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When March 14 rolls around for the first time, Nanami isn’t sure what to expect.
March 14th is her birthday, but…she’s not really sure what birthdays are supposed to be like, to be honest. She knows what they are, of course – unlike Hina Matsuri, most simulation games let at least the protagonist celebrate their birthday – but, being a program, she’s never celebrated one herself.
Is it like Harvest Moon, where your birthday is only important and celebrated once you get married and have a happy spouse, who will cook you dinner for the night? Or is it like Animal Crossing, where even your distant friends get together to make you blow out candles on a cake and give you a present? Maybe it’s more like the Sims, where each birthday is accompanied by a physical change – she really has no way of knowing.
It’s not like she got to see what one was like on the island, either – none of the kids knew what day it was, thanks to the memory loss, and so there hadn’t been any birthdays there. And now that the kids have all graduated from the program, she figures that it’s too late, anyway. They’re all going to move on to their lives, while time flies cruelly on by.
“…Ah, Chiaki-chan? There’s someone here to see you…”
She blinks, looking up from her game to see the outline of her brother. “Here?” Not only was it odd for him to intervene – even now that the Hope Rehabilitation Program has successfully concluded, his position as administrator and observer hasn’t changed – but there’s no way that someone could have returned; the Future Foundation wouldn’t have allowed such a thing.
“Um…maybe I said that wrong. They’re not in the program, but…I might be able to let you speak with them.” Alter Ego presses his finger against his mouth in thought. “I think they’ve set up a camera to the outside, so I can probably tap into that…”
He seems to disappear after that – or maybe it’s more accurate to say that the block of code he was appearing on goes black, since that doesn’t leave – and then all of the sudden she sees a familiar face.
It’s Hinata-kun. The camera’s set up so that she can see his face and what looks like a big cake – with the words “Happy Birthday Nanami” written on it in pink icing, and a big ‘1’ candle in the middle.
“This isn’t exactly the most typical way of doing this, but…happy birthday, Nanami. Hanamura baked you a cake, and the other girls decorated it…I guess you can’t really enjoy it, but we thought you’d like the sentiment.”
It’s funny – they’ve all been rehabilitated, and they all should have moved on with their lives by now, forgotten about the program. And yet here Hinata-kun is, offering her a gift from their whole class.
She can’t help the smile that blossoms on her face. Maybe Animal Crossing was right; it’s the friends that you make who won’t forget you, who will do these sorts of things for you.
“Uh…you can blow out the candle, if you want – or, well, I’ll blow it out for you, but you can make a wish?” He seems somewhat sheepish, but she thinks it’s a neat idea.
“Is that what the candles are really for? Making wishes?” It seems to make sense with what she’s learned from games, but then again, sometimes they can be all over the place.
“Well…that’s what little kids use them for, anyway. But we figured that since this is your first birthday, you’d want to give it a try.”
She nods. If this is how birthdays are supposed to work, then she wants to do it right; she doesn’t know how many of these she’ll get, after all, so she should make it count.
“Okay…go ahead and make a wish, and then we’ll blow the candle out together.”
Nanami closes her eyes. There isn’t really much that she needs, nothing she desires to wish for, and so instead she wishes for her classmates. That they will be happy, in their new lives…and that they will always be friends, even now that they’ve left the island.
And as she and Hinata-kun blow out the candle, she thinks it might just come true.