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“... And for that, please allow me to say it again. Thank you for such a wonderful time today. Please do take good care of me more from now on.”
With that, confetti is popped, startling the birthday boy as thousands of little colored paper rain on him like snow. He had a huge smile on his face while the party attendees pull him one by one in a warm hug.
“Let’s cut the cake!”
Cutting the cake was a wrong idea, Ibara thinks.
Or maybe it was bringing a cake to the birthday party.
Or just holding the birthday party in the first place.
Or the mere thought of hoping to enjoy the day without any headaches.
Cause the moment the cake’s been cut, the moment His Excellency does that and goes to the first recipient, all Ibara could think was murder.
“Won’t you feed me too, Nagisa-kun?”
“...Sure.”
And maybe suicide as well.
It was a humble party, not a lot of people were invited. Just close friends and their plus one or two or three. It was meant to not be grand, just something heartfelt to congratulate Nagisa on the day of his birth, be it true or not because not even himself knew exactly when his birth date was. He said that this was the day he and Hiyori decided to be his birthday, back when they were little, and went along with it up to this day.
It was quite a successful party, if anyone were to ask.
Mika is mortified, standing there looking like a boiled crab.
Natsume is trying to guess the number inside Kohaku’s mind. Kohaku is mentally juggling basic multiplication and subtraction.
Kaoru is busying himself organizing the already neat pile of presents.
Hajime and Subaru seem to be talking about the walls. Or the floor. Then Mitsuru joins and talks about the weather.
Rei is slurping on the tomato juice that Nagisa especially prepares for him because no one else is touching that. He offers some to Yuta who halfheartedly shouted, “Get a room,” before accepting Rei’s offer just to give himself something to do.
Tsumugi is drinking the tea he brought while pointedly not looking at either Nagisa or Hiyori or just the general direction of them.
Jun is helping distribute the cake plate and the spoon, which turns out to be quite a useless task because the cake cutting has been stopped to a halt since the birthday boy is quite busy with other things.
Hiyori is other things.
Ibara is-
“-not paid enough for this. I deserve a raise. One where I raise His Excellency at top of ES tower and push him down like Scar did to Mufasa. I kind of wished an eagle would snatch him mid-air and eat his liver out Prometheus-style, though. That is the only punishment befitting for constantly doing this in a situation where we could be associated with them,” as the party organizers, he and Jun had received a glance or a dozen from the guests, clearly judging — or pitying — them in silence.
Ibara is also taking over the task as the cake cutter because Nagisa is currently still occupied with feeding the cake to Hiyori. Using his hands. Cause that's the most natural thing to do, eating cake with bare hands.
No, the most natural thing to do is to gladly accept — actively encourage and thus gladly accept — being fed cake by hand and even go the extra mile to take his sweet time licking every digit clean from the hand that feeds him. He even had his hands wrapped loosely around His Excellency’s wrist to hold it in place.
“Goddamn, Nagi-senpai is adding another bite,” Jun helpfully comments, massaging his temple as a cover to not stare directly at the sun. True to his message, Nagisa grabbed another handful of chocolate cake to feed Hiyori, blissfully unaware or blatantly uncaring towards the state of the other room occupants.
“The party is over, thank you all for coming, the cake will be distributed shortly and you lots are dismissed,” Ibara cut the next piece generously big especially for Sakuma Rei to honor his service of slurping the tomato juice much louder than necessary that would annoy Ibara to hell and back on a normal day — why does he even use a straw and how he got his hand on one, Ibara doesn’t want to know — but it is the source of his eternal gratitude this day because it drowns other sounds that Ibara would rather have himself dead than hearing.
But the universe is not in Ibara’s favor today, or any day at all to be fair, because Sakuma Rei’s tomato juice is running out and–
“Mmh-”
Ibara is so going to kill himself.
“That’s a… quite a big cut of cake, Saegusa-san,” Kaoru let out a nervous chuckle as he sees Ibara cutting a cake big enough to provide another birthday party. The original cake is enormously huge so it would not run out just because of this, but the piece Ibara put on his plate is sure to be too much for personal consumption.
“Exactly, this is for next year’s portion as well because His Excellency will not be having any more birthdays.”
“Haha,” Kaoru laughed dryly at Ibara who didn’t even tear his gaze away from the cake he’s cutting as he cracked the joke, “any more birthday parties, you mean?”
Only then Ibara looks at him with the look of a looming threat or a call for help, Kaoru is not sure, but it sure will haunt his upcoming nights. Ibara is no longer cutting, Kaoru is no longer smiling.
“You mean birthday parties, right?”
The cake handed to him is one huge piece with at least three spoons stabbed at the top, courtesy to Jun. Kaoru tried his best to shrug it off with an awkward smile and maybe escape Ibara’s soulless eyes or Jun’s ominous fake smile by looking elsewhere, but that was a mistake because what he saw instead is Nagisa licking Hiyori’s cake-smudged face while giggling heartily, his hands circling Hiyori’s waist. And Hiyori? More than happy to present his face with little to no complaint if the love that radiates from his eyes alone is anything to go by.
“Get a room,” Yuta once again shouted before he himself scurried out of the room with a huge plate of cake in his hand, adorned with five spoons.
“But not our dorm room, please.”
“Whatever happens in this room stays in this room,” Jun is still helping Ibara distribute the cake, each piece huge enough to feed an entire Niki Shiina, whatever Ibara means by that, and putting — stabbing — four spoons, at least, on top of the cake before handing them to the guests. They cannot stress enough the importance of using spoons.
“Don’t worry, just a little action like that is nothing to worry about,” Subaru said, as if the little action taking place does not shorten his lifespan by at least 5 years. He accepts the plate and tries his best not to blush because the action is still going on — thankfully their clothes are still intact, unlike their shame, apparently — where they are now going on a full makeout session. It’s like the party never happened, it’s like the others are just decorations, it’s like the world is theirs and theirs alone.
“In case it is not obvious enough, I am instead talking about the murder that is going to happen soon,” Ibara times the end of his sentence with a clean cut of yet another huge chunk of cake.
Subaru blinks.
“And what if word goes out?”
“Then your body is the next thing that stays in this room.”
Silence was not acceptable that day, so Jun had to do an impromptu cup song with a jar of cookies that was conveniently there. It was too heavy to lift with one hand and it doesn’t really let out a good sound because it’s made of glass, so Jun opted to not use it at all and just trust his hands. Halfway through, he lost the tempo and also Subaru.
“What are you doing?” Ibara looked at him like he had just grown two additional heads.
“You’d rather be hearing…” Jun trailed off to give Ibara the closure of lips smacking and soft moans that gets clearer as fewer people are there in the room, now it was just the four of them. That is, if Nagisa and Hiyori are counted as two separate entities. They’ve been glued to each other for so long that nobody would bat an eye if they ended up fusing as one.
“No. You’re pretty shit but keep going,” Jun did just that, but the song somehow changed to an attempt — emphasis on attempt — of Dancing Queen.
“What would you do without me,” that was not a question, but Ibara answered it anyway.
“Murder.”
“That’s what you’d do with me.”
Ibara looks at Jun. Jun looks at Ibara. Hiyori looks content with kissing Nagisa senseless for the next hour or two or three. Nagisa looks like the happiest man alive.
“Hm? Where did everyone go?” Hiyori looks disheveled. His hair is awry with a bit of chocolate sauce here and there. His face is perfectly clean, though, strangely enough. His lips, however, are red and wet as can be, evidence of being thoroughly kissed just moments ago. Nagisa is no better, though it’s not really visible as he buries himself in the crook of Hiyori’s neck, arms holding Hiyori in a sweet embrace.
Ibara and Jun are now putting away the cutlery, already losing the appetite to get any bite of the remaining cake. Or any bite of any food for today. Jun already gave his present to Nagisa, but he considers giving him an additional set of spoons. Cake spoons. Ibara, on the other hand, considers giving himself a present. A gun, preferably.
“They were not thrilled by the thought of supper with obscenity as entertainment,” Ibara cleans up the cake knife with a napkin, silently calculating the amount of force he needed to throw it straight to His Excellency’s head and also His Highness’ throat in one swing.
Hiyori snickers, “As opposed to you two, I suppose?” He got one hand resting on Nagisa’s shoulder, the other buried around silver locks.
Ibara looks at Hiyori. Jun looks at Ibara and then Hiyori. Hiyori looks at Ibara with a playful smirk until he cuts it off with a soft gasp as Nagisa runs his hand inside Hiyori’s shirt, tracing his back in the process, all the while mouthing Hiyori’s earlobe.
Jun is this close to crying. “Please just get a goddamn room,” he said, now already tearing up. Ibara’s soul seems to have left his body.
“Nagisa-kun, you’re gonna get me all sticky!” Hiyori said as if it was not a little too late now that his hands, his hair, his face, his ears, his back, his heart is all covered in the sweet smell of chocolate.
Nagisa pushes his face off of Hiyori’s hair and looks at him in the eye with the sincerity of that of a devout saint, “...Do you want me to stop?”
Hiyori’s grip on Nagisa’s shoulder tightened, his breath hitched, his eyes softened. He feels full, overwhelmed by the love he has for the man in front of him, staring at him with honest eyes and an open heart. At that time, Nagisa could ask Hiyori for the entire universe and Hiyori would, God, Hiyori would give it to him, served on a silver plate along with a ribbon on top.
“No,” came his answer before he closed his eyes to once again feel Nagisa’s lips on his.
“No! Ibara! Don’t kill yourself using that knife! It’s not sharp enough!”
They finally got a room.
“How are you feeling, Nagisa-kun?” Hiyori asked, happily perched on top of Nagisa’s chest, positively beaming. Nagisa runs his hand through Hiyori’s hair. Hiyori’s soft, still a bit wet after taking a shower, smells like heaven, soft and comforting hair.
“...To say that I am happy would be an understatement,” he said as he contemplates painting the sky the same shade as Hiyori’s eyes. The color of a clear evening just when the sun is packing up her things and the moon lets the clouds envelop her in a gentle embrace while they bid the sun goodbye.
“...I should be the one to ask that question, though. You seem delighted pranking Ibara like that.”
Hiyori laughed openly. “It was so much fun! I kinda wished you’d have your birthday every day just so I can pull another one each day and see him shut down like that!”
Nagisa cupped Hiyori’s head with a softness that would make dandelions cry in envy and kissed his radiant smile, hoping some of the sparkle smeared on his own lips.“...You were trying to not make the party drag on too long so that Ibara can have the rest of the day he already cleared the schedule off for him to relax.”
“Um, no,” Hiyori is a generous lover, so he smears his iridescence all over by kissing Nagisa’s smile, Nagisa’s nose, Nagisa’s eyelids, and basically Nagisa’s entire face. “I was trying to hog you all for myself and preferably get you alone to give you the very special birthday present brought by yours truly,” he pulls away and makes a gesture of putting one hand on his chest demurely, the other brushing Nagisa’s pliant lips, undone bathrobe hiding nothing but a shy part of his arms, topping it off with shooting a sultry look, providing Nagisa the best view he could ever ask for — not that he ever needed to.
The grip on Hiyori’s hips would surely leave bruises tomorrow. He hopes it stays there for the next week. “Ibara getting some rest is just a bonus,” Hiyori climbed back to Nagisa’s torso and met his lips halfway.
Ibara did get some rest, but it’s nowhere near enough to undo all the knots in his head, his body, his innocent eyes, unless he went to sleep for one full year.
“...I think my actual birthday was somewhere earlier than today.
...Maybe a few months before. In August.”
“Why is that?”
“...Because the day of my birth, the day I become alive,
...Was when you breathed life into me.”
“Hi, Nagisa-kun! I’m Hiyori, I will be your friend from now on!”
Nagisa flutters his eyes to adjust to the new brightness he is not used to since he spent his life locked in a closed room, having only ever met the sun peeking through the blinds of the window, not like this, standing just an arm away from him. The boy with hair as soft as Monet’s painting then grabs his hand and for the first time, Nagisa can feel his own heart beating from inside his ribcage as if it’s just given the ability to.