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[h_hollister]

A note is left on Ramon's pillow in Spain. There's a (oh man such a cliché) single long-stemmed red rose next to it, as well as a rectangular package wrapped in white and silver paper.

***

I'm not very good at this.
Poetry, I mean.
I've always called it trite
and rather silly
and yet I'm compelled, on occasion, to write it.
Words used for art
from someone who's artless.
I find my art in your smiles
and I find my art in your frowns
and I find my art in little things others might not
notice, like the small fleck of brown in your left eye
right next to your pupil.

I know my poem doesn't rhyme
or scan very well.
Some might call it the exact
opposite of poetry, with only line breaks to mark its ways.
I try to come up with
pretty words to mark yours, but find myself falling
short.
All my words, all my ways,
you steal them from me.
Take them
and give them back, breathless.

I tried to think of
another way to mark your birthday.
Something other than my grasping (gasping?) words
broken into small, manageable bites.

But all I had were my winded words,
so I use them and put them down on paper
to give to you.
I don't know what these words will do to you.
But I have some small hope you'll like them,
exhausted as they are.
Tired after a long day's work, running through my
head over and over, placing themselves in order
just for you.

So easy just to say
I love you
and be done. But there's a demand in my mind,
a demand to make my words yours so you don't have to
steal them
anymore.
So I share them with you, shyly and hopefully and comfortably tired.

Happy twenty-third birthday, Ramon Salazar.

Te amo.

...See, I can steal your words, too.

***

Inside the package is a red leather photo album, filled with rare color photos of Ramon's childhood. There are, sadly, several large, unfortunate gaps. The pictures jump from him at about age eight to age 21, when he first met Hippolyta. The entire back half of the album is them together, though, as if making up for the gap.

Comments

[8th-castellan.livejournal.com]

When the rose, note, and package are spied, Ramon sits himself down on the bed, first and foremost. The rose is picked up, turned over, regarded, then carefully set back down next to him.

Onto the note.

It's read slowly, absorbing every word, every break. She's right, she's not terribly good at poetry. But her skill isn't where the impact lies.

He reads it again. His lips are moving now, murmuring the stanzas under his breath. Once he's done, Ramon sits for a time, digesting it all. Then the paper is folded carefully, delicately, the creases forgiving and gentle, and tucks it into the breast pocket of his waistcoat.

Then onto the package. Fingers run over the sleek, red cover, wanting to take this in first before he moves onto what the actual content of it is. Then, with the crackling of the spine that accompanies opening a newer book, Ramon turns to the first page.

And he is greeted with the photograph of himself as an infant, asleep, dressed in a simple white linen swaddling, his tiny hands curled into tight baby fists. Next to that, a photo of his father holding him when he was so small.

The page after that, Ramon slightly older, the photo apparently capturing some of those first few uneasy baby steps. The page after that, Ramon playing in the snow, decked out in mittens, an oversized coat, and a woolen hat.

There are pictures of him practicing playing the violin with the firey concentration only a determined six-year old can accomplish. Another of him hugging his old butler, Immanuel. Playing chess with one of the servants who worked in the kitchen. Trying on his father's hat. Asleep in his father's lap.

Then the page turns and now it is indeed like a time-warp occurred. Thirteen years unaccounted for, because now it's of Hippolyta and Ramon together. Ramon, in several of them, often has that look of begrudging allowance or reluctance of those who don't like having their picture taken. Hippolyta's antics, happy grins, and silly faces make up for that, though. And there are a few where their happiness really shines through; where even Ramon could agree that their love needs to be captured on film.

The first few tears patter down onto the glossy pages of the photo album.

[h-hollister.livejournal.com]

She's been lurking nearby, waiting for his reaction.

Tears were number three on the list of expected things. So she delurks herself from his 'walk in closet' (closer to a second room in and of itself, with comfortable love seats to lounge in) and stands quietly nearby.

"Good thing there's plastic covering the pictures. You want a tissue, love?"

She's not exactly dry-eyed herself. Her voice is sorta wobbly.

[8th-castellan.livejournal.com]

He doesn't look up, equal part because he feels he doesn't possess the strength to, and because he's certain his face is now a mess of tears.

"Nn...Y-Yes. Yes, please." There's a sniffle after he says so, and he hastily wipes the side of one hand against his nose.

[h-hollister.livejournal.com]

Ah, jeez. Okay, tears of THIS sort, genuine wrecked tears, WEREN'T on her list. She expected happy tears. Now she feels slightly uncomfortable and embarrassed.

"No problem. I didn't realize my poetry was that bad," she says, trying to make a joke of it. Then she flees into the bathroom to fetch him his tissues.

[8th-castellan.livejournal.com]

He would debate whether or not he's wrecked, per se, but it was a bit emotional. They are happy tears, but also ones of being overwhelmed.

When she returns, he's set the album aside, still open so he can get to wiping the pages off as well. There's a small nod, a wobbly smile, and he takes whatever tissues she offers.

"S-...Sorry. It was just-...It was a lot." That's about all he can sum it up as. "...Thank you, Hippolyta." And he's not saying that about the tissues.

[h-hollister.livejournal.com]

Well, then, that's mostly all right. Still, overwhelmed wasn't what she was going for, and still feels a bit squirmy about it. She hands him the tissues, and cleans up the album herself. There's only a couple of drops there.

"You're welcome, love. Sorry that was a lot. I wanted it to be just right."

[8th-castellan.livejournal.com]

"It was! I-...I'd forgotten a lot of that. I remember him, though. The one who took most of those? One of our servants had a camera he was fond of, and tended to be the one to go to if you felt the need to have some photos taken. And-...Mm." He looks at the album again, now closed.

"Where did you find those?" There's as small squirm of his own at the thought of her nosing through the castle, but mainly for the sake of her safety.

[h-hollister.livejournal.com]

"You're not going to believe this, but the Hands found them. They didn't know what to do with them, so they figured I'd come up with something."

And a funny moment that was, too. Hippolyta Hollister, we think Master would Like to have these Pictures. Make them Nice. And even 'nice' wasn't the right word they were grasping for. Just the feeling of organized and presented well, almost ordering her to do so across the plaga link that they still were astonished over.

What she's not told him is that there are several pictures of Miguel and Isobelita in amongst the ones left out of this album. Those would have DEFINITELY been too much.

"So I put them all together in a new album for you, and then added the recent ones. Since I got you a watch last year, I had to come up with something better this time."

[8th-castellan.livejournal.com]

"And I still haven't gotten you anything for your birthday," he says a bit glumly. Well, aside from some damn fine sex. But that was a given!

"But-...But that's most impressive. Where you found them. How you found them." The Hands have been such a funny question mark for a long time now, haven't they? Ever since Hips and Ramon figured out where they really came from. It's hard to know how to react to them now. This, of course, upsets them greatly, the feeling that Master is avoiding them, so...maybe this was their attempt to try and apologize for whatever it is about them that seemingly offends him now? Or maybe it was fragments of who they once were giving Hips a, heh, helpful hand...

"They're-...They're really surreal, aren't they?" He says this as he strokes the cover of the album again. "To think that, once upon a time, it was like that. For me. For this castle..."

[h-hollister.livejournal.com]

"I particularly like the one of you playing the violin."

It seems safe to open the album again, so she does. To the fourth page, exactly to the picture she's referring to. She laid them all out carefully, after all. Took her the better part of two weeks, working where he wouldn't stumble on it, at her pub.

"And you can give me a really good Christmas present to make up for it, love. How's that sound?"

[8th-castellan.livejournal.com]

"Sounds about right, I think." There's also the fact he has yet to return his mother's necklace to Hips, after that now-embarrassing outburst he had in the wake of Deadpool making fun of his deceased parent. Though he didn't want to give that back to her on her birthday, seeing that last year's celebration of such is when he originally bestowed it upon Hippolyta. Doing so again would be sort of awkward.

He turns his attention as well to the album and the photos inside it, not speaking right away. "...I'm sure I'm terrible at it now." Playing the violin, that is.

[h-hollister.livejournal.com]

"You never know until you try," she grins, running a gentle finger over that picture of the violin. "I'm not buying you a violin just yet, though. You're on your own for that one."

Her arm wraps around his waist, pulling him closer, so they can look at the pictures together.

"You were a cutie pie, you know. Still are, but in a different way."

[8th-castellan.livejournal.com]

"Eheh. Thank you. I was-...I was a brat. And I still am, but in a different way." He jokingly mimics her phrasing and tone.

"Maybe that'll be my gift to you; dig up a violin and give you a God-awful serenade with my disgustingly atrophied and rusted skills in playing it." His arm twines around her waist as well.

[h-hollister.livejournal.com]

"Oh, the cats that would die to give me such a gift. I think I'll politely decline that offer, mi amor."

She turns her face for a moment to kiss his cheek, and then her attention is back on the album.

"I kinda got thinking the other day, when I was making this. You'll never get to see me as a kid. All my baby photos are lost in the mists of wonky time. Sorry about that."

[8th-castellan.livejournal.com]

"S'okay. I recall you saying you not exactly, er, enjoying the way you looked when you were young. So maybe it's for the best? That is, not to say I wouldn't enjoy seeing the younger version of yourself."

Again echoing her, he pauses to kiss her cheek in return.

"...Barring de-aging, of course. Though there's always that. Just get you turned into a child again, and I'll take pictures in order to stage childhood photos. It could work!"

[h-hollister.livejournal.com]

"Oh, gawd. Don't even hint that, the Nexus could be listening. You'd hate me being a kid for all the obvious and horrible reasons. Ew."

She giggles a bit and turns the page. The next page is the winter page, of Ramon playing in the snow, all bundled up. There's even one of him standing proudly next to a malformed snowman.

"Man, this makes me want to find snow. Why hasn't it snowed here yet?"

[8th-castellan.livejournal.com]

"Good question. It should have by now. Though...these days, I tend to not curse too loudly when it's absent." Hips probably noticed how much more listless and sluggish Ramon becomes when the temperature drops. And it's not just winter blahs, either.

"...Playing in the snow with you would be sort of fun, though. Just not for a prolonged amount of time, I guess."

[h-hollister.livejournal.com]

"...Oh yeah. Huh. Would that affect me too, do you think?"

There's still so much about this parasite in her bod that she doesn't know. She's not really noticed a difference, exactly, but then again she's not been out in the snow.

[8th-castellan.livejournal.com]

"Probably not. Your body doesn't rely on it like mine does." He realizes this could get into some rather boring or dry speculation about las Plagas, and that's boring, to be honest. So now's the time to change the subject!

"...There was a time when I didn't expect myself to live past twelve, let alone make it all the way to twenty-three. Wow." And this conversation could become depressing. Not that he realizes that right this second.

[h-hollister.livejournal.com]

"Well, you did, and a good thing, too," she replies, trying to nip both dry technical conversations and depressing ones in the bud.

"I do love you so much, darling man."