This is just a little one-shot I've been playing with. Eric is a character borrowed from another story, "Playing the Part." Please enjoy.
1. All characters are 18+
2. No characters represent real people
3. Enjoy the fiction
--
I HATE BIRTHDAYS
There's one day every year that I've grown to hate. Every year, on this same day, something terrible happens to me. February 27. My birthday.
On my second birthday, my parents had a fight and my dad left. I don't have any memories of him at all. Mom doesn't like to talk about him.
On my ninth birthday, I got a new bicycle, then on my first ride, promptly fell and broke my wrist. I couldn't ride it again for six weeks. I just kinda stared at its shiny glory as it sat in the garage, unused.
On my fifteenth birthday, I was going to have some friends over for all-night video gaming. The power went out and didn't come back until noon the next day.
On my nineteenth birthday, I got food poisoning. I'll spare you the details there. Needless to say, it was something different every year, so it was hard to expect what tragedy would befall me.
I started telling my friends not to celebrate my birthday. No parties, no gifts. They teased me about it, and they still wished me a happy day, but my closest friends had seen the pattern and understood my apprehension. A few also joked that they would avoid me on that day, wanting to stay out of the splash zone. To everyone else, who didn't know the history, I simply told them what I had learned from experience:
I hate birthdays.
--
Last April, I'd met Amy. We'd met at some university 'career fair' function that was supposed to help us find jobs after our upcoming graduation. It was funny that I'd never seen her before, with both of us being seniors, but it was a big campus and we did have different majors. Amy was going into business, while I was an IT major.
She was amazingly attractive. Long brown hair, and green eyes that were hypnotic to me. I asked her out, and we hit it off quickly. Very quickly. On the second date, we were making out in my car. On the third date, she said her roommate was gone for the night, and so we made good use of the empty dorm room.
After graduating, I got an apartment with Amy, my friend Will, and his girlfriend Nikki. Things were fine among the four of us until Nikki got a job across the country, and Will couldn't go. They broke up in November, and she moved out, making us split the rent three ways instead of three.
--
"It's your birthday? Go home."
"Are you sure? I can stay later..."
My boss, Eric, cut me off. "Don't make me tell you a second time. Happy Birthday, Evan," he said with a flamboyant hand motion that told me to move along. It was common knowledge in the office that Eric was gay. He was far from a stereotype, at least around us, but every once in a while he'd do something like that little wave, and it made us chuckle.
I was supposed to work until 5:00, but here it was 11:30 and I was cut loose. Normally, I'd rejoice at being off work early on a Friday. But today was not just any Friday. I was now 23 years old.
I had told Amy about all my bad birthday experiences. Will had also filled her in on the ones he'd witnessed. She was super-bummed that I didn't want to celebrate. It was as if she thought it was her 'girlfriend duty' to throw me a party, especially after I'd already thrown her a nice party two months earlier for hers.
"You never had a birthday party in college?" she had asked a few weeks ago. "When was the last time you had a birthday party?"
"When I was about 15. I got the hint that the universe was sending, and I told my mom to stop."
"That's probably the saddest thing I've ever heard."
"You weren't there last year," I pointed out. "Last year, I got falsely accused of plagiarism. I had to work my ass off that entire week to prove I wasn't cheating, or they were going to expel me." It was one of the worst birthdays I'd had. My birthday fell on a Thursday, and I spent that whole night in the library - half studying, half crying - before the judgement came down the following day. I'd been cleared of wrongdoing, of course, but that whole Thursday night, I was alone and miserable.
So now I was driving home early, not knowing what Amy had in store for me. I hoped she respected my wishes, but something told me she had something planned. My suspicions were confirmed when I peeked in the window of my own apartment and saw balloons and streamers on the walls. Amy's car was in the lot, but I didn't see her.
I opened the door to the apartment and viewed the decorations. She'd clearly taken the day off from work to set this up. But where was she?
Then I heard a noise coming from the back of the apartment. My bedroom with Amy was on one side of the hall, with Will's on the other side, and the shared bathroom was in between. Both bedroom doors were closed, which was normal. The noise happened again. Was that a moan?
I walked down the hall, thinking Will was home and had a girl in his room. But a third moan made me realize that it was coming from my room, not his.
I knew what was happening already, but I had to see it. I couldn't stop myself. I opened the door slowly, hoping I'd be wrong. Through an inch-wide crack in the door, I saw Will and Amy, both naked on my bed. Amy lay on her back, eyes closed, naked breasts jiggling, as Will thoroughly fucked her. Amy moaned loudly beneath him.
Happy birthday, Evan.
I decided I'd had enough of this. I took out my cellphone and snapped a couple of pictures of their sweaty affair. Then, out of cruel vengeful hate, I took about ten seconds of video. I couldn't have timed the video any better, as Amy, eyes still closed, groaned out, "Oh, Will, fuck me!"
Then I silently closed the door - as if they could hear me over their bedroom noises - and left the apartment.
--
I knew that Amy had planned a surprise birthday party for me. She didn't think I'd be home until after 5, giving her time to assemble guests and hide them in the apartment.
I sat in my car and wracked my brain. What the hell was I going to do? I admit I cried. A lot. But I had to get out of there. My stomach growled, agreeing with me.
I drove a few miles away, and found a family-style restaurant I'd never been to before, called Quirky's. You know the type, one of those places with the mozzerella sticks and the goofy shit on the walls. By this time, it was 1:30, after the lunch rush. A waitress slid down into the seat opposite mine in the booth. "Mind if I sit?" she said.
"You're already sitting, so I guess not."
"Great. What would you like."
I eyed her up and down. Her blonde wavy hair framed her face in a pretty cute way. Though I judged her to be about my age, she was kind of short, her pert breasts kind of sat just above the table level.
"A cheeseburger. Big one, with bacon. Onion rings, and a Coke."
