Ride on Time

Chapter 47

Christmas Day

Shree woke up and saw her mother lying down beside her, looking at her phone.
"Mom?" Shree said in a croaky voice.
"Happy Birthday," Chandrika greeted.
Shree smiled. "Thanks, Mom."
And then she closed her eyes and went right back to sleep.

"Come, I have new clothes for you," Devi smirked, leading Shree into the master bedroom right after she took a shower. She opened the cupboard and pulled out a pair of denim shorts and a red polo shirt, handing them to her. "Here, put these on."
"Ooo... okay!" Shree grinned and watched her grandmother leave, her housecoat trailing behind her.
Shree quickly got dressed and exited the room. To her surprise, her family had already laid out a cake with twenty-four candles.
"Aiya, why cake all lah?" Shree sighed, going towards the cake. "You all ah..."
"Just cut the cake lah," Vasu chuckled, pushing her towards the cake.
They sang her happy birthday and she blew all the candles after making a wish. A slice of cake was passed around, with each of them taking a bite. They each gave her a present and Shree couldn't wait to open them.
"Open them later, let's eat first," Devi insisted. "We made ayam percik."
"And I helped," Chandrika proudly stated.
"For sure Awah did most of the things," Shree chuckled.
"She helped grind the spices for me," Devi said. "I did most of the cooking."

Shree sat cross-legged on the middle of the living room carpet and started unwrapping her gifts.
First was her grandmother's, the heaviest in the lot. It turned out to be a new Bluetooth speaker.
"Oh my gosh!" Shree exclaimed. "New speaker? Why lah..."
"Never mind lah, your old one broken already, that's why I buy for you new one," Devi remarked in English.
"It can support USB, SD card, Bluetooth and AUX IN," Vasu grinned.
"Your brother is the one who helped order it for you," Devi spoke in Tamil this time. "It's a very good one, use it properly."
"Thanks, Awah," Shree kissed her grandma. "Now what else..."
She opened the rest, all the while complaining about expensive gifts.
"You guys, right," Shree went on, stuffing the carefully removed wrapping paper into a paper bag. "Why lah buy so much things."
"For you lah!" All of them said at the same time.
Shree sighed and got up with her gifts, meaning to try out the Bluetooth speaker first.

***

Mitsuo staggered out of his room, his vision a little blurry even though he was wearing his glasses. He yawned and went over to the living room.
To his surprise, his parents were sitting there with a grin, seemingly waiting for him.
"Happy Birthday, Mitsu!" Hiroshi greeted, grinning. "And Merry Christmas!"
Akiko hugged him. "Happy Birthday, Mitsu. You're twenty-four now."
"Do you have a girlfriend?" Hiroshi asked, his grin not faltering the slightest.
Mitsuo quickly shook his head, his face turning a little pink. "No, not yet."
"Go look for one," Hiroshi smirked. "As it is, they're saying that Japan's population is dying off because of the low marriage rate or something."
"You better not follow that trend, you hear me?" Akiko shook Mitsuo by the shoulders, much to his surprise. "I wanna be able to cradle my grandchildren and you're our only hope."
Mitsuo nodded, slightly annoyed with the sentiment. "Sure. Sure, I'll find one soon."
"Good," Akiko smiled, dusting her son's shoulders. "And make sure she's a good girl that would keep you happy."
Mitsuo nodded again. "Of course. I wouldn't choose a toxic girl."
"And make sure you don't become henpecked, but I'm not saying you have to dominate your wife," Hiroshi cut in. "I want you to be a good husband and have everlasting love for her."
Mitsuo nodded, saluting. "Yessiree."
"I'm okay if it's an Indian girl too," Akiko smirked. "Like what you wrote in your book."
"Mom!" Mitsuo groaned, his face red. "Enough about the marriage stuff..."
His parents laughed and pulled him to the dining room for breakfast.

The Tadaos sat down at their dining table to eat their traditional Christmas lunch.
Plus roasted chicken and Gyoza, together with coleslaw salad.
"This is a little too much, don't you think?" Mitsuo remarked, looking at all the food in front of him.
Akiko snorted. "Oh, don't be silly. We're getting the WFC Family Bucket for dinner later."
"Seriously?" Mitsuo groaned. "Why?"
"Because it's Christmas," Hiroshi smirked. "And exactly twenty-four years ago, we got you."
Mitsuo smiled. "That must've been a Christmas miracle."
"You came out earlier than you should've, but just a few weeks," Akiko said. "So it wasn't serious, thank god."
"Yeah..." Mitsuo nodded, fiddling with his manji again. "Guess I was lucky."
"You were a big baby," Hiroshi laughed. "We had to buy you bigger clothes since day one!"
And then they started reminiscing about the time when Mitsuo was still a baby, even bringing out the embarrassing ones, much to his dismay.

Mitsuo brought the gifts that he got for his parents and handed them around.
"Merry Christmas, my lovely parents," Mitsuo smiled as he gave it to them. He sat down and watched them open it.
Akiko opened hers first, revealing a beautiful gold wristwatch.
"It's beautiful..." she gasped. "It's not real gold, is it?"
"24K gold plated," Mitsuo grinned. "Like it?"
"It's really pretty... thanks, Mitsu," Akiko smiled.
Hiroshi opened his, revealing a nice new leather wallet.
"Thank you, I really needed a new one," he chuckled. "Forgot to get one during Wallet Day."
"I know, that's why I got you one instead," Mitsuo smirked.
His parents looked at each other.
"Hiro-kun, shall we give it to him now?" Akiko asked.
Hiroshi nodded and got up. Akiko followed after him, smirking at Mitsuo as she left.
'Okay... something's up and I don't know I what it is,' Mitsuo thought to himself.
His parents soon returned, holding two boxes. They put them down on the coffee table.
"Okay... what are those?" Mitsuo asked.
"Open them to find out," Hiroshi grinned.
Mitsuo playfully rolled his eyes and reached for the first one, a rectangular box. He tore the wrapping and opened the black box. To his surprise, it was a metal-tipped quill with a small vial of black ink. The feather was a nice shade of dark red.
"It's beautiful..." Mitsuo murmured in awe. "Where did you even get this?"
Hiroshi shrugged. "It's a secret."
Mitsuo sighed and reached for the second one, another rectangular case. He unwrapped it and opened the blue box underneath. To his surprise, there was a glass wand-like object and a nice metal bookmark printed with the Great Wave Off Kanagawa and a tassel tied to its end.
"What's this?" Mitsuo asked, carefully taking the wand out of its case to look at it. "It's beautiful..."
"It's a glass pen," Akiko grinned. "It works like the quill, dipped in ink to write, then dip again."
"Wow..." Mitsuo carefully handled the pen before returning it back into its case. He took out the bookmark and examined that next. "Thank you, both of you. I really like these gifts."
"Take them as a reward for the success of your book," Akiko smiled. "I hope it goes international."
"It has been exported to other Asian countries," Mitsuo grinned. "I'm sure it'll hit Europe one day, then USA."

***

Since it was Christmas, Shree and Chandrika decided to go shopping in AmCorp Mall.
"Look, Christmas tree," Shree gasped at the barricaded pine tree in the centre of the ground floor.
"Go take picture lah," Chandrika said.
Shree chuckled and went over to the tree, standing in front of it while striking a pose. Chandrika snapped a picture and held up her thumb once she was done.
"Let's go," Shree said, following her mother up the escalator to the first floor.

Shree browsed through the section that was marked Asian Literature. She frowned at the books and shook her head at the outdated collection.
"Mom, look, they still have this stupid book," Shree smirked, holding up a book titled Stupid Like You. "I thought it would be funny, but the character is just really stupid."
And then she went on rambling about how the main character made some very stupid decisions in her life.
"But I did learn one thing," Shree said, following her mother around the discount section of the bookstore. "I learned that Japanese people give food offerings to their ancestors every day at their altar. But the character is so stupid, she stole the offering food. Disrespectful, much?"
"Yeah," Chandrika absentmindedly said, not exactly paying attention to whatever she was saying.
Shree sighed and looked at the books on sale. None looked good so she made her way to an aisle marked New Arrivals.
One of the books caught her eye.
Timeless Love
Mitsuo Tadao.
She picked it up and read the synopsis before tucking it under her arm together with a few other books. She decided she was done and started making her way to the counter to pay.