PRANKS and KISSES | 1 ✔️

Chapter 14: Songs and Magic

"Take me to your heart
Show me where to start
Let me play the part of your first love
All the stars are right
Every wish is ours tonight, my love..."

-Got to believe in magic

***

"I accidentally dropped one plate of brownies."

We were all seated on a large picnic blanket, enjoying our lunch, when Hunter dropped the bad news. We all looked up to see him holding only a single plate of brownies, and a somber expression on his face.

Natalie baked the brownies yesterday and brought it here today for our dessert and there were supposed to be two platters of them.

"What happened?" Heather asked, shooting Hunter a suspicious look.

I had a feeling that this wasn't the first time Hunter dropped something accidentally during their trips.

Hunter looked at Heather with rounded eyes, sort of like the look a toddler would give his mom if she found out he set the house on fire.

"It slipped." He said morosely.

He put the remaining plate of brownies in the middle of the picnic blanket and sat down next to me. When he glanced up, he had this insanely dazzling smile plastered on his lips that officially made getting mad at him impossible... Well, at least on my part. The others still looked like they wanted to gut him alive.

"Buddies, don't be sad. There are still enough brownies for the ten of us." He told us in a cheerful voice.

Only Hunter had the ability to delude himself that the glares the others were sending him were looks of sadness and not of murder. I really admired the obliviousness of this guy.

Parker's eyes narrowed to a slit.
"I didn't hear a crash." He said.

"And I also don't see any crumbs on the grass." observed Rush, cracking his knuckles threateningly.

"You have brownie crumbs on your shirt, man." Shawn pointed out; totally unaware that he just incriminated his boy-crush.

Hunter's eyes dropped to his shirt and I swore I heard him mutter a silent curse. He immediately brushed off the crumbs, an act so obvious he might as well just confessed his crime.

"Those aren't brownie crumbs." He denied despite the glaring evidence. "Those are... Uhm... Grasshopper poop."

"Eew." Roe groaned, looking disgusted.

"I don't see many grasshoppers here." Pen retorted dryly.

"I let them escape after we're done playing. I love animals, like, so much." Hunter answered casually.

"Grasshoppers don't play with people!"

"Yes they do! They just won't play with you because you're a cruel person. The animals are afraid of you." Hunter insisted.

I shook my head incredulously. Even a five year old kid wouldn't believe that explanation, much less these three murderously chocolate-starved men.

"I will only ask once." said Cal in a dangerous, calm voice. "What did you do to our brownies?"

Hunter raised both of his hands, palms up.

"Don't be mad, okay?" He said which wasn't really that effective because it just made the boys looked even more livid. "It's just that when the plate slipped my hand..."

I had a really bad feeling about this. Rush, Parker and Cal stood from their seat and slowly advanced towards Hunter like a pack of wolves ready to sink their teeth to their victim... Only Hunter wasn't exactly the victim type.