Iris folded and unfolded her arms, waiting impatiently for Levi to finish his routine.

“We’re gonna be late,” she called to the other side of the door.

“I’m almost done,” said the lad on the other side.

She rolled her eyes but Levi finally opened the door. His hair had been styled into his preferred grunge-style. And he turned so one of his eyes stared at her.

“Is my eyeliner okay?” he asked.

She blinked. There was a thin black line along his eyelashes.

“I think it's fine,” she told him. But she didn’t really understand the point. It was going to be dark so there wouldn’t be many people able to see the makeup anyway.

Levi hesitated to accept the prognosis. He turned back to the bathroom and stared in the mirror for several seconds while Iris rolled her eyes behind him.

“It’s fine,” she repeated. “Do you want to end up stuck somewhere boring tonight?”

“Okay, okay,” Levi said.

He shoved his phone and wallet into his pockets and turned toward her.

“Let’s go,” he agreed.

They walked out of his brand-new apartment and down the long corridor of the quarters specifically reserved for those who had come-of-age. Iris dipped into her own room, just down the hall, to grab her purse and quickly raked a couple fingers through her hair and carefully separated and smoothed out the deep purple streaks she’d put in on her own eighteenth birthday. Then she rejoined Levi out in the hall.

He was grinning, bouncing on his heels. This was the first time he would be allowed out of this prison and able to run wild and free.

They hurried to catch the bus and rode it into the deeper part of the city where their contact was waiting. He was lurking in the shadows beneath an overpass, scrolling on his phone.

The crunch of gravel under their boots drew his attention up and he gave them that sly, lopsided grin only someone about to make a handsome sum of cash can pull off.

“Took ya long enough,” he said coolly.

“We’re here now, thanks for waiting,” Iris brushed him off.

He squared himself to them and watched expectantly as Iris rummaged in her bag and pulled out a cash envelope to hand over to him. His fingers only briefly leafed through the contents before he sighed and pulled out his own envelope.

“You’re always good to me,” he stated. “I think this is some of my best work so take good care of it.”

Levi took it from him and slid the glossy ID card out of the paper. His face stared back at him, well rendered and, holding it up to the light, he nodded agreeably.

“It should get you past bouncers,” the dude said. “And any alcohol you want from the watering hole.”

“Sweet,” Levi agreed.

Iris clapped him on the back. “Happy Birthday,” she said. “Let’s go meet up with the others.”

He was happy to agree and they gave the dealer a friendly farewell before making the long walk to their final destination.

It wasn't a big bar, but it was busy. 

Iris waved at the group already there, surrounding a high-top table. They all looked too young to be here but at the end of the day, as long as their IDs passed an initial inspection, no one really cared.

Levi was shy as he followed Iris. This was the first time he was out and about like this, unsupervised by an authority and able to join in the shenanigans passed down from the older kids.

Iris had done this several times before. Everytime one of the worm children came of age (at eighteen years old), they held a little celebration like this one with all of the other worm-children that were old enough to be let off the facility without someone supervising their every move.

The group at the table was very familiar to both of them. They were all other members of their company but many were from different platoons. Levi and Iris themselves were not from the same platoon, but had met during company training sessions.

The table had already had a number of drinking glasses laid on it and as soon as Levi had come up to the table, another girl named Jaz held up a shot to him. He took it sheepishly. Iris grabbed another free shot off the table, clinked his glass and downed it.

The new member mimicked her motion and kept the shot down but he shuddered as it burned the entire way down. He shook his head as Iris laughed.

“Get used to it, it’s gonna be a long night otherwise,” she informed him.

Jaz came over and threw her arm around Iris’s shoulders. “It took you guys long enough to get here,” she said.

“Someone was getting obsessive over their eyebrows,” Iris dismissed. For the most part the rest of the group had welcomed them with happy smiles but had quickly returned to their mini conversations amongst themselves. 

“Again?” Jaz asked. Her hand tightened briefly before releasing Iris.

“It’s hard to do eyeliner in a tasteful and not adversely gay manner,” Levi protested. There was a slight blush on his cheeks now, alcohol quickly working on a mostly virgin body.

“If you use eyeliner on your masculine, already-gay face, it’s gonna be gay, no matter what you do,” Jaz pointed out.

Iris pulled away from Jaz, freeing herself and made a brief motion to the bar.

Jaz and Levi both gave her a very quick nod that wouldn’t even be noticed by most people, but the group's comradery ran deep and even their micro gestures were well understood between each other.

Iris slipped off to the bar pulling her own fake ID out for the next round of drinks. The bartender recognized her face, but took her ID anyway, for protocol’s sake and then waited for her order.

“Three Long Island iced teas,” she requested.

“Coming right up,” he said and got to work on those. The bar was busy, every seat taken and many people had opted to stand similar to how Iris’s group was. 

As the sunlight waned through the windows, the bar’s dim but warm amber lighting took over casting everybody in a homey atmosphere.

Iris collected their fresh round of drinks and went back to join Levi and Jaz at the high-top.

A couple of their group had split off to go have a ‘good’ smoke. They’d probably join back up in a solid half hour or so. In the meantime, Iris handed Levi his next drink and urged it into him.

Jaz and her also enjoyed the iced teas and their potent alcohol content.

The three of them were laughing at dumb things before they’d even finished. With flushed faces, they had a very good time. It was a much needed relief.