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Every dusk on the 21st of December, Asahi Kambe – usually out of anxiety-induced insomnia – would get up before anyone else would, make himself a cup of his father’s family cherry blossom tea recipe out of the secret stash in the den, and just stare out the window as the sun rose.
It’s a reminder of his name and origin story which nearly everyone on the goddamn glode needed to remind him of. His phone would be flooded with news articles–usually from Japan– commemorating not only the Winter Solstice but his insane birth story.
People would remember the birth of the great Kambe Scion – the boy born in a warehouse during a shoot-out during the biggest drug bust in Osaka that ended the second the sun came up and he shot out screaming. He didn’t particularly mind it, but it was getting old.
He doubted anyone cared that much that some random rich kid was born at the most inconvenient time for his parents and himself, but hey, let them have their fun.
For the most part – at least, now that he’s older – he didn’t care too much about his birthday. He wasn’t so gung-ho about it the way he did when he was 9, half of just general declining interest, half because of the impending dread that came with waiting for the inevitable shit-talking letter from the old bag of bones that was his great-grandmother that would be mixed in with the cards from his friends and family. (His father would try to hide it as he does every time but out of curiosity and apparent self-hate, he would find it and read it and feel horrible about himself soon after)
But this year – his seventeenth birthday – something was different. This was a marker for him, a day that reminded him that he was alive despite all of the crazy shit that’s happened to him in his life. Therefore, it deserved to be special.
So, when his fathers eventually woke up and found him sitting on the kitchen counter, he laid back, looked them directly in the face as they were pouring themselves coffee and saying their sleepy ‘happy birthdays’ to him, and said, “I wanna have a party.”
Both men exchanged a surprised look before looking back at their son. “You do?”
He nodded. “Yeah, I do.”
“It’s a bit last minute, don’t you think?” His older dad said.
Asahi simply shrugged. “Just thought of it.”
“I can arrange a hall–”
“I wanna have it here.”
His younger father raised a curious eyebrow, “You want to have it here?”
“Yup.”
“How many people?”
Asahi shrugged, “Thinking 40 - 50 people? I might invite Haruka’s friends from Japan too, so…60? Could be more.”
“66 is the max, okay? I’m not having the whole Tri-state area in my living room and having sex in my closet.”
“Nah. We’ll just chug your secret Soju and do lines off each other.”
“Asahi–”
“Probably get on the roof and try to fist-fight God or something.”
“Mmhm. Let us know how that goes. Just tell me what you need and how long you need us to be away and I’ll start making phone calls–”
“You’re…not staying?”
He looks up from his phone, “You…want us to stay?”
“Yeah?”
“You…want us to be in the same room as your friends?”
“ Yeah? You know – because it’s my birthday? And you guys are my parents? ”
“O-oh. We–”
“We just thought you wouldn’t want to because –”
“Because…?”
The two exchanged confused glances again before looking back at their son, “Y-yeah! Okay, uh – we’ll stick around. We’ll help out with everything.”
“Cool. Can I have waffles for breakfast?”
“O-Of course! I’ll – I’ll get right on it!”
“Cool,” Asahi sat up and jumped off the counter, “I’m gonna go tell Haruka and the twins. Maybe start telling people about it.”
“O…Okay.”
Asahi nodded and started up the stairs, already pulling out his phone to let his friends know about the party while listening to the confusion between his fathers.
He smirked.
‘It’s gonna be an interesting night.’