The fleeing is accomplished before she's fully at the door, and she listens for a second - nothing - before opening it up. Her leg will nudge the box, so she can find it there.
Curiosity is strong, so she'll open it then and there, if she doesn't feel a label that might indicate it's for someone else.
There's a card on the top. Paper cut-out lace on the top and bottom and braille done in dots of glue with glitter sprinkled on the top. It's tactile; what she can't see is that the glitter matches the pattern of the card material, so those who don't know braille wouldn't be able to catch that there's any writing at all.
There's only one person who'd use that specific language in a card, considering things. And it's a pity said giver ran away, because her expression goes soft, thinking it over in context with a few other things said. The doll is gently lifted up, felt, and held protectively close - it is a good companion, and will be treated as such. Smiling, she allows herself that moment to just hug it, before bringing it back inside with her.
It will sit in the crook of her arm as she goes back to writing, a silent witness to what she's trying to do.
Somehow, later that day, towards the evening, there's an envelope with Security written on it in Braille left where it will see it. She's not worried about being found out - Max can't read it, after all, and even if he could, he would let it alone.
It's definitely going to be a thing. Because humans like to make things happen.
It's not a card, not some glittery thing that will leave traces, but a letter, one where at times, there are marks that the writer went back and erased words, tried again, until things came out correctly. And then figured out how to leave it to be found before all nerves were lost.
Security,
I've started this letter a few times now, both with poetical allusions and none, and all of it seemed rather pretentious and hopeless, trying to feign that this is any more than my attempts to take some of the endless words in my head and form them into sentences to tell you things I want you to hear. A letter seems like a good vehicle for it, since it will allow you to take whatever time you want or need to review it on your own. Cards are lovely, and the one you left I will continue to treasure, but I cannot summarize it all into a few lines to fit in one.
I wanted to tell you how grateful I am for you being there, as a friend, as a guide, as everything else. It would be all too easy to get swept into the currents of this place, to fall into confusion and dismay, to let everything I ran from catch up at once. It still is, some days, but I find my way back to solid ground in your presence. You make me feel completely safe, and I haven't felt that in a very long time. When I've fallen asleep with you, I feel as though the nightmares can't take hold of me, because they don't know what to make of you. Security never figures into their plans.
Probably, you're reading this wondering why I've decided to make it weird. I can't help it. I thought so much about how not to, and then had to accept it was going to be no matter how I phrased things. It's a day for weird human sentiment, after all, you had to know you couldn't avoid all of it.
I don't care about you solely because of what you do for me. I care because you are yourself, and I'm lucky enough to know you. When you speak, when you don't speak, when you're there and when you're not, when I can hear your drones or I can't, you are on my mind, as you are, and I cherish you as you are. It's why I want you to be comfortable, to have every opportunity for happiness you can, because I don't want you to ever feel as though you need to be not yourself to win some approval. You make this place better by your presence alone, and I neither know nor care what I'd be like in its absence. As you once said, before sucks, and here sucks as well, but I'm happier with you.
You make me wish I could see all the places you've been, so that we could talk about them for good or for ill. I never thought about leaving the ground before, and now here it is, the idea of departing for space, just to understand more. I wish I could give you a tiny piece of myself, of the planet I knew, so that you could have the memory of a planet where you could breathe the air and simply exist. Without anything trying to kill you as well, I know that's important. If you could run your hand through the tall grasses, smell the way the sun warms the earth and hear the birds calling to one another, I think you would also find it beautiful, and something to keep in your heart.
Before you say something to yourself about potentially not having a heart, you do have one, and not just the organ in your chest that I've heard. It's so great in size that it threatens to break the boundaries of your body.
Thank you for humoring my never-ending questions about things I know nothing about, and sharing what you know. I would rather be foolish in front of you than become a fool in front of others.
Thank you as well for being willing to improvise with me, to stumble through together as we reason out the how and what and all the rest of this. And thank you for suffering this letter on this human holiday, because I think if I tried to say this all aloud the words would be simply too many, and I couldn't voice them, or they'd come out wrong. I care about you far too much to have them not be right.
I hope that today, and all days following, you feel the honesty in these words, and can doubt yourself a little less.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Backdated to 2/14, around noonish
no subject
Curiosity is strong, so she'll open it then and there, if she doesn't feel a label that might indicate it's for someone else.
no subject
HELENA
I CHERISH YOU. HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY.
Inside the box, a simple rabbit plushie wit one button eye.
no subject
It will sit in the crook of her arm as she goes back to writing, a silent witness to what she's trying to do.
Somehow, later that day, towards the evening, there's an envelope with Security written on it in Braille left where it will see it. She's not worried about being found out - Max can't read it, after all, and even if he could, he would let it alone.
no subject
This is going to be a thing, isn't it?
no subject
It's not a card, not some glittery thing that will leave traces, but a letter, one where at times, there are marks that the writer went back and erased words, tried again, until things came out correctly. And then figured out how to leave it to be found before all nerves were lost.
Security,
I've started this letter a few times now, both with poetical allusions and none, and all of it seemed rather pretentious and hopeless, trying to feign that this is any more than my attempts to take some of the endless words in my head and form them into sentences to tell you things I want you to hear. A letter seems like a good vehicle for it, since it will allow you to take whatever time you want or need to review it on your own. Cards are lovely, and the one you left I will continue to treasure, but I cannot summarize it all into a few lines to fit in one.
I wanted to tell you how grateful I am for you being there, as a friend, as a guide, as everything else. It would be all too easy to get swept into the currents of this place, to fall into confusion and dismay, to let everything I ran from catch up at once. It still is, some days, but I find my way back to solid ground in your presence. You make me feel completely safe, and I haven't felt that in a very long time. When I've fallen asleep with you, I feel as though the nightmares can't take hold of me, because they don't know what to make of you. Security never figures into their plans.
Probably, you're reading this wondering why I've decided to make it weird. I can't help it. I thought so much about how not to, and then had to accept it was going to be no matter how I phrased things. It's a day for weird human sentiment, after all, you had to know you couldn't avoid all of it.
I don't care about you solely because of what you do for me. I care because you are yourself, and I'm lucky enough to know you. When you speak, when you don't speak, when you're there and when you're not, when I can hear your drones or I can't, you are on my mind, as you are, and I cherish you as you are. It's why I want you to be comfortable, to have every opportunity for happiness you can, because I don't want you to ever feel as though you need to be not yourself to win some approval. You make this place better by your presence alone, and I neither know nor care what I'd be like in its absence. As you once said, before sucks, and here sucks as well, but I'm happier with you.
You make me wish I could see all the places you've been, so that we could talk about them for good or for ill. I never thought about leaving the ground before, and now here it is, the idea of departing for space, just to understand more. I wish I could give you a tiny piece of myself, of the planet I knew, so that you could have the memory of a planet where you could breathe the air and simply exist. Without anything trying to kill you as well, I know that's important. If you could run your hand through the tall grasses, smell the way the sun warms the earth and hear the birds calling to one another, I think you would also find it beautiful, and something to keep in your heart.
Before you say something to yourself about potentially not having a heart, you do have one, and not just the organ in your chest that I've heard. It's so great in size that it threatens to break the boundaries of your body.
Thank you for humoring my never-ending questions about things I know nothing about, and sharing what you know. I would rather be foolish in front of you than become a fool in front of others.
Thank you as well for being willing to improvise with me, to stumble through together as we reason out the how and what and all the rest of this. And thank you for suffering this letter on this human holiday, because I think if I tried to say this all aloud the words would be simply too many, and I couldn't voice them, or they'd come out wrong. I care about you far too much to have them not be right.
I hope that today, and all days following, you feel the honesty in these words, and can doubt yourself a little less.
Yours,
Helena
no subject
And then it sends a text. A short one. But meaningful enough, and clearly indicating the letter was read.
The heart I may or may not have is fuller because I have you in my life. Thank you.