It takes him a while, but he finally spots her — the transfer student from France, the star of theatre class, his brunette girlfriend. She’s looking around — it seems like she's looking for him, too; her eyes scan the crowd for his figure.

She tries calling out. “Merethel?”

“Steora? Steora!” Merethel tiptoes and waves his hand high above.

Hygd gasps. “STEORAAAA!!!!”

Smiling, Hrodwyn bends down and hoists Hygd up on their shoulders. Hygd’s head of orange hair pokes out of the crowd like a flag. She waves both her hands wildly. “STEORAAA!!! OVER HERE!!!”

Finally, Steora Rochefort sees her the family, and the brightness of her smile matches her namesake. 

“Hygd!” she says with a wave back, matching the youngest's, and trots over to the three siblings. When she arrives, she immediately greets Merethel with a hug. "Hrodwyn." Her gaze drifts from Hrodwyn's a little as she shuffles slightly closer to Merethel, but she offers the eldest a greeting smile.

Then, of course, 

“Hi, Merethel.”

Her smile and the stars in her eyes takes on a softer quality as she pecks her boyfriend's cheek and wraps him in a hug.

“Hiiiii!” Hygd grins.

Hrodwyn smiles politely and nods. “Hello.”

Merethel wraps his arms around her, happy to feel her weight against him. He sighs, content. “Hello, Steora.” Gently, he returns the peck with one atop her hand, dusting her cheeks with colour. “I hope this is not so busy for you. I was hoping that a random park wouldn't be so crowded, but here we are…”

She responds by lacing her fingers with his. “Mm. It's okay. It's not like I don't deal with a lot of people for work, you know that,” she laughs a little.

Despite the dark, Steora can see Merethel’s smile grow. He tightens his hand in hers and asks, “How are you feeling? How was work?”

“Work is as work always is~” she hums and swings their joined hands a little. “How have you been?” The question is addressed to all three siblings, this time, as she casts a glance at all of them.

Merethel opens his mouth—

“I don't wanna go back to schoooool........” Hygd wails.

Merethel glares at Hygd. She ignores him, flopping on top of Hrodwyn's head. Meanwhile, Hrodwyn responds to Steora with a simple nod and a thumbs-up. Steora gives them a little grin and a thumbs-up back with her free hand. It takes her a while still to get used to Hrodwyn, but she's warming up to the eldest now. Her thumb gently runs across Merethel's hand in a soothing gesture.

“And why not, Hygd?” she asks the youngest with a lilt of amusement and curiosity in her tone. 

Hygd giggles, then sighs dramatically. “C'mon. Who wants to go back to school? Two weeks is noooot enooooough........” Hygd straightens and points at her brother. “Also, vosha doesn't let me play Animal Jam on his laptop.”

“I—what!” Merethel gawks.

Hrodwyn sputters. In front of his girlfriend? Foul.

“I do!” Merethel reddens. “It's just that every time I let you, you always play for two hours. No less! I have homework to do, you know.”

Steora looks at him with her eyebrows knitted. She pokes his cheek gently. “Merethel, you do most of your work with me anyway. Let her play Animal Jam, will you.”

He sighs and rests his hand on the small of her back. “I guess…”

Steora smiles as she leans on Merethel's shoulder. Then to Hygd, in an attempt to soothe ruffled feathers, “Well, if you go to school, then you won't have to fight Merethel for the laptop. If you go early enough the computer lab might even still be open?”

“Yeah, exactly!” Hygd nods wildly. “That's the only thing I'm looking forward to… and seeing my other friends there too!” She gestures her hands everywhere with a smile, throwing her weight around to and fro. Hrodwyn sways wide-eyed like a skyscraper during an earthquake. Hygd doesn’t notice and continues. “What about you, Steora? Do you wanna go back to school?”

“Hmm,” she hums, still with that smile on her lips as she tucks herself perfectly into Merethel's arms. “Yep. I can't wait to go back, really.”

She looks at Merethel and thinks of coming home. “I get to see him more.”

And less of the woman who birthed me.

“And I get to see you more, and you can tell me about Animal Jam!”

She seeks shelter in the brightness of Hygd's smile and counts on it to chase away the shadows of her thoughts.

Merethel chuckles. “I think you just opened Pandora's box.”

“Yeah, you just did,” Hygd grins. “But anyway! So Animal Jam is this game…”

More people begin to fill in the park. Merriment is in the air: friends bet on New Year resolutions, families take pictures together, kids run amok and squeal with laughter, and couples lovingly hold each other. There are some people who look about Hrodwyn's age but speak in their own familiar tongues — international university students perhaps, those who did not go home to their families this winter break. A lot of them live downtown after all, just like the Canadian students from out of town. Some of them are even neighbours. Hrodwyn watches them and imagines themselves in their shoes, but only for a while.

Someone starts passing out sparklers. People clear out for the small flowers of ember sizzling and burning bright against the temperature in the negatives. Phones are pulled out to capture their temporary, iridescent bloom. When Hygd finishes her yapping, Hrodwyn puts Hygd on the ground, raises a finger, and points to the distribution of sparklers. 

“Ah… do you guys want sparklers?”

Steora looks in the direction Hrodwyn is pointing, and her eyes begin to reflect the tiny pinpricks of light dotting the place.

“May we?” she says, voice dyed with wonder as she turns her glittering eyes to Merethel.

He gazes at her with his blue eye and smiles. “Of course! Hygd? Hrodwyn?”

“YAY! Let's go!!” Hygd takes off running.

"Hygd, wait up!" Hrodwyn runs after her.

A woman hands out the sparklers. Hrodwyn collects three unlit stalks and one lit stalk from her. With the singular lit sparkler, Hrodwyn lights Hygd’s and Steora’s, and Steora turns to Merethel. He gazes at her by the light of her sparkler’s embers. They cast a soft glow on her face like tiny stars. His smile melts at his girlfriend, and he raises his unlit sparkler to her.

“A toast of stars for the new year?”

The responding giggle that carries through the little space between them is the quality of feather-down as she gently nudges their sparklers together.

“A toast of stars for the new year,” she repeats after him. “For many more of these, with you.”

His sparkler blooms into life, and his smile is made all the brighter with all the stars wrapped around them — but his eyes remain only on his one star in front of him.

“Have you thought of a New Year's wish?” he asks her.

Stars in the sky, stars in her eyes, and the only star she wants to wish on is

One that lets me stay with you and Hrodwyn and Hygd for the rest of my life
because without any of you none of it has meaning.

“Sure I have.” 

Her smile dims by a fraction and she hopes she can hide it under the glow of the sparklers, of first love.

“Maybe I wanna keep it a secret,” she says with a teasing lilt.

“Maybe it's better that way,” Merethel hums. “People say that if you say your wish out loud, it won’t come true, you know. I don't think I quite believe it myself, but... better safe than sorry, I suppose?” he chuckles as his eyes drift to the dying light.

“Mm. Then I'm not going to,” she leans on him.

Then, softly, so just the two of them can hear, “Hey, Merethel?”

“Hm? Yes, Steora?” his finger grazes her cheek, and he carefully tucks her brown hair behind her ear.

She chances a glance at Hrodwyn and Hygd, making sure they’re busy with their own sparklers, because—

—she's going to lean in, right as their sparklers burn out,

New sparks fly, ones that span infinity.

Merethel closes his eyes with the embrace. In this moment, they are untouchable like the stars in the skies, like the mist from their breaths when they part.

“I love you too, Steora,” one of the breaths whisper.

They are sixteen and there are certainly no forces beyond their control that can shatter this moment between them.

They are sixteen on New Year's Eve and there are no such things as father figures that are about to re-enter their lives after ten long years of absence or mother figures that are mothers by virtue of purely blood relation and nothing more.

They are sixteen, and in love, and in that moment even one second can stretch into infinity.

She pulls back after the quick, chaste kiss, and reaches out to put a hand on his cheek, thumb smoothing across the skin.

“Wow,” she says, “you're handsome.”

There are certainly better things that can be said here, but hey, they're teens in love.

“Not as handsome as you are beautiful,” Merethel says without missing a beat.

Teens in love indeed. What more can be said?

It's the last minute of 2016. Crowds merge. Sprinklers are raised in anticipation. Hrodwyn bends down to carry Hygd on their shoulders again, and the eldest walks towards the young couple — not to intrude on their moment, but in preparation for what will happen next. Hrodwyn’s eyes meet Merethel’s. The two share a knowing look. Concern creases Hrodwyn’s brow. They begin to take another step towards their little brother.

But Merethel looks away from Hrodwyn. So Hrodwyn lets space remain between the two of them. But they never let him out of sight, never let the clear line of distance between them fill. 

Merethel looks at Steora. He hopes the cover of night hides his face, but the uncharacteristic waver in his voice gives him away.

“Hey, Steora?”

“Mm?” she responds, acknowledging him.

“I... think I should've told you this sooner.”

Some of the crowd has started counting down the last thirty seconds. Merethel laughs nervously.

“I, ah... this is my first time seeing fireworks. Out in the open, like this.”

There is more meaning in what is left unsaid. Fear. She catches onto his hesitation and holds him closer in response.

“Are you going to be okay?” she asks, hand sliding to fit into his, a lifeline of reassurance. I'm here echoes silently in the way she presses her form against his, side-by-side.

“Um…” he leans into the comforting pressure. Reaching into his pocket, he takes out a pair of ear plugs and tries to laugh again. His voice is barely audible.

“I don't know. This is my first time doing this.”

“It's okay even if it's not.” The echo of the countdown continues behind them. “I'm here regardless, Merethel.”

A smile that she hopes can be the least bit comforting.

“TEN! NINE! EIGHT!”

Merethel presses himself closer to Steora, closer to the sanctuary of her smile.

“SEVEN! SIX!”

“I know. Thank you, Steora.”

“FIVE!”

He puts in his earplugs, pushes them in tight.

“Four,” Steora says, hand holding his tighter.

“Three…” Merethel tries to not shy away from the sky.

“Two,” Hrodwyn glances at their brother.

“ONE!!” Hygd, oblivious and above it all, looks to the sky.

Light erupts and colours burst from within. Fireworks.

“HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!”

Red, yellow, green, blue — the dreary winter sky has never been filled with so many rockets of colours. The park of people cheer, shout, and yell, embracing the dawn of a new year, of a new start. The fireworks are banging and cracking and snapping; the people are cheering and shouting and yelling and screaming. Merethel flinches, nearly doubling over to the ground. Steora feels his grip crush her hand for a second. The earplugs are helping, but they did not stand guard against the sudden implosion of sound and the brilliant flashes of light. His mouth opens. No words fall out. He tries to bring his eye to look at the sky, to see and hear the fireworks only for what they are. Frightful awe is frozen on his face.

Steora says nothing in response.

All she does is hold him — her frame belies her strength and ability to hold Merethel up despite their difference in size. She gently tries to maneuver him so that he has his back to the fireworks, away from its harsh lighting as she holds him closer to her.

His lips are dry, but he finally speaks. “Y-you don't have to do this, Steora. I'm-I'm sorry,” he gasps. “I-I don't know why... why I'm like... like this.”

She shakes her head.

“Hey,” she says loud enough to be heard over the fireworks, “why wouldn't I do this? I love you.” She says it as if he doesn't know it. “Whatever I can do for you, I will.”

A soothing hand moves up and down his back. He leans closer to his security and musters up courage to look at the sky again.

“We... we should enjoy the fireworks while we can,” Merethel trembles in Steora's embrace, but he manages a smile. “And-and it's my first time. With you.” He takes deep breaths, steadying himself. “It'll be a shame to waste it. I don't want to waste this moment.”

“Time spent with you is never time wasted.”

She looks up to the sky with him, the support on his back ever-steady.

“They're really pretty, aren't they?” she says looking at the fire flowers in the sky.

Merethel remains half-curled in a ball. He squeezes Steora's hand, bracing for cover at every muffled bang of a firework. But still, he watches the fireworks burst in the night sky — he turns to Steora and watches the fire flowers bloom through the reflection in her eyes.

“Yes,” he musters, “they're beautiful.”

She turns to look at her boyfriend in her arms, and smiles at him, mirth twinkling at the corners of her eyes.

“I guess I can't say I think you're more beautiful than the fireworks, huh.”

Merethel manages a soft laugh. He nuzzles his head against Steora's shoulder. “No, no you cannot.”

He wishes he could close his ears like how he could close his eyes. If he could only focus on the lights, if he could only focus on her, all will be beautiful. All will be right.

Merethel raises Steora's hand grasped in his. Though the movement is stiff and his hand is clammy, he manages to bring her hand to his lips once more.

“Happy New Year, Steora.”

Shaky or not, it is the one gesture that will always bring a smile to her face. Aglow with happiness and joy, she leans in to press her lips against his forehead in return.

“Happy New Year, Merethel.”

She smoothes the hair out of his forehead — careful, of course, not to disturb the part covering his eye. 

“Thanks for being the best thing that's happened to me. I still think you're prettier than the fireworks.” Cheeky grin.

“Oh, how am I supposed to top that now? That's unfair…” Merethel scoffs dramatically. Looks like he has regained some of his wits. “Now the best I can do is thank you for giving me the honour of being the best thing that's happened to you. I carry it with great pride and love.”

The brightness of her smile eclipses that of the fading fireworks, and she nuzzles into him gently.

“I carry you in my heart with great pride and love,” she says softly as she pulls him closer to her. Paying attention in English class is paying off.

“Ah! Clever now, are we?” Merethel boops her nose. “You learn fast. I'll have you know that 'it' was referring to 'honour', but I have decided your amendment is far superior.”

“I learn under the—” pauses, she's trying to remember the word, what was it, “—tute-lage? Of the best!” Mispronounced, but ah well. “I can only get better from here.”

“Tutelage? You see me as a tutor?” he laughs teasingly. “That's high praise. But yes — the only way for you is up!”

There are only a few pops and fizzles now. The smoke is already beginning to waft away with a cold draft. Merethel, hesitating for a second, removes his earplugs to pocket them. His hands move to rest at Steora's sides, and his smile grows.

“And I carry you, Steora, in my heart with great pride and love.”

She looks at the thinning crowds, dispersing after the display is over, and exhales a misty sigh.

“I think we should get going too?” she says, reluctantly.

Merethel holds Steora tighter. “...I think we should.”

He sighs, looks at his siblings, and back at Steora. "I wish you could stay with us. I certainly know Hygd and jisha-vosha wouldn't mind."

“You know I want nothing more than that.”

She slots her hand into his.

“I would, if I could.”

The smile she gives him is rueful.

“Let's?”

Her feet don't move.

Merethel doesn't respond. He keeps holding her, anchoring her as the sea of people part to walk around them. 

Why couldn't a kiss truly last infinity? Why couldn't a moment truly last forever?

It is the beacon of the eldest's voice that finds them. “We should go. It's late.” They look at Steora, solemn. “We'll walk you home.”

She averts her gaze. It is her turn to be nervous, unsure. “You guys don't have to! I can take myself home.”

An attempt at — well.
Whether it is a very good attempt or not... well.

Regardless, it flies over Hrodwyn's head. They continue in their same neutral tone. “It's dangerous. It wouldn't be responsible of me to let you walk home alone this late at night.”

“I can defend myself.”

It is not said in reticence.
It sounds more desperate than it is combative.

“I-I'm used to it.”

Hrodwyn tilts their head and looks at Merethel. He caresses Steora's hand.

“Ah... well, we don't have to walk you all the way, of course. We can drop you off where I usually would.”

“Yeah. I mean, yeah. We can do that.”

Relief tugs the corner of her lips upwards.

“Well, um. Let's go, then?”

She tries for what has to be the umpteenth time tonight.

Merethel smiles sadly but plays to her tune. He hooks his arm in hers. “Let's.”

So they go, all four of them. The pitter-patter of their steps break the night’s silence as they walk down the streets, stopping at the mouth of the one where Steora lives. She looks back at the family. With a hug and a peck on the cheek for Merethel and a wave to Hrodwyn and Hygd, her figure is swallowed by the growing distance between them as she goes down the street and disappears into the areas the lamps do not shine on.

Hrodwyn remains watching until the dark swallows her whole. They then look to their siblings. Hygd is practically asleep — her head bobbed and her eyes fluttered the whole walk through. Merethel remains staring down the street, trying to find the afterglow of his star. He feels a hand on his shoulder.

“Let's go home. It's going to get colder. I don't want us to get sick,” Hrodwyn bends down to piggyback Hygd. She hugs Hrodwyn’s back like a baby koala and immediately gives into actual sleep.

Merethel keeps looking down the street. “...Mm, yeah.”

Hrodwyn turns to leave. They look back at Merethel.

“You can ask her to come over tomorrow. When school starts, you'll be seeing her nearly every day, too.”

“...Yeah. All right. Let's go home.”

They yawn. They can feel their brain starting to slow down, but they still have work to do. Rent is due. The kitchen needs to be cleaned. There isn't much food left in the fridge. That'll call for a grocery list. They also need to schedule shifts, visits, gigs. Maybe they can clean the kitchen now. And the sink. Start the dishwasher so it's dry by morning.

Hrodwyn could sleep. Or Hrodwyn could maximise the rare days they're fully off work for the house. It’s all for their siblings. It’s so when Hrodwyn returns to work, everything will be where things need to be, and the days can pass by like clockwork.

Hrodwyn stretches, makes coffee, and gets to work.

4am

KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK

Motherfucking son of a bitch—!! Hrodwyn freezes, Swifter in hand. Who the fuck is at the door at this time?

They remain still for some time. Don't let them know you're here.

Silence falls. They don't hear movement from beyond the thin plaster walls.

Maybe it's a drunk student. I'll ignore it.

But what if it's not?

Shit, the lights are on. They know someone's here. What if I need to call the cops?

Hrodwyn glides with socked feet on freshly-mopped hardwood towards the windows. Very slowly, very carefully, they tug one of the blinds down to form a peephole.

The Swifter falls.

Hrodwyn runs to the door, unlocks it, opens it.

Their big turquoise eyes stare up at narrow azure eyes.

“Daa?”