Hi! Happy Canada Day, as previously mentioned. This is loosely based on my best Canada Day memory, but personalised for the fic's purpose. It seems ironic to be writing this when I just found out that my family isn't doing fireworks today... Anyways, all fireworks are real and the Canada Day activities described are real according to the Internet (I don't live in Vancouver so I had to do my best). Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I don't own Frank or Emily Zhang.
Fireworks
Frank stuffed his head under his pillow but he still couldn't sleep. Nor had he been able to when he'd been lying on his side. Or when he'd been plopped on his stomach. Or on his back.
The room of his door opened just a crack. A shot of light lined his floor now.
"Frankie?" Mom asked.
"Mmm-hmm?"
"I don't know what kind of standards your Grandmother held Canada Day to last year, but this can't fly." She said. "Get up and go find some shoes, alright?"
"You're wearing your pyjamas Mom." Frank said. "So am I."
"That's okay," Mom said.
"Where are we going that lets us wear our pyjamas?" Frank said.
Mom smiled. "Firework hunting."
Grandmother pointed out that they weren't dressed for going out and that Mom's hair was in a mess and that Frank's pyjama bottoms were too long for him but Mom didn't care.
"He's seven, so he can get away with anything and some people wear sweatpants on a regular basis, so I'm fine," Mom said. She kissed Grandmother on the forehead. "Later Mother."
They were out of the door before Grandmother could say more. Mom didn't even fight with Grandmother, she just ran really fast.
"How do you hunt fireworks?" Frank asked as they walked to the driveway. "They're too high in the sky."
"All you need is good eyes and a car, sweetheart." Mom said. She unlocked the car with the button on her keys.
Frank climbed into the car and Mom did too. They pulled out of the driveway and headed away from Stanley Park and towards the city.
There were fireworks being launched off at Canada Place at 10:30, that Frank knew because that's where one of his friends went every Canada Day. But until then, he and Mom drove all around the neighbourhoods where people lived and saw fireworks pop up into the air. Frank kept stretching his neck to see around the passenger seat.
"You can climb up front Frank, I'm driving slowly." Mom said.
Frank did and he buckled in. His feet didn't touch the car floor and when he pointed it out, Mom laughed.
"You're not done growing," she said ruffling his hair. "Unfortunately. "
The peony fireworks were the ones that they saw all the time- the ones where the little bits of light burst away from one another when they climbed high enough in the sky, each little bit having a tail behind it. Mom said that it was supposed to look like a peony flower, but Frank didn't see it. They looked like dried out dandelions.
Some of the fireworks were called palms because they looked like palm trees. They saw Roman Candles, which Mom said where the kind that shot right out straight. The fish fireworks were Frank's favourites- the ones where the flaming bits zigzagged away from the center of the fireworks, curving all around. Frank liked thinking of them as glowing fish, swimming in the stars.
"You know a lot about fireworks," Frank said as she pointed out something called a 'spider' in the air.
"The Chinese invented fireworks, you know," Mom said. "They used the blasts in fireworks in warfare too. Your Grandmother drilled that into my head. Learn your fireworks and she'll leave you alone for a little bit."
She said that last part with a wink.
They saw people lighting up firecrackers on the street and giggling and laughing and running as they crackled around and spit sparks into the air.
There were bangs and crackles everywhere, and they'd always startle Mom a bit every time- but then Frank would get excited about fireworks being green and red and blue all at once and she'd smile.
Mom eventually parked as close to Canada Place as she could and they got out of the car. Mom picked Frank up and sat him down on the hood.
"There aren't any fireworks," he said. The sky was empty and the air was quiet.
"You've got to wait," Mom said poking his belly. He giggled and shoved her hand away.
And so he did that- waiting.
And then the sky lit up.
He could barely see the sky anymore. Not the stars, not the darkness- just the lights and the colours and the smoke that came from it. He heard cheering from the crowd to go with the blasts. The sound rang in Frank's ears as the fireworks faded- just the split second before another one took off. There were spirals and peonies and rings and shapes after shape after shape. Frank cheered too. Mom was keeping her eyes on him and clapping.
"Mom, you should look at the fireworks," Frank told her. "You'll miss them."
"Oh... I like seeing you happy much more than I like fireworks," Mom said with a twisted kind of smile.
The fireworks lasted a good half hour.
"Let's beat the crowd out of here," Mom said slipping her hands under Frank's arms and swinging him around. He giggled before she put him down. "But I think we can make one more pit stop."
"Where?" Frank asked.
"Oh, I don't know about you... but I worked up an appetite firework hunting," Mom said.
"Me too!" Frank said. "Can we go get donuts? Timmy donuts?"
Mom threw her head back and laughed before ruffling his hair.
"Oh, Frank, you're so precious. That's such a Canadian thing to say, your father would cry."
"Wasn't Dad Canadian?" Frank frowned.
"No sweetheart, he was American," Mom said. "He was American and he always teased me because I went and got coffee at Timmy's all the time and I wouldn't drink his rotten Dunkin' Donuts whenever we were in the States."
"But you said that you met him 'cause of the army?" Frank asked again.
"The Americans are fighting in the Middle-East too, remember?" Mom said. "Besides, we didn't meet there. Anyways, I think that today is as good of a day as any to go to Tim Hortons."
They went to the little Tim Hortons that nobody ever went to and was going to close in August. The girl at the counter gave them a box of Timbits- the box with all the flavours in it-, a cup of coffee for Mom and a bottle of orange juice for Frank. They sat at a sticky table that had seven gums under it by the window, and watched the cars go by as they ate.
"Hey," Frank said when Mom took the last jelly-filled Timbit.
Mom smiled. "You want it?"
Frank nodded.
"I don't know if I can give it to you…" Mom sighed.
"What if I arm-wrestle you for it?" Frank asked. Mom smiled and propped her elbow on the table.
"Just you try," she said.
They arm-wrestled for a while and in the end Frank thought that Mom let him win, but it didn't matter because one way or another he got the Timbit and she got the whole-wheat plain natural gross one.
In the car Frank got tired and he curled up in the front seat. Mom put her arm around him. He fell asleep even more quickly, and didn't even realise that Mom had pulled up to Zhang Mansion and plopped him into bed until he woke up the next morning.
And that was the one Canada day that Frank remembered for the rest of his life.
It was July 4th. Yeah, the Americans were a couple of days late when it came to the national holiday, but still. The nymphs somehow knew to keep the blue dye out of Frank's food and just keep the red in, and his entire cohort was happy and free of duty for the day. So really there was no reason to complain except for the distinct lack of Tim Hortons and jazz or salmon festivals at Granville Island or Steveston. And a homesickness that settled in the pit of Frank's stomach, particularly on that day...
However there were fireworks.
The legionnaires gathered in the fields of Mars along with the Greeks. The visitors were all excited about it- they had Cabin 9 working on the display and prepping it. Leo had been working like a madman according to Annabeth, so it was going to be particularly cool.
The fireworks were cool. They'd nailed it with the shapes. Somehow with fireworks the children of Hephaestus had projections of marching armies, soaring Pegasi and Roman eagles storming through the air. The colours were bright and they changed like Northern lights. There were spirals and Roman candles and peonies and spiders and all the shapes that he already knew.
But for the first time ever as he winced and covered his ears and fought to keep his thoughts to straying to the battles with Gaia's army, Frank understood why his mother hadn't liked fireworks.
But for the first time ever as he looked at Hazel who was bright-eyed and eager as she looked at the pyrotechnic advancements and whispered to him that it made her think of the Lundi Gras celebration in New Orleans... Well, he understood how someone you loved could make the fear go away.