sign {h.s.}

κεφάλαιο δέκα

"YOU'VE GOT TO work with me." I all but plead, patience running low. Mere seconds from collapse, my arm is wrapped tightly around Harry's taut waist leaving only the question of who is holding who up. I've never been the strongest girl in the world, but that's never mattered before. Not until this precise moment. Harry, while substantially more sober than he was when I arrived to his apartment, is still wobbly on his feet. Arranging his transport to the third floor of our dorm is proving to be an increasingly impossible task.

"Ik slap? Jij bent de gene die slap is," he huffs at me. As he speaks, his entire body falls slack; the intent concentration of speaking to me taking away from the energy that he had been conserving to stay upright. [Dutch: I am. It is you that is weak.]

The urge to let him fall is increasingly attractive.

Getting him from his apartment to the dorm building had been a trip in the first place. I'd carried him in a similar way as to how I am now from his door to the elevator. I had to help him into the cramped space of my car. He can be a pest-y drunk thing when he wants to be; he spent half of the car ride over dipping his fingers into the seatbelt buckle, unclipping his precaution. Halfway back home, I compromised by driving with one hand on the wheel, the other covering his buckle to prevent any more disruption.

"Harry," I say, my patience running low. "I think it would be easier for both of us if you spoke English."

Again, he scoffs, dramatically rolling his eyes. "Sarebbe più facile per te se parlasso in inglese, non più facile per me. Dimentichi che la mia lingua madre è l'italiano. Inoltre, sono le persone di mentalità chiusa come te che rovinano la lingua inglese con la tua insistenza che tu parli e impari solo l'inglese. Le lingue sono belle. Perché limitarti a uno solo? Il tuo paese non è stato fondato sul pricipio di essere chi vuoi essere e di mettere in practica ciò che vuoi?" There's a tight expression on his face as he stares at me, blinking blankly as he waits for my rebuttal. Equally so, there's something hopeful in his expression, as though he wants nothing more than for me to say something that proves him wrong. He's not impressed when I remain silent. [Italian: It would be easier for you if I spoke in English, not easier for me. You forget that my mother language is Italian. Plus, it's close-minded people like you who ruin the English language with your insistence that you only speak and learn English. Languages are beautiful. Why limit yourself to just one? Wasn't your country founded on the principle of being who you want to be and practicing what you want?]

"Repeat that back to me," I sigh, buying into his little game. Something about the way that he is acting right now is entirely reminiscent of the children that I used to babysit in high school. Everything is a personal and perceived offense. On the other hand, they can be the fastest to forgive.

He rolls his eyes, but complies with my request nonetheless, "it might be easier for you to understand me if I speak in English, but it is not any easier for me to speak in English for you. Italian is my mother language, and everything else is jumbled. You're lucky if my sentences come out in one language in the first place—" he pauses for breath, the stairs and the effort of this rant seeming to have exhausted him. His fingers clutch into the side of my hip as he takes a second to balance himself.

"Do you want to sit down?"

"Estoy bien," he waves a spare hand off at me as he continues on. This time, I don't question his switching of languages, having understood what he was saying in the first place. "English might be the language of business and commerce, but that doesn't mean that it's okay to blindly rely on it. It's rather ignorant to assume that people will easily adapt to English to convenience you."

I want to fight him on it, but my mouth just opens and shuts. Surprisingly, I don't disagree with him. After a moment, I give him a pointed look, "I agree with what you're saying. I only find it annoying when I'm trying to have a productive conversation with you and you purposely change the language to one you know that I can't understand."