The quiet hallways were filled with noisy chatter as students streamed out of the classrooms, eager to go home for the weekend. There weren’t many people in the small town’s elementary school, but it was a nice, quaint little building with a close-knit community. This meant that the knowledge of anything remotely interesting spread quickly like a wildfire, whether it be silly gossip, official announcements, or even what someone’s new favourite colour was. It was almost absurd.

This was how the entire school found out about Kaye’s birthday party in the span of a single afternoon. Although she had only invited the people in her grade, she found herself receiving birthday wishes from various people as she pushed through the crowd in her haste to get out. Rushing out the doors, she ran straight down the dusty roads to her best friend’s home, the old stone church. Kaye pushed against the large, heavy wooden doors, restraining herself from yelling in excitement if only for the fact that she was in a place of worship that required respect.

“Bran? Are you here?” she called. “I have to tell you this really important thing and it can’t wait! Bran? Where are you?” Kaye huffed, stamping her foot impatiently.

After contemplating her friend’s whereabouts for a few seconds, the girl made her way to his backyard. Sure enough, she found Bran sprawled out on the grass, staring at the sky.

“There you are! What are you doing?” she inquired, placing her hands on her hips.  

Bran turned his head towards her with a half-smile. “Watching the clouds. What else?”

“Well, the clouds can wait right? I have to tell you something really important!” she said eagerly.

 Bran let out a long sigh before sitting up. “Okay. What is it?”

Kaye plopped down onto the patch of grass next to him with a grin.

“Well, today’s my birthday, so I’m having a birthday party! You’ll come, right?”

“A… party?”

“Yeah! It’s going to be loads of fun! I invited my whole class so there’s going to be lots of people!”

“I don’t know…”

“Please? I know you don’t really big things that have a lot of people in them, but it would mean a lot to me if you came.”

“Okay, fine. I’ll come. But only because you asked really nicely.”

“Yes! Thank you, thank you, thank you!” Kaye exclaimed, throwing her arms around her friend.

“I’ll see you later! Don’t forget to come!” she called, dashing off to prepare.

As soon as she reached home, Kaye helped her grandparents finish setting up the decorations and food in the spacious albeit rather grassless front yard. It was all meticulously planned down to the last detail, for her grandparents were rather uptight people who despised any form of perceived chaos and disorder.  She had decided on having the party outside, making use of the residual heat from another one of the town’s stifling, dusty days. Kaye sat on the steps of her house’s old, wooden porch, eagerly anticipating her guests.

She waited for an hour. No one had shown up except for Bran, who joined her with all the patience in the world.

One hour soon turned into two hours. It was around dinnertime already, but still nobody else had arrived. The two children knew they were supposed to wait and eat with everyone else, but they couldn’t help but feel hungry, and ended up sharing a bowl of nachos in silence.

Two hours became three hours, and they were still the only people at the party. Kaye’s grandparents had already come to check on them twice, frowning when they saw how empty it was. Bran and Kaye had given in to their hunger, each taking a large portion as there was nobody else to eat the food.

“Kaye, I don’t think they’re really coming,” Bran sighed, setting his plate aside on the porch.

“No, I’m pretty sure they are. They’re just late, that’s all.”

“Look!” Bran said forcefully, throwing his arms out. “The sun’s gone down already! If they were really coming, they would have been here by now.”

“But… I invited them. They have to come. They’re my friends,” Kaye said softly.

Bran gave her a sad look as she buried her face in her hands.

“Happy birthday anyway, Kaye,” he said quietly.

“Thanks, but you can’t really say it’s happy, can you?” she muttered.  “I just don’t get it. They were all so nice and even said happy birthday to me at school. How could they just not come? I mean, I came to all of their birthday parties,” she said, her voice quivering slightly.

“I guess some people are just like that,” Bran shrugged, placing a hand on his friend’s shoulder in an awkward attempt to comfort her.

“Besides, there’s still the cake. If they don’t show up, they don’t get any of it, right? It’s their loss.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Kaye sniffled, managing a small smile.

“Come on,” Bran smiled. “Let’s go cut it. Where are the candles?”

“Uh, my grandparents said that candle wax was poisonous if it melts on food, so they didn’t let me put any on the cake.”

“Oh.”

Bran fished around in his pocket, pulling out a box of matches in triumph.

“Don’t worry, we can use these instead!” he said with a grin.

Kaye gave him a puzzled look. “Matches?”

“Yeah! We’ll just stick them in the cake and pretend they’re normal candles.”

The pair proceeded to insert eight matches into the cake’s surface, lighting each one as they went along. They sang a lone happy birthday together, their childish voices drifting off into night as they celebrated what was left of a once hopeful, cheerful event. Kaye never did know for sure why nobody came that day, although when she was older and more mature, she realised that it might have been due to her being “strange” in their eyes. She was never able to fully grasp this concept either, but she had known one thing at that time.

Her friend gave her matches.

This meant he cared enough to come and stay until the end.

She wasn’t alone after all. 

In fact, she never was in the first place.