All Your Little Quirks • h.ravenclaw ✓

⚪seven

Arven feels unwelcome in that dome of firelight that has welcomed him into its loving embrace in the past few days. He hasn't visited the place after Helena had told him to leave, and even though it has been a week, he can't stop thinking about it.

He keeps replaying the incident over and over in his mind, trying to pinpoint that exact moment where he might have offended Helena in any way. But try as he might, he is met with blank, and the only answer that he comes up with every time is that he has to go to her again and ask her himself. The thought scares him. He doesn't want to hear the hurricane in the ocean, and he doesn't want it to take him away.

At the end of the week however, he somehow convinces himself that she will forgive him – for whatever offence he might have done – and she will understand if he tries to explain himself. Thus, when the sun is swallowed up by the horizon, he takes several sheets of paper and writes, in each one, what he wants to tell her, and leaves his house, and walks into the forest. The path has etched itself into his memory, and he doesn't need a lamp to show him the way anymore.

He drifts slightly from the usual path, however, and wanders into the clumps of bushes and shrubs. Numerous flowers grow everywhere, and he plucks them up, randomly, so that he has a collection of various colours, though they almost look the same in the pitch darkness. When his hands are full, he moves into the usual path again.

The dome is darker today, the fire smaller than he had seen and a strange aroma lingering in the air. Not having the gift of speech, Arven has his other senses stronger than normal, and he can tell that the smell has come from somewhere else, something that isn't supposed to be here. Helena is inside the tent, he notices, and he hears shuffling coming from inside. He lowers himself to drop the flowers on the ground and hesitantly moves to the flap that functions as the door, and knocks on it with his fist. There is hardly any sound produced, but the shuffling stops suddenly.

"Go away," her voice snaps, causing him to shrink back, but when she continues, he realises that she has mistaken him for somebody else, "I told you I'm not going back. Can't you get that inside your thick head?"

Arven isn't sure how to let her know that it's him, so he crouches down and uses a hand to push the flap aside, and peeks in. Helena gives a horrible screech and shoves him away, before crawling out of the tent herself, her eyes wide in horror.

"Arven!" she exclaims, breathless. "You – you scared me."

Whether she is scared because she has mistaken him for the other person, or because she doesn't want him to see the inside of the tent, he can't tell. He is rooting on half of each possibility, because he has seen the interior, and it wasn't something one would expect.

The tent is big enough for two to sit comfortably, at least, that is what's apparent from the outside. But with the split second glance he had caught of the inside, he has seen a large room, larger than his own bedroom, complete with a bed and a table. A trunk took up the middle of the floor, and there were two paintings hung on the wall – a very solid, very vertical wall.

Helena looks at him anxiously, and chews on a few of her strands of hair. A prickling suspicion creeps up his spine, but he pushes it down. She is so kind, and so beautiful, she can't be –

"Hello," she says quietly, still chewing on her hair. There are so many things, so many words that fight inside his mind to be let out, but he can't let all of them out. Not because he can't speak, but because he just can't. He has everything – everything that he wants go tell her – written down on the small pieces of paper that lie in his pocket, and he knows he can't give half of them to her. They will stay in his pocket for the rest of his life, until his clothes would be disposed of and the papers would decompose into shreds of nothingness.

He reaches into his pocket and pulls the stack of papers out. He flips through them briefly and extracts the one with the words, It's not healthy to chew your hair, and tentatively gives it to Helena. He isn't sure if she would accept him back, but when a twinkling laugh leaves her mouth and sails through the air, it dissolves all his tension and leaves with it.

Helena glances at his hands. "You wrote everything down?"

He can't help the blush that rises to his cheeks, and lowering his head, he nods slightly. She moves and sits down on the log, and pats the spot next to her, gesturing for him to sit as well. He does, but sits facing her so that she won't be able to peek into the papers.

I'm sorry.

This is the next piece that he gives to her. Helena remains silent for a long time, before she reaches out and squeezes his hand reassuringly. "You don't have to apologise. I overreacted."

He pulls out another piece.

Will you decorate my hair again? I brought flowers.

This time she laughs loudly. She brings the flowers where he had dropped them, and sits down in front of him, unlike last time. "Come here," she mutters and pulls his head slightly toward her, before beginning to work on his hair.

He isn't sure how she does this. Even though his hair is quite long, he cannot imagine knotting the tiny little stems of the flowers into his hair. But she works quickly, as though she has done it before, and soon enough, his hair is heavy with the numerous flowers that lie knotted to them. His skin tingles where her fingers brush against it, and by the time she moves back, his face is burning, though a wide smile plays on his lips. He gives her the paper where he has written, Thank you.

She smiles radiantly at him. "Too bad you have to get rid of them soon," she says wistfully, though her smile says she doesn't feel so bad about it.

Arven wants to ask her who it was that she was mistaking him as. Was it the man she said loved her? He doesn't have it written down, but he doesn't ask for a quill either, because he doesn't want to ruin her mood, doesn't want to miss the smile on her face or the warmth of her hands as they play with his fingers. Just like the rest of his thoughts, this one spills down to the depths of his mind, never to be retrieved again.