Hunter knew something was up - his friends were all off, voices high-pitched and giddy, and had been since he returned from his outing with Camila. Something was different about them and he didn't like it - if something had happened, he needed to know. The little glances and the way they spoke - did they really think they were being subtle? Usually he wouldn't be surprised, only Luz was in on it too, something he really didn't like.
"Um, everything okay?" he asked her, catching her before she went up to bed.
"Huh? Of course!" she said quickly. "Just a little tired."
"Everyone seems…off."
"Oh I think we're all just tired. It's fine."
He really didn't like this. Luz was his confidante, not the one keeping secrets. It was them alone, separate from the others in their shared pact, so now why was he the one kept out?
When he joined Gus in the basement, Gus seemed far too eager to get to sleep.
"Hey, um, what did you all do today?" Hunter asked, and Gus reluctantly opened his eyes.
"Just the usual. Got some work done on the shack."
"Oh. Okay." Clearly, whatever it was, they didn't want him in on it. Did they not trust him? Did they think he'd mess things up? Then a horrible chill ran down his spine. Had Luz told them? Did they know he was a grimwalker? Is that why they treated him like this now - they knew what he was but didn't want to let it on, or startle him? Would Luz really do something like that? He didn't think she would, why would she? She was just as terrified as him! She knew what it was like!
He tried to breathe. Come on, be rational. She wouldn't, he could trust Luz. And surely if they knew, they'd be stoning him to death by now. They obviously didn't know. Right?
He didn't sleep all night, too caught up in terror. What would Luz do? Would she stand and watched as they attacked him? Should he reveal her secret to shift some of the focus? Like that would work. They'd never turn on her, they'd understand it had been a simple mistake of manipulation in her case.
How could he plan an escape? The Blight was the one to watch out for, the one who could tackle him the most easily. Would Camila lock him in the house? It didn't seem like she'd be the type to let something like that happen, but then, she didn't know what he was. Was he too dramatic for thinking they'd actually kill him? Surely they wouldn't do that. But if they were angry enough, for all the times they stuck up for him only to find out what they'd been protecting…
His thoughts drifted back and forth all night. In the early morning he had begun to calm down, thinking he really shouldn't be jumping to such conclusions. But then, to his horror, Gus got up. It could have been an ordinary bathroom break, but he could hear footsteps and whispers above, and they greeted Gus when he emerged from the basement. They were all gathered up there together, discussing something. Were they coming to kill him in his sleep? Was that it? He reached for Flapjack, who had fruitlessly tried to reassure him all night. They were coming to kill him. He had to fight his way out, had to fight his friends.
He got to his feet. He couldn't let them corner him in the basement; maybe he could slip out while they were all busy. He crept up the stairs, Flapjack at the ready to let him dash out of there, and caught sight of Amity creeping by. Oh titan, he didn't want to fight her again…
His heart pounded and he tried to back off, but her ears twitched at his breathing and she turned to stare at him, her golden eyes shiny in the dark. "Hunter?" she whispered.
"Amity. Hey-"
"Get back downstairs, right now," Amity hissed. "You'll ruin it!"
Her rage told him what he needed to know. "Look, I don't want to fight. I just want to leave in peace, I-" He caught sight of a sign made of flowering vines which spelled out "Happy Birthday Hunter." "H-huh?"
Amity growled. "You ruined it! Get down there now and don't let on that you saw."
"I don't -"
She grabbed him by the arm and started tugging him back downstairs, and he was too confused to protest. She was grabbing him in annoyance, not in hate.
"Just pretend you never saw," she muttered anxiously. "Willow put in all this work for you and you're not going to ruin it because you didn't sleep."
"Willow? Huh?"
She rolled her eyes. "We're putting on a surprise party for you. She organized it and she's extremely excited and you're not supposed to know until you wake up. So shh."
"Hey Ams?" he heard Luz call. "Did you put butterflies in the cake?"
Amity's ears perked up and her voice turned happy and soft. "Yeah, don't worry, they're fresh, I only caught them two days ago! I'm glad the human realm had fairy replacements!" When she turned back to Hunter her ears lay flat again. "Go downstairs. Close your eyes. Sleep. And don't let on you ever saw this, do not ruin Willow's surprise."
"O-okay. But I don't get -"
Amity shut the door in his face as he heard Luz start laughing and Amity worriedly rushing to see if something was wrong with the cake. He stood stunned.
"Happy birthday Hunter?" Cake? A surprise party? Organized by Willow? It wasn't real. This was a dream, right? There was no way. No way…
And yet he could hear them giggling on the other side of the door, rushing around and setting everything up. He looked at Flapjack. "Is this…real?"
His best friend chirped at him. I did tell you they weren't going to kill you.
He backed up from the door and returned to his blankets. "A surprise party for me? They-they're really going to do it?" He didn't want to let his guard down, but he had seen the banner. He had seen it.
He remembered how sad Willow had looked when he talked about not knowing his birthday, but he would never have thought she would go this far. She was so sweet, so thoughtful. The fact she'd do something like this for him .
And then, of course, that everyone else had joined in. They all wanted to do something like this for him? He couldn't sleep now, that was for sure. He waited, as the sun rose and Gus returned to the basement, pretending like he had slept there all along. Until Gus "woke him up," and watched him excitedly as he suggested they head upstairs for breakfast.
Hunter almost wondered if it was a dream after all, but no. There were the streamers and balloons, for him! Sweet flowering vines Willow had made to spell out his birthday sign, and many more flowers trailing throughout the house. Abomination balloons Amity had made, out of the less effective sludge from the human realm, but still recognizable as something festive.
Gus excitedly waved his arms, conjuring a display of confetti to fall around him as Hunter gazed at his friends, all waiting for him. "Surprise!" they shouted happily.
It wasn't hard for Hunter's face to light up in shock and joy, even if he had known for a few hours now. It hadn't seemed real until now, and even then, he still expected to wake up any moment. "Th-this is for me? Really?"
"Of course it is." Willow approached him, a little shyly. "I know you don't know your real birthday, so, I hope you don't mind that we all picked a day for you to celebrate. Now that you have a real group of friends."
"O-oh," he murmured, unable to stop the tears. "Thanks, you guys."
"And we got you gifts!" Luz gestured excitedly. Hunter's eyes widened again as he stared at a set of gifts on the table.
"Really? When did you get them?"
"Yesterday, while you were with Camila!"
"Huh? You were in on it too?" he blinked at Camila, who smiled sheepishly.
"You've got the sweetest friends I've ever seen. I wish I had friends like this in high school. They planned everything but of course I wanted to help them all give you something special."
He wiped his eyes again. "O-okay. Wow."
Camila made sure everyone eat breakfast before cake, which was then eagerly passed around, Amity smiling with pride.
"Mm, I've never had this kind of fairy before," Gus noted.
"They're butterflies!" said Amity. "Luz showed me them and I think they make great fairy replacements, even if they're a bit thin! I caught all of them myself. Aren't you going to have some, Luz?"
Luz laughed nervously, "Sure!" She bit into it, wincing and nodding. "Great job, hermosa."
"Oh, you need a slice too, Camila!"
"In a bit maybe, I'm, er, full."
Hunter, for one, loved the cake. He hadn't even known it was abnormal; he had no experience eating any kind of pastry before. Perhaps fairies were better to add to desserts, but to him this was the sweetest thing he'd ever tasted. And it was made in celebration of him!
He didn't know when he was supposed to open presents so he kept quiet, but Willow quickly directed everyone over to them.
Hunter shakingly opened the first gift, a heavy, rectangular one. His eyes widened as he saw the distinctive cover art of a giant cat face. "Warriors?" he shrieked, and tore open the rest to reveal a box set. "Yes! Thank you Amity!"
"Omen of the Stars! Now if you'd hurry up and read Power of Three, we can read these next!"
"I told you I'm working on it."
"Really? Aren't you still on the second book?"
"I've been busy, let me read at my own pace."
They bickered back and forth for a bit, and then Hunter opened the next gift. "Something soft?" He tore open the paper, and gasped. "A wolf?" He looked at the plush, looking up at him with adorable black eyes.
"Camila mentioned you liked them," said Vee. "And I don't know about you, but when I was in an unfamiliar place, plushies really helped me."
"And!" Luz jumped in, "It has a little satin heart inside that we all hugged so it has all of our love."
"Oh." He hugged the wolf close; he had been missing his frog plush, the only toy he'd managed to hide from Belos, that he always used to sleep with. Nights in his old room were a little easier when he had that, even if it did start to get worn and had a bloodstain on one leg. Having this wolf was going to be nice, and maybe one day the two plushies could meet. If he could ever get his frog back from the old bedroom, that was.
He opened Gus's gift next, a beaded dinosaur toy just like Gus's, only a dromeosaur, bright red to look like Flapjack. "Oh! What? You made this?"
"Yep!"
He grinned and started stimming with it, the beads rubbing comfortingly over his hands, the perfect motion to keep his energy occupied when he got anxious. "Aah, this is so cool! Thank you for making it look like Flap."
The final gift was Luz's, a set of his very own sewing supplies. "Yes! I'm going to make a jacket with this! Maybe, do you want me to try making all of you some custom jackets?" He wanted to find a way to give back somehow, to repay them enough for everything they had done for him.
"Oh that's not necessary," Amity muttered quickly, before Luz jumped in and said "Yes! We can all be matching, like a cool magic squad."
Hunter liked the sound of that, matching with his friends. He was going to work hard to make something they'd all love, even Amity. When he was done opening the gifts, he looked up at Willow. "And thank you so much for giving me the party."
"Oh no, I have a gift for you too!"
"Oh!"
"I had a hard time coming up with something, but…" She gestured for him to follow her out of the room, and Hunter suddenly found himself quite nervous. Why would he be nervous? It was just Willow, he knew her. He wanted to hang out with her. But as she led away from the group, his palms were sweating.
"What is it?"
"Well, um…when I first started the flyer derby team, it really felt like a new start for me. And I think it was a new start for you. And now, things are a lot different and neither of us really know this world, but I think we've both gotten to grow a lot in ways we didn't really think we'd get to. So I wanted to give you something that showed you how happy I am that we're making new stories together."
She led him to a beautiful pot painted with bird designs, in which a small plant with bright green stripes lay growing. "Sorry I couldn't wrap this, but these plants are really sensitive. I learned that humans have this phrase 'turn over a new leaf,' about new beginnings and being able to make something different from what you started with. I think that's something we've both really wanted, and we've been able to do it together. And this plant, the leaves actually move, they fold up at night and then change over when its daylight. So they're a symbol of new beginnings."
Hunter leaned down to look at the beautiful plant, whose leaf patterns were prettier than anything he'd ever seen. Her words enchanted him, but he could hardly think of what to say. "C-can I touch it?"
"Of course!"
He gently brushed his fingers over the leaves. He hadn't known human realm plants moved like that; he'd only just begun learning the botany of the Boiling Isles since it was so important to Willow, and here she was making herself a human realm plant expert too.
"I…I'm sorry if this is a bit much," Willow muttered nervously. "I only got the idea at the last minute and worked hard to grow one."
"No, it's beautiful! And it-it's really growing? It's going to keep growing?"
"Mhm! I asked Camila if it was okay to keep one. It'll keep growing if you tend to it. I'm glad you like it."
He teared up. "Thank you. For the plant and for organizing all this."
"Everyone was excited to do it. We all care about you, Hunter."
"And I care about all of you. B-but Amity said it was your idea specifically, and -" He cut himself off, cursing himself for being stupid enough to let it slip, but it seemed Willow didn't catch on.
She playfully rolled her eyes. "She had to emphasize me, huh? Well…it was sweet of her."
"Hehe, yeah. Well I-I'm glad I have a birthday now." He still couldn't wrap his head around the fact that this was the secret they were keeping from him. Not a stoning, but a birthday. Even if he knew they'd never behave this way if they knew what he was, for a moment he let himself think it was possible.
He and Willow smiled at each other, and after a moment walked back to the other room to join their friends. Their friends, his friends, real, actual friends.
"Hey," Luz waved when they arrived. "We're doing Mario Kart!"
"Not with Amity and Hunter at the same time!" Gus yelled. "They're too scary!"
"Fine, first match is without you, sorry."
Everyone scrambled for their controllers, while Hunter and Willow sat to watch. The house was soon filled with shouting and squealing laughter, as they cycled through several video games and physical party games. He and Amity did indeed terrify everyone else with their competition, Gus revealed surprisingly adept singing abilities during karaoke, and everyone was shocked into silence when Camila crushed the whole group at a classic video game and yelled some incomprehensible victory cry involving space-related jargon.
Everyone seemed warmer and closer than they had been before. Not that things had been hostile, but with everyone wrapped up in some sort of anxiety, it felt like they were often a mess of disconnected nervous energy, desperately trying to cling for support and slipping. But for this night, at least, they held strong. Luz and Vee were partnered for most of the night, with more teasing and joking he'd ever seen from them, Gus was certainly less anxious than he'd seemed in a while, and Willow wrapped Amity in a tight hug when they won a party game together, much to Amity's surprise.
Hunter laughed longer than he ever had before, which was saying something, as his entire stay here was filled with more joy than he'd ever experienced. A fact he usually would feel guilty about, when for most of the rest of his friends, this was a time of more terror and uncertainty than they'd ever faced. But not tonight, at least. Tonight everyone seemed united, even him and Luz just focusing on the fun instead of their secrets. His conviction that his friends were about to kill him was the farthest thing from his mind now.
When people started to get exhausted and Hunter could feel himself slipping into overwhelm, they called it a night. Luz begged Camila to let them all sleep downstairs for a "sleepover," and Camila relented.
Hunter had never had something like this, all his friends curled up in blankets on the floor, perhaps not in the most comfortable of positions, but together. All of them snug and secure in being surrounded by each other. He lay a few feet from them, gazing at the group he was increasingly coming to look at as some kind of safe place, even if it was a temporary one. Even if he was the last person they should allow into it. Somehow, looking at them now, he felt like they might be able to make it, in some way.
Hunter had never had something like this, all his friends curled up in blankets on the floor, perhaps not in the most comfortable of positions, but together. All of them snug and secure in being surrounded by each other. He lay a few feet from them, gazing at the group he was increasingly coming to look at as some kind of safe place, even if it was a temporary one. Even if he was the last person they should allow into it.
Somehow, looking at them now, he felt like they might be able to make it, in some way. Maybe he'd be a part of it, maybe not, but Camila was right - these were greater friends than he could have ever imagined, and he had to do anything to help them make it out. Hopefully that meant some kind of future, a future of many birthdays beyond this, but right now he didn't even care about that. He could die happy having this one.
He let his gaze roam one last time over his…well he couldn't say family, family was something heavy, full of expectation and lies and pain. Well, maybe it wasn't always, maybe it was something better, like Luz's family. But either way, it certainly wasn't something he knew how to have. But he almost felt like this was something like that. Obviously not so defined as Luz's family, but warm like it, and something so separate from anything Belos taught. He didn't want to say it was his, that felt wrong, when they were all so good, and kind, but when they looked at him in expectation, giggling and whispering and waiting to see his joy, he almost felt like they really could want him there after all.
"It's dangerous to think like that," he muttered to Flapjack, and the bird gave him an irritable look. "I know, I know. You don't need to say it." He sighed and looked back at his sleeping friends one last time, some fully snuggled up together, some only lightly brushing each other. Regardless of preference, all were included, and he knew they'd do anything to protect any member of the group. Maybe for one night he'd let himself trust that included him. "Thanks, guys," he mumbled, and closed his eyes into the most trusting rest he'd ever had.
