*** HARMONIA has joined 710.35.155.17 <HARMONIA> Buongiorno, sorry I missed you. <HARMONIA> I'll happily get back to you as soon as I'm done with whatever business I'm on. <HARMONIA> Please leave a message.
[ Steve's longer than usual neck stretches out, rubbing along the insides of the arms that come to embrace him. It keeps stretching until he's up in Giorno's face, butting his cold nose against it. Even then, he's still shoving forward, turning his shaggy head and running a furred cheek against whatever he can reach. He's a flurry of movement even though they're sitting still on the top of this hill. He does everything but lick him in this explosion of canine affection.
Eventually, the dog lets up enough for the human to have some say, at which point Steve loops an arm over the side of Giorno's body that's facing the sky. He feels so small right now. He knows it's because of this new, gangling form, but he can't shake the image from his mind that he's holding that child who was left to waste away, the one he saw just weeks ago. He wishes he could hug it all better, is giving it his best shot, even if he knows the world doesn't work like that.
He wants to smother him in so much attention he can't say he doesn't have people now who think of him every day. ]
If he ever shows up here.
[ For real, or as a fleshy doppelganger that crawls out of his head, or in any way whatsoever... ]
If you need me to — I will. That piece of shit is dead.
Edited (it's 4 am, and grammar) 2021-12-22 08:48 (UTC)
[The world doesn't work like that. There's no going back and fixing what was. That's why he hated that other world's version of him so much, why that lie hurt so much. Why even the most recent memories of feeling a little safe and happy as Haruno are bittersweet. None of it was ever possible for him. It's just cruel, seeing it play out.]
[But he's not thinking about that right now. He can't. His whole world is the fluffy tornado of affection that is Steve in his arms right now, Steve insistently refusing to let Giorno forget his presence, that he cares so much he can't control the dog's instincts, or else he doesn't want to. That he's even trying to fix it with touch is — it won't work. The world doesn't work like that. But it helps. It helps as much as it did when Steve hugged him for the first time, in the van in the forest, with both of them covered in dirt and sap.]
[It reminds him that he's real. That people care. That he's allowed to be wanted.]
[He can't help but cry a little, albeit silently, as he takes fistfuls of Steve's fur between his fingers and holds on tight. His face pressed against anywhere he can manage, between the wiggling and all, he nods fiercely. He knows. He understands. He believes that — Steve would do this. For him. Because he matters that much.]
Thank you.
[Voice thick and halfway muffled, he buries his face deeper in fur. And suddenly, he knows how to explain the hardest part.]
I never had anybody like you before. Who'd — who wanted me to be okay. It was just me, and I couldn't take it. That's why I had to be — somebody else. Somebody stronger.
[That's not how he described it to Riley. Maybe it's not as truthful as that way, the language of destruction, the end of a life and the beginning of another. But he thinks Steve will understand. He'll get the parts that matter.]
But you won't let anything happen to me. The things I was scared of then aren't—
[His smile, where it's hidden, is little and wobbly, but very real.]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Eventually, the dog lets up enough for the human to have some say, at which point Steve loops an arm over the side of Giorno's body that's facing the sky. He feels so small right now. He knows it's because of this new, gangling form, but he can't shake the image from his mind that he's holding that child who was left to waste away, the one he saw just weeks ago. He wishes he could hug it all better, is giving it his best shot, even if he knows the world doesn't work like that.
He wants to smother him in so much attention he can't say he doesn't have people now who think of him every day. ]
If he ever shows up here.
[ For real, or as a fleshy doppelganger that crawls out of his head, or in any way whatsoever... ]
If you need me to — I will. That piece of shit is dead.
no subject
[But he's not thinking about that right now. He can't. His whole world is the fluffy tornado of affection that is Steve in his arms right now, Steve insistently refusing to let Giorno forget his presence, that he cares so much he can't control the dog's instincts, or else he doesn't want to. That he's even trying to fix it with touch is — it won't work. The world doesn't work like that. But it helps. It helps as much as it did when Steve hugged him for the first time, in the van in the forest, with both of them covered in dirt and sap.]
[It reminds him that he's real. That people care. That he's allowed to be wanted.]
[He can't help but cry a little, albeit silently, as he takes fistfuls of Steve's fur between his fingers and holds on tight. His face pressed against anywhere he can manage, between the wiggling and all, he nods fiercely. He knows. He understands. He believes that — Steve would do this. For him. Because he matters that much.]
Thank you.
[Voice thick and halfway muffled, he buries his face deeper in fur. And suddenly, he knows how to explain the hardest part.]
I never had anybody like you before. Who'd — who wanted me to be okay. It was just me, and I couldn't take it. That's why I had to be — somebody else. Somebody stronger.
[That's not how he described it to Riley. Maybe it's not as truthful as that way, the language of destruction, the end of a life and the beginning of another. But he thinks Steve will understand. He'll get the parts that matter.]
But you won't let anything happen to me. The things I was scared of then aren't—
[His smile, where it's hidden, is little and wobbly, but very real.]
I know they don't stand a chance.