It wasn’t anyone’s birthday. No big celebration. No long group chat threads planning outfits or reservations. Just a spontaneous “Tara, hang out?” that snowballed into one of the most chaotic, comforting, and hilarious nights we’ve had in a while.

My house wasn’t ready for company in the traditional sense—no scented candles lit, no fresh linen on the couch. Just the familiar chaos of a lived-in space: slippers kicked off at the door, chargers trailing like vines from sockets, a basket of unfolded laundry quietly watching from the corner. But it didn’t matter. The people coming weren’t guests. They were mine.

They arrived in waves, arms full of plastic bags and shared cravings, laughter already spilling through the hallway before they even set their things down. There was a kind of soft hunger in the air—not just for food, but for connection. For the kind of togetherness that comes without trying.

We didn’t dress up. We didn’t even sit properly around a table. We just existed. Cross-legged on floors, curled on the couch, standing around the kitchen counter eating with our hands like kids who didn’t want the night to grow up too fast.

The food was unpretentious and perfect.
Pizza, still steaming in its box, devoured slice by slice between stories.
Roasted chicken, the kind you tear into with bare hands and lick off your fingers.
Cheese macaroni, warm and golden, nostalgic in a way that tasted like childhood, like Sundays, like comfort.
And Jan, with his magic touch, brought out freshly baked cinnamon rolls—soft, sticky, fragrant with cinnamon and vanilla. He brought them out with quiet pride, and we devoured them like they held a little piece of love in every bite. Maybe they did.

There were drinks, too—none of them matching, all of them mismatched in the best way. Soda cans opened with a hiss. Sweetened cocktails someone pulled out from a forgotten corner of the fridge. Bottles that looked a little too mysterious to trust—but we drank anyway. It was the kind of drink table that didn’t impress anyone, but also didn’t need to. We weren’t here to impress. We were here to be.

We pulled out Jackbox.tv, and suddenly, the room transformed. From quiet chatter to absolute mayhem. Drawing ridiculous characters, guessing answers that made no sense, shouting things like “That was MY answer!” or “Who wrote THIS?!” like we were defending our honor. There was no prize, but there was glory. And shame. And way too much laughter.

After that, we moved on to Herd Mentality—which, despite its innocent name, started full-blown debates. Someone boldly said “cucumber” when asked about the most hated vegetable, and chaos erupted. The room was split between Team okra and Team Ampalaya. Herd Mentality? More like Herd Madness.

Conversations overlapped—one corner of the room deep in quiet catch-up, another bursting into laughter over a memory no one remembered the same way twice.

And then came the moment we’ll all talk about forever:
Marjen.

One moment, she was dramatically defending her answer in a game, and the next, her words began curling into nonsense, sentences collapsing into each other like drunk dominoes.

A stillness entered the room the way wind stills right before rain.

We turned.
She blinked.
And without warning—
She vomited.

There was a pause. A beat of disbelief. Then we all erupted—not in judgment, but in laughter. Loud, ugly, full-bodied laughter. Because what else do you do when one of your closest friends becomes the plot twist of the night?

Someone rushed for tissue. Another grabbed a towel. Someone opened a window. And then we carried on—cleaning up the mess not as a burden, but as something ordinary, even sacred. A quiet act of care that needed no name.

Later, when the night quieted, when the food was mostly gone and the drinks were half-finished and warm, we all found places to sleep. On couches. On yoga mats. Curled up in corners like cats. Someone fell asleep mid-sentence. Someone else covered them with a blanket without saying a word.

And me?
I lay in the middle of it all—watching, listening, holding it close.

There is something almost holy about watching people you love fall asleep in your home.
Not because the night was wild or perfect or worthy of Instagram.
But because they stayed.
Because your space became theirs.
Because in that messy, ordinary chaos, something beautiful unfolded.

Friendship, I’ve learned, isn’t in the big gestures.
It’s in these nights.
In pizza grease on paper plates.
In shared blankets and borrowed clothes.
In cleaning up someone else’s mess, not because you have to, but because love makes no distinction.

In the morning, they left one by one. Quietly. Sleepily. With soft voices and a thousand inside jokes richer.

But what they left behind stayed.

A living room that smelled like laughter and cinnamon.
A kitchen with mugs we forgot to rinse.
A floor full of crumbs and footprints and memories.
And my heart, full.

Ahhh, I love my friends.

Not in the surface-level way.
But in the way that says,
“Even your most unfiltered self is welcome here.”
“Even your chaos has a home in me.”

Because they stay.
Because they don’t flinch when things get messy.
Because they remind me that some nights don’t need an occasion—only a space, a game, a meal, and the right people.

And maybe a mop.

And if that’s not the definition of love,
I don’t know what is.