Mad as a Hatter, Thin as a Dime

“Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday dear Ryan,
Happy birthday to you!”

Ryan laughed as he blew out the twenty candles on a poorly decorated buttermilk cake. As a birthday treat, seeing as there was no show that night or the next, the bands got the luxury of staying in hotel rooms for a night. There were three hotel suites, each with two rooms, booked for the ten of them, and the sleeping arrangements had been left unarranged as they all filed into one of the suites to have a not-so-impromptu party to celebrate Ryan’s birthday. Brendon and Spencer were putting party blowers to use very obnoxiously, and Jake, Benji, Mitch and Jon were all caught up in a party poppers fight. Kyra and Vesper began to regret their decision to quickly stop off at the party store and stock up on traditional party needs. Streamers were now covering the floor of the hotel suite, but it was fun and no one particularly cared about the mess.

“Thanks guys,” the skinny boy grinned as they all sat around eating cake.

They all muttered variations of ‘no problem’ through mouthfuls, and needless to say the cake disappeared pretty quickly. After that it was time for Ryan’s presents. The Panic! guys all gave their friend several gifts, most of them relating back to some private joke or another. Benji and Mitch had gone to the two dollar shop and pretty much wiped the shelves clean, buying anything that they could pass off as thoughtful. Though Ryan could see right through their last-minute preparation, he still laughed and felt thankful for their kindness to get him a gift at all. Jake had apologized admitted that he’d completely forgotten, but Ryan appreciated the honesty. Even Chris, who still hadn’t particularly warmed to any of the Panic! guys except Spencer, had loosened up enough to get him some new guitar strings.

The gifts he received from Kyra and Vesper, however, were completely unexpected and amazing. He felt guilty just accepting them. The book from Vesper was nice enough (he didn’t even know there was a new Palahniuk book out!), but when Ryan unwrapped the most marvelous, expensive model of a camera he’d ever seen his heart almost burst. It was from both the girls, but it still would have cost them a lot of money. Considering the fact that Vesper didn’t have that kind of money, he assumed Kyra had paid for most of it. The gesture was appreciated, but he didn’t feel like he deserved for her to spend so much money on him. Not when he couldn’t even muster up the guts to tell her how he felt.

“Holy shit… T-thank you,” he stammered. “I just… wow.”

Kyra let out a beautiful laugh and color slowly crept into his cheeks.

“Happy birthday, Ryan,” she smiled at him as his heart stopped.

“T-thanks. Thank you so much.”

There was a brief second of awkwardness as Kyra moved over to hug him, and he hugged her back with a hammering heart pumping against his ribcage. He hugged her back tightly and exhaled a breath of hot air. He ignored Brendon’s wolf-whistling and glanced at Vesper over Kyra’s shoulder. She grinned at him and he grinned back.

‘Thank you’, he mouthed at her.

She nodded an acceptance and gave him thumbs up as he and Kyra separated. At the unmistakable sound of her voice, Ryan’s attention returned to the beautiful red-head in front of him. He did a double-take at her words and gulped loudly.

“S-sorry?” he stuttered, wishing he could slap his nervous self senseless.

“Uh, I was wondering if you wanted to go outside with me for a bit?”

For the first time since he’d me her, Kyra almost seemed shy. The way she glanced up at him through her long eyelashes, she reminded him briefly of her sister.

“Um, yeah. Sure. Great.”

He couldn’t quite prevent the ecstatic grin from taking over his lips, and Kyra grinned back with her lips in the quirky smirk that defined her. Very hesitantly, yet still in a moment of daring, Ryan took her hand in his and they began to make their way towards the door.

“Oi! Where are you two going?” Chris yelled over the noise, his glare beginning to work itself back in place.

Kyra rolled her eyes as she looked back at him.

“We’re just going up to the roof. Don’t worry, I don’t think he plans on throwing me off the building, but thanks for the concern, father.”

“That’s not what I’m worried he’ll do to you…” Chris grumbled.

Kyra either didn’t hear or just ignored him completely. She and Ryan began to make their way out the door as Chris stood up from his chair. Vesper quickly put her hand on Chris’ tense arm.

“Relax,” she told him. “He would never do anything to hurt her.”

“Not on purpose, anyway…” Chris began to argue.

“Look at him,” Vesper laughed, although Chris couldn’t exactly do that because the couple in question had already disappeared out the door several seconds before. “He couldn’t hurt a fly, even if he was the sort to harbor negative intentions.”

After a bit more coaxing, Chris was settled and sitting back in an armchair, laughing at something Benji had said. Vesper, after exchanging a few casual words with Spencer, found herself making her way into one of the bedrooms and collapsing on the bed. After taking a few seconds to get over the minor headache that the alcohol she had consumed had assisted in, the annoying ringing in her ears was gone and a smile spread over her face at how happy her best friend must be right now. The fact that she had helped in making this so struck a chord of good and self-accomplishment in her, and unintentionally she began to drift into unconsciousness.

***

Vesper awoke to a light rapping on the other side of the door. She rubbed her eyes wearily, probably smudging whatever eye make-up she had left, and blearily glanced over at the digital alarm lock on the bedside table. It read 11:49 pm.

“Ves?” a whisper floated from beyond the door. “Can I come in?”

Vesper shook her head and slowly picked herself up off the bed, stumbling on her way over to open the door. Ryan stood, looking tired and slightly disheveled but beaming brightly with shining eyes.

“Hey,” she smiled sleepily, moving to the side to allow him to walk in.

She shut the door behind him and flopped back down on the comfortable plush hotel bed as he fidgeted, trying to decide whether or not to take a seat beside her. A few moments later, he did.

“Sorry,” he whispered. “Did I wake you?”

“Uh… yeah,” she muttered with a small laugh. “But it’s okay. I can’t believe I fell asleep anyway.”

He just smiled at her, but it was painstakingly obvious to her that he wanted to spill his guts out. He could be such a girl sometimes. She rolled her eyes and couldn’t restrain her grin.

“So… what did you and Kyra get up to?”

“Well nothing inappropriate that would get my head chopped off by Chris,” he began at a rapid pace. “But we’ve been up on the roof since we left earlier, which means we were alone for three hours! It’s the most romantic place, I swear, and the view of the city lights was ‘mesmerizing’, as she put it. I have to show you that view some time. Anyway, so we were just talking, for the most of it. There were some old chairs up there that we sat on, and we just talked and laughed, and I swear she was flirting with me just a little bit, but maybe I’m getting ahead of myself… And then at one point, we were talking about what terrible dancers we are and so then we decided to be terrible dancers together and we tried to dance without music and we had a moment, but…”

Vesper smiled as her friend retold the exciting events of his birthday, simply glowing. Kyra had achieved exactly what Vesper had been hoping; she’d made Ryan feel like the most special person on the earth. The way he spoke with such admiration warmed her heart, and she couldn’t wait to get the story from Kyra’s point of view to see if she could make something out of it.

“That’s so wonderful, Ry,” she said honestly once he’d finished every miniscule detail he could remember and deem newsworthy. “I’m glad you had such a great day.”

“And thank you,” he continued, engulfing her in a bear hug. “You’ve been the perfect cherry on top of my fantastic day. I can’t remember how I ever lived without you. I don’t know if I could, now.”

“Oh, I’m sure you’d manage. And I don’t know why you’re thanking me; I should be the one thanking you.”

“And why is that?” he asked, brown eyes now curious.

She took a deep breath, and her expression became just a little more solemn.

“You’ve changed my life around,” she confessed. “Before I had you, the only friend I had was Kyra. She was the only person who ever really cared about me, and she had to because she was my sister, even if we are friends on top of that. But you… you had no obligation to befriend me, but you did anyway. There are no blood ties or anything keeping you here, but you’re not leaving. You’ve made me less shy, less self-conscious, less sad. You’ve made me more of a person, and I can never thank anyone enough for bringing you into my life.”

She finished her quiet monologue looking down at the cream and navy blue bedspread, leaving Ryan stunned and speechless for a few moments. Slowly, he reached out and tipped her chin upwards with his fingertips, guiding her eyes to meet his.

“That can’t be true. What about all the guys out there? Benji, Jake, Mitch… Chris, even?”

“Oh, well I guess we’re kind of friends, but it’s more like acquaintances. They’re Kyra’s friends, and they’re all in love or lust with her to some degree. I’m more like a ghost in the background. I’m invisible. No one has ever really noticed me… except you. And I’ll never forget that.”

Their eyes remained connected for long moments afterwards before Ryan pulled Vesper into a strong, meaningful hug. His arms locked around her waist and hers joined around his neck in a special embrace, and together they fell back onto the mattress and into a deep, secure sleep.