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He has so many scars now.
Hunter can't stop staring at them in the bathroom mirror after he puts on his new swimsuit. It was picked out by his sisters together during a Noceda family shopping trip a few days prior. The magenta hue of his swim trunks matches his old eye color, but that fact just reminds him of how much has changed since the last time he went to the beach.
His feelings catch in his throat when his gaze trails down the long scars running over his exposed chest. The water in the Human Realm doesn't even boil, but just the thought of touching so much of it again makes his skin burn.
It shouldn't hurt, and it doesn't for most people, but Hunter already knows that it will for him.
That terrifies him.
He hasn't tried to swim again ever since he drowned on Halloween. It's been months, but even the vague idea of doing it scares him.
Confronting the past is hard. Confronting the realities of the present and his future is even harder.
Around a year ago, shortly after the Day of Unity, Hunter and his friends received an opportunity to go to a Human Realm beach for the first time — and it didn't go well. Amity had gotten sand kicked into her face by a bratty child, Willow had tried and failed to control new types of plants, and Gus’s enthusiasm had made the group of hidden witches receive more than a few suspicious looks. But worst of all, Hunter had been too afraid to leave the towel he was sharing with Camila. Instead, he had spent the day under an umbrella reading animal magazines from the vet clinic, and that meant he never learned how to swim.
Something about the ocean scares him. It’s cold, powerful, and suffocating. When he had an artificial staff from the Emperor’s Coven, it wasn’t as intimidating. He could manipulate the water. He could control it. But now that he's Hunter Noceda instead of the Golden Guard, he’s helpless against it.
He really, really hates having a lack of control.
The family’s plans for the day are questionable. His friends won’t be coming along this time, which means there’s less pressure — and also less support. If Amity was with them, she would listen to each and every word of his nervous rambling and somehow find ways to combat all of it. If Willow was with them, she would hold his hands and lead him directly into the water. If Gus was with them, he would distract Hunter for long enough to make the waves less salty and harsh against his skin.
But today, he’s alone as he faces off against his own reflection in the bathroom.
“At least they make me look less like him,” Hunter grumbles under his breath, picking at a particularly brutal scar under his eye. He’s referring to multiple people at once: his ortet, his uncle, and even the regrettable past version of himself. There’s certainly a disconnect between his brain and his body, and the weightlessness of the water won’t do him any favors.
He rubs the uncomfortably empty spot on his shoulder and winces; he never expected to miss the stinging pain of bird claws digging into bare skin.
Then someone knocks on the door a few times, and his heart gets plunged back under a sea of stress.
“Are you done in there yet, dude? I’ve gotta grab my towel!”
Luz. She’s always had an uncanny habit of showing up whenever he needs her, sometimes even before he realizes it. Their mother calls it a “sibling thing,” but he usually describes it as “embarrassing.”
This time, though, Hunter lets her in with little hesitation. He unlocks the bathroom door and stares at her with an utterly miserable expression that gives away his need for companionship better than any words possibly could. Luz looks up at him from the doorway, her hands shoved into her purple sweatshirt, and frowns with concern. She can always see right through him better than anyone else can.
“You’re nervous,” she says. The blunt statement makes him flinch as if he’s being splashed with cold water, but it has good intentions. “I can tell. What’s up? Lunch not sitting right in your stomach again? I feel that.”
Luz definitely already knows what’s on his mind, but she’s mercifully kind enough to wait for him to spit it out himself. She steps forward a little more so she can shut the door behind her, and the sudden return to privacy is jarring now that he has someone else with him. After so many years of battling his problems alone, it can still feel surreal to finally have a sidekick.
Hunter shakes his head and avoids her gaze, staring down at the new star-patterned sandals she recently bought with Amity. Luz was with him when everything happened — when he lost himself to stormy Halloween waters. She should know better than anyone how he feels. Opening up to her should be simple. Letting her love him should be easy.
In reality, however, attempting to achieve vulnerability is more like trying to swim through a flood of torrential emotions that threaten to drown him.
“I’m just a little worried about how today is going to go,” Hunter admits. “I haven’t tried to swim since…well, you know. I feel like such a coward.”
If Luz was told a year ago that she would someday be facing the mighty Golden Guard in her Human Realm bathroom, trying to coax him out of sheepishness with sisterly love, she would have burst into hysterical laughter.
In the present, however, she looks up at him with a warm smile.
“Well, if it’s any comfort…in my eyes, you’re the bravest brother a girl could have.”
He interrupts her with a dry, “I’m the only brother you have.”
Luz lightly shoves him with a giggle, and he stares at her with a completely puzzled expression because he wasn’t trying to make a joke.
“I haven't finished talking yet!” she complains. “What I’m trying to say is that you’re stronger than you think…and I think that’s made me stronger too. You’re always thinking about the worst case scenario for every situation, but what if you tried to imagine the opposite instead for once?”
Hunter just blinks at her.
“I’m still lost.”
After moving a bit closer to him, cautiously and slowly, Luz wraps an arm around his shoulders. She’s the only person who can give him this much physical affection, and she probably always will be.
“Instead of thinking, ‘What if I freak out?’...try thinking, ‘What if I have a great time?’ instead,” Luz suggests. “I know it sounds silly, but…just give it a shot.”
Hunter gives her one of his classic unamused expressions, one that she used to see far more often than she does nowadays, but he doesn’t shy away from her teasing. He leans into her touch and lets her head droop onto his shoulder. She stares up at him with expectant eyes that sparkle, brown ones that match his and seem to glimpse into his mind.
“I appreciate what you’re trying to do, seriously, but I’m pretty sure that the power of positive thinking isn’t gonna be enough to fix what happened,” he says.
And then, in the way only Luz can, she manages to shift his perspective in an instant.
“I’m not trying to fix you. I know how horrible that day was; I’ve had more than enough nightmares to prove it. I’m just trying to make you see things a little closer to what they really are,” she explains. “Of course you’re scared. I’d probably be more worried about you if you weren’t. But I think admitting your fear is the first step towards overcoming it. That’s something you never used to do…so you’re already making progress.”
The scars on Hunter’s chest almost seem to burn as he shivers.
“…The ocean was always so much easier to deal with when I was wearing armor,” he complains. “But now, like this, all my weaknesses are showing. All the reminders of last time are showing.”
Luz’s arm leaves Hunter’s side, but her warmth returns to him in an instant in the form of a purple pile of fabric — his newer, softer armor. As he holds her sweatshirt in his shaky hands, breathing starts to seem possible again.
“It’ll be a little small on you, but it’s the thought that counts, right?” she says. “Let’s try this again…Noceda family style.”
Just as she always does, Luz has saved Hunter from drowning.
******
It's a warm summer day, but seeing a lake again drags Hunter back to a freezing cold autumn night. He shivers from fear and he pulls tightly on his borrowed sweatshirt like it's a protective embrace from its owner.
The beach is relatively tame today and there are barely any visitors — but that doesn’t mean it’s pleasant. The sand is still too much for him. It sticks to his skin and sparkles against his scars like a more painful version of the glitter his sisters are so fond of. The quiet waves are deafening to his sensitive ears, and his cold ice cream makes his tongue ache.
Vee sits next to him on their shared towel with a matching frozen treat in her hand and a concerned frown on her face.
“Are you okay?” she asks. Then she answers her own question in a breathless ramble. “Well, honestly, I’ve been worried about you all day. I know you don’t want me to care this much, but I can’t help it. So, do you want to talk about it?”
He’s not really sure if he does, but it can’t hurt to try.
“…I don’t think I am okay, Vee,” Hunter admits, his voice quiet and unsteady. He trembles a bit as he stares at his cold hands. “Actually, I know I’m not. I’m…scared.”
Luz was right, but he was hoping she wasn’t. Saying it out loud makes it feel too real. He pulls on his sweatshirt more tightly and wishes it was her arms hugging him instead.
“I’m kinda scared too,” Vee agrees. “But…I’m scared for you, not for myself. I know how hard this is for you, and I don’t want you to have another bad experience.”
She’s worried about Hunter, and he’s still not entirely used to that. Being cared about always feels like something that needs to be repaid — like something that needs to be earned. But somehow, his sister is able to tell him that she loves him regardless of his anxieties.
It’s a strange feeling, but not a bad one.
“You’re a really nice person,” Hunter blurts out. He fumbled his words, as he so often does, but Vee just keeps quietly licking her ice cream while she waits for him to continue. “I mean, isn’t thinking about that day pretty hard for you too? I’m not the only one who’s been hurt by… him.”
The tense silence between the siblings is as frigid as the slow waves of the water; Hunter can barely bring himself to look at her. Bringing up the monster their pasts both share is a bit of a taboo between the two of them, but sometimes it slips out and creates an awkward friction.
Finally, Vee brings her knees up to her chest. Her bathing suit is covered in polka dots that match the basilisk spots on her skin, and she rubs some of its frills between her fingers as she speaks.
“I was scared of him, yeah, but I was even more scared of losing you,” she says.
The compassionate confession makes Hunter’s eyes wet like the lake. His voice shakes a little when he responds to her, and he rubs desperately at the tears poking at the corners of his vision.
“I hurt you. A lot,” he reminds her. “I helped him do it. You shouldn’t treat me the way you do. I don’t think I’ll ever understand it.”
It’s like he’s begging her to be angry with him. It’s like he expects her to hurt him just as much as he’s hurt her. It’s like he wants her to hate him.
Instead of pushing him deeper into the water, however, Vee seems much more interested in helping him float back up.
They both dodge each other’s gazes, staring at opposite sides of the sand surrounding them.
“I was pretty afraid of you at first,” Vee says. “But we were both afraid of him when I met you again. I think we’ve both been trying to make new lives for ourselves, and…I’m glad we can do it together.”
Hunter bites into his ice cream and its cold chill runs up his spine.
“How did you…get past that fear?” he asks her, almost like he doesn’t want to hear the answer. “How’d you stop being scared of something that hurt you so badly before?”
Then, Vee turns back to him and smiles. He can’t see it, but he can sense it.
“Living with you gave me the opportunity to prove that I’m braver and stronger than I was in the past,” she explains. “And I think you are too. You just need to prove it to yourself.”
Hunter’s tight grip on his borrowed sweatshirt loosens and the overpowering noises in his head finally get quieter. He smiles back at Vee, and their ice creams begin to taste sweeter while they watch the waves together.
******
Hunter is tough and sturdy. He was built for the military and dangerous missions. He was meant to be independent and isolated. He was destined to be a weapon.
He certainly doesn’t feel like he’s any of those things when he’s with Camila, though. As she holds his hands in hers, he’s reminded that denying his original fate was the correct choice.
“If it’s still too much for you, even a little bit, we can try again another day,” she tells him. “Don’t push yourself past your limits. That wouldn’t help anything.”
They’re sitting on separate chairs next to each other, divided by the sand underneath them, but the childish corner of his brain fantasizes about cuddling up against her warmth until he melts into it. His mother is his anchor, and a ship can’t go to sea without one.
“I have to do this,” he insists. “I want to be brave.”
Camila looks at Hunter like he’s said something ludicrous, and a little amused smile rises on her lips. She’s so patient, so understanding, and so accommodating. It’s a wonder that he’s managed to get a parent this caring. He’ll never fully be able to make sense of it.
“You’ve already been so brave all this time, though. Muy, muy valiente,” she says. She always automatically shifts to Spanish whenever she wants to be extra affectionate, and it reaches his heart every time. He’s primarily been learning the language for her sake. “Maybe too brave sometimes. But you don’t have to do it alone this time. I promise.”
Slowly, like he’s instinctively afraid of her being upset by it even though she clearly wouldn’t be, Hunter slides his hands out from her grasp. He places them on his knees and digs his nails into his scarred skin.
“I want to believe you, I really do, but I just can’t. It doesn’t feel like I should.”
Camila doesn’t try to force physical contact on him, but her fond gaze never strays from him. “What do I always tell you about your anxiety, mijo?”
“….That it lies to me,” he answers, reciting the past lecture like it’s burned into his brain. It probably is, considering how many times he’s been reminded of it.
“Exactly. It’s biased against you,” Camila says. “I’m probably biased too, but at least I’m on your side!”
She lightly pinches his cheek the same way she does with Luz, her fingers rubbing up against one of the scars she watched him get, and a small laugh escapes him.
Hunter finally gives in and a tiny smile lingers on his face after Camila puts her hand back down. “Alright, alright, I’ll hear you out.”
She looks towards the lake, her gaze fixed on the subtle waves, and she fidgets with her hands. Memories rush in and out with the slow tide, and she seems to hold them with tenderness rather than rejecting them like her son wants to.
“That Halloween was a horrible day. You’re not wrong about that part,” Camila begins. Then, she turns to face him once more. “But I don’t only associate it with bad things, you know.”
Hunter rarely notices how much he’s loved unless it’s directly told to him, so he misses what she’s trying to tell him.
“…What do you mean?”
Camila speaks to him like he’s her world; he makes up a third of it, even if he doesn’t realize just how deep that care goes.
“When I saw what…well, what he was doing to you…” She struggles to find her words; Hunter struggles to understand the true reason why. “…That was the moment I made an important decision. That was the day I decided that you were already my son, even if neither of us knew it yet. I wasn’t going to lose a member of my family — not again.”
His mother’s confession brings Hunter back to the moment Luz first told him he was a part of her family — the moment he became a Noceda. It reminds him of the warm love he felt in his friends' arms after he got rescued from the cold depths of his old life. It pulls his head back up above water.
Camila puts her hand on his shoulder while he cries, quietly and briefly, but her touch is like a life preserver. She sits there and lets him feel what he needs to feel — and doing that feels better now that he’s not stuck doing it alone. A minute later, he wipes his tears away and looks back up at her with a stronger smile than before.
“I think I might be ready to get in the water again.”
When Hunter cautiously steps out into the lake, with one small act of bravery at a time, he’s cheered on by his family — including the first member of it that still resides in his heart.