Bad Reputation | S.M.

Chapter 87

February 11, 2019

"Happy birthday dear Nicole, happy birthday to you!" Everyone sang as I sat in front of a slice of cake, my friends gathered around me. I blew out the candle as everyone began to clap and cheer, causing people in the nightclub to look over at us.

I laughed and Tanya came up to me, giggling and placing a kiss on my cheek. I could smell the vodka tonic coming from her, knowing she was long gone by now.

Adrian came up to me with his girlfriend, Anna, both of them hugging me.

"Guys!" Tanya slurred and clinked on her drink with a fork. "I want to say a speech, to my best friend in the whole wide world, today she is 21, I love her to death and she deserves the whole world!" She smiled. "To Nicole!"

"To Nicole!" Everyone said in unison and drank their drinks as I sipped on my coke. I ate some of my cake as the others went out to dance on the dance floor. Tanya was dancing with Jason, sloppily, but I still consider it dancing. I laughed and I felt someone sit next to me, looking over to see Adrian smiling.

"How's the birthday girl?" He asked and I smiled before responding.

"Good, just taking everything in." I shrugged. "You know my birthday isn't until tomorrow right?"

"Yeah I know buzzkill." We giggled. "You okay?" He furrowed his eyebrows and nudged me.

"Yeah, just feeling a little out of loop right now." I sighed, thinking in the past and wishing to be there instead of here.

"For what reason?" He chuckled and I sighed, staring at him.

"None at all, never mind, let's go dance!" I changed the subject and dragged him on the dance floor where he met with Anna and I danced with Tanya who was nearly about to hit the floor as Jason watched her proudly.

By midnight everyone was sloppy drunk, except for me, some friends from AA, and Adrian surprisingly.

I felt bad, knowing that I may be feeding into their addiction, but Tanya did surprise me and she wanted me to be surrounded by friends.

"Hey Nicole." Callie came up to me with the rest of the AA group.

"Hey, sorry, I didn't mean to leave you guys out." I scooted over so they could sit down, but she shook her head.

"Oh no worries, we understand, but we're going to head out, early morning tomorrow at work."

"Oh yeah of course." I smiled and stood up. "I'll see you guys at the meeting."

"Always." Asher responded and I hugged everyone goodbye as they said 'Happy Birthday'.

Everyone else was still dancing and I took a break, sitting down at the bar and ordering an iced tea, probably annoying the bartender that I am not buying any alcohol.

"Can I buy you a drink?" I heard a grotesque voice next to me and I turned to see a middle aged man with gray hair and a mustache, a creepy look on his face.

"Flattered, but no thank you." I simply smiled, grabbing my iced tea and walking away. As I began to walk away I felt someone grope my ass, making me jump. I rolled my eyes, turning around to face the man and throwing the iced tea in his face.

"Have a nice night douche." I said and walked to the dance floor where Adrian and Anna were laughing at what happened. The man simply walked out angrily, making us all high five each other.

The night seemed to stretch, checking my phone every time only to see that it time changing by a minute. I sat down with a few friends talking about the usual, jobs, apartment hunting, school, I later danced some more, but stopped when hearing an all too familiar song. I don't want to seem ungrateful, I'm just not one to celebrate things anymore, especially when it comes to me. I am also very tired seeing as I was up late last night apartment hunting.