Characters/Pairings: Jake/Rose; Trixie; Spud; Emma (OC); Brad; Stacey; Lacey; Tracey
Story content warnings: of age drinking
The song mentioned is Don't Stop Believin' by Journey.
Don't forget that you can find me on tumblr: we - are - all - of - legend - now and that my ao3 account is wearealloflegendnow (even though I haven't posted there yet)!
~TLL~
Rose slowly peeked one eye open. Her head was pounding and her mouth was dry. She was overheating but in a surprisingly cozy way. Rose stretched slowly, the duvet rustling around her. A warm hand wrapped around her waist, pulling her backward into an even warmer bare chest.
"There is no way it's already morning," Jake groaned.
Rose took her chances and peeked above the blanket. "It's afternoon."
Jake groaned again. "What time did we even go to bed?"
"Five? Six? Sometime after Spud made the third jungle juice."
Rose searched her admittedly fuzzy memory. The third and final jungle juice had been the pink one because they'd finished the raspberry vodka in it. That had been about the time Stacey, Lacey, and Tracey had started trying to prove that they still remembered the Mean Girls Jingle Bell Rock routine, but they had all been laughing so hard that they couldn't stand long enough to try.
"Third?" Jake exclaimed, his voice cracking. "I'm getting too old for this, Rose."
Rose giggled. "We are twenty-two."
"It's been an honour," Jake continued dramatically. "You're the love of my life but I f ear I am dying. Old age has gotten to me. Go, be free, find some pretty young thing who can give you what I can't."
Rose smacked him and rolled over to face him. "Stop it. You won't be as pathetic when you've had breakfast."
"Pathetic!? Pathetic?" Jake said indignantly. "At least I don't look like Pennywise."
"Huh? Oh."
Rose could distinctly remember stumbling into their bedroom, peeling off her New Year's party dress and diving directly under the covers. She even remembered thinking that she'd regret not taking off her makeup in the morning or when she had to do the laundry and deciding to care more later.
"That's it," Rose said. "We're getting up."
"No, I love Pennywise. You are a beautiful, gorgeous, sexy Pennywise and you should stay in bed with me."
Jake kissed her and it made it so tempting to stay in bed, ignore the hangover and the inevitable clean-up that their house was going to need, just to stay in Jake's arm. And she probably would have except they had a house full of people that had stayed the night and had been promised Jake's greasy diner breakfast special and mimosas.
Rose kissed Jake once more and then got up, even though the last thing that she wanted to do was leave him in bed. In the upstairs bathroom, Rose found her twin, Emma, fast asleep in the bathtub, her 2024 headband being crushed against the faucet while an empty bottle of prosecco was clenched in her arms. Rose looked at the front of Emma's golden tube top and made a face. The bottle had clearly not been empty when Emma had gotten into the tub.
Well, showering was going to have to wait awhile. Rose washed as best as she could with a facecloth and her makeup remover. Then, she wrapped herself in the fluffy pink bathrobe that Jake had gotten her for Christmas. She bent over Emma and shook her.
Emma snorted, sitting up fast enough that she knocked over a shampoo bottle and sent the empty bottle clattering around the tub. Rose and Emma both winced at the noise.
"We're going to be making breakfast soon," Rose said. "Thought you might want to shower."
Emma touched her chest. "Do the words 'champagne shower' mean anything to you?"
Sadly, they did.
Rose could remember standing in the living room, five minutes to midnight. The sparkling wine and the champagne flutes were on the coffee table and everyone was tuned into the ball drop on TV, waiting for the countdown to begin. Brad, who had been indulging a little too much in Spud's jungle juice – in Rose's opinion, anyway, Brad probably had a completely different opinion – had grabbed one of the sparkling bottles and shaken it, asking who wanted a champagne shower. Emma, who had been on the tequila since about noon, had offered herself as the first tribute. The champagne had sprayed just as the minute countdown had started and Rose and Jake had danced out of the way, hiding in the corner to kiss each other a happy new year.
Emma winced. "Why do you invite that guy places?"
"Because he's fun and he makes you less of a tight ass. Come on, shower. Mimosas are downstairs."
"Is Jake doing that thing with the bacon?"
"Yes, Jake is making candied bacon. Your duffel is in the office."
"God, why don't you sound hungover?" Emma complained and then she reached up, turning the faucet on.
Rose shut the curtain and tottered back to her and Jake's bedroom. She certainly felt hungover but this was her house and she felt like she had an obligation to make sure that everyone in it had survived the night. Rose dressed quickly in yoga pants and one of Jake's sweaters. Jake had managed to get out of bed and she set out again in search of him.
Rose found him in the living room, prodding Brad with a champagne flute. Brad snorted.
"Five more minutes, Mom," he muttered and rolled over.
Rose covered her mouth. "Who put the dick on his face?"
"Trixie," Jake said. "It's what she always does when someone passes out first."
Jake rubbed his hand over his face, as if to check that he didn't have one.
"Where is Trixie?"
"Making screwdrivers."
Rose nodded and headed off. Trixie was standing at the kitchen island, staring at a bottle of vodka. Spud and Stacey were awake but face down on the kitchen table while Lacey and Tracey were nowhere in sight. Rose wasn't even sure if they were still in the house.
"Trix, you good?"
"I can't tell," Trixie said, sounding like she was still drunk, "if this is my friend or my enemy."
"Frenemy," Stacey said into the wood of the table. "Now, give her to me."
Trixie splashed some vodka in a glass while Rose went to clear the fridge out of whatever juices they hadn't put in the jungle juice. She also pulled out one of the last bottles of sparkling in the fridge in case someone didn't want to start the morning with hard bar. Rose put vodka and grapefruit juice in one of the glasses and took it back to the living room where Jake was force feeding Brad water. Brad hissed like a cat.
"You want scrambled eggs?" Jake asked. "Drink the water."
"I want scrambled eggs," Brad sobbed and he took the glass.
Jake straightened up and eyed the glass in Rose's hand. "Grapefruit?"
"Well, it's not pink lemonade."
Jake kissed her cheek in thanks. "Can you find Lacey and Tracey? Stacey says they definitely stayed here last night."
"On it."
Although, their house wasn't that big and there weren't a lot of places for Lacey and Tracey to be. Rose wound through the downstairs where the balloons and streamers struggled to hang onto the glamour of New Year's Eve. Someone – likely Trixie – had drawn a dick under the gold HAPPY NEW YEAR sign that Rose had hung over a blank wall so that there would be a cute selfie spot for the night. They weren't sleeping on the back porch or the front porch, the downstairs bathroom was empty, and Brad was the only one in the living room so they had to be upstairs. Rose made a stop in the kitchen for a mimosa. Brad had been convinced to leave the couch and Jake was drinking his grapefruit and vodka through a straw while he tied on his YOUR OPINION WAS NOT IN THE RECIPE apron.
"I'm air-frying hashbrowns as an appy so we don't die while wait for the everything else."
"Put tajin on them please." Rose kissed him and then she was on her way upstairs.
Emma was just stumbling out of the bathroom when Rose hit the top step.
"I think I'm dying."
"At least you don't have a dick on your face."
"It better be Brad."
"It is."
"Hell yeah!" and then she upset herself with her own volume. Emma grimaced. "Okay, pants, food, shots. Not necessarily in that order."
"Pants first."
Rose steered Emma toward the study. She breathed a sigh of relief when they entered the room. Lacey and Tracey were curled on top of the pullout bed, snuggled around one another like they were two cats.
"But I slept in a bathtub."
"You made that choice."
"Jimador made that choice," Emma corrected and she picked Rose's mimosa out of her hand. "You mind?"
Rose did but sometimes it was just easier to let Emma have her way. She was the older twin after all.
"Wake them, tell them there's breakfast coming," Rose instructed before living her twin alone.
Rose walked down the stairs, another memory coming back to her. They had been doing karaoke, except they had all started singing Don't Stop Believin'. She felt a smile grace her face as she blurry memory came back, all of them hunkered around the one microphone that they had, acting like they were really on stage. It was a memory that she held close to her, because it was a moment of pure friendship – one that none of them probably thought they would all have with each other when they had all met, way back in middle school.
Rose took a seat at the island, where Jake was now chopping an onion.
"Lacey and Tracey are upstairs with Emma."
"Everyone's breathing?" Stacey asked.
"They were when I came down here."
"Good enough." Stacey gave a thumbs up and then her head went back down on the table.
Rose put her head on her hand and pouted at Jake. "Emma stole my mimosa."
"You have two hands."
"Jake."
Jake rapidly finished with the onion. "All right, welcome to Jake's bar. Would you like a traditional mimosa or would you like to explore our oh so exotic options of grapefruit or mango juice?"
"Mango sounds amazing."
Jake prepared her mimosa and then he handed her a bowl. "Stir."
Rose looked down. "I think it's flour."
"Yes and the spice mix for the fried chicken."
"You're making waffles?"
Jake stared at her. "Rose, you've been talking about new year's waffles since last new year's waffles. Of course I'm making you waffles."
"I love you."
"Love you too. Now, stir it."
Rose did as she was told, making sure it was mixed thoroughly. Then, she was given the job of cracking and whisking some of the eggs, because there was going to be an omelette as well as the fried chicken and waffles, with the candied bacon and a fruit salad that Jake decided on a whim that he had enough fruit in the fridge to make. Rose was on her third mimosa and Jake was debating on putting mushrooms in the omelette when Emma appeared, herding Lacey and Tracey in front of her. Lacey and Tracey hadn't changed out of their party outfits and they slumped down at the table with everyone else.
"If I don't get some carbs right now, I'm going to die," Trixie announced.
The air fryer beeped.
"We're saved!" Brad cheered. "Praise!"
Spud rolled his eyes.
Jake took the hashbrowns from the air fryer, tossed them in tajin, and put some in a separate bowl for Rose before taking the rest to the table. The goblin noises that arose as everyone fought and cracked open ketchup bottles and garlic mayo bottles just made Rose laugh.
Before going back to making his greasy diner breakfast special, Jake stopped by Rose's island stool and wrapped his arm around her shoulders.
"Did you see all the empties in the everywhere?" he whispered in her ear. "That's all waiting for tomorrow, I don't even care."
"It was worth it," Rose said, looking at their friends and family and then looking up at Jake. "It was the best new year."
"The best is yet to come," Jake promised, and then he kissed her. "Another mimosa, babe?"
"Is this the best that was yet to come?"
"Yep," Jake said with a wink. "This is the best mimosa in the world. Just taste."
Rose did and she had to agree.