@unicornpig: Can you please do a JunexDay chapter where Day goes to June's b-day party (right after the epilogue in Champion) and then he just gets a memory of them in Vegas?

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1838 Hours, June 11

Ruby Sector, Los Angeles

My Birthday Party

75 F.

Day is here. In Los Angeles, I know because I saw him earlier. It's been ten years and he's visiting again and coming to my birthday party, though I doubt he knows it is my birthday. He looks older, twenty-seven but his face preserves his beauty and youngness.

Eden will be there, too. He remembers me. I wonder what's he's told to his brother. He's grown up now, graduated and his eye sight has improved. I feel good for him.

My stomach flutters with the thought of meeting Day again. I've been searching a long time for something I think I lost. He had said. He's lost me, that's what I think he means. My knees buckle with just thinking about it. I don't know what to do. How can I let him know me again, after all the bad things I've done to him? How could I let him be hurt by me again?

I'm wearing a dark blue dress. It's beautiful. Laces attach to it in the right places and small jewels decorate it for color. My hair is up, with a few dark curls raining down my neck. I have some makeup on, but only to make my face look clean. I haven't tried to look so good in a long time.

I take a sip of water from the expensive wine glass. The people around me at the table laugh as they tell each other stories while they wait for everyone to arrive. Tess is here as well as Anden and a few old classmates from Drake. Day and Eden haven't arrived yet. I wish Kaede we here.

Anden turns to me with a smile on, I try to smile back, but it wavers. He knows something's wrong instantly, but he doesn't show it for my sake.

Friends ask me how I'm doing and try to start a conversation with me, but I only answer with short comments like "Yeah" and "Thanks" and they quickly drop the subject.

I'm about to excuse myself to use the restroom when out of the shadows of the low-lit restaurant a figure walks in. Then another, slightly shorter. I wouldn't be able to mistake them, never.

Day steps out of the shadows along with Eden, everyone turns around to recieve him with big smiles. They all cheer, and stand up to shake his hand or hive him a hug. I'm the last one. I stand up, and I'm not sure what to do. Should I shake his hand, or give him a hug? I want to kiss him, but I could never let myself do that.

I love you so much, Day. Can't you remember?

As if he had heard, his eyes turn to me. Were both standing, waiting, for one or the other to do something.

I'm supposed to do something, but what? I'm shouting to myself. You're June Iparis, you always know what to do. But I had forgotten- and I don't forget many things- how Day could affect me. He was everything. Is everything to me. He is all I want, and I'm not letting myself have it.

"June," He says, remembering my name from earlier. Oh, how my name sounded to beautiful when he said it. "Nice to see you again." I should've moved then, but my legs became still until he beat me to it. He came near. Really near. Enough for me to see every detail on his face I remember by memory. Again, in his eyes I can see the memories of our past flash through, and it must only be me, because he doesn't remember June. He doesn't remember he loves me.

He's so close, and it feels forever that he is, but it has only been three seconds, I know. Why do I always have to spoil it for myself? I want it to be forever.

I feel Day's hand slip into mine. It's big and warm, and I can feel all his past adventures in them. He shakes my hand, and when the shaking is over, he hesitates there for less than half a second, which might not have been anything to anyone watching, but to me it was everything.

- - -

Day tells us about his life in Antartica. I listen to every bit, and watch how his face moves while he speaks. I see what he does with his hands and eyes. I can see the imperfection in the blue of his eye and how the tips of his hair brush over his forehead. He's still my Day.

Day is so close, and so far away at the same time. I feel alone, all the way in the shadows where the light that hung from the ceiling did not entirely reach my spot. I sit at the head of table that measures 30" x 72", two and a half meters away from him. Three seats away to my left, next to Tess and Anden. And me, I am next to Pascao.

He is laughing from something he said, when his eyes turn for the quickest second toward me. The fix together and he looks so perfect at that moment, my heart aches again for him to hold me. His short hair suits him, and his eyes gleam. I give him a smile, and his broadens. All I want is to stand up a take a seat closer to him.

It's one in the morning exactly when he taps something random on the table with the tips of his fingers, and I see the paper clip ring shine with the light. I turn to look at my hand, I see it is copying his exact movements. The twisted piece of metal around my finger shines back in repond.

- - -

Were all saying farewell when the dinner's over. My heart sinks with a kind of sadness that I've come to recognize is the same one I have whenever Day is gone. I only just realized it's been inside me all this time, sinking at every second.

Tess leaves, Pascao leaves, some others leave, and I still don't know what I'm waiting for. Not until I see the last one left is Day. I can only see the back of him, as he tells something to Eden and Eden winks and leaves.

Day turns to me, and he knows I've been watching. He walks closer and I catch myself doing the same.

"You didn't say much during the dinner." He says when he's a few steps away. He waited here on purpose. He waited for me? Is that why he hasn't left, to speak to me? "I'm sure I told you I wanted to know you, I'm still willing."

"I told you you didn't know me," Was all I could manage to say. He's still willing. We can... we can still be something. "And it's because you don't, but you did. In fact, you knew me more than anyone. And I knew you more than anyone else." I wondered if this was the right thing to say.

"I know," He says, and I'm surprised. It wasn't what I was expecting him to say. He grabs my hand, the one with the paperclip ring. He laces our fingers together and turns his hand around, to show me his side of his hand, the paperclip ring sparkles like his eyes.

"I've been looking for what I lost," Day's eyes bore into mine. "But I don't need to look for it anymore." His eyebrows further together, in some kind of sadness. "June, you're crying."

With my free hand, I touch my cheeks. They are, indeed, wet with tears. When did I start crying?

"I'm glad you've found it." I say.

"Me too." His face nears mine, and the is a new kind of expression on it. Like delight, satisfaction, like when you've found what you've lost.

My breaths are shaky, and my thoughts- which are always organized and contained- are now scattered all over the place. I missed him so much. I missed everything about him.

"You said I didn't know you..." He holds my hand tighter, like I might slip away. Like he slipped away from me ten years ago. How I let him do it. "Your name is the only thing I think about every day and every second, June Iparis. Happy Birthday."