The bracelets we end up buying are simple. A black string with a tiny rhinestone hanging from it, red for Cheeto, blue for Jesse, purple for me. Cheeto is smiling brightly as ze pays for zir own and immediately puts it on. Everyone can tell the matching bracelets were zir idea.

"See? I told you, this store is the best!" Ze says as we leave and Jesse nods in agreement.

"No one was disagreeing when you first said it, Cheeto." I grin.

"Yeah, because neither of you have ever been here!" Cheeto turns around to Jesse and me, who are a bit slower than zir, walking backwards for a few steps. "It's acceptable for Jesse because she just moved here a couple of weeks ago, but you, my guy. You've been living here since you were adopted. Hello??"

"I'm sorry, I can't know every cool thing around here!" I defend myself with my hands up, the purple gem dangling from my left wrist.

"No. No, you can't." Cheeto responds before slowing zir walking pace to what ze would call "a hetero level" to be able to walk next to Jesse and me. Ze opens zir belt bag to take a sticker that says "FCK NZS" from it, one I've seen many times before.

"Ohh, can I have one, too?" I ask. "Please?"

Cheeto nods. "Which one?"

"BLM maybe?"

Cheeto hands me a "Black Lives Matter" sticker before looking at Jesse. "You want one as well?"

Jesse asks something to which Cheeto just responds by casually putting zir own sticker on a streetlamp while walking by. She smiles and nods.

"Cool. Which one do you want?" Cheeto shows her the well-sorted collection of leftist and human rights stickers in zir belt bag.

Jesse ends up deciding on a rainbow-colored one that says "LOVE IS LOVE, GET OVER IT" in big letters on it. Bonus points for her.

"Oh. Wait." Cheeto says before giving it to her. "Uh, just so you know, this is technically not legal, it falls under property damage. I mean, no one really cares and 'property damage' doesn't make sense since you can remove it, but I just wanted to let you know what you're doing."

Jesse raises her eyebrows, but then shrugs and takes the sticker, thanking Cheeto, who exchanges a meaningful look with me, asking with zir eyes: Has she always been like this or are we radicalizing her right now?

I shrug with a smile.

"Oh, for fuck's sake, are you kidding me?" Cheeto stops at an electricity box and I immediately notice what caught zir attention. A huge sticker of a confederate flag.

"Ew." I mutter.

"My thoughts exactly. Do any of you want to... fix this mess? Or should I?"

"Well, one sticker is certainly not enough to cover the whole thing, so..."

Jesse cuts me off by stepping forward and putting her sticker over a part of it, not completely straight so there's enough room for another one, and just stepping to the side.

"Fixed that, I guess." I grin and place my sticker next to hers so that flag is entirely covered. "Okay, maybe we should get going, we've been standing around here very obviously for long enough."

"There's literally nobody here." Cheeto waves around with zir left hand to demonstrate just how empty the street was. "But yeah, we might wanna stop standing around."

So we do. As we start walking, Jesse asks something in sign language.

"Ohh. She asked about our rings." Cheeto translates to me.

I laugh. "Funny story, actually. So, we're engaged..."

"Oh, yeah, totally. He's the love of my life." Cheeto adds and puts an arm around me.

Jesse raises her eyebrows with a smirk and all three of us start laughing.

"No. Uhm..." Cheeto chuckles. "No, it's kind of a coincidence that they're matching. See, Lewis has that black ring on his right middle finger that's some kind of recognition thing in the asexual community, and I have the aromantic ring. Left hand, middle finger, white. Or green, but I'm not the biggest fan of green rings. Do you know what aromantic means?"

Jesse hesitates before responding with an unsure look on her face.

"Couldn't have said it better."

"What did she say?" I ask.

"Like asexual, but with romantic attraction."

"Sounds about right."

~

As Cheeto and I are walking back home – our houses are in about the same direction, so we often end up walking together – there's a comfortable silence. Until Cheeto taps my shoulder and points towards someone nearby.

"Hey, isn't that Jesse's dad?"

I look at the person. "Wait, no, you're right. I mean, they look like him, at least."

Cheeto and I look at each other for a second or two before I finally say it. "Wanna go talk to him?"

Cheeto shrugs. "I kind of want to, but what are we gonna say? 'Hey there, sir, you never met us, but we saw you on our friend's lock screen and just wanted to say hi'?"

"Yes."

Cheeto raises zir eyebrows. "Okay then. You go, social genius."

"Wait, what? Why me?"

"You're the extrovert. And you are convinced that what you just planned to say is the right thing. So..."

"Oh, for fuck's sake." I roll my eyes with a smile and turn to walk over to the man. For a moment, I can't find him, but then I do. Guess I forgot that walking people will probably continue doing so while you're having a conversation. I jog a little to catch up with him, Cheeto is right behind me, failing at holding back zir laughter.

"Uh, hey, excuse me?" I ask as I approach the man – Brandon, if I remember it correctly.

He turns around with a slightly confused smile.

"Are you, by any chance, the father of Jesse Michaels?"

He furrows his brows. "Yes, that's me... Why? What about her? Did anything happen?" His expression changes at the last sentence, the eyes widening just a little.

"Wh- Oh, no no no, don't worry!" I shake my head. "She's fine, at least she was the last time I checked, which is like ten minutes ago. We just wanted to say hello, I guess."

"Yeah, we're her friends." Cheeto adds. "Sorry to tell you, but your daughter's hanging out with the disappointment kids."

"Oh, yeah, she told me about you!" Brandon smiles with relief. "Cheeto and Lewis, right?"

I nod. "I'm Lewis, ze's Cheeto." I explain.

"Well, it's great to meet you! I'm just in town to get her a birthday gift, so..."

"Wait, hold on." Cheeto interrupts him. "It's her birthday soon?"

"Yeah, how did we not know that?" I join.

Brandon shrugs. "Well, she doesn't talk about herself much anyways."

"We never asked!" I facepalm. "Oh, god, I feel like a terrible friend right now."

"You're not the only one." Cheeto pats my back. "So, uh, when exactly is her birthday?"

Brandon laughs. "On the twentieth of October."

"On the twentieth- Fuck. We have nothing prepared!"

Cheeto nods. "I'll throw myself off a cliff. Just kidding, of course!" Ze adds as ze sees Brandon's expression. "There are no cliffs nearby." Ze pauses for a second. "I mean, we kind of do have something prepared."

"Wait, what do you mean?" I ask, turning away from Brandon, who's just standing there with an amused smile on his lips.

"The... You know."

"No, I don't- Oh. Wait, do you mean what I think you mean?"

"Probably."

"But I'm not sure if that's like, ready..."

Cheeto chuckles. "If you wanna wait for it to be perfected, you have to wait for a bit longer."

"May I ask what you're talking ab-"

"No." Cheeto and I interrupt Brandon.

"Yeah, sorry, we don't wanna spoil the surprise." Cheeto says.

"Yeah," I agree. "And if, hypothetically, there was a hidden camera here somewhere and our life was like, a movie or something, we wouldn't wanna spoil it to the viewers either."

"Wait, what makes you think that?" Cheeto grins.

"I don't know, just... What if?"

"Thanks, I'll always feel watched from now on."

"You're welcome."

"Where is this conversation going?" Brandon asks.

I shrug. "We can go way more off topic, to be honest. Anyways, back to Jesse's birthday, I kind of have an idea. But only if both of you are okay with it..."

A/N: yeahhhh i'm still alive lmao

fun fact i wrote about one third of this the day after the last chapter was published but then i got several writer's blocks and now this chapter is a little very chaotic but so are the characters so ya know