#yappee

You’ve always been a bit of a talkative gal. You loved a yap, what could you say? Whether it was with your mum at 11pm when all she wanted to do was go to bed but you had the latest tea from school, or a coffee outing with your besties that devolved into hours of speaking about the same drama you had already spoken about the day before, you were always ready to talk. 

You hadn’t noticed it until you were older, up into your late teens, but when no one seemed to mind, you didn’t think of it. Of course there were moments where someone said something. An off-hand comment about how you talked “so much” or an annoyed request to just be quiet had bred a self-awareness bordering on insecurity. 

For at least a day or so after those instances you would go a little quiet, force down the urge to elaborate on a story or to comment on what someone else had said, but you had good friends and a resilience of spirit that always had you bouncing back. 

It wasn’t that you just liked to talk about yourself. You liked to talk to comfort, to soothe, to excite, to relate, to process, to do anything really. You might have been a yapper, but you were also a good listener, and that balance worked wonders in a person. 

When you first met Jack, and on your early dates, you had tried to be careful with how talkative you were. You really liked him, and you didn’t want to drive him off because you got overeager and yapped his ear off. 

But Jack was naturally succinct, quiet, at least quieter than you, which left you a lot of space to fill. On the opposite end, you were naturally excitable, talkative, a little too loud sometimes, so within the first few dates, you fell back into your patterns. 

After the second date, you had been a little bit worried. You had somehow gotten onto the topic of books during dinner, and your current read was particularly good. You had gone on a little tangent about it, analysing it for him almost, to the point that he had finished over half his plate and you were still barely a quarter of the way through. 

But he had smiled the entire time. He nodded along with your words, mmed and aahed in the right places, interjected a little titbit of his own when he thought of one, and through it all, watched your face with a spark of joy in his eyes. 

That night, when he dropped you off at your door, he pressed a soft kiss to your lips, caressed your face, and he told you how much he had enjoyed listening to you, and that he couldn’t wait to do it again. So that had been that, and the two of you had cemented each other in your hearts. 

When you had both begun introducing the other as your partner, you faced many comments. 

“Isn’t he a bit serious for you?”

“Isn’t she too talkative?” 

“He must get bored quickly around her.”

“She must be so bored with him, he never seems to say anything.” 

And perhaps to others it did seem a bit odd, someone particularly stoic and someone particularly expressive finding love with each other, but it made perfect sense to you. You were two puzzle pieces. You filled in what the other didn’t have and evened out your lives. He liked to listen, you liked to talk. He liked to play, you liked to cheer. It made perfect sense to you.  

Whenever you came with him on the tour, a common scene was found of you two strolling around somewhere, hand in hand as you spoke excitedly about something or other and he watched you with this soft expression on his face he never offered anyone else. 

Once you had even asked him about it. 

“Do you think I talk too much? Like, do you ever get bored listening to me?” You asked as the two of you lay in bed in another hotel room. You were laying facing each other but still pressed close, both of your forearms against each other between you. You chewed on your lip as you looked at his face, but he just reached up and gently pulled your lower lip free. 

“Only when you tell me to get up in the morning,” he whispered with a small smile, and you giggled quietly, shaking your head and pinching his cheek a little. 

“I’m surprised more people don’t know how cheeky you are,” you returned, stroking his face with your hand. He hummed softly, closing his eyes. You thought he fell asleep as his breaths slowed.