Baby you're a firework [4th of July Gathering]

[jeongbro]

From Candlewood, Henry could hear the party going on northeast of town, the thud of distance bass and the pop of fireworks and the shrill of cars put to the test. And how shit was that?

He texted Blue, first. A soft, subtle inquiry, a joke of an invitation, but a broad one. One for all of them. He remembered Ronan's arm in that cast, and him saying it was from Kavinsky, and Henry had no duty to them, but it would be good to keep all of them away from the mess that was going on at that party outside of town. None of them had to come, of course. They were all their own people, adults--and a ghost who was as good as one, in Henry's eyes--and they were each allowed their own decisions.

So Henry texted Any plans for the 4th Wendybird? And then he followed it up, even before she could answer, I think my place could use some Virginian charms.

He had no decorations. Fourth of July over the past two years had become a thing tainted by Joseph Kavinsky. But he could, easily, go down a couple blocks and buy more two-liter bottles of Pipsy and lemon-lime soda than he could possibly need, and some liquor and mixers, and chips and dip. If he didn't use it all up, he'd bring it to Panoptes. And that seemed like a good enough way to ignore that Joseph Kavinsky was trying to blow himself up, to him.


[Running as a gathering]

Comments

[incognoscibilis]

"Not completely." Adam, admittedly, wasn't quite sure what to do with Henry's gesture. It wasn't a high five or a fist bump or any of the typical gestures in which Adam could communicate. It was contact without an association and Adam was so confounded that he returned the gesture, bumping his knuckles to Henry's knee.

"Mondegreen," he said. It was a word he'd picked up somewhere and liked the sound of, so he kept it in his back pocket, hoping for a chance to walk out the trivia, the intelligence of knowing it.

[jeongbro]

Henry smiled, quietly appreciative, as Adam confusedly returned the gesture he had given him. It was certainly not a gesture any Aglionby boy might have given another, under normal circumstances; he felt a bit odd giving it to Adam, and Adam giving it bad, one of his and the Vancouver crowd's little touch-codes. But he needed it, desperately, when he had nothing else here.

The word, big and full and academic, fit perfectly in Adam's mouth, like a Virginian or Carolinian city, his accent soft around the edges. Henry blinked.

"I didn't even know there was a word for it, bro," Henry admitted, and laughed once, speculatively. Then, he tried the word out himself, "Mondegreen. Mon--monty--mundegreens."

Henry laughed and made a face. For someone who spoke such a multitude of languages, his first attempts at a new word always tempted to be clumsy and inarticulate, and this was no exception, even having heard it spoken.

[incognoscibilis]

Henry's consternation was embarrassing as Adam remembered every time he'd hated Gansey for his casual three and four syllable words. Four-dollar words for four-dollar assholes, his father's voice told him, disgusted in the back of his head that he'd ended up raising a son with a vocabulary.

"I heard it on the radio. Some guy was talking about it because he always misheard the lyrics of Rain Is A Good Thing." It was a strangely and likely absolutely unnecessary explanation, a dumbing down of a word that he should have been proud to know. "If you haven't heard that song, it's a good thing."

[jeongbro]

Henry smiled, appreciative of the glimpse of where Adam had learned it. He had an image, suddenly, of Adam working on a car or studiously bent over his homework when he had heard the word the first time, of him mouthing it out to himself to fit it into his mouth perfectly.

"Korean would have a lot of those, then," he confessed. "It's why music videos are so popular, I think. And then, they play the lyrics at the bottom of the screen a lot--so even if you mishear, you can go, 'did they say what I think?'"

[incognoscibilis]

Adam was relieved when Henry smiled, though he had no idea what he'd said to prompt it. Adam wasn't particularly sunny or entertaining, in his own view.

"I don't know much about it," Adam confessed. This was a less dear admission since it wasn't as if Korean was a particularly common language anywhere in Henrietta but Adam never liked showing the deficits in his knowledge.

[jeongbro]

"I could teach you a bit, if you wanted to learn," Henry offered, but it was an idle sort of thing, because he didn't really think the statement was meant to be a curiosity about the language. So instead, he continued--his ears went a little warm as he did, and he was frustrated with himself for that--"I'm going to teach Blue a couple things."

This felt like stepping on toes, somehow. Here was Adam Parrish, knight to Richard Gansey, and here was Henry Cheng, outsider, speaking about Blue Sargent. Not that Blue was a thing to be gifted or given, but there seemed like an unspoken clause that Henry's eyes should not be settling anywhere in her vicinity, and the quiet admission that he'd be teaching her his language felt too much like an admission of his eyes coming close to her.

[incognoscibilis]

"Don't know when I'd have the time," Adam said, an automatic response. A second later, he felt a bit guilty that he wasn't willing to try. It wasn't like him to be lazy but Henry also didn't seem especially pressed on following up on the offer. Maybe it was okay.

Whenever Henry spoke about Blue or Ronan or Noah, Adam felt more aware of the paradigm shift. Henry wanted to be a part of this group and, inch by inch, most of them were beginning to accept this. The exception, of course, was Ronan who accepted change about as well as Adam accepted charity.

"Blue's smart though. I'm sure she'll be great if she wants to learn."

[jeongbro]

Henry nodded, because the offer had been meager at best, and he hadn't really been expecting Adam to take him up on it. He had other things to do with his time, of course. Going to college classes and working his jobs and driving a motorcycle and dating scowling boys.

Not that Blue didn't have things to do, as well.

"It's surprisingly hard to find time. I think we all fell into filling our days a bit," Henry commiserated. Then, without any particularly segue, he said, "Come help me pick some music before Lynch glares a hole in the side of my head."

[incognoscibilis]

"He's going to glare a hole in the side of your head no matter what. It's just his face." It wasn't meant as a slight against Ronan, just a statement of fact. Ronan's smiles were rare and guarded things and Adam hoarded them a little like a dragon sometimes, though he wasn't the only cause of them.

"But I'll do it so I can say we tried."

[jeongbro]

"I still haven't decided if that's just him or if it's an Irish thing," Henry said, somewhat speculatively. He got up from the couch and waited for Adam to join him, with or without chips, to adjourn to the kitchen were Henry's laptop was. Henry rather liked the layout of his apartment, since the breakfast bar of the kitchen meant that the whole space was fairly open.

He hated having to have an apartment, all to himself, in a strange and impossible city, a lifetime and dimension away from everything he'd ever known. But at least the layout was alright.

[incognoscibilis]

Adam thought of Declan Lynch and his easy politician's smile or Matthew Lynch and his uncomplicated devotion. True, one of them was a dream thing but that didn't make them any less Lynch or any less Irish.

If he were Blue, he would have had some flat, nuanced comment about stereotyping Irish people.

What he had, instead, was a shrug as he followed Henry. "Ronan's been through a lot."

[jeongbro]

Henry lifted a hand and wobbled it, comme ci comme ça, because in Henry's opinion, this did not actually excuse too much. Explain, yes. But not excuse. Adam and Gansey and Blue and Noah had all been through a lot. Henry himself had been through his variety of things. None of them tried to punch everything with a pulse.

It didn't matter. Everyone had their methods. Henry did not judge.

He pulled up his streaming service, which briefly flashed the free trial week, pay later! option before registering that he had a code that bypassed that nonsense. "Help me pick something to listen to."

[incognoscibilis]

"Not Tiffany Charlotte and not Todd Chad," Adam suggested. Whatever weird influence those singers had over the people of Darrow, it had largely escaped influencing the outsiders.

"I don't even know what music you like." Or any of them really, beyond that Ronan liked loud and angry EDM and that Gansey hated it on principle.

[jeongbro]

"I don't even know who those are, so we're in luck," Henry said, because as far as he knew, those names had not infiltrated the ranks of his music just yet. It might happen. He'd be sure to down vote it, if and when it did--unless it was good music. Who knew. Maybe this Tiffany Charlotte was Darrow's Madonna.

"I like music." This was broad and encompassing, but it at least got them to a song to start everything off with. Maybe a little more soft-techno than anyone else in the room might be alright with, but Adam had not supplied input.

[incognoscibilis]

"Enjoy the ignorance while you can," Adam said. Darrow as a whole seemed pathologically attached to a pop star who'd been dead now for a few years.

The music had a heavy pulse, the kind that would probably satisfy Ronan's need for a strong bass, even if there wasn't much screaming. Adam just knew it wasn't country and that was good enough for him. That was a genre that had gotten left behind in the trailer if at all possible.

[jeongbro]

Henry laughed, because that seemed an awful lot like some sort of threat about this miserable place, but Adam said it with a sort of long-suffering levity that made the laughter seem appropriate. When the music started, Adam seemed content with the choice, and the briefest glance toward Ronan still pinned to the wall by his own discontent found at least a fraction of relaxation in his shoulders.

"Good enough for now." Henry set the music to shuffle, and hope he didn't thoroughly embarrass himself with anything too insufferably Korean.