Sometimes, if she's very very lucky, he will speak to her in poetry; like a magpie, he delights in giving her stolen things - the shinier the better. He showers her in his adoration with other's words, as though he thinks (and he does think this, she knows he does) that his own words would be wrong, just like so much about him has been wrong for so long.
Freak. Monster. Robot. (These thoughts taste like ashes and murder on her tongue; She knows he has heard far worse.)
He thinks it would be wrong to compare her mind to one of her beloved scalpels - precise, dangerous, graceful and glinting.
He thinks it would be wrong to compare her hands sometimes to birds and other times to tungsten carbide.
He thinks it would be wrong to tell her that he loves her hair at least as much as (maybe more than) he loves the entirety of the rest of her, and that if she were only to twine it around his wrist, he would gladly follow a step behind her for the rest of his life.
And so he gives her words, about her intense fragility, and how his heart has taken root in his body but he doesn't have a name for it.
She would prefer his words, of course she would. Her heart almost explodes against her ribs when he says she is exceptional, even though he always knew it was true and she knows that it shouldn't be. Still, until the day he can look her in the eye and tell her that he doesn't care if it hurts to be near her, so long as he gets to be near her, she will cherish and covet his stolen poetry.
Maybe, if she's very very lucky, one day, he will bring her flowers.
Hello, beloved readers, this is your captain speaking. Thank you so much for taking time out of your lives to read this ridiculous thing that terrorized my brain until I wrote, typed, edited and published in the space of an hour. Comments and concrit are selfishly adored.
Poetry borrowed from 'somewhere i have never traveled', by e.e. cummings, and 'You Are Jeff' by Richard Siken, title from Taylor Swift's 'State of Grace' (if you give it a listen, listen to the acoustic version).