Birthday Blues

[intheheart]

Title: Birthday Blues
Rating: PG
Summary: Jacob Foster has the most stereotypical family troubles ever.
Date: February 23rd, 2010
AU: Sisters
Notes: none


Jake's cell phone buzzed, announcing an incoming text message, right as he entered Bryant Park on his way to lunch. So it was in the middle of Bryant Park, in the middle of the lunch rush, that he stopped dead and yelped "Shit!" for all to hear.

Fortunately it wasn't early enough for most children to be home from school and out for walks. He'd probably taught a few well-wrapped toddlers some new vocabulary words, though, judging from maternal dirty looks.

And anyway, it was justified. Amanda was in town, and she wanted to come over for dinner to celebrate.

Ordinarily this would not be a problem. Jake loved his older sister, and she loved him right back, and Amanda threw good birthday dinners. But right now he was playing host to his younger sister, and Amanda and Lauren got along like a house on fire-- lots of screaming and destruction. They loved each other; he really believed that. They just... had fundamentally clashing personalities.

And it was his birthday. He couldn't exactly ditch Olivia and Lauren to see Amanda.

All this was of course assuming he could get out of work in time, what with the teacher's union threatening to picket City Hall or whatever they were growling about today. Mrs. Hirschfeld was tearing her hair out and passing it on to anyone within reach. Jake was pretty sure that nepotism was going to work in his favor, though. Or whatever you called it when the boss had practically adopted you and your girlfriend's best friend was dating the boss's daughter.

All right. So Amanda and Lauren in town at the same time. It wouldn't be that much of a disaster, he didn't think, especially if he could keep them apart. Dump Lauren on Ivy or something, just for a little while. And even if they did meet up, it wouldn't be the end of the world. Sure, Amanda would probably tell Lauren she was irresponsible, and Lauren would probably call Amanda uptight, but it might not devolve into a screaming fight. It was his birthday, and they were his sisters, and they wouldn't try to ruin it.

He didn't think.

His phone buzzed again, demanding -- Jake, are you paying attention? Call me! Dinner! A -- and he winced. Amanda wasn't going to take no for an answer, either.

So he did the only thing he could do, or at least the only thing he could do on his fifteen minute "grab a sandwich and get back here" break: he turned his phone off and continued on his way.

--

He got a break somewhere in the middle of the afternoon when every single one of his coworkers decided to take a simultaneous smoke break. He might have suspected shenanigans, except ninety percent of them weren't speaking to each other and the final ten percent had the weary, wild-eyed look of people about to go for each other's throats. So he let them go and took the opportunity to call Olivia.

"Amanda's in town," he said, as soon as she picked up. "And she wants to have dinner."

"Oh, dear," Olivia said, and then, more distantly, "Top cupboard, Lauren. I take it our plans are cancelled?"

"They might have to be," Jake said, resigned. "I'm considering just asking Ms. Hirschfeld to keep me all night."

She laughed. "Like she'd do that on your birthday."

"You never know," he said, and stretched a kink out of his shoulder. "She might if I ask really nice. As a present. Anyway, this is pretty serious. And it's all about curriculum disputes, too, so it's on us if this thing explodes."

"I can't believe they're going to picket anything over curriculum issues."

Jake rubbed a hand over his eyebrows. "It happens sometimes. I don't think here, though. Um. Ever."

"So," Olivia said, "what I'm hearing is that your day is about to get rough."

He stopped rubbing his forehead and started pinching the bridge of his nose instead. "As soon as Amanda shows up, yeah. If work doesn't explode, my family will. You know the last time we went out to dinner, they started throwing bread at each other?"

"I still don't think hiding at work is going to solve anything."

That was probably true. Dumping it all on Olivia wasn't fair, and anyway he wouldn't put it past Amanda to worm her way into his office and ambush him. She had enough of professional bearing to fake a politician pretty well.

Jake wondered briefly if Amanda would be Ms. Hirschfeld in twenty-odd years, then decided never to think of that again.

Olivia broke in on his thoughts. "Hello? Are you there?"

"Yeah," he said. "Yeah, sorry, distracted by terrifying thoughts. I promise not to stay late at work."

"Good," Olivia said. "'Cause, no offense, I love your sisters, but I am so totally out of my depth in this that it isn't funny."

He frowned, puzzled. "How do you mean? Sibling relationships, or..."

"No," she said, and a wistful tone crept into her voice. "No, it's just all so... normal, you know? The oldest sibling thinks the rest are slackers, the youngest thinks everyone else is uptight, and there you are, the middle kid desperately trying to keep the peace. It's like a sitcom."

Jake laughed. "I know, I know, I have the most stereotypical family troubles ever."

"You totally do."

The team was beginning to filter back into the conference room, most of them looking considerably more relaxed. "I have to go, Livvy," he said. "Do me a favor and intercept any calls from Amanda. I'll smooth it all over when I get home." Somehow.

"I'm on it," she said, reassuringly. "It'll all be okay. Love you."

"Love you too."

--

Somewhat remarkably, he got out early. Ms. Hirschfeld threw her hands in the air not long after the smoke break of doom and ordered everyone out to sleep on it. Not that Jake was terribly overwrought by this. He might be able to beat Amanda home and have a few minutes of quiet.

So of course Lauren jumped on him the moment he walked through the door of his building.

"Why didn't you tell me Amanda was in town?" she demanded, folding her arms across her chest.

Jake sighed, put his briefcase down, and said, "Up until lunchtime I didn't know she was. What brought this on?"

She rolled her eyes. "Considering that she's currently in your living room chatting up your girlfriend," she said, "it was a bit hard to miss. I couldn't stand it in there, so I came out here to wait for you. You should have warned me, Jake."

"Lauren, please believe me when I say that I really, really did not have time." He pulled open the mailbox and took out the mail. Junk, bill, misdirected letter for apartment one-six, bill, junk, grocery store coupons. Nothing interesting. "It has not been a fun day."

Lauren rolled her eyes and struck a dramatic pose against the wall. "My day wasn't so hot either, I'll have you know. Woke up with a headache and the audition didn't pan out and now here's Amanda, the perfect capper."

Jake was starting to get a headache himself. "It's so hard to be you," he said, wearily. "Now excuse me, I need to go upstairs and have a cup of tea." He'd prefer a nap, but he clearly wasn't going to get one.

"Fine," Lauren said. "Be that way." She hesitated, then said, "Um, before you go, you should know that Ammie's kind of in a pissy mood. Fair warning."

Jake stopped dead, sighed, and leaned his head against the cool metal strip on the side of the elevator. "Lauren, what did you say."

"I might've called her a tightass," Lauren said. "But she was in a bad mood before that. Work something or other. She works too hard. You work too hard, but at least you're not a jerk about it."

"Thanks." He didn't roll his eyes; instead he hit the call button with more than necessary force. "Thanks ever so much, Laure, this was just what my day needed."

"Your girlfriend is calming her down," Lauren said, and snorted. "Somehow. I don't even want to know how."

He shrugged. "Olivia's good at calming people down." He knew why, too, but he sure as hell wasn't going to discuss that with Lauren.

"She is, I guess."

The elevator dinged; timely, because then Jake could pretend he hadn't heard her, and they didn't have to repeat the epic fight they'd had when he'd started dating Olivia. "Okay, upstairs, let's get this over with."

"I don't know," Lauren said, dragging her feet so much he had to hit the "door open" button. "I really don't want to deal with her now. Couldn't we just, I don't know, go around the block? Quick walk. Yeah, that sounds nice." She stopped a foot from the elevator and pivoted towards the door.

"No," Jake said, getting more irritated by the second. "It is February. It's fucking cold outside. I don't want to go for a walk, I want to go upstairs, have a cup of tea, kick all the squatters out of my apartment and fall asleep in my girlfriend's lap. But apparently that's too much to ask on my own fucking birthday. Now get in the damn elevator."

Lauren's eyebrows climbed a little higher every time he swore; by the time he'd finished, they were trying to merge with her hairline. "Okay," she said. "Jeez. You don't have to yell." She finally, finally got in the damn elevator.

Jake punched the button for the sixth floor, almost literally. "Just once I would like to have a family reunion where you and Ammie don't fight."

"That might be asking a bit much," Lauren said, and then, meekly, "I really am sorry. I didn't mean to make your life tough."

It was as close to an apology as he was going to get, he figured. Jake sighed. "It's all right. It's just been a rough day."

The elevator shuddered and began to rise with a creaking complaining sound. "Sounds like it," Lauren said. She dug out her phone and began idly tapping keys. "Does this elevator always make these noises?"

"Oh, yes," he said, and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Always. Super's had the repairman in like six times and they can't figure out what's causing it."

"Bummer," she said, sympathetically.

The elevator creaked its way to the sixth floor and dinged cheerily as the doors opened. Jake dragged himself down the hall and considered flipping the damn thing off. He might have, if Lauren hadn't been immediately behind him. As it was, he settled for rolling his eyes in its general direction while he fumbled his keys out and unlocked the door. Tea first. Tea first, even if he had to kneecap Amanda to do it.

Funny, the lights were off.

And then they weren't.

"Surprise!"

He dropped his briefcase and put both hands over his face to block out the sight of what looked like a metric ton of streamers and everyone he knew in his living room. "I hate you all."

--

"I don't really hate you all," he said later, under the covers with Olivia in the blessed, blessed darkness.

She giggled. "I know. You had fun. Don't lie, I can tell when you lie."

"I did," he admitted, and kissed her nose. And he had, once he'd gotten his tea (liberally laced with whiskey, courtesy of Ivy). There had been presents, and cake, and his favorite kind of conversations-- bizarre. They'd even all gone home at a reasonable hour. Or, well, possibly went bar-hopping, but that wasn't his problem. "Even though my sisters started fighting. At least they took it outside."

"They do love you," she said, and cuddled closer. "I mean, they agreed to be in close proximity for this. For you."

Which reminded him. "Whose idea was this? And who got Ms. Hirschfeld in on it?"

"Amanda's," she said, surprising him not at all. "And she got herself in on it. I didn't tell her about it, though."

Jake grinned, though she probably couldn't see it-- it was dark under there. "Let me guess. You told Gina and Gina told Ivy..."

"Who actually told Aaron who told his father who told Ms. Hirschfeld," Olivia corrected. "I'm not sure why she didn't tell her mother, but that's Ivy for you."

"Probably because these days I see her mother more than she does," he said. "Hey, God, there's a birthday present for you; how about you fix this curriculum nonsense so I don't have to go crazy. Thanks."

She giggled again. "He's working on it, I'm sure."

"At least somebody is," Jake muttered, then sighed. "Argh. I should apologize to Ammie and Laure, I guess. I've been freaking out about them all day and here they were just trying to do something nice for me."

Olivia hummed noncommitally, then said, "Lauren mentioned that you yelled at her, but she also mentioned that she deserved it."

He felt oddly gratified by that, but bound to insist, "No, she really didn’t. She was only trying to delay me. Granted, she picked a pretty obnoxious way of doing it."

"I'm told that deliberate obnoxiousness is a perfectly legitimate reason for yelling at your siblings," Olivia said, innocently. Too innocently.

Jake frowned. "Who told you that?"

"Ivy," she said. "And Michael backed her up."

He thought about that for a moment. "So... the Obnoxious Younger Siblings Brigade, in other words?"

"Yup," she said. "Them."

"Okay," he said, and groped around until he found her hand and held it tight. "I feel better about that then."

She squeezed his hand. "You're still going to apologize, though?"

"Duh," Jake said. "Tomorrow. Definitely tomorrow. Right now I'm going to sleep."

"Yes," she said. "Go to sleep. You can fix the world in the morning."

He snorted. "I do not always try to fix the world." Even though he did. Only a little bit, though.

"Shh," Olivia said, sounding amused. "You're supposed to be sleeping, Jacob."

He grumbled a bit more for form's sake, but closed his eyes and settled comfortably, and was almost asleep when she spoke.

"Happy birthday," Olivia said, softly.

"I'm supposed to be asleep," he reminded her, then grinned at the blackness again, and said, "It was."