from there? ( Emil motions for him to come out with his hand as well. No dragging yet but he's not adverse to the idea. )
[He gets a grumble for his efforts. Lalli has himself pressed against the wall and his arms are stubbornly crossed as he observes Emil's miming. It's not particularly comfortable, but he's not particularly comfortable with any part of this situation! He doesn't understand anyone around him, not even the one person he was supposed to be able to rely on throughout all of this...]
( Well mister, you seem to be getting some of the memo, so there's that!! Emil knows he's being defiant, not misunderstanding his signal. Okay, time for some attempted grabbing and dragging.
Flattening himself on the floor, Emil reaches in with an arm and his fingers brush against Lalli before he takes a grip on his arm, right under his shoulder. If this little shit bites him... )
[OH NO, HE'S FIGHTING AGAINST LALLI'S BULLSHIT. Heck. Unexpected, honestly, and Lalli doesn't have time to consider biting him. He's almost completely out by the time he starts to weakly struggle with his stringbean arms and ends up knocking his head against the bottom of his bed.]
Ow!
[Nngh, this all sucks, and his nails scrabble blindly to find skin to dig into. He's not super successful.]
( When you forcibly grab and drag someone from under a bed and they end up getting hurt...unforeseen results. Emil's trying to roll out of the way, too, so Lalli has room to like...exist. It's not exactly successful. He does let go of Lalli and pushes himself up slightly. )
I'm sorry! ( Uhhh Emil isn't sure what to do about that, or about Lalli digging into his own skin. His impulse reaction is to sit up and grab his wrists as best as possible, also as gently as he can muster while he's a little freaked out. ) Try to calm down, everything is okay!
[He can catch snippets, this time. These are familiar, infuriating words, and he opens his eyes again to glower even as he clenches his hands into fists and he stills.]
( That death glare tells him that he might have maybe sort of fucked up. Ugh!!! )
I know you're frustrated, but it's not so bad. There are ways around it with me, with other people. It's not the best situation, but...it's not hopeless!
( Except the antithesis of his point is obvious in how he can't figure out how to get this sentiment across without some example. How do you pantomime this? )
[He just. Keeps. Talking. He's probably saying something wonderfully optimistic and stupid, because that's who he is, but Lalli can't even begin to guess which tactic Emil is taking this time.]
Emil. I don't know what you're telling me. Please just give up...
[This is the kind of struggle that can only hurt, he's sure of it. Why doesn't Emil see?]
( Ugh! Back home his communications with Lalli were either directives or strictly something that could be understood as emotions. This is more nuanced. How does he convey these feelings to Lalli as a form of reassurance? He doesn't even know if that reassurance will work, but he has to try.
He gets an idea, suddenly, that he thinks may make things easier. He wants to make sure Lalli looks at him, grabbing his face potentially, and Emil makes a sloppy hand gesture that he hopes come off as "stay here, I'll be right back." With that, he's off. Hold up, babe, he's coming back. )
[Ugh. Whatever. Back under the bed he scoots, but not as far this time. His elbows and nose peek out, but only grumpily so as he buries his chin in his crossed arms and he waits.]
( Thank goodness this idiot left Lalli's apartment door open -- or maybe that's irresponsible, sorry everyone else. He rushes back to his own apartment and returns to Lalli's room in about five minutes, rather out of breath. The elevator was gone and he didn't want to chance Lalli misunderstanding.
He sits on the floor, fiddling with his tablet for a good few minutes. Despite their language barrier returning, that's coven business -- not Shehui business. They still have translingual media consumption capabilities. God bless retinal technology?? Well, Emil doesn't know how it works, but he does know he's still understood the copious amounts of alien television he's been watching.
When he shows the tablet to Lalli, it's paused on a still from some strange piece of media. There's a dramatic scene going on, as evident by the woman in the freeze frame holding back tears, but he points to the subtitles. Everything will be okay, Sleo.
Ignore the name, that's not the important part. Also, everything isn't okay for Sleo, but they can talk about the plot of this movie at another time. )
[It takes a while for Lalli to give up and focus on the tablet, stubbornly dwelling in his bad mood, and...
Everything will be okay, Sleo.
He’d understood Emil earlier, as much as he could when blindly judging by tone and expression. He’d seen the desperate optimism he clung to. He’d recognized the attempt at comfort — and he’d already dismissed it as worthless.
Slowly, Lalli slinks back out into the room and takes the tablet from Emil so he can shift into a comfortable position with it and trace the air over the words — he won’t risk touching it and losing the current image to some stupid part of the movie or a menu. He breathes in. Breathes out. He can read this. He can get the exact meaning of the words, Sleo or not.]
( Well, that's a good sign. Except, buddy, he kind of needs that tablet to answer your question to the best of his ability. He thankfully understands some key words, if only based on a vague memory and guesswork. Finland, Sweden. Emil knows exactly what he's talking about. )
It's...fixable. ( Except he has no idea how to convey that or pantomime it in an understandable way. Sorry, but he has to take the tablet back and do another few minutes of searching. The best he can come up with without taking all day is another subtitle still that isn't...exactly what he wants. Someone is yelling into a rotary phone, extremely animated and not as gentle as he'd like to convey his message; "Do something about it!" He hands the tablet back very...cautiously. )
I don't mean it like that, but...! You know! We can, we. Us?? ( please tell him you know what he means and he didn't make it worse )
[He relinquishes the tablet when it's reached for, letting the sight of Emil working hard for an answer instead of thoughtless spouting something nonsensical off soothe him.
The message he gets is...]
Hey.
[This is terrible? He's offended, and lifts a flat glare to see how Emil's going to salvage it. At least he seemed to know that the tone of the picture was wrong, and he was stressing a few words that had Lalli reaching back into his memory to break it down from the clunky Swedish into the comfortable, breezy Finnish he understood. He thinks...he gets it...
Sorry movie, or show, or whatever -- Lalli needs a different app. He opens up the alarm system and starts scrolling through, watching the number get bigger, bigger... Until he thinks it's big enough to suit his needs.
"Wake me up in: 1,417 hours and 00 minutes."]
It takes so long. I like...I like knowing what you say. Doesn't it hurt? [Oh, there was a word he knows Emil...sort of learned. Hand formed into a fist, he taps it against his chest, over his heart.] Medic. Feels like I need a medic.
( Emil's breath is quick until he realizes Lalli gets that it's not exactly what he was looking for. He wishes he had better resources, but this is as good as it gets as far as he knows.
Lalli's words are hard to understand, but he does catch on. The illustration makes it more clear; he may have thought Lalli was trying to express his feelings were hurt for a different reason. )
I'm...sorry. I don't like it either. What else can we do though? ( Emil's forlorn look is all he can really offer in terms of understanding, though he pairs it with an emphatic nod. For as optimistic as he can be, he still can't fight reality. )
[He lets the tablet rest in his lap again, then limply sets it on the floor between then so he can curl his arms around his knees instead. That was another apology. Emil didn't have an answer for him, this time.]
I'm so stupid. I thought it would just...work. Things are hard, but you're...simple. There's nothing complicated about you. So I thought...
[Lalli sighs and buries his face into his knees.]
I thought I could have something for once. Just once.
( The fact that his efforts have become fruitless makes Emil's face fall further. There's still a lot about Lalli that he doesn't know, but he does understand that when Lalli sinks, he can sink far. He doesn't know exactly what his boyfriend is saying, but it's...incredibly defeated. That's not good.
Emil unbunches his legs and crawls over to Lalli's hunched up form. Sorry you don't like being touched, and he might have to shove his hand in here, but Emil places his hand on top of Lalli's heart; the place where he'd had his own hand a minute ago. Maybe he should be a little more emphatic with his thoughts? Subtlety doesn't work well with a language barrier. )
It does hurt me. I hurt. ( He tries to repeat the sentence in his best Finnish, even if it's still a tad bit sloppy. ) But...I know we can do things in the meantime. I liked you before I knew what you were saying, and that won't change now...and we found ways to understand each other then too.
( Lalli probably has no fucking clue what he's saying, but it never stopped Emil before...why would it stop him now. ) It will be okay -- with me, with everyone else.
[Lalli jumps at the hand pressing against him, head jerking up, but only only so he can stare out into the space ahead of him. It was...weird to know beyond a doubt at that someone could feel that painful hammering. Before Emil can decide that with the end of his speech comes the end of the contact, Lalli reaches up to grip around the other boy's wrist. Tight. Unforgiving. Needy.
...
He still doesn't look at him as he loosens his fingers and shifts to adjust their bodies. He pushes him back some to create space, and opens his arm to the side so he can crawl into that space and curl Emil around himself. He gives Emil's wrist another squeeze, too tight, then pulls his arms around him, praying he gets the picture.]
Make me understand you're here. It's hard to feel it.
[And as much as he hopes Emil is obedient to his words, he finds himself equally grateful that he can't actually understand them. How pathetic he must sound... He can't imagine ever having the strength to say something like that, and so it could only come out when he was already broken and vulnerable. He would have been such a disappointment.]
( Touching Lalli forcefully is a bit of a risk, and at the very least Emil thought maybe he would have just shuddered and had no change. Wanting to be touched more is ultimately a surprise. But it's a good one.
His first reaction is simply to be alarmed because of the out of character need to be touched -- the initial grab he thought may be more of a threatening anger. Instead he finds that Lalli creates his own pocket to be held in. Truth be told, he could feel it -- not as much as Lalli thought he'd be able to, but his hammering heart was hard to miss through his thin chest. His own is pounding now, though maybe for a different reason.
The squeeze he gives him is initially tight, though not as tight as Lalli's thin-fingered grip. Emil doesn't need words to understand that gesture, even if what he was verbally offered was more specific. If Lalli needs that reassurance, then he's more than happy to give it. )
[While he ultimately calms at the hold, Lalli is far from completely relaxed. For a while, he still squirrels around, until he finally ends up with his legs wrapped securely around his waist, fingers coming up to dig in Emil's shoulder blades, and his face tucked against his neck. The pressure was a way to suppress his anxiety, but it probably didn't feel particularly kind to be on the receiving end of, if that wasn't something helpful to your mindset to begin with. He can't retreat underneath his bed, though, so Emil will have to deal.
Maybe he'll be more forgiving of this if, after a while, he stops digging his nails in and noses at his cheek. Physical gestures were easier than words. A universal language.]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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It takes a while, but Lalli drags himself out and reluctantly gets to his feet. Forcing his arms to comply, he opens up the door to stare into the face of panic. Please be quiet, lovable idiot...]
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Thank goodness. I thought you'd disappeared somewhere. ( Emil looks at Lalli intently, trying to yet again try and push his way through with telepathy but not feeling he has the capacity. Lalli also looks forlorn -- more so than usual -- which might mean he can't telepathically send messages either. It's important to him, after all, so it could explain the melancholy? )
Can you feel that? Hear it at all? ( He's still trying to send something, anything through to no avail. It doesn't really upset him, if he's lost his telepathy, but it certainly is inconvenient and saddening for Lalli's sake. )
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He's certain it isn't the answer Emil's looking for, and he knows it will mean nothing to him, but it's the only answer he's got now.]
Emil. This...won't work.
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Okay. Okay. Don't freak out, this is...workable. )
I...don't know what you said...but that's alright! It's just like old times, okay? ( Whether or not he's fully settled into that idea isn't exactly legible due to his look of panic. That hand Lalli is so concerned about is withdrawn to point between the two of them, then he sort of circles his fingers around backwards. That gets punctuated with a hesitant thumbs up.
Get it??? He's got this, bro, don't worry. )
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Anyway, he's gonna go crawl under his bed again like a shitty gremlin, please drag him out.]
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He opens the door carefully, not even knocking. At first he blinks at Lalli not being visible, but he knows him better than that. He surveys the room and its emptiness before crouching down to look under the bed.
Hi, fair gremlin. )
Will you get out from there? ( Emil motions for him to come out with his hand as well. No dragging yet but he's not adverse to the idea. )
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There's no point. Don't you get it?
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Flattening himself on the floor, Emil reaches in with an arm and his fingers brush against Lalli before he takes a grip on his arm, right under his shoulder. If this little shit bites him... )
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Ow!
[Nngh, this all sucks, and his nails scrabble blindly to find skin to dig into. He's not super successful.]
I don't know what you want from me!
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I'm sorry! ( Uhhh Emil isn't sure what to do about that, or about Lalli digging into his own skin. His impulse reaction is to sit up and grab his wrists as best as possible, also as gently as he can muster while he's a little freaked out. ) Try to calm down, everything is okay!
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What.
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I know you're frustrated, but it's not so bad. There are ways around it with me, with other people. It's not the best situation, but...it's not hopeless!
( Except the antithesis of his point is obvious in how he can't figure out how to get this sentiment across without some example. How do you pantomime this? )
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Emil. I don't know what you're telling me. Please just give up...
[This is the kind of struggle that can only hurt, he's sure of it. Why doesn't Emil see?]
Very very bad. Okay? Bad. Do you understand?
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He gets an idea, suddenly, that he thinks may make things easier. He wants to make sure Lalli looks at him, grabbing his face potentially, and Emil makes a sloppy hand gesture that he hopes come off as "stay here, I'll be right back." With that, he's off. Hold up, babe, he's coming back. )
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Mrrrh...
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He sits on the floor, fiddling with his tablet for a good few minutes. Despite their language barrier returning, that's coven business -- not Shehui business. They still have translingual media consumption capabilities. God bless retinal technology?? Well, Emil doesn't know how it works, but he does know he's still understood the copious amounts of alien television he's been watching.
When he shows the tablet to Lalli, it's paused on a still from some strange piece of media. There's a dramatic scene going on, as evident by the woman in the freeze frame holding back tears, but he points to the subtitles. Everything will be okay, Sleo.
Ignore the name, that's not the important part. Also, everything isn't okay for Sleo, but they can talk about the plot of this movie at another time. )
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Everything will be okay, Sleo.
He’d understood Emil earlier, as much as he could when blindly judging by tone and expression. He’d seen the desperate optimism he clung to. He’d recognized the attempt at comfort — and he’d already dismissed it as worthless.
Slowly, Lalli slinks back out into the room and takes the tablet from Emil so he can shift into a comfortable position with it and trace the air over the words — he won’t risk touching it and losing the current image to some stupid part of the movie or a menu. He breathes in. Breathes out. He can read this. He can get the exact meaning of the words, Sleo or not.]
What about home...? Ehnn — Finland. Sweden.
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It's...fixable. ( Except he has no idea how to convey that or pantomime it in an understandable way. Sorry, but he has to take the tablet back and do another few minutes of searching. The best he can come up with without taking all day is another subtitle still that isn't...exactly what he wants. Someone is yelling into a rotary phone, extremely animated and not as gentle as he'd like to convey his message; "Do something about it!" He hands the tablet back very...cautiously. )
I don't mean it like that, but...! You know! We can, we. Us?? ( please tell him you know what he means and he didn't make it worse )
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The message he gets is...]
Hey.
[This is terrible? He's offended, and lifts a flat glare to see how Emil's going to salvage it. At least he seemed to know that the tone of the picture was wrong, and he was stressing a few words that had Lalli reaching back into his memory to break it down from the clunky Swedish into the comfortable, breezy Finnish he understood. He thinks...he gets it...
Sorry movie, or show, or whatever -- Lalli needs a different app. He opens up the alarm system and starts scrolling through, watching the number get bigger, bigger... Until he thinks it's big enough to suit his needs.
"Wake me up in: 1,417 hours and 00 minutes."]
It takes so long. I like...I like knowing what you say. Doesn't it hurt? [Oh, there was a word he knows Emil...sort of learned. Hand formed into a fist, he taps it against his chest, over his heart.] Medic. Feels like I need a medic.
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Lalli's words are hard to understand, but he does catch on. The illustration makes it more clear; he may have thought Lalli was trying to express his feelings were hurt for a different reason. )
I'm...sorry. I don't like it either. What else can we do though? ( Emil's forlorn look is all he can really offer in terms of understanding, though he pairs it with an emphatic nod. For as optimistic as he can be, he still can't fight reality. )
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I'm so stupid. I thought it would just...work. Things are hard, but you're...simple. There's nothing complicated about you. So I thought...
[Lalli sighs and buries his face into his knees.]
I thought I could have something for once. Just once.
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Emil unbunches his legs and crawls over to Lalli's hunched up form. Sorry you don't like being touched, and he might have to shove his hand in here, but Emil places his hand on top of Lalli's heart; the place where he'd had his own hand a minute ago. Maybe he should be a little more emphatic with his thoughts? Subtlety doesn't work well with a language barrier. )
It does hurt me. I hurt. ( He tries to repeat the sentence in his best Finnish, even if it's still a tad bit sloppy. ) But...I know we can do things in the meantime. I liked you before I knew what you were saying, and that won't change now...and we found ways to understand each other then too.
( Lalli probably has no fucking clue what he's saying, but it never stopped Emil before...why would it stop him now. ) It will be okay -- with me, with everyone else.
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...
He still doesn't look at him as he loosens his fingers and shifts to adjust their bodies. He pushes him back some to create space, and opens his arm to the side so he can crawl into that space and curl Emil around himself. He gives Emil's wrist another squeeze, too tight, then pulls his arms around him, praying he gets the picture.]
Make me understand you're here. It's hard to feel it.
[And as much as he hopes Emil is obedient to his words, he finds himself equally grateful that he can't actually understand them. How pathetic he must sound... He can't imagine ever having the strength to say something like that, and so it could only come out when he was already broken and vulnerable. He would have been such a disappointment.]
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His first reaction is simply to be alarmed because of the out of character need to be touched -- the initial grab he thought may be more of a threatening anger. Instead he finds that Lalli creates his own pocket to be held in. Truth be told, he could feel it -- not as much as Lalli thought he'd be able to, but his hammering heart was hard to miss through his thin chest. His own is pounding now, though maybe for a different reason.
The squeeze he gives him is initially tight, though not as tight as Lalli's thin-fingered grip. Emil doesn't need words to understand that gesture, even if what he was verbally offered was more specific. If Lalli needs that reassurance, then he's more than happy to give it. )
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Maybe he'll be more forgiving of this if, after a while, he stops digging his nails in and noses at his cheek. Physical gestures were easier than words. A universal language.]
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