Work Text:
Julie took a long sip of her marble soda, enjoying the sweet taste of carbonated Rawst berry. The humid summer heat in Kieran’s hometown was much different than Paldea, but not as brutal as she’d expected. From the way Drayton had described it to her on the plane ride, she’d expected Kitakami in July to feel like the lowest circle of the Distortion World.
To her relief, her experience this week had been nearly perfect in terms of weather. Even the hottest days had been nothing a soda and a shaved ice couldn’t fix. Drayton might disagree; he’d resigned himself to the coldest room in Hideko and Yukito’s house to cope. There was only so much cold treats could do to keep the cold-natured Dragon master cool in this heat. Carmine rolled her eyes, but kept the cold drinks coming his way.
Julie leaned back to look up into the endless blue sky. There wasn’t a cloud to be seen above the towering trees. That was a good thing, especially for today, according to Kieran’s grandparents. She shut her eyes and listened to the soft tune of the windchimes in the breeze, smiling contentedly. This was the very definition of perfection, in her mind. It was a cloudless summer day, there was no world-ending calamity to face, and she was spending the week with the person she loved most. Her mind was clear and her heart was full. She couldn’t ask for more.
Well, almost. She did have a burning question for the boy sitting beside her.
“Hey Kieran, what does tanabata mean?”
She’d heard the word several times today as the two of them walked around Mossui Town. The townsfolk were setting up the booths for festival foods and games, so she was expecting something on par with the Mask Festival.
Kieran took a sip of his marble soda, wondering how best to summarize the topic succinctly. There was a lot to explain. Julie enjoyed a good fairy tale, so he figured he’d start from there.
“Hm, well, it means ‘evening of the seventh,’ if you want the literal meanin’. It’s a festival we celebrate tonight based on an old story. The story goes that there were two gods from opposite sides of the universe. One was the daughter of the Sky King, and her job was to weave the cloth that made the sky change color at sunrise and sunset. The other was the son of the god of life, and he took care of the souls of people and Pokemon that had passed on. They both worked really hard, and didn’t have a lot of time to have fun or fall in love. Their fathers arranged for them to meet at the Milky Way River, and they fell in love at first sight. They got married right away, but things weren’t so great.”
“Oh?” Julie asked. The concern was evident in her voice; she was already invested in this tale. “How so?”
“Well,” Kieran continued, “they both started spendin’ all their time together instead of doin’ their jobs. They got all lovey-dovey instead of workin’, and their dads got mad at them for not doin’ what they were supposed to do. Because they got lazy, their fathers forced them to separate and live on opposite sides of the galaxy.”
“What?!” Julie exclaimed. “That’s awful! How’s that supposed to solve anything?”
Kieran shrugged. “I guess they thought they’d work harder if they weren’t distracted or somethin’. Sounds like a bad idea to me, too.”
“Exactly.” Julie pouted indignantly. “What kind of parents are they to separate them like that? That’s just cruel.”
“Be patient, Julie,” Kieran laughed. “I promise there’s a happy ending.”
Julie took another sip of her soda and sulked. “There better be.”
“Well, you were right – it was a bad idea. They both stopped workin’ completely because they were depressed at bein’ apart forever. Their dads realized they made a mistake and offered a compromise: they could visit each other in private on the evening of the seventh day of the seventh month every year.”
That sounded kinda nice, he thought. A little privacy to talk with Julie like that would be a dream come true. Maybe then he could finally ask her out properly. It had been a few months now since they’d traded Applins; they both knew the meaning behind the gesture, yet the words remained unspoken. One of these days he’d finally work up the courage to say them out loud.
Julie frowned. “One evening out of the year? Not even a whole day?”
“Hey, it’s better than nothin’, right?” Kieran said. “They could meet on the bridge on the river and have a nice date there. That counts for somethin’.”
“I guess,” Julie grumbled. “Still kind of stingy, though.”
“Yeah,” Kieran sighed. “And when it rained, they didn’t get to see each other at all.”
“WHAT?!” Julie shouted, nearly spilling her soda. “That’s terrible!”
Kieran nodded solemnly. “Yup. They’d have to wait a whole year to see each other again and hope it didn’t rain next time.”
“That’s unfair!” Julie was beside herself. She crossed her arms and huffed. “Couldn’t they just go sneak off and meet each other in secret or something? They could be happy and nobody else would have to know.”
“You’ve been readin’ Sis’s manga again, haven’t you?” laughed Kieran.
“Maybe,” she smirked. “I’ve heard you read them too, sometimes.”
He blushed. His cheeks were nearly as pink as Julie’s soda. “H-hey, no judgment. Some of ‘em are pretty good.”
“I’m just teasing you, Kiki.” Julie nudged him gently. “So, back to the story. Do they ever get to run off and be together?”
“No, I’m afraid not.” Kieran looked up in the direction of the festival plaza. “But we celebrate their meeting with the Tanabata festival tonight. We write wishes that we want to come true in the year ahead on slips of paper and tie them onto the bamboo growin’ behind the shrine.”
“So it’s sort of like wishing on a star?” Julie asked.
He nodded. “Yeah, kinda.”
A sudden connection occurred to Julie. “Wait, and today’s your birthday, too! It’s like making a wish on the candles on your birthday cake!” The Kantonian phrase that Kieran and his family had taught her this morning was slowly coming back to her. “O-tanabata omedetou! It all makes sense!”
Kieran laughed softly. Julie had been trying her hardest to perfect her Kantonian. He’d been teaching her words and phrases for a while now, and she was a diligent student. Even if she had the wrong pronunciation, she had the right spirit. It was wonderfully endearing.
“Almost. It’s o-tanjoubi omedetou for ‘happy birthday.’ But yeah, my birthday and Tanabata are all on the same day.”
Julie sighed. “Dang. I thought I was on to something.”
“It’s alright, you were really close.” An idea occurred to him. “So, what are you going to wish for tonight at the festival?”
She was quiet for a moment. She fidgeted with the marble soda bottle in her lap. “What kind of stuff can you wish for, exactly?”
“Well, people usually wish for stuff they really want to happen.” He stopped himself before he blurted out his own wish. “I-it can be something personal or something you want to happen at school. Stuff like that.”
Julie nodded. She knew exactly what she wanted to wish for, but it might be too forward to say out loud. Especially to him.
“I’ll… have to think about it. How about you?”
Kieran turned his head to finish his soda and hide his burning face. He hadn’t expected to be put on the spot like this today. “Uh… w-well, I need to think a little more about it too.”
“Fair enough.” Julie finished off her soda and sat it down on the porch beside her.
Kieran relaxed. Maybe he’d let her read his wish after he hung it on the bamboo tonight. That is, if he could bring himself to write it down.
A quiet moment passed between them. The sounds of the Pokemon in the forest blended with the soft sounds of people going about their day in town. It would be a few more hours before the tanabata festival began tonight. There was cake and leftover snacks from the birthday celebration, and plenty of time left to go explore the trails. But for now, enjoying each other’s company like this was more than enough.
Julie was the first to break the silence.
“Hey Kiki,” Julie said quietly.
“Yeah?”
“The gods in the story are kinda like us, aren’t they?”
Kieran was taken aback. “What do you mean?”
“Well, they get to visit each other every summer, but they have to spend the rest of the year on opposite sides of the world from each other. Well, the galaxy, in their case, but you know what I mean. It feels like we’re a galaxy apart sometimes.”
He nodded. Julie would still be here for another week to celebrate the Mask Festival with him, but her departure date loomed heavy over him. “Yeah, you’re right.”
“It’s hard being far apart for so long like that.” She clasped her hands in her lap. “It gets lonely.”
“It does,” Kieran agreed. He moved over to sit closer to her. “But I look forward to spending summers with you like this.”
“Me too.” She smiled. “It’s worth spending a whole day on a plane to be here with you again.”
“I’ll have to come visit you over winter break again.” Kieran could already taste the chocolate ice cream from the snack cart in Mezagoza. “I had a lot of fun last time.”
“Absolutely!” Julie grinned. “You won’t have to book a hotel this year either. We finally got the guest room all renovated – you can stay with me and Mama.”
Kieran suddenly felt light-headed. Staying in the same house as the girl he loved for a week sounded too good to be true. But here she was, making the offer. He wondered if his face really could catch fire from blushing so much. It certainly felt like it.
“O-oh, th-that sounds really nice, I-I appreciate it,” he stammered. “I’m looking forward to it.”
A voice from inside the house behind them called to them.
“Kids! Come try on your yukatas! A jinbei won’t do for tonight.”
“Comin’, Grandma!” called Kieran. “Guess we better get goin’.”
He helped Julie to her feet. The sudden thought of her in a yukata did nothing to calm his delirious imagination. Pretty. Very pretty. Waya menkoi. He shook his head, hoping to clear it before he began to ramble out loud. He couldn’t take her on a festival date tonight if he was too flustered to function. He’d never hear the end of it from Drayton or Sis, either.
“Hurry up!” called Carmine. “Drayton’s gonna eat the rest of your birthday cake if you don’t get in here.”
“It’s reeeeallly goooood~!” said Drayton languidly. Kieran could almost see the devious grin on his face. “I looove chocolate cake!”
Kieran’s brow furrowed. “Don’t even try it, Toothpaste Head!”
“No violence,” Julie said firmly, placing a hand on his shoulder. “He’s a guest too. If you give him a black eye now, no one’s going to the festival tonight.”
“I guess,” Kieran grumbled. “He better not eat all my cake, though.”
“If he does, I’ll bake you another one. Deal?”
Kieran’s expression brightened. “Deal.”
With that, the two of them went inside to make their preparations for tonight’s festival. As the hours until the festival passed, they drafted their wishes until they got the words just right.
**
Behind the shrine, pieces of brightly colored paper fluttered gently in the summer breeze. The festivities were winding down for the night, but the lights from the plaza illuminated the bamboo thicket with a warm orange glow.
Some papers had simple wishes written upon them. One read, “I want to be lucky in love this year,” while another expressed wishes to graduate high school with good grades. One yellow wish written in crayon broke the mold, wishing for a shiny Arcanine and a trip to the moon. The child’s mother and father had gotten a laugh from his wild request, but encouraged him to tie it on the branch all the same. Whether they were mundane or extraordinary, these wishes were all sincere.
Two wishes in particular stood out. The pink and purple papers were tied to the same plant on opposite branches.
The pink paper held one of the few wishes not written in Kantonian. The handwriting upon it was loopy and feminine. It appeared this person was quite used to writing letters by hand. A single sentence was written upon it in blue pen: I want to live a long, happy life with Kieran by my side. – Julie C.
The purple paper held a wish written in tidy Kantonian script. A faint scribble of red ink could be seen in the corner, barely visible against the paper. The writer had changed their mind after this discovery, it seemed; the wish itself had been written in black ink. This wish was also summed up within a single sentence: I want to be with Julie forever and always. – Koshou Suguri
Tanabata had arrived without a cloud in the sky. If the legend was true, the fated lovers had reunited on the bridge above the Milky Way. Perhaps it was just the excitement stirred up by the festival, but the stars seemed to shine a little brighter tonight.
Perhaps there was a little magic in the air tonight, the sort that made wishes come true.