Work Text:
A Day Not Worth Remembering
One day during dinner, Nayuta makes an announcement, signaling it by slamming her plastic cup onto the table.
“Okay you losers listen up!” she declared to captive audience of three (Denji knew it was three because Yoru mostly never paid attention to Nayuta unless prompted by Asa). “Next week's my birthday so you better have something amazing planned out for me!”
This caused Denji, Reze and Asa to all look at her in confusion.
“Devils have birthdays?” Asa asked, looking to Denji and Reze for assurance, to which Reze could only shrug, and his guess was as good as Asa's.
“Since when is it your birthday?” Denji asked, and he took note of how the proud and smug look on Nayuta's face suddenly fell to agitation as she dropped back into her seat.
“Since I decided to have one,” Nayuta said, and that pride returned to her features. “If I want to do a better job as passing as human, then I think I should do more human things, and have a birthday party seemed like a good way to start.”
“How do you even decide when your birthday is?” Reze asked, more curious than skeptical.
Denji remembered how he had once been mailed false documents regarding Nayuta to make it seem like she was just another girl, a normal Japanese citizen and stuff like that. He did look over it, and while he tried to understand most of it he knew that it was important stuff. It had all been lost in the fire, so he couldn't go back and double check to see when Nayuta's “birthday” had been.
“Even though we don't place the same kind of importance on it like humans do,” Nayuta continued. “Devils are still born, and thus I can decided to take the day I appeared in the human world as a day to celebrate.”
“You just want a day all about you, don't you?” Asa said, and Denji wondered how much of that came from Yoru.
“Is there anything wrong with that?” Nayuta said smugly.
An argument soon began to break out between Asa (and Yoru), and Nayuta, while Reze tried to maintain the peace between the two of them.
Denji meanwhile leaned over his food, mindlessly poking at his dish with his fork.
Birthdays, huh? He honestly couldn't recall having a real sort of birthday, or at least the kind that most people would have wanted, and now that he's older it finds it hard to really be excited about that kind of thing. What difference does a birthday matter? It's just another day of the year, what difference does it really make? Yeah, they can be nice, he's seen movies and shows where people have birthdays and they have all sorts of fun with tons of family and friends with loads of food and presents.
It all seemed like fun, but can't help but have trouble getting behind the idea of having one. Still, Nayuta looked excited about the prospect, so maybe they could do something about that? Sure, money was always tight, but it might do some good to splurge a bit if it made her happier.
“Yeah, we can have it,” Denji said, putting a bit of excitement into his voice, mostly for their sake. “I mean, don't expect anything too fancy, but I'll see what I can do to make it work.”
Nayuta could only cheer.
“Just don't be a brat about it.”
“Since when am I ever a brat?”
Denji couldn't help but laugh, and to his relief, Asa and Reze seemed to soon join in as well.
000
The next week do they have a party, and to Denji's surprise Nayuta invites several other girls from school over. When Denji asked about if they were friends, or friends, Nayuta had told him that they were here of their own volition, that she had not coerced them into coming over via mind control or threat of bullying. He didn't say anything, because he knew that she might have reacted negatively to the implication, but he was happy that she was making friends, actual genuine friends. The apartment was loud as they screamed as laughed about stuff that girls did, and one of them brought over a karaoke machine that they had been quick to plug into the TV. None of them were good at singing, but they still sung their hearts out, even when the pets began to add their own voices to the mix. It was easily one of the biggest dinners Denji had to make, and he was thankful that Asa and Reze were there to help him get it out.
Presents are given, from her friends as well as the three of them. Four if you counted Yoru, who Asa had to convince to help her on ideas to give as gifts. Things like toys and clothes were given and even a movie, and Nayuta ate up the attention from her friends to the point that the the three (four) of them went unnoticed by young devil for almost the entire party
Denji had gotten her a CD for a singer that she liked, and considering that her songs had been blasted out during karaoke at the party it was the right call to make.
Reze had gotten her a pair of nice sunglasses, something she would later wear as much as she could because she liked how cool and intimidating they made her look.
Asa and Yoru got her a book on the history of the Japanese political systems. It had been Yoru's idea, and that had seemed to be her favorite, and while Denji wasn't an expert on politics he didn't think it was as much of a comedy as Nayuta made it out to be.
The Happy Birthday Song Denji found grating.
In the end, they ate cake.
000
As time went on, Denji began to remember more from his childhood, for better or worst.
Mostly worst.
He remembered his dad, though his face was something that would always be blurry in his mind. He would recall a dirty house and empty bottles all over the place and the smells that came from them and how he didn't like them. Sometime he would come home late in the night when Denji had tried to fall asleep in front of the TV because the lights in his room didn't work and the dark made him afraid. The smell of the bottles would be on him and he would be angry and would yell about the money he lost at the tracks.
He remembered the beatings.
He remembered the event that would alter his life forever, but the aftermath itself was almost a blur until he was standing in front the grave with that old man telling him to pay off a debt that was never his to begin with.
At no point could he ever remember having a birthday party.
Maybe his mom would have thrown one if she had been alive.
000
One day, Asa asks a question.
“When are your birthdays?”
It catches both him and Reze by surprise, though in hind site, he should have known when this would come up. The three of them were sitting at a park bench in the mid-afternoon, enjoying ice cream. Not too far away was a dead devil that he and Asa had taken care of, but its corpse didn't hinder the conversation at all.
“What brings this up?” Denji asked, taking a bit out of his chocolate cone. “We just had a party for Nayuta.”
“I know that,” Asa said with a roll of her eyes. “But it got me thinking that it's something we've never talked about before, and I think that's something we should know.”
“We should?” Reze said, and sometimes Denji has to remind himself that despite how much more put together she was compared to them, that Reze's life growing up was worst than his. People celebrated birthdays, even he knew that, but...
“Yes, we should,” Asa said, and for a moment it seemed as though she had lost heart in her own argument. “Growing up, my birthday parties were never big, I had trouble making friends and the only kids who came were the ones who were told by their parents to come, and as I grew older the only people who were there were my mom and dad. It bothered me that I didn't have any friends, but I appreciated that my parents were always there.” She paused, taking a deep breath. “When they died, and I was alone, I stopped celebrating my birthday altogether because it just reminded me how I had nothing left, but now that I have people in my life again, people I love, I want to start celebrating them again.” As she went on, a smile began to grow on her face, a smile that both he and Reze liked, but it vanished when she caught onto what she was saying and became flustered for it. “I mean, if that's alright with you, but if you don't want to, I won-”
“Yeah, that sounds like fun,” Denji said, stopping her before she became too self-deprecating. “If we could handle Nayuta, than I don't see why we shouldn't give you one too.”
“I think it could be a lot of fun,” Reze said, leaning back in her seat.
“Really?” Asa said, surprised. “Yeah, it's going to be fun! Great even!”
Reze laughed, while Denji kept himself reserved. “When your birthday?” he asked.
“The last day of the month.”
000
While Nayuta had gotten a party with her friends from school with loud singing, it had been decided that Asa would would something else than that, and so they had taken a risk and chose instead to take her to a museum for the day. Personally, Denji didn't see the appeal of the place, and he couldn't imagine being there himself, but seeing Asa's face light up as they walked up the building made him happy that he was wrong. They had spent their day going from exhibit to exhibit, with Asa taking interest in history, science, culture and dinosaurs, going over all the panels and listening in-depth to what the tour guides had to say, taking in all the information she could absorb, and where would redoubtably repeat it back to them, and he would happily listen to such information for as many times as she would speak it. This had also been a bonus treat for Yoru, because while she rejected the idea of celebrating a birthday for herself, declaring it below her, it was clear she wanted some kind of attention, so showing her the displays on the wars that had remained had done her wonders. She would recite the wars that had been erased while in control of Asa's body, lecturing them on their glory and feeling proud of herself for what they had been. Both of them had a great day.
He and Reze had to convince Nayuta that it was only fair that she get Asa a present since she had gotten her one herself, which led to Asa being gifted a a combat knife. Where Nayuta had gotten it, no one had known, but Asa seemed genuinely impressed with it, so maybe's Yoru's love of weaponry was rubbing off on her.
Reze had gotten her a trilogy of fantasy books that Asa had once mentioned she had when she was younger but lost, and the almost teary-eyed look she denied having was proof that it was a good gift.
Denji had gotten her a set of starfish hair ties, to which she warmly laughed upon seeing them, before redoing her hair with two of the clips. “I'll try and find more reasons to wear something this nice,” she had said, and it made Denji feel good to know she had liked it.
He still doesn't like the birthday song.
Again there was cake.
000
When he was with Pochita, he forgot when his birthday was, he knew of the general time frame it was supposed to be, but the exact date was something that had slipped his mind. Those days he would imagine some big party where he could get lots of gifts and play video games and would get a girlfriend and he would eat cake until he got sick. But reality was not so kind, and no one he knew would be as charitable to him as he would have wanted them to be, not the Yakuza and not the townspeople who he knew knew about his situation.
But he had Pochita, and however bad things got, no matter how much he wanted them to be better, he had his small devil friend with him. Pochita always made things better, and he wondered if Pochita knew about birthdays, and if he hadn't would he have gotten him something if he did. Maybe he should have asked Pochita when his birthday was, if he had one.
Still, it was around that vague week of when his birthday was supposed to be that he would treat himself and Pochita to “cake”, though back then that was mixing flour and water, with sugar added in to make it taste sweet. At the time it was the best thing he ever ate, but now that he knows better he knows that he was eating glue.
He's grown since then.
000
“You know, they never told us what our birthdays were,” Reze said, all three of them on the roof of the school between classes. “I don't even know if I'm actually as old as I think I am, I just have that number because I was told that was how old I was.” She leaned against the railing and looked at the city before them. There was still plenty of destruction from when the world almost ended, but construction efforts were still going on. Sometimes it was odd to think how the world can almost move on from everything that had happened, but given time most things recover.
“I'm sorry to hear that,” Asa said with a frown. “And about some of the other stuff I said, It slipped my mind that you-”
“Don't be,” Reze said with a laugh. “It's alright because I decided that next Saturday is going to be my birthday.”
“Why's that?” Denji asked, and he wondered if he could just pick a date like that.
“Well, a birthday is to celebrate your birth, the day you receive your name? Right?” Both he and Asa nodded in agreement. “Can I share with you two a secret then?” Again the both nodded, and when Reze leaned in towards them, they leaned in as well. “My name's not actually Reze,” she said with a whisper.
“Huh?”
“What?” They both go, pulling back from her in surprise, and Reze can only laugh.
“Nope!” she said cheerfully. “That name is one they gave me when they assigned me to the mission that would take me to Japan, an alias to use.”
“Wait,” Denji said, looking between Reze and Asa's confused features, while he tried to figure this out. “If your name's not Reze, then what is it actually?”
“Reze,” was what the girl simply answered with.
“But you said-” Asa said, trying to grasp this new information.
“That they named me Reze when they assigned me on my mission to take in Denji,” Reze said, and her tone dropped off slight, likely as the less than pleasant memories were remembered. “I didn't think much of it at the time, but it's the name I want to keep, because it's the name of someone who is a better and happier person than that other girl could ever hope to be. Next Saturday is the anniversary of when I received that name, so I want that to be my birthday.”
Denji can't help but be amused by how she felt about that.
000
When Reze's birthday comes along, there is, by coincidence, a festival going on downtown, so it's a no brainer to take her down there. He never found out what it was for exactly, but it was a fun thing for them to do, there was good food, live music, a raffle that they each signed up for but all lost, varying street performances, and even a petting zoo. One event in participial was some kind of show of some dance company or school showing off their dancers, and while Denji would admit that he enjoyed the views of the girls dancing around in their tight leotards, he found himself looking at Reze, who looked at them with a wide-eyed awe. Maybe she had an interest in that kind of stuff, he knew ballet and Russia was a sort of thing, but he couldn't recall Reze ever mentioning it to anyone before. If she did, maybe he and Asa could get tickets to a show for her or something like that down the line. There's was honestly a lot to do there, much to see, and between all that and the foot traffic they were there for longer than they had wanted to be before they could head back to the apartment, but not before the fireworks went off.
Reze had recently taken up baking as a hobby, so it was not uncommon for her to make things like cookies and cakes, and according to Nayuta, the chef hat that she had gifted her would only increase her effectively in creating pastry delights. Reze had seemed to like it, and wore it for the rest of the party.
To continue with the theme of nurturing Reze's recent hobby, Asa had gotten her a cookbook of baked goods, saying that she thought that Reze would want to learn more than what she had been doing so far. Reze looked through the book, and promised that she would bake a pie that had caught her eye.
Denji had gotten her a puzzle book in English, and when he told her to see if she could find “Big Ass” she burst out laughing, which was followed by Nayuta laughing on the basis of “Big Ass”, all while Asa looked at them in confusion. They really needed to get her in on the joke.
The birthday song still sucked, and Denji assumed it always would.
There was still cake.
000
When Denji came to Public Safety, it occurred to him that he could have a proper birthday for once, he had stuff like a bed and food, so what was to stop him from getting a cake once a year? Nothing, that's what! All he needed to do was find out when his birthday was, and he thought that maybe he could ask Makima if she could help with that, she was a government person, so maybe she could find his birth certificate or something that would let him know when his birthday was exactly. It was something he was looking forward to, having a party with awesome foods and people giving him free stuff, it was going to be awesome.
He never got around to asking her though, because stuff kept happening, getting in the way.
Reze happened, for better and for worst.
Then there was the mess with the assassins.
Then the Gun Devil...
…
Then his birthday actually came, and he didn't know about that until it was too late...
Whenever he thinks about his birthday, all he can do is think about that door, and Power holding that stupid fucking cake and the look on her face just before Makima...
Denji doesn't want to celebrate his birthday.
He's awesome, and he's happy to be alive, but instead all that date reminds him of him being at his very lowest, when he had lost what little he had left. Whatever good he can get out of that day are outweighed by the bad.
Asa and Reze keep asking him when his birthday is, and he keeps telling them that he'll get back to them, but he doesn't intend to. He doesn't like lying to them, but it's the only thing he can think of to say. After a while they stop asking. Maybe they got tired of asking, or maybe they took the hint. Either way, he's glad they stopped, it's just not worth going over.
000
On the eve of his birthday, both Asa and Reze stay the night. It's not uncommon, in fact it's become increasingly common as time goes on, so while there's nothing unusual about it, they go and make it a point that they wanted to stay over. On one hand he's happy for that, another part of him is dreading it because they might make a big deal of it in the morning, but then again how could they? He never told them that. Maybe he was just over-thinking it.
Whatever the reason, when he woke up, he noticed that he was alone in bed, but he also noticed a smell coming coming from the kitchen, and upon getting up to investigate he discover the girls there, as well as a large stack stack on pancakes.
“Morning Denji,” Reze greeted, and was followed by similar saying from Asa and Nayuta, standing over the stove as she flipped a pancake in a skillet. “We were just about to send Nayuta to wake you up.” She was wearing her chef hat.
“Pancakes?” he asked, already feeling his mouth water. He didn't get pancakes all that often, he tended to keep breakfast simple, but it seemed like Reze had gone all out for this, not only were they so many pancakes, but there was butter and syrup, and he could see bowls of chocolate chips and blueberries, and cinnamon too. Holy shit there was bacon too!
“What's all this for?” he asked, walking up to the table and finding that already it had been set with plates and cups set up for everyone. Nayuta was already in her seat, tapping her fingers on the table with impatience, while Asa was going to get the fridge to retrieve juice.
“Oh, this? Nothing really, I just got into a pancake mood, so I wanted to surprise everyone in the morning.”
Denji eyed the pancakes before him, and he waited for something. Something to indicate that this was a surprise party that he didn't want, a reminder of a day he didn't want to remember, but no one said anything.
Maybe it really was just Reze striking a pancake mood?
Whatever the reason, he sat down, and when Reze had cooked up the last pancake, they all ate a delicious breakfast.
000
The day went on and everyone went their own separate ways to accomplish their own varying errands, and Denji found himself out and about with Nayuta to do much needed shopping.
“We should go to the park!” Nayuta announced, chest puffed out as she pushed her sunglasses down her face. She had really grown to like those things. “I want to throw peas at the ducks.”
“Wait, is that why you made me buy peas?” Denji asked, looking down to his bag which contained a bag of frozen peas. While Nayuta did eat peas, she wasn't a big fan of peas, she never craved them before, so between that and his similarly more neutral attitude they were not something he ever bought. “Why not throw them bread?”
“Because the bread is mine, and Asa told me that bread is actually bad for ducks.” Without waiting for a further answer, Nayuta reached into his bag and pulled out the bag of peas, before she rushed off into the park. With an annoyed sigh, Denji chased after the devil, but no sooner did he see her by the pond did the park suddenly fill with screams.
Turning around he saw crowds of people running away from a large, machine-like devil, roaring and hissing as the people fled, large blades spinning wildly under its wide underbelly.
“Holy shit it's the Lawnmower Devil!” Nayuta gasped, pointing at the devil as it tried to swipe at people. She ran up to Denji and took the bag from him and slapped him on the back. “Go get him Chainsaw Man!”
Since he was never one to turn down requests, Denji reached under his shirt and pulled at his ripcord, and rushed at the roaring devil with his own devilish laughter.
It was a fun fight, it got his blood pumping and he could hear Pochita beat in his chest, and when the devil was no more than a chopped up corpse beneath his feet, he was glad to see that no one had been caught in the collateral. It was odd, typically a devil appearing like this would mean some deaths at least, but it seemed like a good day after all.
000
When they returned to the apartment, Asa and Reze had already returned, and they had already begun working on dinner despite how early it was.
“I think we should have a movie night,” Asa had said, reaching into her bag and pulling out three DVDs of movie he had never heard of. “I went to the rental store and asked if they had anything good, on a whim of course!” she said, her voice catching itself at that last bit. “Something good, but something bad, but bad in a way we could all laugh at and have fun with, I know you like those kinds of movies the best.” She reached back and scratched the back of her neck, her hand brushing against the starfish hair ties. “I just figured it had been a while since we had a movie night, so I wanted to get dinner out of the way as quickly as we could.”
Denji reached down and took the movie from her, and looked them over. “Yeah, I'm down for some movies, but only if everyone else is.”
Asa seemed to relax at that, and she smiled. “Yes, I think we're all up for that.”
Dinner is prepared and eaten, and when the dishes had been left in the sink for later do they got the couch and TV to put on the first of the movies that Asa had brought over. One of the movies was good, one was so-so, but another was bad but the kind of bad they could all laugh at.
Asa had also gotten a box of snack cakes, individually wrapped chocolate cupcakes, and it didn't take long for them to make their way through the box, the discarded plastic wrapped stuffed back in.
It was later into the night when the credits of the final movie had played. Nayuta was on the floor in front of the TV, passed out in a pile of dogs and cat, while the three of them were on the couch, with Asa and Reze reclining and laying against him. They had been like that since the final movie started, and it was comfortable enough that Denji had no desire to move from it, in fact he would have been happy to fall asleep between them like that. But it seemed not to be when Reze got up and started to stretch, but then she reached down and kissed him, which was followed by Asa kissing him.
It went on a bit more from there, and it took very little to convince him to let them lead him to the bedroom.
000
Looking back, it was sort of obvious what they were doing, between the pancakes, the devil fight, the movies and even the sex, that they were trying to throwing him a birthday party without ever really throwing him a birthday party. He wondered how they knew that it wasn't something he wanted to celebrate, maybe they found some way to get into contact with Kishibe, or they made some contract with a devil to find it out. Either way, it kept his mind off the things he didn't want to thinking about, to make certain that he enjoyed himself through the day, and despite everything, he did appreciate it, to be acknowledged and treated nice, and to not be reminded of the bad things.
He didn't need a cake with 'Happy Birthday' written on it, he wouldn't even know what to wish for when he blew out the candles. Well, that wasn't entirely honest, he knew what he would wish for, but it wasn't something that could come true.
If he did make a wish on a cake, it would have been that his old family and his new family could all be together. He sometimes thinks about how they would be around one another, about how Power and Nayuta would be awful and great in equal measures, and he could see her testing Asa's patience to the extreme, and he would want Aki and Reze to get along despite the stuff that happened between them during that night. If things were perfect, they would all be together.
He missed them, he missed them more than anything.
Maybe one day, he'll be up for celebrating his birthday properly, with a cake and a party, but for now it makes him think too much about some of the worst things that had happened. Maybe he'll get over it, accept it, even if it never stop hurting completely, but for now he's happy with what they've given him.
All in all, it wasn't a horrible birthday like he thought it was going to be, he rather enjoyed it, and he hoped that they would become better the more he got.