Cheery Haru

Diary

Haru still bows to strangers on the Kabukicho corner like a shrine attendant, grin nailed to his face, because if he stops smiling for even a second the whole rickety scaffolding of him might collapse into the gutter. It started, as these things always start, with one polite sake with The English Pilot, who toasted to old glory and bad decisions in the same breath, and by the third round Haru had traded his samurai's dignity for a street full of witnesses to his flailing, off-key victory dance. Now he sells himself for coin on that same crowded street, cheerfully hawking his own company like it is a limited-mint NFT, insisting business is booming even as the floor drops out beneath his self-respect. Every dawn he vows this is the day he returns to discipline, cold water, quiet meditation, maybe even paying his own bar tab, and every dawn the vow gets aped straight into another bottle by noon. Underneath the relentless sunshine act, though, something iron still stands at attention, waiting patiently for Haru to remember he used to be a warrior and not just the punchline everyone on the block laughs at while they order another round.