mamihlapinatapei – the look between two people in which each loves the other but is too afraid to make the first move
(this one doesn’t strictly follow the prompt, but i had to put a pin in it somewhere! this is my first try writing from grog’s pov. hopefully it worked? i might try grog’s observations on vex at a later time.)
Honestly, Grog isn’t sure how neither of them have worked it out yet.
When they were just bitties – well, when he was a bitty and Pike was bittier than she is now – him and Pike used to read romance novels together, or rather, she’d read ‘em and he’d just listen along and laugh at all the dirty bits ‘cause Pike always got shy about reading them. Those books – they had a lot of people…. pining, is what they called it.
(Grog’s not sure what pinecones have got to do with romance, but hey, the people who wrote those books’re definitely smarter than him, so they must know what it means.)
Anyway. Pining. Percy and Vex do that a lot, he thinks, when they think nobody’s looking at them. Percy gets this look on his face, like… like… Percy’s got a really sharp face, alright, all pointy and refined, the kind of face that Grog knows plenty girls (and more than a few blokes) would be interested in. And then he looks at Vex – not even when she’s doin’ anything, she could just be counting coin – and it’s like all the sharp edges and angles just go away. He gets that smile on his face, the nice one that makes the corners of his eyes crunch up, and, well.
Grog has known Scanlan for years. More importantly, Grog’s known Scanlan for years when Pike has been around, and that means he has a pretty good idea how someone looks when they’re in love. Percy looks at Vex like she hung the moon and every single star in the sky, just for him. And yet the moment she looks back at him, he’s Percival von Whatsit de Rudolph the uptight noble again.
And holy shit. Don’t get him started on Vex…
That was lovely, thank you ❤ and I would love to hear Grog’s take on Vex 😀
Overdressed & Underappreciated 