Balthier swallows hard, pressing his eyes with the heels of his hands again.

This is what he’s always wanted. Since he was old enough to think about a partner. And now that someone is offering it, he feels like running away to hide.

“I want that,” he says. His voice cracks, but he pushes on. “But — everyone I have tried to love has wanted me competent and detached. Any emotion I showed was used against me sooner or later. Except with my mother, and she—“ he takes a rattling breath because honestly this one still hurts. “She still left me.”

He forces himself to open his eyes, giving David a very weak smile. “Will you still love me when I’m morose and afraid and don’t know what to say? I’m easy to like when I’m polished. I’m — not much underneath that.”

Because truly, the only love he’s known has been conditional.