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Bella successfully manages to stay in all weekend except for when she joins packs of students headed for the dining hall. If the elves are still stalking her, she doesn't notice them. On Monday, the subtle artist elf is present in their shared course, and looks at her, but doesn't bother her - Bella leaves with another classmate anyway.
Traveling in packs is quite effective, she decides.
Except she doesn't do it in her own dorm.
It's pouring rain outside Tuesday afternoon and Bella doesn't want to go to the dining hall. She has some stuff in her room - not serious groceries, but enough that she can heat up some broth and noodles, liven it up with a handful of miscellaneous dried herbs, and call it soup. She is hanging out in the kitchen doing this when Brad from down the hall, the same fellow who attempted to interrupt Celo at his baking, chooses to bother her.
"Hey, Isabella."
"It's Bella."
"But your full name's so pretty," says Brad. "You should go by that instead. So Isabella, let's go out tomorrow, I'll show you a good time in town, we'll have some fun."
"No," says Bella, "thank you, and it's still Bella."
"Isabella's prettier. Like you, you're pretty. It's not like I asked you to make like a nymph or something, I just want to take you out," says Brad. "Is it the money, I bet it's that, I can cover it, we can go someplace nice and you can get whatever you want."
"It's still no. It's still Bella."
"Don't be such a bitch, you never have plans," snaps Brad, "what are you going to do, eat at the dining hall and re-read your textbooks, you can come out with me."
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subtly_artistic
Hesitantly, still crying, he nods.
Someone else once thought of him as a walking fuckhole. Someone else once told him he must like things that he didn't want. Someone else once handled him the way Brad just did, with that same combination of violence and casual objectification.
Someone else once called him a freak.
He killed that person. It was messy and bloody and nasty and violent. He keeps remembering it in detail, over and over again, along with everything that led up to it—the years of torture and starvation, locked up underground where the only light that reached him came when his owner wanted to play.
Someone else once called him a freak.
He killed that person. It was messy and bloody and nasty and violent. He keeps remembering it in detail, over and over again, along with everything that led up to it—the years of torture and starvation, locked up underground where the only light that reached him came when his owner wanted to play.
subtly_artistic
Fuck. Bella hasn't actually taken any courses on mental healing yet. She doesn't know what to do with this, doesn't know what to say or what to probe at with what power.
She gathers him up into a hug. [Name, name]. She doesn't know what else to tell him, but she knows his name.
She gathers him up into a hug. [Name, name]. She doesn't know what else to tell him, but she knows his name.
Celo cries helplessly in her lap.
It helps when she tells him his name, anyway. It reminds him that he's not there anymore. He's here, at school, with Bella, crying in her arms on the kitchen floor. Here is much better.
It helps when she tells him his name, anyway. It reminds him that he's not there anymore. He's here, at school, with Bella, crying in her arms on the kitchen floor. Here is much better.
subtly_artistic
Bella holds him. Here you are. You're here, it's just you and me.
It should perhaps not come as a surprise that, under the circumstances, he feels strongly positive towards her.
subtly_artistic
She's not surprised. She carries on kneeling there, hugging him, occasionally repeating his name.
It takes some time, but eventually he is thinking not very much about his trauma and very, very much about his incandescent love for the person who is hugging him and comforting him.
(Perhaps a little surprisingly, given his species, it is not primarily a sexual kind of love. He feels about her the way he feels about - sunlight. He doesn't want to fuck sunlight, but it's warm and bright and good and he likes to bask in it.)
At about the same gradual pace, the crying stops.
(Perhaps a little surprisingly, given his species, it is not primarily a sexual kind of love. He feels about her the way he feels about - sunlight. He doesn't want to fuck sunlight, but it's warm and bright and good and he likes to bask in it.)
At about the same gradual pace, the crying stops.
subtly_artistic
...Sunlight.
Bella decides she likes to be sunlight. That works for her.
"You're okay," she murmurs.
Bella decides she likes to be sunlight. That works for her.
"You're okay," she murmurs.
"Guess so," he murmurs back.
He appears to still be in her lap.
He decides he's not doing anything about this just yet. Physical contact helps, at least if it's the nice kind, and this is.
"Sorry," he adds. "I - thought I could handle him. Turns out I couldn't."
He appears to still be in her lap.
He decides he's not doing anything about this just yet. Physical contact helps, at least if it's the nice kind, and this is.
"Sorry," he adds. "I - thought I could handle him. Turns out I couldn't."
"Okay."
Hug. Definitely hug.
Hug. Definitely hug.
He laughs shakily.
"Yeah, sure."
"Yeah, sure."
Soup! Soup and hugs?
Soup and some kind of touching, then, if Bella doesn't object. He'll settle for holding hands.
subtly_artistic
Bella will hold his hand. "Everyone already thinks we had sex," she remarks.
"...Does that bug you or something?"
subtly_artistic
"It's not true, and even if it were it wouldn't be any of their business."
"Well, yeah," he says. "But I'm a nymph. Of course people are gonna think we've had sex."
subtly_artistic
"As in fact they do. One person believed me when I told her different."