Hazel Hart couldn’t be happier! She has a loving family, a doting boyfriend, is doing well at Uni, but she soon finds out that plans go astray. How far is Hazel Hart willing to go for love?
Love Languages
They like the atmosphere of this nearby park, to relax or study after her last class for the day. Now that his sister is an official teenager and a terror, he can trust her to at least take care of herself without his constant supervision and enjoy more outings with Hazel.
He frowns on the thought of Noire, hoping she remembers to put the sink pipe she had undone the night before back in its place. She had told him she wanted to figure out how the system worked, and he didn’t question where she had obtained a wrench but warned her not to break anything. If her exploration into plumbing goes awry they’d be paying through their nose in next week’s rent.
“This spot!” Hazel’s joyful instruction brings him back from worries about his sister’s amateur tinkering. He’s holding a blanket in his arms and lays it out where Hazel has indicated. It’s right next to the pond, at the edge of where the grass is cut low. Recently cut, he notes, because it smells fresh and heavy with dew.
Hazel sits down on the blanket with her legs folded under her and takes out her class materials from a bag she’d been carrying and Erik slips his backpack from his shoulders. He has online classes but doesn’t have a laptop so he can’t do much but help Hazel study if she wants it. Otherwise, he’s just there to offer her moral support. He loves to spend whatever time he can with her, even something as mundane as watching her study.
“I didn’t tell you before, but this semester I started a language class!” she finally beams up at him. He gives her a pleasant look. Is that what she has been hiding? That is good for her, he didn’t realize she had an interest in studying other languages.
“Which language?”
“I love you.”
Oh.
He blinks in stunned silence.
OH.
His wide-eyed reaction and the sudden prickling feeling running down his arms are not solely because of her admission nor the chilly air.
Her declaration of love was spoken in Rusklavan.
She blushes and he feels the heat of the same creeping into his cheeks as well.
Why does he feel flushed? He knows that she loves him – there’s never been a question if she has or hasn’t. She never had to say it out loud, but now that she has, and has said it in his mother tongue–it seems to change the atmosphere.
The wind picks up around them and tousles her hair. He’s still grappling with how to respond but instinctively kneels and tucks some of the displaced strands out of her face behind her ear.
“Not good I yet am as learn I only words for little month…I think to….” she continues and seems to struggle with the syntax and phraseology–pauses to think about it and get her bearings with a crestfallen expression.
“Do you need help studying it?” he asks in common Simlish.
She nods sadly, and he figures it is because she isn’t as polished as she wanted to be before speaking to him in his native language.
He gives her cheek a touch, to reassure her he is still impressed at her attempt. Rusklavan is not an easy tongue to speak for those who weren’t born into it.
His touch lifts her spirits somewhat, she gives him a weak smile as she grabs a book out of her bag. He sidles up behind her, pulling her close to his chest, and peers over her shoulder, seeing it’s printed in Rusklavan. It’s a standard language textbook. She opens it up and begins to read silently.
“So, you have learned the basics, yes?”
She mumbles in the affirmative. He notices that she has gone stiff–from the cold or her frustration–he can’t tell.
“It will be all right, Hazel, I can help—”
“Do you…love me too?”
She says it so quietly he almost doesn’t hear it. Once he does, though, he can’t believe she has actually asked it, because she would have had to have amnesia of the past couple of years if she were asking him such a thing.
“Of course,” he replies, with a bit more hardness in his voice than is needed. In Ruskslovia, romantic love is announced with soft, intimate gestures or the time spent with one another. Erik always makes time for Hazel, and can’t seem to keep his hands away from her. How can she not see and feel just how much he loves her?
Her eyes turn toward him, her expression still sad, “You’ve never told me you do.”
The comment drives through his heart like an ice pick. He can’t fathom where this is coming from. Her face, contorted with dejection, makes him feel panic; he somehow is upsetting her, “I tell you constantly in every touch, in every moment I spend with you–”
“But never in your own words.”
He blinks, not quite understanding until he does.
Oh.
She needs him to speak it?
OH.
But just saying it seems so empty now when it’s expected. Erik has never been good with words, he learned to be closed-lipped as much of what he said got him into trouble growing up. He now says what he needs to say but prefers to communicate through actions.
He just wants to make her happy.
“I love you,” he says and it strains his heart the way it comes out. It sounds so out of place, foreign, and awkward. He shakes his head, shuts his eyes, trying again, “I love you, Hazel.” His throat tightens in anxiety; it’s not right. The tone, it doesn’t convey how much he loves her. His voice cracks on the next one, “I love you, so much, I–”
He opens his eyes and meets hers. There is bewilderment in them as if she’s trying to understand why he is so horrible at saying this simple phrase to her. A phrase that could be no closer to the truth. Maybe it’s not such a simple thing to say after all.
“Please know that I love you,” he looks away and says softly in defeat, trying to put distance between them. He feels so ashamed, “I promise to be better at saying it to you someday. I’m sorry–”
“No, I’m sorry,” she cuts him off, her voice has a biting edge as she holds fast to his arm to keep him from moving any further.
She is still upset.
He feels awful and can’t bear to look at her. He did this.
It’s his fault she feels this way because he doesn’t consider that maybe, just once in a while she wants to hear him say that he loves her.
Her fingers guide his face back to hers and she kisses him. It feels like a lifeline thrown to him in the midst of drowning. His blood pumps so loudly in his ears that he can’t seem to hear anything else around them. She withdraws her lips with a heartfelt sigh, “I’m sorry I didn’t consider that you love me in your own ways. Not everyone has the same love language.”
He cocks his head to the side, “Like, Rusklavan?”
She smiles with light amusement and it brings him so much relief.
“You said you show your love by touch,” she closes her hand over his and leans in like she is sharing a secret, “I love it when you speak to me. You don’t have to say you love me out loud but I’ll appreciate it so, so, much whenever you do.”
One of Erik’s arms encircles Hazel and he falls back onto the blanket with her, staring up at the clouds that are puffy and white. He releases a breath he wasn’t aware he had been holding and relaxes at the feel of her cheek resting against his chest, her own arms possessing him as if she feared he still could at any moment, bolt away.
The weather is nice, even with the chill in the air–the sun is out but there’s shade provided by the trees. Erik is glad Hazel introduced him to this park. It’s beautiful and tranquil, just like her at this moment.
“To love you is more than a word can do justice. It’s a feeling greater than I can describe but it’s something like…you are warmth on a cold day. You feel like a hug and are as powerful as a smile. You are light where there is dark. I want to be with you forever and always…” he feels an interruptive tap on his shoulder and looks over to her.
“Please be patient, I’m still learning, but…I didn’t understand any of that,” she smiles sheepishly and his cheeks flare up again, realizing he went off on his spiel of affection in Rusklavan.
He stares at her, caught in her gaze for a few moments, considering if he should translate, and then smiles. He relaxes his head onto his backpack and closes his eyes.
“I love you,” he finds it comes easier and rings truer in Rusklavan.
She at least understands that much.
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