Out of all things to occupy her time with, Grace wasn't sure why she picked learning a whole new language as a hobby. And not just any language, but the language of her almost two year boyfriend: Russian. Although Noah claimed that she was learning Russian so that she could finally know what name Alexei kept calling her in Russian. This was a theory that she would go to her grave denying because Grace was not a very touchy feely type of person. So her picking up a sudden interest in learning another language stemmed completely from wanting to have a hobby. Knowing what Alexei had been saying to her was just a bonus.
In private however she fully admitted that it was because she wanted to know what kind of pet name Alexei had given her.
Of course she didn't tell Alexei that she was learning Russian, she didn't want him to stop calling her whatever he was calling her. She wanted to become fluent enough in Russian that she could surprise Alexei one day by responding to something in Russian.
Alexei first started calling her by her mysterious name in Russian over a year before Grace started learning Russian. The two of them had been sitting on her bed, watching vine compilations, Grace was laughing so hard that tears were coming out of her eyes, her cheeks hurt, and her stomach had clenched so tightly she could barely breathe. Alexei had managed to control his laughter first, and while Grace was gasping for breath and wiping at her eyes, he had sat on her bed and stared at her with this look on her face. His eyebrows had frozen halfway up his forehead, there was still a smile on his face but it was as if he had zoned out and forgotten what he was initially laughing at. He looked at her as if he was seeing Grace for the very first time, like he had just realized something about her.
Then he'd said something to her in Russian but Grace had been too busy trying to stop herself for bursting into more giggles and missed it. When she had asked him what he said, Alexei just smiled and told her not to worry about it. And she didn't, not until the next day when he had come to see her and said the same thing to her. She asked him what it meant in English but Alexei simply said that it was a term of endearment that didn't have an English equivalent.
Grace had taken Alexei at his word until he said the mysterious words in front of Ms Chancellor who sighed, hand to her heart, and said, "Oh to be young and in love." Grace had blinked at her, startled and asked her if she knew how to translate what Alexei was saying. Ms Chancellor simply winked at her and added, "Oh there's no translation for it, you'll know what he means eventually."
Before Grace could insist on an answer, Ms Chancellor spun on her seven inch heel and quickly walked away towards her grandpa's office.
And being the proactive person that Grace was, she found herself someone at the Russian embassy to teach her Russian. Her teacher was the cousin of a son of an uncle something or other, the basic gist that Grace got was that her new teacher was related to a Russian diplomat and had far too much time on their hands.
Alexei was surprised to find Grace over at the Russian embassy for hours at a time, holed up in a room with her new teacher. Alexei wasn't the type to get jealous … much. There was the incident with Thomas when Grace was being threatened with death by his mom and everything. But other than that, Alexei wasn't the jealous type.
Oh and that one incident with Spencer who got a little too close for comfort with Grace ….
But other than that, he really wasn't the jealous type.
And although it had been brought to his attention by a certain Noah Estaban that Grace's new teacher was of the attractive variety, Alexei didn't find himself giving the young man dirty looks, or tensing up whenever he was around Grace. Maybe it was a sign of his growth as a human being and his maturity or maybe it was because Grace always looked extra excited to see him after each lesson. Whatever it was, he left the two of them alone, something that Grace was extremely grateful for even if she didn't vocalize it.
Her start off with the Russian language was rocky, as it can be when one starts with any new language. She had to get the hang of seeing a different alphabet and learning the order that the letters came in (although her teacher assured her that that could be learned later on). Once she got the hang of the different letters and the sounds that they made, as well as writing them, she moved on to learning basic words.
She learned to remember and recognize words for things like "apple" or "rain" and eventually moved on to days of the week and counting up to 10. Memorizing names for things was fairly simple, Grace managed to find ways to make sure she didn't forget what she had learned in between classes by remembering things in Russian. If she felt hungry, she would go down to the kitchen and grab an apple, all the while thinking to herself what the correct term was in Russian.
When she eventually moved on to forming simple sentences, it wasn't as difficult as she initially thought it was going to be. She had been full of anxiety, her stomach up in knots when her teacher had told her that within a few classes they would begin sentence structure. She could form basic sentences as long as she remembered the rules and followed the steps that were given to her.
The days when she had to begin learning changes in verbs in order to form more complex sentences was when her learning took a minor halt. Grace just couldn't help but lose track of how certain verbs changed when used in certain sentences, or she forgot which words went where in the sentence. Her progress was so slow compared to her earlier success it made her want to rip her hair out. And to make it worse, Alexei kept calling her that stupid pet name that she hadn't learned the word for and it drove her up the wall. She wanted to poke Alexei in the eyes or tape his mouth shut, it felt as if he was mocking her failure.
"Alexei call me that one more time and I will slap you," she threatened him once, her finger shoved in his face, right in between his eyes. The poor boy didn't know what to do and just raised an eyebrow silently.
"Something wrong?" he asked tentatively. She had sighed and buried her face in his neck.
"I've just been a little frustrated lately, but I'll be fine," Grace grumbled and gave him a light kiss on the lips in apology.
"When are you going to tell me what you are studying over at the Russian Embassy, I did not realize you would ever set foot in that building," Alexei said, and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
"Don't you worry about it, you'll find out one day," Grace said. Alexei was about to ask more questions, but after Grace kissed him, he really couldn't remember what he was going to ask her (not that that was her intention at all).
But Grace kept working at it, she would stay up well into the night, her eyes burning as she kept trying to read and write the sentences that she had been working at all day.
This is hopeless, she thought to herself several times a day over several days. It didn't seem to her as if she was making any new progress, she didn't think that she was writing or reading any faster than usual, and if she wasn't improving, then what was the point of continuing to try (at least that was what she reasoned).
And Grace would have given up except the day arrived when she opened the book in Russian that her teacher had given her to a random page, lounging on her bed and looked at the first sentence. She hadn't even realized that not only had she read the first sentence, but quite a few of the ones that followed before it hit her.
SHE WAS READING RUSSIAN.
The moment she realized that she could read Russian and actually understand it without too much trouble she jumped off of the bed in excitement. She danced around her room, her arms flying in every direction as she swung her hips. It took all of her energy to keep from squealing.
Just wait until Alexei hears me answer in Russian, she thought as she continued to dance and wiggle. Maybe now that she was able to understand what she was reading more easily, and with a larger vocabulary than when she had started, she would be able to figure out what Alexei was saying. She eventually decided that she would tell Alexei by responding to the nickname he had given her. If she couldn't figure out what he was saying, then she wouldn't say anything and keep working.
After she managed to calm herself down, she went out looking for Alexei. Luckily she didn't have to search far, she found him and Jamie playing video games downstairs, both of them hunched over, staring intently at the screen. Alexei kept a stream of Russian swears going under in his breath, Grace fought to fight a smile from spreading across her face as she translated them into English.
Swear words were the first words that anyone learned in a new language, everyone knew this.
Alexei glanced sideways at her before looking back to the TV. Grace wasn't sure what the expression on her face looked like but it must've been interesting enough that Alexei looked back at her even longer and lost the game.
"You did not win fair and square, your sister is very distracting," Alexei said with a grin as he handed the controls back to Jamie.
"Lucky for me because I won," Jamie said with a smile, which quickly changed to a grimace when he saw that Alexei had gotten to his feet and was in the middle of giving Grace a lovesick look that was followed with a kiss.
"I'm leaving before you two get 'cute,'" Jamie said and scampered out of the living room door with a shudder. While he had come to terms with his best friend dating his only sister, he most certainly didn't want to see any evidence of it in his presence.
"And what has made you so happy today?" Alexei asked looking down at Grace. He ran his hand down her arm before reaching her hand and twining their fingers together.
"I've just finally been making some progress with my new … hobby," Grace said, unable to stop herself from smiling. She was just waiting for her it, Alexei was gonna tack on that little pet name of hers at the end of everything he said, like always.
"I'm glad to hear it," Alexei said. He tugged on her arm and lead her towards the front door of the United States embassy. "How about we go and get you some gelato to celebrate?"
"That would be great," Grace said as the two of them stepped outside and were greeted with a typical warm Adrian day.
She was getting anxious and excited just waiting for Alexei to say her pet name in Russian. It seemed like he was taking forever to say it, almost as if he knew that she was waiting for it.
He looked down at her and gave her that look again, the one that said how happy he was to have her with him, that said how much he adored everything about her. He opened his mouth and it felt as if time slowed down for her as he said,
"я люблю тебя," and Grace stumbled over her feet in shock and almost fell. She didn't stumble because she hadn't been able to translate what he had said, she understood him perfectly. Grace tripped because the cute pet name that she thought Alexei had given her wasn't a pet name at all.
Alexei had said that he loved her. He had been saying it for over a year, tacking it on to the end of almost every sentence that he said to her.
"Doesn't translate into English" her ass. There was a translation for that in every language. This entire time she thought he had been calling her some pet name, but he had been saying that he loved her instead. She couldn't help but feel offended that he hadn't translated for her, who does that? If she had known then she …
And it was then that it hit her that she loved Alexei too. If she had known what he had been saying the entire time then she would have said that she loved him. And here she had gone to all these lengths to learn an entirely new language for him.
Grace forgot that she was staring up at Alexei's face after having gained her balance after her trip. She momentarily forgot that time had not frozen despite the fact that that was what it felt like.
"Is something wrong?" Alexei asked concernedly, gripping her arms as he looked down at her. She simply open and closed her mouth like a fish in response before gaining control of her voice.
"I love you too," Grace blurted out having completely forgotten that she had planned to respond back in Russian the entire time. The only thing going through her head was say it say it say it.
Alexei looked down at her stunned, eyes wide, mouth hanging slightly open.
"I -what...what did you say?" he asked her, mouth slightly again. Grace beamed up at him and put her hands around his waist in case Alexei decided to fall over.
"I said I love you too, you big goof," Grace repeated slower this time.
"How did you know what I was saying," Alexei said, his accent becoming thicker by the second.
"I've been learning Russian," Grace said with a shrug, as if it was no big deal.
"How-I-when?" Alexei asked in confusion, his eyes roving over her face as he pulled her closer.
"For a while now, I thought I would surprise you the-" but Grace never got to finish what she was going to say, Alexei pulled her close, bent down and pressed his lips to hers. Grace smiled against his lips, moved her hands from Alexei's waist, up his chest, and wrapped them around his neck to pull him closer. She put her hands in his hair and tried to pull him closer still, even though there was nowhere for Alexei to go at the point. Grace couldn't help but smile against his lips as they moved against hers, she felt so light from happiness, as if something had been weighing on her shoulders and now it was gone. One of Alexei's hands was on the small of her back and the other in her hair and she didn't know how long they had been standing in the middle of a random street-
"That is gross why can't people just keep this for their bedrooms," a passerby snapped loud enough for Grace and Alexei to hear. They broke apart with a giggle as the stranger walked by with a disgusted glare aimed at the two of them. They stood holding each other's hands, the plan for gelato almost completely forgotten (at least on Alexei's part, the only thing that ran through his head concerned Grace's lips).
"You've been saying you love me, and calling me my love, for over a year, why did you never translate it for me?" Grace asked. She was trying so hard to stop grinning but it didn't seem as if her mouth was about to start listening to her. Her cheeks were beginning to ache from how hard she was expressing her happiness. Any moment she was going to start bouncing on the spot out of giddiness, it was absolutely ridiculous.
"I was waiting for you to say it first, I did not want you to feel uncomfortable or obligated to say it back," Alexei said with a shrug of his shoulders.
"Well now you can't ever say anything in Russian without me knowing since I'm learning," Grace said, poking him in the chest. She tugged him down the street in the direction of her favourite gelato shop.
"How unfortunate, now I cannot, as you say, 'talk trash' about you to your face," Alexei said teasingly as he let go of her hand to wrap his arm around Grace's shoulders. She wound her arm around Alexei's waist.
"Oh shut up, I know you love me," Grace said, digging the fingers from her free hand into Alexei's side. He curled inwards and let out a burst of laughter before straightening again and tightening his hold on Grace.
Needless to say, that day the gelato tasted even better than usual.
A/N: inspired by a headcanon from embassyrowheadcanons tumblr