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It’s 1939, and Joseph is sitting on the highest balcony on the entire island, some fifteen or twenty stories up. It’s a rare moment of stillness for him; in the last few weeks all he has had time to think about is training, and more training, and the rings in his body that would slowly poison him very, very soon if he didn’t get his act together. There isn’t a lot of time to sit around and watch the sunset.
Caesar disappeared as soon as they were done for the day, citing an errand he needed to run, though Joseph couldn’t see what errand he could possibly do on an island in the middle of nowhere. Whatever the case, he readily admits it’s lonely without his training partner. After two weeks of spending every waking moment together Caesar’s sudden absence bothers him. It’s like an itch he can’t scratch. He tries not to dwell on it.
It’s nice up here, at least- the dying light makes the ocean so dark it’s almost black, almost shapeless. If he really squints he can just make out the smudge of the Italian mainland in the distance. Joseph wonders what’s going on over there this time of day. Are people heading home from work, returning to their families? Are they laughing and talking over dinner? He thinks about Granny Erina all alone at home and he allows himself to wish fiercely, just for a second, that he was home and the biggest thing he had to worry about was getting lost in Midtown.
He is eighteen years old and so he’s really too old for such stupid things as homesickness, especially when the fate of the entire world was at stake. He’s eighteen and he should be thinking about how to defeat the Pillarmen but for some reason right now all he can think about is how much he wishes he didn’t have to.
“It’s quite a view, isn’t it?”
He turns. Lisa-Lisa is standing just inside the doorway, one hand braced on the wall, the other holding a lit cigarette. For once she has her sunglasses pushed up over her hair instead of obscuring her eyes.
Joseph nods. “Never had views like this in the city.”
She hums and doesn’t say anything else, just walks closer and takes a seat in the chair next to him, crosses her ankles and looks contemplatively out at the water. Joseph side-eyes her but it’s evident she’s not here for conversation, so after a moment he does the same.
“Am I late?” Suzie rushes in, out of breath, and when she sees it’s only the two of them she stops in her tracks. Joseph offers her a lopsided grin, but she’s not paying attention.
“Where is Caesar?” she asks Lisa-Lisa.
“He’s coming,” she answers vaguely.
Joseph looks between them. “Coming for what?”
“Jojo,” Suzie says, putting her hands on her hips, like she’s scolding him. “What do you think ?”
“I really- I have no idea.” He looks at the way Suzie is hiding a grin under an attempt at a scowl, the way Lisa-Lisa is gazing serenely at the landscape below. He mulls over the fact they both sought him out during their free time but weren’t immediately demanding something of him.
Something is up. Nothing dangerous, nothing bad, as far as Joseph can tell, but boy does he hate being kept in the dark.
“I don’t know,” he says blankly. Suzie giggles. “What is it? Tell me!”
Lisa-Lisa arches a perfectly manicured eyebrow. “Do you know what today’s date is?”
As if he could forget, as if he hasn’t spent every waking moment with a countdown in his head. “Of course I do, it’s September-”
Oh.
“My birthday,” Joseph corrects himself. “It’s my birthday.”
“Your birthday!” Suzie squeals. “You’re nineteen!”
“Nineteen?” says Caesar’s head, peeking around the corner of the doorframe. “I didn’t bring enough candles, then. I thought you were twelve.”
Joseph graciously decides to ignore that comment in favor of the more important part of that sentence. “Candles? You baked me a cake?”
Caesar smirks. “You could say that.”
“Caesar,” Lisa-Lisa warns.
Joseph suddenly feels like bouncing up and down in his chair, so he does. “Show me.”
“Prior warning, it’s-”
“Caesar, show me the damn cake right now.”
Caesar presses his lips together and steps onto the balcony, lifting the platter he’s holding with a flourish. On it is the single saddest, ugliest cake Joseph has ever seen. It’s vaguely dome shaped, but it’s squished on one side. The bottom is obviously burnt and there’s some sort of chocolate frosting that’s been smeared on in uneven patches, dripping down the sides in an extremely unappetizing manner. A single candle sits in the center.
Lisa-Lisa sighs heavily. “You told me you knew how to bake.”
Caesar shrugged. “I watched the chef once.” He sets the cake down gently and kneels in front of the table, leaning his forearms on the surface.
“Do you like it?” he asks Joseph. His voice is hitched on the last word, betraying the effort it’s taking him to keep a straight face.
Joseph pretends to think about it. “I like the design,” he says seriously. Caesar’s lips twitch. “I have to say I don’t care for chocolate.”
For a few long seconds they just stare at each other. They burst into laughter at the same time- wild, uncontrolled laughter, the kind that cramps their stomachs and leaves tears streaming from their eyes. Joseph pounds the table with his fist and the candle falls over; it only makes them laugh harder. Caesar slides off the table and curls into a little ball on the floor, his entire body shaking.
Joseph doesn’t exactly know how much time passes before they compose themselves, but by the time they light the candle and sing and cut the cake- surprisingly good, despite how terrible it looks- it’s long past dark. The conversation has petered out, and now only the hum of crickets and the rustling of branches below fills the silence. Joseph tips his head back to the sky and breaths deep, feels the cool air seep into his lungs. He hopes Lisa-Lisa will let him keep the mask off for tonight.
“Well, this has certainly been interesting,” the woman herself says finally, rising from her chair. “But we better head to bed. You two have another long day tomorrow.”
Joseph groans at the reminder. Caesar nods gravely, like the suck-up he is.
“Happy birthday, Jojo,” she says quietly as she passes behind his chair, brushing a hand over his shoulder. It feels nice, he thinks to himself. Grounding. Almost maternal.
Lisa-Lisa glides back inside, where she is instantly swallowed by the darkness of the room. Suzie rushes to follow her.
“Happy birthday!” she chirps, smiling sweetly, and Joseph returns it with a matching one, wiggling his fingers in goodbye. Then it’s just him and Caesar, who eases himself off the floor and into the chair Lisa-Lisa had occupied.
“She didn’t make me put the mask back on,” Joseph says. “What a great birthday.”
Caesar chuckles. He looks different tonight, in a way he can’t quite put a finger on. Less guarded, perhaps. There is a softness around the corners of his mouth and between his brows that Joseph doesn’t think he has ever seen before. He wonders if he is finally getting the chance to look at the real Caesar now, someone he would be after the danger they’ve found themselves in passes.
“What are you thinking about right now?” Joseph finds himself blurting.
Caesar eyes him, but there’s more curiosity in his expression than suspicion. “Nothing of interest. You?”
“That I don’t know how you all knew it was my birthday today,” he says, mostly just to say something, but now that it’s out he realizes how genuinely baffling it is. “Only a few people do, but they’re in New York right now.”
“I have no idea,” Caesar sighs. “Lisa-Lisa knew, somehow.”
“Very strange,” Joseph declares. “She scares me sometimes. You think she can read minds?”
Caesar rolls his eyes. “No, Jojo.”
“Then please explain how this could have happened. Go on, use your arrogant holier-than-thou voice. It’ll make you sound convincing.”
At any other time Caesar would have taken the bait, but now he just just smiles, all soft and open like nothing Joseph has ever seen and he has to mentally check to make sure his Hamon mask hasn’t suddenly reappeared on his face because he can’t breathe. He knows he is staring but he can’t stop.
“You’re ridiculous,” Caesar says softly.
“No, I’m Joseph-”
He is stopped by Caesar’s fingers pressing under his jaw and his blue-green eyes suddenly right up in his face, and then they’re kissing, and Joseph forgets instantly what they were even talking about.
What he does know, though, is that it can’t possibly matter what happens in the next few weeks. Whether Joseph is long dead by next September or whether he gets a hundred more birthdays to celebrate, he can say with absolute certainty that this birthday, with his face cradled in Caesar’s hands and the taste of chocolate frosting still on his tongue, is the best one he will ever have.
____ _____ ____
It’s 1999, and Joseph is sitting on the edge of the docks in Morioh. He shouldn’t be, technically; he managed to sit without falling into the water but who knows if he’s going to be able to get back up without help. He can probably use his stand to pull himself if he had too, but for now he’s content to sit and watch the boats. The gentle lull of the waves and the sea breeze through his hair reminds him of something. A muted version of an old memory, he supposes, though he can’t quite remember from when.
It’s 1999 and Joseph is 79 years old. This is the first birthday he knows he has a son. Strange, how this sort of thing has happened again so late in life. Suzie told him she was expecting Holly on his 21st birthday. He remembers it clearly, even now. She set a little box in front of him, all wrapped up in paper with a little bow on the top, and when he opened it the world’s tiniest pair of socks fell out. It was obvious Suzie had knitted them herself, because they were all lumpy and the ends were already starting to unravel but he cried anyway and then she cried and it’s still the best present he’s ever gotten in his life.
“There you are,” Jotaro says, just behind him. Joseph didn’t hear him come up- he decides to blame it on his grandson’s soft footsteps and not his hearing loss- but he’s far past the point of being startled by him. As big as Jotaro is, he has a unique ability to come and go quietly, without disturbance. Or maybe he’s just using his time stop in everyday situations. Joseph figures it doesn’t matter much either way.
“Ah, Jotaro,” he says, and closes his eyes, listens to the jubilant conversations of the others on the dock and the squawking of seagulls circling overhead. “Come to wish me a happy birthday?”
“Happy birthday, old man,” Jotaro says gruffly, like it pains him to say it. “You shouldn’t be sitting at the edge of the water like that.”
Joseph manages not to roll his eyes, but it’s a near thing. “I’m fine. Trust your grandfather a little more, yes?”
“I trust you about as far as I can throw you.”
“Which is probably a considerable distance,” Joseph pats the wood next to him. “Come on, sit with me awhile.”
Jotaro looks out at the water, squinting slightly, like he’s searching for something that has long disappeared over the horizon. “You need to get up. A taxi’s coming to pick us up.”
Now that Joseph had not been expecting. “A taxi? What for?”
“You’ll see,” Jotaro says shortly, clearly not planning on elaborating. He holds out a hand impatiently. “Get up, before you fall in and drown.”
Joseph laughs and ignores the offer of help, instead using his cane to push himself to his feet. He wobbles dangerously as he straightens and instinctively reaches out with Hermit Purple. Then he blinks and suddenly he’s standing several meters from the water, facing inland. Ghostly purple hands are wrapped like a vice around his arms.
Jotaro was staring at him with something dangerously close to an actual expression. “I told you to be careful.”
“Where would I be without you?” Joseph coos.
“Dead.”
It’s an automatic response, blurted out forcefully, like it’s been on the tip of Jotaro’s tongue for all this time. Joseph raises an eyebrow. Jotaro is frozen in mid-movement, looking as close to shocked as Joseph has seen him in years. They look at each other for a few long seconds.
Finally, Joseph breaks. He cracks a smile. “Right you are. I should be thanking you for the last ten birthdays, shouldn’t I?”
There is no response, but then again, he isn’t expecting one. Jotaro still looks a little wide-eyed; quiet panic, panic like you missed a step on the staircase and for a split second you thought you would tumble all the way to the ground.
“Lighten up,” Joseph says. “I’m seventy-nine today and I won’t have you bringing my surprise party down.”
“How-”
“You’re obvious,” He starts hobbling his way toward the road. “Now where is this taxi? We don’t want to be late.”
“Good grief,” Jotaro mutters.
It is a surprise party, at a little Italian restaurant tucked away in the middle of town. Josuke brought his entire rag-tag group of friends, even the strange manga artist who scowls at anyone who looks at him and smiles faintly when he thinks they’ve looked away. The other two boys, Okuyasu and Koichi (he remembers only after several minutes) enthusiastically wish him a happy birthday before disappearing into the kitchen to have an animated conversation with the chef.
Josuke is practically vibrating with nervous energy, so much so that Jotaro not-so subtly moves to the other side of the table five minutes after they sit down.
“So this is Tonio’s,” he laughs nervously. “The owner, Tonio, he’s a stand user too, but his stand is really cool because he can see everything that’s wrong with you and fix it with food. So there’s no menu because he just gives you what’s going to help- but you like Italian food, right? I mean I hope so. I don’t really know a lot of other restaurants in town, because my mom doesn’t really like eating out, and-”
“Josuke,” Jotaro snaps. “Cut it out already.”
“I love Italian food!” Joseph booms. “My wife is Italian, you see, so I’ve developed quite a taste for it. I’m sure anything that Tonio makes will be delicious.”
Josuke instantly brightens. “Wow, okay great, because I was kind of worried. Koichi suggested that we should just have a picnic or something, while the weather is still nice, right? But now I’m glad we didn’t.”
He’s looking at Joseph so earnestly, a world away from how wary he had been when they first met. Is this the son he would have spent the last fifteen birthdays with, if he’d known?
“Anything would have been wonderful, Josuke,” Joseph says warmly. “Thank you for putting this all together.”
Josuke nods and breaks eye contact, brushing the edges of his pompadour with the tips of his fingers. “ ‘Course. Happy birthday, Mr. Joestar.”
“Hold it!” the mangaka suddenly screeches, whipping out a sketchpad from seemingly thin air. “Don’t move, Josuke. This expression is perfect. ”
“Shut up, Rohan,” Josuke snaps, embarrassed. “Stop being weird.”
“Excuse me for trying to improve my craft,” Rohan fixes his gaze on Joseph. “Mr. Joestar, you wouldn’t mind if I sketched you, would you? Your hair is much less distracting anyway.”
“ What did you just say about my hair? ”
“Here we go,” Jotaro grumbles.
“Oh, did you not catch it the first time? Should I repeat it?”
Josuke stands up so fast he knocks into the table and sends all the silverware in the vicinity flying. “You bastard!”
“Don’t be a child- hey! Get off of me this instant! Do not bring out that monstrosity you call a stand, I swear-”
Over the sound of both their shrieking and the destruction of Tonio’s tastefully decorated dining room, Joseph sips serenely at this tea and watches his son absolutely beat the shit out of his friend.
“This is the second-best birthday of my life,” he declares.
Jotaro looks very, very, tired. “You must have had some shitty birthdays if this even makes the list.”
Joseph thinks on that for a bit. Truthfully, he doesn’t remember most of his birthdays in great detail. Most of them were spent at home, probably, a little celebration with just him and Suzie. For others he must have been overseas, sharing a drink with business associates in high-end restaurants. He sifts through decades of Septembers and comes up with moments he’s pretty sure are not dreams: his sixth birthday, where Granny Erina presented him with a great big buttercream cake. His forty-seventh, spent silently fuming over the presence of Holly’s new Japanese boyfriend. His sixty-fifth (or sixty-sixth?) in Cairo, where he met a young man named Muhammad Abdul who would for a few years be his closest friend.
“They’ve all been good,” he says finally. “But I quite enjoy having a son to celebrate with.”
Jotaro’s face softens. “What’s the first?”
“What?”
“You said this was your second-favorite. What’s the first?”
The truth is the memory is hazy now, after sixty years, but Joseph remembers this: the blue-black of the ocean against a bruised orange sky, the wind in his ears, the steady presence of Lisa-Lisa, and Suzie’s shy smile. The lopsided cake and laughter and the way Caesar’s eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled. The press of lips against his.
It’s a mess of little details framed around the most awful experience of his life, and Joseph isn’t sure if Jotaro would understand yet. They are only eleven years out from killing Dio, not enough time for his grandson to understand how painful memories soften with age, fuzz around the edges until all that’s left are the things that are worth remembering.
So instead, Joseph says, “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
He is rewarded with a scoff, and then a wince as Josuke throws Rohan straight through a wall.
“Food is ready!” Okuyasu crows, bouncing into the room with Koichi and Tonio at his heels. The chef takes one look at the hole in his wall and begins to shout. Josuke cowers behind Rohan, who is half-conscious in a pile of rubble. Jotaro buries his head in his hands and shakes his head slowly back and forth.
Joseph laughs, and laughs, and even after Crazy Diamond has fixed everything and Tonio has served the entrees and everyone is singing Happy Birthday at the top of their lungs he is still smiling like a fool, because it’s not quite what he dreamed up when he was nineteen but it’s close. It means pretty much everything.