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***
“Oh come on Blue, don’t be so difficult.”
“If you would just tell me what this is about, I wouldn’t be so hard about it.” Adam punched Ronan’s arm when he laughed.
“You’re gonna like it, I swear,” Adam said to Blue. Gansey nodded.
Suddenly Noah was in front of her. “Do you trust me?” he asked looking into her eyes and Blue took his hand and brought it to her cheek, nodding. Gansey looked away and something tickled inside him. He wasn’t jealous. He wasn’t jealous of Noah.
“Okay. Close your eyes.”
They were standing outside 300 Fox Way, all five of them, for ten minutes, with Blue debating on whether or not she should go in her house. The truth was that they could all be a little bit more subtle but Blue would still be suspicious anyway. The boys were waiting for her there when she came back from work and they were trying really hard to make her follow them in the house with her eyes closed, because it was a surprise.
Everything was ready. Flowers, cake, food, drinks, music and family. Gansey thought about Maura and how Blue didn’t talk about her when she was with them but then Adam called for him, and he went into the house with the rest of them.
“Okay in 3, 2, 1, OPEN YOUR EYES!”
“HAPPY BIRTHDAY!”
All the ladies of 300 Fox Way were in the house, clapping and shouting “HAPPY BIRTHDAY BLUE!” along with them. There were flowers and candles everywhere. Calla had told Gansey to send the decorations and leave everything on her. In reality, since Gansey knew nothing about party decorations, he called Helen and she told him that he could never do wrong with flowers and candles.
“Oh my God,” Blue said covering her mouth. Noah was smiling next to her and she punched his arm. “Noah!” That only made him smile more. “But my birthday has passed. And we already celebrated it with brownies,” Blue said pointing at Calla.
“Yeah, but you deserve a real birthday party and your friends thought about all this,” Calla said as she threw her arms in the air and pointed around the house at the decorations, “so what you should really say is ‘thank you’.”
“Oh you,” Blue said and turned around and threw her arms around Noah and Adam who were right behind her. “Come on, now, don’t be shy,” she gestured at Gansey and Ronan to go to them and Gansey pulled Ronan by the hand and joined them.
That was their first group hug. Blue between Adam and Noah, with Ronan behind Adam and Gansey behind Noah. Gansey realized then that Noah wasn’t cold, he was taking a little bit of energy out of everyone, and they were all the same. Blue opened her eyes and looked at him and Gansey was thankful that Noah’s body was separating them because her face was only a few inches away from his when her fingers stroked his arms and she mouthed ‘thank you’. He could feel her breath on his face.
***
When Noah appeared on Monmouth Manufacturing the previous day, Ronan was helping him add another building to his miniature Henrietta.
“Guys, did you know it was Blue’s birthday?”
Gansey looked up. “When?” He ran his hand through his already messy hair and pushed his glasses up to his eyes where they had slid down to his nose.
“I don’t know exactly, maybe a couple days ago.”
“And she didn’t even bring us cake. Amazing,” Ronan’s sarcasm made Gansey roll his eyes.
“Should we take her out or something? We could go for gelato.” Noah was pacing up and down and Gansey realized he had never seen him that excited before.
“I have other plans,” Ronan said.
“Maybe we could plan her a surprise party.” Gansey got up from the floor, already planning the whole thing in his head. “At her house.” He pulled his phone out of his pocket. “I’ll make a call.”
Ronan sighed and abandoned the miniature Henrietta to lie down on the floor with his hands under his head. On the third ring someone picked up the phone. “Hello, it’s Gansey.” With the corner of his eye he saw Noah lying on the floor on his side, beside Ronan and looking at him, smiling.
***
The party was a success. Everything was perfect, just as Gansey had imagined it, but there was only one thing left. One more surprise.
He looked around the room, to see if anyone was paying attention to him, but they were all occupied with something.
Noah was switching through songs on Ronan’s iPod because, “It’s a birthday party, Lynch, not a typical emo afternoon of yours,” in which Ronan took personal offense and threw a cushion at him, causing Calla to yell at both of them.
Adam was sitting next to Persephone, looking through some photo albums, probably from Blue’s childhood, and Ronan was playing poker with Calla and Orla.
Gansey walked in the kitchen where Blue was sitting on the counter smiling and with her legs tangling because they couldn’t reach the floor.
Even though he was skeptical at first about their surprise, because he wasn’t sure if Blue would like it, seeing her happy changed everything. He momentarily wished that somehow he was the one to find out Blue had her birthday a couple days ago and not Noah, so that he could be the reason for her smile, but he dismissed that thought as quickly as he got it.
“Hey,” he said sitting next to her on the counter. Blue looked at him smiling and then turned to look if anyone was watching them.
“This is nice,” she said and then looked at her hands resting on her legs. Gansey’s hands were by his side on the counter. When she raised her head Gansey was looking at her. He knew he couldn’t have this and Blue did too.
She shot another glance at her family and the boys and then carefully placed her hand next to Gansey’s on the counter. Gansey felt his heart beat faster and before he had anytime to think about all the reasons why this was a bad idea, he slid his hand closer to Blue’s.
“Gansey,” Blue started saying but he jumped off the counter before she could finish her sentence.
“Come, I have to show you something.”
She jumped off the counter too and stood next to him. His face was just a few inches apart from hers when he leaned down and whispered, “Close your eyes,” before taking her hand in his own.
He guided her through the house, out in the backyard. “No looking.” His thumb was stroking slow circles on Blue’s palm and she closed her fingers tight around it. It was something so casual and simple, but it managed to sent chills up to his spine. Gansey came to a stop under the big tree in her yard and he let go of her hand. Every single tree in Blue’s backyard had little lights hanging from the branches.
They were hundreds. Above them, next to them, all around them.
“You can open your eyes now,” he said quietly, as if no one else should hear that.
Blue opened her eyes, looking at him and he smiled, pointing around with his eyes. She turned around and took a few steps away from Gansey towards the middle of the yard, looking at all the lights, till she turned around to look at him again.
“It was Calla’s idea,” Gansey said with the smile still on his face. “She thought you might like it.” He raised his hand towards a light right above his eyes and poked it with his finger so it would start moving back and forth. “I don’t even know where she found all these little jars.”
Blue walked to where he was standing and looked at the light above him. It was a small jar with a candle inside it, hanging by blue and white ribbons. All of them were the same.
“Blue?” she asked stroking the ribbon and he laughed.
“Happy birthday, Jane.”
She moved closer to him and took his hands in hers. He stopped breathing when she looked into his eyes and placed his hands in her neck. She was warm under his touch and her pulse was beating like crazy. He could feel it under his palm.
She closed the distance between them and placed her own hands on the back of his neck. “Let’s pretend,” she said closing her eyes. “Just for tonight.”
“Oh, Jane.” Gansey wrapped his arms around her, pulling her tight against his body, and started breathing again.
She leaned her head on his chest and she let out a sigh that went through his shirt and tickled his skin. Gansey rested his chin on the top of her head. They had quite a height difference and Blue was fitting perfectly under his chin. He brought one hand up and threaded his fingers through her hair. She smelled of vanilla and strawberry, and he knew his clothes would smell like her afterwards so he hugged her tighter, running his hand across her back.
Blue was slowly stroking the hair at the back of his neck, tracing his spine and drawing little patterns.
They were standing like that, with their arms around each other, in Blue’s backyard, under all those lights, until after a while she said, “I wish we didn’t meet like this.”
“You mean without coming to you about someone else and insulting you? Me too.” His laughter shook them both and she placed one hand on his chest, next to her face, to stop him from moving.
“No,” she said nudging his leg with her knee, “I mean I wish I met you in a different time. In a time where there was no Glendower, no Cabeswater and no curse.”
Gansey let out a small breath and pulled back to look at her face. He knew exactly what she meant.
He cupped her face and stroked her cheek with his thumb. “But Jane, I love our magic. I wouldn’t change a bit of everything we’ve been through so far. All of us. All I know is we were meant to meet like this. This magic connected us. Glendower. Cabeswater. Who tells me I’d stand a chance without them?”
He managed a faint smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes, but he hoped Blue couldn’t see that.
“Well, I take it back.” He tucked Blue’s hair behind her ears. “Perhaps there is something I’d change,” he said looking at her lips.
“I wanna pretend,” she said softly and rose on the tips of her toes as he leaned down.
And then a bit of everything. Gansey’s fingers on her neck, Blue’s fingers tangled in his hair, cheeks against each other, noses rubbing together and breaths in each other’s open mouths.
Everything except from that. And then some more.
Hands roaming up and down each other’s back, lips dragging on each other’s neck and bodies moving in sync. They pulled apart, their hearts beating fast and both out of breath.
“Look at us,” Blue laughed. “Imagine what it would be like if we could actually kiss.”
“I’d probably have a heart attack,” Gansey joked but his smile faded away quickly when he realized what he said. Blue looked at him with an expression of both an apology and shock painted on her face. “I’m sorry,” he added when he saw her, “that was inconsiderate”.
“Ahem,” someone cleared their throat from the house, startling both of them. It was Orla. “Everyone’s waiting for you to blow the candles so we can eat the cake.”
“We’re coming,” Blue said to her and then turned to Gansey when Orla went back in. “Come on.”
“Do you know what your wish is gonna be?” Gansey asked as they walked towards the house.
“You believe in birthday wishes coming true?”
“Out of everything we’ve seen, I’d be really offended if birthday wishes weren’t true.” Something about that sentence made Blue laugh. “You still have a few seconds to decide. Think fast,” he smiled.
***
Later that night, Gansey was turning from left to right on his bed, restless.
They had left Blue’s house nearly two hours ago and it was already midnight. Gansey wasn’t sure if she would call him that night but his phone buzzed before he could finish his thought.
“Did I wake you?”
“No, I was waiting for your call.”
Blue sighed loudly. “We just finished cleaning. Well, I did, cause everyone else bailed out in the end.”
“Oh- I’m sorry we should’ve probably stayed and helped you.” Gansey felt guilty for leaving and not helping with the cleaning, but most of all he felt stupid for not thinking about it. When they had parties at his house, he didn’t have to worry about cleaning, neither did anyone in his family, they had help for that.
Blue’s voice was softer when she spoke again. “I left the candles in the backyard.”
There were a lot of things Gansey wanted to say but none of them felt right. “Jane, I-”
“Let’s not say anything.”
Gansey closed his eyes and ran his fingers through his hair.
“Sometimes,” Blue said slowly, “sometimes, I close my eyes and think that you’re here with me.”
“I do that too,” Gansey admitted. “Do you think- do you think maybe in our dreams we can do things we normally can’t?”
“Yeah, I guess so. I mean look what Ronan can do when he dreams.”
“In my dreams you can kiss me,” Gansey said. He said it in the same way someone would say that the earth is moving. It was a statement.
“You dream about kissing me?” Blue asked.
Gansey let a small laugh slip through his lips. “Sometimes I think if I dream it enough it will break your curse. But I’m not Ronan.”
“I’m glad you’re not,” Blue said and they both laughed.
There was a long pause before she spoke again. “Goodnight, Gansey.”
“Goodnight, Jane.”
“I’ll meet you in your dreams.”
***