afraid_of_marshmallows | Midnight Manor Boarding House Movie Room, Saturday Evening

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Midnight Manor Boarding House Movie Room, Saturday Evening

As soon as Kamala had turned back into a person yesterday, Arden and Eleanor had swung into action. Arden had contacted Mr. and Mrs. Khan to let them know that Operation Birthday Bash was a go and about what time she'd be by to pick up the cake, and then called Mr. Najaf to see if he would be willing to cook up a whole slew of gyros (including some vegan gyros in case Steven or Watts showed up) for Kamala's birthday the next day. She also messaged Bruno and asked Mr. and Mrs. Khan if they could pass the invitation on to Nakia, letting them know about the party and offering to arrange portal service if they could make it out. After that had come ~~handwavily~~ messaging everybody else to let them know that they were celebrating Kamala's belated birthday at Midnight Manor on Saturday evening.

And lo, now it was the appointed hour. Ellie was keeping Kamala distracted upstairs (Arden was not asking how), and she was here setting out drinks (sodas, though Mr. Khan had sent Arden home with a jug of 'sweet tea,' which she had been very appreciative of and had appreciatively poured down the drain once she'd gotten home), gyros, and setting out Mrs. Khan's cake, leaving a spot in case Ellie had somehow managed to find or invent a Squishie cake. Bollywood movies were playing on the TV (though currently with the volume very low), there was a karaoke machine on standby, balloons and streamers were up, the guests ~~Avengers~~ assembled...

Now all they needed was the co-host and the birthday girl!

[Open! If you're a student, a resident of Midnight Manor, or just think Kamala is cool, feel free to handwave yourself an invite!]

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Shh! Stay quiet! We don't want Kamala to hear anything!

And the birthday girl appears! Please wait for Kamala to ping in and then feel free to smother her with well-wishes and friendship!

There's food! There's soda! There's Bollywood movies! There's karaoke! There's probably Mario Kart or Overcooked!

Whatever non-mingling activities you wanna do, this is a great place to do it in!

There is a sleepy-tired Nuance, too!

Alas, Eleanor's search to discover the perfect recipe to turn a Squishy into a cake was not successful, because she didn't want cake that looked like a Squishy, but that was all the results she got to weed through. She supposed she could have tried her hand at it regardless, but the time crunch made her feel like it would just be smarter to contact J,GoB and arrange them to make something like the cupcakes she found, only with Red instead, obviously.

And they'd really delivered on that, too. They looked and tasted great, far better than anything Eleanor would have likely have been able to do herself, even though she was pretty sure if she'd made something, even if it wasn't great, Kamala would have still loved it.

But now everyone else could love it, too, because while it worked in nicely with her pre-party distraction and the previous promise of cupcakes, there were still plenty others for the other guests, as well.

After the Surprise! and greeting Kamala, Arden made her way over to Eleanor, all smiles, fist out for a bump. "We pulled it off!" she said, clearly relieved. "Operation Birthday Bash was a success!"

At least today's. She was going to have to throw herself into setting up for the second one next week. BD-1 was counting on her.

Consider it almost like a warm-up! Besides, Arden would have one extra set of hands on deck now that Kamala was no longer a sloth or the prospective party person!

Eleanor, meanwhile, looked mildly confused at the lifted fist, though she tried her best not to look it, and just sort of awkwardly lifted her own in a mirroring of Arden's. But any faux pas created from not knowing what a fist bump was was quickly dispelled in light of the reason for it in the first place.

"I think if she'd have been a sloth just a little bit longer," she noted, "I'd have gotten that cake down, but I think this is much better. Great job setting everything up, though, Arden, this is great, thank you."

Arden reached over and gently tapped her knuckles against Eleanor's. "Fist bump," she explained. "Same sprit as a high five, if you know what that is?" She certainly had no idea when high fives had come into the zeitgeist. Or what a 'zeitgeist' was, either.

"That just means you can really surprise her with one later if you keep practicing," Arden pointed out, absolutely reaching out to grab a cupcake. "These look killer, though, oh my goddess. J,GoB knocked it outta the park." She took a bite and grinned happily, both at the taste and Eleanor's compliments. "Thanks! Though I mostly just shoved stuff into other people's laps and asked them to do stuff for me," she admitted. " You with the cupcakes - so good - and folks back at Jersey City did all the heavy lifting."

Shockingly, it was apparently still about a decade until even the high five started to come into popularity in Eleanor's timeline, which just seemed wild, but, okay, internet.

So Arden was getting just a little bit of a shake of Eleanor's confused head with that, as well, but she wasn't going to dwell on it, just commit the fist bump to memory and then look into high fives later, when they weren't too busy patting themselves on the back for being, somehow, miraculously, the best birthday party throwers ever.

"But delegating," Eleanor pointed out, "is an important part of making things work out well, too. Like in a household or a business, sometimes you need the person figuring out who does what to make sure everything runs smoothly. So that makes you sort of...the Party Boss, without whom none of this could have come together so well."

And as the probable future matriarch of what little remained of the Zarrin clan, maybe Eleanor should be taking notes.

Let’s be honest, it doesn’t take much to distract Kamala. All Eleanor had to do was ask who the people on her wall were and there would have been an enthusiastic lore dump of the MCU on the poor girl.

Or Eleanor could have done shadow puppets with her hands. You don’t know!

Regardless, when Kamala came downstairs there was definitely a look of confusion as she walked into the room.

“What’s all this?”

What even was time, really? (A lie perpetrated by the Exarchs is what.)

"Oooh, Party Boss. I like that. Makes me feel like I should have some kind of badge or something," Arden said. "But that makes sense. Figuring out what needs to be done, and then making sure everything gets done on time. That seems...useful, actually."

The first useful skill she could claim, as opposed to all those useful skills that remained stubbornly out of reach.

"I hadn't thought of it that way. Thanks, Ellie. That actually makes me feel a lot better."

And, honestly, if someone had been taking bets, she would have put money on it being the MCU tour, which was why she deliberately wasn't asking.

"SURPRISE!!" Arden (and presumably the rest of the guests) yelled. "Happy birthday, Kamala!"

“Whaaat?!”

Kamala’s hands first covered her face in surprise and then slid down to cover her heart. “You didn’t have to do this!”

But that didn’t stop her from immediately giving her bestie a hug. “You guys are the best!”

"Uh, duh, yeah we did," Arden said with a laugh, hugging Kamala right back. "You were a sloth for your birthday. It wasn't like you could throw your own, right? So me and Ellie colluded with some folks back in Jersey City..."

And made plans for a birthday celebration that could happen whenever!

Hey, there had been cupcakes and silly hats as promised, too! But, yeah, Eleanor really should have accounted for the fact that the hardest part of her job would be trying to find a way to actually get the lid back on that MCU can of worms she'd opened enough to actually get Kamala eventually over to the movie room.

And once everyone had done their part in ensuring that the Birthday Girl was thoroughly surprised and happy birthdays, Eleanor contributed her own with a shy and sheepish (and honestly somewhat thrilled) kiss on the cheek.

"It's not like we could just let you being a sloth get in the way of your birthday, right?"

And Eleanor smiled at Arden, pleased that not only did Arden feel better, but that she had been the one to help her feel that way.

"I'll have to get you one," she said, trying to be a bit subtle with this next part, knowing that Arden's time as Party Boss was not over quite yet, "sometime next week. You've definitely earned it. None of this would have happened if it weren't for you. I wouldn't have even known it had been her birthday!"

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY!" Charlie yelled along with everyone else. "Hope this is your best year yet!"

"These cupcakes are amazing!" Charlie said. Charlie somehow had never had a squishy, but the cupcakes were amazing in their own right.

The sideways grin and wink - so subtle there, Arden - proved Arden was picking up exactly what Eleanor was putting down.

"Which just means that next year, we'll both know and with our awesome combined, we can throw her a party like no one has ever seen, yeah?"

She made a mental note to have Kams find out when Ellie's birthday was. You know. No reason.

Kamala’s head was spinning a bit still when the words “Jersey City” got through her head. She looked around and saw the cake which just from years of eating her cooking knew it was from home. Her home. And then she spied and smelled the familiar wrapped gyros from the Gyro King himself.

Kamala just looked at Arden with a pout on her lips. “You are too much.”

If Arden needed any validation of her party planning skills she was getting it now as Kamala was now giving her another bone crushing hug. And there might be a little sniffle and eye wiping as well.

“Hmm. I guess,” Kamala said with a little smirk before pulling Eleanor into an intense hug followed by a short but not-so-shy kiss. “So the cupcakes weren’t cutting it, huh?” She teased. “You really didn’t have to do this.”

“Charlie! Thank you!” Kamala said happily. “I had no idea this was happening! But so far this year is turning out great!”

Slothness aside.

Who was Arden to turn down another hug?

"Nah," she murmured. "This is almost as good as you deserve, bestie." Another tight squeeze. "Everybody just pitched in because they love you. Mr. Najaf even gave me a discount because they were for you! But, uh, you have to bring some new people home to buy his gyros another time to prove that everyone liked them."

And Eleanor would just continue to rest comfortably in the fact that her birthday had been in a convenient spot to have missed them all somewhat recently, leaving it to surely be forgotten about entirely by the time it rolled around again!

Or, at the very least, to still be far enough away that, by the time it rolled around again, it wouldn't have mattered, because if disaster hadn't struck by then, it would be somewhat of a miracle.

And it was that sort of thinking that softened Eleanor's smile, just a bit, as her chest sort of tugged at the idea that she could even manage to still be here for the next one.

"Yeah," she agreed, maybe a little wistfully, as some of those thoughts did turn a little toward the possibility, when her eyes drifted over toward Kamala to see if she was actually enjoying all this, "maybe."

Her attention seemed to somewhat reluctantly shift back toward Arden, but, when it did, she had the full of it, and it came with a speculative lift of her eyebrows. "What about you, though? When do we throw the birthday party for the Party Boss?"

"Ah, yes. Mr. Najaf's friends and family discount," Kamala laughed. "Let me guess..."

She started imitating Najaf's accent and mannerisms. "Okay, I will tell you what I will do. I will give you the friends and family discount since it is for Kamala. Don't tell anyone about this or everyone else will ask for it."

She giggled. "You must have worked your Southern charm on him. He only saves that routine for people he likes and regular customers."

And then there was a small epiphany.

"Oh no. You had to drink Abbu's sweet tea."

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Midnight Manor Boarding House Movie Room, Saturday Evening

Arrive and Mingle (Pre-Surprise)

SURPRISE!!

Other Stuff

OOC

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