“Happy birthday to yooou – and you, and you; happy birthday to
yooou – all three of yooouuuu; happy BIRTHday, dear
Malleri-Teri-and-Alexaaaa! Happy birthday to yooou – and you, and
yoooou!”
Alexa Reid smothers a grin by passing a hand over her mouth.
Seventeen years in and Dad still can't carry a tune, she
smirks to herself. One glance at the twitching corners of her
sisters' lips, and she knows they are all sharing the exact same
thought.
As triplets, the Reid sisters have often shared similar ideas and
emotions, but while they've always been very close – closer than
most siblings – the three girls are quite different in looks and
personality. Having raised them alone after their mother died during
childbirth, their father, Peter, has always been very adamant about
fostering each of his daughters' individuality, even to the point of
having them attend different schools much of the time. He can be
strict, Alexa knows, and he has some very specific rules that are not
up for discussion, but he loves them each with everything he has, and
does whatever is necessary to keep his family feeling close, safe and
happy.
Now, celebrating their 17th birthday, all three girls are
looking forward – with varied emotions – to embarking on their
final year of high school in just under a week. Their father seems
less enthusiastic, but he always seems to get nervous around the
beginning of a new school year. Alexa assumes that it had something
to do with him being a teacher himself. A professor, she
corrects herself, he's a professor now. Dr. Peter Reid took
on a long term contract with a local city college in Toronto about a
year and a half ago which, for the girls, means that they can attend
the same schools this year as they had last year – a rare
occurrence in their academic careers that adds even more fuel to
their excitement for the upcoming school year.
For Alexa, another year in a public high school means even more,
however. It means she'll finally be able to spend more time with her
boyfriend, Marc. Her very secret boyfriend, Marc. No one in
her family even suspects that he exists, despite the fact that it
about killed her to go without seeing him all summer long. Finally,
though, the time when she and Marc can be together again is drawing
very near, and Alexa can feel her excitement growing with each
passing day. Not for the first time, Alexa wishes that she could
have spent her birthday alone with Marc, but knowing how her father
would react if he knew she was in a serious relationship quickly
dispels any notion Alexa has of ever mentioning Marc's name in mixed
company. Still, a girl can dream.
I'm sure he'll text me at some point today, anyway, she smiles
to herself.
“Come on, ladies,” Dad cries with the same level of enthusiasm
he'd used when singing 'Happy Birthday', “blow out your candles,
already! You know the drill! Let's go! Mallie, you're up first
this year.”
“Please don't call me that,” Malleri sighs in phony irritation.
“And are we seriously still doing this?”
“Yeah,” Teri chimes in, “aren't we getting a little old for
this whole candle ritual?”
“Impossible!” Dad exclaims with a grin. “Especially not when
we're so close to a balanced year! Now blow!”
“That's what he said,” Alexa mutters under her breath, smiling as
her sisters dissolve into laughter.
“Hey!” Dad snaps while failing to stifle his own chuckle. “None
of that, now! Come on, Mal, they're melting!” Malleri lets out
another heavy sigh and one of the candles puffs out.
“Ack,” she cries, dismayed. “I wasn't ready!”
“Too bad,” Dad laughs. “Lex, you're up!” Alexa chooses one
of the remaining 16 lit candles and quickly blows it out before
stepping back to let Teri have her turn. Every birthday since they'd
turned three years of age, their father had insisted that they each
take turns blowing out one candle at a time until they'd reached a
multiple of three, and then they'd blow out whichever ones were left
together. As kids, it had just been fun on its own, since the more
candles there were on the cake, the harder it became to just blow one
out. As they grew older, however, the sisters began trying to create
a pattern in the candles that they were blowing out and, if there
were two remaining, they'd tried to leave a split to divide the
candles that were left and see if they could still get them blown out
in one go, even if they all took a step back from the cake to do so.
On what Dad referred to as a “balanced” year, each girl had the
same number of candles to blow out, and they always tried to get just
theirs out in one breath, while leaving the rest still lit for the
other two. It's the little things, Alexa decides as she bends
to blow out another candle for her turn.
Once all of the candles are out, Teri goes to the kitchen to grab
plates while Dad makes a pile of melted wax out of the stubs that are
left.
“You girls were slow this year,” Dad observes. “At this rate
I'll have to just ice the cake with candle wax by the time you turn
twenty-one!”
“Ugh, we are NOT still doing this when we are twenty-one, Father!”
Malleri wrinkles her nose in disgust. “After next year, it's
done! Kind of a gay tradition, anyway.”
“Hey,” Dad frowns, “what have I said to you about using that
kind of language?”
“You said, 'don't',” Malleri concedes, “but...”
“Exactly,” Dad cuts in, satisfied.
“BUT,” Malleri continues, “when someone actually IS gay, we can
say it all we want, however we want. Take back the power of the
word, you know?”
“Oh really?” Dad has turned on his most skeptical voice
now.
“Yes,” Malleri insists. “Everyone does it! It's like how
black guys are always calling one another n-”
“Plates!” Teri pushes herself between her father and sister,
effectively cutting both off from saying anything further. “Let's
eat!”
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