Emerald was always the silent one out of the kids.
It wasn't that she couldn't speak, she was verbal enough to speak a good chunk of the time, but she preferred to simply sign. It was better than forcing her body to let her get any words out whenever it would get into the nonverbal part of being semi-verbal, plus she wouldn't mess up what she'd want to say. Em usually kept the verbal talking for Peridot anyways, she felt the most comfortable with her out of the others.
It wasn't too say she wasn't comfortable with her other siblings, she loved them and she felt everything but discomfort around them, she just felt more shy and uncertain with them when it came to speaking what's in her head. Emeralds creations were what helped her express what was inside anyway. Regardless if it was drawing or engineering, creating was her real mouth piece, not the vocal chords that lied within her throat.
It was just a biological way of communicating a person's wants, needs, and thoughts, and for her it didn't meet all of her requirements.
Nobody questioned it really, aside from Peridot they just figured it was her shyness. It didn't bother her really, just as long as she didn't have to explain why she was the way she was. It would be too complicated to explain it to them. She only feared being unable to express anything that was in her head anymore, never being able to show her feelings or thoughts or anything else through something she made, but it wasn't like that would ever happen.
Whenever Emerald wanted to hang out with the others, she simply came by and sat down close to them. She'd make sure they noticed her presence if they didn't already at that point. They were more than happy to have her around. If they couldn't hang out with her at the moment, they'd politely decline and let her know why. Of course they tried to do that with each other, but she knew Magma and Diamond tend to get grouchy at times and it slipped through whether they wanted it to or not.
They always took a moment with her, Peridot, and Kaminari so they wouldn't accidentally throw any anger and annoyance their way.
Emerald so they didn't accidentally upset her and make her feel bad for trying, Peridot so she wouldn't get caught up in whatever was going on, and Kami so she wouldn't end up crying. Everyone agreed that was worse than any of the others getting upset. That wasn't an incident that they wanted to repeat. She could shiver just remembering the hysterical crying.
She digressed though, the point being that they were always nice about it even if they were angry at that moment. If none of them wanted to spend time with her, she'd be fine with that too, she could always be with one or more of her parents. Hanging out with anyone in the family was fine with her if she was honest.
Emerald just wouldn't be talking like they would, aside from a couple people. Not that they would mind, they'd have fun regardless, or if they didn't do much it was still some quality time being spent.
She sat down next to Otto. He kept talking to the others but acknowledged her presence by hugging her. Once he was able to, he said 'hi' to her without disrupting the conversation that was going on. She didn't know exactly what was being talked about and tuned it all out.
Emerald smiled and stuck around regardless.
