Ink Stained

86: birthday girl (1)*

誕生日の女の子

She loved birthdays. She really did. She always had.

She used to be ecstatic about anyone's birthday, be it her mother, father, Midori, Shiori, Ryu, or Obaasan (when she tolerated such celebrations) because it meant a full day of fun and trivial happiness when everybody let their inner child loose to run around like little demons without judgement. Birthdays were synonymous with fun and happiness, more so than any ordinary day or holiday.

But now, April twentieth came without warning.

She used to count down the days to her birthday, long for it. Something good always happened on her birthday. This year she hadn't even noticed its arrival. She had no clue how her birthday had come upon her without her noticing it. It did not bring festivity and merriment to her as it used to.

She was nineteen today. This was her fourth birthday without her family. The first one she would remember since she went missing. It was hard for her to feel much of anything positive today.

On their birthday, the rest of her family would plan the whole day out to be perfect. There would be omurice for breakfast with a big smiley face of tomato sauce and a bright good morning! written under the face. Hidden under the plate to be found after the omurice was devoured was a secret note. Following the note's instruction led to another on the fridge, made of all the magnetic letters stuck to the door, pointing off in the direction to go to next.

That was usually the living room. The TV was turned on and paused to a video recording of a spluttering baby sitting in a high chair, a party hat on their head. The baby was staring in awe at the huge cake her mother carried in from the side, as if beginning to plan what was the best way to devour it all. The video recording held all the birthday cake-eating videos of Midori and Pai since they way old enough to eat cake, right up until to their most recent birthday.

After watching the video in its entirety, a little note would float up on the TV screen like the credits sequence in dramas, directing them to go upstairs. There, in their bedroom, they'd find gifts from mother, father, and sister on the bed, draped in pretty wrappers that she loved to keep saved in a drawer in her desk because they were too wonderful to simply rip to shreds.

In the middle of the three carefully arranged presents was a huge card from the rest of the family, wishing a happy, happy, happy! birthday. Not a moment later, her parents and sister would burst into the room and they'd all fall to the floor screeching in mad laughter as everyone tickled and poked at each other. Her father remembered to pull out his camera and snap as many pictures as he could while his two daughters hauled him back down and threw their arms around his neck as they hugged him as tight as they could. They laughed when he pretended like he couldn't breathe, their mother snapping up the camera to take the pictures he couldn't.

After they all calmed down, they'd go back down to the kitchen, where her mother would take out a birthday cake for the special girl – or man – to eat while someone took a video of it to add to the compilation, to be played the following year. Midori always used to make sure to splatter as much of the chocolate and vanilla cake on Pai's nose and face as she possibly could. If either of their parents tried to stop it, both daughters would launch slices of cake at their faces, and then they'd all pick the mess of cake off each other's faces and eat it.

She loved birthdays. She did. She always had.

The tradition was repeated every year. While some might think it boring and annoying, she never got tired of it. But now, now she just hurt when she thought about the family tradition she wasn't sure she'd ever get to play in again.