Steady

The Party

Content warning: vomiting

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 Dropping the heavy bag of groceries he's holding onto the countertop, Steve lets out a deep sigh, flexing his fingers to ease their soreness. Next to him, Eddie is already busy sorting out what they bought together, making a row of soft drinks, another of alcoholic drinks, early-evening snacks and late-evening snacks.

With Mr. and Mrs. Harrington's permission, Steve organized a party at his house, taking advantage of his parents' absence, to celebrate his friends' graduation before the formal ceremony in two weeks. Everyone was allowed to bring some friends, as long as they warned him beforehand of how many people would show up. Those who live far away and those who will be in no state to drive will be able to sleep over, on condition that they bring sleeping bags with them, except for Eddie, Nancy, Robin and Vickie, who are the only ones to be allowed to stay in the guest rooms and use the inflatable mattresses.

Still exhausted from his trip to Boston, Steve wipes the sleep out of his eyes. At least, it went well. The apartment ticked all his boxes and according to his calculations, rent shouldn't be an issue. Understanding of his issue with his parents and lending an attentive ear to his meticulous plan, the landlady agreed to keep it on hold for him for a month, after which she will release it back onto the market for other people to visit. Now all he has to do is either to quit his job and prepare for his relocation, or ask Keith to be transferred to Family Video in Boston.

Easy, right?

Well, not really. There remains the problem of convincing his parents, although he doesn't care about whether they agree or not. He's an adult and he's proved his growth in multiple ways. It was up to them to notice it now.

Even worse was to announce it to Eddie. This is the most dreadful part of the plan. Still not having found the courage to let him know about his idea, however vague, to move to Boston, Steve's chickening out the longer he waits. But it's not easy. He doesn't want to leave Eddie behind. Not because the latter let him know that he needed him, but because their friendship is so precious to him that he refuses to jeopardize it. Not only this, but he would miss the hell out of him.

Steve grabs the menu of the pizza place and the list he agreed on with the group and dials the number to place the whole order and decide on a time with them. In the meantime, Eddie takes out the plastic cups and arranges them on the future punch table, first setting three layers of paper tablecloths to protect it and avoid a whooping from Mrs. Harrington upon her return.

Having hung up with the pizza restaurant, Steve gives him a hand, tearing the plastic wrap of paper plates open. He lays them down next to three glass jars turned into cutlery pots on the makeshift buffet, while counting the amount of glass bowls he would need for all the snacks to be available.

Eyeing him while setting up the bar, Eddie grins at him and hands him the colorful napkins they fetched.

"By the way," he says, "you haven't told me about the wedding in Illinois. How was it?"

Ah, yes. The 'wedding in Illinois', or the first thing that came to Steve's mind when he warned Eddie of his absence the past couple days. Whereas he can be good at making up plans and surprises for people he loves, his creativity for lies was painfully bad.

"It was nice," Steve shrugs. "Just a regular wedding."

"Who got married, again?"

"My cousin, Lori."

"It's weird, I saw your parents while you were gone, how come they didn't go?"

Shit. Steve didn't think about that.