Chapter 5: Vacations and Careers

"Ema," Kaname asked one night at dinner. "When is your birthday?"

"Next week," Ema responded innocently.

Silence descended on the dinner table.

"Next week?" Tsubaki echoed, as though unable to believe it.

Ema nodded. "I'm sad that dad and Miwa will both be gone, but at least I won't be alone this year!"

"Ema!" Tsubaki exclaimed, slamming his hands on the table and jumping to his feet. "Why didn't you tell us? This is your first birthday with us! And the only time you turn twelve! It practically marks the end of your childhood. We need to have a big celebration."

Ema blushed and shook her head. "I don't need a big celebration. I just like being at home with everybody." Of course, "everybody" was now one less since Natsume moved out, but Ema tried to invite him to family activities whenever they did anything special.

"Why don't we go to our beach house to celebrate?" Kaname suggested. "Ema-chan hasn't been yet."

"Beach house?" Ema asked in surprised, not having heard of it before.

"Our dad bought Mom an island a few years before he died," Tsubaki explained. "We have a house and a boat there. It's really nice because it's just us on the beach."

Ema's eyes grew huge. She'd known that the Asahina family had some money. Miwa had a job as an executive and flew around the world, but she hadn't realized they had this much money.

~.~

Ema shaded her eyes as she stepped out of the car and into the bright sunshine. Everyone hadn't been able to come since the trip was such short notice. Subaru and Natsume both refused to come based on the fear that the other would show. They didn't explicitly state that as their reason, but Ema was sure that was why. Subaru didn't want to see Natsume, and Natusme wanted to give Subaru his space for now. Iori had extra classes to prepare him for high school exams and Fuuto refused to come, saying he didn't want to celebrate Ema's birthday, so Masaomi ended up staying home to take care of him and Iori.

Kaname took Ema's bag from her and led her to one of the rooms. After changing into her swimsuit, Ema went to the living room, still hardly able to believe the Asahina's owned their own beach.

On the coffee table, Ema found a brochure for Aoyama University. Ema picked it up and started leafing through it. "What are you looking at?" A voice behind Ema asked. Ema jumped and turned to face Tsubaki, showing him what she held in her hand.

"This was on the table," she said. "But whose is it?" The only brother old enough to be thinking about college who wasn't already attending was Louis, but he was planning on entering beautician school.

Tsubaki snorted and took the brochure from Ema. "Ukyo probably put it there the last time we came here, before Azusa and I started school this year. Azusa was originally planning on attending Aoyama University and that's where Ukyo wanted me to go. I think he tried to get almost every brother to try to talk me out of attending voice acting school instead."

"But you've always wanted to be a voice actor," Ema said in surprise, Tsubaki having told her that he gained the dream after listening to a robot anime as child. "Aren't you supposed to follow your dreams? I think that's one of the great things about the Asahina family; that everyone is working hard to follow their dreams. Masaomi as a doctor, Ukyou as a lawyer, Louis as a beautician, and Subaru with basketball. I think it's amazing that you've had the same dream since you were young and have stayed with it all this time."

"Yes!" Tsubaki declared, sweeping Ema into a hug. "You're exactly right, Imouto-chan. Follow your dreams! Tell that to Ukyo the next time you see him, okay?"

"I don't know if I'll do that," Ema said uncertainly. "But I'm grateful I have so many wonderful examples to look up to with my brothers. I hope that someday I'll learn what I want to do with my life."

"I'll help you, okay?" Tsubaki offered, slinging an arm around Ema's shoulders as Azusa walked in. "Azusa! Okay, now we can go to the beach."

"Shouldn't we wait for the others?" Ema asked, surprised.

"Nope," Tsubaki responded cheerfully. "We only need the three of us. The rest can catch up if they want to."

Ema looked back uncertainly as Tsubaki dragged her from the house, feeling bad about leaving everyone else.

"So what do you think of my dream?" Tsubaki asked.

"What?" Ema asked in surprise, turning her attention to Tsubaki.

"You said you think it's great that I've kept the same dream for so long, but what do you think of my dream? Ukyo says that it's a hard profession to break into and that I'm wasting my time when I should be learning about a real career."

Ema felt flustered being asked what seemed like a deep question to her. She was only eleven (almost twelve) and she didn't know much about these sorts of things. "Well, I think your voices are really great," Ema said shyly. "Though maybe my opinion on things like that doesn't matter much."

"It's the most important opinion to me aside from Azusa's," Tsubaki declared, leaning down to kiss Ema's head. Ema flushed and was grateful when Tsubaki ran off to plunge into the ocean. Eventually she'd get used to receiving affection from her brothers.

Ema turned to ask Azusa if he was going to get into the water too, but stopped when she saw an upset expression on his face. "What's wrong, Azusa-san?"

"It's nothing," Azusa said, shaking his head and giving Ema a smile before turning his attention to Tsubaki.

Ema pursed her lips and sat down in the sand, idly drawing designs. "Is it too grown up for me?" She asked, wanting to be helpful if she could.

Azusa looked down at Ema in surprise, then sat down next to her. "Well, I heard you talking with Tsubaki in the living room. And…I guess I'm just upset that I'm not following my dreams. Like you said, so many of our brothers are and then there's me who's just floating along behind Tsubaki."

"What is your dream?" Ema asked. "I'm sure if you wanted to do something else, Tsubaki-san would support you."

"I don't have one," Azusa said with a shrug, staring off into the ocean. "That's why Tsubaki told me to leave Aoyama University and join him in voice acting. So, I did. I'm just following along with Tsubaki, like I've always done."

"Well," Ema said carefully, thinking her answer over, "I think that's okay for now. If you do discover something else that you want to do, I think that you should go after it, but since there isn't a job that you want and you love being with Tsubaki, why not follow him for now? You should do what makes you happy. Tsubaki-san and Ukyo-san both say that you're amazing." Ema remembered Ukyo lamenting over Azusa's perfect high school grades going to waste one night while they were cooking dinner. "I think you would probably be good at whatever you set your mind to, so why not try out voice acting? Maybe it will become your dream."

Azusa looked at Ema, wondering if living alone for so long was what had made her so mature. He knew that he hadn't been anywhere near this mature when he was Ema's age. "I guess you're right," Azusa said, feeling better about his decision to follow Tsubaki. He turned his attention back to his twin, who was waving for Ema and Azusa to join him.

~.~

Dark storm clouds began moving in later in the afternoon and they all moved inside to play games. Tsubaki and Kaname were disappointed that they brought Ema here for her birthday and then the weather turned on them, but Ema was just having fun spending time with her brothers.

Ema, Kaname, Yusuke, and the twins sat around the coffee table playing a board game while Louis watched when Ukyo came from the kitchen. He insisted on making dinner himself tonight, even though Ema's actual birthday wasn't until the next day. "Has anyone seen Wataru?" He asked with a frown, gazing around at his assembled siblings.

"He's not with us," Azusa said. "Is he in his room?"

"No," Ukyo said. "And I don't think that I've seen him for a couple hours. When was the last time anyone saw him?"

That question brought silence before a mad scramble ensued to try to find Wataru inside the house. No one found a sign of him. "Honestly," Ukyo muttered, running a hand through his hair. "This is what happens when Masaomi isn't here, we go and lose Wataru." He then proceeded to pair off the siblings to go looking for Wataru outside. Ema went with Kaname and they started on the left side of the house and moved out from there.

When they reached tide pools that Wataru had been looking at earlier, the rain started pouring down on them. "Why don't you go back inside, Ema-chan?" Kaname suggested. "I'll keep searching."

Mutely, Ema shook her head, worried about what might have happened to her youngest brother. Kaname gave a distracted smile and put his hands on Ema's shoulders. "I'm grateful that my new little sister is concerned about our youngest brother, but I need to take care of you too."

"I've been taking care of myself for years," Ema informed Kaname. "So I don't need any worrying. We should just focus on Wataru right now."

Kaname looked sad as he considered Ema. "I know that Ukyo is always saying I'm a useless flirt, but let me be a big brother and worry about you at least a little bit."

It was true that Ukyo and some of the other brothers often complained about Kaname being a flirt obsessed with women, even to the point where he joined a shrine that was really like a host club, but Ema saw a different side of Kaname. "I don't think you're useless. I always see you giving a lot of care to all our brothers. You greet everyone when they come home and listen about how their day went, and you always help out anyone with their homework when they ask for help. I think that you'll be able to use what you've learned taking care of our brothers to help people at the shrine. "

Kaname was surprised at Ema's reponse. He hadn't realized she'd paid so much attention to him and was so observant. And he couldn't deny that he felt a little flattered that his little sister had a high opinion of him. He wasn't so sure he was deserving of that high opinion, but he did appreciate it.

Hoping to wipe the sad look entirely away from Kaname's face, Ema said, "I think that you're a wonderful big brother, Onii-sama."

Kaname smiled and patted Ema's head. "Not bad, Imouto-chan, but I'd prefer it if you called me Onii-chan instead." The next second, Kaname's phone rang and he pulled it out of his pocket, covering it with one hand to try to protect it from the rain. "Ukyo, did someone find Wataru?" A look of relief passed over his face before it changed to irritation. Shaking his head, Kaname shut the phone and put it back in his pocket before holding his hand out to Ema.

"Wataru's okay?" Ema asked, taking Kaname's hand and letting him help her navigate the rocky shore surrounding the tide pools.

"He's fine," Kaname said dryly. "He went into the pantry a couple hours ago for a snack, and then decided to curl up in the corner there and take nap."

"I guess we didn't check the pantry," Ema said. "Though I'm surprised that Wataru didn't wake up when we were calling for him."

"Wataru is a pretty heavy sleeper," Kaname said. "We would have had to make a lot more noise than that to wake him up. I hope he doesn't start taking after Louis and start falling asleep in strange places all the time."

"At least he's okay," Ema said. "And we got to talk."

Kaname smiled down at Ema and squeezed her hand.