i won't say i'm in love

Wong Ha Jung

Wong Ha Jung was sure that he wasn't late for his next appointment, but he was still anxiously trying to push himself down the hallway faster anyways. Before everything had happened -he was still trying to mentally skip over the exact details- on time had been defined in his books as at least an hour early. Even though it bothered him drop that kind of mentality, it wasn't like he had much of a choice these days.

At least. At least he was feeling somewhat normal that day? Meaning that he could feel his legs, the pain wasn't awful, and the counselor didn't feel especially inclined to go and hide in the nearest closet. He just daydreamed about being able to get back to his bed instead. Which was... bad but Wong Ha Jung was becoming increasingly resigned to the fact that it was the start of one of the less dangerous trends. It could be worse. But it could also be a lot better and that was the part he felt stuck on.

He knocked on the door of his office out of habit and pushing the door open, the counselor was surprised to see that his next appointment had already come in. "Oh, hello, Levi." Was he late? No, he had checked the clock in the hallway just a little while before. Levi was just early, then, which made sense since the boy had worked so hard to bump the other person off of Wong Ha Jung's schedule.

Well in any case, there wasn't any point in keeping him waiting if he was already there. "So how are things?" the man asked, wheeling himself in a position facing the boy. "You said that there was something urgent that you needed to discuss?"

Wong Ha Jung

Utterly clueless, the man blinked. "Okay," he said carefully, studying Levi's appearance. Even though the boy looked agitated, it didn't seem like he was experiencing extreme emotional distress. Well, at least not depression or mania. It seemed like both of those were being contradicted already. Seemed like. "How about you start from the beginning and we'll see what we can do?"

Admittedly, Wong Ha Jung didn't know too much about Levi besides the basics. Incubus, nursing major, had a stint in Manta Carlos Hospital before enrolling in the Academy. They had talked once before, earlier in the year when they both had been fairly new arrivals to the island. Passed that, there really hadn't been any contact between them at all and the counselor hadn't had the time to check on somebody who appeared to be more or less mentally sound.

Maybe my assessment was incorrect? he worried, trying to regain the mental processes he had been using back then. His memories of the beginning of the year seemed so far away. There was almost this fog that he had to cut through. Without knowing what exactly this issue was, all he could do was guess and naturally turned to expecting the worst because, well. That was a pretty reasonable thing to do in his profession.

Wong Ha Jung

The counselor waited for a few more moments to see if there was anything else that Levi wanted to say. But it seemed like that was it. "I see," he said, hesitating. It wasn't that uncommon that students came out in his office but he didn't think that any of those had been incubi until now. "How did you reach this conclusion? It sounds like it's been taking a while to get there."

Actually, though, the part that Wong Ha Jung was most skeptical of was the love part, since the boy had only been on the island for so long and his reaction made it seem like the thought had only just dawned on him. Then again, since it was his roommate, they most likely saw a great deal of each other. And, well. Time spent on the island, no matter how long, always seemed to be particularly intense. So, he was kind of learning to even be skeptical about skepticism. If that even made any sense.

"If you're really convinced of this, then which part specifically do you think is the problem?" Considering what Levi was, there couldn't have been a religious stigma because, well. Demon. That was usually the biggest issue encountered in this kind of situation. So. Social, maybe? It seemed strange to think of since he literally came from Hell, where one would think that nobody would care about anything except obeying whoever it was who was in charge. But what did the man know about that anyways?

Or maybe it was something more Levi centered than it was on everything else. He was still young, after all. Change was scary.

Wong Ha Jung

"Tell me about your roommate," the counselor prompted, slightly alarmed since he wasn't completely sure if the kick the shit out of me part was a joke or not. He thought that it probably was, but still. He wasn't supposed to making such assumptions at work and Levi looked uncertain about it himself. "Is he the type that you would be able to talk things out with? You certainly sound pretty taken." That person was only a blurred name in Wong Ha Jung's mind, difficulty recalling it stemming from the fact that he hadn't thought that information would be relevant. Ah, my mistake. He wondered if he'd ever stop doing that.

Am I really going to have to give romantic advice? the man wondered worriedly. Because I think that we might have a problem with that. He... really wasn't the right person to ask for that sort of thing. It didn't mean that he didn't give it at all -to be honest, most of the problems around the Academy seemed to be romantic in nature so he was actually doing a lot of that- but he simply preferred not to. Of course, Wong Ha Jung would never say that out loud. A good summary of how this process went was like this: somebody would ask directly or indirectly for advice, he would reject loudly in his head. Then he'd feel bad about it and be silently guilted into giving the advice anyways even though it made him feel absolutely awkward.

At least acknowledging the denial is a good step, though?

Wong Ha Jung

The counselor wondered briefly if he was a terrible person for wanting to just march up to this roommate and drag him in so that he and Levi could talk this over. It would have been a very cowardly thing for him to have done, however, just because he was starting to panic a bit as he mentally fumbled for something appropriate to say, wishing that something could be straight forward for once. Don’t be an idiot, Wong. You’re a psychologist, he scolded himself. If you wanted something straight forward, you should have gone into math instead. But he wasn’t any good at math, anyways, so it was almost exactly the same as telling himself You’re not just good at anything at all.

What do you like about this boy? was the first question that came to mind, one that seemed normal and innocuous enough. But Wong Ha Jung wasn’t sure he should ask that, not when all it would do was probably make Levi even more confused, hammering in the idea of love with the thought that maybe all that would come out of it was distance. Or was that just the man’s own thoughts tinting it all? Thoughts wandering off to streaks of red and pink, he could feel the heat starting to burn in his cheeks and covered the lower half of his face with his hand. He acknowledged, I’m hopeless.

“Maybe the two of you should talk,” the man suggested, quietly filing away that bit of advice for himself, too. “It sounds like there might be something mutual” –but don’t get your hopes up, don’t mess it up, don’t –“and if you don’t ask, you’ll never find out, huh?” Sometimes, though, there was no denying that he simply didn’t want to know, for fear of what the answer would be and what kind of weight he’d feel around his neck. Choke or sink, that was all. “If he’s talking to you so much now, he’ll probably keep talking to you afterwards, too, even if he doesn’t feel the same way.“