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

[formicine]

"Hey," Blue says, and steals a chip out of his arrangement without asking. It's a weird, intrusive sort of gesture of affection. She'd normally feel a pang of guilt, but there's about three times too much free food, and he's not eating his.

"Not the most terrible thing we could have done tonight." It's a statement, but also a question.

[incognoscibilis]

Adam turned and looked at Blue as seriously as he could without cracking. "You've ruined the symmetry, Blue," he said in a flatly even tone. To fix the situation, he took a chip from the other side and ate it, certain that Blue was going to retaliate in kind.

"It's very civilized," he agreed.

[formicine]

"That's me, an agent of chaos," she deadpans, regarding him back, though she feels like she's going to laugh. She stacks three chips and moves them to the center of his plate aggressively as though she can prove this about herself, a smile curling at her lips.

"Yeah, somehow I'm not missing the burning cars." She glances at Henry. "He's trying," she says, and she doesn't mean to be civilized.

[incognoscibilis]

And now, of course, any of the parity was completely ruined and Adam gave Blue a petulant look that was only mostly faked. "This is probably the worst chaos we're going to experience all night though," he said, glancing out the window where he knew the party raged somewhere in the distance.

[formicine]

She gives him an exaggerated look of apology, pouting her lower lip, and looks at the places they came from. It's as if the other chips have hidden them: the careful arrangement of chips seems totally changed. She allocates the separate three: one each aesthetically and evenly on either side and breaks the third in half to split between Adam and herself.

"Is that a bad thing?" she asks, and frowns, looking at her half of the chip. "Did I make a mistake here? I feel like I'm doing something wrong and no one will tell me what it is." As though she's supposed to think or feel something about Henry, but she's pretty sure if she'd kept resenting him for being a privileged Aglionby boy that wouldn't have been fair, either.

[incognoscibilis]

Adam pouted back at her, though it came out as mostly a deranged imitation of Noah. Then, because they were being silly, Adam took the offered half-chip and ate it before he leaned all the way over from his seat to the snack table and grabbed the bag. With a half-flourish, he dumped more chips all over the plate in an untidy pile.

"I'm pretty sure none of us know what the right thing to do in this situation even is," Adam said. Gansey's absence, his talent for spinning awkward silence in the gold, was palpable.

[formicine]

Blue giggles at the over-the-top pout (it does look a little Noah-esque, which is funnier than probably intended) and at his flourish. She feels a surge of warm, fierce appreciation for Adam just then, and it's not particularly spawned by anything but chips and Adam.

She'd say I love you, right then, if it were a thing they usually said to each other, but since it seems to be reserved for big occasions when someone might die, she plops down next to him, bumps her head against his shoulder like a cat and hopes he knows.

"Have fun, I think, but." She spreads her hands, too sensible to think that's as easy as it sounds. "If I were Gansey," she says, "I'd already know the steps to this. Do they teach you social dancing 101 at Aglionby? Henry's interested in sustainable resources, isn't that interesting Ronan," she mimicks, gesturing in a way meant to indicate some sort of complex social do-si-do where they end up together, "could you imagine generating power without consuming fossil fuels? Oh, and I think you both have strong feelings about EDM." Her Gansey imitation is intentionally poor, meant to make Adam laugh, and she huffs a sigh.

"I don't even care, really, what people talk about, I just --" She makes a circle with her hands. "Like my friends to all be friends, I guess." Which isn't possible, or even reasonable, and she deals with that, but. "Whatever this place is, we all know more about each other than anyone else."

[incognoscibilis]

When she bumped against his shoulder, Adam started to raise a hand before remembering at the last second that Blue was not, in fact, a barn cat. He liked the gesture though and tapped his knuckles against the back of her hand in an uncertain imitation of how Henry had tapped his knee earlier. It seemed appropriately affectionate without turning over the stones of a past relationship.

Blue's imperfect imitation of Gansey squeezed on Adam's heart in a peculiar way. Her impersonation of him was damnably accurate but not in the same way his or Ronan's would have been. They'd all known slightly different facets of Gansey and it only occurred to him now that, like a gem, Gansey could turn this way or that to cast light where it was needed. To be seen how he preferred in any situation.

The realization was such an epiphany that Adam forced it back in favor of laughing with Blue.

"I missed Social Dancing 101. It's a freshman year class and I wasn't at Aglionby until I was a sophomore," Adam said, still nibbling back laughter. "But, I mean. We're here, aren't we?"

[formicine]

"That explains it," she deadpans, though her smile gives her away. "And I think Ronan must have skipped the class entirely." For some reason that makes her actually laugh, a huff, and she steals the chip bag back to get herself a handful.

"Everyone is here. You're right." Maybe she's overthinking this whole thing. Too much being around Gansey, or -- just being in her own head. The music from the breakfast nook brightens as the song changes. "And I mean, you could have definitely pulled birthday rank if you didn't want to come," she teases, gently. "Was this weekend okay?"

[incognoscibilis]

"There's not a class in the Aglionby catalogue that Ronan hasn't skipped," Adam said. It wasn't meant to be a jibe, just a statement of truth. Ronan as Adam knew him, post-Niall and angry, was a creature that was difficult to contain.

Eating some of his chips at last, Adam nodded. "Is it wrong that I don't mind Henry Cheng?" He more than didn't mind, truthfully, but saying out loud that he was starting to think of him as a friend still felt like uncertain waters. They had been, for so long, the five of them, a complete and interdependent ecosystem. New elements had to be introduced gradually or else there would be ecological disaster.

[formicine]

"I wouldn't expect any less," Blue says with a sliver of fondness creeping into her voice.

She breaks one of her chips down the middle and looks at him sidelong. "No, it's not wrong," she says, keeping her tone purposefully casual. "I mean. You're at his party, eating his chips." Blue crunches on the chip. "I don't mind him either." It does, inexplicably, feel weird to say it, as though they're only ever supposed to have their own group. Even though Gansey was friends with him first.

Or maybe it feels weird that she more than doesn't mind.

[incognoscibilis]

Adam smiled at her because he knew that Blue was fond of Ronan as he was, even if he was prone to scowling and snarling.

"But it feels like we're, I don't know, breaking protocol," Adam guessed. Henry Cheng wasn't a bad person by any means. An acquired taste, yes, but he wasn't destructive in the way that Kavinsky was. It was just that Henry wasn't one of them and so he could be a detrimental element.

"When did we get so cliquish?"

[formicine]

"You're aware you were always cliquish, right? We, I mean. But you guys first. Gansey's." Blue sits up to snag some dip off the table. From the first day she'd noticed them at Ninos, they'd all so obviously belonged to each other, even with Adam being made fun of for not wanting to talk to her.

"I don't think it's always a bad thing," she reasons, looking at the dip and then offering it to Adam. "I don't really want maybe-friends, and it's good to have to work for it. But sometimes it can feel a little -- like we have to close ourselves off, I think," she agrees.

[incognoscibilis]

"Well yeah, but..." No. There was no 'but.' Once Gansey accepted someone into his court, the compact was sealed in Nino's sweet tea and they were made family, drawn into a friendship that went beyond friendship.

"It didn't feel like there rules," Adam said at last. That felt truer.

He took the chip and looked thoughtfully at those assembled in the room.