Archive of Our Own ^beta

       Amanda never really did anything for New Year’s Eve. How could she? She sat at home and watched TV, counting down the seconds on the clock on the wall, and texted Todd “Happy New Year!” when it turned midnight. Last year, she got the fun addition of watching the fireworks in SMS when she sent the message. It was something.

      Only Todd was gone and now her tradition was busted. Not like she minded, fuck Todd, and it was a lame tradition, and now she had the Rowdies. Who, much like herself, never really did anything for New Year's Eve. They never had a reason to. She didn’t think she wanted to do anything; they talked about it, but then came to the conclusion that they didn’t really care. It was only a day after all, and they had never done anything before, why should they start now?

       Clubbing and partying wasn’t really for them, getting drunk and/or high together on their own wasn’t really anything special, and she really didn’t know what else there was to do on New Year’s Eve. That’s what it was, right? Getting wasted and counting down, watching a stupid ball drop on the other side of the country, and waiting three hours until they followed on the West Coast while talking about resolutions that would never be followed. See? Stupid. Why should it fucking matter? 

       Only, it did matter, and Amanda did care. She cared a lot more than she let on and she didn’t even realize it. Because now, attacks, while unpleasant, weren’t much of a threat. Now, she didn’t have to be afraid. Now, she could do something. But what?

        The idea came in the morning as they sat at the breakfast table in their little abandoned warehouse-turned-home. It sprung to her mind as watched Martin light a cigarette. She stared at the flame as he brought it to his mouth, the flame catching the end of where it was set between his teeth. She watched it flicker.

        “What if we did a bonfire tonight for New Year's Eve?” She said when he pulled his hand away, eyes fixated on the burning end that glowed as he took a drag. “Like. A real, proper bonfire?”

        Vogel stopped shoveling Lucky Charms into his mouth and dropped his spoon. “Really?”

       “Yeah, really!” Amanda grinned as her attention was pulled to him. 

       Cross rapidly hit the table with his palms in excitement. “Aw! Yes!”

        “Sounds like a great idea.” Martin’s arm around Amanda’s shoulders tightened and he kissed the top of her head.

        “So what, we go and get some old furniture from the junkyard and bring it to a field?” 

       Cross erupted into frustrated disapproval, Gripps shook his head slowly, and Vogel shook his much more rapidly, making similar protests to Cross. Beast was in its own world, spinning around in circles in the corner but came running over when it heard the commotion. 

       “What are ya, crazy, boss?” Vogel said, pulling at his hair.  

       She furrowed her brows and cracked a nervous smile. “What? Is that not what you do? Like, Meet Me in St. Louis or something?”

        “No!” Gripps interjected. “No. No. No. No—”

        “Fireeee,” rasped Beast with a wild grin. Amanda had no idea when it latched onto the topic of the conversation.

        “We can’t just get some junk in St. Louis and burn it,” said Cross.

        “Yeah! We can’t just burn it! ” Vogel said, paused, and then asked, “Where even is St. Louis?”

        “I don’t know any Louis’ses—” Gripps muttered. “—ses…sesses…”

        “I think it’s far,” Cross said.

        “Oh, then we definitely can’t do that,” laughed Gripps.

        “No fire?” Beast pouted with a depressed chirp.

        “It’s an old movie,” Amanda explained. “My mom loved it. Got Judy Garland. The kids make a fire on Halloween and they burn junk. It was small but the idea’s the same. I thought that’s how people made big bonfires.”

       “NO!” the Rowdies erupted in another chorus.

        Martin whistled and they quieted down again. He looked over to Amanda. “What they mean to say is that that’s not how we do things. Not good for the environment.”

       “It’s the fumes!” Vogel said, crossing his eyes. 

       “Melting paint and shit,” Gripps said disdainfully. “Couch foam and plastics and shit. Fabric blends and shit.”

       “Pollution is shit,” added Cross, like it was a million-dollar idea.

       “YEAH!” Vogel said, beating the air with his fist.

       “Huh. Didn’t think of that,” said Amanda. “Thought it would be like recycling but that makes sense.”

       “Any fire, especially a big one, is gonna emit a lot of carbon,” Martin explained further as he lazily swirled his cigarette. “But burning anything but untreated wood is never a good idea. Burning stuff is punk, poisoning the air is not—ain’t that right, boys?”

       Yet another chorus erupted, this time one of unanimous approval. 

       “So.” Amanda looked back at Martin when he spoke. “Bonfire sound good?”

       Amanda smirked with a glint of excitement in her eyes. “Sounds pretty great to me.” She turned her attention to the group, fully aware of the answer when she asked, “How’s that sound, boys?”

       “Fire! Fire! Fire!” Beast chanted, bouncing in its seat. 

       “WOO!” Gripps shouted at the ceiling

       “Let’s. Fuckin’. GOOOO!” Vogel grabbed Cross and shook him.

       Cross shook out his tongue.

       “You’ve done this before,” Amanda asked Martin, more as a statement than anything as she watched them run out of the van out back of a Home Depot. 

       She and Martin strutted in with their bats resting over their shoulders, emerging amongst the chaos whilst the Home Depot workers scattered like rats, chased by the boys screaming in their faces. 

      “Oh yeah.” He nodded. “They don’t need the pallets anyway. Give them away for free. But we get to have a bit of fun and burn some of the energy they got pent up.”

      The boys began beating in shipping trucks, the deep clangs of denting metal mixed with the heavy music emerging from the van, their laughs and battle cries, and the yelling of the workers.  

       Amanda and Martin dropped their bats and went for the pallets. “No, I meant like, the bonfire deal. You know where to get shit that’s good to burn. You were really great at figuring out what we could use in the junkyard.”

      They picked up either end and started carrying it back to the van.

      “Loads of times. We just don’t do it often. It’s more of a treat than anything—Boys!” He whistled.

       The commotion screeched to a halt.

       “C’mon. It’s in and out and the next one.”

       They immediately scrambled to the pile of pallets and began carrying them back to the van. 

       What Amanda didn’t account for was the fact that everything was last minute. They spent the whole day in the van, having left a little after noon, driving around to various locals to find things the boys knew would be suitable to burn.

       The sky shifted from light blue to a gradient of orange gold as they dropped the first batch of supplies at their field. There were only so many they could carry on the roof and in the back. They could only fit three after everything they got in the junkyard.

       “We’re not gonna get it set up before dark, are we?” Amanda said as Cross split a pallet in two with an axe.

       “Nah. It’ll be fine though.”

       It changed to dusty pink as the sun disappeared when they left the field again, then coral and cobalt as they terrorized the next Home Depot, able to fill much more space, then from violet to sapphire after dumping and splitting the pallets, and finally it was dark, and they still weren’t done.

       As each color shifted, Amanda’s stomach got deeper and deeper, her thoughts flew higher and higher. Everything began to shake when stagnant. Her shoulders and neck began to ache as she carried each heavy thing. 

       “You good, boss?” asked Gripps as she groaned deeply, helping him unload the back of the van on one of the rounds. 

       “What? Yeah, I’m fine.”

       “You’ve been all spacey mind astronaut,” added Vogel.

       “They’ve got a point,” said Martin, his hand appearing on her shoulder. “Your energy is off.” 

       She hated lying to him. Well, she couldn’t lie to any of them. They always knew.

       “Just getting tired.” That wouldn’t stop her. Sometimes she still felt like her autonomy was on the line.

       “You’re burning out.” He rubbed his thumb into the base of her neck. Her eyes fluttered shut and she leaned into the touch, the comforting ache of a massage. Somehow he always instinctively knew where the knots were; she thinks it’s a holistic thing.

       “I’m fine,” she said with another groan. “Seriously. I want to keep going.” 

       Amanda opened her eyes to see them all gazing at her, obviously questioning her. But by now, they knew it was best to let her do what she wanted, only intervening when she was about to seriously hurt herself.

       And she felt bad when the night began to blacken and they were still arranging the wood to be as sturdy as possible, and she was losing energy, fast. 

      Her heart was probably going too fast, everything was deeper and darker, and she felt shaky—or maybe that was the biting cold. The chill sent needles up her spine, her legs sinking into the Earth with the ache of a full day on her feet. Not literally, not an attack, but god that’s what it felt like. 

       And she watched the boys give various glances to each other, sending messages of concern for her and she wished they would stop fucking worrying about her. She was ruining their fun. 

       It was around 10:00 and they were just getting the fire lit, and she was shaking, grimacing at the way her shoulders were seizing, her arms were throbbing, and her feet were melting, and oh.

       The heat from the glowing flames sent her flesh boiling, sinking as liquid legs lowered her into the ground. She stared, a scream caught in her throat. My fault, my fault, my fault—

       She didn’t know when Martin had pulled her back into him. She thinks it was when she was about to faceplant. 

       “I gotcha, sweetheart.” 

       Cold air, hot fire, hot legs, hot tears.

       The rowdies came into view, glowing blue as peace washed over her and her legs grew back. She closed her eyes as the pain dissolved, sinking into Martin’s arms, his voice soft and deep, lulling her back into reality. 

       “I’m sorry,” was the first thing she said when she came back, her voice meek and shaky. 

      Gripps left where he was standing around her, presumably to get her juice. He always brought her juice after an attack. 

       “Don’t apologize, drummer,” Cross said, dropping to a squat beside her and Martin. Vogel and Beast followed. Beast started to pet her hair and Amanda couldn’t help but smile.

       “Yeah!” Vogel agreed, nodding rapidly.

       “But—”

       “Cross is right,” said Martin, gathering Amanda closer to him. She curled up in his arms.

       “I should have stopped before.” She sniffed. “You were right.”

       “Bullshit,” came Gripps’ voice. She looked up to see him extending the box of apple juice, straw already in it. She mumbled a thanks and took it.

       “We gotta trust you know what’s best for your body,” said Martin. “Sometimes you ignore it, but if we stop you too early, then you feel like shit. Like we took somethin’ away from you. And we can’t always catch you before you fall a hundred percent of the time, but we can catch you when you do.” 

       She cracked a brief smile. “You know me so well, it’s really unfair.”

       He kissed her forehead, not pulling away and instead speaking against her skin. “It’s my job.”

       Her breath caught. It always did when he did things like that. It was really unfair. 

       “You’re done for the night, you hear?”

       “It’s just…”

       “Just what?” asked Vogel, tilting his head. 

       “I had a plan. Nothing went to it. I just wish I had the idea sooner, because I was banking on being able to pick up a bunch of shit and just burn it and I was wrong, and it was all so last minute and—”

       “Shh-sh-sh.” Martin said. “None of that.”

       “He’s right,” said Gripps. “We can have fun anyway. We did it. Look at that thing!” He extended an arm to the fire behind him. “It’s beautiful!”

       “We’ve got two hours to midnight, a fire, good music, and we can still have fun. Even if you need to sit out,” added Cross. 

       “Sound good?” asked Martin. 

       “Yeah.” Amanda cracked a soft smile. “Sounds really good.” 

       He wrapped his arms under her legs and arms, picking her up bridal style to carry to the camping bench they set up beside the fire. 

       “I was looking forward to dancing,” she sighed as Martin set her down.

       “Don’t worry, Drummer!” said Vogel, scurrying over to their CD player. “We can put on a show for you!” 

       She laughed and pinched her brows. “Oh god, you’re all horrible,” she teased.

       “We know,” said Cross. “That’s the fun of it!”

       “You’re absolutely right.” She grinned. 

       Despite the persistent dull ache in her body, it was perfect. The pain was unavoidable some days but she at least had them to comfort her through it.

       She couldn’t help but laugh as she watched them; they all laughed, hopping and skipping, flailing their arms about and howling, spinning in aimless circles as Martin ran his fingers through her hair while she curled into his side. She loved them all in ways she never knew were possible.

       And Martin… Martin made her complete in a way she never thought she would have. 

       It started to snow with an hour left. The boys gained newfound energy, chasing snowflakes with their tongues out, rambling about what they would do if it stuck. Eventually, Martin’s jacket ended up on top of hers as the temperatures continued to drop, the time counting down closer to midnight along with it, more and more snow accumulating, speckling the ground with white. The boys began to buzz about, waiting, whining, waiting some more, complaining about ‘why can’t the year just hurry up?’

       Ten…

       The boys jumped around when they realized what time it was.

       Nine…

       Dancing and swaying in place, little jives, disco points, and air guitars—they were happy. This was fun. So much for not giving a damn about the holiday.

       Eight…

       Maybe New Year’s could mean something to them. Maybe it didn’t have to be boring. 

       Seven…

       She finally had a reason to celebrate. The events of the past few years alone were reason to celebrate enough.

       Six…

       The ups and downs, the chaos and near-death experiences, everything.

       Five…

       It all brought her here. This is where she was meant to be. 

       Four…

       Here. With a family that loved her and treated her well. They actually cared. Beast, Cross, Gripps, Vogel, Martin.

       Three…

       Amanda and Martin turned toward each other, smirking.

       Two…

       They started leaning in, eyes drifting shut.

       One.

       Their mouths collided and he gathered her closer. She smiled into the kiss as he pulled her into his lap, only to stand up, carrying her with. She yelped in surprise but held on tight, kissing him with as much energy as he showed in the display of strength that never failed to turn her brain off.

       Vogel shouted, “EW!” as the kiss deepened.

       Amanda lifted an arm away from Martin and extended it out behind her, middle finger skywards.

       Laughter erupted behind them and they both smiled into the kiss once more. Martin spun her around and she couldn't help but break it with a noise of surprise breaking out into a laugh.

       She pulled back to look at him. “Happy New Year, baby.”

       He smiled up at her sweetly. “Happy New Year, Drummer Girl.”