The Canary And The Blue Bird.

Chapter 5. Outed.

Halloween night, 1988.

The one night a year you could dress up as your favourite comic book character and go trick or treating with your friends around the neighbourhood. This year, it landed on a Friday, which meant staying up until three in the morning and not getting home until sunrise. Usually, Dani and I would stay home and hand out candy to the kids in the neighbourhood who came trick or treating, but this year it was different. I was invited to a party. A Halloween party. My first real party. I'll admit, I was really nervous.

I decided not to wear a costume. Instead, I wore a pair of jeans and a plain black T-shirt, along with the rugby team's varsity jacket. It was a black jacket with orange sleeves and white accents. My last name was stitched in white on the front right side, big letter 'T' was stitched on the right, and a tiger head was stitched on the back of the jacket.

Since we wore a uniform to school, none of the students really got to see each other in casual clothing.

"Are you ready, Jamie?" asked Dani.

She was wearing a black sweater she knitted, and a long purple skirt with small black flowers scattered along the fabric. She loved fashion from the 70s, so whenever she could, she would buy anything from thrift stores that had that type of clothing. Her shoulder length layered hair framed her face with loose curls. She wore a small purple scarf around her neck and put on some makeup.

"Almost," I said, shaking my inhaler to use it. "Did you dress up all pretty for Felix?" I teased.

"What?! Of–of course not." She blushed. "That's absurd."

I knew it was true, since her face was bright red.

"Alright, whatever you say."

"Felix will be here in a few minutes so be ready by then, okay?" she said, fixing her hair.

"Yeah, I'll be ready. What about Roshan, is she ready?"

"I am ready," she said in french, walking towards us, "is this okay? I haven't been to many parties so I'm not sure if this is suitable for one.."

She was wearing a long brown dress with a thin black turtleneck underneath and a pair of matching leggings.

"You look great Roshan." I replied, in french.

"I think Felix and his mom are here to pick us up guys" Dani said, walking to the door to put on her shoes.

Outside the door, a dark red ford escort was waiting for us. Inside, was a woman in the driver's seat wearing a bright coloured shawl. Her hair was thick and extremely curly and her skin looked like milk chocolate. Felix was in the passenger's seat. His hair was tied up halfway and wore five black earrings; three on the left, two on the right. He wore black loose ripped jeans and a loose muted green wide neck sweater and a white sleeveless undershirt.

"Hop in kids! Wouldn't want to get to the party too late would we?" his mother said, "I'm Funanaya, Felix's mother, but you can call me Aunty Funa, alright?"

"These are some of my friends. This is Jamie, that's Roshan, and you've already met Dani" Felix introduced.

"It's nice to meet you all. You look like a lovely bunch."

"It's nice to meet you too." We said, simultaneously.

Once we all got in the car, Aunty Funa drove us over to Ethan's house. Her car smelled like fresh strawberries and vanilla, and the radio was playing light jazz.

Soon enough, we reached Ethan's house. It was a big house on top of a small hill. There was a long driveway that brought you to the house that was secluded by some trees. There were kids coming from all directions to his house. Some came from the left, others from the right, and some from the forest at the back of his house.