My Only Exception (gxg)

Part 17

Both mine and Poppy's birthdays were coming up. Poppy's 24th birthday was on March 20th, and my 23rd birthday was on April 8th.

"I'm a Pisces and you're an Aries," Poppy said to me one night, "I'll have to look up and see if they're compatible."

"I know nothing about astrology, so I'll take your word for it when you tell me," I said back to Poppy.

I wanted to do something for Poppy's birthday. She told me that she didn't really care about her birthday, and she liked keeping things low key.

I still wanted the day to be special for her.

Normally, I would have asked Emily for help on this. She's great with gift giving and showing people she cares.

But I was on my own with this one.

I decided that I would at the very least bring Poppy her favorite food, Vietnamese.

However, I was unsure about a gift.

She's not my girlfriend. How much should I even get her?

An idea came to me.

Whenever Poppy and I spent time together, we went to each other's houses, or we were at work together. And at work we didn't interact much, much to my dismay.

I decided to look and see what concerts were coming to either Philadelphia or New Jersey. When I landed on a concert for The Weeknd in Philly, I knew that Poppy would love to go, she was a big fan of The Weeknd.

I looked at tickets for the concert in May, and they were...expensive. I could only afford seats pretty high up in the stadium, I only make $17/hour plus tips as a barista. Thankfully I don't have student loans or rent, but I pay for car insurance and my phone.

Fuck it. Poppy will enjoy this.

I took my credit card out of my wallet, and paid for two tickets for The Weeknd concert.

Poppy and I were both scheduled to work on her birthday, which was a Thursday.

Layla was kind enough to bring in cupcakes for Poppy from a local gourmet bakery.

"Wait, Poppy. Today is your birthday?" Laura, who was working with us, asked, "Why are you working today?"

Poppy shrugged, "I don't make a big thing out of my birthday."

"Happy birthday, Poppy," I said to her, and when no one was looking, she winked at me.

Little did everyone know, later on I was going to bring Poppy dinner at her apartment, and spend the night with her.

I couldn't help but notice that Poppy seemed a bit melancholy all day. She was smiling at work, but I could see it in her eyes that something was up.

I'll ask her about it tonight.

On my way home from work, Emily called me.

"Can we have a girl's night this weekend?" she asked, "I need a girl's night with you."

"Of course," I said to Emily, "I'd love that."

Too bad I can't tell you about a huge part of my life now.

"What are you up to tonight?" she asked me, "I'm exhausted from work."

"So am I, I'll probably just go home and chill with Penelope," I lied.

"That sounds nice. I miss you Delilah, I know we haven't seen each other as much since I started dating Evan."

"I don't hold it against you. I'm happy for you, Em."