A/N: So this one was from a tumblr prompt from Chiceit, 21st Birthday celebration afterglow. This is barely NSFW, a very light dusting of smut, but there is still some, so it can't be put into my normal drabble spot. It's really no dirtier than, say, Cabin Fever, though far more fluffy and sweet.

Twenty-one Candles:

It finally happened on her twenty-first birthday. They'd been dancing around their feelings for years, hinting, teasing, too afraid to do more, to ruin what was firm and real between them for something that might change everything. Maka, in particular, had always feared crossing that line—and Soul tended to follow her lead.

So they had skirted the line, practically straddling it with all the cuddling and hand holding and sharing their lives in every other possible way, but they had never, never crossed it.

That was, until they finally did.

Black*Star, being Black*Star, had insisted that Maka, as his oldest and most loyal follower, should have a celebration for this landmark occasion, one befitting her status. In the eyes of the would-be god, this of course meant a loud, raucous party complete with ridiculous quantities of alcohol that he had, by some form of wheedling or threat or combination thereof, convinced Kid to throw at Gallows Manor. Black*Star had consequently spent the evening drunk enough to bellow about his godhood in ways he had rarely done since he was 15 and Kid, his weapons, and Tsubaki spent their evening doing damage control, which left Maka and Soul largely to their own devices. It might have been her party, but it was a party, with a lot of booze and loud music and dancing, and no one particularly seemed to care who it had been thrown for just as long as the booze kept flowing.

What no one would have expected, least of all Soul, is that Maka would also drink. A lot. It started when she was handed an innocuous looking glass of orange liquid by a passing waiter shortly after they'd arrived and, curious, had put it to her lips for a sip. At her weapon's raised eyebrow (Maka Albarn didnot drink,) she shrugged.

"It's my twenty-first birthday, Soul. I think I'm allowed to try a drink or two. Aside from which, this seems to be mostly orange juice." She drained the drink in a few minutes and asked for another, getting one for her weapon as well and laughing when she was told the name (it was a Screwdriver), before handing her weapon one when refills arrived.

"Nah, I gotta drive home," he raised his hands to refuse.

"We can crash here—plus one or two drinks will be out of your system by the end of the night. Come on, Soul, please? How many times am I going to turn twenty-one?" Maka was a full adult now and for once in her life, she was going to completely let loose. They were among friends. What harm could there be in a few drinks?

Soul sighed, but complied. It was her birthday, after all.

By the time Maka was on her third such drink and Soul his second, she managed to drag him from the fringes of the room to the dance floor. It was alive with activity, loud trance fusion and techno music blaring, lights spinning. The birthday-meister lost herself in the music, moving and grinding in ways that got no complaint out of her normally reserved weapon since all that bumping and grinding was occurring against him and was far from unpleasant. Another drink for both of them and he was grinding back enthusiastically and made no protest as she suddenly leaned her face up to kiss him, kissing her back with eagerly. It was sloppy and awkward, but they were both too far gone to care, in the music, the lights, the booze, each other.

When Maka tugged at her weapon's hand to lead him away from the dance floor, Soul again did not protest. When she led him down a hall and through a door and he realized that they were now in some sort of large walk in hall closet, he did manage to get out, as she pushed him against a wall.

"Uh, Maka, I don' think—"

He was cut off by her mouth on his and, more importantly and even better, her hand on the front of his jeans, rubbing him in a way that should probably be illegal with how good it felt. He groaned into her mouth and his hands began exploring her body, her chest, her rear. She wiggled and gasped beneath his touch, encouraging him to explore further, to move his mouth away from hers to begin kissing her neck, relishing in her pleased little mewls.

When her hand stopped stroking through fabric to unfasten his jeans and make its way down, quickly finding hot flesh and grasping it eagerly, he moaned against her neck, gasping her name like a prayer and then moving his own hand down to ride up her thigh and over her panties, stroking the fabric softly.

"Soul," she breathed approvingly, her breath hot against his neck, the stink of alcohol on it almost overwhelming. Something in his warm, fuzzy brain began to click, then. Alcohol. Drunk. She was drunk. He was drunk. This wasn't a dream, though he had had countless such dreams. This was real. They had never crossed this line, had never even shared a kiss that wasn't on the cheek, and yet—here they were. Drunk. In a closet. Groping each other. His finger stilled against her panties and this time she groaned questioningly as he moved his hand to pull hers from his pants.

"Soul?"

"I'm—gonna go get us some water," he panted out, hastily zipping up his jeans. "Just, wait here. Alright?"

"What?" She was confused, hurt, it was clear in her tone. Weren't they just—and hadn't they just? And why was he?

"Look," he let out a shaky breath, backing up once, twice, because he really, really didn't want to cut off what had been going on, but he'd be damned if this was going to happen for the first time drunk in a fucking closet. If he was going to be with his meister, then fuck it all, he wanted to be sure this was something she really wanted, not just a result of booze and hormones. Hazy brain or no, he had enough control to reason out that much. "We're both drunk. Let's just—calm down, maybe drink somethin' that won't kill half our brain cells, and then we can—"

"Oh," Maka's face fell further, her eyes meeting the floor. "Right, I guess you sobered enough to remember my total lack of sex appeal." She had thought things were different, but they weren't. Clearly they weren't. She felt broken at the thought; some birthday this was turning out to be.

"Wha?" He was stunned. "That is not what I meant." It was practically a growl and he took a step back towards her.

"Oh?" her green eyes lifted to meet his, flashing, angry at the challenge in his tone. "And what did you mean, Soul?" she practically spat out his name, as if it were a word too vile to be spoken. He clenched a fist and took two more steps until he was hovering over her. The alcohol was still clouding his judgement, but it did not stifle his anger that she would think this was about her not being good enough some how. That was so opposite the truth that he couldn't stop the words from coming.

"Only," his hands were on her shoulders now, gripping them firmly. "that when I do finally have sex with the woman I love, I don't want it to be because we got fuckin' wasted outta our minds in a death damned closet." His face was close to hers and he had to stifle the urge to kiss her again. He was breathing heard, trying to reign in his emotions, reeling from the alcohol, from what he'd just said, what they'd just been doing, all of it.

"Wh—what did you?" Maka's mouth was gaping. "You—love?" she managed to squeak out. They were words she had wanted to hear for years, words she had felt as long, but she had never imagined she would hear them this way. Then again, as her hazy brain began to realign into some sense of reason, she also hadn't imagined her first kiss would be drunk on a dance floor, that she would end up in a closet like this with her weapon on her birthday, but then, the alcohol had left only her wishes intact and her wish had long been to be with him, something that came to the forefront once her inhibitions were left at the door.

"Yeah, I do," he said. "I…" he shook his head, moving to back away, but she took his hands in hers.

"M..me too." She managed, somehow, to keep her eyes on his. "I—yeah, I'm drunk, but that doesn't mean—um—that I don't have those feelings, you know? So yeah."

"Oh," he just looked at her for a long moment. "That's—that's good." He smiled. "That's really good. But, um, I still don't think we should be doin' this, here, now, drunk off our asses."

Maka nodded slowly. "Yeah, I guess you're right. Maybe we could get that water. And, um," she colored brightly, embarrassed through the clearing haze, "Kid told me we could have one of the guest rooms, so we could—mmm—wait up there for awhile and see if, uh, we still, you know." She looked down at her shoes for a minute, then smiled up at him a bit sheepishly.

"Oh, yeah," he ran a hand through his hair, a nervous habit. "We could do that. Sure." His own smile was less sheepish than it was hopeful, and as she took his hand to lead him out of the closet, he made no protest. After all, he had promised to follow her anywhere.

It turned out, once the alcohol was largely out of their systems an hour later, they were both still very much willing to continue what they had started earlier and did not hesitate to do so.

The following morning, wrapped up in her weapon's warm, strong arms, Maka couldn't regret having gotten drunk if this was where it led them, couldn't regret what they had done, even if the road here had been bumpy and ridden with potholes. When they did it, their eyes were wide open, the alcohol long gone, but the drinks had granted her a birthday miracle, had finally allowed them to express what both had repressed for far too long.

After that night, every year when Maka's birthday rolled around, they always made their toast with Screwdrivers in hand.