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"I love you," I blurt out, and the confession gets smudged by the laughter it tears out of me, the kind of satisfied, almost relieved chuckling when you get something heavy out of your chest, except it's light, and sweet, and…
D doesn't answer, but I never expected they would.
Those were my words to say, my feelings to confess, not theirs. I love them, and I want them to know that. That's all there is to it, really. Just them knowing they're loved.
I nuzzle into their cheek, smudging the echo of my words between us like cream, and it sinks into our skin, into our blood, becoming a part of what we are.
Then D whips out their phone, checking the app that tracks my cycle.
"You're not ovulating," they say very seriously, while I can only blink stupidly, not quite believing they're doing that right now.
But soon it clicks.
"You don't think I just thought of that because I'm horny, do you?"
D doesn't answer.
I heave an exasperated sigh, tugging on their cheek with force that would make a human scream, but D doesn't even flinch, because 'human' is something so far removed from them, they can only pretend to look similar, and even then not entirely.
"Dear, it's not a spontaneous thought. It's been some days since I started to think about it, I was just waiting for the moment to say it when it would feel right."
D puts the phone away.
"You don't have to answer. I just wanted to say it, okay?"
I want to say it again, but this time the words get stuck in my throat, scared to come out. That doesn't surprise me: I too would be scared to come out if the person I existed for wouldn't believe I'm real.
If I'm being honest, it kinda stings. But, then again, what should one expect when they're in love with an entity so foreign to their kind it blames your feelings on your human biology (the most upsetting part is—they're right, like, ninety percent of the time, and nearly all of my feelings go away after a good meal, a deep sleep, or a session of reassuring cuddling. I hate it here (I'm lying.))
D takes my hand in theirs, squeezing and rubbing it silently, intertwining our fingers. Their touch is stable and measured, never tipping over the line that would turn it to painful. For others they barely put any strength in the contact, but I cannot stand being tickled, even with the best intentions, so it took a lot of trial and error for D to learn how to touch me without giving me an ick or a bruise.
Unless I ask for those bruises.
Sometimes I do.
"Just because I don't expect you to say it back, doesn't mean I don't want to hear anything from you at all."
"…I don't know what to say."
"A thank you will suffice."
"Isn't 'thank you' used as an insult or a rejection in such context?"
"Sometimes. I don't mind hearing it, though. I put a lot of thought into this one, and need my hard work properly appreciated."
"…Thank you."
"Yep, yep. Keep 'em coming. I don't feel appreciated enough."
D gives me a long poignant look reserved for the times I'm being a brat, and then they scoop me into a hug. More hands touch me when it's appropriate for a human to have, but soon they're gone, and only two of them remain in place, holding me close.
"Thank you," D says again, their whisper kissing my temple together with their lips, and I shut my eyes, enjoying its gentleness.
"I love you."
This time nothing blocks them, and the words slip out with practiced ease.
In a sense, they are practiced. Well trained, one might say. There are plenty of people who heard them from me, friends, and family, and even strangers who somehow managed to shake my soul with the things they made without even knowing about my existence.
Not in a way I use them for D, though.
When it comes to romance, those words are still fresh and new for me, hence the previous hiccup. Doesn't matter: I'm gonna have plenty of chances to practice.
D stiffens first, then hugs me closer.
This time they don't thank me, and when I raise my head, I catch them speaking without words. Their mouth moves, but no sound comes out.
The shape of it is pretty obvious, though.
The worries and the fears I previously ignored melt at this sight.
"You don't have to say it back," I remind them, but still kiss the corner of their lips, stealing away a taste of those unvoiced feelings.
It's really sweet.
"But it's important. You're important," D says seriously, frowning.
I almost break out in purring. I don't do that only because living with a cat for half of my life taught me I'm horrible at it.
"I am," I agree, hugging their neck. "That's why you can only say them when you actually mean it. Like I do. I love you."
Repeated wielding dabs down some of their luster, but the words are still nice to say, even if they don't hold as much feelings as they did for the first time.
"You think I can't mean them?" D asks grimly.
Their tone is somewhat wrong, though I cannot put a finger as to why exactly. Just wrong—in a way that gets immediately clocked by my brain as 'dangerous', 'roll back the action', 'remember, you cannot exist in the presence of even one person mildly displeased with you', 'if you piss them off, it's going to take forever to mend the relationship', 'did you hurt them? never expected anything less from you, who else can turn their confession into an emotional crime scene, phooey', 'hurry up and say something nice, hurry, hurry, HURRY!!!'
"Of course you can! Just…give them some time to settle down? Don't push yourself, okay?"
D may not notice the emotional charge of my words, but they still clock me out instantly just by physical signs alone: their whole demeanor changes so visibly, I can see it happening, even though I'm not the best at reading people's faces. Especially when they only pretend to be people.
"I scared you," they sigh, pulling me against their chest. The sound that comes from it is similar to the one you hear when listening to an empty conch—the echo of the endless sea sighing the air of aeons into your ear, the sound of something that existed long before you, and will continue to exist long after you, but still it shares the moment of their eternity with you, privately, like a candy behind everyone else's back, don't tell anyone, I only have one, and I give it to you.
It calms me down, soothing the tremors I haven't even noticed.
"It's not you. It's…" I shake my hand in unspecified gesture I generally use to refer to my trauma when I have no energy to put it into words. I rarely do. Deep emotionally charged conversations dry me up like a jellyfish out of water: rotten and stinking for hours on end. I can only display my heart cracks in passing comments or joke about them, otherwise they start bleeding tears, and I have a million issues with those.
In any case, there's plenty of things wrong with me without an additional of supernatural significant other, who can read my moods like an open book and cannot say back 'I love you'.
More than two hands touch me: rubbing my head, and my back, and my thighs as I listen to the sound of the sea that comes from D's chest, lulling myself back into relative calm.
"Hum something," I ask, closing my eyes. "Please?"
They obey without asking why. Their ethereal warm voice wraps me into another level of hugs, weaving into a pulsing living harmony of multiple mouths singing at varying pitch—maybe there are more than just one, I can't see it. It clings close to my skin, seeping through it to soothe the ache in my insides. This is the song without lyrics, but it has all the meaning: the same as three words I repeat.
"I love you," I say again, barely opening my mouth, and the sound so quiet I'm not sure I really said that, or just thought about it and forgot to actually spell the words.
It doesn't matter, though.
I know. D knows.
We both can feel it.
Even if we don't say it exactly the same.