Under Pressure

Part 16

It was 3 in the morning and his phone was ringing.

Jeremy almost slept through it, confused and groggy, but it was loud and annoying enough that he flung out an arm and grabbed it off the nightstand.

It was Christine.

"Hello?" If she was calling this late, it had to be important...

"Happy birthday!" Christine was yelling and he could hear music in the background, almost drowning out her voice. He winced and held the phone away from his ear.

"Um. Oh... Oh, right. Thanks." He tried to hide the sleep from his voice but probably did a terrible job. There was a pause on the other end.

"Oh. Oh my God, Jeremy, I'm so sorry. I forgot you're three hours ahead!"

Jeremy laughed a little. "It's fine, don't worry about it." He closed his eyes. She must be at a party or something, based on all the noise going on.

"Okay. I'm gonna go now, sorry! Go back to sleep."

"Thanks, Christine."

She hung up and Jeremy groaned, dropping the phone somewhere on the bed. He'd had worse awakenings. It was kind of hilarious honestly, cute even, though he was too sleepy to laugh about it now. He rolled over into Squip, who dropped an arm around him.

"Excited, isn't she?" Squip murmured in his ear. Jeremy sighed a little.

"Don't talk. Sleeping."

Squip nuzzled gently into his hair. "Whatever you say, birthday boy."

Jeremy would've smacked him if he hadn't been too tired to move.

As far as birthdays went, the day overall had been nice. It was a milestone, the big twenty-one, a true mark of adulthood, if only because he could drink alcohol now... Legally, anyway. Jeremy felt like they needed to celebrate, make a big deal of it like a normal college kid and throw a wild party, some kind of testament to the fact he'd actually survived long enough to make it to this point. In high school, twenty-one seemed like an impossible accomplishment, so far off into the future that it wasn't even worth thinking about. He'd been too busy trying to survive day-to-day, trying not to make an irreparable fool of himself, trying not to get shoved into a locker, wishing Christine would look at him and notice he existed...

It was surreal how much had changed in four years. He hadn't envisioned a future for himself at all, he wasn't just surviving. You could almost say he was thriving.

Wild.

Big parties weren't exactly something he enjoyed--who would he invite, a bunch of strangers?--so that was off the table, but they couldn't waste the night in the apartment. Michael took the decision out of his hands for him over breakfast.

"So I know it's not exactly your scene, but there's this pub on campus, right? DJ Fuzzbear is playing tonight, and they have arcade games. And since it's your birthday and everything, I'm willing to chauffer your wasted ass back home after." Michael grinned at him, raising his eyebrows in that goofy way that forced Jeremy to smile even in the worst of moods, and he couldn't say no. It was better than his original plan for the night, which was basically nothing. Since childhood he'd been terrible at figuring out what to do for his birthday; it was almost tradition to let Michael figure it out at this point. "I'll even let Silas in my car."

"How thoughtful. Thank you, Michael." Squip's voice dripped with sarcasm as he flipped another chocolate chip pancake onto Jeremy's plate. Michael leaned back in his chair, propping his Limited Edition Crash Bandicoot sock-clad feet up on the table. It earned him a disapproving stare from Squip, but they didn't say anything. It was a losing battle.