concept writing based on early versions of one of my books (not on Wattpad)

~*~

My eyes flutter open. That sounds pretty, but I promise it isn't. My first thought of the day: "holy shit, it's bright." My face and sheets are soaked in drool and my breath smells like a trash can full of chicken juice. I turn over from my stomach to my side so I'm not lying in the little saliva pond, wipe my mouth with the back of my hand, and pick up my phone to check the time. It's 10:47 in the morning on Monday, April thirteenth, 2020. The sourness of the not-so-early morning goes away when I remember what today is: my fourteenth birthday.

It's kinda bittersweet. Don't get me wrong, I love my birthday, always, no matter what. The presents, the food, the party. That last one's the bitter part, because with all this corona stuff going on, I can't have a party. Charlie promised she'd come over and talk to me through the glass front door, I'm sure at least Sage and Jane will send me happy birthday messages, and I've always got my mom and dad. Still, it's not a lot compared to the big birthday sleepovers I usually have. I don't know if I'll get to do my usual birthday feast either since the stores have turned into war zones.

I sigh, roll out of bed, and go get ready in the bathroom. When I come back, I open up my closet and my dresser and stare at my clothes, imagining countless outfits and regretting not picking one out last night. I could wear a dress, be all fancy and whatnot. I dig through my flannels until I finally see my dress, my one and only dress that I have solely in case someone dies or gets married. It's pretty, but having all those soft, comfy flannels in front of it sure doesn't do it any favors. I settle on my favorite flannel, a classic red and black plaid with short cuffed sleeves, along with some sweatpants and a pair of fuzzy grey socks. It's my birthday and I have no school or social life, giving me free rein to look however I want-not that that's a big change from a regular day with school and socializing-so I wear a dazzling set of golden hoop earrings that especially offset the sweatpants.

I go downstairs to find my parents waiting for me. "Hey, sleeping beauty!" Dad calls. Mom turns around and waves at me with a smile. "Happy birthday!"

"Thank you," I say, and survey the room. Mom's at the stove, Dad's wandering between the toaster and the fridge. "Oh man, what all you got cookin' up in here?"

"Scrambled eggs and waffles," Mom reports.

"And milk!" Dad chimes in, proud of whatever he can accomplish in the kitchen.

"And milk," I echo with a laugh. I grab the syrup and spread butter and take it to the table while Dad brings in three fancy wine glasses full of milk and a fork and butter knife for each of us. On the end of the table opposite from where we eat, there are two gift bags with tissue paper poking out from the tops, beckoning me to open them. Before I can give them much more thought, Mom brings in the plates. All my worry about the traditional Yero birthday feast goes out the window as I bite into the buttery, syrup-covered, chocolate-freaking-chip waffles and the perfectly cooked, moist scrambled eggs. And yes, the milk is great too.

After breakfast comes the presents. Well, the cards, then the presents. I may be a selfish brat, but I still have some class. Mom's card is her usual, sentimental and motherly. Dad's is also the usual, short and funny. I congratulate him on fitting in not one but two dad jokes this time. Mom got me a T-shirt that has Stitch wearing one of the American army outfits from Hamilton on it with the lyrics "immigrants, we get the job done" around him. Dad bought me a year-long subscription to Duolingo Plus. Both are freaking amazing and I have to hold myself back from screeching like the Mesozoic reptile I am, and afterwards I give my parents massive hugs.

The day is full of Disney movies, all my choice. I start us off with Coco, which I've watched so many times that I can and do talk and sing along with it now. Seriously, I know, like, all of it. I might have a problem. Next comes Princess and the Frog, which always makes me hungry. I mean, between the sugary, honey-drizzled beignets and the gumbo, who in their right mind wouldn't want to eat? Halfway through that, around 1:30, the doorbell rings. Dad peaks out the front window and says it's Charlie. I go and open the thick wooden door that's behind the thin glass one. Charlie's standing outside with a little rectangular present in her hands. She's in a hoodie and sweatpants even though it's supposed to be hot and humid out there, but I can't blame her since that's what basically the entire world is wearing right now.

"Happy birthday, Maya!" she greets happily.

"Hi, thank you!"

"How are you? Getting bored yet?"

"No, not yet." I lower my voice and look dramatically into the distance. "But it's coming." Charlie giggles, I smile, and I ask in my normal voice, "You?"

"A little. I miss all my friends and my church."

"Oh, right, you couldn't go yesterday." Charlie shakes her head sadly. Yesterday was Easter, which she was really looking forward to because it was going to be her first Easter at her new church. I remember her telling me a few weeks ago about the big Easter egg hunt they hold each year for the little kids. She was supposed to be hiding the eggs, but she not-so-jokingly joked about wishing she could hunt them.

"Yeah, it's okay though," she sighs. "My mom got us some chocolate bunnies to share, so it's not terrible."

"Nice, nice." We don't have much to talk about. We text almost every day and we've met at each other's doors a few times, so the little we have left going on in our lives has already been covered.

"What presents did you get?" she asks after we're quiet for a moment.

"A Hamilton shirt and a subscription for my Spanish lessons. I'll show you the shirt later, it's getting washed right now."

"Oh, cool! I can't wait to see it! That reminds me, you're free all day today, right?

"Um, I think my grandparents are stopping by later tonight, but other than that, yeah. Why?"

"Okay, good. No reason." From the smile on her face that she's very forcefully trying to hold back, it's pretty obvious that there is a reason.

"Aww, come on, you gotta tell me."

"Nope, sorry, I'm sworn to secrecy."

"By who?"

"Matthias." She claps her hand over her mouth and groans. "I told him I can't keep secrets."

"You really can't."

"I really can't! Ugh, I guess I better go before I spoil the whole surprise."

"Surprise?"

"Oh my gosh! Okay, yeah, I'm going!" She sits the present down on the porch and starts walking back to her house. "Goodbye, Maya!"

"Bye, Charlie!"

I wait until she's a good bit away, then I unlock and open the glass door, get the present, and lock both the doors back up.

"Oh, what'd you get?" Mom asks.

I take the present over to the table and start unwrapping. Again, my primal lizard brain really wants to screech right now. It's the Dear Evan Hansen novel. At this rate, I'm gonna have enough musical merchandise to open my own store by next Christmas. Not that I'd ever give away my babies.

The rest of the day is still Disney movies. When the Hamil-Stitch shirt is dry, I take it straight out of the dryer and put it on. It's hot and I'm already kinda warm in here, but other than that it fits really well and feels great. I go back downstairs and sit back down on the couch, then my phone lights up. Since I've already gotten birthday messages from Charlie, Sage, Jane, and my grandparents, I'm imaging this is probably some distant aunt whose name and relation I don't know and who hasn't seen me since I was three days old. But, to my surprise, it's actually Matthias. Are you available for the next hour or so?

Yeah

Five or six minutes go by, then he sends me a jumble of numbers and a link. I've been to enough online classes in the last two weeks to recognize this is a link to join a Zoom meeting. "No way," I mutter.

"What?" Dad asks.

"Matthias just invited me to a Zoom meeting."

"You think your friends are throwing you a party?" Mom asks.

I shrug. "Don't know. Guess I'll go see."

They wave and I head upstairs to my room. I tap the link, type in the numbers for the password, test the audio, and next thing you know, I hear "Happy birthday, Maya!" I look at the participants. Charlie, Matthias, Sage, Jane, Blake, and Kevin are all here.

"Oh my god, you guys! Thank you so much!"

"Thank Matthias," Jane says. "He's the one who, um, I don't even know. Made this?" She's sharing one screen with Blake, and from the background it looks like they're sitting in their kitchen. Blake's eating cereal, even though it's, like, 4:30.

"Oh, it was easy. Lots of things are easy when you lie about your age." He smirks while the rest of us laugh. He always does these really cool things, like set up an entire Zoom meeting or teach himself how to, you know, math, then says it was the easiest thing in the world. "Charlie's the one who came up with the idea," he tells us.

"Yeah, but Blake's the one who told me we could even do this," Charlie explains.

"Alright, alright!" Sage says. "You're all the nicest little dorks in the world, we get it."

Everyone laughs, and I thank them over and over. After a minute, I notice the only one who hasn't spoken yet is Kevin. "Kev! Where you at, man?" I look at his screen. It's just various shades of black and brown with a blurry face mixed in somewhere. "Uh, where are you?"

"Bed," he answers.

"It's almost five o'clock," Matthias states, dumbfounded.

"I didn't say I was asleep."

"You didn't say you were awake either," I quip, and everyone laughs.

Light floods Kevin's screen, and it's now clear that he was under his covers. He props the camera up against what I'm guessing is the covers he just tossed off of himself and squints at us while fixing his hair. "Hey, don't judge me, Blake's eating cereal."

"This is true," Blake mumbles, their mouth full.

"What cereal you eatin'?" I ask.

Blake looks down at their bowl and chuckles. "Hell, I- I don't even know."

Jane sighs. If she wasn't so damn nice, I have no doubt she would've killed Blake by now. It might still happen.

"Maya," Charlie calls, pulling the group's attention away from Blake and Kevin and their inability to function as normal human beings. "Did you open my present yet?"

"I did. It is awesome, thank you!"

I readjust my position and sit up just enough that my shirt comes on screen, making Charlie gasp. "Is that your new shirt?"

"Oh, yeah, you guys like it?" I pull at it and put the whole thing in the camera's view. Everyone oohs and ahhs, even though I'm pretty sure none of them can see it clearly and only half of them actually get it.

We stay on the call together for almost an hour, joking about nothing, ranting about school, saying whatever unholy madness comes to mind. At some point, everyone's phones and laptops start needing a charge, so we say a hundred goodbyes and leave one by one. Eventually, it's just me, Kevin, and Sage. I've got host privileges now that Matthias is gone so I'm messing with settings, Sage is out in their backyard, which I always think looks like some kinda fairy oasis, and Kevin is eating a chocolate Easter bunny. Kevin squints at the screen again and goes "Oh my god."

"What?" Sage and I ask.

"Delilah just text me and asked if any of us want to hang out. Girl, I wanna not get corona!"

"You know what, hell, let 'er get it," I groan. She's asked all of us to hang out at least once since we got out of school. Kevin actually did take a walk with her or something that the first week, but other than that we've all either ignored her, let her down gently, or had to remind her there is a freaking pandemic outside. Even Sage, who almost always keeps quiet about Delilah, is shaking their head.

"Mm-mm-mmm," Kevin hums. "I'ma head out, see if I can screw Delilah's head back on. Bye, y'all."

"Bye, Kev."

"Bye, Kevin."

Sage sighs and says they're leaving too, we say goodbye and both leave. I'm sitting up on my bed, so I flop back and smile. They put together a whole Zoom meeting for my birthday. I look up at the picture of all of us hanging above my bed. Matthias is in the center with his arms crossed and a smile on his face. Sage is behind him, one hand on his shoulder and another hand holding up a peace sign. Kevin's next to Sage, also holding up a peace sign, and he's wearing sunglasses even though you can clearly see that it's cloudy. Delilah is next to Kevin, but a little more spaced out than everyone else. On Sage's other side is Charlie, who's making a heart shape with her hands. The picture was taken almost a year ago, months before Charlie transitioned, so you can barely even recognize her. I'm behind her, resting my hands and chin on the top of her head. Blake is T-posing next to me. Jane's next to them, laughing awkwardly.

"I can't wait to see you guys."