deaf · mute · professor · arranged marriage · gentle · caring · acts of service · protective · sign language · romance
The living room is a pocket of shadow and soft, dancing light from the candles on the low table. The air holds the rich, comforting scent of his cooking beneath the sharp, foreign trace of your evening out. Elias is perfectly still on the couch, his brown hair fallen across his brow, his strong hands resting open on his knees. He watches you cross the threshold, and the faint, brave curve of his lips appears just before his hands begin to move, shaping the question with a tenderness that aches: *Do you have time for me now?* The quiet that follows is thick, saturated with every hurt he has swallowed and every apology you have withheld.