Chapter Text
Date: 1/25/2023. Time: 3:43 PM. Location: The Noceda Household.
I walk into my bedroom, fully expecting no one to have been home: Luz, Vee, and her friends had taken a day trip to go to the beach (I don’t quite no why, it’s way too cold to swim…), and had taken Camilia with them as a driver, leaving what I thought was myself and no one else at home. However, I come to realize that was a misinformed judgement, as I see someone else in my room, none other than one Amity Blight sitting on my bed.
“Uh, hey.” I awkwardly introduce myself. I hadn’t talked to Amity one and one in nearly months at this point, not since the wedding had been called off, not because of mine or hers wants not to, but because I no longer held much weight in terms of connections, what with every Whittebane venture being either sold off or folded in the wake of my uncles arrest. “Surprised to see you here, thought it was just me.” I say as I sit down next to her.
She looks shy as well, though she takes some chips off my plate. I don’t put up any resistance, we used to split food all the time on our “dates” our families put us on. “Yeah, well, I just… want to get away from my family for a bit.” Understatement of the century, I think as I feel like she should want to get away from them for GOOD. I don’t verbalize that, though, as I do respect her decisions and don’t want her to do something she doesn’t want to, but GOD I wish she would.
Instead, I reply a little bit snarkily “Yeah no, trust me I understand that part.” I say, biting into another chip “Just thought you would go with Luz, Vee, Willow, and Gus is all” I add in a matter of fact way. While I’ve been added into the friend group somewhat these past couple of months, and have gotten quite a bit closer with everyone else in particular, I still have a bit of a strain in my relationship with Amity. It’s not either of our faults, I don’t think, we just… bring up some bad memories to each other.
“It’s way to fucking cold to go to the beach right now.” she adds matter of factly, biting onto another potato chip
“THANK YOU!” I suddenly scream out, happy to seemingly find another person with a functioning brain “WHAT ARE THEY EVEN DOING?! IT’S 23 FUCKING DEGREES OUT RIGHT NOW*.” We both stare at each other after that sudden outburst before bursting out into a laughing fit, both seemingly amused by our friends weirdness and relieved to find someone else with a functioning brain cell.
“Oh, oh my god Hunter” she says, holding her sides at how hard she was just laughing “I’ll tell you what, I love those guys, they are easily the best friends I’ve ever had, but GOD can they be stupid sometimes. So I’m glad you’re here to at least make me realize that I’M not the crazy one.” She says, tears in her eyes from how hard she was just laughing.
We both seem to settle down after that, just enjoying each other's company. It was weird to be around each other without plotting how we could get out of the arranged marriage we were in, but it was… nice, to just be able to hang out together as normal kids.
“Oh trust me, I know how much you LOVEEEE those guys, especially someone whose name starts with L” I say, a smirk on my face. Her face meanwhile goes into a full tomato mode, red covering seemingly every available lot and creating a housing crisis on her head. She starts to stammer, unable to figure out how to respond, before she suddenly seems to calm down and hits me with her retort.
“Oh yeah? Well don’t make me talk about the puppy dog eyes you get whenever Willow comes in the room. It’s just like:” and then she gives me the biggest, roundest eyes I’ve ever seen. Suddenly I’m the one all red and pouty, and we get into a play fight, me throwing pillows at her while she tries to tug on my arm, before it eventually gets into playful slapping.
We stop before it gets to serious, and burst out laughing once again. “God, you know Amity, when we aren’t being pressured by our parents to get along, we get along very well. Weird how that works, huh?” I say, as we start to calm down, sitting back up and staring at each other.
“Yeah, I guess we do.” she says, as we turn away from each other, she speaks again “I’m just… really glad you got out of there, Hunter. You haven’t told us much about what happened with you, but I know the stories Luz has told me about herself, and the things that vile man has done to her, I can only imagine what all he has done to you.” she says, as she squeezes my hand in reassurance.
I stare at her for a bit, contemplating whether or not to go into it now in a safe place with someone else who had been abused basically her whole life. I start slow. “If you don’t mind if I ask, what all did he do to Luz? I was there for some of it, but for some of it I was away. Only if it’s okay for me to know, of course.”
She shakes her head nonchalantly, dismissing my worries in a hurry “You are basically her brother now, Hunter. I know she is close to you, and wouldn’t mind you knowing the details.” She starts to recount everything Phillip had done to her, from the beatings to the starvation, to the emotional manipulation, some of which I knew and some of which I hadn’t, but all were very familiar to me and my life before his arrest. Still though, one question lingered in the back of my mind.
“D-do you know if Phillip touched her?” I thought I might be going too far, but if he had, I knew that my lifes purpose from there on out would be to kill the man personally.
“Touch inappropriately? No? Well, at least if he had, she hadn’t said anything.” as she says that, I breathe a huge sigh of relief, but slowly the memories of what he had done to me fly back at me, and make me freeze. “Hunter, why do you ask that?” she asks, before her face drops in realization and I see panic set into her heart in a blaze “Hunter, d-did he touch YOU?” That one singular question sets me off, as I start to feel a river poor out of my eyes, and I feel Amity hug me tight as I cry into her shoulders. Even though I’m so safe right now, it feels like I’m back there with him…