A/N: This will be more of a breather chapter after the last one since it got intense at the end, but I think this one is just as important as the last one. Kurt will get some much-needed relief from the intensity of the last chapter. The chapter will also be very rambly and dialogue-heavy.
OMAC001: Kurt's condition heavily influences the dialogue and what ends up as the focus of the writing. As you see later on in this chapter, he likes to pick apart elements of things such as architecture and books. He turns his attention away from social interaction and confrontation since he has trouble understanding others. The violent reaction he had in the last chapter was important as well.
Chapter 3A:
The Black Ichor of Love
Kurt had a strong aversion to anything of powerful odor and had a hard time being with Eda when she decided to go on a trash-diving spree. Of course, he was ordered to follow her based on his standing in the house, so instead of participating in the diving, he followed his sister into the woods. She was watching a scene in the middle of the foliage. They saw a tall, rosy-cheeked girl, no older than fourteen standing in the verdure among all the flowers. She had short, curly hair that was just shy of her shoulders, a small set of glasses set upon the bridge of her nose and reflecting her green eyes, and an angry, frustrated pout on her face. Beside her, a group of books and papers laid out in a stack with a small jar that rattled and rumbled every few moments. Kurt and Luz watched the witch open the jar, her left hand keeping it steady and her right stirring whatever was inside it with a branch. As she moved it around, her face became more and more disgusted with the concoction inside and it was only a few moments before the girl gave up on it, leaving the strange brew to fizz, froth, and foam. She committed herself to breathing exercises to calm herself, then her hand grazed the grass below her, making it glow in luminescence and creating a bed of flora!
Kurt inched closer and stared as she spoke to herself, "I have to get better," she said, "I won't be left behind... I'm gonna get better. Even if I get a bad grade, it's not a reflection of me as a witch. My parents are right, there's nothing I can do but get better," she clenched her fists from where they rest above the greenery, "There are better opportunities in this track, I have to do it."
After she finished her rant, the peaceful lull was interrupted by the greenery shifting, and as she turned to face it, another girl being carried on a wagon on top of a massive cauldron rolled up and out of the bushes. She was an average-sized girl, thin, and youthful, and her silhouette was tended to carefully with bits of make-up and accessories, her face unblemished, unnaturally pale, and plump - the perfect picture of the perfect girl. If there was anything that separated her from others, it was her bright green hair with a patch of brown hair in the middle of her forehead. Once she came off the cauldron and landed on her feet, the girl in the vegetation glared at the other for a moment, and between them, one could feel the tension. It was cold. Unrelenting. And enough to reach the two humans watching from afar.
"What are you doing here?" the girl in the verdure murmured to the girl from the wagon, "Amity."
"Uh oh," Kurt heard from his sister, "Things just got real."
"Willow!" she hallooed, "I thought you'd be here... you always go when you're feeling-" she stopped herself, her gaze cast toward the grass below with a crestfallen expression. She hesitated a moment before trudging forward, "So, listen..."
"What?"
"About what happened in class earlier..." she began, "I'm sorry about all that. I didn't mean to embarrass you like that, I just..."
"You 'just' what?" Willow said, leering at her like a soldier would his enemy, "You 'just' made me look like a fool in front of our class by switching my work with someone else's!"
"I know, I know... I-I should have stuck up for you, and I'm sorry, but I just can't go against them, you know that," Amity replied, "Boscha and her pack. They have my hands tied."
"Whatever just leave me alone," Willow cast her gaze downward, crossing her arms, "Go back to them, like you always do."
"It's not like that, Willow..."
"And besides, shouldn't you get to class so you can prepare your-" the bespectacled girl was cut off by a caterwaul from her small jar that she had just been stirring, a sound Kurt likened to that of a broken water heater. It began to bubble over then tilted forward, and it spilled over the ground and onto Willow's boots.
"Oh, Willow," Amity implored, looking down at the mixture with disappointment. She sighed, "You would be so much better if you just did the Plant track. You keep making things like these and getting bad grades, this is why they keep calling you half-a-witch..." she said, not realizing her Freudian slip.
"Oof, say what you really feel, huh?" Luz muttered, still enjoying the drama.
Willow's eyes shrunk as she said this and she clenched her fists a second time, unknowingly setting off the vegetation again as the space between Amity and the leaves tightened, stranging the tense air. Amity quickly rectified her mistake, "That's not what I meant. I was just saying that the Abomination track might not be for you."
"Can we stop talking about this, Amity?" Willow uttered, turning away from Amity, her face heating up, and she pulled her hood up in embarrassment. "I said before that I want to be in the Abomination track, and that's where I'll be!"
"But you like doing plant magic! You shouldn't be in this track if you don't like-"
"Don't tell me what to do Amity!" she growled, her tone reaching a fever pitch as a tendril wrapped around her legs. As quickly as it happened, a creature made of mauve sludge reared its head from the cauldron that sat upon the wagon and ripped her from the plant's loose appendage. Willow's anger dimmed out, the plants retreating and Amity's monster doing the same, "Shouldn't you be with your friend Boscha bullying other witches? Why should a Blight spend their time on someone of 'low status' like me?" she taunted and then went to pick up her books, preparing to leave if Amity did not.
"You don't have to go there, Willow," Amity pleaded, "I just want-"
"I don't want it, traitor," she spat, intending to cause her some pain with her callous and dry tone, but Amity was largely unfazed... she'd seen Willow react this way before, but now it was clear she wanted to be left alone. Amity hesitated for a moment before heading back to whatever school Kurt assumed they went to. Willow sat in silence attempting to breathe, she only managed to do so for only a few seconds before she rose to her feet, seething, stomping her shoes into the sludge, "I hate this. I hate this! I hate when she says that! I hate abominations! I hate getting bad grades!" the foliage around her grew and grew until it lashed out on the two hiding within the bushes it grabbed Luz by the ankle and Kurt by the neck. Kurt gasped for air and Luz tried to pull herself out.
"Kurt!" Luz shouted.
Kurt's dark face turned ashen, the oxygen leaving his face as he tried to breathe. Luz watched as he choked with a face of cold apathy, his eyes going bloodshot, his arm outstretched to try and cut the tendril holding Luz, but Kurt made no attempt to stop the tendril gripping his neck.
A black fire rose from his chest enveloping the Venus death trap and Kurt's head, and the tendril on his throat slowly burned away.
Their panic was heard by the witch nearby since she quickly rushed to help Luz, "Oh no, no, no!" Willow cried, trying to pull Luz from the vine tendril, "Hold on!" she stepped back and used her magic to unwrap it from her leg and after she did, Luz fell onto her posterior. "Are you two okay?"
Kurt held a thumbs up.
"Yep, I'm good- thorns only cut through a few layers of skin..." Luz flipped her body onto her feet standing upright, dusting herself off, but Willow's eyes gazed at her every move. Kurt had a name for this immense closeness that he called "The Danger Zone" and Willow weaved into his zone easily, as he fell backward in a loss of coordination and confusion.
"Your ears are so... circly," she observed.
"The better to hear you with, my dear," she rejoindered.
"Are you two, perchance humans?"
"No, we have a severe sickness that forces our ears to be short. It's very conta-" Kurt cut in, glaring at her, a motion that told her that this was no time to be making jokes, and stopping her before she could further hyperbolize the truth, at this, she gave a nervous chuckle. They were found because they were careless. It would be easier on them if she would simply tell the truth, "Yeah, we're humans."
"This is amazing!" Willow exclaimed in excessive excitement, "Real humans on the isles! How'd you get here?! Where'd you come from?!" she moved into Kurt's danger zone again, and the teen's body nearly fell over with how quickly she had advanced.
A bell rang in the distance, and Willow quickly exited Kurt's danger zone again looking up to the sky, "Uh, sorry..." her voice returned to its normal volume. "I gotta get to class. Disappoint my teachers, my friends, and my family again. I guess I'll see you later." Willow went to pick up her books again.
"Hey, wait!" Luz called out, stopping her before she could leave, "I'm Luz Noceda and this is my older brother, Kurt Noceda," she began. "Your name is Willow, right? What you did with those plants..."
"Hang you by the foot?"
"Well, yes, but-"
"Nearly turned the leaves into monsters?"
"Well, I don't know about-"
"Choked your brother with them?"
"Let me talk please, Willow? Yes?" Willow went silent, "What you did was amazing!"
"Thanks... but, I'm not allowed to do plant magic," she replied, staring somberly at the cauldron of the
Luz interrupted. Willow nodded, confused by Luz's excitement for what was such a trivial thing to her. Luz let out a screech of joy, "I'm so jealous! I have a teacher, but she hasn't taught us anything at all."
Kurt would not deny that she had not taught them any magic, especially since it seemed she was unsure whether she could teach them this song, but there was a little info that she gave them that was important. Dynamics of the world, understanding the culture, little things that would go over her head when she mentioned them. But he could not disagree with the fact that she was not teaching to the students. These were simply things that he picked up on while she was ranting about nonsense.
He could see why Luz would want some way of getting actual, practical knowledge rather than anecdotal knowledge, but once again, he would implore that she stay patient and not rush it. Eda was learning just as they were - she'd had very minimal contact with humans and to add, they were younger than her, he was nearly in adulthood while she was getting close to her middle age, the dark age of fifty. Everything in her mind was solidified and stagnant; stable. Then they showed up and blew all of it out of the water. This was a major change in her life, one she needed to adjust to, one he needed to adjust to, and one that Luz did not. Giving both of them the chance to "feel it out" was important.
Luz did not listen to his words, choosing to strike a deal with Willow to dupe her teacher into believing that she was an abomination - which, apparently, in this world, they were. Kurt followed them before they went into the school, it was typical of the mischievous Luz to do such reckless things, but he separated after that. He waited until after the bell had rung to enter when he knew all the students would be in their classes.
He explored the larger-than-it-looked school of Hexside, feeling it was like walking into a pastel-painted version of Hogwarts or if he'd jumped right into Luna Nova or UA. It was massive and whimsical, but as with any school, he felt small, intensely so, as if he were under a magnifying glass with a giant, black pupil staring down at him. He assumed that it was the architects' job to create a school aesthetic like that, the crushing feeling that encapsulated every one of his senses.
"Hey!" someone called out across the hall, having no regard for the students in the other classrooms. The sudden sound caused Kurt to dip to the side after hearing the shout, he held onto the wall for support, but his body managed to pull itself up after seeing the two walk up to him. They were twins about his age with green hair, one long and one short, "It's you!" the short-haired twin lilted. "You were the human that went all over town with the little black demon."
Kurt didn't reply, he couldn't, not for lack of trying, though. He croaked and wheezed, but still nothing. His mouth would open, then shut before a word could escape, so he nodded in lieu of proper words. The short-haired twin advanced closer to him, observing him more closely, "I didn't know you went to Hexside."
He sheepishly scratched the back of his neck, silently admitting to the fact that he most certainly did not go to this school. "Yeah, in fact, I didn't even know they allowed humans into this school," the long-haired one said, in a higher tone of voice, "It's almost as if you-" she gasped dramatically.
"Snuck in?" the other smirked, almost as if proud of Kurt for doing so.
Kurt hesitated, before nodding, it was only to take a look-
"Oh, wow," the long-haired twin chaffed, "I didn't peg you for a rule-breaker or the type to do that stuff. Hm."
He panicked waving his hands to indicate that he hadn't meant to break any rules, all he wanted to do was see the school. There wasn't a rule against him looking around, right?
"You're more interesting than I thought." she leaned in alluringly, outside the danger zone. Kurt shifted, unknowingly moving closer.
"What's your name, guy?" the short-haired twin clapped a hand on his sister's shoulder and she gave a teasing smirk to Kurt. He reached into his jacket pocket then pulled out a small, barely legible note, and he handed the slip of paper over to the two of them, when he did, the scar on his shoulder itched. The note always kept people from trying to get him to talk when he was in school, so naturally, he assumed that it would work here. "Kurt, hm? So you can't speak?" he said, nearly in a gasp. Kurt nodded grimly and the short-haired twin paused in contemplation, having never met anyone who was not able to speak.
"Whoa, I thought humans were masters of language and knew almost everything about speaking," she teased, attempting to lighten the mood again but Kurt's eyebrow twitched at the very notion.
"Chill out, Emira," the twin chastised, "Hey, man, don't worry about it. We have a magic trick that'll help," he spun a circle, and a light blue aura enveloped them, concentrating in their eyes and disappearing, "There we go. Now we can understand you, a little,"
What in hell just happened?
"It's a magic spell," he replied, "I can tell what you're thinking through the minute details like lip movements, heartbeat, and a buncha other stuff that my mom would love to tell you about."
Okay, now he was freaked out. These two were an odd pair, truly. Just who the hell were these two? And now he was absolutely sure they would hear thi-
"This is Emira, and I'm Edric. We're the Blight twins," he said, waiting for a reaction.
Apparently, this was his first time being heard by anyone other than his family. He wondered if they were like this with all people or if he was special because he did not speak.
No reaction. Weird. Maybe their spell only reads surface-level thoughts, he wondered, the weak thoughts that typically go into speaking, but the deep thoughts might go unheard. He turned his head to the twins, wondering what they were doing when they probably should have been in class.
"Oh, sometimes, we don't feel like going to class, so we don't." Edric stated frankly, rolling his hand in circles monotonously, "Our parents are too... occupied to try and stop us and since the teacher won't stop us, we just end up doing whatever."
Then why come to school at all?
"Our friends go to class even though we don't," Edric replied, "...so it's the only agreed-upon meeting place that we have other than our house."
"Today we were just going to meet with some of our friends and see if they wanna hang out today," Emira said, "We'll start with you, I guess. Wanna come hang out?"
He was... unsure. Though they were nice, did this come with some kind of caveat? Would hanging out with them put him in a bad place? They seemed very much like those who had fooled him in the past, convincing him that he was wanted, and then turning on him at the last second, but he nodded desperately despite this notion. Though there were many that asked him to hang out with them, it had been a long time since he agreed to hang out with someone. Such that he hardly remembered if it was true or not, and looking back on it from here, all those times he'd rejected someone else was simply for stupid and self-centered reasons. It was as Eda said on the first night: he did not come here for adventure or to be the main character of some dream fanfiction, he is here because he needs change. He hoped this would be the right one.
From there they went from classroom to classroom, Emira sending messages to multiple people through pentsagram (Portmonteau of Instagram and Pentagram? What in the world?) but only two accepted her invite to skip class. The first arrived at the entrance where they were waiting, it was a girl. Cream-skinned, brown-haired, with hair cut in four bangs on the front and a messy bun on the back, she was sinewy and just as tall as Luz, if not, slightly taller, and she stared up at him with wide green eyes. "Hey, you're the new kid on the block, right? Nice to meet ya! I'm Viney."
Once again, odd names ran rampant in this world. Somehow he managed to introduce himself with the Blight twins' spell.
"K, U, R, T?" she said, pausing for a moment, "Oh, Kurt!"
He nodded.
"Nice to meet you, Kurt," oddly, she didn't enter his danger zone as many others had before, she stayed just outside of it, keeping her distance completely friendly, "We gonna bring your girlfriend, too? Or are we just gonna head out like this?"
"Nah, my gf's doing a test right now, I don't wanna keep her away from her studies, y'know?" Edric responded.
"How mature of you," Viney opined, "You respect her decision as if it were your own despite hating this school."
"I don't hate Hexside, I just hate learning things," Edric uttered, sheepishly.
Kurt wondered about that.
"Well, I just- er, I don't like how they teach us. I understand how they expect us to fit in these stringent lines of what we are supposed to be, but we don't. And they don't understand that." He explained, "Doing this is essentially my form of protest."
"Here we go again," Emira sighed, putting her face in her hands.
Viney began, "No, no, no, no, no, no, no-"
"Wait-"
"Don't act like you do this to protest," she objected, "Like you're some kind of civil servant and not the school's most infamous absent student."
"I do it for a good cause, V." Edric grinned, "Scout's honor."
"Yeah? If what you do is a 'good cause', then what I do must be a fuckin' revolution! I go to detention almost every day, if you don't know. People like us, all the people in the detention track, we are the ones who protest. Besides..." Viney rejoindered, "Being absent isn't protest, it's a checkmark in a teacher's attendance book."
"Quitting something for personal reasons is called a 'conscientious objection' if you don't recall," he remarked with a smile.
"Heh heh, wait, no, first of- heh, first-" Viney tittered, interrupting herself with a long chuckle, "That's with religion, you dipshit!" she chortled. After calming herself, she replied seriously, "If you really wanted to protest, you'd do it when there are consequences."
Emira objected, "I don't know about you two, but I'd rather talk about something else," she said, "Especially since you two manage to talk about this every time we wanna hang out."
"All right, then, I have a question for you then, Em. Why do you skip class?" Viney asked.
She flicked a finger, flexing a tiny bit of blue magic, "Cause I know what I need to about illusions."
A new voice intruded, "Are you guys all done with your philosophical debate?"
Standing before them was a girl who looked Kurt in the eye, she had long wavy black hair, and olive skin, she was lithe and limber wearing a casual outfit: A light blue skirt reaching the knee, a sweater with long, black sleeves and tights, and navy-blue shoes. She approached the arguing friends with a smile and faced Emira, "You told me we would be hanging out today?"
"Hey, Florence! I didn't know you'd show up!" Viney commented, moving in for a hug. They hugged for a few moments and then separated, "So, you're coming to hang out too, huh?"
"Yeah. I thought it would be interesting," Florence spoke curtly, her tone almost percussive and rhythmic. Turning to face the Blight twins and the new face, "And who might this be?"
"Oh, and this is our new friend, Kurt," she mussed with his hair, but oddly he had no qualms with the affectionate gesture. "Oh, and he's uh..." she did the zipper over the mouth gesture.
She paused in realization, then gave a warm, comforting smile, "I understand how that can be, my brother was the same way for quite some time," Florence explained, walking closer to him.
"I used a spell so we could understand each other. Here, I'll use it on you," Emira deftly spun a circle and did the spell.
After it was done, Kurt waved a hand slightly, still feeling awkward speaking through his odd body language.
"Well, hello," she spoke, once again cordial and palliative, "I'm Florence."
He shook her hand courteously, "Nice to meet you, too." she said.
Viney cut in, "So... are we going to see your house now, or what?"
Kurt followed the twins to their mansion - Blight Manor, a massive home that was almost as large as Hexside was and just as gothic. For the most part, it was empty, the only people in it were the abominations (who acted as maids and butlers), other attendants who helped out, and now, the teens of the high school and Kurt. Viney was the first to speak as it seemed she always was, "Hey, this is way bigger than I thought it'd be," she declared as they walked into the living room, her voice echoing throughout the main hall and up the spiral staircase. It was like an Italian renaissance-era village home, "Kinda lonely."
"Especially lonely when each floor is for a different person," Emira stated, frankly. "Our sister, Amity, and us, we're always on the third floor. Our parents are on the top and basement floors all day and they only come together for dinner or to sleep. They can get scary as hell when they're together, but sometimes they're worse by themselves."
"I can tell," Florence interjected in a hushed tone, noticing a servant sweeping up a pile of broken china in the Kitchen across the way and a shattered mirror in the opened bathroom.
"Yeah, sometimes the job takes its toll on them and sometimes that takes its toll on us, y'know," Emira continued, "We try to stay outta the line of fire, but they can get very... physical."
Florence glanced at the twins with a worrisome expression, "Did- wait, Your mom did this?"
"Yeah," Emira replied. "She-"
"Hey, we're not here to talk about this, are we? Let's get the fuck upstairs, right?" Edric snapped, "C'mon, you guys."
"I mean... yeah. Let's head upstairs, why don't we?"
Emira apologized for his rudeness, promising that she would give them a tour later, however, Viney and Florence paid this no mind, and Edric moved quicker than the rest of them and they went up to the second floor, then third, and down the hall into a spacious room. Kurt and Florence followed from behind, while Viney stayed directly behind Emira. The room was of ample expanse, able to fit the five of them and then some. A young maid exited from the walk-in closet, noticing the Blight twins and bowing. "No need for the formalities, Zadie. We're just relaxing here for a few hours, we'll get out of your hair if you need to work in here." Emira said politely.
"No, no! It's fine! I've finished up in here," she replied, smiling. "Something I can help you with?"
"No, you know us, Zadie, we don't really need anything, seriously," Edric entreated, clapping a hand on her shoulder, "In fact, why don't you hang out with us a little?"
"Yeah," cooed Emira, tugging on her sleeve and pouting childishly, "It'll be fun and you can get a break~!"
She gave a coy smile and took her hair scarf off, untied her apron, and placed all of it into a small laundry basket, "I'll bring this down to the laundry room and set a pot of tea, then I'll hang out with you guys."
"Yes!" Em cheered, "Let's do some witch games!"
As Zadie set the pot of tea, Kurt sat next to Florence and Emira on the bench of the window sill, he saw Viney and Edric talking amongst themselves, and Emira and Florence giggling at an unheard joke. Silent as the two conversed with the separate twins, Kurt took to observing the grand scale of the room, its architecture, and its shape. The room was akin to that of a renaissance suite, with plasterwork along the edges of columns that reached to the high ceiling, inlaid woodwork, with Caryatids and Atlases outside of the doorway to the balcony, each depicting a famous person he knew little about. The room had regal furniture of massive scale made from ebony wood. Then there was the bench he sat on, which must have been large enough to hold six American-sized men, all lying down, facing upwards with their feet outstretched. Across the way, Kurt saw cabinets, bookshelves, mirrors, and art. The rug below was a gradient of red with various designs and patterns, and the walls a warm reddish-brown, curving in smoothly almost like a contemporary design. Kurt walked up to the bookshelf and glanced through the few books that stood out to him, and when he skimmed through, it seemed that most of the books were that of nonfiction biographies, at least from what he could tell. Very few of them were fiction, and those that were all had been written with a disconnected second-person style.
"Hey, Kurt! Come over here!" he heard Edric shout, as he finished a chapter of one novelette. Everyone was gathered in a circle and given varying small cups of varying colors and Edric motioned for him to sit next to him and Viney. Zadie had returned while he was looking through their book collection and she was sitting in the circle along with Florence and Emira. "We're gonna play some games so we can get to know each other better. Is that alright?"
Kurt nodded.
"Sure," said Zadie, "How does this game work?"
"It's an oldie, but a goodie. Two truths and a lie," Emira said, "Then we can move on to something more interesting. Let's start with you, Kurt," she continued with a Cheshire cat grin, "Two truths and a lie. Go."
He held himself back from the jerk response and came up with them: the first being that he liked playing instruments, the second being that he had a birthmark on his lower back, and the third being that he was a book nerd. Using this as a test to see if he was able to lie while they were, by all means, reading his mind.
"Hm, is the lie the birthmark one? Cause if not, that's gotta suck, dude," Ed chuckled.
"Wait, wait, I'm not gonna say the birthmark one- cause I have one down there too! Looks like someone bit me on the ass, man," Viney blurted, "I used to be so insecure about it-"
Emira gasped mockingly. "Viney? Insecure about anything?"
"Can it, I'm serious," she snapped, "I could show you if you want!" she stood, "Cause, you guys don't think I'm serious. I'll do it. It's a big-ass Griffin bite. No, no, you guys asked for it - sit down, Zadie! I've got a point to make," she reached to her waistband and slid her thumbs down both sides, giving the sound of fabric sliding across her skin. Everyone averted their eyes, except Kurt, "Ha! I got you guys good with that one! 'cept you, Kurt, you little pervert."
Kurt was very attuned to people's expressions, and she didn't seem like she was going to go through with it, so he didn't do anything or react when she did the prank.
"I doubt you'd see something like that coming, just by reading my expression," she replied.
"Okay, Viney, let's settle down, now," Zadie uttered, a blush still on her face. "Kurt, I think your lie is the one about instruments."
Florence was still reeling from the prank, so Emira answered in her stead. Quietly, she mused over the three answers until the same Cheshire grin slowly pulled on her lips, "I think the last one," she said.
Kurt glared at her for a moment then he conceded, it was the last one.
"Can we see the birthmark?" Emira asked, unafraid.
"Em! W-W-Why would you ask something like... t-that!" Florence protested.
He pulled up his hoodie, then his shirt like he had done many times before, flexing his lumbar and showing the long scar along his lumbar to his tailbone. They all stared with either amazement or disquietude, to them, humans were incredibly bizarre and peculiar creatures. Hell, they weren't wrong, but there was something they didn't know about him, about humans in general. While Luz was incapable of it, Kurt was no stranger to lying. It was something of a rarity for him to see with such clarity, even if it was behind a wall of fog and dew.
Lies are powerful. Powerful enough to block out even magic abilities from seeing the truth.
After everyone introduced themselves, they proceeded to play this world's equivalent of modern board games such as Monopoly, Risk, the Chameleon, and a few others. By the end of the day, Kurt and the others had decided to just engage in a talk while Zadie went back to work to finish up before Emira and Edric's sister got back from Hexside. Although he didn't have any expectations when it came to things like this, he ended up having a better time than he imagined with them, and he had an almost goofy smile on his face by the time they decided to head back outside. They were standing in the living room, Kurt was in the kitchen helping Zadie with the dishes, Edric and Emira waiting for their sister ("Mittens" they'd affectionately named her) to come home, and Florence and Viney had gone and had a discussion on whether siblings suck or not (Florence having a single brother and Viney having five brothers and a younger sister). He felt a light consonance breathe into him, somehow, they had made a safe place for him where he didn't feel like he was under constant surveillance of his anxious mind. He didn't need to speak. He didn't need to be. And all at once, he was accepted despite this. It felt like he was far away from the thing that made him want to disappear and now that he was, he could just hang out with like-minded teens that were just like him. This day was a much-needed breath of fresh air.
"You know you don't have to help me, Kurt," Zadie said beside him.
No, after the day that she and the others just gave him, he had to do something to repay them. This would be only the start of it. "No, that's alright, Kurt. I was just going along with Edric and Emira. There's no need to thank me," she said, "They do things like this very often, actually. Especially Edric. I try my best to cover for them when they do. The two of them, even though Emira doesn't like to admit it, they are inseparable. And they are very generous and kind. I can tell they saw something similar in you if they wanted you to come along."
Was he generous or kind? Kurt wasn't sure if that was true-
"No, Kurt. You are a compassionate person. I can tell just by looking in your eyes, but even more so, I can tell just by how you acted today," Zadie insisted, "You were constantly thinking about how everyone else felt before yourself, even when we played the games. And even now you insist on helping me even though this is my job. Please, just go with the others. I can handle this."
He paused for a moment before walking back to the twins and sitting beside Emira. They were scrolling through p-p-p...
"Penstagram," Emira finished for him, "I don't understand how you have such a hard time saying it."
Well, social media was never his thing. Not in his world and apparently, not in this one either.
"Hey, you keep mentioning your world, can you tell me about it?" Emira asked, curious about Kurt's former life a little, "You hardly talk about yourself, even though we all wanna know about you."
Viney and Florence overheard this and interjected, "Yeah, tell us about your world some."
When they asked about his world, he heard the voice in his brain overtake the surface-level thoughts, it was a knee-jerk reaction, and he looked up at them. His voice croaked. His mind was too full of mixed emotions to stop him from speaking, "Cruel," he rasped in a hoarse and tired voice, unwilling to say or convey anything more.
That was the first time the Blight twins, Zadie, Florence, and Viney heard him speak. Kurt froze for a few moments as everyone's morbid curiosity faded and they began to realize that he did not want to talk about his world any further. Eventually, after a long silence, Edric looked outside and realized that the sun was going down and that it would soon be the evening. Taking a second to realize that they all needed to be cheered up, he made a suggestion, "It's getting late, and I understand that you guys probably want to head home but before you go, how about staying for dinner? I'm sure Amity won't mind and our parents will probably still be doing what they've been doing for the rest of the night... so, how 'bout it?"
A chorus of nods followed.