Another supah short one!
At exactly seven, there was a knock at her door. She pulled herself away from her bookshelf, scouring each level for her Spanish books and dictionaries, and answered. "Hola," she smiled, indicating that Ronon should come in.
"Hola," he repeated uncertainly, following her across the room.
She sat down in her desk chair and he sat in the chair next to hers on the same side of the desk with her. She folded her hands in her lap and bit her lip. "Um how are you?" she asked politely as he got settled into his seat.
"Good," he nodded.
"Ok, so before we start, I just want to let you know a few things," she started, "First of all, Spanish is quite different from English, phonetically speaking," she explained immediately, "There are fewer vowel sounds in Spanish and in general it's pronounced more forward in the mouth."
He nodded again.
"Spanish also uses the same alphabet as English, unlike Chinese or Greek or Arabic or something like that, so that makes our lives a hell of a lot easier. Spanish syntax—"
"What's that?" he interrupted.
"Oh. Sentence structure. Word order. Sorry."
He flashed a look at her for her unnecessary apology.
She winced. "Anyway," she smiled at him (he smiled back), "Spanish syntax is also very similar to English. So that makes learning it as a second language a bit easier, too."
He nodded in silence once more.
"Before we go into the actual language…do you mind if I give you a brief history of it?" she asked timidly.
"You're the teacher," he replied, shrugging.
She reached for her globe across the desk and spun around. "Spanish evolved from Latin," she began, pointing to Italy. "And we've discovered that Latin actually evolved from Ancient. So...very distantly, Spanish is a derivative of Ancient." He sat back and listened in unreadable silence as she tried to condense the history of the Spanish language down into two minutes. "Right," she coughed, realizing that he was giving her his complete and undivided attention and therefore staring directly at her, "So due to its dissemination during the colonial period, Spanish is spoken natively in something like twenty-one different countries across the world so…obviously there's a bit of variation from country to country."
"Twenty-one countries?" he repeated.
"Uh huh," she nodded.
"How many countries are there on Earth?" he asked. It was something he had never really wondered before.
She shook her head, unsure of the exact number. "Maybe two hundred?" she answered.
Ronon raised his eyebrows. He had never heard of a planet in the Pegasus Galaxy to boast so many nations. He knew that a lot of people lived on Earth, but a population that size - untouched by the Wraith - was near unfathomable to him.
"It's not all peace and rainbows," she said quietly, as if reading his thoughts. "We don't all get along. There's war, famine, hate..."
"In-fighting is a luxury," he growled.
She took a deep breath. "Perhaps," she nodded.
They sat in uncomfortable silence for a moment.
"Chapter one?" she finally asked nervously, tucking a piece of hair behind her ear. "I think we'll start like this and slowly move away from the book and into more practical uses of the language if you choose to continue," she suggested.
"Yeah, sure," he replied, sitting up straighter and looking at the page she had opened the book to.
They began with basic greetings and sentences, then moved on to telling the time, which finally prompted her to look down at her watch. "Oh shit," she exclaimed.
"What is it?" he asked, looking up at her from the page.
"Speaking of which… I'm so sorry. It's already nine," she said quickly, a little embarrassed, "I didn't mean to keep you for so long," she winced.
"How did you learn Spanish?" he immediately asked her, not addressing her concern.
"Oh," she uttered, taken aback, "I um, well, Texas shares a border with Mexico," she explained, "My nanny when I was younger was from Mexico. Her name is Marisol. She was kind of a second mother to me," she smiled. "She spoke to me in Spanish from the time I was a baby, so I grew up bilingual. So did my sister," she added, "You're learning the Mexican Spanish accent from me, by the way," she informed him, "To me, it's what I'm used to...it's what I grew up with."
"So you speak Mexican Spanish?" he asked.
"Well," she started, "To be honest, my accent is a bit of a mess. I grew up with the Mexican accent, but I also spent a year living in Chile, so I sometimes speak with a Chilean accent." She paused. "It sounds really funny though," she smiled to herself, looking down.
"Say something," he ordered bluntly.
"Um, ok," she laughed nervously, thinking. "Well…" she finally said, "there's this card game that I play with the Spaniards. It's called 'Escoba,'" she enunciated slowly, "It means 'broom.' But I say 'e'coba,'" she blushed, "I drop the s's in certain words. They always make fun of me for it. Or," she laughed again, "'Chile,'" she said the word clearly, "is pronounced 'Tchile' down there."
Ronon was smiling a crooked half smile. "I like it," he said, raising his eyebrows. He cleared his throat, frowning. "I'd better go," he murmured, standing up. Emma stood as well. "Good night," he nodded to her, shoving his hands in his pockets.
"Buenas noches," she smiled.
"And…thanks," he added on his way out.
She fell backwards onto her bed as soon as the door closed. "Oh fuck," she groaned, clamping her hand to her forehead, and feeling how quickly her heart was pounding in her chest.