Two years in a row now, someone I loved died on my birthday

[controlledvariable]

Who: Steph and friends!
What: A birthday party
Where: A restaurant in... let's go with Howl Barrow? It's not really important.
When: Sukkadi night
Notes: HI. If we haven't pre-discussed this and you're unsure whether your character would be invited, hit me up and I will tell you. On the off-chance your character would like to bring a friend/SO, we can work something out. But yes, come here, tag around and feel free to talk to everyone. Have fun or Steph will make sad faces. P.S. She's wearing this because I wanted an excuse to use it.
Warnings: None for now

Birthdays are weird. They've never been a big deal for Steph. Her parents never cared, she rarely had friends close enough to make a big deal out of it, and she didn't even tell Tim for a long time (she's pretty sure he actually found out by snooping). Last year it was a quiet affair, just dinner with her mom and a few small gifts. Things had been too awkward with Tim to do anything together, and Cass was - busy with something that Steph can't remember now. Baedal makes it even weirder, for starters she'd forgotten it was her birthday for a good two weeks and then she hadn't been sure exactly how to go about recognizing it, considering the fact it wasn't the actual date of her birthday here. On the other hand, she feels like she has more friends here than she has back home, so she takes Angela's suggestion about a party to heart.

After much deliberation, Steph decides to rent out part of a restaurant for her partying needs. Babs had offered her house, but Steph feels like the population of Baedal, her included, has imposed on Babs enough already. So a restaurant it is - one that Angela helped her choose, pay for and organize, which Steph is extremely grateful for. As a result of Angela's help, said restaurant ends up being a little eclectic, hole-in-the-wall place with a restaurant/bar downstairs and the private room upstairs, serving platters of food that Steph isn't entirely sure she recognizes. There's odd pieces of art on the walls, the chairs, small sofas and tables don't actually seem to match each other, but the whole thing seems to fit a general theme and Steph likes it, so that's good enough for her. She'd entrusted music to the venue, not really having the resources at the moment to put music onto one of those fancy crystals; it's been good so far though, a little on the instrumental side, but Steph doesn't mind that. There's a small bar up here, too, with Steph choosing the package that gets them free beer and house wines - if anyone wants anything stronger or fancier than that, it's up to them to pay (Steph isn't made of money, alright).

She's kind of nervous about it, this is the first party she's ever thrown for herself and she just wants everyone to have a nice time. When she'd invited everyone - either by private CiD message or in person - she'd told them that presents weren't necessary, that it was just a small get together to help her celebrate the technical passing of a year. She really just wants everyone to have a good time.

Comments

[boomvox]

At some point, after inflicting the birthday girl with her gift, snagging another cocktail, and mingling a bit, Jae spots his sort-of-contemporary and slinks over, creeping in (obviously, the creeping is merely for show) for a side-hug.

"Hey, you." It's been a while, and it's been - well. An interesting while, for both of them.

[rhinemaid]

Side-hugs from Jae are inarguably some of Ilde's favourite hugs, and she leans into the side of him with faint relief - there is one Nice Person that she understands, and that would be Jae - that is partly to see him again and partly...to see him again, safe and whole as far as she can tell. (Checking him for missing body parts does actually cross her mind. Just in case.)

“Hey. You still look as if you've been dipped in lime sherbert.” But she likes lime sherbert, so it's fine.

[boomvox]

He leaves his arm around her, and slim as he is it's not much of a burden, despite his height. "I learned how to do a party trick with it," he tells her. ... Because he did. Jae might - well, does - look a little more compact lately, in a way that's beyond more peoples notice, but Ilde might very well catch it. Magically, he's starting to shore up a bit.

[rhinemaid]

It's a subtle difference in the way she's accustomed to him feeling and she decides, after only a moment of consideration, that she likes it. (Because everything in the world needs to be arranged into categories of things Ilde likes and things Ilde doesn't like. That's just the way things are.)

“What sort of party trick? Are you going to show me?”

[boomvox]

Jae blinks a few times, fixing his gaze at Ilde, as if clearing his head or concentrating - he scrunches up his nose and then-

His hair turns pink. He leaves it like that for a moment, shaking his head a bit as if to confirm the glamour is sticking correctly, then runs one hand over his hair and it turns back into its now-default lime sherbert flavor (shush).