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Kieran's handwriting was still shaky.
He had been using his left hand for a good few weeks now, but he was still getting used to it. To the grip of the pen, and the positioning of his hand against the paper. He was still getting used to the way the ink would smudge on to his hand anytime he tried to write in Galarian. (At least when he could use his other hand again, he would probably be able to switch between which hand he used. He could use his left hand for Kantoian and his right hand for Galarian, then he wouldn't have to worry about any ink smudges at all.)
He was getting better, at least. His letters were now somewhat legible (even if his kanji wasn't even close.) And he was moving up from "it looks like a kindergartener wrote it" to "it looks like a second grader did it." It wasn't exactly the best feeling in the world, starting over from square one, from zero. But it was something. It was progress. And that was okay.
His right hand had officially been moved out of its cast a week ago, and now he was using it as a glorified paper weight in order to hold the card down.
His grandfather had always said he was a creative person. Creative and sentimental. It wasn't exactly what Kieran had wanted to be. Back when was Champion, anything other than training was a weakness. Creativity only led to niche battle strategies that would be hard to pull off. And sentimentality? That went out the window. He couldn't afford to show any weakness. To give his opponent any advantage.
Kieran missed it now. It was hard to create when the hands used to create were impaired. His small wood carvings were rugged and choppy, and horrible to look at, but his grandmother still placed them on the shelves. His sketchbook which was once full of detailed pictures of the mountains or the rice fields or the biomes in the Terarium, was now full of shaky sketches of trees and grass, and anything else that he could vaguely draw the shape of and have his uneven lines be viewed as "artistic" or "stylistic" and not a tragic outcome of Area Zero that he might not recover from.
His sentimentality had only grown. Every sketch he had done, every colored or lined piece of art was stashed away in a portfolio that he would look at and hope he could achieve again one day. Sculptures and scenes he had once dismissed as "not good enough" were now held in high esteem as he prayed and worked and hoped that he would be able to create something like that again one day.
It was the irony of loss that he was so accustomed now, that he only appreciates it when it's not there.
But he does what he can with what he has. The people around him deserve that much. (They tell him that he deserves it, too. That he should be kinder to himself. He'll get there one day, he knows. He'll stop holding others on an unreachable pedestal eventually. But for now, he's working through the smaller things, and they tell him that's okay, too.)
His handwriting is still shaky, but he will continue to write.
The orange construction paper isn't a color he would've preferred for himself in any capacity, but it's Juliana's favorite color, and the color of her school. It's something he can work with, at least.
He hasn't made a card yet, like this. His grandparents’ birthdays had already passed by the time they went down into Area Zero, and Carmine had stopped accepting handmade cards a while ago. (He was eight and she was eleven, and by then she was starting to become a "young lady”, and apparently young ladies didn't like construction paper stuffed with glitter glue and stickers anymore. It had been a while since then, maybe she would accept one now. But Kieran had been too scared and too hurt to try.)
So, Juliana's birthday it was, right at the end of spring.
It wasn't going to be the best card he had ever made. His grandmother's calligraphy courses had been abandoned by his left hand the moment he realized he wasn't even able to apply the right amount of pressure. So, it was his shaky, elementary handwriting that replaced it.
Still, he was careful in his writing. Carving out each letter onto the page, one painstaking pen stroke at a time.
He didn't have glitter glue in his dorm, even if he thought that Juliana would appreciate it, because it's just one of those things she likes. So, he makes do with markers and small paper crafts that probably take much more dexterity than he currently has. It's not the best, but he tried. And Juliana likes it when he tries more than she seems to like anything else, so he tells himself that it'll be okay. He tells himself that the small Hisuian Zorua he had drawn, like the one she had traded to him, was somewhat recognizable and the Applin that sat next to it was a testament to how they first got together. And she would like that. She would like a crappily drawn birthday card that he drew with heart more than she'd appreciate any detailed masterpiece that didn't have an ounce of thought put into it.
It's what he tells himself, because he knows it's true. He knows it. And maybe one day, he'll feel it, too.
It's a small party, only really consisting of the League Club and her friends from Paldea, who had been willing to fly all the way here. Gifts are wrapped up and placed on the table where the League Club computer used to sit (having been moved aside for the occasion) and the main table is decorated with a pink striped tablecloth and small, flower confetti. There's a multi-colored banner that wraps around the ceiling, eventually making its way towards the back wall where they meet to form a giant "Happy Birthday!"
Kieran places his gift on the table as he comes in, one of the first to arrive besides Juliana, her Paldean friends, and Lacey. It's almost funny, looking at the decorations and seeing Juliana's face as she seems embarrassed. For someone who had somehow captured the hearts of everyone she had ever met, she had always hated the spotlight.
He goes up to her, trying his best to be able to greet her properly. Should he kiss her? No, that's too much. Maybe just on the cheek? Yeah, a kiss on the cheek should work, that'll be fine, not too lovey-dovey, but still enough, hopefully.
Before he can even think about how he'll greet her, he's being pulled into a hug, and so he does the reasonable thing and pulls back. He plants an awkward kiss on Juliana's cheek, that technically hits her jaw more than her actual cheek, but she laughs and kisses him right back, so he thinks that maybe he's doing all right.
Everyone else files in eventually, and he spends his time... actually talking to people. Penny catches him up on her newest anime. Arven talks to him about what dishes are best for certain Pokémon. And Nemona immediately challenges him to a battle, before remembering that she had promised Juliana a birthday battle, and that she would instead battle Kieran afterwards.
The party starts with a few games, and then food, and eventually the cake and the presents.
Kieran immediately wants to give his gift first, and Drayton rolls his eyes and calls him a "good-old fashioned lover boy" which embarrasses him so much that he decides that maybe his gift would be best given last. (Juliana tells him it’s okay, and that it wasn't that funny, but he doesn't really believe her.)
She unwraps present after present. Lacey got her an embroidery sorting kit. Crispin had gotten her a poster for a kaiju movie. (It was one Kieran hadn't seen yet, and he was not at all jealous in the slightest.) Amarys had gotten her a mini whiteboard to replace the notepad she had to use during class. Drayton had gotten her a snack box, which seemed more for himself, really. Carmine had gotten her a set of earrings. Nemona had gotten her one of those coin passports, already half-full of various Paldean and Unovan landmarks the two of them had been to. Arven had gotten her a vegetarian cookbook, along with a small notebook with his own amended recipes. And Penny had gotten her a boxed series of an old show that Juliana clearly enjoyed.
Kieran handed her his gift, trying not to bounce his leg as she carefully peeled off the wrapping paper.
The necklace inside was hand carved. (Not by Kieran, as much as he would've liked to. But there was a pride that came with his family and their carvings. He knew Juliana wouldn't mind anything he got her, but he couldn't dare get her something that didn't meet his own standards, not for her birthday, anyway.) The wood of the small Applin charm shined against the fluorescent lights of the club. He hoped she liked it.
She stared at it for a while before immediately clipping it on, running her fingers over the charm over and over. She opened the card and quickly read through the contents before she hugged him tightly again.
He could hear the shaky sounds come out of her mouth, as if she was trying to talk, but he just shook his head.
"Happy Birthday 'Liana," he whispered, "I love you."
He wondered if maybe it was too much, to say "I love you" so soon. Carmine had told him that relationships were supposed to start out with an "I like you" phase that would turn into love. But it had never felt like that, not really. He hoped she had felt it, too.
His insecurities disappeared as she hugged him tighter, kissing his cheek and holding her hand out for him to see.
"I love you," she had signed, and Kieran could only hide his face in her shoulder.
It wasn't perfect. Their love was messy, and choppy, and young. Because they were teenagers, and they were messy, and choppy, and young. But he’d do it all again next year when he had to relearn his right hand again, too. Because it was there, and it was real. And that was enough.