so show me family
Summary: Tour is busy, and exhausting. The Kats are very tired, and no one but you is really sure what day it is. You're birthday. Coincidentally in Dani's hometown. I wonder what happens next...?
Tags: Platonic! Katseye x 7th Member! Reader, no use of y/n, anxiety, negative self talk, one (1) very very very mild sex joke, reader's parents are assholes (mentioned), forgotten birthdays, really really thoughtful gift giving, very soft kats, crying, Dani's hometown, Dani's parents appearance, surprise parties, tour
Word Count: 4096
Part of the mountain is you series
Read the requests here, here, and here!
Tour is exhausting. It’s hours upon hours in that bus, constantly shifting time zones, cameras in their faces all the time and glitter perpetually stuck in their hair. It’s exhausting but exhilarating, and Sophia especially loves to see the glow across all of your faces (what feels like) every night. The glow that’s decidedly missing from your face right now. You’re not trying to be weird, or too quite, or standoffish but you can feel this weight pressing into you, the heaviness of disappointment and the sting of self-loathing. There’s a text from Michael that you haven’t responded to yet, a couple from both Adela and Emily that you haven’t looked at yet, but none from the people whose lives you’re so intertwined with, who you care about so much. You wonder if either of your parents will text, or call, or say anything, or if they even remember their only child’s birthday. Probably not.
You’re slumped over in one of the seats, hoodie on, earbuds in, your face perfectly blank. It’s a sharp contrast to Daniela next to you, who’s so excited to be headed towards Atlanta she’s practically vibrating out of her seat. Sophia actually doesn’t know how she has all that energy because they’ve already been in the car for upwards of six hours and the leader herself is losing her mind a little bit. She goes back to analyzing your face when the feeling like she’s forgotten something hits her full force. It’s nearly noon, and they’ve stopped a couple of times so far for coffee runs and bathroom breaks and the leader digs through her purse to make sure she didn’t leave something absolutely crucial in a bathroom in North Carolina.
She has her chocolate and her mascara and an extra pair of flip-flops and is momentarily eased but she still can’t shake the nagging feeling in her head that there is something amiss. That is, until she eyes the little red box with a little gold bow tucked into the side of her bag and oh holy shit thats not today is it? All of the muscles in Sophia’s body are suddenly pulled taut and the color drains from her face as she hunts around for her phone. The sudden alarm on her face must be pretty obvious because Lara’s eyebrow furrow across from her as she asks what’s wrong. Sophia doesn’t answer, quickly searching for her little calendar app and fuck it is today, she thinks.
She turns her phone silently to Lara, whose eyes widen as she reads the bolded, underlined, and italicized red text right under today’s date. ACE BIRTHDAY. Fuck.
Both sets of eyes turn to you, oblivious in your own world, and they linger for just a minute too long and now Dani’s noticed.
“What the fuck are you looking at?” She leans over, whispering.
“Do you know what today is?” Lara whispers back, head starting to pound a little bit because how could they have fucked this up so badly? She remembers you at her own birthday, just weeks before, and her heart clenches in guilt.
“Ummmm. Thursday maybe? Friday?” Daniela replies, eyebrows rising in bewilderment.
“Okay, first of all, it’s Tuesday. Secondly, no, like the actual date-date.” Daniela shakes her head, trying to piece together just where Lara and Sophia are going with this.
“What day is Ace’s birthday?”
“Oh, November 25th.” She says, the dots still not connecting.
“Dani, what’s today’s date?” Lara pushes gently. Oh. OH. Oh my god. Now the three of them are staring at you, and you’re starting to feel three laser-sharp gazes on your body. You tug the hoodie of your hoodie off and your headphones out as you look at them cautiously.
“Why are you staring at me?” Your tone is accusatory, your mind jumping straight to glitter in your bed or a rubber band over the faucet in the bus’s little bathroom, but that’s more Yoonchae and Megan’s thing. You wonder, briefly, if maybe they did remember what today was after all, but you shove that thought down before you even give your brain a chance to get your hopes up.
Part of you is a little crushed. You didn’t want anything big or grand or overwhelming, but you would be lying if you said you weren’t hoping for just a ‘happy birthday’ and maybe a card. The other part of you knows that they are absolutely exhausted, and you shouldn’t be bothering them with something so trivial as a birthday. You’re hoping they just forgot, trying to will your brain to not go down the rabbit hole of picking apart everything you’ve done over the past several weeks, looking for ny little action that might constitute them deliberately ignoring the day.
You’ve definitely had worse birthdays, parties that were designed for your mother’s ideal version of a daughter and the actual kid she had, with bright lights and too many people. So maybe this is better. It’s quieter, at least, and the six of them have given you the best year of your whole life so maybe thats good enough. Or maybe they did decide you didn’t deserve it. Or maybe you’re getting too wrapped up in your own selfishness and they are just so tired.
You’re pulled from your thoughts as you watch the three of them very conspicuously look away, three sets of eyes darting randomly around the room. You let an amused smile play across your face, watching the playful glint in Daniela’s eye as she leans over to ruffle your hair.
“I’ve got to make a phone call.” She says and you watch her walk to the back of the bus. For a (relatively) tiny tour bus, sound does not travel all that well and you tuck yourself back into your music and your hoodie instead of trying to eavesdrop.
Lara and Sophia, on the other hand, hear every word she says. It’s all in rapid-fire Spanish so they don’t understand all of it, but they hear the words ‘sorpresa’ and ‘no grande’ and Sophia suddenly remembers that in less than three hours they will be in Daniela's hometown, with all of Dani’s favorite things, and more importantly, Dani’s mom. She hangs up the phone with a satisfied little smile on her face and unbeknownst to you the three of them start to hatch a very quiet little plan.
You shrink back into your head, and the venomous voice of your anxiety starts to chip away at you. You think about a missed count during one of the dance breaks, taking an additional water break during already stressed rehearsals. Your brain does this toxic teeter-totter between ‘are they analyzing my every move?’ and ‘do they even care?’. It’s exhausting your already fried mind and you try to block it out by turning your music up just a little louder.
They stop for gas, and while you and Lara are in the bathroom, Megan and Yoonchae get filled in on the situation. Sophia and Daniela watch as their faces change from confusion to intense guilt, and then to quiet excitement. By the time they hear your sneakers and Lara’s high heels get louder on the pavement, the plan to surround, but not overwhelm you, in gentle love and soft affection is making the six of them a little giddy.
By the time the tour bus has pulled into the hotel, Daniela is nearly pushing her away out of the bus, you in tow close behind her. You try to protest quietly, saying something about needing to bring your stuff up to your room in the hotel, but Daniela just flashes those big brown eyes at you, which, okay. Maybe your bag can sit in the bus for a while longer. You find it a little odd for a second that no one else makes any effort to try to come with you two, and odder still when her first move isn’t to bolt to the house she’s been missing so much, but Dani’s hand is in yours before you can think on it for too long and suddenly the two of you are stumbling into the backseat of taxi. You still feel heavy but Daniela’s shoulder is pressing into yours and it eases fractionally. For someone who’s been on tour for weeks and then in a bus for hours, her energy is incredible and it’s rubbing off on you enough to last for a good couple hours before you’re seriously starting to yawn.
The two of you find a little hole-in-the-wall coffee shop and she tucks the two of you into a little booth in the back. All of a sudden she looks nervous, jumpy, and your head swivels around to see if you’re being ambushed by fans or paparazzi. Finding neither, your eyes return to her, and she looks shy? You haven’t seen this look on her face since Dream and it’s actually starting to freak you out a little.
“Everything okay?” You ask quietly, your heart starting to beat a little faster. She nods, rifling through her purse, and pulling out a tiny black jewelry box and slides it across the wooden table. Your heart flutters, your stomach doing a little twist.
“That’s for you.” She says quietly, her eyes all soft and her smile still shy. “Don’t think I forgot.” The cafe lighting is dim, but she can still see the way happy tears jerk forward in your eyes. The box is heavy in your hands, the lid opening with a soft click.
Daniela watches your eyes change and your breath hitch and the scene in front of her gets a little blurry as her own eyes fill with tears.
“Do you like it?” She asks, remembering the hours she had spent with Lara and Sophia, determined to find the perfect one. The two of them had laughed at her, but now, watching your fingers gently pick up the golden chain, eyes filled with awe, all those hours become worth it.
“Dani, it's so beautiful.” The necklace feels heavy in your hands, an intricate golden sun with tiny ornate details, and it might be the most beautiful piece of jewelry you’ve ever seen. She reaches over the table and slots her thumbnail into what looks like a little seam on the edge of the sun and you realize it’s not just a necklace but a locket. The face of the sun swings open and you’re dropping it on the table in favor of bolting out up out of your seat to hug her. She giggles softly as you bury your face in her curls, her arms wrapping warm and secure around your frame.
“You can change the photos if you want to-”
“No!” You reach back across the table, clutching the chain protectively and taking a closer look at the faces shining back at you. Their photos you know well, and you feel like crying all over when the full effort she put into not just the locket itself but the significance of the images. There's a sixteen year old you, and nineteen year old her with your cheeks smushed together beaming at the camera. It was the first non-company picture you ever took together, a selfie from a week into Dream Academy taken on her phone. The other picture is much more recent, taken over the summer. It's a blurry candid of you and her dancing in Lara’s backyard, at one of her parents dinners, fairy lights and vibrant textiles making your eyes bright. You click the locket shut and just hold it in your hand for a second, feeling the weight of something new, something lighter. Something warm.
“You didn’t forget? I didn’t like, piss you off or something?” You ask quietly, and she presses a kiss to your forehead.
“I could never forget. I’m sorry, lovey, that I didn’t say anything sooner.” She whispers into your hair, realizing that she had let you spend hours falling into your head, guilt panging in her heart. “You didn’t do anything wrong, my love.” You reach out for her, squeezing one of her hands, your little signal that you’re getting stuck in the anxiety jungle of your brain. “Look me in my eyes. I’m not lying. Te amo mucho, mi hermanita.” Her voice sounds sincere and you lean into touch, trying to let yourself believe her. She clasps the shiny, golden sun around your neck and you let the weight of it tether you to the ground, and the reality she desperately wants you to believe.
Her phone buzzes, and you look over to see who it is before she grabs it, hiding in a way she’s never down before. You cock an eyebrow at her, playfully skeptical.
“Jonah.” She says, and yeah, maybe there’s things on her phone you never want to see. You let it go, tossing the plastic coffee cups into the trash can as her fingers fly across the screen. “My mom wants us to have dinner at our house. That’s okay, right?” Your heart speeds up for a second, palms sweating. “Hey, whoa. It’s just my mom. Just Auntie Ana.” You nod, and she smiles again, but this time its that giddy little grin she gets when Manon says something diabolical in Spanish and your suddenly not sure whats going on. You wonder, briefly, if she knows its your birthday, but your thoughts start to spiral again and your fingers come up to feel all the little grooves of the locket.
“Okay, perfect. We should probably head over there now-ish because of the traffic.” You hold her hand as the two of you make your way back onto the Atlanta sun, and she pulls you back into another cab as you slowly, painfully, make your way through the Atlanta traffic. It’s somehow worse than LA, and by the time you actually make it out of the heart of the city and into the suburbs, the sun is well on its way to setting. The yellows, reds, and purples of the Georgia sunset make Daniela’s childhood home feel even more cozy, and you can tell just how excited she is to be back.
Or maybe she’s just been anticipating the sight that awaits you for hours, the sight you weren’t expecting at all. The front door opens into a small hallway, where you almost instinctively toe your shoes off, but instead follow Daniela inside to the living room. There are some little streamers hung up on the walls, a couple of balloons carefully positioned around the room, and a little vase of your favorite flowers on the coffee table, along with a pile of neatly wrapped presents. There isn’t a camera in sight. Your heart swells so much it might burst. The whole thing is wrapped up in tender care, and it's so obvious that they’ve put so much effort into showing just how loved you are without making you too nervous or overwhelmed. You're met with big smiles and warm hugs and quiet “Happy Birthday!”s. Daniela’s mom peeks her head in from the kitchen, a much louder “Feliz Cumpleanos!” ringing through the air and the little bubble of careful softness is filled with the quiet happy chatter. It makes you want to cry a little because a parent cares about the fact that it's your birthday and yeah, maybe she’s not your mom, but she’s a mom and really anything counts at this point.
“Does your mom need any help?” You ask Daniela and Lara reaches up from her spot on the couch to pull you by your belt loops into her lap.
“Hey!” You sputter as Megan and Manon giggle so loudly they almost tip over the armchair. “It’s your birthday. Let us take care of you, yeah?” Lara’s voice is calm and soothing in your ear and for the first time since she’s known you, you lean against her without protest, quietly accepting her love. Daniela’s dad settles himself into the living room, and the walls shake with laughter as your told story after story of Daniela’s childhood, each one more embarrassing than the last for her, more entertaining for the rest of you. By the time Ana has dinner on the table, all of your faces are flushed with laughter. Dinner isn’t a show, it’s chaotic like pretty much everything Katseye does together is, but it's not performative, its just quiet acknowledgement and as your eyes sweep the table, you’re reminded of just how drastically different your life has become. You think about the scared teenager filming your first audition, sure it was just an unrealistic dream that would never mean anything. Little did you know, it would mean everything.
It would mean the difference between doing what you love and being stuck in that town, having someone to call in the middle of the night and knowing your parents wouldn’t answer. Having people, real people, who cared enough about your anxiety to do anything to make it a little better instead of all the “friends” who had looked at you in judgement. Silverware clinks on plates around the table, cups are picked up to be set down again to be picked up again, and its over before you want it to be. There’s a little cake with pink frosting and little strawberries and a quiet song and photos that will end up on private Instagrams and held in camera rolls because this little moment is just yours.
Daniela’s parents leave the table and you and Sophia and probably Lara itch to jump up and help her. Daniela’s hand on yours keep you rooted firmly in the wooden chair and you start to speak before Sophia can even move.
“Thank you.” You’re greeted with a round of smiles, soft and kind, but not fully understanding the weight of your words. “For, like, everything.”
“Oh, Ace-” You cut Lara off, because if you let her speak now you will lose the battle to your own tears and you really, really have something to say.
“You guys have given me such a beautiful life, and you care about me in a way that no one has before and I’m just so grateful. I promise I’m trying to like, believe it when you say that you’ll always be there for me and I don’t know what I would do without you.” Tears reflect back at you across the table and Megan’s hand slots into yours on top of the wood.
“We don’t know what we would do without you! Of course we’re not going anywhere and we will always, always, be here to say it.” Sophia says, voice choked with emotion.
“Of course, babes. We love you.” The actual words come from Manon, but the sentiment is murmured around the table and you all know that she or any of them could make a (very much earned) jab at your parents and things that never should have happened but now is not the time for that heavy, heavy conversation. Now is the time for celebrations and cake and oh!
“We have presents!” Yoonchae’s face twists into one of excitement as she jumps up from her seat, followed quickly by Lara. Megan guides you up, and giggles as Manon nearly trips over her own chair. You’re guided back into the living room and pressed down into the middle of the couch.
Lara stands first, because she’s Lara and thrusts a square box with pink paper into your hands. You take the tape off carefully, revealing a pair of very sturdy, very expensive noise canceling baby blue headphones. You open your mouth, but she jumps in first.
“I don’t want to hear a word about the price. Do you like it?” She says simply and you just nod, trying to swallow the suspiciously teary lump in your throat.
“Thank you.” You whisper, trying to fight the tears in your eyes again.
“Oh and these, these are from my mom.” The other box is smaller and square and you realize that she must’ve put some serious thought into this weeks ago if Kavita herself got to have a hand in the gift giving. The smaller box opens to reveal a pair of shiny golden bangles with little star charms and you have to blink really hard for a couple of seconds to properly push away the tears.
Manon gives you a heavier box with a set of matching tea mugs that you had stared at for too long in London, Yoonchae’s silver wrapping paper unveils a little SONY digital camera, a set of tiny little stickers, and a pink Tamagotchi. There’s a LEGO flower set from Megan, and a little bag with “just the essentials” from her mom. You lose the battle to your tears when you realize its filled with little star fidgets and a dinosaur squishy and a bunch of little magnetic rings and a keychain that just says ‘breathe’ and maybe this is what your own mother should have done at the beginning.
Sophia’s gift is last and you’re not entirely sure why you even bothered to wipe your tears when you flip through the little photo album that must have taken her a good couple hours. There’s photos from all the way back in your trainee days, and some that she must’ve gotten from Michael and tucked into some of the clear plastic slots are little letters that you know will make you cry even harder.
When all the wrapping paper has found its way onto the floor and there are grateful tears pressing into your eyes, Ana comes back holding a small, nondescript black box.
“I’m sorry it’s not more properly wrapped.” She apologizes and you smile up at her as best you can without tears because they put effort into giving you a gift and just the thought that they care is so overwhelming your heart might burst. She nods at you to open it, and you pull the lip off to reveal a key? It’s functional, not decorative, plain and silver and you look up at her, confused, but touched nonetheless.
“It’s a key.” She says, helpfully. “It’s a key to our house. For when you need a home.” They watch your hands freeze, your jaw drop, and for one horrifying second Daniela thinks they might have stepped too far.
“Really?” Your eyes are already red, cheeks shining with freshly fallen happy tears, and Daniela’s plucking the box from your hands and guiding you up to your feet by your elbow and Daniela must have learned to hug from her mama because her embrace is so warm and kind and safe and you let yourself have the tiniest, tiniest of happy sobs.
“Yes, really! You belong here.” She pulls back, gesturing around the room, saying something about everyone, but all you hear is that one word in your head. Belong, belong, belong. I belong here.
“Thank you so much. Uh, gracias.” You whisper, and you must have gotten something right because her face beams with what you think is pride. Everyone else also seems to be touched by the gesture and you’re very glad you’re not the only one with tears on your face. Daniela pulls you down to essentially sit in her lap, tucking some of your hair out of the way so she can whisper in your ear.
“I’m going to spend the night here tonight. Do you want to stay here with me? No pressure. Sophia brought your bag.” You do want that, more than you’re willing to let on, the idea of spending a night in a home home, the home that Daniela grew up in, after weeks of tour is absolutely delightful, but you don’t want to cause anyone problems and Daniela sees it play out all over your face. She presses the cool silver key into your hands wordlessly and you grip it tightly, running your fingers over the little grooves.
Her eyes shine when you nod, and the rest of the girls quietly put the room back together. You stand to help them and six stern, but loving eyes press you right back into the soft cushions of the couch. You part with tearful, grateful hugs and forehead kisses and then it's just you and Daniela and her parents in the house that she grew up in and you now have a key to. Like so many nights of your life, you fall asleep with tears on your face, but this time they’re happy, grateful tears as you’re surrounded by warmth.
a/n: highkey not sure where this fits in the timeline yet, so its going in the one shot category for now
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