There’s cake, and what she thinks might almost be a smile on okaa-san’s face. She doesn’t treasure the memory because she thinks there’ll be better ones to come.
They say birthdays are special, and she joins the rest of the class in toddling up to the big wall opposite to the windows she likes looking out of. She’s holding a small sticker with her name clumsily printed onto it, and the teacher guides her towards the small group on the far end all gathered around a purple poster.
“Your birthdays are all in December,” they’re told, “near the end of the year.” The teacher turns to her. “Nagi, when is yours?”
Wide eyes stare at the slightly crumpled sticker in her grasp. Where others have numbers with their names, she has none. She cannot remember precisely what date her birthday falls on, only that around a certain week each year, she’s given a small slice of cake to eat by herself after dinner.
“Are you having a birthday party, Nagi?” Her classmate asks, knees bumping against hers as they sit side by side up on the top of the tallest playground. “We could play princess! It’d be more fun than at school, because school is boring.”
Nagi fidgets with her semi-eaten bento, Lately, she’s been having difficulty finishing the full portions of her meals. Even as she mentally considers what days Okaa-san and Tou-san are likely to not be home, knows that it would be very possible to host a birthday party just like the others, she hesitates.
Honestly, she doesn’t want to have a birthday party.
Nagi doesn’t like the pressure of socialising and playing pretend and acting as a big sister in a fake family made of all her friends, trying to guess at how she’s meant to act because she knows that her family isn’t quite the ideal.
“Maybe, I’ll have to ask.” She says.
Of course, she never does.
There’s no cake. No one asks her if she’s going to have a party.
Nagi tells herself she doesn’t mind.
Chrome smiles. She hasn’t quite got all the pieces together yet, but she thinks she’s getting there. Nearly.
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