𝔻𝕚𝕣𝕥 𝔹𝕖𝕟𝕖𝕒𝕥𝕙 𝕄𝕪 𝔽𝕖𝕖𝕥 (ᴛᴏᴋʏᴏ ʀᴇᴠᴇɴɢᴇʀꜱ x ᴍᴀʟᴇ ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ) [HIATUS]

Chapter 34.5 (New Year's Special)

Author's note: This does not take place in the current timeline, I just wanted to write a one-off short story to celebrate the New Years. This is in a possible future timeline with a good ending.

(Y/n)'s POV

December 31st, 2017

The streets of Tokyo were bustling with excitement from every corner. New Years was always taken seriously in this country and by many of the people it occupied. With such deep-rooted traditions, even if I didn't learn them all from my family, at least school, work, and friends would teach me something I could always incorporate in my own tradition. 

I did consider New Years to be one of, if not my favorite, holiday. It wasn't necessarily political; it was more of a personal holiday for every person to celebrate how they wished. 

The loud calls of vendors on the streets and people talking to one another as they walked by filled my ears. Seeing families carrying grocery bags filled with ingredients for their osechi ryori made my mind wonder what exactly we were planning on making for tomorrow. 

I did very minuscule stuff growing up to celebrate. My dad would go out drinking with his friends or colleagues while my mom would cook sweet red bean rice for us to eat. She would even purchase sparklers for us to play with when the night turned dark. I remember how excited my siblings and I would get. Once she was confined to a wheelchair and I had to start taking responsibility for most of the household chores, those traditions stopped. It broke my heart explaining to Hajime and Miki why we couldn't do our sparklers anymore and that our special meal was now whatever I knew how to make.

But the year I met Mikey, my life started to turn around for the better. His family celebrated in a more traditional sense compared to what my family had ever done. Shinichiro and Emma would make large portions of osechi ryori for their whole family to eat on New Year's Day, they even showed me how to make some of the dishes. Then Toman had their own special way of celebrating. As small as the gang was at the time, everyone would gather on their motorcycles, and we'd race up to Mushashi shrine once the night hit. We'd celebrate with our convince store drinks and snacks, joking and laughing and enjoying each other's company. Draken and Kazutora were usually the ones who were able to get their hands on a few firecrackers, though I never pressed how. 

It was a real eye opener for me to see how families and friends could celebrate the New Year and enjoy it so much. People would make such a big deal out of the holiday and enjoy it to the fullest, I loved seeing how happy everyone looked. It made me realize that it was a holiday I wanted to celebrate, it was something important to me. Because of this realization, I would always leave the group early, taking home a couple sparklers as I did so.

It was late by the time I got home, my mother having been asleep for a few hours and so were the twins. My dad would be out far later than he should have been, sometimes he wouldn't even come home that night. Even so, I knew what I wanted to do from now on. I walked into the twin's room and softly woke them up, their groggy eyes trying to comprehend why they were being awoken. I'd get them dressed in warm outwear and we'd sneak out of the apartment. With a bag of sparklers in hand I would take them to the park and up a small hill. It would look over a the city, you could see so many lights and you'd have a great view of the sky. 

They'd ask me again what we were doing as I sat down and took out two sparklers, handing them each one. They tilted their heads in question at the seemly plain stick I placed in their hands. I'd carefully lean the stick towards me and light it with a lighter. Seeing the look of amazement in their eyes as the sparklers began was my favorite part of the night. They screamed in joy and ran around, playing and waving the sparklers as they did so. I would wait, sitting on the ground as I knew midnight grew near. Then, a single firework would shoot up into the sky. Catching the two off guard but they quickly realized what was happening. I would motion for them to come sit down with me when their sparklers died and we'd watch the fireworks together, cuddling in the cold night air.