A/N: This was originally written for an Olympics challenge during Sochi, so that's where this fic is going to end up. The Olympics referred to in this chapter are the Vancouver Olympics. (And uh, no hard feelings towards any silver medalist at Vancouver. Y'all are great, I'm sure.)
A little bit less than one year later, Jack was lying flat on his back in the middle of those same daffodils. An obnoxiously large, black walking cast encased his right leg, and his crutches were laid out next to him. He fought the urge to sigh for about the hundredth time. He could not wait until he was out of this thing.
He waited a few more minutes for Aster to make his appearance, and then he gave in. He sighed, loud and long, into the cool morning air. This sucked.
"Quite the bellows you've got there, Snowbird."
Jack sprang up onto his elbows and craned his neck until he caught a glimpse of his friend. Aster had somehow gotten a lot closer than Jack had expected while he was distracted, and Jack had to physically restrain himself from jumping when he realized just how close he had gotten to looming. "Aster!"
Aster crouched down next to him and clucked over the cast. "Looks like you took a spill there, Jacko. Was it your more-chaotic-than-usual-skating lack of a death wish?" he asked, giving Jack's leg a scrutinizing eye.
Jack just sighed again. He'd been doing that a lot lately. "Yeah. Ran into another guy during training. Fractured both bones in my ankle."
"Hmm." Aster laid a paw on Jack's leg and winced as if that light touch had told him something. "Training for what?"
Jack couldn't help but boggle at him a little bit over that. "You really don't get out much, do you? There was this little thing two months ago, nothing big, just the Olympics?" he said, eyebrows climbing up into his hair line. Surely even a magical creature would notice a worldwide event like that.
Aster sat back on his haunches. "The Olympics? I thought that was only for pros," he said, and the bastard had the audacity to actually sound confused.
"I am a professional!" Jack snapped, sitting up so he could more properly glare. "I've been competing in the World Championships since I was 16!"
Aster's mouth opened, then closed. Jack didn't know whether to feel gratified or annoyed at how shocked he looked. Then finally, he looked away, fixing his gaze back on Jack's ankle. "I see. So you were going to skate at the Olympics?" he asked, an odd note to his voice. Jack had to strain to hear it, but he was pretty sure that there was something like embarrassment and regret there. Maybe even grief.
Jack breathed out slowly, reminding himself that there really was no way Aster could have known if he wasn't following human sports at all. And why would he? It's not as if he were human. Their lives only briefly intersected once a year. He had no idea what Aster even did with the rest of his life. When he finally answered, his voice was dull. "Yeah. I officially made the team a few months ago, and I-it's not as if I was going to medal or anything. But I was so excited just to go..." He swallowed hard, tamping down the bitter disappointment that had been his constant companion for the last two months. "But we'd just gotten there when I had the accident. I spent almost the entire games in the hospital recovering from the surgery." He'd never forget the blinding pain or the sudden, sure knowledge that he was out of the games.
Aster still crouched next to him, still and quiet. "And the other guy?"
Jack laughed shortly. "Got a fucking silver."
"Oh, Jack," Aster murmured, and then did the last thing Jack expected. He pulled him into a sideways hug.
Jack froze for a moment, unsure what to do, but then allowed himself to relax into Aster's hold. He turned his face into Aster's shoulder and let himself breathe in his scent, warm and grassy and just a little bit earthy. At that moment, cradled against impossibly soft fur and a solid body, that scent was the most comforting smell in the world. He'd been hugged a number of times since the collision, by his coach and his teammates and by his entire family, but there was something different about this one. It was familiar and yet not, simultaneously calling him back to the muted terror of a childhood nightmare and reminding him of the strange sort-of friendship they had now. It was the most vulnerable he'd ever felt, and he could feel the fragility laced over his bones, over his life. It was being human, and for a moment, he had never despised being something more.
He felt the tears welling up in the back of his throat even before he could feel Aster's rumbled "let it out, Snowbird" and then he was crying for the first time since the accident. He buried his head in Aster's shoulder and sobbed. He sobbed for pain and for lost opportunities, and he sobbed because he would never again live without the knowledge that happiness was ephemeral, balanced on a steel blade and so, so tenuous. He sobbed knowing that when he'd heard that snap, he'd lost the last bit of innocent childhood that had been clinging to his young frame.
Through it all, Aster just held him close and occasionally stroked his hair. He murmured nonsense sounds at him as he cried, half-formed words that were meant more as comfort than as answers, and Jack soaked up the attention.
It couldn't have lasted too long, no more than ten or fifteen minutes, but when he was done, Jack felt absolutely exhausted. He pulled away eventually, wiping at his eyes as he went. "I'm sorry."
Aster shook his head and gave Jack an awkward pat on the shoulder. "No worries, Jacko. We all need a good cry now and again."
"I just-I was so close, Aster," Jack said, his voice still thick with emotion. It had been at the very tips of his fingers before it had gotten away from him, and that was perhaps what hurt most of all.
"I know, mate. And you'll get there again. You're what, twenty? You'll have another chance. And this time you'll be even better," Aster said. He sounded awfully sure for a rabbit who hadn't even believed that he was capable of going to the Olympics a half hour ago, and Jack couldn't help a watery chuckle at that.
"Nineteen," he replied, and Aster gave him a questioning look. "My birthday's not until May."
"Good," Aster said with a decisive nod. "Nice spring birthday. It's good luck."
Jack shrugged, looking down again. "I don't feel very lucky," he muttered.
"Sure you are," Aster said dismissively. "You have a second chance. You'll probably have more chances than that. And you have the strength to take them." Jack must have looked unconvinced because he added, "The boy I pulled out of that lake all those years ago was a fighter. The Moon saw something special in you, otherwise he wouldn't have helped me save you. And I see it, too, Jack." He looked Jack up and down, lingering at his ankle and at his face. "You won't let this keep you down for too long."
Jack felt something warm growing under his diaphragm then, and it took him a moment to identify it as hope. It wasn't something he'd felt much over the past couple months. He smiled as he looked down, a private sort of smile that he wouldn't show to just anyone. Somehow, Aster didn't feel like just anyone.
"There we go," Aster said, as if something important had been decided, then moved forward to crouch next to Jack's leg. "D'you mind if I try something here, Jack?"
"Uh." Jack wasn't entirely sure he wanted a giant rabbit handling his damaged ankle, but Aster had never given him reason to distrust him in the past. "Okay?"
Aster laid his paws on Jack's leg and without warning, Jack started to feel a warmth start to seep into his skin. It felt like the warmth of the sun on a spring day soaking into his skin, loosening muscles, strengthening bones. Nothing moved or hurt or anything as ostentatious as all that, but something seemed indescribably different after Aster took his paws from Jack's ankle, and it was with some trepidation that he asked, "What did you do?"
"Not all that much," Aster admitted. "I'm no healer. But I've got some control over life and growth. I can give things a little nudge, remind them what they should be doing and which way's forward."
Jack felt his cheeks redden. Seems like Aster had been doing that for him in more ways than one. "Thanks," he muttered, then looked up with a spark in his eyes that hadn't been there in far too long. "Who would have guessed? The Easter Bunny has magic."
"And more than just that besides, bucko," Aster said, a smile finally crinkling his features.
Jack smiled back helplessly, but then his face clouded as he realized the time. They'd been sitting there for at least forty-five minutes, if not an hour. "Wait, shit, did I get you off schedule?" he asked, suddenly casting around for his crutches.
Aster shook his head as if at some private joke, then stood up and stretched. "Don't worry about that one, Snowbird. I worked a bit faster than usual to put aside some time for you this year, and I can make up some time over the west coast. She'll be apples, mate," he said, leaning down to offer Jack his paws.
Jack wordlessly took them, and tried not to squeak when Aster pulled him up off the ground in one smooth motion that put barely any pressure on his ankle. It was then, standing there with his hands wrapped around Aster's forearms for balance, that he finally gave in to temptation and surged forward to hook his arms around Aster's waist. He pressed his face once more against soft, soft fur and hugged Aster close. "Thank you," he finally said. "For everything." For hope.
Though he had initially stiffened at the unexpected contact, Aster relaxed at this. It was as if he'd heard something unsaid, and he just gave a throaty chuckle that Jack could feel reverberating in his chest. "Like I said, Snowbird. No worries. Just doing my job," he said, wrapping his own arms around Jack and patting him on the back. "Ah, speaking of which," he began, and started to pull away, then thought better of it. "Er, let me help you with your crutches, Jacko."
Once Jack was standing on his own strength, Aster went to busy himself with the basket of eggs that had apparently been sitting behind them all the time. 'Doing his job'? Jack wasn't sure what he thought of that. Regardless of what the Easter Bunny's unknown duties were, no part of what they had just shared felt businesslike. Jack's musings were cut off, however, when Aster reappeared with the egg that Jack was starting to expect at the end of each visit. "Here you go, mate."
Jack shuffled his weight so he could take the egg as gently as possible. This one was another blown egg: light, fragile, and for a permanent collection. He turned it over in his hands, marveling at its intricate pattern. This one had been dyed a midnight blue, but Aster had found some way to keep delicate white paths dye-free. The white lines spiraled around the egg in feathery designs, bringing to mind chill winds on a winter day. "How did you-"
"Trade secret," Aster replied with an impish look. "I'll be seeing you, Jack."
"Yeah," Jack said, looking away. He focused on his egg so he wouldn't have to watch Aster leave, so he was surprised when Aster took a step towards him instead.
"Hey, Jack?" Aster said, and there was a hesitance in his voice that Jack might have called vulnerable if he didn't know better. "If you wanted to be out in the evening next year, we might have more time to talk. Should be done with egg duty by seven or so your time."
"Really?" Jack asked, before he could stop himself. He winced at the eagerness in his voice, but Aster didn't seem bothered.
"Yeah, really. You're pretty far along on the route here, and if you don't mind a tired rabbit, I'll be all yours."
"I-" Jack knew he was turning red at that turn of phrase, but Aster either didn't notice or was determinedly ignoring it. "Yeah, sure. I'll be out here waiting for you."
Aster gave him a true smile at that point, and it was like the sun coming out on a spring morning. "Right. Right then. I'll see you next year, then, Snowbird," he said, and with a wave, he was on his way.
This time, Jack was able to watch him go.
A/N:
The eggs this time were created using a form of resist dyeing. In this case, Aster likely used wax. If you want to do something like this at home, rubber cement makes it really easy. An even easier method (if a little less effective) is to just draw on your eggs with white crayon before you dunk them.
As always, thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed! Next time, Jack starts to learn a little more about the secret ways of the world.