Notes: Genderswap AU! These girls are just so precious, I had to come back to them...
Day 27: On one of their birthdays
Hinata stared down at her phone nervously, the date on the LINE profile taunting her from where it glowed on the screen.
August 16.
That was Fuyumi Kuzuryu's birthday, and it was a week away.
It wasn't that Hinata was agonizing over a present or anything—she'd put those five days of stress behind her a week earlier, when she had finally found and settled on a cell phone charm. It was pretty cute: a miniature model of a chocolate parfait on a thin cord fastener, with tiny Swarovski crystal accents to give it a slightly more refined air. It was already wrapped and stored safely in Hinata's desk drawer.
The problem was that Kuzuryu hadn't mentioned anything about her birthday herself.
Hinata worried at her bottom lip as she scrolled through their conversation, confirming that there was no mention of a birthday. She felt a bit stupid; here she had gone and gotten herself all excited about celebrating her friend's birthday without considering the idea that maybe she wasn't going to be invited to any celebration. Maybe Kuzuryu was holding a party that would only be for her own classmates, girls that she had known for longer than just two months. Really, there was nothing that the two of them had in common to begin with, except that they sometimes rode the same train.
But, well... she had the phone charm wrapped and ready. Even if she wasn't invited to celebrate with Kuzuryu, Hinata at least wanted to give her the present. It was summer vacation, so they didn't meet up as regularly and predictably as during the school year—whereas they would meet up and go window shopping after school once or twice a week, they had hung out a whopping four times the first week of vacation, and not at all since them—so they'd have to coordinate some time to get together.
Sighing, and with nerves eating at her insides, Hinata scrolled back to the bottom of their conversation and began typing out a message.
-So your birthday is coming up soon, right?
With that expertly-crafted line out of her system, Hinata collapsed back onto the veranda, staring up at her mom's laundry swaying silently in the ineffectual August breeze like some sort of poor man's windchime. What was she so nervous about, anyway? It wasn't like Hinata had never had friends before or anything. She had just... never had a friend quite like Kuzuryu, somehow.
She fisted her hand in her shirt, right above her sternum. Maybe she should get go back inside the apartment; the humidity was making it hard to breathe.
Her phone buzzed and Hinata sat up straight again, grabbing it from the floor and opening up the messaging app as quickly as her fingers would allow.
-Yeah I guess! Being born around Obon kinda sucks tho. No one's ever around for a party or anything, so it's usually just me, my family, and Fujiya.
Relief washed over her; so she hadn't been invited to a party because there was no party to be invited to?
-Oh same! I mean, not that my birthday is coming up or anything, it's on January 1... but it's always impossible to find many people who want to spend New Year's going to some girl's birthday party.
-You totally get it then! Yeah, so I kinda gave up on ever planning anything for my birthday lmao
And then half a minute later, just as Hinata was about to start tapping out a reply, another message arrived.
-So are you going anywhere for Obon?
She felt her chest tighten. That half-minute pause, that roundabout way of asking spoke volumes. Kuzuryu usually acted confident and outgoing, but there were times, every once in a while, when Hinata could see glimpses of a girl who was just a little bit awkward about interacting with her peers. This was one of those times.
Hinata was suddenly immensely glad that her grandmother in the countryside had thrown out her back and didn't feel up to entertaining guests that year—and then was immensely remorseful for thinking such a terrible thing, but she couldn't fight her grin as she sent her reply.
-No, not this year! I'm just sticking around at home. Did you want to meet up at some point?
Kuzuryu's response was a sticker depicting a large, buff yakuza gangster pumping his fist in triumph, followed by a text message to clarify:
-Yeah sure! There's actually a summer festival not far from me that's scheduled on for the 16th if you want to go with me?
Hinata's smile widened. A festival! She was already getting excited just thinking of how much fun it would be to go around the festival together, and she'd have the opportunity to give Kuzuryu her birthday present after all.
-Yeah, let's do it! Where and when?
By the time their plans were settled, Hinata's cheeks hurt from grinning so hard, and her heart was pounding in her chest. That couldn't be a good sign; she probably should head into the air conditioning after all, before she collapsed of heatstroke.
So she stood up and stepped inside, hugging her phone to her chest.
Hinata arrived embarrassingly early at their agreed-upon meeting place, just outside the festival entrance. She shifted her pochette on her shoulder nervously, making sure that the present was still inside there, safe and sound. Sighing, she fanned herself with as she waited; the afternoon's scorching heat was still stubbornly sticking around, but hopefully it would start to cool down soon when the sun began to set.
FIfteen minutes before they were scheduled to meet, Hinata spotted Kuzuryu's car approaching to drop the small girl off. The Kuzuryu family was obviously very well-off—the bodyguard, the personal chauffeur, everything about Kuzuryu pointed towards that fact—but Hinata still hadn't managed to get the full story from her friend.
And, true to form, Kuzuryu stepped out of the car fully decked out in extravagant summer festival wear—a yukata with a base color of butter yellow transitioning to vermilion, patterned with pink and red chrysanthemums; a crimson obi with a glittering golden obijime; blonde hair pulled into a high loose bun, adorned with a kanzashi hairpin in shades of red and pink; she even wore tabi socks and zori sandals, and carried a kinchaku pouch made of red fabric patterned with pink blossoms.
As she stepped daintily towards the entrance with the car pulling away behind her, Kuzuryu looked the very picture of a fairytale princess. Then her eyes locked onto Hinata and she paused mid-step, shattering the image as she opened her mouth to exclaim:
"Why the fuck aren't you in yukata?!"
Hinata looked down at her own clothing: a shapeless unisex tee shirt and a denim skirt that was meant to reach the wearer's knees, but against her lanky legs it was several centimeters shorter. She winced, embarrassed. "I'm too tall to wear yukata," she explained, her ears burning. "No one carries women's kimono that are long enough for me..."
"Shit, really? Now I feel weird, being the only one of us dressed like this." Kuzuryu pouted up at her, fiddling with the whorls of hair trailing from her bun. "I wish you'd said something last week. I know a good place that does custom kimono, I could have had one made for you..."
"Oh, no!" Hinata shook her head sharply. "I mean, if I wanted a custom yukata, I would have gotten one ages ago... I probably won't bother spending that kind of money until my coming of age ceremony." She laughed wryly. "I don't think I'd be able to pull one off anyway. I'm not cute like you."
Kuzuryu took a step back to glare up at her, and Hinata clapped a hand over her mouth, feeling her cheeks flare up as she realized what she said. Gosh, they hadn't even started walking around, and already she just wanted to shrivel up and die. She almost wanted to flat-out refuse in embarrassment when Kuzuryu crooked a finger to beckon her closer. "Hey. Lean over for a sec."
Fighting down the mortification and trying not to be afraid of whatever Kuzuryu was about to do, she leaned forward, finding herself close enough to catch a whiff of Kuzuryu's shampoo—it smelled like honeysuckle and raindrops and was entirely overwhelming.
Kuzuryu reached towards Hinata's face, and Hinata tried not to flinch away when soft fingers brushed against her temple. Then, in a swift motion, Kuzuryu used her other hand to pull her kanzashi from her bun and pin it just above Hinata's ear.
"There you go," Kuzuryu said, grinning triumphantly even as a few golden tendrils escaped to land on her shoulders. "See? You're totally cute, Hinata."
Well, Hinata hadn't thought her face could burn any brighter, but apparently it had other plans. She touched the hairpin gently, tentatively; the silk flowers were soft under her fingertips, and the trailing petals tickled the tip of her ear whenever she moved. She couldn't help but feel incredibly self-conscious and uncomfortable with the unfamiliar sensation. "I mean, you say 'see,' but I can't actually see what I look like..."
"You'll just have to trust me, then," Kuzuryu said flippantly, tossing her kinchaku over her shoulder in a quite un-ladylike manner as she walked towards the food stands. "And I say you look cute. Shit, that hairpin looks better on you than me. You can keep it if you want."
"I couldn't—!" Hinata followed after, quickly catching up with the blonde. "I mean, why are you giving me something when it's your birthday? Oh, right..."
Hinata slowed her steps to dig into her pochette, and Kuzuryu stopped as well, turning to look up at her.
"Ah... here." Hinata pulled out the present, the ribbon a little wrinkled by being squashed in her bag, and held it out. "Happy birthday."
It was Kuzuryu's turn to flush as she accepted the gift. "I, well... shit, you didn't have to get me a present," she mumbled.
"But it's your birthday!" Hinata laughed. "How can you say that when you just gave me something?"
"Because..." Kuzuryu suttered a bit, picking at the edge of the wrapping paper bashfully. "B-because... I just want you to look your best too, okay?! And next year I'm gonna buy you that custom yukata!"
"What?!" Hinata gaped at her. "No, no, that's too much! You can't just—"
"Too bad! It's my birthday and what I want is for you to have a yukata to wear!" She poked Hinata in the chest, grinning devilishly. "And when we go visit a shrine for your birthday I'll make sure to give you a custom-made furisode, too."
"A furi— Kuzuryu!" Hinata ran to catch up with her friend as she dashed off towards the cotton candy stand. "That's way too expensive! N-no, not..." She held her palms up in surrender when the cotton candy vendor shot her a nasty glare. "S-sorry, sir, I didn't mean the cotton candy..."
Kuzuryu cackled, two sticks of cotton candy in her hands, and passed one off to Hinata. "Whatever, let's just forget about that. It's not until January, anyway."
Pouting, Hinata took the cotton candy. "You're still giving me stuff even though it's your birthday," she grumbled.
Kuzuryu only shot her a grin before turning to lead the way down the line of stalls.
The kanzashi petals tickled Hinata's ear again, and she reached up to caress it. It just wasn't fair. Hinata had been pretty proud of the present she got for Kuzuryu, but that just couldn't compare. Cotton candy aside, Kuzuryu just kept offering her such wonderful things—the kanzashi, the offer of companionship on her own birthday as if it were natural, and the warm feelings that fluttered about her chest with such an aching thrill, it almost made her want to cry in the best possible way.
Notes: Somehow I... couldn't fit Kuzuryu opening her birthday present into the fic, but... she totally opened it eventually and loved it! Just trust me on this!