[ As she curls into him, Claude's arms go around her as well in what's almost an automatic reaction. The kind which feels right, like an instinct that'd always been there just as in so many years ago when it was he'd first realized it felt like the empty spaces around him were made for her to fit into. And she had so seamlessly in a way that no one ever had, and so much so that he could do nothing but marvel at the simplicity of it in a way which had made him never want to let go. That belief had never once wavered, not even in their jagged separation here where they'd only ached with loss, and it doesn't now either.

Claude leans down to kiss the top of her head and considers resting his chin on top of it, but decides against it to watch what he can see of her face while she talks. It works out since when her words abruptly stop, there's a second where his breath inaudibly catches in his throat and even for all of his control over everything he projects, he forgets to inhale again. The absence of what follows he hears loud and clear.

Or - does he? Is it wishful thinking, just a product of that all important phrase resonating somewhere inside of him with a truth he'd long ago stopped denying to himself? It's difficult to not think of something Sylvain had told him months ago, something that'd all but confirm it. Something Claude still hears now said in what Hilda tells him: the same thing, just in different words. An admission from either one of them which will take time - something beyond worth waiting for. ]

You mean so much to me, too. And so do we, and for what we have with Sylvain as well. I care about you for who you are, Hilda. Not for who you think you should be but for all of you, no matter what. We'll just have to work on everything else together now that we can, but I believe in us.