Japan, Japan!" Feliciano came sprinting down the hallway excitedly. "This thing is amazing!" In his right hand, there was the bowl he gave to Feliciano the other day.
"What do you mean?" Kiku replied, wincing at the other man's loud hollering.
"When I sat down with it, it filled with Minestrone that tasted off," "But I feel less lonely now," "I think there's some Japanese writing on it!"
Feliciano thrust the bowl into his hands. "What does it say?"
Closely inspecting the bowl, there were light-blue flowers on the side, which appeared to be hand-painted. Turning to the other side of the bowl, Chinese characters were etched in light blue.
"Thinking of you," Kiku spoke out-loud, a feeling of nostalgia and longing washing over him.
"Did I upset you?" "You look more scary than usual," Feliciano exclaimed, recoiling back in fear.
"I'm fine Italy," His feelings were opposite of fine, more turbulent. The bowl was given to him by Yao, who specially made it himself, painted it, and gave it as the first ever gift.
Kiku stared again at the middle of the bowl. Looking closer, a barely readable message was painted inside.
"Italy, have you seen this yet?" Kiku handed the bowl over to Feliciano, pointing at the faded writing.
A few seconds of silence rang through the hallway, as Feliciano slowly read what was written.
"What does that mean?" He stumbled over his words, sounding surprised, as if caught off-guard.
"This bowl shows a message said by their father, whether he is alive or not,"
"Oh," Feliciano's eyes widened in realisation. "Thank you for letting me borrow this Japan," "I'm going to go to Romano's to show him this, if you don't mind,"
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"Ah, Kiku!" "There you are!" Yao's cheery voice interrupted Kiku's train of thoughts. The older man was covered in leaves from trying to find Kiku's hidden spot.
The young boy stared up at the man, who excitedly smiled down towards him.
"I have a gift for you since today was when you became a nation," "Follow me!" He held out his hand towards Kiku.
Kiku took Yao's hand, no expression coming upon his face. Though, he was curious at what Yao was going to gift him.
After a while, they were out the garden area. Yao brought him to another building, inside it smelt of pond-mud. The smell of horrible, but Kiku was instantly excited. They were at the pottery shop that he and Yao would often frequent.
Yao would either come here to order custom made dishes and bowls or make some himself. Once the pottery had been made, Yao always allowed him to paint it, something that Kiku quite enjoyed.
"Close your eyes," "It's a surprise,"
Kiku shut his eyes with his hands, Yao guiding him with a hand on his shoulder.
"You can open your eyes now," On a table near him was a white ceramic bowl with pretty blue flowers patterned on the sides, the words '想着你' written on the front.
"It's pretty," Kiku replied flatly, a slight smile appearing upon his face.
A wide grin came upon Yao's face, "You'll love it even more!" "This bowl automatically fills with soup whenever you sit infront of it, you don't even have to cook anything," "And it will always leave a positive message behind,"
Kiku glanced again over to the bowl intrigued "Really?" "How does it do that?"
Yao knelt down to whisper something in his ear.
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Sitting down at the kotatsu table, Kiku watched as the the ceramic bowl instantaneously filled with udon noodle soup, chicken, mushrooms, and bok choy leaves. It smelt heavenly, as he ate mostly rations these days.
Once he ate some of the noodles, it tasted incredibly stale and bitter, a nauseous feeling pooling at the bottom of his stomach.
It took all his strength not to spit out the food, swallowing it.
Why was the bowl responding like that to him suddenly? He'd not ate from it for ages, and the last time it only tasted slightly stale. Now, it outright was attacking his stomach.
Once Kiku got rid of the contents of the bowl, he turned it around to read whatever message was left inside.
