My Dear Child

Mitsuki always awoke at dawn. It didn't matter if he had been studying for hours for an exam, or the sleepless nights that still haunted him. Perhaps it was about something related to the effect of the bright orange sun. Sometimes the shades of orange were darker, blending with faint ques of pink. Golden colors would illuminate the sun, basking the first year high schooler in its glow. The red glow, as dark as crimson blood or a red string would be weaved inside the planet somehow called the sun. The redness, beautiful so close to the sun that the fifteen year old with light blue hair could almost taste the impermanence.

By the Kamo River, Mitsuki could see the city of Kyoto waking. It was hours before he was supposed to be up, but Mitsuki thought it was best to see the lingering beauty. Before the sunrise disappeared into the clear blue skies of summer, or the gray skies with rainclouds overhead. Before the sky became dark again and turned the darkness into another beauty, called sunset.

His father loved sunsets. Mitsuki knew though, that his father wouldn't be able to see the sunset from his beloved Kyoto from his prison cell in Tokyo. He wondered what his father was thinking now. It had been years since he had been dragged out by his primary school classmates, punched and kicked before a boy with hair as gold as the sun yelled at them to leave Mitsuki alone. Unfortunately, by the time Mitsuki had gotten up off his feet, his rescuer was nowhere to be found.

His father had killed people. He was a criminal.

And yet, such a man was always the first to wake in the morning, taking a sleepy Mitsuki with him so that they could watch the sunset together. His father had laughed when Mitsuki had asked him if sunsets or sunrises could have feelings. The child had pouted, not liking being laughed at.

But his father had told him, with the same golden eyes that Mitsuki had inherited, that if they saw the same sky, then surely their thoughts would be connected.

"No matter what happens, Mitsuki…"

Somehow, even though it was too early for his father to awake, the young boy thought that his father was sending him a message. The same message that he was holding in his hand, reading it over and over until he memorized how his father's strokes were sharp and narrow.

The neatness had fallen away.

Happy birthday, my dear child.