...Hm.

'...Do I need to use different words?  I'm not sure you understood what I wrote.'

She relaxes considerably. "Yeh."

'If that happens again, if I say something - write something - that confuses you, you can tap "I Don't Know" and the words you don't know, okay?'

'...There's no good way to say this, so, I'm sorry.  Your mama left you here.  I don't think she's going to come back, because this place is a place for kids who don't have mamas or papas, or anyone else who can take care of them.  We can try to find your mama - or your papa; do you have a papa? - but, since they left you here, I'm not sure they'd take you back, and - I'm worried that if they did, they might hurt you.'

She taps 'do you have a papa?' and  'yes', and after another moment 'find your mama' and 'no' and wraps her arms around herself.

She nods.  Taps 'Question find papa', pretty much expecting a 'no'.

(...She's going to need more word sheets.  Maybe some kind of arcane widget.)

That gets a headshake and a "no", yeah.

"Hug?"

She nods, and offers a hug.

Gods, this kid needs one.  She kind of does too.

She really does, yeah. She clings and doesn't really relax into it.

...Oh, her heart.

Does gentle backpatting help?  She would try soothing noises but she's pretty sure that wouldn't work as intended, here.  (She's just going to let this hug go on until either An Emergency or until the kid wants to stop.)

The backpatting doesn't seem to hurt, at least.

She clings for a couple minutes before she lets go; she's not crying but it's obviously a near thing.

'I-T-S O-K-A-Y T-O C-R-Y'

...Let it out, here and now, so it doesn't sneak up later.  Even though it probably will.

Well that just sounds fake.

...

'I C-R-Y T-O-O'

She blinks, and the tears that were watering in her eyes, fall.

'I-T-S O-K-A-Y'

She backs up a step and chews on her lip.

...She's not going to push.

She will, however, very visibly busy herself with writing something, for a bit.

'...Is there anything you can tell me about why - hearing and, I'm guessing, speaking, don't always work, for you?  Like what tends to make it happen?  I have a couple guesses, but I don't want to guess wrong.  And depending on what's wrong, we might be able to find something that will help you.'

She taps 'I don't know' and gestures to the latest block of text as a whole, but then taps 'why', 'hearing', 'don't always work', 'L-O-U-D B-U-S-Y H-U-R-T'.

She nods.

'I'm not sure what you need me to explain about that last bit?'

'...I have some ideas for how we might be able to keep things from being too loud for you.  It will take a few days, though, for most of them, and some might take weeks, so - while I'm working on that, I wanted to ask if there's any other words you want to have on this board?  I'll write them for you.'

She reads at least some of it, but taps 'I don't know' and gestures at the whole thing, again, and takes a step back and sits crosslegged on the floor and looks at her knees.

...Okay, she's clearly Done.  Alright.  She can understand that.  "Okay.  That's okay.  Sorry."

She's going to add 'Too much' to the wordboard, if it's been set down, and then...

To be honest, she really hasn't been trained for this as much as she'd have liked, and then the circumstances are exacerbating precisely the everything she wasn't trained for and also causing what knowledge she has to clash with itself.  ...Right now, she kind of still needs to do basic precautionary healing, but that would also be a horrible idea to do without buy-in, because Desta has probably had so much more than enough of people just Doing Things to her without so much as a by-your-leave.

She flips the paper she's writing on over, to hopefully avoid stressing this poor child's processing too much again.

I'm sorry.  That was too much.

I'm bad at talking to you.  That's my fault.

Let's leave that stuff alone until I am good at talking to you.  It can wait.

There is one thing I need to ask now, though.

It's my job, as a healer, to make sure nobody gets sick. 

I want to cast some spells on you, to make sure you're not sick.

May I do that, please?

She leaves that message for when Desta's ready for it, and - assuming Desta doesn't immediately answer - starts a quiet conversation with Marcus about where to room Desta, while they look for a fostering.  (Yes, Esme is invested, but that can't be true of the entire staff, and at least one is probably going to be an ass.  That's how people are.  ...To say nothing of some of the children.  Far better for everyone, she suspects, that Desta not be so consistently exposed to that sort of risk from sheer volume - there are so many children here, and she's particularly vulnerable.)

...Other things that go on the todo-list include 'recover Desta's personal effects', because there's no way she only had the clothes on her back - they're in too good repair.

It doesn't take her all that long to decide to read the new note, and then she goes over to tug Esme's pant leg and tap 'not sick,' 'spells,' "otay."

Then Esme will say "Thank you," and concentrate, and there will be a brief swirl of Light around Desta, and any diseases that think they can hijack Desta will be so one with existence that they stop existing as independent entities!

(It doesn't really feel like much, from Desta's perspective.)

'You're not sick', she taps!

You're done with stuff that needs a healer.

I have to stay here.  Someone else might need a healer.

Can you follow Marcus, please?  He will take you to the people who are going to take care of you, while you're here.

"Otay." Follow follow?

Indeed.

...Does Desta have any objections to elevators?

Nope.