Interpreter
He doesn't talk very much.
Denmark calls me his interpreter. Except when he calls me the little housewife. I like to slap him for the wife one, but the interpreter one is true.
His silence speaks volumes. The same way a cat communicates with its tail, or a dog with its ears, Berwald can say everything with a pointed look and a certain inclination of his head.
Then again, anything he might want to say around Denmark is on everyone else's mind too. Denmark is pretty predictable.
But my favorite conversations are the ones with Routsi's monosyllables in them. I know he's really serious if he goes so far as to actually say 'no' instead of only shaking his head or glaring.
Once he spoke a lot to me. Denmark would say it was when he proposed to me, but then I would hit him.
He was sitting next to me on the couch of our Nordic common room. Everyone else was out for a Denmark party, which is the kind that includes much of Europe. I don't know. I don't go because Sve doesn't want me to go. Instead we sat in silence, and when I got up he grabbed my arm and sat me back down. He looked at me very hard and said:
"Tino, you know how much I like you. Please I ask you, please never go away with Denmark or Russia. I would like to always have you beside me." The words were awkward because he is unaccustomed to them; but with his eyes and his tilted head, he filled them with a special kind of meaning. And I couldn't leave him.