Watch As I Write

Okay, so. I think it’s. Kiiiiiinda obvious, but Diego has. Issues. A lot of issues. Here is a man who has been told that he is lesser his entire life by the only father figure he has ever known. That his only purpose in life, the only way he can find fulfillment and possibly, just possibly come out on top, is by saving and helping others. And that shit stuck. Stuck so much so that he’s been doing vigilante work even after he left the Umbrella Academy—and that’s after getting thrown out of the police academy.

He is a man who wants so, so badly to help other people that he’s willing to break the law. He is an idealist refusing to be trapped by the the world around him, his reputation, his past, but these things are all all wrapped around him like rope he can struggle against, but never really get out of.

So to put it simply, to be with Diego…is a little bit of a balancing act. You need to support him—god do you need to support him, he really hasn’t had very much of that in his life—but you also need to play voice of reason. You need to tell him that it’s okay for him to rest, that he doesn’t need to do everything. You need to tell him that it’s okay for him to trust other people, to trust the world around him to be okay, to be safe for just a little bit.

Sometimes this will take words, sometimes it will take getting him to shut up and listen to you for what feels like once in his goddamn life, but other times? Other times the most it’ll take is just pulling him into bed with you and laying down with him, enough of your weight on him that he knows that to leave would be to disturb you, and he really doesn’t want to wake you up, doesn’t want you to let go of him. So he’ll stay put. If only for just that one night.

On that note, Diego is definitely touch-starved. In a group like the Umbrella Academy, he had never gotten much in the way of attention—let alone affection—that was just his, and the physical affection you give him is certainly just his.

Touch is absolutely one of his love languages, and he just eats that affection up when you express it, and he will more than gladly express it back.

(As an aside, he can be prone to jealousy over the little things, but over the little things it reads less as jealousy, than it does just being maybe a little more. Touch-y, hover-y, than normal. Most of the time it doesn’t even hit your radar that he may be feeling a little ignored, because you give the affection he wants so freely in return that most of the time it’s resolved before you need to think about it too much.)

(Jealousy over the big things, though, definitely reads as just straight-up jealousy.)

So for those of you who haven’t gotten the memo. Diego is (not really secretly) the biggest dork of the known universe. He also has a tendency to hide this. From my understanding it may be a factor of his experiences of abuse—you tend to hide the things that bring you joy for fear that they may be taken away or ridiculed. So dancing, singing, any sort of expression, really, these are all things of himself that he had hidden away, and to let them out, typically means being behind closed doors, if not locked ones.

To be with him means that you get the glorious experience that is being trusted to be within those doors. You get to see all the funny little things that make Diego who he is, not just the ones he always puts out there. You get to see the dancing that has obviously been practiced, you get to hear the singing that is pretty solidly off-key most of the time, and you get to see him in all these different, new ways that are just that: different. Because he trusts you to know all of him.

Sure, the first couple of times you catch him, you might find that he hides, that he decides to drop everything (figuratively) and pretend that you hadn’t just caught him doing what he was doing. But by the time you’re fully in a relationship, he’s moved past hiding what he likes from you and trying to share it with you.

So you catch him dancing and he’ll just grin at you and try to pull you over to join him. You catch him singing, you’ll get him serenading you, just to see you roll your eyes at him, because you also smile.

This all just showcases the sheer trust he has in you. He can trust you and be vulnerable around you because you love him, and he doesn’t have to be on-guard all the time, just waiting for someone to kick him while he’s not ready to take the hit. He can feel safe when you’re around—if nothing else he can at least feel safer.

And it’s for that reason you get to see the parts of him that nearly no one else does. You get to hear him struggle with his stutter, still, on occasion, sneaking up on him. You get to see the hurt in his heart, scars deeper than the ones on his skin. And you understand that to see all of him means that you can finally love all of him.

Another thing: here is a man who had never had to worry about making a home for a significant portion of his life. The way the Umbrella Academy ran, he wasn’t really ever required to do much in the way of chores. And then the boxing gym, well, that’s not really much in the way of a home to be made as much as a temporary living solution. But here’s the fun thing he finds out: there’s a number of things when it comes to homemaking that he finds out he really likes, when he moves in with you. Sure, part of it is just the sheer, “wow, I actually get to have this,” factor, but part of it actually is just straight-up enjoying these things.

Folding laundry? It’s tedious, but it goes faster with four hands, and that means he gets to spend time with you when he does it. Baking? He obviously may not do it all the time, but funny enough, the precision involved in following a recipe does mean he can get pretty damn good results.

There is so much comfort in moving in with you, and really, there is a part of him insisting that he needs to pay you back in some way for it—he doesn’t, you can insist, but he still will be hard-pressed to just sit back when he could be doing something around the house to help you, better still, with you.

It’s always the little things that he takes the greatest enjoyment out of with you. And while it’s a little sad to think of why, not dwelling on the why means you get to love the fact that he’s enjoying doing the dishes with you just because it’s in a home you both are a part of together.

But does this mean he will consider going grocery shopping with you a date? Mmmmmmayyybeee. (Definitely. Not like. A big date. But like. Still a date).

So Diego, he doesn’t do good with people not trusting him to get things done. And sometimes that can include taking care of himself. So sometimes he can get very defensive when you try to tell him to take care of himself, to not go out one night or another because he’s recovering from an injury or illness.

He insists he knows his limits. In truth, he knows how to push himself hard enough that he breaks and then to insist on keeping going. You can see that easier than he can. So a sizable chunk of the time, you need to be careful in letting him know that he needs to take better care of himself, you need to be careful with your words to let them speak louder than the chunk of his mind insisting, angrily, that everyone thinks they know better than him.

Your actions regarding this can speak just as loudly as any well-planned arguments. Letting him know that you trust him just builds his trust in you. So that the next time you simply tell him to sit down and goddammit stop doing that, you have stitches, Diego, you’re going to break them, he’s going to be more prone to listening. He’ll be frustrated, but. He’ll listen.

(He’ll listen even better next time if you stay close to him during the time he’s down for the count, an easy association for his sharp mind to make that if he lets you take care of him from time to time that he’ll be treated to a dose of his more obvious love language.)

In truth, you really need to be patient with him. You need to be willing to help him talk things out by being willing to communicate. He’s hot-headed and doesn’t always think before he says or does something just to make sure it hurts, but god does he feel how it hurts when it comes to you. He feels it in an instant. You have to be level-headed when he isn’t, and as frustrating as it is, as much as it takes, he will give more than enough to make up for it. This is something else that your actions can lead to, helping him learn to take a step back and cool off.

ALSO, delving into nsfw territory: you know this, I know this, we all know this, he is kinky. He’s interested in your comfort first and foremost when it comes to the bedroom (or, well, let’s be real occasionally outside it), but when it reaches the point where you fall into his sheets, he is observant about your tastes, and he is certainly vocal about his. Dropping hints is less like dropping hints than it is outright suggesting without shame about something to bring into the bedroom next you both get the chance.