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The first birthday that Kojiro celebrates with Kaoru is when he turns four. It happens in their kindergarten class. Their teacher gathers everyone in the center of the room with her charming smiling and clapping hands. At first, Kojiro doesn’t understand what’s happening until the teacher starts leading the class in a birthday song. His eyes widen with surprise as he stares around at the other children in the class. Sure, he’s been bragging about it being his birthday all morning, but he didn’t actually expect anything like this, especially not when the teacher busts out a box of birthday cookies for everyone.
Kojiro hands out a cookie to each of his classmates. Kaoru is the last in line and Kojiro is grinning madly when he hands over the cookie to him. He leans in enough to whisper; “I saved the best-looking cookies for the two of us.”
Kaoru blinks for a moment but then smiles.
“Happy birthday, Kojiro.”
---
On his eighth birthday, Kojiro gets his first skateboard.
He’s been begging his parents to get one for months after he and Kaoru had seen some older kids skating in the park. It’s love for both of them from the moment that they first saw a heel flip. They collect up every skateboard magazine they can find and scour the internet for videos of different tricks and tutorials. Sometimes it feels like they’d be able to skate like the pros as soon as their feet touched a board.
Kaoru’s parents get him a board for his birthday back in March and Kojiro is frothing with jealousy. The only thing that tempers him is the fact that Kaoru lets him practice on it. It helps, but it’s never satisfying to step off of the board and hand it back.
The morning of his birthday Kojiro wakes, nearly bursting at the seams with excitement. There have been enough hints from his parents that he’s all but certain that he’ll have a skateboard to call his own. When he comes down to the kitchen and sees only the breakfast that his mother put out for him, disappointment looms over him. The breakfast is perfect, of course, but it’s not his skateboard.
As he finishes eating, he hears the now-familiar sound of Kaoru rolling up to the house on his board.
“Thanks for breakfast,” Kojiro mumbles as he pushes himself away from the table.
“Oh, dear,” his mother says. “You should wait just a moment. I think you’ll need what your father has for you…”
And then his dad is in the kitchen, holding out a brand new skateboard. His parents beam at him and Kojiro nearly cries. He launches himself at each of them for a hug before tearing the board away and crashing out the door to show Kaoru.
For the first of many times, they skate to school together.
---
Kojiro breaks his wrist on his tenth birthday.
They’ve been lucky so far. Neither he nor Kaoru has broken any bones since they started skating. There have been plenty of cuts and bruises, but nothing they couldn’t patch up themselves with a first-aid kit.
Really, it was only a matter of time though.
The emergency room of the hospital is packed full of all kinds of people with different injuries and ailments. It makes Kojiro a little queasy to look around at them all. It makes him even more queasy to look at his own wrist.
He’s about to look at it again when Kaoru smacks his good arm.
“Don’t you dare,” Kaoru says. “A broken bone is bad enough. You don’t need to make a mess with your puke, too.”
Kojiro scowls at him and sticks out his tongue. “I wasn’t gonna puke.”
Kaoru rolls his eyes. “Sure you weren’t. Just like you didn’t totally wipe out on the halfpipe today.”
His mother is up at the front desk inquiring about how long the wait is, so Kojiro risks shoving Kaoru with his good arm.
Kaoru just laughs while Kojiro slumps back into his seat to sulk.
Eventually, though, Kaoru says; “You almost had it, you know.”
Kojiro blinks and looks over at his best friend. “Huh?”
“The aerial,” Kaoru replies. “You almost had it down.”
Kojiro feels his cheeks warm as pride warms in his belly. “You think so?”
Kaoru rolls his eyes, perhaps unable to be this sincere for too long. “I know so. If you had pulled a few more degrees in the air you would have landed it perfectly.”
Grinning, Kojiro goes to lift his hand in a fist pump before realizing that it’s his bad arm. He grimaces in pain and shrinks back into his seat.
“Idiot,” Kaoru mutters. “You’re not going to do any tricks right now. But maybe you’ll actually be able to figure it out by your next birthday.”
Silently, Kojiro vows to do just that and stick it in Kaoru’s grumpy face.
---
They’re out late enough to see the sixth of July turn into the seventh when Kojiro turns sixteen.
He, Kaoru, and Adam are skating out ahead of the rest of the group, speeding down the street, weaving up and down alleyways. The city is their skatepark this late at night and the three of them are kings. Behind them, the other skaters shout and cheer, high on life, skating, and probably a little bit of booze.
Adam is in the middle of their trio like he usually is, but he drops back suddenly, slowing his pace before picking up again and moving to Kojiro’s other side.
Kojiro gives both of his friends a confused look, but he doesn’t slow down.
“What the hell are you doing?” he asks.
“Looks like you’ve lost track of the time, Joe,” Adam says with a laugh. He uses the new nickname that Kojiro’s taken on in these dark, heady nights.
“Wha-?” Kojiro starts, but suddenly a loud pop goes off at his other side.
Kaoru has snapped open a party popper, confetti and streamers fly in the air around them. From behind them a series of more pops echo through the night as everyone in the group sets off their own popper. Even Adam sets one off, laughing frantically at Kojiro’s side.
“Happy birthday, dimwit,” Kaoru says.
There’s a glint in his golden eyes and a softness to his smile that makes Kojiro’s heart twist in a way that’s still new to him. Not for the first time, he’s seized by the compulsion to pull Kaoru close and kiss him, but then he sees Kaoru’s gaze flicker over to Adam and the compulsion dies.
Kojiro grins, then throws his head back in sweet, blissful laughter. He has his friends by his sides and his board under his feet.
He doesn’t need a kiss as long as he has that.
---
On his seventeenth birthday, it’s just him, Kaoru, and Adam at Crazy Rock. Adam brought up the idea of using the old, abandoned mine a few months back but this is the first time that they’re really taking a good look at it.
The place is an absolute mess, with dirt and dust flittering through the air. They’re not the first to sneak in there by the looks of the graffiti and discarded cigarette butts and beer cans, but they’re the only ones there now. That’s probably thanks to Adam.
Kojiro glances at him as he rolls just behind him. There’s still a lot about Adam that they don’t know, but they know he has money and plenty of it. They never make a big deal out of it because they can tell Adam doesn’t want them to. He doesn’t hide his affluence, but he’d rather focus on the rush of skating when they’re together.
That’s just fine with Kojiro.
“So what do you think, Birthday Boy?” Adam asks as he taps out a few steps on his board.
“I think it’s perfect,” Kojiro replies just before pushing off and landing a perfect wallride on the side of the path.
When he lands back on the ground Adam and Kojiro roll up to him and all three come to a stop.
Adam digs into the pocket of his jacket and holds out two colorful pins, golden and glinting in the poor lighting of the mine. Each one has the letter S decoratively stretched out in red and white. An arrow, with heart-shaped fletching, pierces through the letter in a dramatic fashion. It’s all very Adam, and yet…
Kojiro glaces at Kaoru. “You designed this?”
There’s a flash of pink on Kaoru’s cheeks, his eyes widening slightly before he schools his expression and nods. “Yeah.”
“It’s awesome,” Kojiro says as he snatches one of the pins from Adam’s hand. Kaoru takes the other.
Adam lifts the lapel of his uniform to show off his own pin adorning his hoodie.
Kojiro grins as he attaches his own pin to the collar of his shirt. He can only imagine the sick things that the three of them will do together next year.
---
By Kojiro’s nineteenth birthday, Adam is gone.
It’s still painful to try and look back and see how everything went to shit. He can’t decide which is worse, Adam acting out and hurting people or the fact that Adam just left without an explanation. It doesn’t really matter when both things hurt as much as they do.
He and Kaoru have been bobbing along in a sea of confusion and anger for the past few months, wondering what they could have done differently, where things had all gone so wrong. The more they think about it, the more they close in on themselves. Kaoru snaps at him more often, and Kojiro lets him. It’s cathartic to argue and bicker over stupid things instead of lingering on the subjects that hurt the most.
As long as they’re still talking. As long as they have each other.
And yet…
“Hey, Kaoru?”
Kojiro’s voice cracks as he speaks.
Kaoru flips his board to stop and look at him. “Yeah?”
“I want you to know first,” Kojiro continues. He speaks slowly, knowing that what he’s going to tell Kaoru is going to hurt them both.
“I’m going to Italy. I’m going to study cooking there.”
---
For his twentieth birthday, his Italian friends offer to take him out on the town for the night. It’s a tempting offer, but one that he turns down with confidence. There’s only one place he wants to be right now, but he’ll settle for the next best thing.
The blue glow of his computer screen welcomes him as he settles on top of his bed. The familiar sound of a phone dialing fills the air until Kojiro’s tired, grumpy face is spread across his screen.
“Morning, Princess,” he says with a grin.
Kaoru grumbles something unintelligible as he slides on his glasses. He straightens up, still in his own bed, looking rumpled and unkempt.
He looks lovely.
“If it weren’t your birthday today I’d hang up right now.”
“But it is my birthday,” Kojiro teases. “Soooooo?”
“So, happy birthday, you dumb gorilla.”
Kojiro can’t stop smiling.
---
His twenty-sixth birthday might be the best one yet.
He’s surprised when he comes into Sia la Luce and finds Kaoru there instead of his staff.
“Oh no,” Kojiro says in mock terror as he clutches a hand to his chest. “You’ve murdered my staff and now I’m next. I knew this day would come!”
Kaoru gives him a flat expression as he snaps his fan closed. “While I would absolutely be capable of all of that, I don’t think it would make for a terribly good birthday present.”
“Birthday?” Kojiro says. He runs a hand over his curls. “Is that today?”
He hasn’t really celebrated his birthday in any big way in years. His parents usually have dinner with him. Sometimes Kaoru joins them. He’s had ladies who have begged to spend his birthday with him, but he’s always turned down that particular offer. There’s only ever been one person he wants to have that sort of birthday with and he’d never been an option until now.
“Don’t play dumb,” Kaoru replies. “It’s hardly necessary for you.”
Kojiro chuckles and moves in towards Kaoru, wrapping one large arm around him and pulling his body flush to his. He nuzzles his face against Kaoru’s cheek, up near his ear, and murmurs; “Are you here to wish me a happy birthday, Kaoru?”
Though Kojiro can feel the receptive softness of Kaoru’s body, he’s not surprised when Kaoru smacks him with the broadside of his fan.
“There will be time for that later,” Kaoru tells him. “The others will be here soon.”
“Others?”
Reki, Langa, Miya, Hiromi, and Oka crowd into the restaurant not long after that. Apparently, Kaoru had paid off his staff for the day and was donating a substantial fee to make up for the day’s lost business. Today is wholly dedicated to celebrating. Kaoru makes it clear that no excuses will be tolerated.
Not that Kojiro feels the need to object, not when he’s surrounded by his friends, the family he’s built. There are flowers, cakes, and drinks. Games and singing and dancing. His parents visit for a while, invited by Kaoru, of course. Kojiro happily introduces them to everyone there.
Adam and Kikuchi stop briefly between meetings, Adam with a giant bouquet of roses for him. Langa looks a little relieved that they’re not for him this time. They toast to another year and reminisce about old times they had once been buried under a mountain of hurt and misunderstood feelings.
It’s been a while since Kojiro has felt this completely whole, and he smiles in spite of himself.
Later, after everyone but Kaoru has left and they are walking hand in hand through the night towards Kojiro’s apartment, he lifts Kaoru’s hand and kisses it.
“What’s that for?” Kaoru tentatively inquires.
“To show you how happy I am,” Kojiro replies easily. “How much I appreciate what you did today. How much I love you.”
Kaoru blushes in that perfect way he does when he’s overwhelmed by Kojiro’s affection. It’s one of Kojiro’s favorite expressions to see there.
Like earlier, he wraps his arm around Kaoru and pulls him close.
Kaoru gives his chest a smack. “What are you doing, idiot?” he hisses. “We’re still outside.”
Kojiro shakes his head before resting his forehead against Kaoru’s. “Don’t care.”
And he doesn’t. There’s not anyone out at that hour anyway. They’re alone on the side of the street, and at that moment it feels like they’re the only two in the whole world.
“Wish me a happy birthday, Koaru?” he murmurs.
Kaoru sighs but presses a soft kiss to Kojiro’s lips. “Happy birthday, Kojiro.”