Michael is three years younger than Lucas at any point in this story, and even today.
Michael remembers much less of Japan than Lucas does, partially because he was actually a lot more isolated.
It probably did damage him a little bit, having Lucas there so reliably at all times. It took him years to figure out how to talk to anyone else. He still has trouble with it, which is part of why he has a tendency to default to offering people coffee or cake.
He was never as trusting of Tamie as Lucas was, or at least never as open about it.
He resents their parents less than Lucas does. It’s both because they spent less time with him – less to corrupt or be seen as meaningless or a lie – and because he was fairly aware of them and their career choice from very early on in his life.
He lets Lucas be irresponsible, despite how exasperating it is, mostly because he knows that Lucas has spent his entire life being the responsible one. He deserves to relax sometime, and if it’s now, so be it.
He falls into cafe work because he happens to discover he’s pretty good at baking in a cooking class Lucas signs him up for.
He falls into Cafe 42 because he decides to move out the little house Tamie has for her cover, long before Lucas made the same choice. The cheapest place was the apartment share with Thana Tsui, and Thana offered him a job as manager of the cafe when she learned what he was capable of.
